The Academy - Unsung Requiem


Book Description

Victor Morgan’s entire life has been in the limelight. Groomed by his fierce mother as a piano prodigy, intent on using him to build a legacy for the Morgan name. But legacies require the utmost in care. Any little disaster can cause a mountain of problems. After a 17th birthday party ends in catastrophe, a fight with his parents sends Victor out into the world for the first time on his own. With his Academy team and Sang by his side, it’s everything he’s wanted for years. It’s his time to get out from under his parents’ oppressive control and finally be himself. But Victor is a local celebrity in the Charleston community. His name and face have been everywhere. His every move is noticed. When his actions lead to the risk of a very public exposure of himself and his team, including thwarting Sang’s chances at remaining a Ghost Bird, Victor realizes the life his mother built may jeopardize everything. The Morgan name may just be his downfall. There may be no escape. The only way to save Sang and his team might be to give up what he really wants more than anything: to finally be the real Victor Morgan. The Academy, Verismo




The Academy - Introductions


Book Description

With an agoraphobic mother and a barely-there father, Sang abhors the isolation keeping her in the shadows. The only thing Sang craves is a fresh start and to be accepted as ordinary by her peers, because for her being different meant being cast out alone. When her family moves to a new school district, Sang infiltrates a group of boys nearly perfect in every way. Grateful for an influence outside of her parents’ negativity, she quickly bonds with the boys, hoping to blend in and learn from them what it means to have a natural relationship with friends. Only the boys have secrets of their own and they’ll do anything to keep her safe from the knowledge of the mysterious Academy that they've sworn allegiance to. Bit by bit, Sang discovers that her friends are far from the normalcy she expected. Will her loyalty change when she's forced to remain in the dark, or will she accept that she's traded one house of secrets for another? Meet Kota, Victor, Silas, Nathan, Gabriel, Luke and North in a story about differences and loyalty, truth and mystery, friendships and heart-throbbing intimacy. The Academy, ever vigilant.




Luke


Book Description

The Academy: Ghost Bird series in a different look at the very beginning. Read Introductions with a whole new perspective--the boys'.Luke Taylor can't seem to ever relate to his brother, North. They're like night and day: North is rigid and intense where Luke is playful and a dreamer, his head often in the clouds. Being around each other too long can be difficult. The Academy and Luke's friends helped to bring them together, and Luke will be forever grateful, but North is just no fun sometimes. Luke can't wait for the new job at the high school this year. He's eager to expand his friendship circle...and maybe having a project to focus on will help North blow off some steam.When the Academy hires the team on a small side job, Luke and North are forced to stick together. The brothers are on the job, but they struggle to communicate and work together.The rest of the team are reluctant and dragging their feet on their current mission. Something about a girl having trouble at home. Who is this Sang Sorenson and how can one shy, mysterious girl turn a dedicated Academy team upside down nearly overnight? The brothers need to find out. But if they can't come together, they not only risk losing her but their differences might just tear the entire team apart.




Plays Well with Others


Book Description

With great narrative inventiveness and emotional amplitude, Allan Gurganus gives us artistic Manhattan in the wild 1980s, where young artists--refugees from the middle class--hurl themselves into playful work and serious fun. Our guide is Hartley Mims Jr., a Southerner whose native knack for happiness might thwart his literary ambitions. Through his eyes we encounter the composer Robert Christian Gustafson, an Iowa preacher's son whose good looks constitute both a mythic draw and a major limitation, and Angelina "Alabama" Byrnes, a failed deb, five feet tall but bristling with outsized talent. These friends shelter each other, promote each other's work, and compete erotically. When tragedy strikes, this circle grows up fast, somehow finding, at the worst of times, the truest sort of family. Funny and heartbreaking, as eventful as Dickens and as atmospheric as one of Fitzgerald's parties, Plays Well with Others combines a fable's high-noon energy with an elegy's evening grace. Allan Gurganus's celebrated new novel is a lovesong to imperishable friendship, a hymn to a brilliant and now-vanished world.




First Kiss


Book Description

From USA TODAY Bestselling Author, C. L. Stone, read First Kiss, the tenth book in The Academy Ghost Bird Series. The time has finally come for Sang Sorenson to be formally introduced to the Academy. Protocol dictates the boys keep the details of Sang's official introduction to the Academy a secret from her. The only thing they can advise her to do is to work on what will become her mantra: She is determined to stay with her team, no matter what. Despite her wishes, however, the boys are second-guessing her place with them, concerned for her safety. With dangers all around and threats closing in, some of the boys are questioning if this is the right time to bring her to meet the Academy at all. Sang is challenged with being the brave face among them and instilling the confidence needed to keep her with them. However, in order to appear compliant with the Academy's rules, she has to be willing to listen and try their suggestions. As the boys have suspected and feared, the council wants to see how she'll work with a different team. An all-girl team. She has no choice but to go along with the proposal or risk losing a shot at the Academy. But when the Academy's inner world is revealed to her, Sang knows that she's finally found her place-somewhere she belongs-and she sees a future with them. The deeper she gets, the more she sees how she can make a difference. Learning what she is capable of and the impact she can have, she feels obligated to help. There's so few girls, and they need her. The guys try to stick to their plan, but every team must pay their debts, and the cost of keeping her might be more than any of them can afford. It's up to Sang alone to prove to the Academy where she truly belongs-but can she resist the call of a new team that needs her? The Academy, Inside The time has finally come for Sang Sorenson to be formally introduced to the Academy. Protocol dictates the boys keep the details of Sang's official introduction to the Academy a secret from her. The only thing they can advise her to do is to work on what will become her mantra: She is determined to stay with her team, no matter what. Despite her wishes, however, the boys are second-guessing her place with them, concerned for her safety. With dangers all around and threats closing in, some of the boys are questioning if this is the right time to bring her to meet the Academy at all. Sang is challenged with being the brave face among them and instilling the confidence needed to keep her with them. However, in order to appear compliant with the Academy's rules, she has to be willing to listen and try their suggestions. As the boys have suspected and feared, the council wants to see how she'll work with a different team. An all-girl team. She has no choice but to go along with the proposal or risk losing a shot at the Academy. But when the Academy's inner world is revealed to her, Sang knows that she's finally found her place-somewhere she belongs-and she sees a future with them. The deeper she gets, the more she sees how she can make a difference. Learning what she is capable of and the impact she can have, she feels obligated to help. There's so few girls, and they need her. The guys try to stick to their plan, but every team must pay their debts, and the cost of keeping her might be more than any of them can afford. It's up to Sang alone to prove to the Academy where she truly belongs-but can she resist the call of a new team that needs her?




The Academy - Forgiveness and Permission


Book Description

Forgiveness and Permission is the fourth book in The Academy Ghost Bird Series. Sang Sorenson’s abusive mother is secure in a hospital, and her father has vanished to a new family of his own, leaving Sang and her sister to fend for themselves. Sang is hanging by a thread, and her only hope is a group of boys she feels she barely knows. She’s never really alone. The Academy team has stepped in, promising to protect and care for Sang. Kota, Victor, Silas, Nathan, Gabriel, Luke and North take over, showing Sang they can be depended on for anything. But just because the parents are away, doesn’t mean Sang’s life has become any easier. The newfound freedom will have a higher price than any of them had imagined. Principal Hendricks now wants to use Sang to exploit Academy secrets. Mr. McCoy has his own dark plans for her. Enemies are closing in. Sang will need to learn to believe in the boys, and the boys will need to learn to trust her if they want to survive their rivals. And each other. The Academy, Relentless Trust Keywords: spies, family, young adult, child abuse, coming of age, friendship, action, adventure, YA, mysteries, thrillers, Charleston, academy, menage, reverse, harem, dysfunctional, relationships, social situations, sleuth, private detective, neglect, family, families, high, school, sibling, bullies, bullying, love, romantic, romance, teen, drama, love triangle, contemporary, secrets




Cities in Transition


Book Description

'Cities in Transition' looks at the complex yet enduring relationship between cinema and the city, discussing how early cinema, digital technology and changing urban geographies have all impacted upon notions and representations of the modern city.




The Healing Power of Sugar


Book Description

From USA TODAY Bestselling Author, C. L. Stone, read The Healing Power of Sugar, the ninth book in The Academy Ghost Bird Series. It's been a week since Sang has attended any classes at Ashley Waters, and since then, everything has changed. Her school schedule has been turned upside down, and now, thanks to her absences, the school counselor, Ms. Wright, has suspended her. The fear of school officials getting further involved and looking to contact her parents has Sang and the boys forced into their best behavior. It seems that the once perfect student, Sang Sorenson, is now one of the school's worst, and without explanation, because she needs to keep her lips tightly sealed. Academy secrets are becoming hazardous to keep. The more that Kota, Victor, Silas, Nathan, Gabriel, Luke and North try to protect her, the more inevitable her downfall seems to be. They do their best to make sure Sang stays in school and when she returns to classes, try to help her get back on the straight and narrow-she can't afford to screw up anymore. But then fate deals out a setback that cripples the whole team, and they need to make a move, it turns into a risky one. There's no way to predict the outcome. If they fail, the boys may lose the job they were sent to do, and worse, they may even lose Sang. Everything gets more difficult when it's revealed there might be a traitor amidst the group. Desperate to fix things, Sang needs to stop the group from spilling secrets and find out the truth. And why all fingers seem to be pointing to Luke. The Academy, Magnanimous




Alpha Boys School


Book Description

Facing a life of poverty, neglect, abandonment and even homelessness, young Jamaican boys are placed in a disciplinarian Catholic boarding school. With a rigorous musical training program overseen by an eccentric jazz-loving nun, the young virtuoso graduates of Alpha Boys' School went on to change the shape of music forever. It's the 1950s in Jamaica and a musical revolution is brewing. People all over Kingston dance nightly to vast outdoor sound systems blasting American rhythm and blues records across the shanty towns. In the hotels and theaters big bands are playing jazz and calypso. Street musicians are playing home-grown folk music called mento. Out of this musical stew, Jamaica will soon birth a dance music all of its own, a sound that will conquer the globe. Starting with ska in the early 1960s, followed by rocksteady, eventually arriving at reggae in 1969, a group of virtuoso graduates of a Roman Catholic boarding school spearhead a musical and cultural revolution that still reverberates around the world over half a century later. The Sisters of Mercy nuns at Alpha provided a home alongside industrial trades apprenticeships and religious indoctrination. One in particular, Sister Mary Ignatius, dedicated 64 years of her life to running the school's music program. Her deep appreciation of jazz and her sense of fun endeared her to the boys in the band, inspiring them to attain greatness. From early Jamaican jazz giants like Joe Harriott and Dizzy Reece to the greatest ska band of all time, The Skatalites, and some of reggae's most inspirational artists such as Cedric Brooks, Johnny Osbourne, Leroy Smart and Yellowman, the Alpha story is the untold history of Jamaican music. Join Heather Augustyn and Adam Reeves as they delve into the history of this remarkable institution and reveal the life and works of 47 of the greatest Alpha boys. The culmination of many combined years of work, using musicians' personal recollections and a wealth of rarely seen photographs, Alpha Boys' School: Cradle of Jamaican Music will take you to the heart of the Jamaica music story. Whether you are a lover of original ska and rocksteady, roots, dub, dancehall and beyond, these stories will take you deeper into the music. If you enjoyed Solid Foundation: An Oral History of Reggae by David Katz, Bass Culture by Lloyd Bradley or So Much Things To Say: The Oral History of Bob Marley by Roger Steffens, then this is definitely for you.




The Other Side of Envy


Book Description

From USA TODAY Bestselling Author, C. L. Stone, read The Other Side of Envy, the eighth book in The Academy Ghost Bird Series. Sang Sorenson dreams of what life might be like for her in the Academy, but joining isn't as easy as simply writing an exam or passing an interview. She'll need to pull the team together to get them on her side in order for it to work, which is harder than it sounds. The boys will do anything to protect her, which, for some, means keeping her out. But that's not all that's going on in Sang's complicated life. After a shocking revelation, Gabriel Coleman splinters himself off from everyone, avoiding not just his Academy team, but even going so far as to avoid Sang. Desperate to bring him back and get him on her side, Sang digs deep into his past to try to discover a way to reach out to him. His truth is riddled with tragic events, but with the help of Kota, Victor, Silas, Nathan, Luke and North, she might be able to reach out to him before envy and despair drag him too far down to be saved. The Academy, Deeply Bonded