CAN I HAVE A HUG FIRST? is a short story collection born out of author Mary Paula Hunter's career as a performance artist. Her monologues turned short stories feature midlife adults struggling to align their crazy minds with an equally crazy world. Hilarious and tragic in a high energy mix, these stories will get the reader questioning what came first— the whacked mind or the whacked world?

Newbery Medal winner Carol Ryrie Brink uses vignettes of people she knew during her childhood in Idaho to give a glimpse of everyday life in the early twentieth century and to provide insight into her own tragic early years. This evocative and ultimately uplifting memoir is read by veteran narrators Emily Eiden, Nora Hunter, Susan C. Hunter and a full cast of the author's descendants and family members. Brink fans will recognize the real-life inspirations for many of the characters in her ...