Harley Locke is no stranger to darkness, but when the irresistibly hot and broody new guy crashes into her world, she isn't sure she'll survive him. She has one year before she can take her kid-sister and escape their volatile home life, and she'll do anything to protect her-including accepting her supernatural heritage that has every demon in Chicago chomping after her rare blood. Draven Reid has spent the better part of a century searching for the Key to opening the Gates of Hell so he can r...
The Homecoming (Collins Modern Classics) (The Tillerman Cycle, #1)
by Cynthia Voigt
"A glowing book...An enthralling journey to a gratifying end." THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW The Tillerman kids' mother just left them one day in a car in a mall parking lot. Their father, too, had left them a long time ago. So, as usual, it was up to thirteen-year-old Dicey, the eldest of four, to take care of everything, make all the decisions, feed them, find places to sleep. But above all, Dicey would have to make sure to avoid the authorities who would split them up and place them in foste...
Abigail's parents, believing the end of the world is near, sell their house, give the money to an end-of-times preacher, and drive from North Carolina to San Francisco where they remain homeless and destitute, as Abigail fights to keep her parents, her twin brother, and herself united against all odds.
A Girl of the Limberlost (G.K. Hall large print perennial bestseller collection) (A Dell Yearling classic)
by Gene Stratton-Porter
Elnora Comstock is a poor girl, living with her widowed mother on the edge of the Limberlost swamp. She begins high school despite lack of money and her painfully unfashionable dress. She faces cold neglect from her mother, a woman ruined by the death of her husband. Eventually, Elnora wins her mother's love. She then meets and falls in love with a young man who is already engaged.
Crystal must choose between her dream of becoming the first college student in her family, or keeping a promise to her twin sister, Amber, to raise together the baby one had in high school.
Although dismayed and embarrassed when his father takes him on the road to get rich preaching the word of God, fourteen-year-old Steven finds himself caught up in the money and the things it can buy. Includes questions for discussion.
One night before putting him to bed, Enaiatollah's mother tells him three things: don't use drugs, don't use weapons, and don't steal. The next day he wakes up to find she isn't there. Ten-year-old Enaiatollah is left alone in Pakistan to fend for himself. In a book that takes a true story and shapes it into a beautiful piece of fiction, Italian novelist Fabio Geda describes Enaiatollah's remarkable five-year journey from Afghanistan to Italy where he finally managed to claim political asylum ag...
When Gemma, a rebellious 14-year-old bored with life in her small seaside town, decides to run away to join her boyfriend Tar in London, the pair are offered shelter in a squat. They meet two heroin addicts and are themselves soon hooked, while Gemma is forced into prostitution to pay for the drug.
The Agency 2: The Body at the Tower (The Agency, #2)
by Y.S. Lee
Mary’s second adventure as an undercover agent forces her to relive some harrowing childhood experiences as she seeks the identity of a murderer. Mary Quinn is back, now a trusted member of the Agency, the all-female detective unit operating out of Miss Scrimshaw’s Academy for Girls. Her new assignment sends her into the grimy underbelly of Victorian London dressed as a poor boy, evoking her own childhood memories of fear, hunger, and constant want. As she insinuates herself into the confidence...
Sharon Darrow's harrowing coming-of-age tale, told from the points of view of mother, son, and daughter, is rich with metaphorical significance and - like its small-town heroine - is obstinately, everlastingly hopeful. Lexieville, Arkansas, can hardly be called a town - it's just a handful of shotgun houses squatting at the end of a gravel road off the two-lane highway out of Sardis. For many in the Lexie clan, this is the only place they've ever been, the only home they'll ever know. Truly Lexi...
Bones meets Fringe in a big, dark, scary, brilliantly-plotted urban thriller that will leave you guessing until the very end Nearly Boswell knows how to keep secrets. Living in a DC trailer park, she knows better than to share anything that would make her a target with her classmates. Like her mother's job as an exotic dancer, her obsession with the personal ads, and especially the emotions she can taste when she brushes against someone's skin. But when a serial killer goes on a killing spree an...
In a gripping thriller with a hint of Oliver Twist, a street kid and his dog are chasing an unlikely fortune — and dodging the thugs who would steal it. Twelve-year-old Bully has lost his mum and his old life. Living rough on the streets of London with his dog, Jack, he can’t imagine a future. But one day he finds, tucked inside his most cherished possession—the last birthday card his mother ever gave him—a lottery ticket he bought her. And it’s a winner. A big winner. Suddenly there’s hope, if...