Search results for ""author weird"

From #1 New York Times bestselling author Jason Reynolds comes the high-flying sequel to his groundbreaking young adult novel Miles Morales: Spider-Man about the adventures of the unassuming, everyday kid who just so happens to be Spider-Man. Miles Morales is still just your average teenager. He has unexpectedly become totally obsessed with poetry and can never seem to do much more than babble around his crush. Nothing too weird. Oh! Except, just yesterday, he used his spidey superpowers to save the world (no biggie) from an evil mastermind called The Warden. And the grand prize Miles gets for that is… Suspension. But what begins as a long boring day of in-school suspension is interrupted by a little bzzz in his mind. His spidey-sense is telling him there’s something not quite right here, and soon he finds himself in a fierce battle with an insidious…termite?! His unexpected foe is hiding a secret, one that could lead to the destruction of the world’s history—especially Black and Brown history—and only Miles can stop him. Yeah, just a typical day in the life of your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man.

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SOMETIMES THE ONLY PERSON WHO CAN SOLVE YOUR MURDER IS YOU.'Startling and original, My Murder is a gripping speculative twist on the crime novel.' - Paula Hawkins bestselling author of The Girl on the Train'Completely absorbing. A smart, speculative twist on domestic suspense.' - Ashley Audrain'One of the most original, smart, funny and thought-provoking books you'll read this year' - Daily MailLou has been murdered.She was the fifth victim of the serial killer Edward Early. A young wife and new mother, Lou's death outraged a public breathlessly following the story of the serial murders. Lou has been cloned.Along with Early's other four victims, Lou has been brought back to life by the government-funded replication commission. The women gather at a weekly support group, helping each other to navigate a society obsessed with their very existence. Lou has been lied to. But when Lou agrees to help fellow murder victim Fern secure a visit with Edward Early, a shocking revelation causes Lou to investigate the events around her death and question everything she thought she knew about her murder.Can she finally uncover the truth? Praise for Katie Williams:"Like an extended episode of 'Black Mirror' ... Williams offers a master class in not losing sight of the human element... the kind of story that - in the subtlest of ways - can instruct us, and nourish us, and make us want to live and love a little better."-Matt Haig, New York Times Book Review"[A] vivid, clever debut." -O, the Oprah Magazine"Allow me to introduce you to your new favorite writer." -James Hannaham, award-winning author of DELICIOUS FOODS: A Novel"Delightfully weird and humorous...a fascinating exploration of our increasing reliance on technology and our obsession with finding a quick fix for everything." -Shondaland"A sharp and moving novel." -Publishers Weekly "With its clever, compelling vision of the future, deeply human characters, and delightfully unpredictable story, this novel is itself a receipe for contentment." -Kirkus Reviews, starred review"My prescription for happiness is: 'Sit still, read a book that can't be classified by genre, and tell everyone.' I'm telling you, Katie Williams delivers." -Helen Ellis, New York Times-bestselling author of AMERICAN HOUSEWIFE

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'Nerd royalty' Ben Goldacre 'Laugh-out-loud funny' Bill Gates'Totally brilliant' Tim HarfordWHAT IF you still had so many more strange questions about the universe?And WHAT IF Randall Munroe, former NASA roboticist and xkcd creator, were prepared to move mountains, fill the solar system with soup and alter the space-time continuum to answer them?Whether it's how to make a lava lamp out of lava or feeding the inhabitants of New York to a T. Rex, welcome to the weird, wonderful (and sometimes terrifying) world of WHAT IF? 2

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Why do we find sexuality so, well ... scary? Comedian and co-creator of the hit show Feel Good, Mae Martin, investigates in this hilarious and intelligent guide to 21st century sexuality. By narrating their own, often humiliating, adventures in sex, dating and identity, Mae demystifies everything from weird crushes and coming out, to the pros and cons of labels and the joys of sexual fluidity.Mae's mission is to ensure that in a world that's full of things to worry about, who we choose to kiss should not be one of them. And when it comes to sexuality, Mae asks:CAN EVERYONE PLEASE CALM DOWN?

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Sip and taste your way through Austin. Austin Food Crawls is an exciting culinary tour through this trendy Texas city. Discover hidden gems and long-standing institutions. Each crawl is the complete recipe for a great night out, the perfect tourist day, a new way to experience your own city, or simply food porn to enjoy from home. Head to Cesar Chavez for some of the best tacos, get weird in East Austin, and bring the whole family to Allendale. Put on your walking shoes and your stretchy pants, and dig into the Capitol City one dish at a time.

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The Janjilons are not what they seem. They look like a type of monkey but they are really children. How did they turn into Janjilons? And could it happen to anyone? Behind this mystery is someone evil, Judge Ormerod who wants to be the next Duke of Westshire. With the help of three weird sisters, he has to rid the land of clever children from being an obstacle to him. The Janjilons work for him as the three sisters mete out punishment and keep them locked up. Petronella starts to look into these strange happenings. But time is running out because when the Judge no longer needs the Janjilons, they will be destroyed.

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Pretty and popular, sixteen-year-old Mariah Ebinger is the typical American teen. Well, except for the weird dreams. And the helicopter phobia. And the—OK, this is pretty strange—the ability to speak Spanish. She’s, like, never even heard Spanish! But except for that stuff, totally typical. The terrible thing is that Rolando Carrera may be typical as well. His wife and daughter murdered by the death squads in Argentina’s “dirty war,” Carrera has crossed some terrible internal line. His grief, his rage…they have blended into a toxic cocktail of obsession with one single burning aim: Kill Mariah Ebinger.

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What makes me, me – and you, you? What is this thing called ‘love’? Does life have a point? Is ‘no’ the right answer to this question? Philosophy transports us from the wonderful to the weird, from the funny to the very serious indeed. With the aid of tall stories, jokes, fascinating insights and common sense, Peter Cave offers a comprehensive survey of all areas of philosophy, addressing the big puzzles in ethics and politics, metaphysics and knowledge, religion and the emotions, aesthetics and logic. Replete with a smorgasbord of amusing and mind-boggling examples, The Big Think Book is perfect for anyone who delights in life’s conundrums.

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We all know about the Great White, but did you know about the shark that can glow in the dark? Or the one that can trump to lose buoyancy? Full of photographs, scientific diagrams and illustrations, Shark Super Powers is the perfect guide for any shark fanatic. Dive right in with marine biologists Jillian and Duncan as they take you into the depths of the ocean. There you’ll discover all sorts of weird and wonderful sharks you perhaps didn’t know existed. Learn all about these amazing creatures and their extraordinary super powers.

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'Awesomeness for fans of awesomeness' Dermot O'LearyIan Iansson is a little bit worried about his school trip.Firstly, Ian doesn't have any friends, plus, his mum has packed him ten pairs of pants for the two-day trip. But as it turns out, these are the least of Ian's problems...Because when Ian's class arrives at the spooky old house, there's something very weird going on. Something that looks awfully like zombies; groaning, dribbling zombies that no one but Ian seems to have noticed.

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Heard about the fish that clean shark teeth? Or the frog that lives with a tarantula? Welcome to the weird world of symbiosis - where animals form incredible relationships. Macken Murphy introduces his favourite symbiotic relationships in his first kids' non-fiction book. Along the way he explains the cool science behind the baffling behaviour of some animals - from friendly alliances to pesky parasites. You'll even find out about symbiotic relationships including YOU! (Hint - is your head ever itchy?) By the end of the book you won't look at nature in the same way again!

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From the West African fable of Anansi the Spider, to Michabo, the magical hare who rebuilt the world and Tanuki, the sweet but troublesome racoon-dog of Japanese folklore, Mythopedia is an encyclopedia of mythical creatures that covers legends, tales and myths from around the world.Lovingly created by the illustration duo behind popular flipbook Myth Match, Good Wives and Warriors, this book contains pages upon pages of cultural folklore from around the world.Let these weird and wonderful creatures spark your child's imagination for their own storytelling and drawing while teaching them about international cultures.

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Bestselling illustrator Britta Teckentrup explores the world of birds in a sumptuously illustrated non-fiction book.There are birds everywhere! Some of them live by the sea, some of them in the savannah, and some might live in your roof.There are Birds Everywhere is the fourth in a series of non-fiction books from Britta Teckentrup. Young readers will learn where in the world all sorts of birds can be found and all the weird and wonderful things about them that they never imagined were true. With an added search-and-find element, this is non-fiction with spark and personality from a much-loved illustrator.

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'Will have youngsters giggling and guffawing from first page to last!' Lancashire Evening PostIt's a new year at Little Strangehaven Primary but things are just as weird as last term . . .Who put laser-eyed robot librarians in charge of class discipline? What's with the new pedal-powered desks? And what does it all have to do with the mysterious goings-on in the cellar?Spy-detectives Tuchus and Topps reckon it's got to be something to do with Pamela Stranglebum and her sinister company, Minerva Industries. With the help of their Scottish gargoyle chum Gregor, can Lenny and Agatha uncover the truth before it's too late . . .?

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***One of BBC Focus magazine's top books of 2018***Get ready to make history better... on the second try.Imagine you are stranded in the past (your time machine has broken) and the only way home is to rebuild civilization yourself. But you need to do it better and faster this time round. In this one amazing book, you will learn How to Invent Everything.Ryan North -- bestselling author, programmer and comic book legend -- provides all the science, engineering, mathematics, art, music, philosophy, facts and figures required for this challenge. Thanks to his detailed blueprint, humanity will mature quickly and efficiently – instead of spending 200,000 years stumbling around in the dark without language, not realising that tying a rock to a string would mean we could navigate the entire world. Or thinking disease was caused by weird smells.Fascinating and hilarious, How To Invent Everything is an epic, deeply researched history of the key technologies that made each stage of human history possible (from writing and farming to buttons and birth control) – and it's as entertaining as a great time-travel novel.So if you’ve ever secretly wondered if you could do history better yourself, now is your chance to find out how.

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'A dream! I learnt something new and fascinating on every page' Lucy Mangan 'If you love words, the weird and the wild, I guarantee you'll crouch over this book like a dragon over gold' Meg Clothier 'Endlessly fascinating' - the Spectator Many of the animals we encounter in everyday life, from the creatures in our fields to those in our fantasies, have remained the same since medieval times - but the words we use, and the ways we describe them, have often changed beyond recognition... Old English was spoken over a thousand years ago, when every animal was a deor. In this glittering Old English bestiary we find deors big and small, the ordinary and the extraordinary, the good, the bad and the downright baffling. From walker-weavers (spiders) and grey-cloaked ones (eagles) to moon-heads and teeth-tyrants (historians still don't know!), we discover a world both familiar and strange: where ants could be monsters and panthers could be your friend, where dog-headed men were as real as elephants and where whales were as sneaky as wolves. From the author of The Wordhord comes another delightful dive into the realm of Old English - words and creatures that will change the way you see the world.

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From the good, the bad and the downright extraordinary, the Eurovision Song Contest is more than just one night of the year, it's a celebration of all things fabulous. This handy little guide is jam-packed with a myriad of Eurovision ideas to help you get your party started and guarantee yourself a great celebration that's as weird and wonderful as the acts themselves.So, get ready for questionable outfits, hilarious sassy commentary and lots of feathers.This isn't the time to be formal or trendy - focus on flamboyance and tackiness in large doses. Lay on the cheese as thickly as you can, and you won't go far wrong!

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From the creative parents who brought the world the web sensation "Dinovember" comes photographic proof of what toys get up to when the rest of the house is asleep. Now in paperback.You might have noticed weird things happening in your house. Unexplainable messes. Food all over the kitchen floor. Who could the culprits be? Dinosaurs! Boasting bright and hilarious photographs, along with a story written from the point of view of an older, wiser sibling, Refe and Susan Tuma's picture book documents a very messy adventure that shows just what the dinosaurs did last night.

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Harley Quinn and her Gang of Harleys are hitting the road! As if Hollywood wasn't weird enough already, now Harley's made her way to Tinseltown and she's about to have the most destructive fifteen minutes of fame ever. Will the industry survive Harley's Hollywood hijix, or will the City of Angels fall from grace? And will Coney Island be able to contain Harley's newfound celebrity status? From the best-selling creative team of Jimmy Palmiotti and Amanda Conner (STARFIRE) comes HARLEY QUINN VOL. 4! Collects HARLEY QUINN #17-21 and HARLEY QUINN ROAD TRIP SPECIAL #1.

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With a biting mix of wonder and pride, William Ecenbarger observes that in the quirky state of Pennsylvania, the town of Mauch Chunk changed its name to Jim Thorpe—even though the famous Indian athlete never set foot in it. A former journalist for the Philadelphia Inquirer Magazine, and author of the bestseller Kids for Cash, Ecenbarger has collected a dozen of his fascinating articles showcasing the Keystone State in Pennsylvania Stories—Well Told. He provides a history of the pencil, and considers why the first day of Pennsylvania’s deer hunting season—the world’s largest participatory sporting event—is an unofficial state holiday, closing schools and state offices. Ecenbarger also profiles George “Boom Boom” Zambelli, the internationally renowned pyrotechnic king, and goes driving with Pennsylvania native John Updike in rural Berks County, PA. Other fascinating tales unfold in Pennsylvania Stories, from an inspiring tale of Governor Bob Casey’s double organ transplant, to darker essays on the electric chair and the Ku Klux Klan, to a mile-by-mile appreciation of the Pennsylvania Turnpike. In these weird and wonderful stories, Ecenbarger highlights just what makes Pennsylvania both eccentric and great. His book is a delightfully intriguing read for natives and curious outsiders alike.

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"A must-read for anyone who has ever fought their own battles with both fitting in and being themselves." ~Shannon Schuren, author of Where Echoes LieSmart and athletic, Ben Snyder is ready for middle school. But his super picky eating, which has never been a big deal before, is about to take him down. Suddenly everybody’s on his case about what he’s eating and what he’s not—his old friends, his new friends, his weird lab partner, the girl he’s crushing on, and a bully—and Ben finds himself in social free fall, sliding toward the bottom of the middle school food chain. Even worse, there’s an upcoming three-day class trip to a colonial campsite. Knowing he can’t handle the gag-worthy menu, Ben prepares for the outing like it’s a survival mission. Armed with new and unexpected information about his eating habits that could change everything, he sets out with three tactical goals: impress the girl, outsmart the bully, and avoid every single meal. But when his plans go sideways and epic hunger threatens to push him over the edge, Ben must decide how far he will go to fit in and if he has the courage to stand out.

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From Philip K. Dick Award-nominated author M.T. Hill, The Breach is a unique science fiction mystery set in the dangerous underground world of the urban exploration scene. Freya Medlock, a reporter at her local paper, is down on her luck and chasing a break. When she’s assigned to cover the death of a young climber named Stephen, she might just have the story she needs. Digging into Stephen’s life, Freya uncovers a strange photo uploaded to an urban exploration forum not long before he died. It seems to show a weird nest, yet the caption below suggests there’s more to it. Freya believes this nest – discovering what it really is and where it’s hidden – could be the key to understanding the mysteries surrounding Stephen’s death. Soon she meets Shep, a trainee steeplejack with his own secret life. When Shep’s not working up chimneys, he’s also into urban exploration – undertaking dangerous ‘missions’ into abandoned and restricted sites. As Shep draws Freya deeper into the urbex scene, the circumstances of Stephen’s death become increasingly unsettling – and Freya finds herself risking more and more to get the answers she wants. But neither Freya nor Shep realise that some dark corners are better left unlit.

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A science educator in domestic chaos fetishises Scandinavian furniture and champagne flutes. A group of white-collar deadbeats attend a swinger’s party in the era of drunk Muldoon. A pervasive smell seeps through the walls of a German housing block. A seabird performs at an open-mic night.Bug Week is a scalpel-clean examination of male entitlement, a dissection of death, an agar plate of mundanity. From 1960s Wellington to post-Communist Germany, Bug Week traverses the weird, the wry and the grotesque in a story collection of human taxonomy.

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We like Jeff Goldblum. You like Jeff Goldblum. Helen McClory really likes Jeff Goldblum. The Goldblum Variations is a collection of flash fiction, stories and games on the one and only Jeff Goldblum as he, and alternate versions of himself, travels through the known (and unknown) universe in a mighty celebration of weird and wonderful Goldbluminess. Maybe he's cooking, maybe he's wearing a nice jumper, maybe he's reading this very book. The possibilities are endless. Treat yourself, because all that glitters is Goldblum.

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Gemima, Speedy, Pauli Peanuts and Other Visitations from Ray Muggles is a unique collection of short stories that span different decades and continents and are vivid jagged tales that pay homage to the weird and strange world of us all. The stories explore diverse and dark themes, such as, racism, old age and the outsider in society. stwap im to an electric chair and put a million volts thruw im Fred Kray reed diz buk and I'll whack ya! Paulie Peanuts I prefer Col, Columbo boy! - Speedy

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“Short stories have to accomplish a nearly impossible magic trick: to introduce a world often much stranger than our own and make you care about it in a matter of pages,” writes R. F. Kuang in her introduction. “The most important part of this magic trick is just a willingness to get weird.” The stories in The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2023 are brimming with bizarre and otherworldly premises. Women can’t lie or fall in love. Fathers feed their children ghost preserves. Souls chase one another through animal incarnations. Yet these stories are grounded deeply in our reality. Out of these stories’ weirdness emerges the cruelty of border enforcement, the horror of legislation restricting reproductive freedom, the frightening pace of AI. The result is a stunning, immersive, intensely felt experience, showing us less of what the world is, and more of what it could be.The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2023 includes Nathan Ballingrud • KT Bryski • Isabel Cañas • Maria Dong • Kim Fu • Theodora Goss • Alix E. Harrow • S. L. Huang • Stephen Graham Jones • Shingai Njeri Kagunda • Isabel J. Kim • Samantha Mills • MKRNYILGLD • Malka Older • Susan Palwick • Linda Raquel Nieves Pérez • Sofia Samatar • Kristina Ten • Catherynne M. Valente • Chris Willrich

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Torrid Romance is a great, kitschy collection of early romance comics by a legendary comicbook creator. Vanguard's Wally Wood Classic series follows the best-selling Wally Wood: Strange Worlds and Wally Wood: Eerie Crime & Horror with an all-new collection of Golden-Age Romance comics by the Hall of Fame co-creator of Mad, Weird Science, and Daredevil. These rare and valuable stories have NEVER appeared in any book. This massive collection costs less than a single issue of the original, early-1950's collector's-item comics! This special edition comes DLX slipcased.

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• COMBINES the hilariousness of school picture day (weird outfits, bad hair, and funny expressions) with that of anthropomorphic animal art. These notecards will appeal to those who enjoy humorous stationery. • 20 DIFERENT NOTECARDS—no two cards are alike—features hilariously awkward and adorable portraits of animals in school attire. • EACH ANIMAL character has a name that prints on the back of card. Choose from Buddy Bulldog, Ryan Racoon, Katie Kitten, and more. • CARDS WITH CUTE ANIMALS also include 20 envelopes. • PERFECT FOR animal lovers, pet owners, and anyone going back to school.

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MPT’s summer issue ’The Illuminated Paths’ focuses on emerging poets of the Maghreb, with poems written in Arabic, Arabic dialect and Tamazight, and translated as part of the British Council’s Majaaz project by Victoria Adukwei Bulley, Martha Sprackland, Adham Smart, Vidyan Ravinthiran and Stewart Sanderson. Also: an introduction to Dalit poetry curated by Gopika Jadeja, Judith Wilkinson’s translations of Toon Tellegen, Maria Stepanova’s `weird ballads’, and Michèle Lalonde’s searing `anti-imperialist cri de coeur’: `Speak White’. All this and more in the groundbreaking magazine dedicated to poetry in translation: for the best in world poetry read MPT.

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This is your very own nature scrapbook, packed with fascinating facts and brilliant activities. Doodle, draw and colour in leaves, butterflies, frogs and much more. How many different types of snowflakes are there, and how are leaves formed? Find out how to make your own leaf prints, bee hotels and sun masks.With her beautiful, distinctive illustrations, Nina Chakrabarti urges you to explore the weird and wonderful things you can find all around you - whether you're out in a park, in your back garden or sitting in your living room at home!

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Malcolm Devlin''s debut short-fiction collection, first published in 2017, announced the arrival of a major new talent in the worlds of weird fiction and literary horror. In You Will Grow Into Them, change is the only constant. These nine stories tackle the unease of transformation, growth, and change in a world where the mundane is only a veneer hiding the darkness below. Childhood anxieties manifest as degraded doppelgangers; fungal blooms are harvested from the backs of dancers; and lycanthropes become the new social pariahs. In You Will Grow Into Them, the demons we carry inside us are very real indeed.

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Grandad and Lenny are trying to paint the living-room. But Grandad’s paint is very old and it’s gone quite strange. It has stripes and patterns in it….. At first it seems like fun to make pictures with this weird paint. Lenny calls his picture ‘Fang’ because it looks like a creature, and Grandad calls his ‘Mildred’. Lenny and Grandad decide to hang their pictures on the wall and go in search of frames. But when they return the pictures have disappeared. It looks like they’ve been stolen, but then they realise something else has happened.... That’s when things start to go terribly, terribly wrong…

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Wales' history is packed with peculiar customs and curious characters. Here you will discover alien landscapes, ancient druids and a Victorian ghost hunter. Find out why revellers would carry a decorated horse’s skull on a pole door to door at Christmastime, how an eccentric inventor hoped to defeat Hitler with his futuristic ray gun, and why a cursed wall is protected by a global corporation for fear it might destroy a town. From the folklore surrounding the red dragon on the flag, to the evolution of the song ‘Sosban Fach’, this compendium of weird and wonderful facts will surprise and delight even the most knowledgeable resident or visitor.

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Limerick’s history stretches back over thousands of years. It is famed for pigs and poetry, but so far only the surface of its past has been revealed.The A–Z of Curious County Limerick looks at the forgotten tales, such as the story of the deer that ran amok through the streets of Limerick City and the man who was sentenced to work in a bog. Many of these stories of the area were well known and talked about at the time but did not get passed down to recent generations.Each letter of the alphabet leads to another weird or wonderful tale, from animals and their amazing antics, to Zepp the travelling chip salesman.

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A fun, inclusive guide to satisfying sex for all men, jam-packed with expert advice, game-changing insights, and sensational sex positions. You know you want it: More. Better. Hotter. But the editors at Men’s Health know you also have a lot of questions, especially as cultural ideas about gender, sexuality, and “taboo” desires have started to shift, making sex a little more complicated, too. Jordyn Taylor, Men’s Health’s sex and relationship editor, and sex expert Zachary Zane, tapped the top sex professionals for the best advice about getting it on. No matter your preferences or what you’re into, and whether you’re single or in a relationship or several relationships at once, Best. Sex. Ever. is your funny and friendly authority on having awesome sex. You’ll find the answers to pressing questions like:Is dirty talk problematic in a post-#MeToo world? (Nope. As long as your partner is into it, curse away, my dude.)What’s the secret to taking a really good nude? (See: our illustrated guide to the best-ever selfie positions!) Is it weird that I’m a straight guy who wants to try butt stuff? (Only if you hate the mind-blowing pleasure of prostate massage.)Are my kinks normal? (Definitely—and we’ll show you how to try them.)What’s the sexiest way to ask for enthusiastic consent? (Yup, it can be sexy.) Complete with sex position illustrations, juicy anecdotes and honest myth-busting advice for open-minded, sex-loving guys, this book is bursting with insights on achieving pleasure with your partner(s)--every single time.

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Filled with over 750 questions, this is the ultimate quizzing challenge for curious minds. Curious kids are guaranteed to be kept on their toes by this mind-boggling mix of multiple choice, true or false, head-to-head and picture quizzes.There are rounds on geography, history, sport, science, pop culture, animals, general knowledge and even all the weird and wonderful stuff that doesn’t fit into any other category. No matter the specialist subject, it’s put to the test in here!Quizzers can dip in and out as they choose and tackle the majority of the quizzes on their own, or they can pit themselves against friends or family with the head-to-head rounds.

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The creators of Brains On!, the award-winning science podcast for kids, introduce readers to a fact-filled and humorous look at the weird and wonderful world of microbes!It's show-and-tell day, and Dominique can't wait to introduce her awesome pets to the class. They're more helpful than dogs, cuddlier than gerbils, and way smarter than lizards. They're her...MICRO-PETS!As Dominique takes her classmates on a tour through her microbiome, they'll meet some face mites, hang with feet fungi, and visit the fart factory-powered by bacteria in her intestines!

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This is the true story of a rock and roll musician who takes up taekwondo at forty-one years old. Doni Blair, bassist for the Toadies, knows he's past his physical prime, but he's determined to push himself and pursue his dream of becoming a martial artist-even if it kills him. As a kid Doni was obsessed with ninjas and kung fu movies. He and his brother took up taekwondo-there was no ninja school in Sherman, Texas. Classes were expensive, especially considering their parents' tenuous employment status and fondness for alcohol. The family lived like "white-trash gypsies," Blair writes, adding that he got good at moving furniture at three in the morning. The Blair kids loved taekwondo, but the family just couldn't afford classes. Doni walked away from martial arts. Thirty years later, he's walking back. "I'm not a kid anymore," he writes. "I'm a middle-aged man trying to come to grips with being a middle-aged man. I'm not as fast as I used to be. It takes longer for the injuries to heal. I have to eat more bran." Doni discovers the road to black belt is rough and, well, weird. He meets martial seekers of every sort. He has run-ins with a teenage savant who seems determined to break the author's leg. He drives a van full of seven-year-olds for the dojang's after-school program. They puke everywhere. Even If It Kills Meis smart and funny, introspective and irreverent. It blends rock and roll and taekwondo-two of the coolest things in the world.

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Once upon a time – the 1980s – in a galaxy not really all that far away – New York – Michael Gingold started a collection of newspaper advertisements for the science fiction, fantasy, and horror releases that stoked his passion as a genre fan. Eventually, he would grow up to become editor-in-chief of the horror magazine Fangoria, plus a writer for numerous other genre publications, a screenwriter, respected author, and all-around expert for films frightful and fanstastical. As the years went by, Michael held on to this collection of weird and wonderful art, eventually publishing the best-selling, horror-themed Ad Nauseam: Newsprint Nightmares from the 1980s and its sequel, Ad Nauseam II: Newsprint Nightmares from the 1990s and 2000s. And now he presents Ad Astra: 20 Years of Newspaper Ads for Sci-Fi & Fantasy Films, a year-by-year look at the movies that shaped many a childhood in the '80s and '90s. Inside this 270-page book, you'll find Star Trek to Starship Troopers, The Dark Crystal to Dark City, Blade Runner to The Running Man, RoboCop to Robot Jox, The Empire Strikes Back to Back to the Future, and many, many more. See alternate artwork for your favorite films, learn the fascinating behind-the-scenes stories of their marketing campaigns, and read the most entertaining and unexpected quotes from reviewers at the time all carefully curated by Michael. So throw on your jetpack as we travel back in time to when print was king and movie marketing was an art form for the ages! Also available: Ad Nauseam: Newsprint Nightmares from the '70s and '80s and Ad Nauseam II: Newsprint Nightmares from the 1990s and 2000s.

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BEWARE: Rampaging Mutant Dino-Hamster! Fans of My Big Fat Zombie Goldfish and The Terrible Two will be scrambling to get their hands on this hilarious classroom comedy. When a mysterious growling hamster appears at the back of his class, Sam knows just what to call him: Hamstersaurus Rex. Sam tries to protect Hammie from an overzealous Hamster Monitor, and from the meanest bully in the history of Horace Hotwater Middle School. The bully isn’t afraid of some weird little class pet. But maybe he should be. Hamstersaurus Rex is no ordinary hamster.

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Bestselling illustrator Britta Teckentrup explores the world of bugs in a sumptuously illustrated paperback edition. There are bugs everywhere! Some of them live in jungles, some of them underwater, and some certainly live in your house. There are Bugs Everywhere is the second in a series of non-fiction books from Britta Teckentrup. Young readers will learn where in the world all sorts of animals can be found and all the weird and wonderful things about them that they never imagined were true. With an added search-and-find element, this is non-fiction with spark and personality from a much-loved illustrator.

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‘A funny and beautifully written welcome to the enigmatic, weird and wonderful world of wasps’ DAVE GOULSON, author of SILENT EARTH There may be no insect with a worse reputation than the wasp, and none guarding so many undiscovered wonders. Where bees and ants have long been the darlings of the insect world, wasps are much older, cleverer and more diverse. They are the bee’s evolutionary ancestors – flying 100 million years earlier – and today they are just as essential for the survival of our environment. A bee, ecologist Professor Seirian Sumner argues, is just a wasp that has forgotten how to hunt. For readers of Entangled Life, Other Minds and The Gospel of Eels, this is a book to upturn your expectations about one overlooked animal and the wider architecture of our natural world. With endless surprises, this book might teach you about the wasps that spend their entire lives sealed inside a fig, about stinging wasps, about parasitic wasps, about wasps that turn cockroaches into living zombies, about how wasps taught us to make paper. It offers up a maligned insect in all its diverse, unexpected splendour; as both predator and pollinator, the wasp is an essential pest controller worldwide. Inside their sophisticated social worlds is the best model we have for the earth’s major evolutionary transitions. In their understudied biology are clues to progressing medicine, including a possible cure for cancer. The closer you look at these spurned, winged insects – both custodians and bouncers of our planet – the more you see. Their secrets have so far gone mostly untapped, but the potential of the wasp is endless.

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'Smart and funny, with characters so real and vulnerable, you want to send them care packages. I loved this book' - Rainbow Rowell ------------------------------------------From debut author Mary H.K. Choi comes a compulsively readable novel that shows young love in all its awkward glory - perfect for fans of Eleanor & Park and To All the Boys I've Loved Before.For Penny Lee high school was a total non-event. Her friends were okay, her grades were fine, and while she somehow managed to land a boyfriend, he doesn't actually know anything about her. When Penny heads to college in Austin, Texas, to learn how to become a writer, it's seventy-nine miles and a million light years away from everything she can't wait to leave behind.Sam's stuck. Literally, figuratively, emotionally, financially. He works at a café and sleeps there too, on a mattress on the floor of an empty storage room upstairs. He knows that this is the god-awful chapter of his life that will serve as inspiration for when he's a famous movie director but right this second the seventeen bucks in his bank account and his dying laptop are really testing him. When Sam and Penny cross paths it's less meet-cute and more a collision of unbearable awkwardness. Still, they swap numbers and stay in touch - via text - and soon become digitally inseparable, sharing their deepest anxieties and secret dreams without the humiliating weirdness of having to see each other.

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In an increasingly polarised world, it sometimes feels impossible to talk to someone you disagree with, let alone change their mind. However, as David McRaney reveals, you could be just one conversation away from reshaping someone's world view – here's how. ‘In a time when too many minds seem closed, this is a masterful analysis of what it takes to open them.’ ADAM GRANT, AUTHOR OF THINK AGAIN Self-delusion expert and psychology nerd David McRaney sets out to discover not just what it takes to influence others, but why we believe in the first place. Along the way he meets a former Westboro Baptist Church member who was de-radicalised on Twitter, goes deep canvassing to see how quickly people will surrender their character-defining views, finds a former 9/11 Truther who turned his back on it all, and reveals how, within a few years, half a country can go from opposing the ‘gay agenda’ to happily attending same-sex weddings. Distilling the latest research in psychology and neuroscience, How Minds Change reveals how beliefs take hold, not over hundreds of years, but in less than a generation, in less than a decade, and sometimes in an instant. *** ‘Optimistic, illuminating and even inspiring.’ GUARDIAN ‘A tonic for those who might scratch their head at how others could be so nonsensical.’ NEW SCIENTIST ‘How Minds Change brings us face to face with the radically weird science of how our thoughts, perceptions, and beliefs are actually formed, and how they can, for better or worse, be modified.’ JORDAN ELLENBERG

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Age range 9 to 12Warning! This book may contain some of the following. . . Men with huge heads! Nervous hamsters! Stoopid people! Free money! Ducks, genies, and crime-solving fish! A voucher for eternal youth! Daft drawings, ridiculous rhymes, and weird creatures! Rubbish clowns, rubbish ghosts, and rubbish in dust bins! The secret to life-long happiness! Hairy things and guitar-playing ferrets! To find out which of these are contained inside, do read this book, do try and enjoy it, but don't put Dave in the microwave!

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Nearly three million years ago the Ice Age began. Oceans froze, ice sheets covered land and animals, along with humans, found ways to thrive. These prehistoric creatures were weird, wonderful and enormous!Explore the Earth continent by continent and come face to face with Ice-Age megafauna, such as North America's short-faced bear - which was 3.7 metres tall, and mastodons - which weighed twice as much as a T. rex! Accompanying the images, lively text allows you imagine exactly what these mega animals were like!

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Vanguard continues their trademark Definitive Reference series with Frazetta: World''s Best Comics Cover Artist, a sister book to 2022''s hit, Frazetta Book Cover Art.While the prior book by illustration and cartooning historian J. David Spurlock catalogued, documented, and commented on all of Frazetta''s book cover paintings, this new volume focuses on the artist''s comics magazine cover art, which originally appeared on such periodicals as Creepy magazine, Ghost Rider, Mad magazine, Vampirella, National Lampoon and EC Comics'' Weird Science-Fantasy.

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From Val Emmich, the bestselling author of Dear Evan Hansen: The Novel, comes a deeply affecting story of two teens who find themselves thrown together overnight during a snowstorm and discover a surprising connection -- perfect for fans of Nina LaCour, David Arnold, and Robin Benway.Tegan Everly is painfully shy. Known around school simply as the girl with the weird hand, she's only her true outspoken self with her friend Neel, and right now they're not exactly talking. When Tegan is ambushed by her mom with a truth she can't face, she flees home in a snowstorm, finding refuge at a forgotten local attraction -- the tiny Thomas Edison museum.She's not alone for long. In walks Mac Durant. Striking, magnetic, a gifted athlete, Mac Durant is the classmate adored by all. Tegan can't stand him. Even his name sounds fake. Except the Mac Durant she thinks she knows isn't the one before her now -- this Mac is rattled and asking her for help.Over one unforgettable night spent consuming antique records and corner-shop provisions, Tegan and Mac cast aside their public personas and family pressures long enough to forge an unexpectedly charged bond and -- in the very spot in New Jersey that inspired Edison's boldest creations -- totally reinvent themselves. But could Tegan's most shameful secret destroy what they've built?Emotionally vivid and endlessly charming, Maybe We're Electric is an artfully woven meditation on how pain can connect us -- we can carry it alone in darkness or share the burden and watch the world light up again.

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