The Whole Way Home


Book Description

A radiant talent on the brink of making it big in Nashville must confront her small-town past and an old love she’s never forgotten in this engaging novel—a soulful ballad filled with romance, heartbreak, secrets, and scandal from the author of Season of the Dragonflies. Playing to packed houses while her hit song rushes up the charts, country singer and fiddler Jo Lover is poised to become a one-name Nashville star like her idols, Loretta, Reba, and Dolly. To ensure her success, Jo has carefully crafted her image: a pretty, sassy, down-to-earth girl from small-town Virginia who pours her heart into her songs. But the stage persona she’s built is threatened when her independent label merges with big-time Capitol Records, bringing Nashville heartthrob JD Gunn—her first love—back into her life. Long ago Jo played with JD’s band. But they parted ways, and took their own crooked roads to stardom. Now Jo’s excited—and terrified—to see him again. When the label reunites them for a show, the old sparks fly, the duet they sing goes viral, and fans begin clamoring for more—igniting the media’s interest in the compelling singer. Why is a small-town girl like Jo so quiet about her past? When did she and JD first meet? What split them apart? All too soon, the painful secret she’s been hiding is uncovered, a shocking revelation that threatens to destroy her reputation and her dreams. To salvage her life and her career, Jo must finally face the past—and her feelings for JD—to become the true Nashville diva she was meant to be.




All the Way Home


Book Description

As wry as Bill Bryson’s I’m a Stranger Here Myself, as insightful as Tracy Kidder’s House, here is smart, engaging tale of one man’s stuggle to restore his family’s new home—a decrepit old mansion—and discover himself With his pregnant wife and their 18-month-old son in tow, David Giffels scoured the environs of Akron, OH, in search of the perfect house. But nothing seemed right . . . until he spotted the beautiful, decaying Guilded Era mansion. A former rubber robber baron’s domain, the once grand house does need some repair . . . okay it’s a dump. So what if, there’s “nothing holding this place up but memory,”—the assessment of his father, a structural engineer? It wouldn’t be perfect if it were easy, and Giffels relishes the challenge. He’s a committed do it yourselfer who fears a life without struggle—and Home Depot. All the Way Home follows Giffels’s funny and sometimes frustrating journey as he and his young family turns a decrepit money pit into the the home of their dreams. From outwitting squatters (both four- and two-legged) to rebuilding termite ridden walls, battling wisteria vines and finding $14,000 in Depression-era cash hidden in a bathroom wall, Giffels takes readers along on the ultimate fixer-up trip. Throughout he shows them the heart of a young man on the brink of adulthood, happily struggling with his new roles as a husband and a father—a man trying to find his way without losing himself.




Louisiana's Way Home


Book Description

From two-time Newbery Medalist Kate DiCamillo comes a story of discovering who you are — and deciding who you want to be. When Louisiana Elefante’s granny wakes her up in the middle of the night to tell her that the day of reckoning has arrived and they have to leave home immediately, Louisiana isn’t overly worried. After all, Granny has many middle-of-the-night ideas. But this time, things are different. This time, Granny intends for them never to return. Separated from her best friends, Raymie and Beverly, Louisiana struggles to oppose the winds of fate (and Granny) and find a way home. But as Louisiana’s life becomes entwined with the lives of the people of a small Georgia town — including a surly motel owner, a walrus-like minister, and a mysterious boy with a crow on his shoulder — she starts to worry that she is destined only for good-byes. (Which could be due to the curse on Louisiana's and Granny’s heads. But that is a story for another time.) Called “one of DiCamillo’s most singular and arresting creations” by The New York Times Book Review, the heartbreakingly irresistible Louisiana Elefante was introduced to readers in Raymie Nightingale — and now, with humor and tenderness, Kate DiCamillo returns to tell her story.




The Way Back


Book Description

Something ravenous lurks in a Mississippi swamp. When twelve-year-old Jake Kelly sees his father attacked by a rogue alligator, he becomes obsessed with hunting the beast down. To help in his quest, Jake enlists the aid of his friend, Buck Miller, and a reclusive outcast named Abe Garner. But Jake soon learns there’s more to the old hermit than anyone knows. And once trapped in the swamp, the boys discover the creature they seek isn’t the monster they thought it was... It’s something much worse. When hope is lost, faith will find the way back.




Home Free


Book Description

The vigilantes of the Sisterhood reorganize as a secret group called the CIC and dedicated to serving their friend, the president of the United States, Martine Connor.




The Long Way Home


Book Description

Lydia Laube returns to Saudi Arabia, collects her pay and decides to take 'the long way home' through Egypt, Sudan, Kenya and India. Our Good Little Woman is as eccentric as ever ... blithely she trots along, sunshade held aloft, while behind her ships sink, hotels explode and wars erupt.




Arkoumene


Book Description

Eleven-year-old Ethan Smith is a shy, ordinary boy who dislikes math and hard work. As he goes about his days playing computer games, escaping bullies, and living within his imagination, he finds himself wishing something exciting would happen to him. While taking a walk one afternoon, Ethan's wish comes true in a way he never imagined. He is suddenly kidnapped by an elven horse in an abandoned alley and wakes up in Arkoumene, a strange world populated by cyclopes, dragons, trolls, and evil goblins. The horse who can speak and whose name is Cara takes Ethan to a village in the country of Ryon, where he learns that a prince has mysteriously disappeared, the king has been deceived, and enemy soldiers are creeping unnoticed into the land. But when Ethan and his new Ryonian friends accidentally discover the enemy army's logbook during a cave exploration, all of them must embark on a journey across the dangerous countryside to warn the king of the impending attack and expose the truth about the missing prince's fate. Arkoumene is the tale of one boy's mission to save a kingdom from an evil plan as he confronts his fears and realizes that he can be braver than he ever imagined.




Sing You Home


Book Description

Ten years of infertility issues culminate in the destruction of music therapist Zoe Baxter's marriage, after which she falls in love with another woman and wants to start a family, but her ex-husband, Max, stands in the way.




Iron River


Book Description

2019 Paterson Prize winner Skipping Stones Book Award Kirkus Reviews' Best YA Historical Fiction of 2018 A river runs through young Manny Maldonado Jr.’s life, heart and imagination. Sometimes at night it even shoots through his brain like a bullet. But this river isn’t water, it’s iron—the tracks and trains of the Southern Pacific railroad that pass along his tight-knit neighborhood in the San Gabriel valley just ten miles east of L.A. The iron river is everything to Man-on-Fire, Man for short to his friends, Little Man to his uncles and cousins. He watches it, he waits for it, he plays nears its tracks, he listens for the weight of its currents (strong currents flowing east pulling two hundred boxcars, light current going west with less than fifty cars), he whiles away long summer days throwing rocks and bricks at it with his friends Danny, Marco and Little. They line up cans and bottles in mock battles to try to throw it off track. But nothing derails the iron river, and nothing stops the stinking cop Turk from trying to pin a hobo’s murder on the four young boys.





Book Description