Relates the angst-ridden life of fourteen-year-old Libby Madrigal as she tries to deal with her unhappily married alcoholic father and overeating mother, moving to a new town, and finding the perfect boy to "seriously" kiss.
Eleven-year-old Willa Mae finds herself struggling to understand old family tensions and secrets when her father returns from the war in 1947 to claim her from her grandparents with whom she has been living for the past five years.
Fourteen-year-old Jill forces her family out of denial when her father pleads guilty to a criminal act that isolates them from their friends and neighbors.
After moving to Miami, Florida, sixteen-year-old Desert McGraw, whose life as the daughter of a rock star has been anything but normal, determines to make a permanent home for herself and her family--even if it means breaking up the band.
In western Massachusetts in 1976, still grieving and guilt-ridden over her father's drowning, twelve-year-old Blue is dealt another blow when her older sister, Star, runs away to escape their stepfather's violence against their mother.
After discovering the secrets that lie in an abandoned house, fourteen-year-old Susan Backstrom, with the help of some new friends, has the ability to make a safe, new life for herself.
In their senior year of high school, three best friends, Nikki, Alicia, and Sam, attempt an "experiment" in which they each befriend a classmate they think needs attention and try to improve that person's life.
When fourteen-year-old Rachel reads the journal of her brother, who died when she was seven, she learns secrets that help her understand her parents and herself.
