resilience

Poetry·Mark Roberts, age 10 — A boy recounts the aftermath of a crash he can't remember, describing the physical trauma and how others see him differently while he remains the same inside.

Story·Hilary Miller, age 13 — A Thai girl defies her overprotective mother to save their home by selling the family's beloved mango tree to pay off the mortgage.

Story·Lucy Lumsdaine, age 13 — After her mother's death, a girl obsessively fills her life with activities until a poetry assignment about sadness breaks through her denial.

Story·Rachel Marris Reeves, age 12 — In 3014, thirteen-year-old Cassie's birthday is forgotten when her busy parents leave for work trips, but she finds strength in a message from her great-grandmother.

Story·Mara Elizabeth Lasky, age 13 — After her house burns down, Angela returns to sift through the ashes, finds her parents' charred wedding photo, and finally allows herself to grieve before reconciling with her mother.

Story·Rachel Hellwig, age 13 — An aspiring ballerina practices relentlessly for a Nutcracker audition but isn't chosen, only to be called in as an understudy when another dancer falls ill.

Story·Lia Regal, age 12 — A Brooklyn girl finds refuge in basketball as her parents' marriage dissolves, then moves to a coastal farmhouse after the divorce, starting fresh with a new team.

Story·Danny Musher, age 13 — A young enslaved man flees through dark woods pursued by slave-catchers, finds what seems to be a safe house on the Underground Railroad, but is captured when the hiding place...

Story·Megan Gannett, age 13 — A twelve-year-old girl struggles with her parents' prolonged grief over her baby brother's death until her fiddle performance helps them all find healing.

Story·Luria Rittenberg, age 12 — A grandmother tells her granddaughter how, as a six-year-old lost in a blizzard, she was saved after kissing a mezuzah on a stranger's door—where her future husband found her.