Kathryn Lasky

Abandoned by his pack, a baby wolf with a mysterious mark on his deformed paw survives and embarks on a journey that will change the world of the wolves of the Beyond.

When Soren, a barn owl, arrives at St. Aggie's, a school for orphaned owls, he suspects trouble and with his new friend, a clever elf owl named Gylfie, embarks on a perilous journey to save all owls from the danger at St. Aggie's.

When earthquakes and erupting volcanoes strike the Beyond, Faolan and the other surviving wolves must head for the Distant Blue, where they hope to find a new home.

Wishing to fight off evil that exists among the owls of the Great Ga'Hoole Tree, Soren, Gylfie, Twilight, and Digger must endure harsh training from the elders to become Ga'Hoolian owls, and carry out their good deeds.

After earning the right to return to the wolf pack that abandoned him, the exiled Faolan joins the clan as a lowly "gnaw wolf," but his goal of rising in the pack order is threatened when a jealous rival frames him for an unspeakable crime.

Estrella is a filly, daughter of the lead mare, one of a shipment of horses bound for the new world, but when the ship is becalmed and the horses are dropped overboard to lighten the load, Estrella finds that it is up to her to lead the herd to land and safety.

As the filly Estrella leads her herd north to good grass and water, the stallion Hold On, blinded in the canyon fire, is found by the human boy Tijo, who has an ability to understand horses that sets him apart from other humans--but when Hold On and Tijo catch up with the herd, Estrella must decide whether or not the horses should accept this boy or drive him away.

In 1769, thirteen-year-old Maria Antonia Josepha Johanna, daughter of Empress Maria Theresa, begins a journal chronicling her life at the Austrian court and her preparations for her future role as queen of France. Includes information about the history of the period, a family tree, and contemporary portraits.

Mary, the young Scottish queen, is sent a diary from her mother in which she records her experiences living at the court of France's King Henry II as she awaits her marriage to Henry's son, Francis.

In her fictionalized journal, eleven-year-old Minnie Swift recounts how her family dealt with the difficult times during the Depression and how an orphan from Texas changed their lives in Indianapolis just before Christmas 1932.