Judith Viorst

Lulu's parents refuse to give in when she demands a brontosaurus for her birthday and so she sets out to find her own, but while the brontosaurus she finally meets approves of pets, he does not intend to be Lulu's.

With his mother on the phone, his father checking e-mail, and his sister playing with her friends, a little boy feels as if he is all alone in the house, and no matter how badly he behaves, no one comes to stop him.

A collection of poems recounting a woman's experiences during three stages of her life, from her observations as a single woman in Greenwich Village to her accounts of married life and her reflections in middle age.

A whimsical account of the multi-generational frenzy that ensued when the author's son's family temporarily moved into her home describes how her compulsively ordered environment was thrown into turmoil.

[The author] explores, among the many other issues of [being seventy], the state of our sex lives and teeth, how we can stay married though thermostatically incompatible, and the joys of grandparenthood and shopping.-Dust jacket.

A volume drawing from personal interviews with married men and women, as well as findings from therapists, reveals how to achieve a "grown-up" marriage by delving into the many issues and problems that married couples of all ages face.

Olivia, who is very neat and practically perfect, despairs because her sister Sophia is super-completely and totally the messiest person, no matter where she goes or what she does.

The author draws on the work of biological and social scientists, psychoanalysts, and philosophers and interweaves fiction, poetry and personal stories, including some of her own, to argue that we are constantly dealing with issues of control.

A collection of poems that examines a wide variety of feelings and experiences from a child's point of view.

This is a romp - the comic, over-the-top story of Brenda Kovner, a middle-aged, middle-class married woman who tells us, in the first paragraph and in the first person, that, though she is not the murdering kind, "I am planning to kill Mr. Monti because he is doing harm to my family." Unlikely? Well, she also tells us she isn't the kind to sleep with three different men within twenty-four hours. "And since I indeed did do that, I might indeed be able to murder Mr. Monti.". Murder, mayhem, and motherhood are hilariously woven together in this novel by bestselling author Judith Viorst. Brenda (a syndicated newspaper columnist, compulsive advice-giver, and possessor of what she likes to call "a profound grasp of the human condition") lives in Washington, D.C., with her pediatric-surgeon husband Jake, possessor of great thighs, a gorilla suit, and a mounting irritation with Brenda's "helpful" intrusions. Other characters include the burly, bullying Joseph Monti; his neurotic daughter Josephine (among her phobias is a fear of contracting botulism from canned foods that have been improperly sealed); Brenda's son Wally, a truly lovely person who intends, over Mr. Monti's strenuous objections, to marry Jo; Brenda's other son, Jeff (who, though he no longer snorts, smokes, or swallows controlled substances, is not so truly lovely); Philip Eastlake, formerly Epstein, a world-famous TV pundit ("Oy, is that a genius or is that a genius!"); and Adrienne, a woman so politically correct that her definition of date rape includes any consensual sexual act that ends without the woman's having an orgasm. There is also Adrienne's (and Brenda's) lover, the super-empathetic black activist Louis; Joseph Monti's surprising wife, Brenda's easily offended sister, Rosalie, who arrives in Washington with her frisky Great Dane; and Brenda's closest friend, Carolyn, who warns Brenda that "there is no such thing as equal-opportunity adultery.". Along with murder and adultery, Murdering Mr. Monti examines the passionate wish that some of us - okay, many of us - have to be in control of our lives (and everyone else's) and the necessity of learning, as Brenda may or may not learn, FOR PEACE OF MIND RESIGN AS GENERAL MANAGER OF THE UNIVERSE. It also examines the outrageous lengths to which mothers will go for their children, for it is Brenda's contention that some mothers - no, most mothers - are willing to lie, cheat, steal, and, yes, kill for their kids. Witty and wise, Murdering Mr. Monti is wonderfully entertaining from beginning to end.

Verses running backwards through the alphabet take note of some anomalies in English spelling and grammar.

Two boys create a lot of havoc while waiting for their parents to get up on Sunday morning.