Gary Paulsen

Ben has been invited to try out for a special hockey academy. But Dad wants Ben to catch up to the school field trip instead. So Ben, Dad, and their dogs, Atticus and Conor, jump into their truck. Ben concocts a secret plan to make the tryout, but Atticus and Conor are on to him. Dad's new apprentice, Brig, and Ben's twin classmates, Jacob and Charlotte, are along for the ride.

The lives of a fourteen-year-old Mexican prostitute, living in the United States illegally, and a wealthy American girl intersect in a dramatic way.

A fourteen-year-old boy who has been neglected by irresponsible parents spends a wonderful summer on a farm where his grandmother cooks for two elderly brothers.

Continues the adventures of Sarny, the slave girl Nightjohn taught to read, through the aftermath of the Civil War during which time she taught other Blacks and lived a full life until age ninety-four.

When David goes out on his sailboat to scatter his recently deceased uncle's ashes to the wind, he is caught in a fierce storm and must survive many days on his own as he works out his feelings about life and his uncle.

Although dismayed and embarrassed when his father takes him on the road to get rich preaching the word of God, fourteen-year-old Steven finds himself caught up in the money and the things it can buy.

Ten short stories in which the lives of young people in different circumstances are changed by their encounters with books.