Family Life Science

Eleven-year-old Roxie was excited to start sixth grade... until a mortifying incident at a pool party turns her into a middle school laughingstock. Roxie can't imagine enduring a full year of bullying and body shaming, so when her country music star Granny invites Roxie to join her on tour, she jumps at the chance to leave her troubles behind. But then Granny—who's been struggling with memory loss—goes missing, leaving Roxie without an escape plan... and without her best friend.

While her friends are spending their summers having pool parties and sleepovers, twelve-year-old Carolina - Carol - is spending hers in the middle of the New Mexico desert, helping her parents move the grandfather she's never met into a home for people with dementia. At first, Carol avoids prickly Grandpa Serge.

This smart and witty collection of opinions, observations, and anecdotes covers a broad range of personal topics. Kathie Lee Gifford's stories are often funny, sometimes heartfelt, and always compelling - think Nora Ephron's I Feel Bad About My Neck meets Carol Burnett.

No subject is off-limits: talking to her kids about sex, being married to Frank Gifford, embarrassing professional gaffes, run-ins with celebrities (of which there are many), the harsh and funny realities of aging.

When their mother’s new job forces them to move from bustling San Antonio to middle-of-nowhere Aura, Texas, Caitlyn tries to stay positive, focusing on meeting new people and having new adventures. Cassie, on the other hand, is convinced that it’s only a matter of time until they’ll be sick of Aura and ready to move back to the big city. But being the new kids isn’t their only challenge. The girls start experiencing strange visions, and they must work together to change the future before it can happen.

After their adventures in China and Germany, the Kidd family is ready for some rest and relaxation. But when you're an ace treasure hunting team, there's always another adventure waiting around the corner! This time the Kidds head to Russia, where a set of priceless paintings by Leonardo da Vinci and Rembrandt has gone missing. Hot on the trail of the daring thieves, the Kidds race through the sinister streets of St. Petersburg and the wild Arctic tundra to track down the stolen treasure.

Masuo Yasui arrived in America in 1903 with big dreams and empty pockets. He worked on the railroads, in a cannery, and as a houseboy before settling in Oregon to open a store, raise a large family, and become one of the area's most successful orchardists. But his family's life changed forever on December 7, 1941, when they were forced from their homes into vast inland camps. Although shamed and broken, the Yasui family would yet endure to claim their place as Americans.

Even after rescuing the king from deadly Snuffweasels, Zarf is scum on the bottom rung of the middle-school social ladder. After all, he is still a troll. But at least he still has his two best friends, Kevin and Chester...until Kevin disappears, that is. Now Zarf is at an all-time low. It seems a band of wolves are seeking revenge for the constant disgrace they've suffered over the years, and Little Red Ridinghood's kid might be next on their list.

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.

An extraordinary quest, a magician’s powers, and the journey to find a kingdom.... Timoken is a prince from a secret kingdom. Before his birth, a forest-jinni bestowed upon him two magical gifts: a cloak made from the web of the last moon spider, and a potion called Alixir, the water of eternal life. Yet in exchange for the protection of these gifts, Timoken will always have one foot in the world of men and the other in the strange world of magic.

Twelve-year-old Autumn Malog is a servant at the enchanting Inglenook School, where young magicians study to become the king’s future monster-hunters. Along with her Gran and three too many older brothers, she works as a beastkeeper, tending to Inglenook’s menagerie of terrifying monsters. But when she isn’t mucking out the wyvern stalls or coaxing the resident boggart to behave, Autumn searches for clues about her twin brother’s mysterious disappearance.

There's a lot Emma wants to tell her mother about: her job leading cemetery walking tours, her new drum set, and the fact that the town's most famous ghost, the Morning Glory, seems to be trying to send Emma a message. But Emma can't share any of this, because Emma's mom is dead. Luckily there's a loophole. The women in Emma's family all have a special destiny that comes to them in the form of a dream, and when they finally achieve this destiny, they're rewarded with a vision of all their extraordinary ancestors.

When Fionn Boyle sets foot on Arranmore Island, it begins to stir beneath his feet.... Once in a generation, Arranmore Island chooses a new Storm Keeper to wield its power and keep its magic safe from enemies. The time has come for Fionn’s grandfather, a secretive and eccentric old man, to step down. Soon, a new Keeper will rise. But deep underground, someone has been waiting for Fionn. As the battle to become the island’s next champion rages, a more sinister magic is waking up, intent on rekindling an ancient war.

When Alice TodHunter Moon was five years old, she saw a beautiful golden Dragon Boat fly over her PathFinder village. She knew at once that the boat was Magykal. That was years ago, before her mother died, her father disappeared at sea, and the Garmin took her best friend, Ferdie. Now it's up to Tod and Ferdie's brother Oskar to rescue Ferdie from the Garmins' keeper, the malevolent Lady.

Life used to be great for Rose: full of friends, a loving mom, and a growing fashion blog. But when her mother dies in a car crash, Rose is sent away to live with a strange grandmother she hardly knows and forced to attend a new school where mean girls ridicule her at every turn. The only place Rose finds refuge is in her grandmother’s greenhouse. But one night, she sees a strange light glowing from within it. She goes to investigate...and finds herself transported back 500 years to Hatfield Palace.

Henry Leach wants nothing more than for magic to be real and for his little sister, Brianna, to leave him alone. Both wishes come true, but not in the way he expects. As it turns out, Henry's family has a history with magic - a history that dates back to the San Francisco earthquake of 1906. Now his father has been caught up in an evil wizard's scheme, and the last Wandmaker, Coralis, needs Henry's help to save the world. It would be a dream come true for Henry - except that in his first act of magic, he accidentally turns his sister into a hedgehog. Oops!

Leo Fender is no stranger to catastrophe, whether it’s the intergalactic war that took his mother’s life or the ongoing fight for his own. He’s seen his planet plundered, his ship attacked, his father kidnapped, and his brother go missing—and found himself stranded on a ship with a bunch of mercenary space pirates. Still, nothing could have prepared him for the moment he and the crew tried to save his father...and discovered a dark plot that could destroy hundreds of worlds in the blink of an eye.

Identical twins Cassie and Caitlyn Waters may be able to see into the future, but with a teacher who suspects they have powers waiting to catch them midvision and the grandmother they just met in town to teach them how to better control what they foresee, the last thing they need is more trouble. Luckily, a class-wide game of Truth or Dare has begun and the twins are having fun competing. When a vision shows the girls' friend getting hurt, Cassie and Caitlyn know that they're the only ones who can prevent it.

This is a story of the days of chivalry in England and of young Myles Falworth, son of a lord unjustly disgraced for treason, who was forced to make his fortune as best he might in the days when men seemed made of iron. How he entered the service of a powerful lord, rose to knighthood, defeated his father's old enemy in thrilling combat, and at last won the friendship of the king is told against a background of the dangerous times of the 14th century that makes them live again.

Eleven-year-old Nedda Papas is obsessed with becoming an astronaut. In 1986 in Easter, a small Florida Space Coast town, her dreams seem almost within reach - if she can just grow up fast enough. Theo, the scientist father she idolizes, is consumed by his own obsessions. Laid off from his job at NASA and still reeling from the loss of Nedda's newborn brother several years before, Theo turns to the dangerous dream of extending his living daughter's childhood just a little longer. The result is an invention that alters the fabric of time.

What is new about how teenagers communicate through services such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram? Do social media affect the quality of teens' lives? In this eye-opening book, youth culture and technology expert Danah Boyd uncovers some of the major myths regarding teens' use of social media. She explores tropes about identity, privacy, safety, danger, and bullying. Ultimately, Boyd argues that society fails young people when paternalism and protectionism hinder teenagers' ability to become informed, thoughtful, and engaged citizens through their online interactions.