Chantele Sedgwick

A 2015 Whitney Award Nominee! A powerful story of loss, second chances, and first love, reminiscent of Sarah Dessen and John Green. When Oakley Nelson loses her older brother, Lucas, to cancer, she thinks she’ll never recover. Between her parents’ arguing and the battle she’s fighting with depression, she feels nothing inside but a hollow emptiness. When Mom suggests they spend a few months in California with Aunt Jo, Oakley isn’t sure a change of scenery will alter anything, but she’s willing to give it a try. In California, Oakley discovers a sort of safety and freedom in Aunt Jo’s beach house. Once they’re settled, Mom hands her a notebook full of letters addressed to her—from Lucas. As Oakley reads one each day, she realizes how much he loved her, and each letter challenges her to be better and to continue to enjoy her life. He wants her to move on. If only it were that easy. But then a surfer named Carson comes into her life, and Oakley is blindsided. He makes her feel again. As she lets him in, she is surprised by how much she cares for him, and that’s when things get complicated. How can she fall in love and be happy when Lucas never got the chance to do those very same things? With her brother’s dying words as guidance, Oakley knows she must learn to listen and trust again. But will she have to leave the past behind to find happiness in the future? Sky Pony Press, with our Good Books, Racehorse and Arcade imprints, is proud to publish a broad range of books for young readers—picture books for small children, chapter books, books for middle grade readers, and novels for young adults. Our list includes bestsellers for children who love to play Minecraft; stories told with LEGO bricks; books that teach lessons about tolerance, patience, and the environment, and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.

Love, Lucas

Still mourning the loss of Lucas Nelson, the boy she loved in secret for years, seventeen-year-old Emmy Martin turns to her passion for mountain biking to try to fill the empty void in her life. But just when things start looking up, Emmy discovers her mom has been diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s. Confused and angry that her parents didn’t tell her sooner, she throws herself into mountain biking like never before. When Cole Evans, the rich boy who usually doesn’t care about anything but himself, offers to train her for the biggest mountain biking race of the season, she accepts, determined to beat Whitney, and prove she’s good enough for a sponsor. The more time she spends with Cole, the more she realizes he’s different than she’d expected, and, to her surprise, she’s falling for him. Torn between the deep feelings she still has for Lucas and her growing ones for Cole, she knows she must choose a path: one offers her the chance to love again, while the other is blocked by the overwhelming heartache for the boy she lost. As she drifts further away from her family and closer to her dream of being sponsored, a terrible accident threatens any semblance of peace and happiness she has left. Instead of closing herself off to the people she loves, Emmy must learn to rely on those she has pushed away if she’s going to have any chance of getting her life back again.

Switching Gears

When Mia Cox finds out she can’t donate her kidney to save her younger sister’s life, she doesn’t hesitate to jump on a plane to New York, convinced she can talk their estranged birth mother, Carmen, into donating hers instead. She doesn’t know the city or how she’ll find Carmen when she gets there, but she has to try. If she doesn’t, Maddy’s going to die. On the cross-country flight, Mia figures she’ll have more than enough time to make a plan for when she lands—where she’ll go, where she’ll sleep, what she’ll eat. But then she falls into an embarrassing conversation with the cute boy sitting next to her, and only after she insults him does she realize he’s the one and only Jaxton Scott, the troubled lead singer of a famous rock band she hates. While Mia is running toward what she hopes is a cure for her sister, Jax is running away from his rockstar life. As the hours pass, they get to know each other, and she finds herself opening up to him like she never has to anyone. When Jax volunteers to help Mia on the rest of her journey, she’s hesitant to accept his offer. Under different circumstances, she would want to get to know him better, but how can she entertain this random crush on a real-life rockstar while Maddy lies in the hospital, her name one of many on a never-ending transplant list? Though everything seems perfect while they’re in the air, once on the ground again, Mia’s lack of preparation catches up with her, and she receives grave news from home. Clinging to the shred of hope she has left, she accepts Jax’s help but makes it clear that her priority is finding Carmen and saving Maddy’s life. She will not, under any circumstances, stray from her mission no matter how cute, thoughtful, and sweet her new friend may be.

Interlude

New town, new friends, new guy . . . and an old bucket list. The past haunts the present in the newest installation in the Love, Lucas universe. After her dad is sentenced to prison time, seventeen-year-old Lucy Nelson and her mother move across the country to start over in the town—and farmhouse—where her mother grew up. Once settled, Lucy is determined to keep her mind off anything “real” and decides to pass the time by reading a stack of her mother’s childhood books, which has sat in her grandmother’s home for decades. When Lucy finds her mom’s old summer bucket list shoved between the pages of a worn copy of Anne of Green Gables, she’s eager to write her own list to escape her inevitable summer boredom. Feeling brave, she fills it with challenges she’d never normally do and also adds the one thing that her mother had never crossed off the original list: Visit Susan’s grave. When Lucy befriends Mira and her handsome cousin, Jack, she begins to feel almost normal as they help check off her list. When she asks her mother about Susan, she refuses to talk about her. As Lucy falls for Jack, she yearns to tell him the truth about her dad and her old life but lies about everything instead. When her friends see through the lies and her mom reaches her breaking point over questions about Susan, Lucy must learn to trust her friends, try to bring peace to her mother, and to somehow find the courage to forgive her dad.

The Summer of Lost Things

"Ash Summerland has it all--good looks, popularity, and the best grades at The Academy of Magical Beings. Ready to complete his last assignment in order to graduate, Ash is confident he will get the apprenticeship he wants. When he opens the letter from the Council, he is shocked to discover he has been assigned to apprentice Lady Shenelle, Keeper of Happy Endings. A.K.A. the head fairy godmother. Ash is forced to grant three wishes to a troubled human girl named Kendall, and ultimately give her a "happy ever after". But Kendall turns out to be more than he bargained for."--Summary on book cover.

Not Your Average Fairy Tale

When Ash Summerland left the Academy of Magical Beings, he was sure he'd put his troubles behind him. But when his girlfriend, Kendall, is almost killed by an old enemy over something he knows little about, Ash is forced to confront the demons of his past if he wants to save his and Kendall's future. With his fairy magic fading and his djinn magic more powerful than ever, Ash isn't sure he can stop the evil from closing in around him. Although Kendall is the only thing keeping him from going over the edge, if he can't learn to balance out his magic and find a way to defeat his enemies once and for all, both his world, and the girl he loves will be lost forever.

Chantele Sedgwick

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