A multiracial, bilingual girl plans a birthday party and hopes her abuelita (grandma) will be able to come from Peru to join the celebration.
Realistic Fiction
Realistic Fiction genre
Diamond Boy
“Diamonds for everyone.” That’s what fifteen-year-old Patson Moyo hears when his family arrives in the Marange diamond fields. Soon Patson is working in the mines himself, hoping find his girazi–the priceless that stone that could change his life forever. But when the government’s soldiers comes to Marange, Patson’s world is shattered. Set against the backdrop of President Robert Mugabe’s brutal regime in Zimbabwe, Diamond Boy is the story of young man who succumbs to greed but finds his way out through a transformative journey to South Africa in search of his missing sister, in search of freedom, and in search of himself.
How Does My Garden Grow?
Sophie lives in the city, and her vegetables come from the supermarket. Then she goes to visit her grandparents in the countryside — and soon discovers how much there is to learn about how things grow! Sophie helps her grandfather through the different seasons, finding out about mulching onions, eating flowers, weeding, bees, making salad, catching beetles, digging, earthing up, picking and composting. When winter comes, Sophie has to go home — but her grandfather has one last surprise for her.
The Nowhere Box
George’s little brothers wreck his toys and his games and trail after him wherever he goes. Try as he might, there’s just no hiding from them. George has had enough! So he commandeers an empty washing machine box and goes to the one place his brothers can’t follow: Nowhere. Nowhere is amazing! It’s magnificent! It’s also, however, free of pirates and dragons and . . . well, anyone at all. From exciting new talent Sam Zuppardi comes an all-too-relatable story of an older brother who knows when he needs his space and when he needs his siblings.
The Lion Who Stole My Arm
When his ambition to become a great hunter like his father is crushed by a lion attack that causes him to lose an arm, young Pedru is overcome by a desire to kill the lion that mauled him but questions his resolve when an opportunity arises.
Jungle Of Bones
When sullen teenager Dylan Barstow is caught joyriding in a stolen car he is sent to his ex-Marine uncle for the summer, but soon they are on the way to Papua New Guinea in search of a World War II fighter plane and Dylan discovers that defiance is not a survival skill when you are lost in a jungle.
Friday Never Leaving
Friday Brown and her mother Vivienne live their lives on the road, but when Vivienne succumbs to cancer, 17-year-old Friday decides to search for the father she never knew. Her journey takes her to an abandoned house where a bunch of street kids are squatting, and an intimidating girl named Arden holds court. Friday gets initiated into the group, but her relationship with Arden is precarious, and it puts Friday, and anyone who befriends her, at risk. With the threat of a dangerous confrontation growing, Friday has to decide between returning to her isolated, transient life, or trying to help the people she’s come to care about, if she can.
Lizzy Bennet’s Diary
Jane Austen’s beloved heroine Lizzy Bennet tells the story of Pride and Prejudice in her own words.
When Lizzy Bennet’s father gives her a diary, she fancies she will use it to write a novel, as her real life is exceedingly dull. Then the handsome Mr. Bingley moves to nearby Netherfield Park, and suddenly life is every bit as thrilling as a novel would be. Who will he dance with at the Meryton ball? Who is his haughty friend? Will Lizzy ever receive a marriage proposal? Readers will have to read her diary to find out! Marcia Williams offers a lively introduction to Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice in a highly illustrated scrapbook-diary format, featuring such novelties as foldout notes from sisters and suitors, an elegant bill of fare, and an invitation to the ball.
Wild Boy
In the seedy underworld of Victorian London, a boy is born and abandoned. Snatched up by an unscrupulous and abusive showman, Wild Boy, covered in hair from head to toe, becomes a sideshow freak. Isolated from other children and wickedly abused by the cruel master who bought him, Wild Boy becomes an avid observer, developing Sherlock Holmes–like deductive skills. Although he is tormented and insulted, kicked and spat at, his quick mind takes in everything he sees. When a murder occurs at the fair, Wild Boy is hastily accused. Can he use his powers of deduction to save himself? And will the talented and spunky young acrobat Clarissa be with him — or against him?
The True Tale Of The Monster Billy Dean
Billy Dean is a secret child. He has a beautiful young mother and a father who arrives at night carrying the scents of candles and incense and cigarettes. Birds fly to his window. Mice run out from his walls. His world is a carpet, a bed, pictures of the holy island, and a single locked door. His father fills his mind and his dreams with mysterious tales and memories and dreadful warnings. But then his father disappears, and Billy’s mother brings him out into the world at last. He learns the horrifying story of what was saved and what was destroyed on the day he was born, the day the bombers came to Blinkbonny. The kind butcher, Mr. McCaufrey, and the medium, Missus Malone, are waiting for him. He becomes The Angel Child, one who can heal the living, contact the dead, bring comfort to a troubled world.