Cobra Kai: The Karate Kid Saga Continues - Johnny's Story


Book Description

Is Johnny really the good guy? See The Karate Kid in a whole new light in this retelling through the eyes of Johnny Lawrence, two-time All Valley Tournament Champion. Summer, 1984. Senior year is about to start and Johnny and the rest of the Cobra Kai rule the school. But, when the new kid makes moves on the girl that broke Johnny's heart, he vows to settle the score and win back her love. Or so goes the story Sensei Lawrence tells his students nearly 35 years later. Based on the hit YouTube Original series Cobra Kai, go back and find out Johnny's side of the story!




The Karate Kid Saga Continues: Johnny's Story #3


Book Description

Johnny struggles not to mess with Daniel as he trains for the upcoming All Valley Karate Tournament, but he takes a risk when he has dinner with Ali and her family. Aligned to Common Core Standards and correlated to state standards. Graphic Novels is an imprint of Spotlight a division of ABDO.




Infinite Kung Fu


Book Description

One of YALSA's Top 10 Great Graphic Novels for Teens! Named one of the best graphic novels of the year by Publishers Weekly, Heeb Magazine, io9, CNN, Comic Book Resources, Complex, USA Today, Forbidden Planet International, IFC, ComicsAlliance, Paste, and Graphic Novel Reporter! "Pure awesome. From ôber-violent kung fu fight sequences and zombie stalkers, to blood-drenched battles among armies and supernatural beings, this book is a testament to just how cool a well-drawn and well-written martial-arts action epic can be. If you pick up only one comic book or graphic novel... let this be the one."-- USA Today "Over 450 pages of stunningly choreographed fight scenes of epic imagination. Kagan McLeod is a master cartoonist."-- CNN GeekOut "The best elements of horror, Westerns, and of course, kung fu films are seamlessly interlaced to tell a highly imaginative tale. You couldn't sandblast the smile from my face as I read this."-- Ain't It Cool News "INFINITE KUNG FU is glorious and deranged in the way that all comics should be."-- Warren Ellis, author of Transmetropolitan, Red, and Crooked Little Vein "The great strength of this graphic novel is its originality, but equally impressive are McLeod's extraordinary illustrations and compelling narrative."-- Publishers Weekly (starred review) "Stunningly gorgeous... McLeod's unique brand of comic book wizardry practically oozes out of every panel as his art delivers animated stylings with a hip-hop flavor."-- Complex "All of that buzz and hype was completely on the money... It's like the best kung-fu movie you've ever seen, unimpaired by time or budget constraints."-- Comic Book Resources "A kung fu epic for people who don't buy into the kung fu cult."-- Royal Flush Infinite Kung Fu walks you through familiar corridors in the house of martial mayhem, but dares to take you where kung fu is afraid to go! The Martial World is ruled by a mysterious emperor whose kung fu armies are each headed by a cruel and highly skilled master. Here, where the way of the fist is a way of life, ex-soldier Yang Lei Kung must infiltrate the emperor's forces and stop him from destroying all life on the planet. Allegiances are blurred as techniques are perfected, and Lei Kung becomes less certain who's friend and who's foe in each chapter! Fists fly, limbs are lost and blood vessels burst in this tale of furious rivals, supernatural masters, walking corpses, and above all, raging kung fu!




Masters of Doom


Book Description

Masters of Doom is the amazing true story of the Lennon and McCartney of video games: John Carmack and John Romero. Together, they ruled big business. They transformed popular culture. And they provoked a national controversy. More than anything, they lived a unique and rollicking American Dream, escaping the broken homes of their youth to co-create the most notoriously successful game franchises in history—Doom and Quake—until the games they made tore them apart. Americans spend more money on video games than on movie tickets. Masters of Doom is the first book to chronicle this industry’s greatest story, written by one of the medium’s leading observers. David Kushner takes readers inside the rags-to-riches adventure of two rebellious entrepreneurs who came of age to shape a generation. The vivid portrait reveals why their games are so violent and why their immersion in their brilliantly designed fantasy worlds offered them solace. And it shows how they channeled their fury and imagination into products that are a formative influence on our culture, from MTV to the Internet to Columbine. This is a story of friendship and betrayal, commerce and artistry—a powerful and compassionate account of what it’s like to be young, driven, and wildly creative. “To my taste, the greatest American myth of cosmogenesis features the maladjusted, antisocial, genius teenage boy who, in the insular laboratory of his own bedroom, invents the universe from scratch. Masters of Doom is a particularly inspired rendition. Dave Kushner chronicles the saga of video game virtuosi Carmack and Romero with terrific brio. This is a page-turning, mythopoeic cyber-soap opera about two glamorous geek geniuses—and it should be read while scarfing down pepperoni pizza and swilling Diet Coke, with Queens of the Stone Age cranked up all the way.”—Mark Leyner, author of I Smell Esther Williams




The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole, Aged 13 3/4


Book Description

Adrian Mole's first love, Pandora, has left him; a neighbor, Mr. Lucas, appears to be seducing his mother (and what does that mean for his father?); the BBC refuses to publish his poetry; and his dog swallowed the tree off the Christmas cake. "Why" indeed.




Shantaram


Book Description

Based on his own extraordinary life, Gregory David Roberts’ Shantaram is a mesmerizing novel about a man on the run who becomes entangled within the underworld of contemporary Bombay—the basis for the Apple + TV series starring Charlie Hunnam. “It took me a long time and most of the world to learn what I know about love and fate and the choices we make, but the heart of it came to me in an instant, while I was chained to a wall and being tortured.” An escaped convict with a false passport, Lin flees maximum security prison in Australia for the teeming streets of Bombay, where he can disappear. Accompanied by his guide and faithful friend, Prabaker, the two enter the city’s hidden society of beggars and gangsters, prostitutes and holy men, soldiers and actors, and Indians and exiles from other countries, who seek in this remarkable place what they cannot find elsewhere. As a hunted man without a home, family, or identity, Lin searches for love and meaning while running a clinic in one of the city’s poorest slums, and serving his apprenticeship in the dark arts of the Bombay mafia. The search leads him to war, prison torture, murder, and a series of enigmatic and bloody betrayals. The keys to unlock the mysteries and intrigues that bind Lin are held by two people. The first is Khader Khan: mafia godfather, criminal-philosopher-saint, and mentor to Lin in the underworld of the Golden City. The second is Karla: elusive, dangerous, and beautiful, whose passions are driven by secrets that torment her and yet give her a terrible power. Burning slums and five-star hotels, romantic love and prison agonies, criminal wars and Bollywood films, spiritual gurus and mujaheddin guerrillas—this huge novel has the world of human experience in its reach, and a passionate love for India at its heart.




A Taste of Power


Book Description

"Profound, funny ... wild and moving ... heartbreaking accounts of a lonely black childhood.... Brown sees racial oppression in national and global context; every political word she writes pounds home a lesson about commerce, money, racism, communism, you name it ... A glowing achievement.” —Los Angeles Times Elaine Brown assumed her role as the first and only female leader of the Black Panther Party with these words: “I have all the guns and all the money. I can withstand challenge from without and from within. Am I right, Comrade?” It was August 1974. From a small Oakland-based cell, the Panthers had grown to become a revolutionary national organization, mobilizing black communities and white supporters across the country—but relentlessly targeted by the police and the FBI, and increasingly riven by violence and strife within. How Brown came to a position of power over this paramilitary, male-dominated organization, and what she did with that power, is a riveting, unsparing account of self-discovery. Brown’s story begins with growing up in an impoverished neighborhood in Philadelphia and attending a predominantly white school, where she first sensed what it meant to be black, female, and poor in America. She describes her political awakening during the bohemian years of her adolescence, and her time as a foot soldier for the Panthers, who seemed to hold the promise of redemption. And she tells of her ascent into the upper echelons of Panther leadership: her tumultuous relationship with the charismatic Huey Newton, who would become her lover and her nemesis; her experience with the male power rituals that would sow the seeds of the party's demise; and the scars that she both suffered and inflicted in that era’s paradigm-shifting clashes of sex and power. Stunning, lyrical, and acute, this is the indelible testimony of a black woman’s battle to define herself.




Chasing the Dragon


Book Description

In Chasing the Dragon, New York Times Bestselling writer Denton J. Tipton explores a dark fantasy world ravaged by the rampant abuse of a drug made from the blood of dragons. For fans of The Witcher and Breaking Bad. In Chasing the Dragon, New York Times Bestselling writer Denton J. Tipton and celebrated painter menton3explore a dark fantasy world ravaged by the rampant abuse of a drug made from the blood of dragons. When two young slaves discover a terrible secret that could change the course of the world, will a meek alchemist’s apprentice and a drug-addled concubine survive long outside their cages? For fans of The Witcher and Breaking Bad.




John Cappas


Book Description

This is the story of the Chicago criminal legend, John Louis Cappas. To crime buffs, Tall Money is a hellacious and felonious Chicago epic. To younger readers, it's a cautionary and wild tale of drugs and treachery aimed at a generation steeped in bling, casual violence, materialism and coming-of-age incarceration. Tall Money is Risky Business gone terribly, terribly awry. "The soul I once thought John had lost is now seen in all of its human glory. The world of crime and punishment does not produce success stories with any regularity or certainty. I consider John Cappas to be a success story and I am now proud to say I know him well. The best part of my job is when the faith that is placed in another person proves to be justified. John has achieved in ways I never imagined and, I think, will do so even more in the future." Charles P. Kocoras United States District Judge June 26, 2012




The Films of John G. Avildsen


Book Description

The life and work of American director John G. Avildsen is thoroughly examined in this detailed filmography and critical study. Each of the most significant films made by the Oscar-winning Avildsen is given a separate chapter, including such critical successes as Joe and Save the Tiger, and box-office blockbusters Rocky and its sequels and the Karate Kid series. The authors' observations on these and other titles--some well known, others less familiar--are enhanced by extensive production notes, and by commentary from John G. Avildsen himself. Cinema historian Jean Bodon of Sam Houston State University provides a foreword.