Tied by destiny, Prewitt the Bargeboy and Calliope the Lost Princess set out on their twelfth birthdays, determined to end the reign of the evil Spectress and her marauders by calling the Firebird back to Lyrica.

"It begins with an octopus who plays the ukulele. Since this is a story, the octopus has to want somethingmaybe to travel to faraway galaxies in a totally awesome purple spaceship. Then the octopus sets out to build a spaceship out of soda cans, glue, umbrellas, glitter, and waffles. OK, maybe the octopus needs some help, like from an adorable bunny friend, and maybe that bunny turns out to be . . . a rocket scientist? (Probably not.) But could something...

With the help of a mysterious fairy queen who provides monstrous but gentle creatures to aid him, a miner's son takes on the dangerous task of helping the king and princess confound their enemies and save the kingdom.

When she and her new friends discover a portal to a fairy tale realm, Mihi Whan Park finally gets her shot at being a princess, but she must decide where her loyalties lie when her friends want to go home.

Eldest of three sisters in a land where it is considered to be a misfortune, Sophie is resigned to her fate as a hat shop apprentice until a witch turns her into an old woman and she finds herself in the castle of the greatly feared wizard Howl.

It's not easy to enjoy a picnic when you have unseeable interlopers to contend with! In a new trio of stories for beginning readers, the affable Max the dog and mischievous Baby Cakes the cat encounter a scare-happy ghost who has a run-in with a mirror, the wind at its blustery best, and a teeny-tiny fairy with a wayward wand who may have met her match. -- From the publisher.

In the land of Alorria, where mystical beasts and their human guardians create perfect weather every day, twelve-year-old Mina longs to get a storm beast of her very own--she is shy, however, and so it is a mystery to everyone when Pixit, a lightning beast of chaos and fire, bonds with Mina. Now Mina and Pixit are enrolled in lightning school to train for their duties, but when Mina learns the dark truth behind Alorria's idyllic weather and its terrible...

"Lily the sorcerer queen and Thorn the giant-bat-whisperer journey to the Sultanate of Fire to help their friend K'leef in a no-holds-barred contest for the throne"--

Captured and enslaved by the corsair stoat Badrang, young mouse warrior Martin vows to end the evil beast's plundering and killing.

Soraya is a princess who has been cursed to be poisonous to the touch, and she is forced to live a life in isolation. Her twin brother is getting married, and she must decide if she will step out of the shadows and into the light. Locked in a dungeon below the castle, lurks a demon with the answers she seeks, but Soraya soon learns that the price of her freedom may be more than she is willing to pay.