By Julie Sternberg
Ages 8-11
She’s just a tween, but Celie has quite a few things on her mind: fights with her sister, a forgetful grandmother, and, worst of all, best-friend problems. How will she survive and sort out her feelings? By writing, of course!
By Christine Pakkala
Ages 7-10
Good-hearted Lola can’t help getting into trouble. Her friends are all traveling for the Thanksgiving holiday, so she offers to dog-sit—but fails to mention this to Mom. Now Lola is juggling her dog-sitting responsibilities with her worries. Will her parents discover the growing knot in her hair and cause her excruciating pain brushing it out? Will her grandmothers discover that she’s lied to them every year about who makes the best pumpkin pie? Will brother Jack get so involved in his new baby-sitting and yard-work jobs that, like Mom and Dad, he won’t have time for her anymore? Lola’s worries, like the knot in her hair, grow greater until she finally has to stop hiding them and start untangling them.
By L.B. Schulman
Ages 12+
After an abrupt move across the country to San Francisco, sixteen-year-old Livvy is shocked to find that her mother has lied to her. Instead of looking for work at a bakery, her mom is taking care of Adelle, Livvy’s grandmother, who Livvy thought was long dead. Suffering from Alzheimer’s, Adelle shouts out startling details, mistakes her own name, and seems to relive moments that may have taken place in a concentration camp. When Livvy and her new friend Franklin D. find journal entries from the Holocaust in Adelle’s home, Livvy begins to suspect that her grandmother may have a shocking link to a notable figure—Anne Frank.
By Amanda Rawson Hill
Ages 8-12
Kate has trouble believing in magic, especially since the people she loves keep leaving her. But when Grammy tells her the three rules of everyday magic—believe, give, and trust—Kate can't resist believing, at least a little. Following Grammy's advice, she tries to bring her father, her best friend, and even Grammy herself back to her. Nothing turns out as Kate expects, yet the magic of giving—of trusting that if you love and give, good things will happen, even if you don't see them happen—will change Kate and her family forever.
By Janice N. Harrington
Ages 10+
Keet knows the only good thing about moving away from her Alabama home is that she’ll live near her beloved grandfather. When Keet starts school, it’s even worse than she expected because the kids tease her about her southern accent. Now Keet, who can “talk the whiskers off a catfish,” doesn’t want to open her mouth. Slowly, though, while fishing with her grandfather, she learns the art of listening. Gradually, she makes her first new friend. But just as she’s beginning to settle in, her grandfather has a stroke, and even though he’s still nearby, he suddenly feels ever-so-far-away. Keet is determined to reel him back to her by telling him stories; in the process she finds her voice and her grandfather again. This lyrical and deeply emotional novel-in-verse celebrates the power of story and of finding one’s individual voice.
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