Central Kansas Library System

What happens when a nice - or nasty - old woman calls on a rat-catcher to catch a nasty - or nice - family of rats living below her floor? Even a rat-catcher knows there can be more than one side to every story. So . . . up he comes with the best possible solution.

Here's the original short story that first introduced us to Slippery Jim diGriz, better known as the Stainless Steel Rat! diGriz is charming, quick-witted, sophisticated, and a devious criminal mastermind. The Rat has just pulled off a successful and complex criminal operation, but the Special Corps is on his trail. Is this the end for the Stainless Steel Rat or just the beginning? Join Slippery Jim on this rollicking adventure.

In Rats, early readers will learn all about the responsibilities of having a rat and find out how they can keep their pet healthy and happy. Vibrant, full-color photos and carefully leveled text will engage emergent readers as they discover what it takes to be a pet owner. A labeled diagram helps readers understand what a rat needs, while a picture glossary reinforces new vocabulary. Children can learn more about pet rats online using our safe search...

In this "impossible to stop reading" suspense thriller from a New York Times bestseller, a bomb scare lands a pilot in midst of a horse racing crime(The Telegraph). Dick Francis, Edgar Award–winning master of mystery and suspense, takes you into the thrilling world of horse racing. Hired to fly four racing buffs to the track, pilot Matt Shore expects it will be the kind of job he likes: quick and easy. That is until he's forced to make...

Fourth-grader Jason and his younger brother Edward shop for school clothes, get ready for Halloween, acquire a couple of pet rats, and deal with not-birthday presents from Aunt Bea.

One shocking encounter will turn childhood friends into eternal enemies.Vince's immortality is no blessing. Unlike his childhood companion from long ago, he refuses to feed on humans to prolong his life. When people from his village start disappearing, he suspects an immortal killer at work…Saul eagerly takes what he needs to survive his eternal life. But when he comes face-to-face with his adolescent friend and has to answer for his crimes, his...

Visionary space industrialist Dan Randolph is dead-but his protégé, pilot Pancho Barnes, now sits on the board of his conglomerate. She has her work cut out for her. For Randolph's rival, Martin Humphries, still wants to control Astro and still wants to drive independent asteroid miners like Lars Fuchs out of business. Humphries wants revenge against Pancho and, most of all, he wants his old flame, Amanda, who has become Lars Fuchs's wife. Brimming...

This short story from the collection Wild Child was originally published in the New Yorker.

When Gerald Loomis loses his wife, friends and neighbors try to rally him with food and suggestions for pets to keep him company. But Gerald has already picked a pet, a Burmese Python he's named Siddhartha. During a cold snap, Gerald ventures out to the pet store to pick up a rat to feed Siddhartha but finds he can't follow through with

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No shade means no offense (as defined by the Urban Dictionary).Example: Don't tell her I told you, but your little cousin is a ho. No shade. Every little girl dreams of a happy ending to her story; a home, children, and a man who loves her enough to share his life and last name. When Billy's longtime boyfriend Marcus finally pops the question, it's one of the happiest moments of her life. Billy calls on her childhood friends Reese and Yoshi to stand...

In August 1992, a young mother and her two small sons were brutally murdered in the woods behind their home. Her neighbour, Andrew Gyle, was convicted of the crime and sentenced to life imprisonment. Now, twenty-three years later, a macabre discovery throws new light on the case. Could there have been a shocking miscarriage of justice? DCI Colin Anderson and his partner, DI Costello, uncover serious discrepancies in the original investigation; it...