Among the ashes of a dying world, an agent of the Commandant finds a letter. It reads: Burn before reading. Thus begins an unlikely correspondence between two rival agents hellbent on securing the best possible future for their warring factions. Now, what began as a taunt, a battlefield boast, grows into something more. Something epic. Something romantic. Something that could change the past and the future. Except the discovery of their bond would...

The changing needs of aging parents impact a family gathering during which Abby Whitshank relates how her husband and she fell in love during the summer of 1959 and shares decades of marriage impacted by children and long-held secrets.

We shall all, in the end, be led to where we belong. We shall all, in the end, find our way home. In a time of war, a mysterious child appears at the monastery of the Order of the Chronicles of Sorrowing. Gentle Brother Edik finds the girl, Beatryce, curled in a stall, wracked with fever, coated in dirt and blood, and holding fast to the ear of Answelica the goat. As the monk nurses Beatryce to health, he uncovers her dangerous secret, one that imperils...

Gooney Bird Greene: A most unusual new student who loves to be the center of attention entertains her teacher and fellow second graders by telling absolutely true stories about herself, including how she got her name. Gooney Bird and the room mother: Gooney Bird Greene, an entertaining second grader who introduces challenging vocabulary words and tells "absolutely true" stories, finds a surprise room mother to bring cupcakes for the Thanksgiving...

When Max cuts out words from magazines and newspapers, collecting them the way his brothers collect stamps and coins, they all learn about words, sentences, and storytelling.

Pi Patel, the son of a zookeeper, has a fervent love of stories and practices not only his native Hinduism but also Christianity and Islam. When Pi is sixteen, his family and their zoo animals emigrate from India to North America aboard a Japanese cargo ship. The ship sinks and Pi finds himeself in a lifeboat, his only companions a hyena, an orangutan, a wounded zebra and a 450-pound Bengal tiger. Soon the tiger has dispatched all but Pi. Can Pi and...

As a tradition, on the night before Christmas, David Adley and a group of men gather together at the local gentlemen's club to tell stories. This time, Dr. McCarron tells the story of a patient who, determined to give birth to her child, goes to extreme measures.

Cornered by the wicked Erlking on the night of the wild hunt, Serilda claims that she can spin straw into gold, a lie that saves her life but lands her in the Erlking's castle on the next full moon with a room full of straw and an impossible task. Fortunately, Gild, an impish (and attractive) poltergeist shows up, offering help in exchange for Serilda's golden necklace. Gild easily fulfills his end of the bargain and does so a second time for Serilda's...