Like Other Girls

“What if I played football?” I ask. As soon as it’s out of my mouth, I feel stupid. Even suggesting it feels like I’ve overstepped some kind of invisible line we’ve all agreed not to discuss. We don’t talk about how Mara is different from other girls. We don’t talk about how Mara is gay but no one says so. But when I do stuff like this, I worry it gets harder for us all to ignore what’s right in front of us. I direct my gaze to Quinn. “What do you think?” “I think it’s frickin’ genius,” he says. After getting kicked off the basketball team for a fight that was absolutely totally not her fault (okay maybe a little her fault), Mara is dying to find a new sport to play to prove to her coach that she can be a team player. A lifelong football fan, Mara decides to hit the gridiron with her brother, Noah, and best friend, Quinn?and she turns out to be a natural. But joining the team sets off a chain of events in her small Oregon town?and within her family?that she never could have predicted. Inspired by what they see as Mara’s political statement, four other girls join the team. Now Mara’s lumped in as one of the girls?one of the girls who can’t throw, can’t kick, and doesn’t know a fullback from a linebacker. Complicating matters is the fact that Valentina, Mara’s crush, is one of the new players, as is Carly, Mara’s nemesis?the girl Mara fought with when she was kicked off the basketball team. What results is a coming-of-age story that is at once tear-jerking and funny, thought-provoking and real, as Mara’s preconceived notions about gender, sports, sexuality, and friendship are turned upside down. Britta Lundin's sophomore novel will give readers all the feels, and make them stand up and cheer.

A gripping look at sexuality, identity and growing up. It's not easy being a girl...

“A chilling novel showcasing Claire Douglas's trademark brilliantly claustrophobic settings and tightly plotted twists. Impossible to know which of the well-drawn characters to trust and very hard to put down.”—Gilly MacMillan, bestselling author of What She Knew From the Sunday Times bestselling author of Do Not Disturb, an electrifying tale of psychological suspense in which an unsuspecting young woman finds herself trapped in an increasingly sinister web of mystery and lies. CARER/COMPANION WANTED FOR ELDERLY LADY YOUNG FEMALE PREFERRED COMPETITIVE SALARY ROOM AND BOARD INCLUDED She thought she was safe. So did the others . . . At loose ends after the devastating death of her mother, Una Richardson responds to an advertisement for a ladies’ companion, a position that leads her into the wealthy, secluded world of Mrs. Elspeth McKenzie. But Elspeth's home isn’t the comforting haven it seems. Kathryn, her cold and bitter daughter, resents Una's presence. More disturbing is evidence suggesting two girls lived here before her. What happened to the young women? Why won’t the McKenzies talk about them? What are they hiding? As the walls begin to close in around her, Una fears she'll end up just like the other girls . . .

Till now, Stephanie has done her best to play by the rules--which seem to be stacked against girls like her. It doesn't help that she wants to play football, dress like a boy, and fight apartheid in South Africa--despite living in rural middle England--as she struggles to find her voice in a world where everything is different for girls. Then she hears them on the radio. Greenham women--an irreverent group of lesbians, punk rockers, mothers, and activists who have set up camp outside a US military base to protest nuclear war--are calling for backups in the face of imminent eviction from their muddy tents. She heads there immediately, where a series of adventures--from a break-in to a nuclear research center to a doomed love affair with a punk rock singer in a girl band--changes the course of her life forever. But the sense of community she has found is challenged when she faces tragedy at home.

In Girls Like Us, Randi Pink masterfully weaves four lives into a larger story–as timely as ever–about a woman’s right to choose her future. Four teenage girls. Four different stories. What they all have in common is that they’re dealing with unplanned pregnancies. In rural Georgia, Izella is wise beyond her years, but burdened with the responsibility of her older sister, Ola, who has found out she’s pregnant. Their young neighbor, Missippi, is also pregnant, but doesn’t fully understand the extent of her predicament. When her father sends her to Chicago to give birth, she meets the final narrator, Susan, who is white and the daughter of an anti-choice senator.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER WINNER OF THE BOOKER PRIZE “A must-read about modern Britain and womanhood . . . An impressive, fierce novel about the lives of black British families, their struggles, pains, laughter, longings and loves . . . Her style is passionate, razor-sharp, brimming with energy and humor. There is never a single moment of dullness in this book and the pace does not allow you to turn away from its momentum.” —Booker Prize Judges Bernardine Evaristo is the winner of the 2019 Booker Prize and the first black woman to receive this highest literary honor in the English language. Girl, Woman, Other is a magnificent portrayal of the intersections of identity and a moving and hopeful story of an interconnected group of Black British women that paints a vivid portrait of the state of contemporary Britain and looks back to the legacy of Britain’s colonial history in Africa and the Caribbean. The twelve central characters of this multi-voiced novel lead vastly different lives: Amma is a newly acclaimed playwright whose work often explores her Black lesbian identity; her old friend Shirley is a teacher, jaded after decades of work in London’s funding-deprived schools; Carole, one of Shirley’s former students, is a successful investment banker; Carole’s mother Bummi works as a cleaner and worries about her daughter’s lack of rootedness despite her obvious achievements. From a nonbinary social media influencer to a 93-year-old woman living on a farm in Northern England, these unforgettable characters also intersect in shared aspects of their identities, from age to race to sexuality to class. Sparklingly witty and filled with emotion, centering voices we often see othered, and written in an innovative fast-moving form that borrows technique from poetry, Girl, Woman, Other is a polyphonic and richly textured social novel that shows a side of Britain we rarely see, one that reminds us of all that connects us to our neighbors, even in times when we are encouraged to be split apart.

"Powerfully raw, deeply moving, and utterly authentic. Rachel Lloyd has turned a personal atrocity into triumph and is nothing less than a true hero.... Never again will you look at young girls on the street as one of 'those' women—you will only see little girls that are girls just like us." —Demi Moore, actress and activist With the power and verity of First They Killed My Father and A Long Way Gone, Rachel Lloyd’s riveting survivor story is the true tale of her hard-won escape from the commercial sex industry and her bold founding of GEMS, New York City’s Girls Education and Mentoring Service, to help countless other young girls escape "the life." Lloyd’s unflinchingly honest memoir is a powerful and unforgettable story of inhuman abuse, enduring hope, and the promise of redemption.