Stories Come to Life

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Welcome to Stories Come to Life. I am your host, Kathryn Lopez Luker. 

When Cress FINALLY convinces her mother to allow her to go to a house party with some friends from school, she thinks her life may make a dramatic change for the better. Maybe she will be approached by a magnificent boy who will share a secret world with her. Cress hopes so. Reality is a bit different. Maybe the world view Cress has now that she is barely fourteen years old is actually quite a bit different than what the other girls have at ages sixteen and seventeen. There are many ways to live, and Cress is finding a way that allows her to be authentically herself.

Now, sit back, relax, and listen to this story come to life.

Listening to audiobooks really does count as reading, and there's no better way to relax than to hear Stories Come to Life!
Let me know what you think! Please send an email to me at [email protected]. I'd love to hear from you!

Send us Fan Mail

Welcome to Stories Come to Life. I am your host, Kathryn Lopez Luker. 

In the first chapter today, Cress is filled with teenage emotion and melancholy. Flowers bloom so fleetingly, the raindrops on the lawn evaporate and disappear, and everything in life seems destined to degrade and disintegrate. Maybe Cress’s emotions come because the young man she loves doesn’t know she exists. Or maybe it is just the blight man was born for. It is Crescent that she mourns for. 

Then in the second chapter, Cress’s dear friend, Honor Gallagher, is back for a quick visit. Yes, Honor is five years older than Cress, but the age difference never seemed to matter back when Cress was twelve and Honor was seventeen. But can things ever really stay the same?

Now, sit back, relax, and listen to this story come to life.

Listening to audiobooks really does count as reading, and there's no better way to relax than to hear Stories Come to Life!
Let me know what you think! Please send an email to me at [email protected]. I'd love to hear from you!

Send us Fan Mail

Welcome to Stories Come to Life. I am your host, Kathryn Lopez Luker. 

Cress has tentatively reached the upper level of popularity in her high school. So, when a girl who REALLY wants to be Cress’s friend invites her to spend the night at her house, Cress is torn. Should she go and perhaps risk falling from the popularity heights, or could her approval perhaps raise Ina to that coveted level? As in most of Cress’s adventures, things are not always easy to judge from the outside, and Cress has to listen to her heart.

Now, sit back, relax, and listen to this story come to life.

Listening to audiobooks really does count as reading, and there's no better way to relax than to hear Stories Come to Life!
Let me know what you think! Please send an email to me at [email protected]. I'd love to hear from you!

Send us Fan Mail

Welcome to Stories Come to Life. I am your host, Kathryn Lopez Luker. 

Music lessons? Could Cress really want to take music lessons? All her life (so far) Cress has been decidedly AGAINST music lessons because they would be so dull as compared to hiking or swimming or doing anything outside. But that was before Cress met Mrs. Charlesbois. She is wonderful: elegant and artistic and best of all, interested in Cress. Adult friendships and situations, though, have a complexity Cress doesn’t know if she wants to understand. 

And then Edwin, brave Edwin! He always impresses Cress. Not only does he recite Virgil like a Roman, but he defends Cress’s honor when a bully tries to use his muscles against Edwin’s brains. 

Now, sit back, relax, and listen to this story come to life.

Listening to audiobooks really does count as reading, and there's no better way to relax than to hear Stories Come to Life!
Let me know what you think! Please send an email to me at [email protected]. I'd love to hear from you!

Send us Fan Mail

Welcome to Stories Come to Life. I am your host, Kathryn Lopez Luker. 

This is the winter that Cress is thirteen years old. Cress is trying to find out what her “trademark” will be at school. Will she be a serious, sweet, and unknown person, or should she find a way to be known as “that Crazy Cress Delahanty”?  Then, later in the season, Cress will be performing in a dance recital. But oh, she is so worried her parents may mispronounce a word or somehow want to participate in the festivities. What would her friend Bernadine (known as Nedra on Fridays) think of her if Mr. and Mrs. Delahanty do something embarrassing?

Now, sit back, relax, and listen to this story come to life.

Listening to audiobooks really does count as reading, and there's no better way to relax than to hear Stories Come to Life!
Let me know what you think! Please send an email to me at [email protected]. I'd love to hear from you!

Send us Fan Mail

Welcome to Stories Come to Life. I am your host, Kathryn Lopez Luker. 

Cress Delahanty is thirteen years old in today’s chapters. She has to navigate through the difficult time of her beloved grandmother’s passing, as well as trying to be a comfort to her grandfather. Then in late summer, she goes with her parents to the seaside village of Balboa where she knows Edwin and his family are staying. Will they run into each other on the boardwalk? Cress certainly hopes so, as she has a new and very glorious hat carefully prepared for the meeting.  

Now, sit back, relax, and listen to this story come to life. 

Listening to audiobooks really does count as reading, and there's no better way to relax than to hear Stories Come to Life!
Let me know what you think! Please send an email to me at [email protected]. I'd love to hear from you!

Send us Fan Mail

Welcome to Stories Come to Life. I am your host, Kathryn Lopez Luker. 

This is the first episode of Cress Delahanty, a book I loved when I read it first years and years ago. The author, Jessamyn West, was born in 1902. She moved to Orange County, California in 1908 when there were citrus groves and rural areas filled with birdsong and open spaces. This is the setting of the story we will be listening to for the next while. It begins when Cress, whose full name is Crescent, is twelve years old. She is a thoughtful, dreamy girl who has a rich inner life. Maybe you will see yourself in Cress as she grows from a child to a young woman. Or perhaps, as you watch Cress grow up, you will understand the lives of the people around you a little bit better. I hope you will learn to love this story as much as I do! 

Now, sit back, relax, and listen to this story come to life.

Listening to audiobooks really does count as reading, and there's no better way to relax than to hear Stories Come to Life!
Let me know what you think! Please send an email to me at [email protected]. I'd love to hear from you!

Send us Fan Mail

Welcome to Stories Come to Life. I am your host, Kathryn Lopez Luker. 

Poor Chet and Biff are STILL on the island! But they trust that the Hardy boys will send help to rescue them. What is confusing, is the sound of another motorboat cruising around the island. Could it be additional gangsters coming to rescue the bad guys? Here is the thrilling conclusion of The Hardy Boys in The Missing Chums!

Now, sit back, relax, and listen to this story come to life. 

Listening to audiobooks really does count as reading, and there's no better way to relax than to hear Stories Come to Life!
Let me know what you think! Please send an email to me at [email protected]. I'd love to hear from you!

Send us Fan Mail

Welcome to Stories Come to Life. I am your host, Kathryn Lopez Luker. 

Frank and Joe are able to sneak quietly back into the deep dark of the back cavern where their friends, Chet and Biff, are being held captive. Not only are they relieved to find them safe, but they have the keys to rescue them! But it isn’t easy to escape from the gangsters, as the slightest sound will awaken the thugs and maybe all four boys will be captured. Will the Hardy boys be able to rescue their friends?

To find out, sit back, relax, and listen to this story come to life.

Listening to audiobooks really does count as reading, and there's no better way to relax than to hear Stories Come to Life!
Let me know what you think! Please send an email to me at [email protected]. I'd love to hear from you!

Send us Fan Mail

Welcome to Stories Come to Life. I am your host, Kathryn Lopez Luker. 

Frank and Joe have an idea that their missing chums, Chet Morton and Biff Hooper, may have gone out to Blacksnake Island and run into trouble, so they head out to the island in their boat, Sleuth. Yes, there certainly is trouble on the island, and it doesn’t just come from the venomous blacksnakes that frequent the place. There are dangerous caves and unscrupulous outlaws as well! Can Frank and Joe do anything to save their friends?

To find out, sit back, relax, and listen to this story come to life.

Listening to audiobooks really does count as reading, and there's no better way to relax than to hear Stories Come to Life!
Let me know what you think! Please send an email to me at [email protected]. I'd love to hear from you!