Before they were the Boxcar Children, Henry, Jessie, Violet, and Benny Alden lived with their parents on Fair Meadow Farm. Although times are hard, the Aldens are happy - “the best family of all,” Mama likes to say. One day, a blizzard hits the countryside, and a traveling family needs shelter. The Aldens take them in, and the strangers soon become friends. But things never stay the same at the farm, and the spring and summer bring events that will forever change their lives.

The Aldens are spending their first week of summer at Camp Quest in Colorado. The children are excited to learn about fossil-hunting and paleontology from renowned scientist Dr. Iris Perez. But strange events at the camp make them wonder if the legends of a bigfoot-like creature roaming the valley might be more fact than fiction. Can the Aldens help Dr. Iris figure out who - or what - is causing such a stir?

When an oil spill takes place off the coast of Connecticut, the Aldens are happy to volunteer to help clean up the animals affected, including a rare species of shore bird. But could more have been done to prevent the spill? As the Aldens take up the case, it leads them on an adventure to help other endangered animals around the world.

Henry, Jessie, Violet, and Benny didn't think the old trunk in their house held anything interesting. But an unusual statue they find inside leads them to the Reddimus Society, a secret guild dedicated to returning lost treasures to where they belong. Now the Aldens must help their new friends by traveling across the country with the statue and six mysterious boxes! Can the Boxcar Children keep these seven treasures out of the wrong hands?

Folksy and fresh, endearing and affecting, Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe is the now-classic novel of two women in the 1980s; of gray-headed Mrs. Threadgoode telling her life story to Evelyn, who is in the sad slump of middle age. The tale she tells is also of two women - of the irrepressibly daredevilish tomboy Idgie and her friend Rut - -who back in the thirties ran a little place in Whistle Stop, Alabama, a Southern kind of Cafe Wobegon offering good barbecue and good coffee and all kinds of love and laughter, even an occasional murder.

In September 1960, John Steinbeck and his poodle, Charley, embarked on a journey across America, from small towns to growing cities to glorious wilderness oases. Travels with Charley is animated by Steinbeck’s attention to the specific details of the natural world and his sense of how the lives of people are intimately connected to the rhythms of nature—to weather, geography, the cycles of the seasons. His keen ear for the transactions among people is evident, too, as he records the interests and obsessions that preoccupy the Americans he encounters along the way.

It is three in the morning when Bobby Western plunges from the Coast Guard tender into darkness. His dive light illuminates the sunken jet, nine bodies still buckled in their seats, hair floating, eyes devoid of speculation. Missing from the site are the pilot’s bag, the plane’s black box, and the tenth passenger. A collateral witness to machinations that can only bring him harm, Western is shadowed in body and spirit—by men with badges; by the ghost of his father, inventor of the bomb that melted glass and flesh in Hiroshima; and by his sister, the love and ruin of his soul.

Based on the extraordinary life of National Book Award-winning author Louise Erdrich’s grandfather who worked as a night watchman and carried the fight against Native dispossession from rural North Dakota all the way to Washington, DC, this powerful novel explores themes of love and death with lightness and gravity and unfolds with the elegant prose, sly humor, and depth of feeling of a master craftsman.

When Cameron, a five-year-old boy with a big imagination, first met Botox, the wrinkleless little bulldog, he thought he knew everything about dogs. But he will discover that’s not so. Botox, our four-legged protagonist with a huge imagination, is about to teach Cameron an amazing lesson. Can anybody hear him? Until now, nobody could hear him. But thanks to his imagination, Cameron is the only person who can hear Botox talk, while everyone only hear him barking.

After an escaped kangaroo starts a fire that burns down his house, Teddy Fitzroy accepts an invitation to go to Malibu with his girlfriend, Summer, and her mother, Kandace. He’s hoping to spend some time relaxing on the beach, but wherever Teddy goes, trouble isn’t far behind. First, a massive dead whale has washed up on the beach—and before anyone can determine what killed it, it explodes. Doc, the head vet from FunJungle, suspects something fishy is going on and ropes Teddy and Summer into helping him investigate.

This definitive audio collection, read by Stacy Keach, traces the development and maturation of Hemingway's distinct and revolutionary storytelling style - from the plain bald language of his first story to his mastery of seamless prose that contained a spare, eloquent pathos, as well as a sense of expansive solitude. These stories showcase the singular talent of a master, the most important American writer of the 20th century.

"Are you a gifted child looking for special opportunities?" Dozens of children respond to this peculiar ad in the newspaper and are then put through a series of mind-bending tests, which readers take along with them. Only four children—two boys and two girls—succeed. Their challenge: to go on a secret mission that only the most intelligent and inventive children could complete. To accomplish it they will have to go undercover at the Learning Institute for the Very Enlightened, where the only rule is that there are no rules.

This breathtaking, full-color illustrated fantasy is inspired by Chinese folklore, and is a companion to the Newbery Honor winner Where the Mountain Meets the Moon. Pinmei's gentle, loving grandmother always has the most thrilling tales for her granddaughter and the other villagers. However, the peace is shattered one night when soldiers of the Emperor arrive and kidnap the storyteller. Everyone knows that the Emperor wants something called the Luminous Stone That Lights the Night.

Princess Celeste is bored to tears, and her brothers, Prince Jude and Prince Torrin, aren't doing much better. In a palace where all they have to look forward to are endless games of croquet and barley-water soup for supper, they don't have much by way of excitement. Until the one night Torrin sees a light in a forgotten tower of the palace, and they meet a wonderful and mysterious aunt who unlocks a brand-new world of adventure they will never forget.

Teddy Fitzroy's back for another zoo mystery this time it's a koala caper in this action-packed follow-up to Belly Up, which Kirkus Reviews called great fun. School troublemaker Vance Jessup thinks Teddy Fitzroy's home at Fun Jungle, a state-of-the-art zoo and theme park, is the perfect place for a cruel prank. Vance bullies Teddy into his scheme, but the plan goes terribly awry. Teddy sneaks into the koala exhibit to hide out until the chaos dies down.