On a warm summer evening in the late 1960s, as Samantha DeSantis walks home from an impromptu softball game, she spots a bike in the distance. She watches as the rider picks up speed, drawing nearer. It's Buck Kendall, an alarmingly handsome, mysterious, and charismatic boy from her school. She can't look away as the hope of finally meeting him draws near. In ways she can't yet possibly understand, the immediate connection they share is oddly familiar. Their budding relationship awakens her to the joy and pain of love-and teaches her about the woman she will become.

Samantha learns even more when she dares to break the ice and challenge the wildly popular (and equally untamed) Brian. She learns that boys can be good friends, too. Every girl in school wants him, but to Brian, Samantha is the best girl in the world. He knows that someday, some guy will be lucky to have her.

From two very different types of love, Samantha learns more than she could ever hope or expect. The heart wants what it wants. Why fight it?

1953. Ricochet, Washington. Three thirteen-year-old girls embark on a rabbit-raising project for 4H; a project that will change their lives and the way they view the quirky inhabitants of their provincial little town on the Columbia River. Tallulah, Penny, and Clover are as different from one another as the sour apple soup is from the sweet butter bean pie Tully's mother concocts at the Parsley Cafe. Tully is feisty and full of spit and vinegar; Clover, a privileged snob; and Penny lives a timid existence on the dodgy edge of town with her alcoholic father. Even so, the three misfits are thrown together in a scheme to get out of school a week early by showing their rabbits at the county fair. Spearheaded by Tully, they form The Byers Avenue Bunny Club and begin a series of adventures that Tully, aware of the importance of teamwork, hopes will unify the peculiar group and help them reach their goal. Their first escapade is a maiden voyage down Black Bottom Creek, during which they learn little about boating but a great deal about trust and loyalty. And they'll need every bit of that when they're faced with abuse and then murder. Do the girls have enough courage to confront their fears? And will the odd little band of friends live to look back at the sinister events of the year that changed everything they were sure of?

When her seventeen-year-old son Max grabs a German Lugar to shoot alligators he swears are slithering up their front lawn, Maggie knows she has a problem. Thinking he is on drugs, she seeks help from experts and learns it's worse than she imagined. It's schizophrenia. Despite medications and therapy, Max's life spirals downward, and Maggie tumbles after him, hoping to pull him back to the world of reason. Trapped in a maze of theories and medications, legal and medical opinions, progress and setbacks, Maggie learns that even a mother's love is not enough to help a son in the throes of a devastating mental illness. As Max's world becomes more fragmented, Maggie tries to piece his broken life back together, maintain a normal routine for her younger son, and preserve her own sanity.

On a warm summer evening in the late 1960s, as Samantha DeSantis walks home from an impromptu softball game, she spots a bike in the distance. She watches as the rider picks up speed, drawing nearer. It's Buck Kendall, an alarmingly handsome, mysterious, and charismatic boy from her school. She can't look away as the hope of finally meeting him draws near. In ways she can't yet possibly understand, the immediate connection they share is oddly familiar. Their budding relationship awakens her to the joy and pain of love-and teaches her about the woman she will become.

Samantha learns even more when she dares to break the ice and challenge the wildly popular (and equally untamed) Brian. She learns that boys can be good friends, too. Every girl in school wants him, but to Brian, Samantha is the best girl in the world. He knows that someday, some guy will be lucky to have her.

From two very different types of love, Samantha learns more than she could ever hope or expect. The heart wants what it wants. Why fight it?

Based upon the classic Scottish fairy tale about a girl's lover being stolen by the Queen of Faery, this magical, contemporary novel is set on a midwestern college campus in the late 1960s and early 1970s with outlandish theater majors. "An intriguing mix of magic, literature and academic politics".--Locus.

Originally intending to produce the first comprehensive scholarly reference guide to the antecedents, practices, and theory of oral history, the editors have gone even further, creating a highly readable and useful tool for scholars, students, and the general public. Covering the vast scope of this increasingly popular field, the eminent contributors discuss almost every aspect of a field that once was the province of historians but now has become increasingly democratized and available across numerous disciplines.