Multi-lingual adventure for kids--English, Spanish, Italian--
with built in teaching guides, these foreign language vocabulary builders are used extensively as teaching aids by language teachers, ESL teachers and middle school reading teachers.

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Hunt for Fred-X: Los Gatos of the C.I.A.
ISBN 1-57168-861-7 $22.95
Trade Paperback 6 X 9  200 Pages
Fully Illustrated
For Readers Age Eight and Up – Adults, too

Buzzer Louis, world-renowned retired director of operations of the clandestine CIA – Cats-In-Action – climbs back into service at the request of Mexican President Vicente Fox to help the Mexican national police capture the infamous owl Fred-X, international villain and catnabbing meanie who is stealing Mexican cats and flying them to the Yucatán to be sold into slavery. Buzz takes along his old friend and former CIA contract operative Cincinnati the dancing pig, his gray tabby sister Dusty Louise as interpreter, and his tiny orange tabby twin siblings – the very funny pranksters Luigi Panettone Giaccomazza and Luisa Manicotti Giaccomazza.

On this international adventure that would make Tom Clancy envious, they all learn a little about Hispanic culture and they learn to speak a little Spanish. 750-word Spanish vocabulary incorporated into the text and in an extensive glossary/pronunciation guide.

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Fred-X Rising: I Gatti of the C.I.A.
ISBN 1-57168-698-6  $22.95
Trade Paperback 6 X 9  204 Pages
Fully Illustrated 
For Readers Age Eight and Up – Adults, too

Continuing the adventures of the clever and lovable cats introduced in the wildly successful Hunt for Fred-X, Buzzer Louis is summoned to Italy this time by his cousin Césare Pepperoni Giaccomazza who heads up the Rome Bureau of Interpol to once again track down that evil international catnabbing villain Fred-X. Fred-X, assisted by his European girlfriend Frieda-K and an unscrupulous cardinal from the Vatican, is stealing Italian cats to be sold into the international slave trade. Buzz heads for Italy, taking along his best friend Cincinnati the dancing pig, his pretty and petulant sister Dusty Louise and – as interpreters – the hilariously funny tiny twin pranksters Luigi Panettone Giaccomazza and Luisa Manicotti Giaccomazza. Fighting the greedy forces of evil, they enlist the aid of a band of Greek stunt cats and Il Papa – the pope, himself – in a diabolically clever plot to put an end to the owls’ criminal ways once and for all time.

As they track Fred-X across the Trentino from Rome to Bolzano to Venezia, they learn a little Italian history and culture and learn to speak considerable Italian. You will, too, from the 750-word Italian vocabulary built into the text and in an extensive glossary/pronunciation guide.

Download flyer for FRED-X RISING.

Get Fred-X

Third in this multi-language learning series, Get Fred-X is due for release early in 2009 from Eakin Press.

More fun and clever crime-fighting from the lovable cats and their sidekick, the dancing pig  . . . all in the United States this time. Meet rail-riding hoboes, bumbling, yet clever, policemen, visit the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and find out how Buzzer Louis and Cincinnati the dancing pig outsmart that cat-grabbing meaning Fred-X yet once again.

Non-fiction adult

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Growing Up Simple: An Irreverent Look at Kids in the 1950s
Foreword by Texas humorist Liz Carpenter
ISBN 1-57168-071-3 $24.95
Trade Paperback 6 X 9 260 Pages
42 Vintage Photographs

This multi-award winning nonfiction novel is a fun and funny account of the incredible hijinks of a small band of merry pranksters, overachievers of the first order, who grew up in the placid, black-and-white world of the ‘50s, a time when life was simple and the only major fear kids had to face was the ever-present threat of polio. Winner of the IPPY Humor Award as the funniest book published in North America in 2003; the Violet Crown Award as the best nonfiction book by a Texas author of 2003; and a coveted Silver Spur from the Texas Public Relations Association.

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Chick Magnates, Ayatollean Televangelist,
& A Pig Farmer’s Beef
Inside the Sometimes Hilarious World of Advertising
ISBN 1-934645-19-2  $22.95
Trade Paperback 6 X 9, 216 Pages
Vintage Photographs

A nonfiction novel, hilariously funny and (almost) totally true, Chick Magnates, Ayatollean Televangelist, & A Pig Farmer’s Beef is the story of the amazingly off-the-wall-clever people of one of the Southwest’s more creative advertising agencies between 1973 and 1998. It’s the story of how creativity, applied when least expected and always in unorthodox fashion, overcame almost any obstacle to the agency’s and its clients successes – clients like chick magnate Bo Pilgrim, the surprisingly Muslim-like business precepts of Reverend Pat Robertson’s CBN, a larcenous Iowa pig farmer turned producer of some unbelievably nutritious beef, and many more, from other-worldly utility types at TXU to soft drink purveyor Pepsi Cola to both Dallas newspapers, Safeway’s Tom Thumb Supermarkets, super-Aggie ‘Bum’ Bright, and a host of others.

It’s a business primer from the real world – where the rubber meets the road – told in Arnold’s confidential, talking-only-to-you storytelling style, a style reminiscent of James Herriot and Mark Twain.

Entertaining and informative, even if you don’t care a whit about advertising.

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BestSeller: Must-Read Author’s Guide to Successfully Selling Your Book
ISBN 1-57168-799-8 $18.95
Trade Paperback 6 X 9  150 Pages
Fully Illustrated

The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth about the author as marketer, presented with unprecedented humor and style. This book educates, inspires and occasionally frightens. Accompanied by 90-minute interactive workshop conducted by the author for writers’ groups.

Download BestSeller Workshop details.