Freak

Follows a Seattle serial murder investigation centering on Abby Locke, who has been imprisoned for the attempted killing of a police officer and who has captured the attention of a violent fan obsessed with proving her innocence.

After moving to a new town with his unemployed father, Quinn struggles to fit in both at the skate park and in school and finds himself failing miserably until another skateboarder, Jasmine, starts to take an interest in him.

This “marvelously absorbing” book is “a walk on the wild side of words and ventures into the zone where language and mathematics intersect” (San Jose Mercury News). A former Wall Street Journal reporter and NPR regular, Stefan Fatsis recounts his remarkable rise through the ranks of elite Scrabble players while exploring the game’s strange, potent hold over them—and him. At least thirty million American homes have a Scrabble set—but the game’s most talented competitors inhabit a sphere far removed from the masses of “living room players.” Theirs is a surprisingly diverse subculture whose stars include a vitamin-popping standup comic; a former bank teller whose intestinal troubles earned him the nickname “G.I. Joel”; a burly, unemployed African American from Baltimore’s inner city; the three-time national champion who plays according to Zen principles; and the author himself, who over the course of the book is transformed from a curious reporter to a confirmed Scrabble nut. Fatsis begins by haunting the gritty corner of a Greenwich Village park where pickup Scrabble games can be found whenever weather permits. His curiosity soon morphs into compulsion, as he sets about memorizing thousands of obscure words and fills his evenings with solo Scrabble played on his living room floor. Before long he finds himself at tournaments, socializing—and competing—with Scrabble’s elite. But this book is about more than hardcore Scrabblers, for the game yields insights into realms as disparate as linguistics, psychology, and mathematics. Word Freak extends its reach even farther, pondering the light Scrabble throws on such notions as brilliance, memory, competition, failure, and hope. It is a geography of obsession that celebrates the uncanny powers locked in all of us, “a can’t-put-it-down narrative that dances between memoir and reportage” (Los Angeles Times). “Funny, thoughtful, character-rich, unchallengeably winning writing.” —The Atlantic Monthly This edition includes a new afterword by the author.

Max is used to being called Stupid. And he is used to everyone being scared of him. On account of his size and looking like his dad. Kevin is used to being called Dwarf. And he is used to everyone laughing at him. On account of his size and being some cripple kid. But greatness comes in all sizes, and together Max and Kevin become Freak The Mighty and walk high above the world. An inspiring, heartbreaking, multi-award winning international bestseller.

"Top of the line thriller writing" (Jeffery Deaver): Jennifer Hillier's fast-paced psychological suspense about a sexually addicted college professor terrorized by an ex lover. IF HE CAN'T HAVE HER . . . Dr. Sheila Tao is a professor of psychology, an expert in human behavior with her own hidden past. But she's not the only one keeping secrets. . . . When Sheila began an affair with her sexy graduate assistant Ethan Wolfe, she knew she was playing with fire. Consumed by lust when they were together, she was riddled with guilt when they were apart. Now she's finally engaged to a good man, and it's time to end the dangerous liaison. But Ethan has something different in mind. He intends to make her pay for rejecting him. . . . NO ONE CAN. As Sheila attempts to counter Ethan's increasingly threatening moves, he schemes to reveal her darkest, most intimate secrets by destroying her prestigious career . . . and then her. Caught in a terrifying cat-and-mouse game, Sheila must fight for her life and free herself from the ex-lover whom she couldn't resist--who is now the manipulative monster who won't let her go. CREEP Pulsing with the dark obsession of Radiohead's song "Creep," this "truly frightening" (Suspense Magazine) debut thriller rockets to a heart-pounding climax.

In recent years parents and teachers have become increasingly concerned about bullying in schools, and bullying has attracted significant attention as people seek explanations and solutions. Despite this attention, there is little discussion about homophobic and transphobic bullying in Canadian high schools. Get That Freak fills that gap by exploring the experiences of bullying among youth who identify or are identified as queer. Through interviews with recent high school graduates in British Columbia, Haskell and Burtch share stories of physical, verbal and emotional harassment and offer important insights into the negative outcomes that result from being bullied. Challenging the familiar image of these youth as helpless victims, this book also recognizes positive outcomes: moments of resistance, friendship and inner strength. Taking the lead from the youth, the authors make recommendations for challenging homophobic and transphobic bullying in high schools and for supporting students who experience this form of harassment. In this engaging and enlightening book, youth share their feelings of rage and hurt, joy and triumph, as they reminisce about the experience of being queer in high school. Book jacket.

In Operation Freak, Christian Flaugh embarks upon an exploration of the intricate connection between the physical bodies and narratives that, subjected to all manner of operations, generate identity. The author spotlights such voluntary and involuntary acts to show how discourses of ability, disability, and bodily manipulation regularly influence the production in and of various Francophone texts. Flaugh's foundation is the critical examination of mutually-informing narratives: Francophone novels that hyperbolically signal normative discourses through quintessential "freaks" (monstres) such as the Siamese twin, the bearded lady, and the exotic witch; and the related sociocultural master narratives from North America, North Africa, and the Caribbean. Employing disability and freak culture theories alongside studies of identification and narrative, Flaugh's close readings move beyond polarized discussions of "disabled" and "non-disabled" bodies. They expand such discussions to articulate how ability - like identity and narrative - is impermanent. It passes and it is passed throughout a spectrum at the same time that it intersects regularly with various narratives of identity like citizenship, gender, and race. Each chapter reveals how "operation" is a profit-driven identification process informed by abilities and constantly reproduced by surgeons, slave masters, writers, and the "freak" protagonists themselves. An unflinching look at such manipulation, Operation Freak illustrates the undeniably visceral relation between bodily ability, identity, narrative, and normality carved onto the body of the freak of culture (monstre de la culture).

"Your father already has a son, even if he doesn't want to admit it, he can't!""Fuck, what happened to the Son?" So what if he had a son? I just won't admit it! ""Brat, you're still a bit too inexperienced. When you grow up in the future, go find your wife! Your mother is your father's! "Powerful women were more powerful, beautiful men were many, and there was a dark family with a perverted genius in each family. They were a bunch of eccentrics. One old and one young, watching how they fought for a woman ...