Difficult Adult Children

Frannie doesn't know what to make of the poem she's reading in school. She hasn't thought much about hope. There are so many other things to think about. Each day, her friend Samantha seems a bit more "holy". And there is a new boy in class everyone is calling the Jesus Boy.

For 16-year-old Sahara, life and death and everything in between depends on the color of a little stick. She waits three long minutes, praying to Jesus, Mary, and all the saints that the stick will turn blue, meaning she isn't pregnant. Instead the stick turns pink, and Sahara's life is changed in a heartbeat.

After the death of her parents, Mary Lennox is sent to live in the remote Yorkshire countryside with her rarely seen uncle. With no one to play with, she resents the landscape and the gloomy house. But then she discovers a key which unlocks the hidden door to a secret garden. Academy Award winner Glenda Jackson captures the magic of the story that has been adored by adults and children alike for generations.

Rowan has too many secrets to write down in the pages of a diary. And if he did, he wouldn't want anyone he knows to read them. He understands who he is and what he likes, but it's not safe for others to find out. Now the kids at school say Rowan's too different to spend time with. He's not the right kind of girl, and he's not the right kind of boy. His mom ignores him. And at night, his dad hurts him in ways he's not ready to talk about yet.

Her name is Odd. Twelve-year-old Audrey Wyatt bears the unfortunate nickname "Odd", a name even her bar-hopping, alcoholic mother uses when she's sober enough to recognize the girl. Cowed by life, Odd doesn't protest, not when she's deformed as she is. Born with a combination of rare birth defects, Odd's eyes are a startling and dreadful red. Demon eyes is the first thought that springs to mind. The little girl takes care to hide them behind dark sunglasses, something her mother insists on, except when she's trading freak-show peeks for dollars or drinks.

No one knows where the brilliant-colored spheres came from. One day they were just there, hidden all over the Earth like huge gemstones. Burn a pair, and they make you a little better: an inch taller, skilled at math, better looking. The rarer the sphere, the greater the improvement - and the more expensive the sphere.

Johanna is steadfast, patient, reliable; the go-to girl, the one everyone can count on. But always being there for others can’t give Johanna everything she needs - it can’t give her Reeve Hartt. Reeve is fierce, beautiful, wounded, elusive; a flame that draws Johanna’s fluttering moth. Johanna is determined to get her, against all advice, and to help her, against all reason. But love isn’t always reasonable, right? In the precarious place where attraction and need collide, a teenager experiences the dark side of a first love, and struggles to find her way into a new light.

Cherry Kerrigan loves her simple life, her family's tiny trailer, even working at Burrito Barn. Forget college - she's marrying her sweetheart from next door. But here comes Ardelia Deen, a glamorous starlet who sweeps Cherry into a world of fast cars and penthouse parties. Now Cherry's small-town life just seems so...small. When Ardelia drops a bomb of an offer, Cherry knows her life will change forever - no matter what she decides.

Dark Dude captures New York City in the 1960s - violent, decaying, slouching away from the American dream - and brings to life a character who has no choice but to head out west in search of something better. But, when Rico and his ex-druggie friend arrive in Wisconsin, they discover that picket-fenced apple-pie people can be just as violent and judgmental as the neighbors they left behind.

Lena has lived her whole life near the beach, walking for miles up and down the shore and breathing the salty air, swimming in the cold water, and watching the surfers rule the waves. The problem is, she's spent her whole life just watching. As her 16th birthday approaches, Lena vows she will no longer watch from the sand: she will learn to surf. But her father, a former surfer himself, refuses to allow her to take lessons. After a near drowning in his past, he can't bear to let Lena take up the risky sport. Yet something lures Lena to the water - an ancient, powerful magic.

High-school junior Jordan MacKenzie’s life was pretty typical: fractured family, new boyfriends, dead-end job. She’d been living with her father (the predictable optometrist) since her mother (the hippie holdover) had become too embarrassing to be around. Jordan felt that she finally had as normal a life as she could. Then came Gayle D’Angelo. Jordan knew her father was dating Gayle and that Gayle was married.

From the award-winning author of Artichoke Hearts. During the summer of her GCSEs, Kite's world falls apart. Her best friend, Dawn, commits suicide after a long struggle with feeling under pressure to achieve. Kite's dad takes her to the Lake District, to give her time and space to grieve. In London, Kite is a confident girl, at home in the noisy, bustling city, but in the countryside she feels vulnerable and disorientated.

What if finding her means losing himself? Seventeen-year-old Bo has always had delusions that he could travel through time. When he was 10, Bo claimed to have witnessed the Titanic hit an iceberg, and at 15, he found himself on a Civil War battlefield, horrified by the bodies surrounding him. So when his concerned parents send him to a school for troubled youth, Bo assumes he knows the truth: that he's actually attending Berkshire Academy, a school for kids who, like Bo, have "superpowers".

Frankie Parsons is twelve going on old man, an apparently sensible, talented boy with a drumbeat of worrying questions steadily gaining volume in his head: Are the smoke alarm batteries flat? Does the cat, and therefore the rest of the family, have worms? Will bird flu strike and ruin life as we know it? Is the Kidney-shaped spot on his chest actually a galloping cancer?

What did you hear? Kimberly Landis-Lilley and Teddy Lin are over. Yes, the Kim and Teddy broke up. At least that's what Phil Spooner thinks he overheard and then told Jess Howard, Kim's best friend. Something about Teddy not liking Kim's Instas? Or was it that Teddy is moving to Italy and didn't want to do long distance? Or that Kim slid into someone else's DMs? Jess told her boyfriend, Elvis, that he needs to be on Kim's side. Especially if he wants to keep her as his girlfriend. But Elvis is also Teddy's best friend. Now, Kim's run out of school for the day. Jess is furious.

How can I hold myself together, when everything around me is falling apart? Neena's always been a good girl - great grades, parent-approved friends and absolutely no boyfriends. But ever since her brother Akash left her, she's been slowly falling apart - and uncovering a new version of herself who is altogether more dangerous. As her wild behaviour spirals more and more out of control, Neena's grip on her sanity begins to weaken too.

Child genius Becky Bexley helps to organise a lot of fun at the university she studies at, including a humorous game in front of an audience for charity. She also turns out to have a talent for stand-up comedy, surprising perhaps, since she's only about eleven. Alcohol comes up for discussion one day as students talk about embarrassing things they did while drunk and the harmful effects of alcohol on the body, while Becky mostly listens in.

When Chloe falls asleep in study hall, it is the middle of May. When she wakes up, snow is on the ground and she can't remember the last six months of her life. Before, she'd been a mediocre student. Now she's on track for valedictorian and is being recruited by Ivy League schools. Before, she never had a chance with super jock Blake. Now he's her boyfriend. Before, she and Maggie were inseparable. Now her best friend won't speak to her. What happened to Chloe? Remembering the truth could be more dangerous than she knows…

Josh Flagsmith is a brave, epileptic pirate boy. Born with visionary powers, Josh is chosen as the Pirate Guardian, and entrusted with the onyx Stone of Truth, which he uses to control his epilepsy. But when a cruel colonist dictator seizes power and throws Josh’s parents in prison, Josh has to escape and sail to the island of Amaryllis to seek aid from the Pirate Council. Helped by his friends, Sandy and Megs, and the dictator’s cunning stepdaughter, Lavinia, Josh must find a way to rescue his parents and overthrow the evil dictator.

In this powerful middle-grade novel from the acclaimed author of Things You Can't Say, a young girl navigates the social growing pains of middle school and struggles to find her place while her older brother fights to overcome opioid addiction. When Emma starts sixth grade, things finally begin to change. She may still be in the shadow of her older brother, Austin, the popular high school quarterback, but she's made artsy new friends who get her way more than her bookish best friend, Becca. But things are changing for Austin, too.