authentic voice
— Through letters to her absent mother, a French orphan girl chronicles her journey to America on an immigrant ship, through Ellis Island, and discovers an unexpected family connection.
— A lonely Indian boy finds friendship and belonging when a girl from his school discovers him at his secret pond refuge in Minnesota.
— A child connects Van Gogh's Starry Night to moments with parents—dad at the museum, mom watching them draw—finding calm in the painting above their bed.
— A girl escapes her stifling bedroom on a summer night to lie in the grass under moonlight, until her mother gently brings her back inside.
— A girl resentful of caring for her sister with cerebral palsy realizes during a Thanksgiving church service that her sister has never complained despite having far less.
— A girl inherits a magic fiddle from a mysterious man in the woods, and when she plays it by candlelight, shadows come alive and dance on moonbeams.
— A young pitcher struggles through a tough inning, then later coaches his younger brother through batting practice, passing on his coach's wisdom about perseverance.
— A Mexican-American girl's nursing school dreams seem crushed by poverty until her cantankerous neighbor unexpectedly offers to pay her college tuition.
— A sixth-grader watches her imaginative pioneer game fall apart when popular kids mock it, realizing she and her friends are growing up and leaving childhood behind.
— During a military coup in Sierra Leone, a fifth-grader shelters with his embassy family, finding and symbolically discarding a bullet that represents the violence surrounding them.