Showing results by narrator "Helen Laser" in All Categories

Land a lighthouse deal to catapult your startup over the chasm of early adopters and into the land of new opportunities with trillion-dollar companies. Navigate to the Lighthouse explains how to do that, using strategic business development as a competitive advantage. When you approach the chasm and look at lighthouses shining on potential trajectory-changing deals, two questions likely cross your mind: Should I invest the time and resources to pursue what seem like impossible deals? If so, what’s the path to get there—strategically and tactically? Kurt Davis has the answers.

In this tale inspired by Cinderella (and for fans of The Last Airbender), Ellie is a firemage in a kingdom of water and windmages. Her worried stepmother warns her against showing off her powers, but when everyone at the king’s ball is in danger from a dragon, Ellie can no longer keep them secret. She works together with another firemage to save the entire kingdom.

A sportscaster and a kindergarten teacher vie for the last copy of a bestselling dessert cookbook. To prove how badly they want it, each tries to outdo the other with meme-like, dessert-inspired lines.

The dark side of the gig economy (Uber, Airbnb, etc.) and how to make it equitable for the users and workers most exploited.

Annae, a brilliant graduate student in psychiatric magic and survivor of academic abuse, can't stop reading people's minds. This is how she protects herself—using her abilities to know exactly how her colleagues view her—how she escapes the torturous experience of her own existence. When Annae moves to England to rebuild her life and finish her studies under the seminal magician Marec Gorski—infamous for bringing to life a homunculus made from his unwanted better self—she sees, inside his head, a man who is both a destructive force to everyone around him, and her mirror image.

Sixth grade is supposed to be perfect. Shannon’s got a sure spot in the in-crowd called The Group, and her best friend is their leader, Jen, the most popular girl in school. But the rules are always changing, and Shannon has to scramble to keep up. She never knows which TV shows are cool, what songs to listen to, and who she’s allowed to talk to. Who makes these rules, anyway? And does Shannon have to follow them?

Robin Lindstrom spent her first year as a young widow cocooned in the safe haven of the Minnesota farmhouse she’d once shared with Gabe, the love of her life—the man she thought she’d be with ’til the end. But her world is turned upside down when she receives an email informing her that her late husband has enrolled her in a dating app. The subscription lasts 12 months; use it!, Gabe’s message-from-the-grave reads. I don’t like the thought of you being alone. If you won’t do it for yourself, do it as a favor to me. Please.

By day, punk-rock runaway Charity Blake struggles through a stream of dead-end jobs and the haunting memories of her past. But at night she is the Harpy, sprouting wings with black feathers, and claws made for tearing the flesh of her prey. Having survived a lifetime of abuse and torment from a sadistic man who broke her spirit, Charity's physical manifestation of her grief and anger allows her to hunt down those like her abuser. Only this time, Charity isn't a helpless little girl praying for things to end. Now she is the monster, and hell hath no fury like a harpy scorned.

Summer after summer is the hottest on record. People’s homes are flooding, burning, blowing away. We live with the loss, pain, and grief of what’s happened, and anxiety for what might happen next, as the systems in which we live are increasingly strained. Lessons from the Climate Anxiety Counseling Booth addresses our collective concerns with empathy, grace, and practical strategies to help us all envision a viable future.

Finley and Arthur are back at boarding school and neither quite knows where the other stands—are they a couple? Are they not a couple? What does one magical Christmas Eve kiss in Oklahoma mean for their relationship status? This confusion isn't helped by the re-entry of old enemies into their school lives, especially ones that may or may not be crushing on Arthur. Finley is at a loss when navigating the complexities of her new (maybe) relationship, which could very well turn into love. . . if she doesn't blow it.

Train-wreck antihero Charity Blake thrives at being a winged avenger, but exacting vengeance takes as much from her as it gives. To retain the humanity she’s fought tooth and claw to keep, she tries to walk away from her monstrous side for good. With no sense of purpose and a lifetime of failures haunting her, Charity struggles not to fall back into old, murderous habits. Until she meets a little girl who is more broken than herself.

A grand-scale nuclear war between the US and the United Korean Empire leads to the contamination of Earth’s atmosphere, leaving the planet uninhabitable. Piper, a microbiology intern working under the world-renowned Dr. Landry, is surprised when she is selected to join a last-ditch effort to colonize a planet within a nearby solar system in the Goldilocks Zone.

Are you ready to listen about daring deeds and world-changing events? Meet the American Trailblazers, diverse historical and modern figures who accomplished incredible things. History books for kids age 9-12 should include a range of people and stories - here you'll learn about the greats in sports, civil rights, art, science, and more.

The calf plopped to the ground, looking as grumpy as she felt. She had energy to spare, but nowhere to run and no one to play with. She was trapped! Her mom let out an amused snort, and then licked her little snout clean. Suddenly, there was a commotion in the barn, and a loud braying sent her scurrying under her mother, cowering and shaking.

Victor and Zoey are getting old—well, older—and it’s beginning to be a real problem. Best friends since college they have been through thick and thin, poor and poorer, drunk and drunker throughout their twenties in New York. Victor has built a successful career writing celebrity profiles for one of the last glossy magazines left standing, and Zoey is working for a fashion startup that is desperately trying to figure out how to monetize influencers, but has definitely figured out how to create a toxic work culture.

Kat Wallace has her hands full: three lively children, a floundering marriage to a diplomat who is barely ever home, a commission as an officer in the Bosch Pirate Force, and a driving desire to destroy her past enslaver. None of those things has kept her from her mission to eliminate human trafficking on New Earth.

All Kat wants to do is run her own life. But it seems as though everyone else has competing plans for her. Her commander of the Bosch Pirate Force wants her to lead. Her husband wants her to abandon her pirating ways. Her mother-in-law wouldn’t mind seeing her dead. And her past enslaver, Rob Abernathy, wants her back. As listeners of A Merry Life know, Kat is fearless, principled, and determined to settle old scores. When a face from her past spurs a dangerous mission, she jumps at the opportunity, unaware that it will have explosive results.

Penny Crenshaw’s divorce and her husband’s swift remarriage to a much younger woman have been hot topics around Atlanta’s social circles. After a year of enduring the cruel gossip, Penny leaps from the frying pan into the fire by heading back to Kentucky to settle her grandmother’s estate. Reluctantly, Penny travels to her hometown of Camden, knowing she will be stirring up all the ghosts from her turbulent childhood. But not all her problems stem from a dysfunctional family. One of Penny’s greatest sources of pain lives just down the street: Bradley Hitchens.

Charity's half-baked, though valiant, attempt to save Rose from herself failed on a colossal level. Now she's alone again, shunned by the other Harpies and determined to leave her bloody past behind. Though she aches for the safety of an ordinary life, she struggles to fit into the monotony of one. And just when her insipid routine threatens to plunge her back into bad habits—bad habits come looking for her.

This powerful story is told from the collective perspective of the children who were rescued from Czechoslovakia on the eve of World War II, as Hitler's campaign of hatred toward Jews and political dissidents took hold. The narrative starts in 1938 and follows the children as they journey to foster families in England for the duration of the war, return to Prague afterward in an unsuccessful search for their parents, and eventually connect with Nicholas Winton, a British former stockbroker who was instrumental in bringing them to safety.