Fourteen-year-old Ishmael Leseur is certain that his name is the cause of his unhappy school life as the victim of the worst bully in his class, but when a new boy arrives, he shows Ishmael that things could be different.

A novel on Ishmael, a gorilla-philosopher. He advertises for a pupil interested in saving the world and Julie Gerchak, 12, answers. The lessons center on the educational system, which according to Ishmael is not really doing its job.When Ishmael places an advertisement for pupils with "an earnest desire to save the world," he does not expect a child to answer him. But twelve-year-old Julie Gerchak is undaunted by Ishmael's reluctance to teach someone...

Ishmael Jones is someone who can't afford to be noticed, someone who lives under the radar, who drives on the dark side of the road. He's employed to search out secrets, investigate mysteries and shine a light in dark places. Sometimes he kills people. Invited by his employer, the enigmatic Colonel, to join him and his family for Christmas, Ishmael arrives at the grand but isolated Belcourt Manor in the midst of a blizzard to find that the Colonel...

"One night in 2014, two readers named Logan Smalley and Stephanie Kent discussed their favorite literary opening lines. "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times," one suggested. "All of this happened, more or less," the other pointed out. And then, one phrase came immediately to mind: "Call Me Ishmael." As they talked more, the pair wondered what would happen if they invited readers to call a phone number and ask them to leave a voicemail...

"This landmark anthology brings together for the first time more than three hundred poems by over seventy African American poets, including Gwendolyn Brooks, Robert Hayden, Ai, Toi Derricotte, Rita Dove, Elizabeth Alexander, Natasha Tretheway, Major Jackson, and Kevin Young. Angles of Ascent looks to the immediate past of contemporary African American poetry, including the influence of Modernism in the 1950's and the Black Arts Movement of the 1960's,...