In 2009, a group of high school students come across the documentary Invisible Children. A documentary about child soldiers in Uganda, the trauma they experience, and the terror they face against a man named [name_m]Joseph[/name_m] Kony’s regime. They decide to start a club on campus to advocate for the group, fundraise, and spread the world of [name_m]Joseph[/name_m] Kony’s child army. They hold many events to raise money, even bringing in the organization to show the film to the entire school. They are discouraged as they work tirelessly for years trying get to people involved and caring about a cause they care so deeply about.
Suddenly in 2012, Kony is all over the news and #kony2012 is spreading all across social media. The organization the students once cared so much about is the limelight, for good and bad reasons. The hope is rekindling for the group as campus held worked to hold rallies and get the international world to recognize Kony’s child soldiers. Invisible Children, the organization, is thrown into turmoil as their cause goes viral. Scrutiny leads to a mental breakdown of a founder of the organization. The world is watching and still nothing is being done. Some ask was it even real in the first place?
Lost Causes is a true story about a viral sensation, real trauma, and trying to do the right thing in a world that never stops looking for the next story.
Next title: Booked for Broke
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Booked For Broke
(Be warned, this is a bit of a stretch)
Words have many meanings. They’re powerful things, but what if there was a world in which the most powerful weapon a person could have was a dictionary?
Twin sisters [name_f]Pearl[/name_f] and [name_u]Ruby[/name_u] think they’ve stumbled into that very world. [name_f]Every[/name_f] word they can think of has power – it feels like a very weird sort of Scrabble game, almost – and the written word holds incredible amounts of it.
The problem is, this world survives off words written on paper, which happens to be very easy to destroy. And if someone found a way to destroy every book in Veritania, the world would simply collapse.
[name_f]Pearl[/name_f] and [name_u]Ruby[/name_u] have walked into an adventure much like some of their favourite books, with a slight catch. Their own fate, as well as the world around them, is held within the pages that make up this strange reality. And should they disappear, the twins will vanish with them.
Yeah, so that makes precisely no sense! But there you go. And sticking with the jewel theme:
Jewelled Jeopardy
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Jeweled Jeopardy
It’s hidden in plain sight. [name_m]Locker[/name_m] number 651 in the Brussels Midi train station. The combination’s there too, if you know where to look. The missing room- or rather, where to find it- is just there for the taking.
For [name_m]Peter[/name_m] Vladimirovna, the mission is personal. He is the descendent of the one and only [name_m]Peter[/name_m] the Great, the emperor who crafted the [name_f]Amber[/name_f] Room. It was supposed to be an instrument of peace, all six hundred square feet of glittering panelling and jeweled decadence. After the Germans stole and dismantled the room, it disappeared into air thinner than that hiding the lost Romanov family of which [name_m]Peter[/name_m] is a part. That is, until rumor got back to [name_f]Russia[/name_f] about Brussels and locker number 651. This is Peter’s chance to achieve the mission he was born for: taking back the Russian throne.
However, things are never as they seem. Peter’s mission is dangerous, and it turns out that he isn’t the only one who wants the [name_f]Amber[/name_f] Room, he isn’t the only one who knows where to find it, and worst of all, he isn’t the only one who wants to sit on the throne of [name_f]Russia[/name_f]. Now, there’s a target on his back and a race to the secrets of the train station. If he gets there first, he’ll restore his ancestors’ legacies and have a certain bid for the crown. If he doesn’t, it’s not just his future that’s in jeopardy; it’s his life.
In the Late [name_u]Night[/name_u]
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In The Late [name_u]Night[/name_u]
Middle child [name_f]Felicity[/name_f] isn’t particularly special at all, it seems. Her brother [name_m]Thomas[/name_m] is halfway through all the things [name_f]Felicity[/name_f] doesn’t understand that will lead to him becoming a doctor one day, her older sister [name_f]Lydia[/name_f] is top of the class in practically every subject and the six-year-old twins are six years old, and therefore loved by everyone they meet, apparently.
She’s not exactly bitter about the fact that everything she does is viewed as pointless in her parents’ eyes, or how they don’t really seem to think that what she likes to do is worth anything, but it’s not like it doesn’t hurt sometimes.
And then everything changes.
When [name_f]Gemma[/name_f] disappears in the middle of the night, [name_f]Felicity[/name_f] finds herself pushed even further into the background, but that seems to be a good thing. Because only in being invisible can she find a way to rescue her little sister.
Let the clock strike twelve, and let yourself disappear. It’s not exactly [name_f]Cinderella[/name_f], but [name_f]Felicity[/name_f] is going to take anything she can get at this point.
Next Title: The Unseen Trilogy
The Unseen Trilogy
When [name_f]Bella[/name_f] auditioned for the television show that was based off the book series, The Unseen Trilogy. Never in her wildest dreams did she think that the television show would rack up so many viewers and fans. [name_f]Nor[/name_f] did she think that it would go on to have a movie, let alone it’s own trilogy. But what [name_f]Bella[/name_f] didn’t put into account was that, as soon as she started the filming process for the show, paranormal activity started happen within her life.
She never thought that her life would flip from good to bad so fast. It was a change she was not excited about. The paranormal activity within her life got so bad to the point that she had to leave the show after one of the directors died when a whole set fell on him unexpectedly. [name_f]Bella[/name_f], then, decided to research The Unseen Trilogy book series. After doing so much research, she discovered that anyone who was the lead in the live action adaptions of the book series would inevitably become cursed.
What was [name_f]Bella[/name_f] to do now? [name_f]Live[/name_f] with this curse that was seemingly messing with her career? This truly was a unseen nightmare.
Next Title: [name_u]Love[/name_u] Letters For A Girl Named [name_u]Sage[/name_u]
[name_u]Love[/name_u] Letters For A Girl Named [name_u]Sage[/name_u]
When [name_f]Ella[/name_f] breaks the only rule her parents have ever really enforced, to never enter her older sister’s bedroom, it’s to discover a box filled with letters. The box itself is covered in little hearts, and [name_f]Ella[/name_f] is naturally curious. [name_f]Chloe[/name_f] was fourteen when she disappeared, three years ago. [name_f]Ella[/name_f] was only eight, meaning she didn’t know that many of her sister’s secrets.
Yet here she is, suddenly in position of two of Chloe’s biggest secrets. One, that she knew what was going to happen to her. And two, that she was writing love letters to a girl.
[name_f]Chloe[/name_f] never sent her letters, and [name_f]Ella[/name_f] can see why. She was scared that [name_u]Sage[/name_u] wouldn’t like her back, that [name_u]Sage[/name_u] would hate her. But from what Ella’s gleaned from the letters, it doesn’t sound like that would be what happened.
But it never could. And while [name_f]Ella[/name_f] tries to put together the story of what happened to [name_f]Chloe[/name_f] three years ago, she has to wonder. If she could carry out the wish in Chloe’s final letter to [name_u]Sage[/name_u], what would the girl who hates any mention of [name_f]Chloe[/name_f] [name_m]Johnson[/name_m] say about the letters?
Next Title: Timeswept
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Timeswept
[name_u]Mallory[/name_u] [name_m]Watson[/name_m], contrary to popular belief at her school, doesn’t actually resent having a genius for an older sister. [name_f]Clover[/name_f] is the best sister she could have asked for, and it’s even cooler when she tells [name_u]Mallory[/name_u] about her latest experiments.
Thing is, while [name_f]Clover[/name_f] lives up to her name in terms of how insanely lucky she is half the time, [name_u]Mallory[/name_u] also seems to live up to her name. Since it means ‘unfortunate’, is it much of a surprise that when she accidentally knocks one bottle over during a school trip to the labs [name_f]Clover[/name_f] works at it manages to not only catapult herself through time but half her classmates as well?
It falls to [name_u]Mallory[/name_u] and [name_f]Clover[/name_f] to work out how to save everyone else, made only slightly harder by the fact that [name_u]Mallory[/name_u] hasn’t exactly ended up in the most technological time period.
Next Title - Code: RADAR
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Code: RADAR
Since the start of the year, [name_m]Faraday[/name_m] Secondary School has been plagued with strange mysteries, ranging from boxes of books vanishing without a trace to fires popping up out of seemingly nowhere. It’s nothing the teachers can’t handle at first, but it doesn’t take long to get out of hand.
The disappearances start in [name_u]November[/name_u]. The missing student’s desk is always marked with one of four words, and the word is very predictable. ‘Radio’, ‘detection’, ‘and’ and ‘ranging’.
Still, the school doesn’t close. Students keep vanishing, but the teachers are adamant that they have things under control.
That lasts until [name_u]February[/name_u].
That’s when the first body shows up. And that’s finally when some students give up with waiting for the teachers to sort things out. If they don’t want more of their fellow students to die, then they’ll have to solve the case themselves.
The code might be predictable, but is anything else about the case as cut-and-dry as how the kidnapper gets their nickname?
Next Title: [name_u]Sun[/name_u] And [name_f]Moon[/name_f]
[name_u]Sun[/name_u] And [name_f]Moon[/name_f]
[name_u]Jo[/name_u] and [name_f]Millie[/name_f] were pure opposites. The sun and the moon. [name_m]Black[/name_m] and white. Everybody always asked how they could be twins but still be so different. [name_u]Jo[/name_u] was the daredevil, the one who climbed higher than the rest of the kids on the playground, the one who punched a kid in her class when he made her friend cry. [name_f]Millie[/name_f] was the quiet one, always reading or writing or drawing. They even looked different. [name_u]Jo[/name_u] had short strawberry blond hair and blue eyes, [name_f]Millie[/name_f] long brown locks and brown eyes. But when their little sister [name_u]Quinn[/name_u] disappeared, they had to word together to save her. Especially because her kidnapper seems to be after them next.
Two Hours
Two Hours
Dr. [name_u]Holly[/name_u] [name_m]Mills[/name_m] is about to deliver her first baby. As the baby makes its entrance into the world, [name_u]Holly[/name_u] notices immediately there is a problem. With her team of nurses and specialists, [name_u]Holly[/name_u] spend the next hour working to save the baby’s life.
[name_f]Anya[/name_f] [name_m]Harrison[/name_m] is the baby. Through the perspective of an older soul, Anya’s story of fighting for her new life is told. With no language between them, [name_u]Holly[/name_u] and [name_f]Anya[/name_f] must communicate in order to end the day with happiness.
When [name_m]Avett[/name_m] [name_u]Grove[/name_u] [name_m]Burns[/name_m]
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When [name_m]Avett[/name_m] [name_u]Grove[/name_u] [name_m]Burns[/name_m]
[name_m]Avett[/name_m] [name_u]Grove[/name_u] is a quiet street on the edge of town, exactly the kind of place that nobody really seems to care about. Until, that is, the entire street goes up in flames during the annual Halloween celebration in the town centre.
Nobody is hurt, thankfully, but from the ashes spring a lot of questions the townspeople are reluctant to answer.
Who started the fire in the first place?
Why target [name_m]Avett[/name_m] [name_u]Grove[/name_u] of all places?
How come they chose the one night nobody would be at home?
Are they planning to strike again?
And most importantly, what secrets are the residents of the street hiding that make them so desperate to keep all those questions unanswered?
Next: ’insert name here’ and The Book Garden
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[name_f]Janie[/name_f] and The Book Garden
On [name_m]Silas[/name_m] [name_f]Street[/name_f], there is a book.
On [name_m]Silas[/name_m] [name_f]Street[/name_f], there is another book.
On [name_m]Silas[/name_m] [name_f]Street[/name_f], a third book.
On [name_m]Silas[/name_m] [name_f]Street[/name_f], a pile of books,
On [name_m]Silas[/name_m] [name_f]Street[/name_f], a girl, bathed in moonlight.
On [name_m]Silas[/name_m] [name_f]Street[/name_f], a girl, match in hand.
On [name_m]Silas[/name_m] [name_f]Street[/name_f], the faint glow of struck fire.
On [name_m]Silas[/name_m] [name_f]Street[/name_f], the small smoke of fire, blown out.
On [name_m]Silas[/name_m] [name_f]Street[/name_f], a willow tree.
On [name_m]Silas[/name_m] [name_f]Street[/name_f], it bears witness to the crime,
one of extinguished matches and piles of books,
one of a brave girl and far too many secrets.
All at the book garden on [name_m]Silas[/name_m] [name_f]Street[/name_f].
Next: One too few
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One Too Few
Whenever [name_f]Lyra[/name_f] [name_u]Blake[/name_u] claims that she’s the oldest of four children, her classmates are always quick to point out that by what she’s told them she should have two younger siblings at school with her, but there’s only one. She, in turn, is lightning-fast to tell them that they’re idiots, and she did indeed have three younger siblings.
Did.
What [name_f]Lyra[/name_f] isn’t aware of is that her classmates are prepared to go much further than you’d expect to find out where the missing [name_u]Blake[/name_u] sibling is, and they’re not going to stop until they’ve solved the ‘mystery’. What her classmates aren’t aware of is that [name_f]Lyra[/name_f] uses the word ‘did’ for a very specific reason, one they’re all going to learn in the most unexpected way.
Next Title: The Undoing of Reality
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The Undoing of Reality
There is a stone house in the Basque Country. The arid winds of the region have worn the facade, and fells of grasses paint green a rich landscape of farmland and beauty so old, anyone would think the house’s secrets were buried underneath centuries of limestone.
They’d think that, wouldn’t they?
[name_m]Leo[/name_m] Molina has lived in that stone house for his whole life. His parents stay to that house, mostly, and he spends his days on the fell, tending sheep and spending time with his childhood best friend, [name_f]Lara[/name_f]. That is his life, as was the life of his father and grandfather before him.
[name_m]Leo[/name_m] does have that cliché restless streak, dreams of living under the bright gleam of the ever-enticing “out there” and of leaving behind his life and sheep for something new. Something interesting.
But when he comes down from the fell that day to find his mother gone, without a trace, [name_m]Leo[/name_m] starts to realize that there’s a lot more to this place than sheep and monotony. Everyone has secrets, from the people he knew best to the shadowy stranger he can swear he sees in the grass every night at dusk. The very strings that held the house in place, that held that Molinas to this land, to this world, disappear before Leo’s very eyes.
His world was never boring, and as his reality begins to crumble like a stone house in arid wind, [name_m]Leo[/name_m] knows that more than anyone.
Next Title: The Stars at Her Feet
The Stars at Her Feet
(this might be a stretch)
Three weeks.
That’s how long I have to live. That’s how long I have before I’m hanged. That’s how long I have to wait until I’m rescued. Not from the execution - rescued from life.
No one understood why I confessed to having dreams - I probably could have gotten a few more years before someone saw through my lies - but I didn’t want more time. I didn’t want to keep hearing the whispers at dawn, the whispers forged from shadow, that told of the wonders beyond the night. I didn’t want to keep dreaming of the day I can’t remember. All the dream would show me was blood and stone and silver, and the eyes of a snake, glowing in the ashes of destruction. I didn’t want to keep seeing the visions of myself at dusk, the visions of myself as a conqueror of night, the visions that brought me beyond the sunless sky, the visions of me with the stars at my feet. I didn’t want to keep waking up, knowing I’d been somewhere in the night but remembering only screams and fire and black phantom hands that brought burning and torture and death to their victims.
Soon I will die, and I’ll be free of the madness that consumes me every day and every night. I’ll be in dark, blissful oblivion.
If only I’d known the truth about me.
Next Title: How Hallie Mendoza’s Sandwich Ruined My Life
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How [name_f]Hallie[/name_f] Mendoza’s Sandwich Ruined [name_f]My[/name_f] Life
It all started with a sandwich. Yes, I know, that probably sounds pretty melodramatic, but really, it did. If [name_f]Hallie[/name_f] [name_u]Mendoza[/name_u] had brought a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, or maybe ham and cheese, everything would have been fine. But no. It had to be turkey and pickles. And if you think that sounds disgusting, you’re right.
I suppose it wasn’t really Hallie’s fault for eating it. It wasn’t even her mother’s fault for packing it. No, I like to blame the universe. That horrible CRUNCH of the pickles was the straw that broke the camel’s back—the camel being me. I’d already had a horrible day; all the thoughts of all the kids in school had seemed louder than ever. Their emotions were overwhelming. So when [name_f]Hallie[/name_f] crunched into that pickle sandwich, I snapped. And then, so did everything else.
Next title: When [name_f]Venus[/name_f] Died
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When [name_f]Venus[/name_f] Died
Ten year old [name_f]Aisling[/name_f] Lacina grew up listening to all kinds of crazy stories about what lived outside her planet from her older sisters, but the best ones were always Kiera’s tales of dragons living on [name_f]Venus[/name_f]. They were ridiculous, naturally, and yet [name_f]Aisling[/name_f] always wondered if that would really be where such majestic creatures lived.
Then three things happen all at once.
One – [name_f]Venus[/name_f] disappears without any sort of warning, and nobody can work out why.
Two – [name_f]Caitlin[/name_f] discovers a dragon in the back garden.
Three – [name_f]Aisling[/name_f] is taken from her bed in the middle of the night. Her room appears to have been torn apart, but nothing is missing, and it’s full of clues.
All of them point to this being linked to the appearance of the dragon and the disappearance of the planet, but the twins don’t understand why Aisling’s kidnapping is the only one like it, nor do they understand why this dragon insists on taking them both somewhere.
[name_f]Caitlin[/name_f] is sceptical, [name_f]Kiera[/name_f] is determined, and honestly, the dragon is kind of adorable in a ‘it could absolutely kill us both if it tried but it isn’t and it wants to help us’ sort of way. Together, they’re an unstoppable force… they think.
Next Title: Destiny’s Fall
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Destiny’s Fall
Life aboard the [name_f]Destiny[/name_f] has always provided little personal freedom. On a ship designed to travel the depths of space for thousands of generations, every move, every life has to be planned out in excruciating detail to ensure things are running smoothly.
[name_m]Marcus[/name_m] has never been bothered by the strict rules, in fact, he enjoyed the simplicity. When the ship’s security systems fail one day, leaving all the rules and regulations with no one left to enforce them, he is under the impression that most of his crewmates will feel the same. At first, it seems like he’s right: Life aboard the [name_f]Destiny[/name_f] just goes on, everyone is following the rules like they always did. But over time, the voices asking for a new form of power, a sort of government, become louder and louder until no one can ignore them any more, and [name_m]Marcus[/name_m] finds himself in the middle of a social experiment he didn’t ask for, with nowhere to hide and nowhere else to go.
next: Whispers of [name_f]Paradise[/name_f]
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whispers of paradise
“You’re intolerable. Yet I tolerate you. More than that; I love you”, [name_u]Sascha[/name_u] wasn’t looking at her. “You are awful. You’re everything. I can’t stand loving you. I would break is you left me. You’re like waves crushing against limestone, you wither me away. And I enjoy the feeling of being swept into you. I enjoy it even as I’m drowning. In your presence, in your body, in your beauty.”
“And you think loving you is easy? You’re like that poem: You are a church of broken glass and hallelujahs. You are hunted like every other holy thing”, [name_f]Miriam[/name_f] rubbed her face and looked up at him, framed by a halo of sun. “You fucking haunt me. Can’t you see that? [name_m]Even[/name_m] here. In paradise.”
“This”, he said. “ is only a whisper of paradise.”
next: april is the cruellest month
[name_f]April[/name_f] is the Cruellest Month
[name_f]Hope[/name_f] McCarter has not had a good life. But this past month has been the worst. On [name_f]April[/name_f] first, her mother disappeared. On [name_f]April[/name_f] fourth, her father went MIA. On [name_f]April[/name_f] sixteenth, her older sister was diagnosed with terminal cancer.
But these events, horrible as they might be, aren’t coincidences. When [name_f]Hope[/name_f] receives a mysterious letter detailing specific instructions, she and her younger brother, [name_u]Sean[/name_u], rush to follow them. After all, the letter gives them until [name_f]April[/name_f] thirtieth to finish. If they fail, their parents will never return, and their sister will never be cured.
Despite what [name_f]Hope[/name_f] and [name_u]Sean[/name_u] originally believe, however, the person behind all of their family’s misfortune might not be the villain. After all, everyone has a price. Someone just has to pay it.
Next: [name_u]Fire[/name_u] Droplets
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