Real Life Magazine

Introduction by Thomas Lawson, Susan Morgan.

A FINALIST for the Booker Prize, the National Book Critics Circle John Leonard Prize, the VCU/Cabell First Novelist Prize, the Lambda Literary Award, the NYPL Young Lions Award, and the Edmund White Debut Fiction Award “A blistering coming of age story” —O: The Oprah Magazine Named a Best Book of the Year by The New York Times, The Washington Post, New York Public Library, Vanity Fair, Elle, NPR, The Guardian, The Paris Review, Harper's Bazaar, Financial Times, Huffington Post, BBC, Shondaland, Barnes & Noble, Vulture, Thrillist, Vice, Self, Electric Literature, and Shelf Awareness A novel of startling intimacy, violence, and mercy among friends in a Midwestern university town, from an electric new voice. Almost everything about Wallace is at odds with the Midwestern university town where he is working uneasily toward a biochem degree. An introverted young man from Alabama, black and queer, he has left behind his family without escaping the long shadows of his childhood. For reasons of self-preservation, Wallace has enforced a wary distance even within his own circle of friends—some dating each other, some dating women, some feigning straightness. But over the course of a late-summer weekend, a series of confrontations with colleagues, and an unexpected encounter with an ostensibly straight, white classmate, conspire to fracture his defenses while exposing long-hidden currents of hostility and desire within their community. Real Life is a novel of profound and lacerating power, a story that asks if it’s ever really possible to overcome our private wounds, and at what cost.

Presents unique craft projects that have been seen on the Life hacks for kids YouTube show, including feather earrings, melted crayon art, a headband holder, and indoor s'mores, and includes questions answered by Sunny.

Presents the text of Alice Walker's story "Everyday Use"; contains background essays that provide insight into the story; and features a selection of critical response. Includes a chronology and an interview with the author.

Does the perfect boy exist? _Amber, Alice, and Andrea attend the exclusive #London International High School, where all the students have one thing in common: a #realLife social media profile. Though these three don't know one another yet, they have shared a desire to find the #perfect guy. Since everyone knows the perfect guy doesn't exist, though, they decide to create a #realLife profile of their ideal boy. But fiction and "real life" are about to collide...

A major work of American literature from a major American writer that powerfully portrays the anguish of being Black in a society that at times seems poised on the brink of total racial war. "Baldwin is one of the few genuinely indispensable American writers." —Saturday Review At the height of his theatrical career, the actor Leo Proudhammer is nearly felled by a heart attack. As he hovers between life and death, Baldwin shows the choices that have made him enviably famous and terrifyingly vulnerable. For between Leo's childhood on the streets of Harlem and his arrival into the intoxicating world of the theater lies a wilderness of desire and loss, shame and rage. An adored older brother vanishes into prison. There are love affairs with a white woman and a younger black man, each of whom will make irresistible claims on Leo's loyalty. Tell Me How Long the Train's Been Gone is overpowering in its vitality and extravagant in the intensity of its feeling.

From the former editor-in-chief of Real Simple, enjoy this hilarious and deeply insightful take on the indignities of middle age and how to weather them with grace: "A pure pleasure to read" (Cathi Hanauer, author of Gone). ​ Do you hate the term “middle age?” So does Kristin van Ogtrop, who is still trying to come up with a less annoying way to describe those years when you find yourself both satisfied and outraged, confident and confused, full of appreciation but occasional disdain for the world around you. Like an intimate chat with your best friend, this mostly funny, sometimes sad, always affirming volume from longtime magazine journalist van Ogtrop is a celebration of that period of life when mild humiliations are significantly outweighed by a self-actualized triumph of the spirit. Finally! Featuring stories from her own life, as well as anecdotes from her unwitting friends and family, van Ogtrop encourages you to laugh at the small irritations of midlife: neglectful children, stealth insomnia, forks that try to kill you, t.v. remotes that won’t find Netflix, abdominal muscles that can’t seem to get the job done. But also to acknowledge the things you may have lost: innocence, unbridled optimism, smooth skin. Dear friends. Parents. It’s all here: the sublime and the ridiculous, living together in the pages of this book as they do in your heart, like a big messy family, in this no-better-term-for-it middle age.

REAL SIMPLE, the #1 women's lifestyle magazine, shares the secrets to mastering "life 101"— from home to work to relationships —in this must-have, illustrated handbook to help young adults navigate their busy, new lives. Right after graduation, the questions start piling up. And they just keep on coming throughout your 20s and beyond: How do I find a job that I love--and, um that pays? What should I wear to the interview? And speaking of clothes, where do I put them when my apartment doesn't even have a closet?REAL SIMPLE created The Real Simple Guide to Real Life: Adulthood Made Easy to answer all of those questions — and so many more. Original essays from best-selling young writers and practical advice from expert contributors simplify (and demystify) landing a job, finding an apartment, decorating on the cheap, cooking for one, dressing for work, organizing a small space, picking a mentor, writing a thank-you note (yes, they're still a thing) — plus all the answers you need to deal with 401(k)s, kitchen fails, epic hangovers, messy roommates, and even messier breakups. Hear from these inspiring women and others about what they wish they had known when they were starting out: Gretchen Rubin, Barbara Corcoran, Rosie Schaap, Gail Simmons, Melinda Gates, Cristina Henrí­quez, Madeleine Albright, Doree Shafrir, Camille Styles, Egypt Sherrod, Kelly Wearstler, Brené Brown, Edan Lepucki, Abby Larson, Emmy Rossum, Jenni Konner, Jessica Alba, Molly Antopol, Anna Holmes, Rachel Sklar, and J. Courtney Sullivan.