Book picks similar to
Winning London by Elizabeth J. Kruger


mary-kate-and-ashley
fiction
childrens
childhood

It's Not the End of the World


Judy Blume - 1972
    Singer why she had to have her Viking diorama out of the sixthgrade showcase. She felt like yelling, To keep my parents from getting divorced. But she couldn't say it, and the whole class was looking at her anyway. Karen's world was ending. Her father had moved out of the house weeks before; now he was going to Las Vegas to get divorced and her mother was pleased! She had only a few days to get the two of them together in the same room. Maybe, if she could, they would just forget about the divorce. Then the Newman family could be its old self again -- maybe. But Karen knew something she didn't know last winter: that sometimes people who shouldn't be apart are impossible together. So she felt like yelling at Mrs. Singer. And then Mrs. Singer did a surprising thing....

The Maze of Bones


Rick Riordan - 2008
    When their beloved aunt--matriarch of the world's most powerful family--dies, orphaned siblings Amy and Dan Cahill compete with less honorable Cahill descendants in a race around the world to find cryptic clues to a mysterious fortune.Book includes game cards which the reader may use to play an online version of the treasure hunt.

When Will This Cruel War Be Over?: The Civil War Diary of Emma Simpson, Gordonsville, Virginia, 1864


Barry Denenberg - 1996
    A Confederate girl records the hardships of Southern life as the Civil War rages at her doorstep and tears her family and her country apart.

Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging


Louise Rennison - 1999
    I have one of those under-the-skin spots that will never come to a head but lurk in a red way for the next two years.2. It is on my nose3. I have a three-year-old sister who may have peed somewhere in my room.4. In fourteen days the summer hols will be over and then it will be back to Stalag 14 and Oberfuhrer Frau Simpson and her bunch of sadistic teachers.5. I am very ugly and need to go into an ugly home.6. I went to a party dressed as a stuffed olive.In this wildly funny journal of a year in the life of Georgia Nicolson, British author Louise Rennison has perfectly captured the soaring joys and bottomless angst of being a teenager. In the spirit of Bridget Jones's Diary, this fresh, irreverent, and simply hilarious book will leave you laughing out loud. As Georgia would say, it's "Fabbity fab fab!"

My Life in Pink & Green


Lisa Greenwald - 2009
    After the local homecoming queen shows up at her family's struggling drugstore with a beauty disaster that Lucy helps to fix, Lucy has a long line of makeover customers for every school dance and bat mitzvah. But all the makeup tips in the world won't help save the pharmacy. If only she could find a way to make the pharmacy the center of town again, a place where people want to spend time, like in the old days. Lucy dreams up a solution that could resuscitate the family business and help the environment, too. But will Lucy's family stop fighting long enough to listen to a seventh-grader?This book is a funny and sweet debut featuring an unforgettable narrator who knows what she wants, whether it's great makeup, a killer business plan, or a better world.

Hope Was Here


Joan Bauer - 2000
    But what they find is that the owner, G.T., isn't quite ready to give up yet - in fact, he's decided to run for mayor against a corrupt candidate. And as Hope starts to make her place at the diner, she also finds herself caught up in G.T.'s campaign - particularly his visions for the future. After all, as G.T. points out, everyone can use a little hope to help get through the tough times... even Hope herself.Filled with heart, charm, and good old-fashioned fun, this is Joan Bauer at her best.

Aquamarine


Alice Hoffman - 2001
    There in the depths is a mysterious and beautiful creature with a sharp tongue and a broken heart: a mermaid named Aquamarine who has left her six sisters to search for love on land. Now, as this mythological yet very real being starts to fade in the burning August sun, a rescue is begun.On the edge of growing up, during a summer that is the hottest on record, Hailey and Claire are discovering that life can take an unpredictable course, friendship is forever, and magic can be found in the most unexpected places.

The Tower Treasure


Franklin W. Dixon - 1927
    This first one, "The Tower Mystery," introduced the action, mystery, and suspense themes. The boys continue to deliver thrills to this day.It all starts with the boys, Frank and Joe, on their motorcycles delivering important papers to a lawyer in Willowville for their father, Fenton Hardy. He's the well-known private investigator in Bayport. A reckless driver almost forces them over the embankment. It is not long before they find that their friend Chet's yellow jalopy has been stolen, possibly by the same red-haired driver! Stolen loot may be the issue. Later a dying criminal confesses that the loot has been stashed "in the tower" and the Hardy Boys make an astonishing discovery.

The Music of Dolphins


Karen Hesse - 1996
    When she is eventually spotted on an unpopulated island off Cuba, she is an adolescent and seems hardly human to her rescuers. Mila is taken to a child study center in Boston. Eager to please, she makes rapid progress in language and social skills. With her recorder, Mila finds she can even make music like the dolphin songs she yearningly remembers. But the more Mila discovers about what it means to be human--the locked doors, the rules, the betrayals--the more she longs for her watery home and gentle dolphin family. In an emotionally wracking conclusion, she returns to the world where her ears never want for song. Where, although she cannot stand on her tail or jump the waves, she is part of the music of dolphins.

How to Train a Boy


Jacqueline Carroll - 1999
    

Voyage on the Great Titanic: The Diary of Margaret Ann Brady, R.M.S. Titanic, 1912


Ellen Emerson White - 1998
    Titanic 1912 (Dear America Series)

Lady of Palenque : Flower of Bacal, Mesoamerica, A.D. 749


Anna Kirwan - 2004
    749, through the eyes of Princess Green Jay, Lady of Palenque.A political marriage is arranged between the thirty-three-year-old king of Xukpip and Princess Green Jay, the thirteen-year-old daughter of the king of Lakamha. The two are paired because of similar horoscopes -- and Green Jay possesses skills that will be valuable to her husband-to-be: She can read and write. Author Anna Kirwan relates fascinating aspects of ancient Mayan culture as she shares the young princess's physical and emotional state from the betrothal, with its distressing rituals, through her arduous journey to a foreign land and people, and a husband who is a complete stranger.

Sarah Bishop


Scott O'Dell - 1980
    Left alone after the deaths of her father and brother, who take opposite sides in the War of Independence, Sarah Bishop flees from the British who seek to arrest her and struggles to shape a new life for herself in the wilderness.

The Agony of Alice


Phyllis Reynolds Naylor - 1985
    Here she is, about to be a teenager and she doesn't know how. It's worse for her than for anyone else, she believes, because she has no role model. Her mother has been dead for years. Help and advice can only come from her father, manager of a music store, and her nineteen-year-old brother, who is a slob. What do they know about being a teen age girl? What she needs, Alice decides, is a gorgeous woman who does everything right, as a roadmap, so to speak. If only she finds herself, when school begins, in the classroom of the beautiful sixth-grade teacher, Miss Cole, her troubles will be over. Unfortunately, she draws the homely, pear-shaped Mrs. Plotkin. One of Mrs. Plotkin's first assignments is for each member of the class to keep a journal of their thoughts and feelings. Alice calls hers "The Agony of Alice," and in it she records all the embarrassing things that happen to her. Through the school year, Alice has lots to record. She also comes to know the lovely Miss Cole, as well as Mrs. Plotkin. And she meets an aunt and a female cousin whom she has not really known before. Out of all this, to her amazement, comes a role model—one that she would never have accepted before she made a few very important discoveries on her own, things no roadmap could have shown her. Alice moves on, ready to be a wise teenager.

Tales from a Not-So-Fabulous Life


Rachel Renée Russell - 2009
    New mean girl. New crush. New diary so I can spill about all of it…I put a lot of really personal stuff in this diary along with my sketches and doodles.But, mostly it’s about how TRAUMATIC it was transferring to my new private middle school, Westchester Country Day.And, how a lot of the CCP (Cool, Cute & Popular) kids were really SNOBBY and made my life TOTALLY miserable. People like, oh, I don’t know, maybe…MACKENZIE HOLLISTER!!And, it just so happened that I got stuck with a locker right next to hers. I could NOT believe I had such CRAPPY luck. I knew right then and there it was going to be a VERY, VERY long school year :-( !