Download or read book The Extraordinary Life of a Mediocre Jock written by Ted Kluck and published by Harvest House Publishers. This book was released on 2018-05-08 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Join Flex on His Quest to Be Cool Like most middle schoolers, Flex's mind is on a million different things—school, sports, friends, girls (of course), and yeah, he's thinking about God too. More than any of these thoughts, Flex is obsessed with one thing—being cool. But how can Flex attain awesomeness when he's so amazingly average at, well...EVERYTHING?!? Football could be his ticket out of seventh-grade obscurity, but then Coach sticks him with a boring jersey number and reassigns him to the most unglamorous position on the entire team. His parents aren't helping, either. They won't even let him bring his iPod to school like the other kids do. At least, his parents love him and love the Lord. That's HUGE. And just when Flex thinks life couldn't any more complicated, he finds himself suddenly drawn to KK, the mysterious drama girl. She's homeschooled and in ninth grade. KK is totally different...and a little exciting. Will Flex ever be considered cool? In God's eyes, maybe he already is.
Download or read book The Outstanding Life of an Awkward Theater Kid written by Ted Kluck and published by Harvest House Publishers. This book was released on 2020-05-05 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Can Flex Deal with the Drama? Flex is a football player, not an actor. But he can fake it if it means getting to see KK, the girl he’s dating (sort of—it’s complicated), every day after school for about a month. This play isn’t for the weak, though. First, Flex has to deal with his nemesis, Actor Boy, the guy who greets girls with kisses on either cheek. C’mon, dude. Really?!? Then there’s the whole Shakespeare thing. What was “Bill” thinking when he wrote this gobbledygook? Thou dost protest…seriously. Meanwhile KK is hanging out with Watson, the King of the Youth Group, and no amount of video game playing is going to make Flex feel okay about that. He’d better get his jealousy in check before KK checks out on him for good. But with some encouragement from Mimi and Pops (his mom and dad), a little advice from an unlikely ally, and a whole lot of truth from God’s awesome book, Flex might just turn his fear of failure into a performance befitting of the bard himself. Or at the very least, get KK to return his texts.
Download or read book The Happy Rant written by Ted Kluck and published by Harvest House Publishers. This book was released on 2022-08-02 with total page 210 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the hive mind behind the popular Happy Rant podcast (Ted Kluck, Ronnie Martin, and Barnabas Piper) comes this cornucopia of humorous and thought-provoking critiques of Christian culture. Come for the good-natured cynicism. Stay for the enlightenment. Ted Kluck, Ronnie Martin and Barnabas Piper, hosts of the Happy Rant podcast, take their faith-based back-and-forth from the recording booth to the book page with this collection of insightful and often hilarious takedowns of pastor trends, personality tests, political engagement, and more. The Happy Rant crew have a lot of strong opinions, and occasionally they even agree with each other! Always candid and frequently compelling, Ted, Ronnie, and Barnabas tackle everything from the divisive, hot-button issues within the church to more lighthearted fare that reminds us never to take ourselves too seriously. As entertaining as it is engaging, The Happy Rant will help you to think more critically about the world around you and enjoy a laugh or two (or maybe three) along the way.
Download or read book Wherever I Wind Up written by R.A. Dickey and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2013-03-26 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The perfect gift for baseball fans, now with a new epilogue by author R.A. Dickey, winner of the 2012 Cy Young award. "An astounding memoir—haunting and touching, courageous and wise."—Jeremy Schaap, bestselling author, Emmy award-winning journalist, ESPN In 1996, R.A. Dickey was the Texas Rangers’ much-heralded No. 1 draft choice. Then, a routine physical revealed that his right elbow was missing its ulnar collateral ligament, and his lifelong dream—along with his $810,000 signing bonus—was ripped away. Yet, despite twice being consigned to baseball’s scrap heap, Dickey battled back. Sustained by his Christian faith, the love of his wife and children, and a relentless quest for self-awareness, Dickey is now the starting pitcher for the Toronoto Blue Jays (he was previously a star pitcher for the New York Mets) and one of the National League’s premier players, as well as the winner of the 2012 Cy Young award. In Wherever I Wind Up, Dickey eloquently shares his quintessentially American tale of overcoming extraordinary odds to achieve a game, a career, and a life unlike any other.
Download or read book A Class Apart written by Alec Klein and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2007-08-21 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Enter Stuyvesant High, one of the most extraordinary schools in America, a place where the brainiacs prevail and jocks are embarrassed to admit they play on the woeful football team. Academic competition is so intense that students say they can have only two of these three things: good grades, a social life, or sleep. About one in four Stuyvesant students gains admission to the Ivy League. And the school's alumni include several Nobel laureates, Academy Award winners, and luminaries in the arts, business, and public service. A Class Apart follows the lives of Stuyvesant's remarkable students, such as Romeo, the football team captain who teaches himself calculus and strives to make it into Harvard; Jane, a world-weary poet at seventeen, battling the demon of drug addiction; Milo, a ten-year-old prodigy trying to fit in among high-school students who are literally twice his size; Mariya, a first-generation American beginning to resist parental pressure for ever-higher grades so that she can enjoy her sophomore year. And then there is the faculty, such as math chairman Mr. Jaye, who is determined not to let bureaucratic red tape stop him from helping his teachers. He even finds a job for a depressed math genius who lacks a college degree but possesses the gift of teaching. This is the story of the American dream, a New York City school that inspires immigrants to come to these shores so that their children can attend Stuyvesant in the first step to a better life. It's also the controversial story of elitism in education. Stuyvesant is a public school, but children must pass a rigorous entrance exam to get in. Only about 3 percent do so, which, Stuyvesant students and faculty point out, makes admission to their high school tougher than to Harvard. On the eve of the hundredth anniversary of Stuyvesant's first graduating class, reporter Alec Klein, an alumnus, was given unfettered access to the school and the students and faculty who inhabit it. What emerges is a book filled with stunning, raw, and heartrending personalities, whose stories are hilarious, sad, and powerfully moving.
Download or read book How It All Blew Up written by Arvin Ahmadi and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2021-09-28 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda goes to Italy in Arvin Ahmadi's newest incisive look at identity and what it means to find yourself by running away. Eighteen-year-old Amir Azadi always knew coming out to his Muslim family would be messy--he just didn't think it would end in an airport interrogation room. But when faced with a failed relationship, bullies, and blackmail, running away to Rome is his only option. Right? Soon, late nights with new friends and dates in the Sistine Chapel start to feel like second nature... until his old life comes knocking on his door. Now, Amir has to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth to a US Customs officer, or risk losing his hard-won freedom. At turns uplifting and devastating, How It All Blew Up is Arvin Ahmadi's most powerful novel yet, a celebration of how life's most painful moments can live alongside the riotous, life-changing joys of discovering who you are.
Download or read book George Being George written by Nelson W. Aldrich and published by Random House Trade Paperbacks. This book was released on 2009-10-27 with total page 434 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Contributors include Harold Bloom, Jules Feiffer, John Guare, Norman Mailer, Peter Matthiessen, Maggie Paley, Richard Price, James Salter, Robert Silvers, William Styron, Gay Talese, Calvin Trillin, Gore Vidal, and 200 other Plimpton intimates Norman Mailer said that George Plimpton was the best-loved man in New York. This book is the party that was George’s life–and it’s a big one–attended by scores of famous people, as well as lesser-known intimates and acquaintances. They talk about his life: its privileged beginnings, its wild and triumphant middle, its brave, sad end. They say that George was a man of many parts: the “last gentleman,” founder and first editor of The Paris Review, the graceful writer who brought the New Journalism to sports, and Everyman’s proxy boxer, trapeze artist, stand-up comic, Western movie villain, and Playboy centerfold photographer. George’s last years were awesome, truly so. His greatest gift was to be a blessing to others–not all, truth be told–and that gift ended only with his death. But his parties, if this is one, need never end at all.
Download or read book Diary of a Mad Diva written by Joan Rivers and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2015-04-21 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the headline-making, New York Times bestselling author of I Hate Everyone...Starting With Me comes another intimate glimpse into the delightfully hilarious mind of Joan Rivers. When her daughter Melissa gives her a diary for Christmas, at first Joan is horrified—who the hell does Melissa think she is? That fat pig, Bridget Jones? But as Joan, being both beautiful and introspective, begins to record her day-to-day musings, she realizes she has a lot to say. About everything. And everyone, God help them. The result? A no-holds-barred, delightfully vicious and always hilarious look at the everyday life of the ultimate diva. Follow Joan on a family vacation in Mexico and on trips between New York and Los Angeles where she mingles with the stars, never missing a beat as she delivers blistering critiques on current events, and excoriating insights about life, pop culture, and celebrities (from A to D list), all in her relentlessly funny signature style. This is the Diary of a Mad Diva. Forget about Anais Nin, Anne Frank, and Sylvia Plath. For the first time in a century, a diary by someone that’s actually worth reading.
Download or read book Poison Shy written by Stacey Madden and published by ECW Press. This book was released on 2012-10-09 with total page 136 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Brandon Galloway, a 29-year-old nobody with a history of dead-end jobs, lands a position with a pest control company. When he meets 21-year-old wild child Melanie Blaxley while fumigating her apartment for bed bugs, her vulgar sensuality and reckless promiscuity both attract and repulse him. Before long her world of crazy sex and petty crime starts to take its toll on Brandon's sanity, and he wonders how much more of her he can stand. Then she disappears, and Brandon must find out if it is all just a prank, or if Melanie's wild ways finally led her into danger. A hair-raising thrill ride through the bars and backstreets of a fictional small town, this fast-paced and darkly funny debut novel explores obsession, fear, and the threat of other people.
Download or read book High Before Homeroom written by Maya Sloan and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2010-06-22 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Losers, now you can get the bad-boy rep the girls find positively irresistible! Unleash your dark side with the Doug Schaffer plan for drug addiction and rehabilitation! (Kids, don't try this at home.) At sixteen years old, Doug Schaffer knows two things for sure: 1. He is doomed to live in the shadow of his older brother, Trevor, a former high school football star who is stationed in Iraq. 2. Free-spirited Laurilee, the hot ear-piercing girl at the mall, only dates bad boys. Cue Doug's foolproof plan to tarnish his own unremarkable reputation. The first step is to develop a drug addiction. His mom's too preoccupied with organizing care packages for Mothers Support Our Troops Northwest Oklahoma City Chapter to stop him. Besides, he just needs to get hooked on meth long enough to come back from rehab a totally different person. Someone people notice. With the help of Trevor’s strung-out former high-school buddy, drug addict Doug has the confidence that loser Doug never mustered. He stays out all night, scores girls, and stands up for himself. Then Trevor unexpectedly returns home with a dark secret of his own, and everything Doug thought was true is shattered. Soon the brothers find a common ground they never knew they shared as they discover the price of pleasing others is the freedom to be yourself.
Download or read book Subterranean Kerouac written by Ellis Amburn and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 1999-11-29 with total page 468 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this first biography of Jack Kerouac to fully portray the intense inner life that inspired his work, Kerouac's last editor addresses the writer's homosexual relationships with men, and sheds a new light on their profound impact upon his life. of photos.
Download or read book Coming Home written by M.j. O'shea and published by Dreamspinner Press. This book was released on 2012-04-01 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tallis Carrington ruled Rock Bay with his gang of jocks and an iron fist—until a scandal destroyed his family's name. Ten years later Tallis is dead broke, newly homeless, and on the walk of shame to end all walks of shame. He needs money and needs it fast, and Rock Bay is the only home he knows. But the people of Rock Bay haven't forgotten him—or the spoiled brat he used to be.The only person in town willing to overlook his past is Lex, the new coffee shop owner, who offers Tally a job even though he appears to despise Tally based on his reputation alone. When Tally discovers his gorgeous boss is the kid he tortured back in high school, Lex's hot and cold routine finally makes sense. Now Tally has to pull out all the stops to prove he was never really the jerk he seemed to be. After all, if he can win Lex's heart, the rest of the town should be a piece of coffee cake.
Download or read book Class written by Paul Fussell and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 1992 with total page 212 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book describes the living-room artifacts, clothing styles, and intellectual proclivities of American classes from top to bottom.
Download or read book The Beginning of Everything written by Robyn Schneider and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2013-08-27 with total page 222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Robyn Schneider's The Beginning of Everything is a witty and heart-wrenching teen novel that will appeal to fans of books by John Green and Ned Vizzini, novels such as The Perks of Being a Wallflower, and classics like The Great Gatsby and The Catcher in the Rye. Varsity tennis captain Ezra Faulkner was supposed to be homecoming king, but that was before—before his girlfriend cheated on him, before a car accident shattered his leg, and before he fell in love with unpredictable new girl Cassidy Thorpe. As Kirkus said in a starred review, "Schneider takes familiar stereotypes and infuses them with plenty of depth. Here are teens who could easily trade barbs and double entendres with the characters that fill John Green's novels." Funny, smart, and including everything from flash mobs to blanket forts to a poodle who just might be the reincarnation of Jay Gatsby, The Beginning of Everything is a refreshing contemporary twist on the classic coming-of-age novel—a heart-wrenching story about how difficult it is to play the part that people expect, and how new beginnings can stem from abrupt and tragic endings.
Download or read book The Awesome Book of Bible Comics written by Sandy Silverthorne and published by Harvest House Publishers. This book was released on 2016-10-01 with total page 178 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Your Favorite Bible Stories—as You've Never Seen Them Before! Bible stories can be seriously awesome! The Awesome Book of Bible Comics illustrates many of the most popular stories from the Bible—and that's a pretty sweet deal, because you do not want to miss out on how Noah escapes becoming fish food David goes head-to-head with a big bully and wins the world's strongest man brings down the house a baby boy becomes the world's biggest superstar overnight Jesus is sentenced to death—but brings the world new life These and several other stories about heroes (and sometimes villains) of the Bible are filled with action and fun to read. Jump in and see how God showed His love and faithfulness through each of these adventures.
Download or read book The Middle School Rules of Thomas Morstead written by Sean Jensen and published by BroadStreet Publishing Group LLC. This book was released on 2020-06-02 with total page 178 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Before he earned a Super Bowl ring and started a foundation, he had to survive middle school.” Thomas Morstead entered his 12th NFL season with the New Orleans Saints, distinguishing himself as one of the league’s top punters. In Super Bowl XLIV, he executed an onside kick that the Saints recovered and parlayed into a touchdown to take a 13-10 lead. The Saints defeated the Indianapolis Colts to win the Super Bowl. In 2014, Thomas and his wife Lauren started What You Give Will Grow, a foundation committed to improving the lives of those in need, with a strong focus on children and cancer initiatives, in New Orleans and the Gulf South communities. The Middle School Rules of Thomas Morstead shares how Thomas learned about his cultural roots, handled being bullied for his appearance, and dealt with the disappointment of not making the high school varsity soccer team. Inspired by many, including his parents, Thomas pushes himself in every area of his life and boldly chases his dreams.
Download or read book The Lock Artist written by Steve Hamilton and published by Minotaur Books. This book was released on 2010-01-05 with total page 318 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Steve Hamilton steps away from his Edgar Award-winning Alex McKnight series to introduce a unique new character, unlike anyone you've ever seen in the world of crime fiction. "I was the Miracle Boy, once upon a time. Later on, the Milford Mute. The Golden Boy. The Young Ghost. The Kid. The Boxman. The Lock Artist. That was all me. But you can call me Mike." Marked by tragedy, traumatized at the age of eight, Michael, now eighteen, is no ordinary young man. Besides not uttering a single word in ten years, he discovers the one thing he can somehow do better than anyone else. Whether it's a locked door without a key, a padlock with no combination, or even an eight-hundred pound safe ... he can open them all. It's an unforgivable talent. A talent that will make young Michael a hot commodity with the wrong people and, whether he likes it or not, push him ever close to a life of crime. Until he finally sees his chance to escape, and with one desperate gamble risks everything to come back home to the only person he ever loved, and to unlock the secret that has kept him silent for so long. The Lock Artist is the winner of the 2011 Edgar Award for Best Novel and a 2011 Alex Award winner.
