Central Places: A Novel
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Central Places: A Novel

Audrey Zhou is living her dream life in New York. With a successful job and soon to marry her dashing fiancé Ben, she returns home to Illinois to introduce Ben to her parents. Upon arriving in her hometown, Audrey becomes tense, with flashbacks of her fraught high school days and strained relationship with her demanding […]

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Into the West
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Into the West

A story about the founding of Mercedes Lackey’s most well-known world, Valdemar, Into the West is about an ethical leader, Baron Kordas Valdemar, guiding his people into the wilderness and away from a tyrannical Empire. In the process, Kordas encounters exotic people, unnatural creatures, and absolute terror. Into the West is the second in a […]

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Shot Clock
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Shot Clock

The Sabres, two-time AAU National Champions, led by basketball phenom Dante Jones, are holding their annual tryouts. Recently, Dante was shot by a police officer in Oasis Springs, leaving the community to mourn. Tony aims to make the Sabres in the hope of carrying on his best friend’s legacy. Unfortunately, Tony doesn’t make the team. […]

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Kimchi, Kimchi Every Day
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Kimchi, Kimchi Every Day

A cute little girl talks about how she likes to eat kimchi every day, and she lists out the different ways she will eat her kimchi during the days of the week. Whether it us eating it on Monday as a kimchi pancake or on Thursday as a kimchi kimbap. You can have different varieties […]

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Beardstown
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Beardstown

In the early 1800s, Thomas Beard bought a plot of land in what would later become Illinois. Over two centuries later, the town he founded still exists, having withstood many of the tests which plague small towns in America, either killing them outright or draining them away piece by piece. To me, this was one […]

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Self-Portrait with Nothing
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Self-Portrait with Nothing

Self-Portrait with Nothing is a glance into the multiverse, an attempt to articulate the endless permutations of identity, loss, and love. The story follows Pepper Rafferty, a forensic anthropologist, whose universe is ripped open when her estranged biological mother and famed artist, Ula Frost, goes missing. With the rumors of alternate universes looming over the […]

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The Sevenfold Hunters
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The Sevenfold Hunters

Abyan Guled is a member of the Sevenfold, an elite squad of alien hunters training at Carlisle Academy. Her only goal is graduating with first place— but when one of her team members dies, and the grieving team is forced to take on a new recruit, Artemis, the Sevenfold begins to fracture from within. To […]

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The Name Game
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The Name Game

The Name Game is the story of a girl who is sitting at home, feeling bored. Soon she notices a bird outside her window, and she wants to know all about it. The bird talks to her and tells her things about itself! Based on what the bird says and how it looks, the girl […]

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