Europe

Materials from Europe

After the Train

Peter Liebig can’t wait for summer. He’s tired of classrooms, teachers, and the endless lectures about the horrible Nazis. The war has been over for ten years, and besides, his town of Rolfen, West Germany, has moved on nicely. Despite its bombed-out church, it looks just as calm and pretty as ever. There is money to be made at the beach, and there are whole days to spend with Father at his job. And, of course, there’s soccer. Plenty for a thirteen-year-old boy to look forward to. But when Peter stumbles across a letter he was never meant to see, he unravels a troubling secret. Soon he questions everything—the town’s peaceful nature, his parents’ stories about the war, and his own sense of belonging.

Shylock’s Daughter

Sixteen-year-old Jessica, who longs to be free of the restrictions of her father and life in the Jewish ghetto of sixteen-century Venice, falls in love with a Christian aristocrat and must make choices which will affect her whole family. Inspired by Shakespeare’s play The Merchant of Venice.

The Wish House

From the best-selling author of WITCH CHILD and SORCERESS comes another engrossing, atmospheric novel — following a teenage boy as he uncovers the secrets of the mysterious and provocative Wish House. It’s the start of summer vacation, and fifteen-year-old Richard has discovered that a family has taken up residence in the usually deserted Wish House. Richard is intrigued by both the house and the bohemian family now living there. The father, Jethro Dalton, is an internationally renowned painter; his seemingly licentious wife is fascinated by herbs and cures. But it’s their beautiful and vibrant daughter, Clio, the muse for Jethro’s paintings, who draws Richard utterly into the Daltons’ world. Soon Richard finds himself so captivated by Clio that he steals off to the woods to spend days and nights with her, meanwhile struggling to understand and fit in with her eccentric clan. How could he know that some mysteries are best left alone — and that some betrayals can never be forgiven?

Ivy

Ivy is used to being overlooked. The youngest in a family of thieves, scoundrels, and roustabouts, the girl with the flame-colored hair and odd-colored eyes is declared useless by her father from the day she is born. But that’s only if you look at her but don’t see. For Ivy has a quality that makes people take notice. It’s more than beauty — and it draws people toward her.

Which makes her the perfect subject for an aspiring painter named Oscar Aretino Frosdick, a member of the pre-Raphaelite school of artists. Oscar is determined to make his mark on the art world, with Ivy as his model and muse. But behind Ivy’s angelic looks lurk dark secrets and a troubled past — a past that has given her an unfortunate taste for laudanum. And when treachery and jealousy surface in the Eden that is the artist’s garden, Ivy must learn to be more than a pretty face if she is to survive.

Julie Hearn, author of The Minister’s Daughter and The Sign of the Raven, has created a memorable tale of nineteenth-century England with a character destined to take her place alongside Dickens’s Pip and Oliver Twist.

Blade: Playing Dead

bladeNobody knows the city like Blade. You have to when you’re on your own, when you can’t trust anyone, when you’ve got a past you need to hide. Blade is practically invisible, perfectly alone, living only by his wits—just the way he likes it. Until the day a chance encounter sends his world crashing down around him and he finds himself on the run again. Yet he’s not alone this time. Suddenly he’s got Becky and her daughter, Jaz, weighing him down. But is he running from his past or from Becky’s? Blade knows he should drop these two, but he can’t. With people depending on him, he’ll need to find a way to outsmart the thugs who are hot on both of their heels, lurking around every corner.

A Finder’s Magic

A boy who loses his dog meets a mysterious stranger and has a surprising adventure in an enchanting tale from a stellar author-illustrator team.When Till’s beloved dog slips its leash on their daily romp, the boy goes to bed in despair. But he wakes to meet Mr. Finder, an odd little man from his dream, who offers to help him retrieve the frisky pup. Together Till and Finder question some likely witnesses: a heron, a mole, a riddling cat, and two obliging old ladies, Miss Gammer and Miss Mousy. But Finder is a peculiar fi gure, given to disappearing suddenly, and Till starts to wonder: Can he be trusted? Part detective story, part fairy tale, A Finder’s Magic has mystery, darkness and light, and all the emotional truth that is a hallmark of Philippa Pearce’s writing.

The Snagglegrollop

When he asks for a typical pet–a dog, a cat–his parents say no, so Sam wonders, “How about a Snagglegrollop?” A what?! The next day Sam comes home from school with a strange-looking creature indeed! The Snagglegrollop eats an awful lot of food–and entire tubes of toothpaste, too. But it tells silly jokes and takes the family for wonderful weekend romps. They become very fond of it. Some nights, though, the Snagglegrollop just sits on the roof, staring at the stars. “It seems quite sad,” Sam thinks. Could it be that all it needs is the companionship of his classmate Emily’s Quibblesnuff?

Super Duck

Duck and his long-suffering friends Frog, Sheep and Goat take off on their latest unforgettable adventure. A runaway kite is all it takes the resulting chaos makes Super Duck ideal for reading and laughing out loud. Alborough s timeless sense of humor and rhyme bursts from the pages, and will have the youngest super heroes shouting along.

After the War

“Didn’t the gas ovens finish you all off?” is the response that meets Ruth Mendenberg when she returns to her village in Poland after the liberation of Buchenwald at the end of World War II. Her entire family wiped out in the Holocaust, the fifteen-year-old girl has nowhere to go. Members of the underground organization Brichah find her, and she joins them in their dangerous quest to smuggle illegal immigrants to Palestine. Ruth risks her life to help lead a group of children on a daring journey over half a continent and across the sea to Eretz Israel, using secret routes and forged documents — and sheer force of will.