Family Life Science

Oscar Ogilvie is living with his dad in a house at the end of Lucifer Street, in Cairo, Illinois, when world events change his life forever. The great stock market crash has rippled across the country, and the bank takes over their home - along with all their cherished model trains. Oscar’s dad is forced to head west in search of work, and Oscar must move in with his no-nonsense aunt Carmen. Only a mysterious drifter helps alleviate Oscar’s loneliness.

Darcy Pennington hates her life. She is an insufferably average teenager with no real friends, crushing social anxiety, and an indescribable sense of not fitting in anywhere. A change in her dad's job forces her to attend Cedar Cove Family Camp the summer before her eighth-grade year, and Darcy once again finds herself on the outside of a social circle of teenagers, with her only advocate being an awkward girl named Samantha Palm. The only problem is, Darcy has no desire to be friends with her, but as the hostility from the other teenagers increases, she decides to return the friendship.

Since their last adventure, life in the Walker household is much improved. Dahlia Kristoff (aka the Wind Witch) has been banished. And now the Walkers are…rich! The kids are at a new school, Bay Academy Prep, surrounded by the children of bankers and CEOs. But this change in their fortune hasn't brought them happiness. Brendan is having a hard time making friends. Cordelia's worried that her adventures in Denver Kristoff's books have warped her mind - and even her body. And Eleanor just wants things to go back to how they used to be.

When a widower receives notice from a doctor that he doesn't have long left to live, he is struck by the question of who will care for his adult son - a son whom he fiercely loves, a boy with Down syndrome. With no recourse in mind, and with a desire to see the country on one last trip, the man signs up as a census taker for a mysterious governmental bureau and leaves town with his son.

In this masterpiece of nature writing, beautifully narrated by Oscar-winning actress Tilda Swinton, Nan Shepherd describes her journeys into the Cairngorm mountains of Scotland. There she encounters a world that can be breathtakingly beautiful at times and shockingly harsh at others. Her intense, poetic prose explores and records the rocks, rivers, creatures and hidden aspects of this remarkable landscape.

Best-selling, critically acclaimed author Mark Helprin's work has drawn favorable comparisons to an elite group of literary legends, including James Joyce, Franz Kafka, Edgar Allan Poe, and Thomas Mann. Helprin's sheer comic brilliance shines in this ingenious farce.

“I am a recluse and I love books more than I love people.” – So begins Fiza Pathan, the self-proclaimed Reclusive Writer and Reader of Mumbai. In this charming collection of personal essays, Fiza recalls important phases of her life, along with the books she was reading at the time and where she read them. Revealed along the way are Fiza’s personal struggles, from the father who didn’t want a girl child to the years she believed she wanted to be a nun to the college friends who shamed her for gaining weight. Her greatest victories are found here as well, among them the publication...

After being swept up in the magical world of Caraval, Donatella Dragna has finally escaped her father and saved her sister, Scarlett, from a disastrous arranged marriage. The girls should be celebrating, but Tella isn't yet free. She made a desperate bargain with a mysterious criminal, and what Tella owes him no one has ever been able to deliver: Caraval Master Legend's true name. The only chance of uncovering Legend's identity is to win Caraval, so Tella throws herself into the legendary competition once more.

Milo Bolt is ready to be the hero of his own story. With Uncle Horatio trapped in an enchanted sleep by the power-hungry Alchemist, he sets off with his new friend Alessia to find a cure. As they search for clues, the pair find themselves at the magical treehouse—home of the Botanist, the Alchemist’s sworn enemy. In their hunt for the cure, Milo and Alessia must forage in the Secret Garden, challenge Robin Hood, and confront the mighty Jabberwock. Will they find the cure and help Uncle Horatio before it’s too late?

Edinburgh is a city filled with magical creatures. No one can see them...except Ramya Knox. As she is pulled into her family's world of secrets and spells, Ramya sets out to discover the truth about the Hidden Folk with only three words of warning from her grandfather: beware the sirens. Plunged into an adventure that will change everything, Ramya is about to learn that there is more to her powers than she ever imagined.

Inside a small Yorkshire parsonage, Charlotte, Branwell, Emily, and Anne Brontë have invented a game called Glass Town, where their toy soldiers fight Napoleon and no one dies. This make-believe land helps the four escape from a harsh reality: Charlotte and Emily are being sent away to a dangerous boarding school, a school they might not return from. But on this Beastliest Day, the day Anne and Branwell walk their sisters to the train station, something incredible happens.

An abandoned house at the end of the block. A mysterious girl in an upstairs window. A strange black SUV lurking around every corner. When Nick and Tesla Holt are sent to live with their eccentric Uncle Newt, they find their new neighborhood is full of secrets. What the heck is going on? To unravel the mysteries (and save their skins), Nick and Tesla must use everyday household objects to build electromagnets, rocket launchers, and other crazy contraptions.

In this beautifully reimagined story by NSK Neustadt Laureate and New York Times best-selling author Cynthia Leitich Smith (Muscogee Creek), Native American Lily and English Wendy embark on a high-flying journey of magic, adventure, and courage to a fairy-tale island known as Neverland....

Abi and her two step-brothers, Max and Louis, find that strange things happen when they are alone in their eerie, ivy-covered new house. Abi, reading alone, finds herself tumbling deep into books, while Louis summons a startling guest through his bedroom window. Even Max has started to see shapes in the shadows....Their busy parents see none of it - but Louis' secret visitor is growing too alarming to keep secret, and he finds he cannot manage without Max and Abi's help. Can they find out where the mysterious creature has come from - and how to get it back there?

Anastasia is a completely average almost-eleven-year-old. That is, UNTIL her parents die in a tragic vacuum-cleaner accident. UNTIL she's rescued by two long-lost great-aunties. And UNTIL she's taken to their delightful and, er, "authentic" Victorian home, St. Agony's Asylum for the Criminally Insane. But something strange is going on at the asylum. Anastasia soon begins to suspect that her aunties are not who they say they are. So when she meets Ollie and Quentin, two mysterious brothers, the three join together to plot their great escape!

Theodosia Throckmorton is in a fix. Allowed to attend a reception given by one of the directors of her parents museum, she stumbles across Mr. Tetley of the British Museum in most unusual circumstances! Since Theo has last seen him in a showdown in an ancient Egyptian tomb, his reappearance could mean only one thing: the Serpents of Chaos are back.

The world Cal and Frida have always known is gone, and they've left the crumbling city of Los Angeles far behind them. They now live in a shack in the wilderness, working side-by-side to make their days tolerable despite the isolation and hardships they face. Consumed by fear of the future and mourning for a past they can't reclaim, they seek comfort and solace in each other. But the tentative existence they've built for themselves is thrown into doubt when Frida finds out she's pregnant.

Arthur and Rose Trout are the heroes of Roar, a magical world they created together when they were little, where anything they imagine can become real. Roar is filled with incredible wonders from their own imaginations. Arthur and Rose are looking forward to exploring beyond the End of Roar, an as-yet unexplored part of the world. When they arrive, they’re greeted by some long-forgotten fairies who are very excited to see them. Maybe too excited…

Bea's five-year-old daughter, Agnes, is slowly wasting away. The smog and pollution of the overdeveloped, overpopulated metropolis they call home is ravaging her lungs. Bea knows she cannot stay in the City, but there is only one alternative: the Wilderness State. Mankind has never been allowed to venture into this vast expanse of untamed land. Until now. Bea and Agnes join 18 other volunteers who agree to take part in a radical experiment.

After an incident shatters their family, 11-year old Samantha and her older sister Caitlin are sent to live in rural Oregon with an aunt they've never met. Sam wants nothing more than to go back to the way things were…before she spoke up about their father's anger. When Aunt Vicky gives Sam a mysterious card game called "A Game of Fox & Squirrels", Sam falls in love with the animal characters, especially the charming trickster fox, Ashander. One day, Ashander shows up in her room and offers Sam an adventure and a promise: find the Golden Acorn, and Sam can have anything she desires.