200 K-pop obsessed Japanese girls at a language learning programme in Seoul; transliteration of who said what to who when and where in three languages. a handful of foreign guys? an ex-German with a chip on his shoulder? talking green elephant? minor riff on Yale & Seattle.==long description/ author's noteI wrote this book after 'Harajuku Sunday,' which covers 10 years in the lives of American expats in Tokyo, starting from first arrival as 22 year arts university grads to the first adult realities of being 30+. Wanting a completely different challenge, I focused on seven weeks rather than ten years, ensemble cast of 200 Japanese girls rather than half-a-dozen Westerners, Japanese abroad rather than foreigners in Japan, and a few supernatural/preternatural 'slipstream' elements rather than absolute naturalism.The book possibly has two appeals: at least a third is somewhat overwraught 'fuzzy focus' romanticism between two artists with lots of lush description, and then much of the rest is sort of analytical/descriptive about 'Germans in Seoul' or 'which Japanese personalities interplay with which German ones' or 'how does a tri-cultural classroom divide socially.' I admit the thought does go through my mind to make this a multimedia sort of thing, complete with maps, pictures, architectual sketches, but this is some leisure activity for decades from now.It is said that Japanese culture is inscrutable and the people are "strong but silent." Perhaps perversely, by the time you figure out what is said, it is already too late to formulate an appropriate response. THus, the Japan-expert is constantly on the fringes of things, able to participate on peripherally in a closed society, but filled with a perpetual nostalgia for the past.Enjoy! This ebook will be free for at least three or four months, and represents one person's contribution to the collective culture of the world. I can't guarantee I can keep it zero-cost forever! -MC

The young blue-body-painted girls of the Portland Poets' Collective merely want to rain-dance in peace--but the CDC has other plans. Science and mysticism collide in "Sweets for the Sweet," where reiki practioners study the darker side of their craft, and big data comes CRUNCHing in with plenty of capital and firepower.Who would have thought that a night of babysitting could change her life forever?Since his little sister bit her in November, Matt Johnson has kept her alive. Only Natalie could have a hot guy climb through her bedroom window every night and have it mean absolutely nothing romantic. Natalie works hard to hide her crush on Matt because the last thing this newly-turned vampire needs to deal with is a broken heart. Her insecurities about Matt come to a head when the mothers insist on them going to the Valentine's dance together. Will this Valentine's Day suck worse than all her previous Valentine's days?******Excerpt“Thanks,” I told him. “You’re getting good at solving my problems.”“That’s me,” he said, lifting the bottle to refill our glasses. “Synthetic blood deliveryman, fashion consultant, parental advice provider…”“Good friend,” I said. I wanted more, but I couldn’t exactly say, “Slurpalicious hottie." I mean, I didn’t have the guts.******Valentine's Day Sucks is a 16,000 word novella which would be approximately 62 pages in print. Your download will include a three-chapter excerpt of Stirring Up Trouble, a young adult novel currently available at all major retailers.

Tatiana, the new girl, arrived in English IIIA amidst a murmur of expectation. We had already heard a beautiful "Russian princess" was coming to our own boring little neck of New Jersey, and her first impression on us was no disappointment...the SAT-cramming students of a high academic north New Jersey high school welcome a Russian exchange student; and lives are forever changed...merry christmas readers !this is a free christmas download to celebrate xmas 2012. a short story, "dancer, zero" involves sat-cramming north new jersey high school students and their new Russian exchange student, Tatiana.themes: ballet, coming-of-age, university admissions, north jersey

*This book made it as far as the so-called 'Big Six' publishers.*'THE' voice of a generation, lost in Tokyo.A young American college graduate travels to Tokyo to find his fortune. There, he joins a fast-moving, high-spending, drug-using crowd of louche foreigners. After one particularly disastrous party, criminal charges are filed, reputations are ruined, and the narrator is targeted by an enraged father who is also a senior US embassy commissioner. Involved with a hooker girlfriend and thoroughly addicted to the drugs with which he once only experimented, the narrator is confronted on his inner-most resources to overcome the greatest challenge of his life. From the members’ rooms of Japan’s most exclusive private clubs, to the penthouse suites of its ennui-filled glitterati, to the luxury yachts populating Tokyo Bay, HARAJUKU SUNDAY unfolds against a background of the beautiful and damned: a story about modern Tokyo, drug use, and the lives of young Americans at the far edge of the Pacific Rim. Drawing comparisons to the work of the young Yukio Mishima and Ryu Murakami, SUNDAY is Lost in Translation meets Brideshead Revisited in an elegy for a lost period of expat life.