Family Relationships Fiction

The extraordinarily evocative stories depict the generation born in a small-town America during the Depression and growing up in a world where the old sexual morality was turned around and material comforts were easily had. Yet, as these stories reflect so accurately, life was still unsettling, and Updike chronicles telling moments both joyful and painful. The texts are taken from his recent omnibus, The Early Stories, 1953-1975.

Murderers, mob bosses, and convicts . . . these guys are not your average neighbors. Unless you live on Alcatraz. It's 1935 and 12-year-old Moose Flanagan and his family have just moved to the infamous island that's home to criminals like notorious escapee Roy Gardner, Machine Gun Kelly, and of course, Al Capone. Now Moose has to try to fit in at his new school, avoid getting caught up in one of the warden's daughter's countless plots, and keep an eye on his sister Natalie, who's not like other kids.

The first thing every listener will want to know is whether Anne Shirley appears in these stories of Avonlea and Spencervale. She certainly does. As a matter of fact, page one starts off in this manner: "Anne Shirley was curled up on the window seat of Theodora Dix's sitting room one Saturday evening, looking dreamily afar at some fair starland beyond the hills of sunset. Anne was visiting for a fortnight of her vacation."

Listen to stories from the best-selling Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul series, Volumes I, II, and III. This trilogy is packed with compassion, love, experience, and wisdom.

Morgan Rowlands loves Cal Blaire. He taught her about Wicca and helped her find out who she is. But now they share a secret. A terrible, dark secret that binds them together, even as it tears them apart.

The Briscoe family is once again the talk of their small town when March returns to East Texas two years after he was caught having an affair with his brother's wife. His mother, June, hardly welcomes him back with open arms. Her husband's own past affairs have made her tired of being the long-suffering spouse. Is it, perhaps, time for a change? Within days of March's arrival, someone is dead, marriages are upended, and even the strongest of alliances are shattered. In the end, the ties that hold them together might be exactly what drag them all down.

Fifteen-year-old Morgan has a secret: She can't wait to escape the perfect little island where she lives. She's desperate to finish high school and escape her sad divorced mom, her volatile little brother, and worst of all, her great group of friends...who don't understand Morgan at all. Because really, Morgan's biggest secret is that she has a lot of secrets, including the one about wanting to kiss another girl. Then one night, Morgan is saved from drowning by a mysterious girl named Keltie. The two become friends, and suddenly life on the island doesn't seem so stifling anymore.

Angie always thought high school romances were just silly infatuations that come and go. She certainly never thought she would fall in love over one short summer. But then she sees Jack Duluth’s crew cut peek out over a booth in McKnight’s drugstore, and their connection is beyond any childish crush. Suddenly, Angie and Jack are filling their summer with stolen moments and romantic nights. But as fall grows closer, they must figure out if their love is forever or just a summer they’ll never forget.

Desperate to return home to Earth and claim the reward Babel promised, Emmett and the Genesis team join forces with the Imago. Babel's initial attack left their home city in ruins, but that was just part of the Imago's plan. They knew one thing Babel didn't. This world is coming to an end. Eden's two moons are on a collision course no one can prevent. After building eight secret launch stations, the Imago hoped to lure Babel down to their doomed planet as they left it behind. A perfect plan until the Genesis team's escape route was destroyed.

Everyone has three lives. A public life, a private life, and a secret life. I'm a junior in high school, and yet, I've never been on a date. Everybody says it's because my overprotective brothers scare all the guys away, but I can't help wondering if there's something wrong with me. That is, until I hear a rumor that I'm secretly dating my brothers' best friend. What?

Raquel lleva toda la vida loca por Ares, su atractivo y misterioso vecino. Lo observa sin ser vista desde su ventana y es que, muy a su pesar, no han intercambiado ni una triste palabra. Lo que Raquel no sabe es que eso está a punto de cambiar.... Ares comenzará a cruzarse en su camino hasta en los lugares más inesperados y descubrirá que, en realidad, Raquel no es la niña inocente que creía.

Carter Jones is astonished early one morning when he finds a real English butler, bowler hat and all, on the doorstep - one who stays to help the Jones family, which is a little bit broken. In addition to figuring out middle school, Carter has to adjust to the unwelcome presence of this new know-it-all adult in his life and navigate the butler's notions of decorum. And ultimately, when his burden of grief and anger from the past can no longer be ignored, Carter learns that a burden becomes lighter when it is shared.

An unthinkable danger. An unexpected choice. Annabel, once the daughter of a wealthy merchant, is trapped in indentured servitude to Lord Ranulf, a recluse who is rumored to be both terrifying and beastly. Her circumstances are made even worse by the proximity of Lord Ranulf's bailiff - a revolting man who has made unwelcome advances on Annabel in the past.

It’s been a year since eighteen-year-old River Lang’s best friend died in a car accident. And every day since, he’s had to pass by the depressing billboard that appeared as a result: a texting and driving PSA that reduces Dylan to a cautionary tale and River to the best friend of the dead kid at school. Dylan was so much more than a statistic, though, and River hates that everyone in town seems to have forgotten. When he’s caught improving (a.k.a. vandalizing) Dylan’s billboard, River is blackmailed into joining the Affinity Trials.

They say Delia burned herself to death in her stepfather's shed. They say it was suicide. But June doesn't believe it. June and Delia used to be closer than anything. Best friends in that way that comes before everyone else - before guys, before family. It was like being in love, but more. They had a billion secrets tying them together like thin silk cords. But one night a year ago, everything changed. June, Delia, and June's boyfriend, Ryan, were just having a little fun. Their good time got out of hand.

When an English assignment forces "snobby" Ashbury students Lydia, Emily, and Cassie to exchange letters with "low-life" Brookfield guys, Lydia and Emily are surprised to find their Brookfield pen pals so kind and civilized. But after Cassie's cross-town correspondent threatens her, the friends plan a series of madcap missions designed to teach this malevolent male a lesson he won't forget.

Mayfair Cummings is young, beautiful, and brilliant. But her intelligence makes her the outcast of both the private school she attends and the broken family she hopes to salvage. When she catches the eye of both a popular senior and her handsome English teacher, not even her brilliant mind can help her navigate the explosive new relationships she is forming or a scandal that is brewing....

Karen Cushman's Newbery Honor-winning book tells the story of a medieval girl who works to avoid the marriage her father has arranged for her during her 14th year. Contained in this program is Catherine's diary - Catherine, called Little Bird or Birdy, daughter of Rollo and the lady Aislinn, sister to Thomas, Edward, and the abominable Robert. Against a vivid backdrop of everyday life on a medieval English manor, Catherine's earthy, spirited account of her fourteenth year is a richly entertaining story with an utterly unforgettable heroine.

Ryan Hart is caught in the middle. She has an older brother and a new baby sister, and she’s in a friendship tug-of-war with two friends who both want to be her best best friend. How can Ryan think about being kind to a classmate who is relentless with his teasing? Or be her signature sunny self when her brother, Ray, pulls the ultimate prank? But even when it seems like nothing is going her way, Ryan still looks for a way to see the bright side of things, refusing to let anything steal her joy, and finding ways to share it with everyone she meets.

A slumber party over at Lucille's richie nanna's big giant house is sure to be a dream come true for Junie B.! 'Cause what could possibly go wrong?