The True Naomi Story

It's every girl's dream: to be catapulted from a boring, everyday existence into a world of fame, riches, adoring fans and critical acclaim. This fabulous and page-turning novel follows the path of the loveable Naomi, from her days waiting tables in New York's East Village, to signing a record deal and playing packed stadium gigs. It's as if one day she woke up to find the dreams she had as a shy, gawky teenager from nerdsville had all come true at once... But stardom isn't always all it's cracked up to be. Soon Naomi's adrift in a world where lovers are players, where friends quickly become enemies, and where you never quite know just who you can trust. Can Naomi learn to play the game of fame before her star comes tumbling down?

It's every girl's dream: to be catapulted from a boring, everyday existence into a world of fame, riches, adoring fans and critical acclaim. This fabulous and page-turning novel follows the path of the loveable Naomi, from her days waiting tables in New York's East Village, to signing a record deal and playing packed stadium gigs. It's as if one day she woke up to find the dreams she had as a shy, gawky teenager from nerdsville had all come true at once... But stardom isn't always all it's cracked up to be. Soon Naomi's adrift in a world where lovers are players, where friends quickly become enemies, and where you never quite know just who you can trust. Can Naomi learn to play the game of fame before her star comes tumbling down?

A hilarious story of one man’s obsession and a brilliant reckoning of a nation’s cultural confusion—from a master Japanese novelist. When twenty-eight-year-old Joji first lays eyes upon the teenage waitress Naomi, he is instantly smitten by her exotic, almost Western appearance. Determined to transform her into the perfect wife and to whisk her away from the seamy underbelly of post-World War I Tokyo, Joji adopts and ultimately marries Naomi, paying for English and music lessons that promise to mold her into his ideal companion. But as she grows older, Joji discovers that Naomi is far from the naïve girl of his fantasies. And, in Tanizaki’s masterpiece of lurid obsession, passion quickly descends into comically helpless masochism.

The Instant New York Times bestseller A TODAY Show Read with Jenna Book Club Pick A captivating debut novel about the tangled fates of two best friends and daughters of the Italian mafia, and a coming-of-age story of twentieth-century Brooklyn itself. Two daughters. Two families. One inescapable fate. Sofia Colicchio is a free spirit, loud and untamed. Antonia Russo is thoughtful, ever observing the world around her. Best friends since birth, they live in the shadow of their fathers’ unspoken community: the Family. Sunday dinners gather them each week to feast, discuss business, and renew the intoxicating bond borne of blood and love. But the disappearance of Antonia’s father drives a whisper-thin wedge between the girls as they grow into women, wives, mothers, and leaders. Their hearts expand in tandem with Red Hook and Brooklyn around them, as they push against the boundaries of society’s expectations and fight to preserve their complex but life-sustaining friendship. One fateful night their loyalty to each other and the Family will be tested. Only one of them can pull the trigger before it’s too late.

A reissue of Pam Munoz Ryan's bestselling backlist with a distinctive author treatment and new cover art by Raul Colon.Naomi Soledad Leon Outlaw has had a lot to contend with in her young life, her name for one. Then there are her clothes (sewn in polyester by Gram), her difficulty speaking up, and her status at school as "nobody special." But according to Gram, most problems can be overcome with positive thinking. And with Gram and her little brother, Owen, Naomi's life at Avocado Acres Trailer Rancho in California is happy and peaceful...until their mother reappears after seven years of being gone, stirring up all sorts of questions and challenging Naomi to discover and proclaim who she really is.

Naomi Jacobs went to sleep one night in 2008 as a 32-year-old mother, and woke up the next morning believing she was a fifteen-year-old school girl. She did not recognise the house she woke up in, though it was hers, nor her ten-year-old son, Leo. As far as she was concerned, she was in 1992 when John Major was Prime Minister, before the world had been blessed with mobile phones, DVDs or reality TV. She didn't know it, but she had dissociative amnesia. With the help of her personal diaries and those close to her, Naomi set about piecing together as much as she could of her missing years. What she discovered shocked her. As she dug deeper, she began to experience disturbing flashbacks of traumatic events. Would Naomi ever find her way back to the person she once was? Did she even want to? Funny and moving, Forgotten Girl is ultimately an inspiring story of loss and redemption, and the power of second chances.

An ambulance screams through the Jerusalem’s quiet streets. Inside, a toddler fights for his life, his parents nowhere to be found. With profound shock, an emergency room doctor realizes that the child’s mother—a young American—is already at the hospital, sitting at the bedside of yet another child with traumatic injuries. Devoutly reciting Pslams, she stubbornly refuses to answer any questions, cautioning her children to say nothing. Brought in to investigate, Jerusalem detective Bina Tzedek-herself a young mother- carefully peels back layer after layer of secrets and lies, following a dark, winding path through Jerusalem’s Old City, kabbalists, mystical ancient texts, and terrifying cult rituals, until she comes face to face with the horrifying truth which has held a young American family captive. Based on true events, The Devil in Jerusalem from internationally bestselling author Naomi Ragen is an eye-opening look at the dangerous predators lurking around the watering holes of those who come seeking spiritual enlightenment.

In the Old Testament we read God s word as it was spoken to his people Israel. Today, thousands of years later, we hear in these thirty-nine books his inspired and authoritative message for us. These twin convictions, shared by all of the contributors to The New International Commentary on the Old Testament, define the goal of this ambitious series of commentaries. For those many modern readers who find the Old Testament to be strange and foreign soil, the NICOT series serves as an authoritative guide bridging the cultural gap between today s world and the world of ancient Israel. Each NICOT volume aims to help us hear God s word as clearly as possible. Scholars, pastors, and serious Bible students will welcome the fresh light that this commentary series casts on ancient yet familiar biblical texts. The contributors apply their proven scholarly expertise and wide experience as teachers to illumine our understanding of the Old Testament. As gifted writers, they present the results of the best recent research in an interesting manner. Each commentary opens with an introduction to the biblical book, looking especially at questions concerning its background, authorship, date, purpose, structure, and theology. A select bibliography also points readers to resources for their own study. The author s own translation from the original Hebrew forms the basis of the commentary proper. Verse-by-verse comments nicely balance in-depth discussions of technical matters textual criticism, critical problems, and so on with exposition of the biblical writer s theology and its implications for the life of faith today.

In New York in the 1940s, a boy tries to befriend a girl traumatized by Nazi brutality in France.

Sharon Sholl is an ordinary girl growing up in America. She meets an ordinary young man, Mark Main, two weeks before her sixteenth birthday, who blows to pieces her little world, she says of him. An American Girl is a relational journey, which, no matter how you look at it, is a love story. Sharon's love story is about her extraordinary life with Mark whom she met in 1968, four weeks before he was to leave for Vietnam. From the moment she was born, she also traveled a relational journey with the God of the universe, the Creator God. She didn't pursue that relationship seriously until in her early forties, she and Mark came to a point in their marriage when it seemed as though they had hit rock bottom. Sharon presents the beautiful, the distressing, and the unattractive of her journey of nearly seventy years. Perhaps as you read about this ordinary American girl, you will identify with some of the challenges but mostly with the joys one encounters in this life on earth, joys that are available to all.