Tara Sands

"Iris Walsh saw her twin sister, Piper, get kidnapped--so why does no one believe her? Iris narrowly escaped her pretty, popular twin sister's fate as a teen: kidnapped, trafficked and long gone before the cops agreed to investigate. With no evidence to go on but a few scattered memories, the case quickly goes cold. Now an adult, Iris wants one thing--proof. And if the police still won't help, she'll just have to find it her own way; by interning...

Olivia has been Macy McMillan's best friend ever since Macy transferred to Hamiliton Elementary from Braeside School for the Deaf. But then their sixth grade teacher assigned that embarrassing family tree project, and Olivia made a joke about Macy's father, and now neither girl is speaking--signing--to the other. It couldn't have happened at a worse time. With her mother getting married and an ugly For Sale sign jammed into their yard, Macy could...

"Twelve-year-old Jacky "Ha-Ha" Hart is a class clown with a penchant for pranking--and when she's required to act in the school play to appease her frustrated teachers, she must conquer her stutter"--

"Summer is almost over, and you know what that means--time to head back to school! But when a tropical storm ends A.J.'s vacation earlier than expected, he and his family have to stay at Andrea's house. Ugh, disgusting! When everyone in the house starts getting cabin fever, and even back-to-school shopping won't calm the kids down, Andrea and A.J. are sent to Camp Ockatollyquay. The catch? It's a camp to get kids ready for school! But not to worry--Andrea...

Rescuing a squirrel after an accident involving a vacuum cleaner, comic-reading cynic Flora Belle Buckman is astonished when the squirrel, Ulysses, demonstrates astonishing powers of strength and flight after being revived.

In 1871 Wisconsin, thirteen-year-old Georgia sets out to find her sister Agatha, presumed dead when remains are found wearing the dress she was last seen in, and before the end of the year gains fame as a sharpshooter and foiler of counterfeiters.

"When Lauren and Ryan's marriage reaches the breaking point, they come up with an unconventional plan. They decide to take a year off in the hopes of finding a way to fall in love again. One year apart, and only one rule: they cannot contact each other. Aside from that, anything goes. Lauren embarks on a journey of self-discovery, quickly finding that her friends and family have their own ideas about the meaning of marriage. These influences, as well...

In the summer of 1938, Layla Beck's father, a United States senator, cuts off her allowance and demands that she find employment on the Federal Writers' Project, a New Deal jobs program. Within days, Layla finds herself far from her accustomed social whirl, assigned to cover the history of the remote mill town of Macedonia, West Virginia, and destined, in her opinion, to go completely mad with boredom. But once she secures a room in the home of the...

"Trojan princess Cassandra is cursed by Apollo with the gift of prophecy, and must try to find her place in a world that she knows to be perilous; years later, will her friendship with a young Amazon princess named Rin help her to avert a disastrous end to their war?"--

In alternating chapters, two eighth-graders describe how their feelings about themselves, each other, and their families have changed over the years.