Fiction. Asian Studies. "McFerrin's first novel paints a portrait of a truly multicultural family - a Scottish father, a half-British and half-Japanese mother, and four children... McFerrin's writing is thoughtful and smooth as she captures ever-changing images of the world around Ellen and her family, successfully filtering those images through the eyes of her youthful characters"-Library Journal. McFerrin writes: "I came at last to namako, a word that in the Japanese combination of characters means both 'sea cucumber' and 'raw child,' a symbol for the simplicity and vulnerability that I feel is at the root of the Japanese and perhaps all psyches." The end result is, according to Publishers Weekly, "a vivid, often humorous novel" that "offers a winning young heroine, a complex family and memorable vignettes of a year spent betwixt and between."

Thirty-seven newly commissioned, easy-to-read maps lead readers to each Civil War battle site and are accompanied by discussions of what occurred during each confrontation. 10,000 first printing.

The Negative is the second volume in the acclaimed and highly influential The Ansel Adams Photography Series. This second volume is anchored by a detailed discussion of Adams' Zone System and his seminal concept of visualization. It presents detailed discussion of artificial and natural light, film and exposure, and darkroom equipment and techniques. Numerous examples of Adams' work clarify the principles discussed. Handsomely illustrated with photographs by Adams as well as instructive line drawings, this classic manual can dramatically improve your photography.

This New York City 5 Borough atlas is the most accurate of its kind. It includes a full street index, history, postal zones and stations, outdoor activities, a map of the Theater District and of Downtown, and a map of main routes that pass through the areas of New York City, eastern New Jersey, Nassau County, NY and Fairfield County, CT. The atlas shows 321 square miles of crisp, new digitized map, which makes all of the details sharper and cleaner. Features in this atlas include subway lines and stops, transportation information, and tolls for bridges and tunnels, airport maps, building numbers, direction of streets in Manhattan, schools, hospitals, ZIP codes and other points of interest in New York City.

Whether you're a dedicated photographer on a budget or a serious hobbyist, the Nikon D50 will open new doors for you. You already know it's packed with features and reasonably priced; now learn to use all its tricks. This indispensable guide takes you step by step through everything the D50 can do. Better yet, it teaches you professional techniques for using lenses and lighting and taking top-quality shots. This is the book that belongs with you on every shoot.
* Use the Quick Tour to get familiar with your camera and start shooting
* Learn when to use each of the D50's seven DVP modes
* Explore metering techniques, ISO settings, and white balance
* Experiment with exposure, lenses, and lighting effects
* Delve into formulas for setting up and composing more than 25 different types of photographs
* Take the confusion out of downloading and editing your photos

Dog's self-esteem is so low that he doubts he can do anything well.

It's tough being the middle mouse. No one's paying any attention to Nora, so she decides to do something her family can't ignore: make noise. Nora slams windows, bangs doors, and upsets furniture, to no avail. It's not until she crashes out the door—and the house goes strangely silent—that her family realizes: a noisy Nora is much better than no Nora at all.

"A wonderful story." —Booklist

Awards:
( An ALA Notable Book
( A School Library Journal Best Book of the Year

The California legislature granted a charter to the new community of Oakland in 1862, and a year later, the town council appointed three peace officers. When it was a dusty Western town, Oakland's major business was raising cattle to feed San Franciscans and the gold miners north of Sacramento. Year by year, as Oakland grew in size and population, the police department grew with it. The Oakland Police Department pioneered the use of call boxes, police cars, and other technical innovations. It has served the city well through good times and bad, wars, fires, and earthquakes. A large, diverse organization serving a complex multicultural city, the Oakland Police Department today accepts the challenges of policing in the 21st century.

Only a handful of fictional characters are recognized by first name alone. Dean Koontz’s Odd Thomas is one of those rare literary heroes who have come alive in readers’ imaginations as he explores the greatest mysteries of this world and the next with his inimitable wit, heart, and quiet gallantry. Now Koontz follows Odd as he is irresistibly drawn onward to a destiny he cannot imagine and to undreamed of places where the perils he will face and the stakes for which he fights will eclipse all that he has known.

The legend began in the obscure little town of Pico Mundo. A fry cook named Odd was rumored to have the extraordinary ability to communicate with the dead. Through tragedy and triumph, exhilaration and heartbreak, word of Odd Thomas’s gifts filtered far beyond Pico Mundo, attracting unforgettable new friends—and enemies of implacable evil. With great gifts comes the responsibility to meet great challenges. But no mere human being was ever meant to face the darkness that now stalks the world—not even one as oddly special as Odd Thomas.

After grappling with the very essence of reality itself, after finding the veil that separates him from his soul mate, Stormy Llewellyn, tantalizingly thin yet impenetrable, Odd longed only to return to a life of quiet anonymity with his two otherworldly sidekicks—his dog Boo and a new companion, one of the few who might rival his old pal Elvis. But a true hero, however humble, must persevere. Haunted by dreams of an all-encompassing red tide, Odd is pulled inexorably to the sea, to a small California coastal town where nothing is as it seems. Now the forces arrayed against him have both official sanction and an infinitely more sinister authority…and in this dark night of the soul dawn will come only after the most shattering revelations of all.

Burnishing Dean Koontz’s stature as a master of suspense and one of our most innovative and gifted storytellers, Odd Hours illuminates a legacy of mystery and hope that will shine on long after the final page.

“The dead don't talk. I don't know why.” But they do try to communicate, with a short-order cook in a small desert town serving as their reluctant confidant. Odd Thomas thinks of himself as an ordinary guy, if possessed of a certain measure of talent at the Pico Mundo Grill and rapturously in love with the most beautiful girl in the world, Stormy Llewellyn. Maybe he has a gift, maybe it’s a curse, Odd has never been sure, but he tries to do his best by the silent souls who seek him out. Sometimes they want justice, and Odd’s otherworldly tips to Pico Mundo's sympathetic police chief, Wyatt Porter, can solve a crime. Occasionally they can prevent one. But this time it's different.
A mysterious man comes to town with a voracious appetite, a filing cabinet stuffed with information on the world's worst killers, and a pack of hyena-like shades following him wherever he goes. Who the man is and what he wants, not even Odd’s deceased informants can tell him. His most ominous clue is a page ripped from a day-by-day calendar for August 15.

Today is August 14.

In less than twenty-four hours, Pico Mundo will awaken to a day of catastrophe. As evil coils under the searing desert sun, Odd travels through the shifting prisms of his world, struggling to avert a looming cataclysm with the aid of his soul mate and an unlikely community of allies that includes the King of Rock 'n' Roll. His account of two shattering days when past and present, fate and destiny converge is the stuff of our worst nightmares—and a testament by which to live: sanely if not safely, with courage, humor, and a full heart that even in the darkness must persevere.

When the death of their creator leaves them without protection, a band of magic living toys must attempt a dangerous journey across the city to another toyshop, while under attack from evil toys serving the Dark One.

Ernest J. Gaines is best known for his prize-winning THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MISS JANE PITTMAN, but OF LOVE AND DUST has equal power and fascination. It zeros in on an explosion in the making between two men, one black and one white, trapped in the vise of Southern back country prejudice.

When young Marcus is bonded out of jail, he is sent to the Hebert Plantation to work in the fields. He treats Sidney Bonbon, the Cajun overseer, with contempt and Bonbon retaliates by working him nearly to death. Marcus decides to take his revenge.