Samantha's stories describe her life during this important period of change. Her own world is filled with frills and finery, parties and play. But Samantha sees that times are not good for everybody. That's why she tries to make a difference in the life of her friend Nellie, a servant girl whose world is nothing like Samantha's Samantha befriends a servant girl named Nellie who moves in next door. The girls become fast friends, though their lives are different.

    Since second grade, they've shared secrets, good and bad. Now in seventh grade, Alison moves into the neighborhood. Stephanie hopes all three of them can be best friends, because Stephanie really likes Alison. But it looks as if it's going to be a case of two's company and three's a crowd. Can the girls' friendship be saved?

    and waitingAt twelve, Maggie had been thrown out of more boarding schools than she cared to remember. "Impossible to handle," they said—nasty, mean, disobedient, rebellious, thieving—anything they could say to explain why she must be removed from the school.Maggie was thin and pale, with shabby clothes and stringy hair, when she arrived at her new home. "It was a mistake to bring her here," said Maggie's great-aunts, whose huge stone house looked like another boarding school—or a prison. But they took her in anyway. After all, aside from Uncle Morris, they were Maggie's only living relatives.But from behind the closet door in the great and gloomy house, Maggie hears the faint whisperings, the beckoning voices. And in the forbidding house of her ancestors, Maggie finds magic ... the kind that lets her, for the first time, love and be loved.

    Titanic 1912 (Dear America Series)

    When diphtheria strikes the village and the children of Clifton start dying, Jessie's mother sends her on a dangerous mission to bring back help. But beyond the walls of Clifton, Jessie discovers a world even more alien and threatening than she could have imagined, and soon she finds her own life in jeopardy. Can she get help before the children of Clifton, and Jessie herself, run out of time?

    They're identical, and they do EVERYTHING together, especially since their mother died three years earlier - but they couldn't be more different. Bossy, bouncy, funny Ruby loves to take charge, and is desperate to be a famous actress, while quiet, sensitive, academic Garnet loves nothing more than to curl up with one of her favourite books. And when everything around the twins is changing so much, can being a double act work for ever?

    But then a millionaire's daughter moves into the next-door mansion, an old miser hides a fortune in his decrepit house, and a runaway kid starts hiding out in Sleepyside!"

    Addie, on the other hand, is fearful even of spiders and depends on Meryl for courage and protection. Waving her sword Bloodbiter, the older girl declaims in the garden from the heroic epic of Drualt to a thrilled audience of Addie, their governess, and the young sorcerer Rhys. But when Meryl falls ill with the dreaded Gray Death, Addie must gather her courage and set off alone on a quest to find the cure and save her beloved sister. Addie takes the seven-league boots and magic spyglass left to her by her mother and the enchanted tablecloth and cloak given to her by Rhys - along with a shy declaration of his love. She prevails in encounters with tricky specters (spiders too) and outwits a wickedly personable dragon in adventures touched with romance and a bittersweet ending.

    When she finds a mysterious old book on hypnotism, she discovers she can make people do whatever she wants. But a sinister stranger is watching her every move and he'll do anything to steal her hypnotic secret...

    But once Vesper and Brinnie arrive, they are plunged into a fierce struggle between rebel forces— and someone is out to kill the two of them! If anyone can triumph over those kind of odds, it's Vesper — one of Lloyd Alexander's most intrepid (and best-selling) heroines.

    She chooses the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. Knowing her younger brother Jamie has money and thus can help her with a serious cash-flow problem, she invites him along.Once settled into the museum, Claudia and Jamie find themselves caught up in the mystery of an angel statue that the museum purchased at auction for a bargain price of $225. The statue is possibly an early work of the Renaissance master, Michelangelo, and therefore worth millions. Is it? Or isn’t it? Claudia is determined to find out. Her quest leads her to Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, the remarkable old woman who sold the statue, and to some equally remarkable discoveries about herself.

    Heather is such a whiny little brat. Always getting Michael and me into trouble. But since our mother married her father, we're stuck with her ... our "poor stepsister" who lost her real mother in a mysterious fire. But now something terrible has happened. Heather has found a new friend, out in the graveyard behind our home—a girl named Helen who died with her family in a mysterious fire over a hundred years ago. Now her ghost returns to lure children into the pond ... to drown! I don't want to believe in ghosts, but I've followed Heather into the graveyard and watch her talk to Helen. And I'm terrified. Not for myself, but for Heather...

    Annabel never thought it was strange that she had Gloria instead of real parents. Until one day a wicked, wicked cat named Belinda comes to tell her the truth -- she's not just a little girl, she's a half-fairy! And she can do lots of things that other kids can't do, such as kiss her own elbow and fly around the house. But being a fairy isn't all fun and games, and soon Annabel must make a choice. If she chooses to be a fairy, she'll have to say good-bye to Gloria forever. How can she decide between her newly found magic and her dearest friend?

    Now Sammy's witnessed a crime at the Heavenly Hotel-a light fingered thief stealing $4,000 from Madame Nashira, the astrologer with the fire-hazard hair-do. Thing is, while she was watching him, he was watching her, too...Fast-paced and funny, packed with menacing suspects and clever clues, the Sammy Keyes mysteries keep you guessing to the last riveting page.

    While her father is away fighting in World War II, Molly finds her life full of change as she eats terrible vegetables from the victory garden and plans revenge on her brother for ruining her Halloween.