Fiction. Women's Studies. With A FLOATING WORLD, Karen Best infuses mundane life with elements of the fantastic. From mermaids and sea serpents to deadly pin pricks and crying icons, these 13 stories stretch the boundaries of reality while exploring the search for answers where there are none. The stories entrance with wonder, unexpected beauty and a passionate belief in the magical—and haunt with longing, entrapment, and an unfulfilled search for meaning.

A Floating World: Stories

Literature & Fiction

Best, Karen

Contemporary

Beating Windward Press

"Boat Girl" is the heartbreaking memoir of growing up aboard a sailboat. Throughout the 1980's and 90's, Melanie's family lived aboard a 47-foot sailboat, spending their summers along the US East Coast and their winters in the Bahamas. But the cruising life was not all fun in the sun. The family had to work hard to pay for their way of life. They dodged hurricanes, overzealous federal agents and bullying land-kids. And they endured a boatload of family drama. As her father published articles about how living on a boat brings families together, Melanie secretly struggled with an eating disorder, the alienation of being a boat kid, and confusion over her developing sexuality. As an adult, she lived aboard her own 28-foot sailboat and had several relationships trying to find someone who wasn't intimidated by her stubborn independence and free-spirited lifestyle. "Boat Girl" weaves all this together into a story about a girl who, once all is said and done, simply wants her own boat and her own life. Melanie paints a vivid picture of the trials and tribulations of family life aboard a sailboat without drowning the reader in the technical details of sailing. "Boat Girl" strikes a perfect balance between a coming of age story and a sea tale, enjoyable for boaters and land-lovers alike.

Boat Girl: A Memoir of Youth, Love, and Fiberglass

Neale, Melanie

History & Criticism

Fiction. Novella by Keith Gouveia with stories by C.A. Burns, Kevin Cockle, Lorne Dixon, Giovanna Lagana, Mark Onspaugh, Gerald S. Parker, Marsheila Rockwell, and J. T. Seate. In a world where serial killers are usually isolated and disconnected, THE SNUFF SYNDICATE provides an online forum made for them, by them. For members, social media is a tool to share pure, murder- filled ecstasy. Killing is a business of painstaking details, and every killer, from novice to expert needs a place to go to see what others are doing, from the ways they select victims to the methods they use to bloody their hands. The Snuff Syndicate is where they can brag, ask for advice and revel in their most gratifying hobby. THE SNUFF SYNDICATE offers readers a unique look into the gritty world of bloodletting. Keith Gouveia's novella strings together eight disparate stories of serial killers. This unique collaborative-anthology reads more like a multi-point- of-view novel rather than an anthology.

The Snuff Syndicate

Gouveia, Keith

Dixon, Lorne

Burns, C.A.

Cockle, Kevin

Lagana, Giovanna

Genre Fiction

"Boat Kid" is the engaging memoir of what it's like to grow up aboard a sailboat. Throughout the 1980s and 90s, Melanie's family lived aboard a 47-foot sailboat, spending their summers along the US East Coast and their winters in the Bahamas. Melanie and her sister were homeschooled, the family fished for dinner and made their own bread, but her parents were far from hippie dropouts. Despite their unique lifestyle, her parents were determined to raise proper young ladies while surrounded by sea-gypsies, mystics, nudists, boat bums, sharks, and smugglers. And the cruising life was not all fun in the sun. The family had to work hard to pay for their way of life. They dodged hurricanes, federal agents, and bullying land kids. And as her father published articles about how living on a boat brings families together, Melanie secretly struggled with an eating disorder, the alienation of being a boat kid, and her developing sexuality. "Boat Kid" weaves all this together into a story about a girl who, once all is said and done, simply wants her own boat and the freedom to live her own life. Melanie paints a vivid picture of family life aboard a sailboat without drowning the reader in the technical details of sailing. "Boat Kid" strikes a perfect balance between coming-of-age story and sea tale enjoyable for boaters and land-lovers alike. "Boat Kid" is a Mom's Choice Award Winner for Juvenile, Ages 9 to 12 (Silver Medal) (2013) and is the Middle Grades version (ages 9-15) of Melanie's "Boat Girl: A Memoir of Youth, Love & Fiberglass."

Boat Kid: How I Survived Swimming with Sharks, Being Homeschooled, and Growing Up on a Sailboat

Children's Books

Biographies

Charles Washington, a college grad brimming with energy and idealism and promise, is swept up in the Compassion Boom. At the height of the financial meltdown, he spurns the prescribed job market to take a job with a not-for-profit, sacrificing salary for the selfless mission of his first post-college employer. Charles is out to save the world - the world of fraternities! Charles is an Educational Consultant with the Nu Kappa Epsilon National Fraternity Headquarters. He's making no money, but he's on a noble mission: he will crisscross the country to clean up the corroded culture of fraternity life, driving from college to college, fraternity house to fraternity house, conducting leadership development workshops and serving as a 24/7 role model for his NKE brothers. Charles will whisk away the alcoholism and drug abuse, and put an end to the hazing. He will help transform 21st-century fraternity life into a leadership experience just as enriching as the Boy Scouts. The only problem: Charles isn't nearly the clean-cut role model he wants to believe he is, and he's about to learn that he is ill-prepared for the true demands of leadership. Very quickly, he finds himself caught in a whirlwind of alcohol, parties, hazing, and sex, a series of events and decisions which will test his new values and threaten his entire future. American Fraternity Man is an intimate portrait of a young man struggling to become the right kind of professional, while coming to terms with the harsh financial and political realities behind the ambitious mission statements and corporate philosophies. Set within a broad panoramic of the national fraternity world, American Fraternity Man offers a humanizing look at the individuals who live and breathe Greek Life, while also giving an unrivaled glimpse at the power, potential, and absurdity of the National Fraternity/Sorority business. Through both text and illustrations, Nathan Holic offers the very human story of one young man's longing for morality and purpose in a world he simply has not been prepared to understand.

American Fraternity Man

Holic, Nathan

Fiction. NO SURRENDER is a novella inspired by HP Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos. In the wake of the American Civil War, Union Army Lieutenant Nathan Kenning commands a detachment of peacekeeping troops in Tampa, Florida. Their mandate: to police the area, assist the harried Freedmen's Bureau and defend the thousands of emancipated slaves in the region from Confederate reprisal. Then, one fateful evening, a ragged madman stumbles into town ranting about mass murder and black magic in an adjacent county. War-weary but determined, Lieutenant Kenning leads a small detachment into the swampy countryside to investigate the madman's reports of disgruntled Confederate soldiers running a brutal campaign of terror and murder... and, just possibly, awakening an ancient evil beyond mankind's influence or understanding... "Before he died, HP Lovecraft gave everyone license to write in his ever-expanding universe and I'm certain he would have loved to read this tale penned by rising star, Dale Lucas. With his mastery of the written word, insight into a bygone era, and subtle imagery, Dale has captured HP Lovecraft's vision of Nyarlathotep perfectly and you are in good hands when you crack the spine."&mdash;Keith Gouveia

No Surrender

Lucas, Dale

Beware who walks between the rows . . . For over 3,000 years Scarecrows have been a symbol of fall. They've stood steadfast in vast fields and personal gardens, guarding against all sorts of trespassers. In The Screaming Field, young Tommy Wilson is about to turn the whimsical icon upside down and make it a source of nightmares. A beloved resident of Middletown, Rhode Island, Jesse Wilson has died, leaving his farm to his only living relative: his grandson, Tommy Wilson. Just seventeen years old, Tommy is ill-prepared for the past due slips and foreclosure notices on the farm. Headstrong and stubborn, Tommy is not only determined to save the farm but also to steal his true love away from her current boyfriend. Soon, Tommy sets himself on a dangerous path, one in which darkness walks between the rows.

The Screaming Field

Science Fiction & Fantasy

Literary Nonfiction. Latino/Latina Studies. Women's Studies. Revolution uprooted six-year-old Cecilia from her comfortable middle-class Cuban home and dropped her into the low-income Miami neighborhood of Little Havana. Her philandering father all but abandoned his family to focus on his mistress and rebuilding his career, chasing the American promise of wealth and freedom from the past. Her mother spiraled into madness trying to hold the family together and get him back. Neglected and trapped, Cecilia rebelled against her conservative heritage and embraced the 1960s counter-culture, seeking love and attention anywhere she could get it. And just maybe a place of her own in America. But immigrant children either thrive or self-destruct in a new land. How will Cecilia beat the odds? While most memoirs by Cuban-Americans revolve around childhood scenes in Cuba and explore the experiences of a young man, LEAVING LITTLE HAVANA is the first refugee memoir to focus on a Cuban girl growing up in America, rising above the obstacles and clearing a path to her dream. "LEAVING LITTLE HAVANA is the compelling story of a Cuban girl seeking a new life in the U.S. with her family as the Cuban revolution unfolds in the early sixties. 'Cecilita's' personal account, and sexual awakening, is transparent, sad, and triumphant, sprinkled with anecdotes of an emerging Cuban- American landscape. In short, this book is a colorful reminiscence of historical scenes on both sides of the Straits of Florida, providing closure to a Cuban American journalist coming to terms with her turbulent past."—Guarione M. Diaz "LEAVING LITTLE HAVANA is a candid, touching, and engaging memoir of a young Cuban exile's coming of age. Cecilia Fernandez writes with passion and intensity, both of her missteps and her triumphs, casting fresh light on the American experience in the process."—Les Standiford "Every so often along comes a book that seizes you by the collar and arrests you on the spot. From page one, LEAVING LITTLE HAVANA is a brilliant, voice-driven book that will make your heart skip a few beats. My experience reading this book was similar to the first time I read The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros when you instantly know you are reading a classic, a story so achingly beautiful and unforgettable you relish every last word as if it were the buzzing of a hummingbird at your lips feeding you honey. This book is about family, about what happens to family in exile, about how people come into a great world of struggle and manage to get by and survive. The author has a great gift for capturing that world-known enclave of Miami we love and call Little Havana. This might be the book that puts it on the literary map for good and forever."—Virgil Suárez

Leaving Little Havana: A Memoir of Miami's Cuban Ghetto

Biographies & Memoirs

Fernandez, Cecilia M.

Community & Culture

A Chilling Collection of Werewolf Horror! Animal Behavior and Other Tales of Lycanthropy delivers thirteen startling tales - a lone wolf wishing to be a mother, a police detective with an animal edge on the criminals, big plans for prom night, a natural born werewolf discovering there is something far deadlier stalking the streets, the strenuous trials of boot camp, caged women in isolated cabins, lone sharks coming to collect, the best Halloween costume money can't buy, and more... The moon is full. The beast is restless. Are you brave enough to answer the call? This revised and expanded edition contains 2 NEW stories.

Animal Behavior: And Other Tales of Lycanthropy

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