Defy The Alpha(s)
Two centuries after the Great War, peace between humans and werewolves was finally achieved, or so everyone believes. Werewolves reign like gods, and humans remain blissfully unaware of their true place in the new world order.
To maintain this fragile balance, each year, a handful of "lucky" humans are selected from various districts to attend Lunaris Academy, a prestigious institution that promises glory, status, and a chance to mingle with the elite. Those chosen are hailed as the lucky few, destined to marry powerful alphas and rise as luna.
This year, Violet Purple is among the chosen, much to everyone's surprise. For an orphaned girl adopted by a disgraced prostitute, this is a golden ticket to a better life or so she's told. But Lunaris Academy isn’t the paradise it’s painted to be.
Everything Violet and her fellow humans have been taught is a lie. Humans are far from equal; they're pawns in a much larger game. The academy is nothing but a gilded cage, and the students are lambs led to slaughter, playthings for the alphas to toy with in their ruthless games.
To make matters worse, Violet catches the attention of the most dangerous players in this game, the Terror Four: the Alpha of the North, Alpha of the South, Alpha of the East, and Alpha of the West. Each one is more dangerous, more twisted, and more powerful than the last. But even among themselves, the alphas are divided, each with their own deadly ambitions.
Yet, they all have their eyes on her.
They expect Violet to play along, to fall in line like the others who worship at their feet, to break under their games. But Violet isn’t like the others. She refuses to bow. She’ll defy them all.
Glimmy · Fantasy
An anonymous author reveals a lifetime of secrets in this unforgettable memoir as she tells the story of her relationship with her father, who raped her over the course of her childhood, until the author was 21. The result is one of the most frank and cathartic depictions of child abuse ever written. The author recalls abusing her Barbie dolls, her sense of being the “other woman” to her own mother, and the mingling of violence with desire, a tendency so crucial to the author’s development that it continues to govern her ***** relationships. This is not a story of things getting better, but an unflinching and staggeringly artful portrait of a shattered life. she writes, and the feeling is underscored, pages later, with a fact: “He threatened to kill himself if I told anyone.” Works of art by Fernando Botero and Frida Kahlo are invoked throughout, as are the fairy tales in which the author searches for analogues to explain her condition. But by the end of the book, she has articulated an experience that for many victims remains unspeakable.