Book picks similar to
Stella Stands Alone by A. LaFaye


historical-fiction
ya
slavery
civil-war

Fly by Night


Frances Hardinge - 2005
    Her cruel uncle keeps her locked up in his mill, and her only friend is her pet goose, Saracen, who'll bite anything that crosses his path. But she does have one small, rare thing: the ability to read. She doesn't know it yet, but in a world where books are dangerous things, this gift will change her life.Enter Eponymous Clent, a smooth-talking con man who seems to love words nearly as much as Mosca herself. Soon Mosca and Clent are living a life of deceit and danger -- discovering secret societies, following shady characters onto floating coffeehouses, and entangling themselves with crazed dukes and double-crossing racketeers. It would be exactly the kind of tale Mosca has always longed to take part in, until she learns that her one true love -- words -- may be the death of her."Fly by Night" is astonishingly original, a grand feat of the imagination from a masterful new storyteller.

Theodosia and the Serpents of Chaos


R.L. LaFevers - 2007
    Sneaking behind her father's back, Theo uses old, nearly forgotten Egyptian magic to remove the curses and protect her father and the rest of the museum employees from the ancient, sinister forces lurking in the museum's dark hallways.When Theo's mother returns from her latest archaeological dig bearing the Heart of Egypt - a legendary amulet belonging to an ancient tomb - Theo learns that it comes inscribed with a curse so black and vile that it threatens to crumble the British Empire from within and start a war too terrible to imagine. Theo will have to call upon everything she's ever learned in order to prevent the rising chaos from destroying her country - and herself.

Counting on Grace


Elizabeth Winthrop - 2006
    Pownal, Vermont. At 12, Grace and her best friend Arthur must leave school and go to work as a “doffers” on their mothers’ looms in the mill. Grace’s mother is the best worker, fast and powerful, and Grace desperately wants to help her. But she’s left handed and doffing is a right-handed job. Grace’s every mistake costs her mother, and the family. She only feels capable on Sundays, when she and Arthur receive special lessons from their teacher. Together they write a secret letter to the Child Labor Board about underage children working in Pownal. A few weeks later a man with a camera shows up. It is the famous reformer Lewis Hine, undercover, collecting evidence for the Child Labor Board. Grace’s brief acquaintance with Hine and the photos he takes of her are a gift that changes her sense of herself, her future, and her family’s future.

Ice Whale


Jean Craighead George - 2014
    But when he unwittingly guides Yankee whalers to a pod of bowhead whales, all the whales are killed. For this act, the boy receives a curse of banishment. Through the generations, this curse is handed down. Siku, the ice whale, returns year after year, in reality and dreams, to haunt each descendant. The curse is finally broken when a daughter recognizes and saves the whale, and he in turn saves her. Told in alternating voices, both human and whale, Jean Craighead George’s last novel is an ambitious and touching take on the interconnectedness of humans, animals, and the earth they depend on.

Stella by Starlight


Sharon M. Draper - 2015
    Some stores she can go into. Some stores she can't. Some folks are right pleasant. Others are a lot less so. To Stella, it sort of evens out, and heck, the Klan hasn't bothered them for years. But one late night, later than she should ever be up, much less wandering around outside, Stella and her little brother see something they're never supposed to see, something that is the first flicker of change to come, unwelcome change by any stretch of the imagination. As Stella's community - her world - is upended, she decides to fight fire with fire. And she learns that ashes don't necessarily signify an end.

The Breaker Boys


Pat Hughes - 2004
    Anger—mainly  at his father and stepmother—is what gets him there and what prevents him from making friends. Then, in the spring of 1897, it gets him kicked out and sent home. To avoid his family, Nate disappears on his bicycle every day. In this way he meets the breaker boys, who do dangerous, dirty work for his father, separating coal from debris. Nate admires these Polish immigrants, especially Johnny, and longs to become his friend. But the only way is for Nate to hide that he is the boss's son. As Nate and Johnny's friendship marches toward the moment of truth, Nate discovers that the mine workers are plotting a strike. Should he warn his family or protect his friend?This fascinating second novel features a hero who is blessed—or cursed—with the ability to see both sides of a painful issue and to accept that no one is impartial.

The Friendship


Mildred D. Taylor - 1987
    What they don t expect is to hear Mr. Tom Bee, an elderly black man, daring to call the white storekeeper by his first name. The year is 1933, the place is Mississippi, and any child knows that some things just aren t done. A powerful story. Readers will be haunted by its drama and emotion long after they have closed the book.Booklist

Castle of Shadows


Ellen Renner - 2010
    Now revolution whispers through the air, and Charlie is powerless to stop it.Then she discovers a clue: a desperate, unfinished letter scribbled years before by the missing Queen. Charlie doesn't understand the danger her mother writes of, but she does know that the Queen absolutely must be found—together, they can surely save the King and the kingdom.So plucky Charlie embarks on a quest to track down her mother, armed with the precious scrap of paper and with Tobias, the gardener’s boy, as an unlikely ally. Putting away her tattered old clothes, she must deal with games of political intrigue, the rebels’ rough-laid schemes, and the prime minister’s sudden interest in the forgotten princess’s well-being. And every step closer to the Queen pulls Charlie deeper into an entangling web of lies and secrets, where nothing is as it seems and people are not who they say...

The Misadventures of Maude March


Audrey Couloumbis - 2005
    When she and her sister Maude escape their self-serving guardians for the wilds of the frontier, they begin an adventure the likes of which Sallie has only read about. This time however, the "wanted woman" isn't a dime-novel villian, it's Sallie's very own sister! What follows is not the lies the papers printed, but the honest-to-goodness truth of how two sisters went from being orphans to being outlaws—and lived to tell the tale!

Boom!


Mark Haddon - 1992
    What does "spudvetch" mean? Why do Mr Kidd's eyes flicker with fluorescent blue light when Charlie says spudvetch to him? A high-powered adventure can end only with a Boom!

A Boy at War: A Novel of Pearl Harbor


Harry Mazer - 2001
     For Adam, living near Honolulu, this Sunday morning is one he has been looking forward to -- fishing with friends, away from the ever-watchful eyes of his father, a navy lieutenant. Then, right before his eyes, Adam watches Japanese planes fly overhead and attack the U.S. Navy. All he can think is that it's just like in the movies. But as he sees his father's ship, the Arizona, sink beneath the water, he realizes this isn't make-believe. It's real. Over the next few days, Adam searches for answers -- about his friends, the war, and especially, his father. But Adam soon learns sometimes there are no answers.

The Legend of Holly Claus


Brittney Ryan - 2004
    Holly's heart is frozen, and she must face her enemy, free her self, and save her father's kingdom.

Queenie Peavy


Robert Burch - 1966
    SHE knows why she fires stones at anything and everything -- isn't she the best shot in Georgia? SHE knows why she is defiant with her teachers and deliberately mean to her schoolmates -- aren't they all against her? And Queenie doesn't care -- not Queenie Peavy!The fact is that Queenie has a chip on her shoulder too big for a lonely thirteen year old to carry. Times have "turned off hard" for everybody in the early 1930s, and they are especially hard for a girl whose idolized father has been in jail and whose mother works long hours. But in spite of all that, Queenie can be happy, for Queenie has character. ~ from back cover of 1975 Dell paperback edition

Steal Away


Jennifer Armstrong - 1992
    An American Bookseller Pick of the Lists in Orchard hardcover.

Hidden Figures


Margot Lee Shetterly - 2016
    It is the powerful story of four African-American female mathematicians at NASA who helped achieve some of the greatest moments in our space program. Now a major motion picture starring Taraji P. Henson, Octavia Spencer, Janelle Monae, Kirsten Dunst, and Kevin Costner.Before John Glenn orbited the earth, or Neil Armstrong walked on the moon, a group of dedicated female mathematicians known as “human computers” used pencils, slide rules, and adding machines to calculate the numbers that would launch rockets, and astronauts, into space.This book brings to life the stories of Dorothy Vaughan, Mary Jackson, Katherine Johnson, and Christine Darden, who lived through the Civil Rights era, the Space Race, the Cold War, and the movement for gender equality, and whose work forever changed the face of NASA and the country.