Living in Indiana during World War I, ten-year-old Mallie longs to be seen as different from her identical twin and finds an example of individuality in the gypsies who moved into her community.
Mr. Goose finds an abandoned egg, hatches it, and raises a peculiar green-skinned long-tailed chick, who worries about his identity but comes to recognize that he has a loving parent.
A young girl feels different from everyone else because she has an eye on the end of one finger, but it comes in handy on occasion, such as when she is helping catch a spy.
Harrison and Tucker always act and think alike as they are growing up, but when they go to kindergarten and end up in different classrooms they start to develop differences.
Azoth, a former guild rat, takes on a new name--Kylar Stern--and identity while learning the art of assassination from a master, Durzo Blint, the city's most accomplished assassin.
After the Axis Institute is blown up, fifteen-year-old Cadell Piggot is unhappily stuck in foster care with constant police surveillance to protect him from the evil Prosper English until he gets an offer to join a mysterious group called Genius Squad.