Griffin, Paul

Life has been difficult for Ben Coffin and he doesn't make friends easily, so he spends most of his time with his favorite characters from science fiction books. One day he rescues a scruffy dog on the way home from the library. The dog, who he names Flip, then leads Ben to befriend Halley, a girl who dresses in crazy colors. Ben nicknames her "Rainbow Girl," and together Ben and Halley decide to write a novel. In doing so, Ben's life unravels. If he wants to keep his new friend, he will have to figure out what friendship really means.

Seventh-grader Ben, always an outsider, is led into a deep friendship with Halley, who is being treated for cancer, by the special dog he and his adoptive mother take in.

Five teenagers from the elite Hartwell Academy are on their way back to New York from an end-of-summer camping trip in Idaho when they realize that something has gone wrong; one of them has become violently ill, and their private plane has apparently been hijacked and is headed in the wrong direction--and even if they can somehow break into the cockpit and manage to overpower the hijacker, they have no idea how to fly the plane, much less land it.

Tamika, a fifteen-year-old hearing-impaired girl, Jimmi, an eighteen-year-old veteran who stopped taking his antipsychotic medication, and sixteen-year-old Fatima, an illegal immigrant from Africa, meet and connect in their Bronx, New York, neighborhood, with devastating results.

Having escaped from juvenile detention centers and foster care, two teenaged boys live on their own in an abandoned shack in a New York City park, making their way by stealing, occasionally working, and trying to keep from being arrested.

"When Lorenzo adopts a runt piglet destined for auction, an unexpected, life-changing friendship forms"--Provided by publisher.

"When Lorenzo adopts a runt piglet destined for auction, an unexpected, life-changing friendship forms"--Provided by publisher.

Seventh-grader Ben, always an outsider, is led into a deep friendship with Halley, who is being treated for cancer, by the special dog he and his adoptive mother take in.

Seventh-grader Ben, always an outsider, is led into a deep friendship with Halley, who is being treated for cancer, by the special dog he and his adoptive mother take in.