Breakfast with A Flock of Angels!

On Saturday October 10, 10:00 AM - noon, breakfast with three angel-inspired authors: the authors of Angel Lane, Coffeehouse Angel, and Lakeshore Christmas! Sheila Roberts, Suzanne Selfors, and Susan Wiggs look forward to joining you at Eagle Creek Winery for a deliciously special breakfast and warm conversation. Breakfst includes, lox, bagel and cream cheese, apple strudel, grapes, a glass of Eagle Creek white wine, Starbucks coffee and a selection of teas.

You'll have a second chance to shake hands with the angels on Saturday...

ABFAS Top 10 August Best-Sellers...

It's Stupendous September, it's Back to School, time
to get your brain back on the train!
Time to write it all down. It's time!

We have the planner to suit your personality.

Sleek, slender, professional moleskines, the notebook of Picasso and Hemmingway ...

Practical, portable Pomegranate student planners, August 2009 to August 2010 ...

Sandra Boynton's Mom's Family Desk Planner (17 months!) and Mom's Birthday Calendar (forever!) ...

Bible verses, zen sayings, kittens, Sudoku, Word-a-Day, Places to see before you die, and much, much more, there's A Page A Day just right for you ...

Elegant leather or ornate French vert, tooled or jeweled, plain or embossed, Paper Blanks are functional art ...

Catch a sneek peek of Skeleton Creek's sequel, Ghost in the Machine!

"Ghost in the Machine, the second (and last) book in the story, comes out in the fall, but I'm already creating an even bigger cross-platform experience. I want bloggers, readers, booksellers, and librarians to have unprecidented access to the project as it's being made, so I've pulled back the curtain on the creative process," says Patrick Carman. "I'm convinced technology can create more readers, not fewer, if we're willing to re-imagine what some books can be."

Click here to get the full scoop!

Buy Skeleton Creek - $14.99
Pre-purchase Ghost in the Machine - $14.99

September 19-20: The Wenatchee River Salmon Festival!

Fun for all ages, and FREE!

Set in the pristine majesty of the Cascade Mountains, Salmon Fest is an outdoor education adventure you will not want to miss.

Connect your family to nature in a fun and entertaining way. Enjoy learning about our natural resources and the incredible environment in which we live. Take part in the many inter-generational hands-on activities, interactive exhibits, wildlife "edu-tainment", music, and art, and experience a meaningful cultural exchange with Native Americans in their encampment.

Learn more at http://www.salmonfest.org.

September 25-27: Leavenworth's Autumn Leaf Festival!

It's that wonderful time of year! Crisp colors in the hills, plump berries in the gardens, and once again - Leavenworth's own special Autumn Leaf Festival.

This is the festival that began them all: Leavenworth's first festival, originating in 1964 when we adopted our Bavarian theme. Autumn Leaf Festival is the crowning jewel in the all-year-long efforts of the Autumn Leaf Festival Association, whose many volunteers promote Leavenworth all across the Pacific Northwest and Canada. Now, in September, they get to bring it home: the float, the parades, and even the chicken-dancing.

This year's family fun includes L-Bow the Clown, giant pumpkin carving, and the climbing tower, air trampoline, and other "jumpy-toys" kids love. Enjoy master yodelers, alphorn performances, traditional Bavarian dance performances, the 133rd US Army band, and lots of live traditional Bavarian music including Leavenworth's own Musikkapelle Band. Learn more at http://www.autumnleaffestival.com.

What are Leavenworth's soccer coaches reading?

Soccer coach and high school teacher Dayle Massey enthusiastically recommends The River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt's Darkest Journey by Candice Millard. It's a page-turner, Dayle says - a book that reads like an adventure story, yet is also carefully researched history, drawing on detailed journals by several participants. Teddy Roosevelt, energetic, wilderness-loving, and (still) America's youngest-ever president, was decisively crushed when he ran for a third term as an independent, trying to work outside the two-party system. T.R.'s response to defeat and humiliation was always to seek out physical challenge. So he set out with Brazil's most celebrated explorer, Candido Mariano da Silva Rondon, and experienced naturalist George Cherrie: their 22-person team would attempt the first descent and charting of an uncharted tributary of the Amazon, named the River of Doubt by early explorers who had only glimpsed its twisting, foaming headwaters. The stream was a succession of rapids and boiling white water, and the team encountered terrible illness, loss of canoes and supplies to the rapids, and frequent attack from hostile natives. "It's amazing any of them survived," said Dayle. Naturalist Cherrie confided to his diary one night, as the emaciated team lay crippled by disease and fatigue and trapped by rapids, that he had little hope that the sweat-soaked, raving Roosevelt would survive until morning. "Of course I was also fascinated by the description of the jungle, the ecology, the insects," said biologist Dayle. "It's a really gripping book," Dayle concluded. "I couldn't put it down."

As I was typing up Dayle's comments, Dave, our Book For All Seasons adventure-book specialist, looked over my shoulder. "The River of Doubt!" Dave exclaimed. "That's one of my all-time favorite books!"

Buy The River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt's Darkest Journey by Candice Millard - $15.00

Soccer coach and teacher Pete Speigel likes to stay current with the best of young adult literature. "The Invention of Hugo Cabret," he told me. "It's fascinating. I've never seen pictures integrated into a book like that." The Invention of Hugo Cabret is a genre-defier: a chapter-book-picture-book, almost a textual movie, some have said, whose nearly three hundred pages of pictures are integral to the story; the story is equal parts visual and verbal. It is the story of twelve-year-old Hugo, an orphan, clock keeper and thief. Hugo lives in the walls of a busy Paris train station, and his survival depends on secrets and anonymity. When his world suddenly interlocks with an eccentric girl and the owner of a small toy booth in the train station, Hugo's undercover life, and his most precious secret, are put in jeopardy. "It's a very fast read, with all those pictures," Pete said. "And it's really beautifully done." The Invention of Hugo Cabret has received the 2008 Caldecott medal, the Quill Award, was a 2007 National Book Award Finalist, a New York Times #1 Bestseller, and one the New York Times Ten Best Illustrated Books of the Year.

Buy The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick - $24.99