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Contents

The Way Back Home

“Hey look, everybody! It’s the loser! Hey shrimp, how’s your dad doing?” Joey hooted and pointed a grubby finger at Finn, who stood horrified as the group of kids on the playground laughed. Finn lowered his head and pretended not to hear them as he walked slowly off the playground and back to the classroom. [...]

The Girl Next Door

There are friends, and then there are arranged friends who you are friends with because of your parents, simple as that. The girl next door was next on my mom’s arranged friends list, and I wouldn’t have ever agreed to so-called hang out had I not needed a summer job and she needed a piano [...]

The Shape Stealers

Zed and I stood, facing the forest. “Are you sure, Zed?” I asked, turning to him. His blue eyes flashed as he glanced back at me. “You don’t have to come with me, Reina,” he growled. “But I’m doing this. I will prove to Hans that I’m not a coward.” At that point, I knew [...]

Home

A good samaritan puts the bigoted cashier in his place

Drifting

nxiously I waited with fingers intertwined in my thick, curly hair and my foot tapping out a rhythm on my icy driveway. Puffs of air escaped from my cracked lips. I felt as if someone were slamming my heart against my chest. My eyes swept across the neighborhood. A quick glance behind my shoulder told [...]

Answers in the Sky

idnight woke at the crack of dawn. His glossy, dark pelt shone in the light of the rising sun. The tree shadows danced in the wind like fingers on a black table. Midnight looked around, watching his brother, Moonshadow, his sister, Autumn, and his mother, Silverwater. Midnight’s father had left the beautiful earth shortly after [...]

Frolic

A mound of fur, tongues, tails, clumsy paws, and deep brown eyes, laughing with the ecstasy of play The heap seems its own creature, without distinction between separate bodies Teeth nip, paws bat, tongues kiss, tails flash from side to side, a blur of pure happiness With playful growls and tackles and pounces, with not [...]

Orange to Black

Come on Come on Come on I bolt to the window Quick as lightning, with a gasp, my mouth drops open the sun is swiftly sliding into the water, an orange marble sinking into the horizon infusing the river with orange dye I think where does it go? does it sink into the river with [...]

If Only I Could

If only I could help the world. I would like to get bad people and teach them how to be nice. If only I could fly and help people with their feelings, and stop them from killing people that are trying really hard to help us all to be good people and nice and kind [...]

My Cousin’s Keeper

My Cousin’s Keeper, by Simon French; Candlewick Press: Massachusetts, 2014; $16.99 Do you know what it feels like to be bullied? Have you ever felt left out? These are questions that My Cousin’s Keeper forces the reader to consider. They are questions I never thought a lot about until I read this book. No book [...]

The Way to Stay in Destiny

The Way to Stay in Destiny, by Augusta Scattergood; Scholastic Press: New York, 2015; $16.99 It’s funny how we can adapt to the way we live and call it normal, right to the point where it all changes. Theo had spent his whole life in Kentucky with his grandparents and his dog. But then, in [...]