Abeni's Song

IN DARKNESS, A SONG CAN LEAD THE WAY. BEWARE WHICH ONE YOU LISTEN TO. Abeni's Song by award-winning author P. Djèlí Clark is the enchanting beginning of an epic West African and African Diaspora-inspired fantasy adventure for middle-grade readers about a reluctant apprentice to magic and the stolen villagers she sets out to save. On the day of the Harvest Festival, the old woman who lives in the forest appears in Abeni's village with a terrible message: You ignored my warnings. It's too late to run. They are coming. Warriors with burning blades storm the village. A man with a cursed flute plays an impossibly alluring song. And everyone Abeni has ever known and loved is captured and marched toward far-off ghost ships set for even more distant lands. But not Abeni. Abeni is magically whisked away by the old woman. In the forest, Abeni begins her unwanted magical apprenticeship, her journey to escape the witch, and her impossible mission to bring her people home. “Abeni's Song” is the beginning of a timeless, enchanting fantasy adventure about a reluctant apprentice, a team of spirit kids, and the village they set out to save.

The Children of the Night are free. Abeni and her spirit friends rescued them from a terrible fate in the Witch Priest’s army of monsters. But when Abeni is asked to return home to rebuild her village, she refuses. She must carry on with her mission until all of her people are safe. When Abeni is captured and imprisoned by the legendary Kingdom of Gold Weavers, she must win her freedom by retrieving the mystical Golden Throne—or risk becoming a living statue of gold forever! Legend says the throne is guarded by a dragon who can only be defeated by a magic sword. But stories are not always what they seem. And the truth can change everything. To reclaim the throne, Abeni and her spirit companions must travel to a city of light high in the mountains and a lost kingdom beneath the sands, fight frightening monsters and a golden army, all while evading the Witch Priest’s daughter, who hunts them at every turn. Without courage and strength, even a kingdom of gold will fall to darkness. Will Abeni and her song be enough to save them all?

One woman's decades-long journey to a diagnosis of autism, and the barriers that keep too many neurodivergent people from knowing their true selves. Marian Schembari was thirty-four years old when she learned she was autistic. By then, she'd spent decades hiding her tics and shutting down in public, wondering why she couldn't just act like everyone else. Therapists told her she had Tourette's syndrome, obsessive-compulsive disorder, sensory processing disorder, social anxiety, and recurrent depression. They prescribed breathing techniques and gratitude journaling. Nothing helped. It wasn't until years later that she finally learned the truth: she wasn't weird or deficient or moody or sensitive or broken. She was autistic. Today, more people than ever are diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder. Testing improvements have made it easier to identify neurodivergence, especially among women and girls who spent decades dismissed by everyone from parents to doctors and misled by gender-biased research. A diagnosis can end the cycle of shame and invisibility, but only if it can be found. In this deeply personal and researched memoir, Schembari's journey takes her from the mountains of New Zealand to the tech offices of San Francisco, from her first love to her first child, all with unflinching honesty and good humor. “A Little Less Broken” breaks down the barriers that leave women in the dark about their own bodies and reveals what it truly means to embrace our differences.