self-esteem

Although his past accomplishments have convinced everyone else he is headed for college and greatness, seventeen-year-old Stan just wants to work at Happy Video, live in his parents' basement, write a movie script--and convince someone there really is a madman after him.

A moment of false bravado and some imaginative letters allow shy, anxiety-ridden, thirteen-year-old Markus to connect with a Hollywood star, but when she returns home to Norway she wants to meet the thirty-six-year-old millionaire she believes him to be.

Discusses various aspects of low self-esteem, how it can lead to drug abuse, the negative consequences, and where to get help for such a problem.

Discusses various forms of family violence, including child abuse, sibling abuse, incest, and elder abuse, and discusses how to get help as well as ways of building self-esteem.

The author chronicles her effort to avoid looking at her body in a mirror for an entire year, revealing how the journey allowed her to rediscover her sense of true beauty.

A fifteen-year-old boy from an abusive home desperately seeking his older brother's love and approval starts pushing drugs for him and suffers the consequences.

Seventeen-year-old Christy, sad since her father's death, ignored by her mother, and abused by her drug-dealing half-brother, finds friends who help her learn to stand up for herself and move past the old hurts and fears that are keeping her down.

In the wake of her cousin's suicide, overweight and introverted seventeen-year-old Miles experiences significant changes in her relationships with her mother and father, her best friend Jamal and his family, and her cousin's father, while gaining insights about herself, both positive and negative.