#hardcover #vintage #ya #kids #children #realisticfiction #novel #realistic 

Light Hardcover (1 lb or less)

Oregon

Fourteen-year-old Barry, visiting an eighty-three-year-old woman in a nursing home and encouraging her to delve into her distant past, finds the project affects him deeply in his situation as an adopted child.

Visiting Miss Pierce

e13cc4fc-79ab-4134-be18-9bf6ed840996-1

#hardcover #ya #youngadultfiction #jewish #diverse #teenage #realisticfiction

HARPER’S DAD IS getting a divorce from her beloved stepmother, Jane. Even worse, Harper has lost her stepsister, Tess; the divorce divides them. Harper decides to escape by joining a volunteer program to build a house for a family in Tennessee who lost their home in a tornado. Not that she knows a thing about construction.

Soon she’s living in a funky motel and working long days in blazing heat with a group of kids from all over the country. At the site, she works alongside Teddy, the son of the family for whom they are building the house. Their partnership turns into a summer romance, complete with power tools. Learning to trust and love Teddy isn’t easy for Harper, but it’s the first step toward finding her way back home.


From the Hardcover edition.

How to Build a House

bd7ee622-6541-4748-826e-bee32cc0da08-1

Stephane Gerson

A Family Story

In this piercing memoir, a father maps the contours of his grief and explores how his family navigates the unthinkable loss of eight-year-old Owen.

On a day like any other, on a rafting trip down Utah's Green River, StUphane Gerson's eight-year-old son, Owen, drowned in a spot known as Disaster Falls. That same night, as darkness fell, StUphane huddled in a tent with his wife, Alison, and their older son, Julian, trying to understand what seemed inconceivable. "It's just the three of us now," Alison said over the sounds of a light rain and, nearby, the rushing river. "We cannot do it alone. We have to stick together." Disaster Falls chronicles the aftermath of that day and their shared determination to stay true to Alison's resolution. Gerson captures the different ways of grieving that threatened to isolate each of them in their post-Owen worlds and then, with beautiful specificity, shows how he and Alison preserved and reconfigured their marriage from within. Blending family history (including the ogood deatho of his father, which offers a very different perspective on mortality) and the natural history of the river, he provides an expansive, unflinching meditation on loss, our responsibilities toward our children, and the stories we tell ourselves in the wake of traumatic events. Slowly, inexorably, Gerson writes his way back to Owen, straight to the singularity that cleaved his life into before and after, creating a portrait of grief iridescent in its fullness, and unexpectedly consoling.

Disaster Falls

253ef540-556b-4f2d-81f6-87eb0c833e64-1

Meg Medina

First edition. 
Award-winning author
New hardcover book listed in like new condition due to a small tear of the upper right back corner jacket cover as well as a ripple/crinkle at the top portion of back cover￼


Hardcover (1 to 2 lbs)

Maryland

Nora Lopez is seventeen during the summer of 1977, when New York is besieged by arson, a massive blackout, and a serial killer named Son of Sam. Meg Medina transports us to a time when tempers and temperatures ran high to share the story of a young woman who discovers that the greatest dangers are often closer than we like to admit.

Burn Baby Burn

fb85c362-a3ab-4b13-bd49-2557cfacc6e9-1

#hardcover #fiction #contemporary #realisticfiction #ya #children #childrens #juvenile #middlegrade #kids 

Massachusetts

3 starred reviews * A Kirkus Best Book of 2017 * A New York Public Library Top Ten Books for Kids pick * An ALA Notable Book * 2018 NCTE Charlotte Huck Honor Book

From rising star Caela Carter, author of My Life with the Liars and How to Be a Girl in the World, comes a captivating and heartfelt story about siblings who learn that love can never be divided, only multiplied. 

Flora and her brother, Julian, don't believe they were born. They've lived in so many foster homes, they can't remember where they came from. And even now that they've been adopted, Flora still struggles to believe that they've found their forever home. Though Flora is trying her best to trust two new people, when she finds out that there will be a new baby, she's worried that there won't be enough love for everyone.

So along with their new mother, Flora and Julian begin a journey to go back and discover their past--for only then can they really begin to build their future.

Perfect for fans of Rebecca Stead's When You Reach Me, Kathryn Erskine's Mockingbird, and Ali Benjamin's The Thing About Jellyfish, this powerful novel about love and family will inspire and delight readers of all ages.

Forever, or a Long, Long Time

edaad595-3193-4549-8756-23b503b0c0e9-1

Nancy Bo Flood

Books is an excellent reading condition. Is a library book so has plastic cover and pocket for card. 

New York

A tender and gripping novel about family, identity, and loss. Thirteen-year-old Tess is having a hard enough time understanding what it means to be part white and part Navajo, but now she's coping with her sister Gaby's announcement that she's going to enlist and fight in the Iraq war. Gaby's decision comes just weeks after the news that Lori Piestewa, a member of their community, is the first Native American woman in US history to die in combat, adding to Tess's stress and emotions. While Gaby is away, Tess reluctantly cares for her sister's semi-wild stallion, Blue, who will teach Tess how to deal with tragic loss and guide her own journey of self-discovery. Lori Piestewa was a real-life soldier who was killed in Iraq and was a member of the Hopi tribe. Back matter includes further information about Piestewa as well as a note by author Nancy Bo Flood detailing her experiences living on the Navajo reservation. A pronunciation guide to all Navajo vocabulary used within the text is also included.

Soldier Sister, Fly Home

913820c1-08f3-4987-b618-7e44bbb1a38d-1

Rose Kent

First Edition 
Kimchi and calamari. It sounds like a quirky food fusion of Korean and Italian cuisine, and it's exactly how Joseph Calderaro feels about himself. Why wouldn't an adopted Korean drummer—comic book junkie feel like a combo platter given:

(1) his face in the mirror

(2) his proud Italian family.

And now Joseph has to write an essay about his ancestors for social studies. All he knows is that his birth family shipped his diapered butt on a plane to the USA. End of story. But what he writes leads to a catastrophe messier than a table of shattered dishes—and self-discovery that Joseph never could have imagined.

Grade level: 4 - 7
Ages 8 - 12+

A wide range of readers can relate to Joseph's story--those who are adopted, have mixed-race heritage, or those caught between their parents' culture and the culture where they live now.

Kimchi and Calamari

03319336-a56b-4f6b-81bb-5d1cd206d154-0

Bill Konigsberg

Rated 4 out of 5 on Goodreads.
Ex-library book in excellent condition with the exception of library stickers on the front cover and spine, as well as the library stamp on the first page.

Two teenagers, strangers to each other, have decided to jump from the same bridge at the same time. But what results is far from straightforward in this absorbing, honest lifesaver from acclaimed author Bill Konigsberg. Aaron and Tillie don't know each other, but they are both feeling suicidal, and arrive at the George Washington Bridge at the same time, intending to jump. Aaron is a gay misfit struggling with depression and loneliness. Tillie isn't sure what her problem is -- only that she will never be good enough. On the bridge, there are four things that could happen: Aaron jumps and Tillie doesn't. Tillie jumps and Aaron doesn't. They both jump. Neither of them jumps. Or maybe all four things happen, in this astonishing and insightful novel from Bill Konigsberg.

The Bridge

71599634-4219-454f-9532-8713abcc31b0-1

 collection of five children's realistic fiction stories selling at an affordable price of short stories

Light Paperback (1 lb or less)

Virginia

Children's 

Various realistic fiction 

Brand new, in original sealed packaging. Audio book on CD.
For children aged 7 - 9.  
Grade Level 4 - 7
1st book in series

Audio books are a great way to get kids to read. Perfect for long car rides!

This bewitching first novel is a puzzle, wrapped in a mystery, disguised as an adventure, and delivered as a work of art.
Chasing Vermeer joins the Scholastic Gold line, which features award-winning and beloved novels. Includes exclusive bonus content!

When a book of unexplainable occurences brings Petra and Calder together, strange things start to happen: Seemingly unrelated events connect; an eccentric old woman seeks their company; an invaluable Vermeer painting disappears. Before they know it, the two find themselves at the center of an international art scandal, where no one is spared from suspicion. As Petra and Calder are drawn clue by clue into a mysterious labyrinth, they must draw on their powers of intuition, their problem solving skills, and their knowledge of Vermeer. Can they decipher a crime that has stumped even the FBI?

Chasing Vermeer - Audio Book on CDs

#hardcover #fiction #realisticfiction #adult #love #redemption #family #realistic #exlibrary #adultread 

A Novel

LONGLISTED FOR THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE

In this astonishingly accomplished, morally complicated, "exceptional and starkly beautiful debut" (Kevin Powers, National Book Award-nominated author of The Yellow Birds), a prideful electrician in 1920s rural Alabama struggles to overcome past sins and find peace after being sent to prison for manslaughter.

Roscoe T Martin set his sights on a new type of power spreading at the start of the twentieth century: electricity. It became his training, his life's work. But when his wife, Marie, inherits her father's failing farm, Roscoe has to give up his livelihood, with great cost to his sense of self, his marriage, and his family. Realizing he might lose them all if he doesn't do something, he begins to use his skills as an electrician to siphon energy from the state, ushering in a period of bounty and happiness. Even the love of Marie and their child seem back within Roscoe's grasp.

Then a young man working for the state power company stumbles on Roscoe's illegal lines and is electrocuted, and everything changes: Roscoe is arrested; the farm once more starts to deteriorate; and Marie abandons her husband, leaving him to face his twenty-year sentence alone. Now an unmoored Roscoe must carve out a place at Kilby Prison. Climbing the ranks of the incarcerated from dairy hand to librarian to "dog boy," an inmate who helps the guards track down escapees, he is ultimately forced to ask himself once more if his work is just that, or if the price of his crimes--for him and his family--is greater than he ever let himself believe.

Gorgeously spare and brilliantly insightful, Work Like Any Other is "a striking debut about love and redemption, the heavy burdens of family and guilt, and learning how to escape them...Virginia Reeves is a major new talent" (Philipp Meyer, New York Times bestselling author of The Son).

Work Like Any Other

6b5bbdeb-9745-493e-b511-f45a88b6b2dc-1

#hardcover #fiction #realisticfiction #ronhansen 

Minnesota

Based on a true story from 1920s Manhattan, a latest historical work by the National Book Award finalist author of Atticus follows the affair between voluptuous Ruth Snyder and undergarment salesman Judd Gray, whose plot to kill Ruth's husband triggers an explosive police investigation.

A Wild Surge of Guilty Passion

39bbb728-77e0-430d-b165-cdb0305c3eb9-1

Beth Kephart

California

The threat of two escaped convicts and a missing friend lead Lizzie on a harrowing journey through the wilds of the Adirondacks in this stunning novel from National Book Award finalist Beth Kephart. Thirteen-year-old Lizzie’s favorite place in the world is her uncle’s cabin. Uncle Davy’s renovated schoolhouse cabin, filled with antiques and on the edge of the Adirondacks, disconnected from the rest of the world, is like something out of a fairy tale. And an escape from reality is exactly what Lizzie needs. Life hasn’t been easy for Lizzie lately. Her father abandoned their family, leaving Lizzie with her oftentimes irresponsible mother. Now, her mom has cancer and being unable to care for Lizzie during her chemotherapy, Mom asks her where she’d like to spend the summer. The answer is simple: Uncle Davy’s cabin. Lizzie loves her uncle’s home for many reasons, but the main one is Matias, Uncle Davy’s neighbor and Lizzie’s best friend. Matias has proportionate dwarfism, but that doesn’t stop him and Lizzie from wandering in the woods. Every day they go to their favorite nook where Matias paints with watercolors and Lizzie writes. Until one day when Matias never arrives. When news breaks about two escaped convicts from the nearby prison, Lizzie fears the worst. And when Uncle Davy goes missing, too, Lizzie knows she’s the only one who knows this area of woods well enough to save them. Armed with her trusted Keppy survival book, Lizzie sets out into the wilds of the Adirondacks, proving just how far she’ll go to save the people she loves.

Wild Blues

93336c90-bd99-42b3-b8ee-c2483d6f2065-1

Melody Carlson

Rated a very respectable 3.9 out of 5 on Goodreads

Diary of a Teenage Girl: Caitlin Book 1 

Sixteen-year-old Caitlin O'Conner keeps a six-month diary in which she records the day-to-day events of her life as well as her struggles to understand herself and God's plan for her future.

Becoming Me

af5c0c86-19a3-4976-b120-17d39f7755a6-1

Tommy Wallach

Pennsylvania

"Parker hasn't spoken since he watched his father die five years ago. He communicates through writing on slips of paper and keeps track of his thoughts by journaling. A loner, Parker has little interest in school, his classmates, or his future. But everything changes when he meets Zelda, a mysterious young woman with an unusual request: 'treat me like a teenager'"--

Thanks for the Trouble

ef6bde58-b1ca-4a7b-b42f-ecf001b1fad6-1

#paperback #realistic #realisticfiction #kids #chapterbook 

Graduation of Jake Moon 

Ann M. Martin

Ann Martin's phenomenal Newbery Honor book, now in paperback.The summer Hattie turns 12, her predictable small-town life is turned on end when her uncle Adam returns home for the first time in over 10 years. Hattie has never met him, never known about him. He's been institutionalized; his condition involves schizophrenia and autism.Hattie, a shy girl who prefers the company of adults, takes immediately to her excitable uncle, even when the rest of the family -- her parents and grandparents -- have trouble dealing with his intense way of seeing the world. And Adam, too, sees that Hattie is special, that her quiet, shy ways are not a disability,.

A Corner of the Universe

6dd6ae05-d3bb-4e44-91ac-33551c5e665b-1

Lauren Oliver

Rated 3.9 out of 5 on Goodreads, this book includes 2 new stories and extra bonus content.


Heavy Paperback (2 to 4 lbs)

After she dies in a car crash, teenaged Samantha relives the day of her death over and over again until, on the seventh day, she finally discovers a way to save herself.

Before I Fall

ea5877b5-dba0-43e5-abca-8f5c37b4e9ca-1

Brandy Colbert

Four years after Theo's best friend, Donovan, disappeared at age thirteen, he is found and brought home and Theo puts her health at risk as she decides whether to tell the truth about the abductor, knowing her revelation could end her life-long dream of becoming a professional ballet dancer.

Pointe

984f9564-28dc-4717-8da9-1fe141f2d3fb-1

#paperback #middleschool #realisticfiction #fiction #ya #middlegrades 

Lost in the Sun 

Sarah Dessen

Book in excellent condition, with the exception of a black marker, line on the bottom outer pages which does not affect the inside pages, as well as a name that has been blocked out on the first page. ￼

Paperback (1 to 2 lbs)

When she is abandoned by her alcoholic mother, Ruby winds up living with Cora, the sister she has not seen for ten years, and learns about Cora's new life, what makes a family, and that she too has something to offer others.

Lock and Key

e7b91ca1-a739-4724-864d-d28e9701e65b-1

Matt Mendez

Louisiana

"There are moments when a story shakes you...Barely Missing Everything is one of those stories, and Mendez, a gifted storyteller with a distinct voice, is sure to bring a quake to the literary landscape." --Jason Reynolds, New York Times bestselling author of Long Way Down

In the tradition of Jason Reynolds and Matt de la Peña, this heartbreaking, no-holds-barred debut novel told from three points of view explores how difficult it is to make it in life when you--your life, brown lives--don't matter.

Juan has plans. He's going to get out of El Paso, Texas, on a basketball scholarship and make something of himself--or at least find something better than his mom Fabi's cruddy apartment, her string of loser boyfriends, and a dead dad. Basketball is going to be his ticket out, his ticket up. He just needs to make it happen.

His best friend JD has plans, too. He's going to be a filmmaker one day, like Quinten Tarantino or Guillermo del Toro (NOT Steven Spielberg). He's got a camera and he's got passion--what else could he need?

Fabi doesn't have a plan anymore. When you get pregnant at sixteen and have been stuck bartending to make ends meet for the past seventeen years, you realize plans don't always pan out, and that there some things you just can't plan for...

Like Juan's run-in with the police, like a sprained ankle, and a tanking math grade that will likely ruin his chance at a scholarship. Like JD causing the implosion of his family. Like letters from a man named Mando on death row. Like finding out this man could be the father your mother said was dead.

Soon Juan and JD are embarking on a Thelma and Louise­-like road trip to visit Mando. Juan will finally meet his dad, JD has a perfect subject for his documentary, and Fabi is desperate to stop them. But, as we already know, there are some things you just can't plan for...

Barely Missing Everything

d44dd568-4c2f-490c-b01c-b6c165e4cda6-1

Lisa Genova

The breathtaking new novel from the author of STILL ALICE, which was adapted into an Oscar-winning film starring Julianne Moore.

Joe O'Brien is a Boston cop; his physical stamina and methodical mind have seen him through decades policing the city streets, while raising a family with his wife Rosie. When he starts committing uncharacteristic errors - mislaying his police weapon, trouble writing up reports, slurred speech - he attributes them to stress. Finally, he agrees to see a doctor and is handed a terrifying, unexpected diagnosis: Huntington's disease.

Not only is Joe's life set to change beyond recognition, but each of his four grown children has a fifty-fifty chance of inheriting the disease. Observing her potential future play out in his escalating symptoms, his pretty yoga teacher daughter Katie wrestles with how to make the most of the here and now, and how to care for her dad who is, inside, always an O'Brien. Inside the O'Briens is a powerfully true and tender elegy to the resilience of the human spirit.

Inside the O'Briens

075c8eb9-caf5-4e82-85ee-72b632843dbe-1

Emery Lord

Unread paperback listed as in like new condition due to a tiny tear on the spine

"Can seventeen-year-old Jonah save his family restaurant from ruin, his mother from her sadness, and his danger-seeking girlfriend Vivi from herself?"--

Browse by categories

Save this search

Pat Derby