Showing results by author "Frances O'Roark Dowell" in All Categories

The Quilting Life on the Written Page, as read to you by award-winning author Frances O'Roark Dowell (Birds in the Air, Margaret Goes Modern, Dovey Coe, Shooting the Moon).

Sixth grade is a most confusing time. Best friends aren't friends anymore. Worst enemies suddenly want to be partners in crime. And classmates you thought you knew have all sorts of surprising stuff going on. The kids in Mrs. Herrera's class are dealing with all this and more.

New York Times best-selling author Frances O’Roark Dowell has garnered the Edgar Award and the Christopher Medal for her keen-eyed, humorous fiction. Embarrassed by her family’s offbeat lifestyle, Janie Gorman lives with her modern-hippy parents on a rustic goat farm. Smart, creative, and a bit quirky, Janie longs to be seen as normal. But having to milk goats every day is not helping her reach that goal.

One true friend. Someone shining. That's all twelve-year-old Arie Mae wants. But shining true friends are hard to come by deep in the mountains of western North Carolina, so she sets her sights on a cousin unseen, someone who lives all the way away in the big city of Baltimore, Maryland. Three unanswered letters later, Arie Mae learns that a group of kids from Baltimore are coming to spend a summer on the mountain.

While waiting outside the principal’s office at school, Isabelle Bean stumbles upon another world. It’s just like a fairy tale—until Isabelle is mistaken for a witch, all thanks to her favorite pair of boots.

Is it possible to start afresh when you're thoroughly weighted down? Seventeen pounds. That's the difference between Abigail Walker and Kristen Gorzca. Between chubby and slim, between teased and taunting. Abby is fine with her body and sick of seventeen pounds making her miserable, so she speaks out against Kristen and her groupies - and becomes officially unpopular. Embracing her new status, Abby heads to an abandoned lot across the street and crosses an unfamiliar stream that leads her to a boy who's as different as they come.

A ghost saved 12-year-old Maddie's life when she was an infant, her Granny Lane claims, so Maddie must always remember that she is special. But it's hard to feel special when you've spent your life being shuttled from one foster home to another. And now that she's at the East Tennessee Children's Home, Maddie feels, well, less than ordinary. Six-year-old Ricky Ray, who came to the Home after his parents failed to come back from a party, thinks Maddie's the cat's meow. But what does a little boy like that know?

Having spent her youth travelling the world, Edgar Award winner Frances O'Roark Dowell is the author of the critically acclaimed Shooting the Moon. A compelling coming-of-age story, The Kind of Friends We Used to Be will resonate in the minds of listeners of all ages long after its conclusion.

In the old days, when Kate had no interest in romance, she never cared what other people thought. Now, it appeared, love was turning her into a rotten human being.

Edgar Award-winning author Frances O'Roark Dowell is acclaimed for the rich characterizations in her poignant coming-of-age novels. Drawing on her experience as a colonel's daughter, Dowell delivers an evocative portrait of a 12-year-old girl whose view of life, war, and her dad - Fort Hood's base commander - changes as her corpsman brother sends home haunting images from Vietnam. An eloquent narration captures the emotional intensity of the novel's gripping prose.

Everybody knows Hazard Stokes has mad football skills. A defensive back, he’s never played dirty (no need for that when you’re as good as he is) so it’s a shock when he makes a bad hit the first game of the season and gets thrown off the field. Now Coach won’t let him back on the team until a therapist gives the thumbs up. At first, Haz denies there’s a problem, but over time he starts to get it.