Once Upon A House

Once Upon a Time... a House received Honorable Mention at the 2013 Hollywood Book Festival. It is the English version of the children s bestselling book Il Etait une Fois une Maison, which was awarded a literary prize in France. Somewhere in the middle of nowhere, lonely and forgotten by everybody, a House has one day the joy of seeing different guests come, one by one with the seasons, to build a new life: Mrs. Spider, Mr. and Mrs. Mouse, Mrs. Duck and her ducklings, the big gray and white Cat, the Ewe, even the Ants and the Bees... all of this little community shares the same place and lives peacefully together. Until one day this agreeable quietude is disturbed by the arrival of Man and his faithful friend, the Dog! What lesson must Man learn in order to become less selfish and more respectful of nature? A bitter lesson! Dulce Rodrigues has authored six children s books and a travelogue about Egypt. Born and raised in Lisbon, Portugal, she received a scholarship to study at the Goethe-Institut in Germany, and one for a scientific course with the Open University in the UK, and wound up living in many different countries around Europe.

When Dani Springer's teenage son decides to move to the East Coast to live with his father, she pulls up stakes and heads for the Berkshires to open a Bed and Breakfast, and wait for him to come to his senses. She finds the perfect New England Colonial with a magnificent English-style cottage garden. The only catch is that the house comes with the eighty-three year old owner, who will only sell the house if she can continue living in the guesthouse, rent free. At first, the arrangement seems simple enough, but nothing about the relationship between Dani and Clarissa Hamilton is simple because, long ago, the house became the most important part of Clarissa's life. Now that it is being turned into a business, she is not amused and finds ways to sabotage Dani's efforts to get The Maples up and running. The battle between the women is sometimes funny, sometimes painful. The wild card in the mix is Evan Murray, the landscape architect who is reworking the cottage garden. The threads of Clarissa's, Evan's, and Dani's lives become entangled as Evan and Clarissa come to terms with a past they didn't know they shared.

BONUS: This edition contains a Once Upon a Time, There Was You discussion guide. Even on their wedding day, John and Irene sensed that they were about to make a mistake. Years later, divorced, dating other people, and living in different parts of the country, they seem to have nothing in common—nothing except the most important person in each of their lives: Sadie, their spirited eighteen-year-old daughter. Feeling smothered by Irene and distanced from John, Sadie is growing more and more attached to her new boyfriend, Ron. When tragedy strikes, Irene and John come together to support the daughter they love so dearly. What takes longer is to remember how they really feel about each other. Elizabeth Berg’s immense talent shines in this unforgettable novel about the power of love, the unshakeable bonds of family, and the beauty of second chances.

A boy learns that nature is full of stories to tell when he finds and follows a mouse's tracks in a wintery wood. Milo wants a story, but his mom is too busy to entertain him. Instead, she encourages him to go out and play in the snow. At first, Milo is disappointed - he doesn't want to play outside, he wants a story. But when he starts to follow a trail of mouse-prints, he discovers signs of activity all around, prompting him to ask, "What happened here?" Before long, he's using his imagination -- depicted in lush wordless spreads that capture the vividness of Milo's fantasies -- to fill in the gaps. By the time Milo comes home, he's the one with stories to tell. A must have for the winter season, Liza Woodruff's Once Upon a Winter Day is a fun read-aloud that shares details about animal behavior from a child's perspective.

This poignant memoir shares one woman's memories growing up between the two world wars as a member of the McMillan family, a hardworking bunch who made their living on an eastern Washington farm. In a series of vignettes, Ernestine McMillan Hilton recalls the joys of small-town holiday celebrations, close-knit neighbors, and the events that shape the lives of the McMillans as they scratch a living from a scabland farm. With vivid detail, Hilton remembers how the sweet taste of strawberry Jell-O mingled with the wonders of Election Day in 1924 when her mother had the opportunity to vote for the first time, and she revisits how the end of the horse-and-buggy era gave rise to the Model T. She also relates the arrival of her baby brothers, the joys of going to school, and the hardships of the Great Depression. Once Upon a Green Meadow re-creates the charm and hardship of a rural American life that has vanished forever. But more importantly, Hilton's memoir reveals how one family's love sustained them throughout the hard times.

'One of the most extraordinary stories you will ever read of the triumph of the human spirit' Daily MailSet in 1970s Manchester, Once in a House on Fire tells the true story of three sisters and their mother, a close-knit and loving family forced to battle with poverty, abuse and the effects of depression. Beautifully written and deeply inspiring, with a new afterword by Andrea Ashworth, it is a book that will stay with its readers for ever.

Not quite four months after the Western Region's election of October 10, 1965, did the localized mayhem in that Region find its way furiously into the center of the nation on January 15, 1966! It was like a whirl-wind of nothing but anarchy and lawlessness. The serious aftermath of the marred and rigged election was that it acted as the last straw that broke the Carmel's back, providing immediate reason for the army to overthrow the government of Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe. Anarchy ensued; a counter coup led to the death of Major-General Ironsi. Callous barbarous massacre of thousands of easterners in the North followed. With their lives in jeopardy, easterners fled for safety to eastern region; refugee crisis followed. To guarantee their safety, easterners seceded from Nigeria and on May 30th 1967, formed an independent and sovereign nation of the Republic of Biafra. Determined to bring Easterners back, on July 6, 1967 Nigeria invaded Biafra; waged a gruesome thirty-month-civil war against Biafra. Nigeria blockaded Biafra on land, sea and air, to prevent food from entering Biafra. A malnutrition disease, Kwashiorkor that caused the deaths of thousands of Biafrans, followed. Nigeria bombed Biafran civilians, killing thousands. On January 12, 1970 the war ended leaving more than three million people dead in a war that was totally avoidable!