True Girl

In July 1970, 18-year-old Paula Oberbroeckling left her house in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, and never returned. A cold case for 50 years, Paula’s story had been largely forgotten when Katherine Dykstra began looking for answers. A woman was dead. Why had no one been held responsible? How could a community give up and move on? Could there ever be justice for Paula?

When she was 15, Jennifer Mee developed an unrelenting case of the hiccups - hiccupping as many as 50 times a minute for months. Soon the Florida teen's strange story went viral. Dubbed the "Hiccup Girl" by the media, she gained international sympathy and appeared on a slew of popular TV shows. Eventually Jennifer's hiccups went away, and so did her fame.

The Most Beautiful Girl is a heartbreaking yet uplifting memoir of a daughter, her father, and the healing power of music. The story opens with a scene at Johnny Cash's funeral when author Tamara Saviano is struck with grief about unfinished business with her father. Robert Ruditys died two years before Cash, and hadn't spoken to his only daughter for more than a decade before that. Her grief led the author on a journey to rediscover her father and examine the lost relationship with a man she once loved.

In the Civil War, the government hired women and girls - some as young as nine - to make millions of rounds of ammunition. They worked 72-hour weeks with little training. Poor immigrant girls and widows paid the price for carelessness at three major arsenals. Many of these workers were killed, blown up, and burned beyond recognition. Gunpowder Girls is a story of child labor and immigrant hopes and the cruel, endless demands of an all-consuming war. A Junior Library Guild selection.

In 1901 Evelyn Nesbit, a chorus girl, dined alone with the architect Stanford White in his townhouse on 24th Street in New York. Nesbit, just 16 years old, had recently moved to the city. White was 47. As the foremost architect of his day, he was a celebrity. She told no one that White raped her that night until, several years later, she confided in Harry Thaw, the millionaire playboy who would later become her husband. Thaw, thirsting for revenge, shot and killed White in 1906 before hundreds of theatergoers during a performance in Madison Square Garden.

These days, it appears that there is always a trendy ingredient capturing everyone's attention. At present, activated charcoal has taken the spotlight and can be found in various beauty products, health supplements, and even food items. Back in the early 20th century, radium, a naturally occurring metal with an atomic number of 88 and symbol RA on the periodic table, was the new and exotic substance. This ingredient found its way into toothpaste, beauty creams, lotions, corsets, watches, and even water.

As Australia sank into the darkest days of the Great Depression, a succession of bloody mysteries grabbed headlines and gripped the country. The Hammer Horror, The Bungendore Bones, The Park Demon, The Human Glove and The Pyjama Girl—these were just some of the grisly cases that had to be solved by the Sydney detectives of The Murder Squad. The Murder Squad reopens the files on Australia's most chilling forgotten crimes to ask who was guilty, who was innocent, and whether some cops were as dangerous as the monsters they were hunting.

The year 1963: Reeling from the death of her mother and President Kennedy’s assassination, Catherine Gray shows up on Elizabeth Bentley’s doorstep demanding answers to the shocking mystery she just uncovered about her family. What she doesn’t expect is for Bentley to ensnare her in her own story of becoming a controversial World War II spy and Cold War informer.

Amid the excitement of the early twentieth century, hundreds of young women spend their days hard at work painting watch dials with glow-in-the-dark radium paint. The painters consider themselves lucky—until they start suffering from a mysterious illness. As the corporations try to cover up a shocking secret, these shining girls suddenly find themselves at the center of a deadly scandal. The Radium Girls: Young Readers Edition tells the unbelievable true story of these incredible women, whose determination to fight back saved countless lives.

It can sometimes feel like change is impossible. When you're overwhelmed by anxiety, toxic friendships, pressure from parents, and all the other demands of life, you might think that life is always going to be this way. But that isn't the case.

Emotionally battered and neglected by her personality disordered parents—and manipulated by Mormon beliefs—16-year-old Sarah was convinced her boyfriend Michael would save her. When her parents discovered that they’d committed the sin of premarital sex, the aftermath left the teenagers irrevocably bonded.

1938, Italy. Six-year-old Lia loves to build sandcastles at the beach and her biggest problem is her shyness and quiet, birdlike voice—until prime minister Mussolini joins forces with Hitler in World War II, and everything changes. Now there are laws saying Jewish children can’t go to school, Jews can’t work, or go on vacation. It’s difficult for Lia to understand why this is happening to her family. When her father loses his job, they must give up their home and move from city to city.

Yuna was just an eight-year-old girl when she experienced total devastation. Growing up in the Mongolian countryside, she wasn't ready to face the darker side of the world. And yet she had to. After she was kidnapped by an organized crime gang, Yuna had to overcome her fears at an early age and start taking care of herself. She tried to escape from slavery, but everybody that she encountered wanted to take advantage of her.

With thousands of men off fighting in the Civil War, the government hired women and girls - some as young as 10 - to make millions of rounds of ammunition. Poor immigrant girls and widows paid the price for carelessness at three major arsenals. Many of these workers were killed, blown up and burned beyond recognition.

Pink Jade is a touching and inspiring chronicle of a young Vietnamese girl and her family's life during the turmoil preceding and following the Vietnam War. It speaks to her journey to find peace and love after escaping the horrors of war-torn Vietnam. Sharing the trauma of forced displacement and the difficulties and uncertainty of what would come next, the author invites listeners to walk with her, as she and her family relocate her lost father and start a new life with a new direction.

The follow-up to Ben Brooks' New York Times best-selling Stories for Boys Who Dare to Be Different, this book offers more extraordinary true stories of amazing people who broke the mold and changed the world for the better. The resulting message? Be yourself, and your dreams might come true.

There are the fabled urban myths of lesbians who fill up a U-Haul on the second date and lead sweetly romantic lives of cocoa and comfy slippers. Safe and sound. A lot of cozy and not much crazy. These are NOT those stories- these are wild women with dirty minds, untamed tongues, and even the occasional cuff or clamp. A lotta crazy and no cozy slippers to be seen. These Wild Girls tell stories of their own Wild Nights (and days,) memories too hot to keep undercover.

On December 30, 1999, in rural Oklahoma, 16-year-old Ashley Freeman and her best friend, Lauria Bible, were having a sleepover. The next morning, the Freeman family trailer was in flames and both girls were missing. While rumors of drug debts, revenge, and police collusion abounded in the years that followed, the case remained unsolved, and the girls were never found.

Rumors of dragon sightings are stirring up fears based on old stories that depict dragons as bloodthirsty, fire-breathing monsters. To protect his people, the Overking decrees that all dragons must die. Twelve-year-old Eliana knows the truth about dragons. After all, her best friend Winston is one! Fresh off an adventure where she saved her kingdom with her ability to communicate with Winston’s family, she is now excited to hone her skills through her Dragon Speaker apprenticeship.

On a winter morning in 1990, Senator Byron Dorgan of North Dakota picked up the Bismarck Tribune. On the front page, a small girl gazed into the distance, shedding a tear. The headline: Foster home children beaten - and nobody's helping. Dorgan, who had been working with American Indian tribes to secure resources, was distressed. He flew to the Standing Rock Indian Reservation to meet with five-year-old Tamara and her grandfather. They became friends. Then she disappeared. And he would search for her for decades until they finally found each other again.