In Freddy and the Bean Home News, Freddy's friend Mr. Dimsey, the editor of the Guardian, is ousted for publishing news of Bean Farm in the local newspaper. Freddy takes it upon himself to found a newspaper of his own and calls it The Bean Home News. But it turns out that being a newspaperman isn't quite as easy as Freddy thought it might be.

A robin with poor eyesight has mistaken Freddy the pig's tail for a worm. Putting aside the poem he is writing, Freddy decides to help the poor bird solve his problem. But the solution just seems to lead to bigger problems.

Mr. Boorschmidt's Stupendous and Unexcelled Circus is back in town. This time one of its attractions is really out of this world. In the big ring are six Martians and their flying saucer! But Boorschmidt doesn't stop there. He wants something even more spectacular to offer the audience, so he asks Freddy for help. Freddy knows what to do. He organizes an amazing baseball team.

Warnings had been printed in the Bean Home News and the Centerboro Guardian, but nobody paid much attention to them. An animal revolt? "Preposterous!" said the Beans and all the other humans.

But it's true - and the outrages begin: cars are stopped and overturned all over the county, farmers starting out to do their morning chores are driven back into the house, and the cows refuse to come in at milking time.

Freddy the Pig needs a break. As editor of the Bean Home News and president of the First Animal Bank, he has no time for himself anymore. So when rich Mr. Camphor wants a summer caretaker, Freddy trots right over to apply. Soon, he's sunning himself on a houseboat, writing a bit of poetry, and even dabbling with his paint set. But Freddy's life of ease quickly comes to an end.

Returning from a riding trip through New England, Freddy the pig, Jinx the cat, and Samuel Jackson the mole are surprised at the cool reception they get from the people of Centerboro. It seems that some animals have been raiding gardens, stealing bicycles, and breaking into houses. And they'e led by a pig that matches Freddy's description!

This heirloom book about a renaissance pig is lovingly passed from generation to generation, and is an authentic American classic. Freddy the Pig knows the rats have stolen the missing toy train. Now he has to find where it is hidden and convict the rats of the crime. Who will win Freddy's first case, the sly, scheming rats or the honorable Freddy?

While Freddy the pig relaxes in his best cowboy outfit and sings a song, he decides that he needs a vacation. He will ride his pony, Cy, out West. He'll see some wide-open spaces and maybe find some excitement. But before Freddy can leave, the excitement finds him first. Uncle Ben races up to the farm and asks Freddy for help. A pack of sneaky spies is trying to steal Uncle Ben's plans for building a flying saucer.

Mr. Bean knows he has the smartest animals in the state of New York. He's just not sure they can care for his farm by themselves while he takes his wife on vacation. So to show how responsible they are, Freddy the pig and his friends start their own bank and their own animal republic. But a hotly contested election between a plain-spoken cow and a wily woodpecker might be more than even Freddy can handle.

Acclaimed author Walter R. Brooks is beloved for his Freddy series. In this tale, Freddy and his friends decide to take a trip to Mars. However, things go a little haywire, and Freddy and his pals are knocked off track. This is when the fun begins. John McDonough's festive narration makes listeners feel a part of Freddy's crew to Mars.

The barnyard animals are tired of being cold in the winter. Since Farmer Bean doesn't have enough money to patch the holes in the barn or heat the chicken coop, they are migrating to Florida for the winter. Travelling to the beat of Freddy the pig's funny songs, they meet with one adventure after another. They find gold treasure to take home to Farmer Bean in the spring. Florida is fun, except for the time when alligators try to eat them for lunch.

When robot Roz opens her eyes for the first time, she discovers that she is alone on a remote, wild island. Why is she there? Where did she come from? And, most important, how will she survive in her harsh surroundings? Roz's only hope is to learn from the island's hostile animal inhabitants. When she tries to care for an orphaned gosling, the other animals finally decide to help, and the island starts to feel like home. Until one day, the robot's mysterious past comes back to haunt her....

Harry Potter has never even heard of Hogwarts when the letters start dropping on the doormat at number four, Privet Drive. Addressed in green ink on yellowish parchment with a purple seal, they are swiftly confiscated by his grisly aunt and uncle. Then, on Harry's eleventh birthday, a great beetle-eyed giant of a man called Rubeus Hagrid bursts in with some astonishing news: Harry Potter is a wizard, and he has a place at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. An incredible adventure is about to begin!

Told from four-year-old Laura's point of view, this story begins in 1871 in a little log cabin on the edge of the Big Woods of Wisconsin. Laura lives in the little house with her pa, her ma, her sisters Mary and Carrie, and their trusty dog, Jack. Pioneer life is sometimes hard for the family, since they must grow or catch all their own food as they get ready for the cold winter. But it is also exciting as Laura and her family celebrate Christmas with homemade toys and treats, do the spring planting, bring in the harvest, and make their first trip into town.

Sam Gribley is terribly unhappy living in New York City with his family, so he runs away to the Catskill Mountains to live in the woods - all by himself. With only a penknife, a ball of cord, 40 dollars, and some flint and steel, he intends to survive on his own. Sam learns about courage, danger, and independence during his year in the wilderness, a year that changes his life forever.

Nominated for a 2011 Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album For Children. Who better to read the novel of the new Nanny McPhee film than Nanny McPhee herself, Emma Thompson, who also wrote both the screenplay and the novel. This delightful audio edition captures the magic and the mayhem of Nanny McPhee’s brand new adventure – it will have you laughing out loud!

When L. Frank Baum introduced Dorothy and friends to the American public in 1900, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz became an instant, best-selling hit. Today the whimsical tale remains a cultural phenomenon that continues to spawn wildly popular books, movies, and musicals. Now, editors John Joseph Adams and Douglas Cohen have brought together leading fantasy writers such as Orson Scott Card and Jane Yolen to create the ultimate anthology for Oz fans.

Mr. Chesney operates Pilgrim Parties, a tour group that takes paying participants into an outer realm where the inhabitants play frightening and foreboding roles. The time has come to end the staged madness...but can it really be stopped?

Fired from his longtime job as captain of the Coal Patrol, two-foot-three-inch, 1,300-year-old elf Gumdrop Coal is angry. He's one of Santa's original elves, inspired by the fat man's vision to bring joy to children on that one special day each year. But somewhere along the way, things went sour for Gumdrop. Maybe it was delivering one too many lumps of coal for the Naughty List. Maybe it's the conspiracy against Christmas that he's starting to sense down every chimney.

When a strange little man comes to the Coven Tree Church Social promising he can give people exactly what they ask for, three young believers-in-magic each make a wish that comes true in the most unexpected way.

It's a tough job, but somebody's got to do it. Guts, glory, danger, and sacrifice are all in a day's work for Hank the Cowdog, Head of Ranch Security. While investigating a murder on the ranch, Hank finds himself the number-one suspect.

Welcome to the Monkey House is a collection of Kurt Vonnegut's shorter works. Originally printed in publications as diverse as The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction and The Atlantic Monthly, what these superb stories share is Vonnegut's audacious sense of humor and extraordinary range of creative vision.

Somewhere on the frontier between thought and reality exists the Discworld, a parallel time and place that might sound and smell very much like our own, but which looks completely different. Particularly as it’s carried though space on the back of a giant turtle (sex unknown). It plays by different rules. But then, some things are the same everywhere. The Disc’s very existence is about to be threatened by a strange new blight: the world’s first tourist, upon whose survival rests the peace and prosperity of the land.

This is a captivating, good-humored look at family life in a small farming community in Indiana in the early 1900s.

Originally published in The New Yorker in 1954, The Ponder Heart is easily Eudora Welty’s most comic novel, a lighthearted burlesque that rivals Caldwell’s Tobacco Road for capturing rural idioms, and the novels of Mark Twain for high farce.

You don't have to be a hunter or camper to enjoy this collection of hilarious stories by a writer who is often compared to Mark Twain and Garrison Keillor. In fact, the charm of Patrick F. McManus' work is that it provides plenty of reasons for staying indoors, surrounded by friendly appliances. You'll laugh aloud as McManus and his friends, including Rancid and Crazy Eddie, venture into the great outdoors to face formidable foes.

. C. “Scar” Gordon was on the French Riviera recovering from a tour of combat in Southeast Asia, but he hadn’t given up his habit of scanning the personals in the newspaper. One ad in particular leapt out at him: "Are you a coward? This is not for you. We badly need a brave man. He must be 23 to 25 years old, in perfect health, at least six feet tall, weigh about 190 pounds, fluent English with some French, proficient with all weapons, some knowledge of engineering and mathematics essential...."

Allan Gurganus's Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All became an instant classic upon its publication. Critics and fans alike fell in love with the voice of 99-year-old Confederate widow Lucy Marsden, one of the most entertaining and loquacious heroines in American literature. Lucy married at the turn of the 20th century, when she was 15 and her husband was 50. If Colonel William Marsden was a veteran of the "War for Southern Independence", Lucy became a "veteran of the veteran" with a unique perspective on Southern history and Southern manhood.

The Sugar Creek Gang discovers a "disguise" hidden in a old tree. Does it belong to the bank robber hiding in the swamp? A mysterious map hidden near the tree proves to be even more exciting than the disguise. Before the adventure ends, the gang encounters the robber, helps Bill Collins welcome a new baby sister, and saves the victim of a black widow spider bite. Join the gang as they learn the lesson of sowing and reaping.

Imagine an alternate universe where romance and technology reign. Where tinkerers and dreamers craft and recraft a world of automatons, ornate clockworks, calculating machines, and other marvels that. Where scientists and schoolgirls, fair folk and Romans, intergalactic bandits, and intrepid orphans - decked out in corsets, clockwerk suits, and tall black boots - solve dastardly crimes, escape from monstrous predicaments, consult oracles, and hover over volcanoes in steam-powered airships.

This heirloom book about a renaissance pig is lovingly passed from generation to generation, and is an authentic American classic. Freddy the Pig knows the rats have stolen the missing toy train. Now he has to find where it is hidden and convict the rats of the crime. Who will win Freddy's first case, the sly, scheming rats or the honorable Freddy?

A robin with poor eyesight has mistaken Freddy the pig's tail for a worm. Putting aside the poem he is writing, Freddy decides to help the poor bird solve his problem. But the solution just seems to lead to bigger problems.

Freddy the Pig needs a break. As editor of the Bean Home News and president of the First Animal Bank, he has no time for himself anymore. So when rich Mr. Camphor wants a summer caretaker, Freddy trots right over to apply. Soon, he's sunning himself on a houseboat, writing a bit of poetry, and even dabbling with his paint set. But Freddy's life of ease quickly comes to an end.

Mr. Boorschmidt's Stupendous and Unexcelled Circus is back in town. This time one of its attractions is really out of this world. In the big ring are six Martians and their flying saucer! But Boorschmidt doesn't stop there. He wants something even more spectacular to offer the audience, so he asks Freddy for help. Freddy knows what to do. He organizes an amazing baseball team.

A series of robberies has disrupted the peaceful life at the Bean Farm. First, food disappears from The First Animal Bank. Then sheets and shirts vanish from a clothesline. By the time oats are stolen from the barn, everyone is suspicious and upset. Soon, the animals even suspect Freddy! Who, or what, is responsible for the crimes? What is the mysterious white shape in the Great Woods?

While Freddy the pig relaxes in his best cowboy outfit and sings a song, he decides that he needs a vacation. He will ride his pony, Cy, out West. He'll see some wide-open spaces and maybe find some excitement. But before Freddy can leave, the excitement finds him first. Uncle Ben races up to the farm and asks Freddy for help. A pack of sneaky spies is trying to steal Uncle Ben's plans for building a flying saucer.

Mr. Bean knows he has the smartest animals in the state of New York. He's just not sure they can care for his farm by themselves while he takes his wife on vacation. So to show how responsible they are, Freddy the pig and his friends start their own bank and their own animal republic. But a hotly contested election between a plain-spoken cow and a wily woodpecker might be more than even Freddy can handle.

In Freddy and the Bean Home News, Freddy's friend Mr. Dimsey, the editor of the Guardian, is ousted for publishing news of Bean Farm in the local newspaper. Freddy takes it upon himself to found a newspaper of his own and calls it The Bean Home News. But it turns out that being a newspaperman isn't quite as easy as Freddy thought it might be.

Freddy is certainly an extraordinary pig by all accounts. Although he spends his time oversleeping and overeating just like a normal pig, he also finds the time to daydream, enterprise, and even write poetry! Always full of new ideas, he proposes that the animals of Bean Farm start a tour company.

Acclaimed author Walter R. Brooks is beloved for his Freddy series. In this tale, Freddy and his friends decide to take a trip to Mars. However, things go a little haywire, and Freddy and his pals are knocked off track. This is when the fun begins. John McDonough's festive narration makes listeners feel a part of Freddy's crew to Mars.