The Gentle Art Of Verbal Self-Defense

Typical teenager Joanna Gore Alex is less than thrilled to be the new girl in a new school. During her first day, she quickly learns teachers obviously favor the popular students and her classmates have no interest in being nice. Just when Joanna believes the day couldn't get any worse, she has a slightly embarrassing and awkward altercation with one of the hottest guys at school. But as the school days pass by, Joanna forms friendships with some unexpected classmates and discovers exactly how strong she can be against the school's mean girl. When Joanna is drawn to one of her brother's new friends, Frank, she feels like she's known him forever. Even his full name - Francis James - sounds familiar to her for some reason. Joanna quickly learns life isn't all about handing assignments in on time (although it is important), she discovers the meaning of friendship, family, heartache, and most of all, love.

Kaylani is the last water dragon, or she was until a scientist began making hybrids out of dragon DNA. She has been unable to have her own children, even when she mated with the earth dragon, Avani. He is now mated, so having a dragon baby is no longer an option. Instead of her own child, Kaylani adopted Naida, a hybrid created in a laboratory by the mad scientist, Oliver, using her DNA. Everett is a human who has become a doctor to the dragons. He switched his focus from humans to dragons, shifters, and eventually hybrid and elf anatomy. He has worked to find ways to save the hybrids, whether from explosives in their brains, from shifting into deformed creatures in a hybridization gone wrong or correcting the DNA of the ones whose injected DNA is incompatible and will kill the hybrid when they shift for the first time. Kaylani recognized Everett as her mate the first time she saw him. Unlike the other elemental dragons, she has no intention of fighting the mate bond and would love nothing more than for Everett to claim her. Everett, however, doesn't feel worthy of the gorgeous water dragon who looks like a goddess. However, her intelligence and her kindness continue to draw him to her, nearly as much as the mate bond pulls her to him. They work well together and have opened a school for the laboratory created dragons and hybrids, as well as other pure shifters, to help them understand themselves better and ensure that they have a positive future. Can Kaylani convince Everett to claim her, taking her as his mate, or are they destined to work side by side, never knowing the true love that comes from the dragon bond?

After her mother shoved her away, Astrallaine moved in with a woman she didn't know. She must be self-sufficient and capable of standing alone — without leaning against other walls. Will she be able to continue in life when a man appears and makes her even more miserable? Will she be able to let go of the wretched version of herself?

My mother-in-law gets into an accident and is taken to the emergency room. I call my attorney husband, but he only answers after over 20 missed calls. "What are you on about this time? Gigi has a bit of a problem, and I'm helping her. Stop being unreasonable." I suppress my grievance and say, "Mom's gotten into an accident. Transfer 100 thousand dollars to me." However, he believes Gigi Norris' lies and snarls, "What does your mother getting into an accident have to do with me? Don't even think of getting money from me to provide for your family. Now, leave me alone. I'm busy!" He hangs up, and my mother-in-law dies. Three days later, I see my husband in court. Gigi has been taken to court for driving under the influence, and he's there to defend her. He speaks eloquently and manages to get her off based on a lack of evidence. I lose hope in him and ask him for a divorce once the court is out of session. That's when he panics. "Think about how well my mother treats you! You'll break her heart by divorcing me!" I sneer. I throw the hospital bill and death certificate in his face. The idiot doesn't even know he no longer has a mother!

This life is full of evil, disappointments, untrustworthy people and betrayal. Lauren's life was turned upside down when her chose mate of almost ten years leaves her for his fated mate. A mate who had rejected him for a more powerful Alpha. With her arrival back in their lives, everything is stripped from Lauren, leaving her with nothing. She feels broke and dejected.

On the day Clara forced me to sign the divorce papers, I got bound to a self-sabotaging system. The system commanded me to slap her hard and tell her to get lost. I trembled in fear because Clara was a ruthless person. If I dared to stop her from getting back together with the love of her life, she would utterly destroy me. But the system threatened me: "If you don't self-sabotage, you will die soon." Left with no choice, I slapped her. As soon as I hit her, I ran out of the house, terrified. The system then told me to smash a police car on the side of the road. I suspected the system wanted me dead. However, after I smashed the police car's side view mirror, I realized that the system was trying to sabotage someone else's life instead.