Henrietta Rich, a New York City teenager, spends a year in China when her father accepts a teaching position in Beijing.
Intermediate (ages 9-14)
Material appropriate for intermediate age groups
Operation Siberian Crane: The Story Behind the International Efforts to Save an Amazing Bird
This book describes the cooperative effort by scientists in the Soviet Union and the United States to save the Siberian crane, with the support and aid of conservationists from other nations.
Wildflower Girl
Thirteen-year-old Peggy O’Driscoll, left orphaned and homeless by the Great Famine of the 1840s, leaves Ireland to seek her fortune in America.
One More Elephant: The Fight to Save Wildlife in Uganda
Two brothers, Peter and William Moeller save the rapidly diminishing herds of elephants and other wildlife living in the Queen Elizabeth National Park in Uganda.
The Travel Game
Tad and his aunt Hattie take an imaginary trip to Hong Kong. Armed with a globe, an illustrated almanac, and their imaginations, Tad and Aunt Hattie play the travel game. They ride elephants in India, escape deadly piranhas in the Amazon River, and hail a water taxi to visit the beautiful boat city of Hong Kong—all without leaving the apartment above the family tailor shop in Buffalo, New York. This funny, affectionate story is based on author John Grandits’s own childhood experiences. The charming and highly detailed illustrations will encourage children to play their own version of the travel game.
A Cat Royal Adventure: Den of Thieves
TRAITORS, CAPTIVES, AND A PEOPLE’S REVOLUTION The third volume of the CAT ROYAL ADVENTURE series takes readers to Paris on a covert mission. The Theater Royal is closed for renovations, so Mr. Sheridan commissions Cat to act as his spy in revolutionary Paris. Disguised as a ballerina, Cat joins the revolution, only to find that it is up to her to save her friends when they are captured as traitors. Like the previous two books in the series, The Diamond of Drury Lane and Cat Among the Pigeons, Den of Thieves is filled with disguises, danger, drama, and, most of all, the irrepressible Cat Royal.
Shopaholic
Taylor, Sam, and Sophie have been best mates forever. But lately things have been changing. Taylor is starting to sense that maybe Sam and Sophie would rather hang out only with each other rather than with her. And she can’t talk to her mum about it — she’s been acting even more depressed than usual, spending the day watching the telly in her bathrobe and only eating when Taylor makes her dinner. Then Taylor meets Kat while out shopping one day. Kat is glamorous. Kat is planning on becoming a model. Kat has dozens of older blokes following her around. And suddenly Taylor’s life is looking brighter. Kat seems to understand exactly how Taylor feels and Taylor is willing to do anything to be friends with her. The thing is, Kat loves to go shopping and if Taylor wants to continue to be her friend, then she’ll have to come up with the money to keep Kat happy…even if that means going against everything Taylor knows is right. An emotionally-charged novel about what loneliness can drive you to do, and how a little credit card can lead to lots of trouble.
A Boat To Nowhere
Fleeing from agents of the new communist government in Vietnam, an old man and three children begin an endless and seemingly hopeless struggle for survival as boat people.
My Sister Sif
Fourteen-year-old Riko manages to get her delicate older sister Sif and herself to their remote Pacific island home, where an American scientist who falls in love with Sif and discovers her connection with an underwater race creates complications in Riko’s life.
Ratface
A teenage boy and girl attempt to escape with a seven-year-old boy from a racist cult known as the White League, when they find out that they are not orphans as they have been told.