Meet the Wise Ink Freshman Class of 2018

As a new year approached, Jennifer Bonner embraced college life and flourished as a visual artist. Childhood heart problems rarely clouded her thoughts. Then, unusual fatigue led to terrifying news. Without a heart transplant she would die soon. As she put it, ''The bomb dropped today.''

While she waited most of 1988 for a new heart, she lived. And as she relished each day, she wrote. Her diary entries frankly address love, sex, friendship, art, and mortality, and reveal a young woman determined to thrive.

Poignant, irreverent, and bold, The Wait is Jen's diary, framed by the stories of her remarkable family and heart surgery advances. Steady medical progress brought her two decades of life and hope for decades more. But Jen's continued survival depended on chance events that she and her doctors couldn't control.

For fifteen years, Mike Rognlien has learned from some of the best (and some of the . . . not best) leaders in the corporate world. His tenure at Facebook, Microsoft, and numerous other companies taught him valuable lessons in responsibility, accountability, and the fine art of T-shirt printing. And now, with a mix of wisdom and rueful humor, he’s sharing his accumulated life lessons with you. Yes, you.

Because if you want your company to be the best it can be, that’s how you have to start thinking of it: as your company. You have to fully understand the role you play, the impact your performance has on your fellow employees, and the unconscious biases that can control your thoughts and decisions. You have to be sure that this is what makes you happy, and prepared to fail spectacularly badly.

“Take these poems in and let them break something wild open in you.” —from the foreword by Danez Smith, author of Don’t Call Us Dead and finalist for the National Book Award

The Bold, Untold North is a collection of writing by fifth-grade students from John A. Johnson Elementary, who spent months crafting these original poems with guidance from the Mid-Continent Oceanographic Institute. Six hours of lesson plans are included, allowing other classrooms to craft their own wild, wonderful verses.
From lady slippers to flying squirrels to lynx to wolves, The Bold, Untold North captures the wildlife of Minnesota from the unique, joyful perspectives of these budding young writers.

 

A snake teaches a raccoon the value of cooperation. A swallow and an oak tree share a friendship across distance and time. An opossum and the moon tell each other stories through the night. Within this book are tales of birds and beasts, sun and
moon, plants and fish—all with wisdom to share and lessons to impart.

Whether you’re young or old, these tales—printed in both Spanish and English—will stir your imagination and feed your soul. Inspired by the stories Graycloud’s (Mixtli’s) grandmother told him when he was just a boy, they’re given a new voice here for the next generation.

 

 

“You are pregnant.”
 
With those three words, eighteen-year- old Chris Bauer was faced with one of life’s most agonizing decisions—how to handle an unplanned pregnancy.  Should she become a mother, terminate her pregnancy, or give her baby up for adoption?  She ultimately chose the latter course, entrusting her newborn daughter to another family. But life wasn’t done with them.
 
Those Three Words tells the story of how Chris and her daughter reconnected after eighteen years, rekindling their relationship and bond despite time and distance. This is a bittersweet book full of struggle and overwhelming love. The bond of family can overcome any obstacle, no matter how big, and this story of birth mother and daughter is a beautiful, moving confirmation of that fact.
Those Three Words is a powerful testament to parental love in all its forms.

When LaBelle Nambangi immigrated to America from Cameroon, one thing remained a constant among the vast cultural changes she experienced: the patriarchy. She was dismayed by the ingrained sexism present in both countries, but also inspired by the women she met on either side of the Atlantic who defied their cultures and succeeded despite the societal biases that attempted to hold them down.

Women Who Soar shares the stories of these inspirational figures—leaders, entrepreneurs, visionaries, mothers, sisters—and their fight against patriarchal culture.  No matter the country, no matter the society, the battle of breaking the patriarchy is far from over. But
when women band together, there’s no height they can’t reach.

In the summer of ‘81, Jack has graduated from high school and is headed out
on one last road trip with his friends Curtis and Bruce. He can’t imagine how out of
control things are about to get.

When Curtis shoots an old man who catches the boys trespassing, Bruce decides to go home and face the music—but even though Jack knows he may be throwing his life away, he can’t bring himself to abandon his best friend. He and Curtis flee north, directionless and hopeless . . . until the ghost of Elvis appears in Jack’s dreams, and things take a turn for the bizarre.

If the two boys head to Graceland, promises the King, all will be made right for them. And so, in one last quest for salvation, Jack and Curtis turn toward Memphis— leaving cops, preachers, and all manner of strangeness in their wake.

 

Meet Charley and Otis, two lovable bulldogs with two very different personalities!

Even in their dreams, Charley and Otis are different!

Otis just likes having fun, but Charley wants her dreams to make a difference. She pictures herself as a pilot, a doctor, a business owner. Otis may scoff, but Charley knows that with hard work and enthusiasm, even the most daring of dreams are possible!

 

 

An anthem for working mothers everywhere, My Favorite Job Is You takes you on a mother's journey in finding her balance between motherhood and a career. This light-hearted poem serves as encouragement to all mothers rocking their babies to sleep at night and waking up before the sun to do it all over again. Ashley Flynn writes the perfect story to communicate no matter what job Mom does when they’re away, being home is their favorite job!


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