The Diverse Families bookshelf was created and funded through numerous grants. Due to lack of additional grants and the loss of key personnel, the project has come to an end. We have tremendously enjoyed creating this database and hope that it can help bring readers and books together.
Browse by Family Relationship:
Divorce
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Homesick
Kate Klise
Benny's parents are getting divorced, his mom left and his father has become a hoarder, and to make matters worse his hometown has been entered into a contest, and now the pressure is on to get the house cleaned up.
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Honor Among Thieves
Rachel Caine and Ann Aguirre
A savvy young criminal with antisocial behavior is recruited to attend the Honors space program and joins a team on a sentient spaceship destined for the far reaches of the galaxy only to discover dangerous secrets hidden among the stars.
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How I Saved My Father's Life (And Ruined Everything Else)
Ann Hood
After her father leaves and marries the glamorous Ava Pomme, Madeline blames her mother for their difficult new life, but in spite of the twelve-year-old's efforts to achieve sainthood, it takes a summer trip to Italy to put her family into perspective.
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How Tia Lola Learned to Teach
Julia Alvarez
Juanita and Miguel's great aunt, Tia Lola, comes from the Dominican Republic to help take care of them after their parents divorce, and soon she is so involved in their small Vermont community that when her visa expires, the whole town turns out to support her.
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How Would You Feel If Your Dad Was Gay?
Ann Heron
Jasmine thinks she's lucky to have three dads--a stepfather, her natural father, and his lover. However, her schoolmates and even teachers find this hard to accept. Jasmine's brother is subjected to name-calling and almost ends up in a fight over his father's lifestyle. At home, the two dads are supportive and understanding, and the children's natural father contacts the principal about it. A special assembly is the result, with a children's counselor discussing different kinds of families. A subplot, featuring a lesbian and her son, speaks nonjudgmentally to the issue of the sexual preferences among the offspring of homosexual parents. This book with a purpose does a good job of raising the issues sensitively and answering the questions reasonably. Scratchy ink drawings depict an African-American family living in an average neighborhood, with the children attending a racially balanced school.
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I Am Living in 2 Homes (I Am Book)
Garcelle Beauvais and Sebastian A. Jones
Twins Jay and Nia are children of two worlds and two homes. Readers can follow the siblings as they both address the difficulties of having parents who are no longer together and discover the benefits of having two very different homes to explore and enjoy.
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I Am Nuchu
Brenda Stanley
Upon his parents' 1981 divorce, Cal Burton goes from being a popular, comfortable Spokane basketball all-star to a resident of a Ute Indian reservation in Utah, where apathy, poor living conditions, racism, and bitterness over a decades-old family tragedy change his life.
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If I Lie
Corrine Jackson
Seventeen-year-old Sophie Quinn becomes an outcast in her small military town when she chooses to keep a secret for her Marine boyfriend who is missing in action in Afghanistan.
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If I Told You So
Timothy Woodward
Sean Jackson is sixteen and his choice is either to take a landscaping job in Georgia with his father, or to stay in his small New Hampshire hometown and take a job at the local ice cream shop. He stays home and deals with the pressures of a young man who struggles with trying to tell his father that he is gay.
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I Have Lost My Way
Gayle Forman
A fateful accident draws three strangers together over the course of a single day: Freya who has lost her voice while recording her debut album. Harun who is making plans to run away from everyone he has ever loved. Nathaniel who has just arrived in New York City with a backpack, a desperate plan, and nothing left to lose. As the day progresses, their secrets start to unravel and they begin to understand that the way out of their own loss might just lie in helping the others out of theirs.
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I Have Two Homes
Marian de Smet
Nina used to live with her parents in one house, but now she lives in two houses, sometimes with her mom and other times with her dad, and although she is confused about what is happening, Nina knows both her parents love her very much.
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I Know It's Over
C. K. Kelly Martin
Sixteen-year-old Nick, still trying to come to terms with his parents' divorce, experiences exhiliration and despair in his relationship with his girlfriend Sasha especially when, after instigating a trial separation, she announces that she is pregnant.
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I Never
Laura Hopper
Janey King’s priorities used to be clear: track, school, friends, and family. But when seventeen-year-old Janey learns that her seemingly happy parents are getting divorced, her world starts to shift. Back at school, Luke Hallstrom, an adorable senior, pursues Janey, and she realizes that she has two new priorities to consider: love and sex.
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In Real Life: My Journey to a Pixelated World
Joey Graceffa
A confessional, uplifting memoir from the beloved YouTube personality. It's not where you begin that matters. It's where you end up. Twenty-three year old Joey Graceffa has captured the hearts of millions of teens and young adults through his playful, sweet, and inspirational YouTube presence (not to mention his sparkling eyes and perfect hair). Yet, Joey wasn't always comfortable in his skin, and in this candid memoir, he thoughtfully looks back on his journey from pain to pride, self-doubt to self-acceptance. To his fans, Joey is that best friend who always captures the brighter side of life but also isn't afraid to get real. In the pages of his first book, he opens up about his years of struggling with family hardships and troubles at school, with cruel bullying and the sting of rejection. He tells of first loves and losses, embarrassing moments and surprising discoveries, loneliness, laughter, and life-changing forks in the road, showing us the incalculable value of finally finding and following your true passion in this world. Funny, warm-hearted, and inspiring, Joey Graceffa's story is a welcome reminder that it's not where you begin that matters, but where you end up.
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It's Not the End of the World
Judy Blume
A young girl tries to restore order to her family life by preventing her parents from going through with their divorce.
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It's Our Prom (So Deal with It)
Julie Anne Peters
Told in separate voices, Azure, who is a lesbian, and Luke, who is bisexual, help plan an inclusive senior prom. At the same time, Luke is writing and producing a musical about his life, both are working through the crush they have on their friend Radhika, and all three are dealing with problems at home.
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It's So Amazing!: A Book About Eggs, Sperm, Birth, Babies, and Families
Robbie H. Harris
Uses bird and bee cartoon characters to present straightforward explanations of topics related to sexual development, love, reproduction, adoption, sexually transmitted diseases, and more.
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Just a Girl
Carrie Mesrobian
Senior Rianne Hettrick-Wynne has had her share of hookups and parties in small-town Wereford, Minnesota. Now volleyball season is over and her once-solid friendships are unraveling, while an all-of-a-sudden relationship with Luke Pinsky is weirdly becoming serious. Add to that the possibility of getting kicked out of her house, and Rianne is desperate to make a plan that doesn't include going to college or working at Planet Tan for the rest of her life. At the same time, her divorced parents have started cohabiting again without any explanation, making Rianne wonder why they're so intent on pointing out every bad choice she makes when they can't even act like adults. That's not the only question she can't answer: How is it that Sergei, a broken-English-speaking Russian who makes his own vodka, is the only one who seems to understand her? And why, when she has Luke, the most unattainable boy in Wereford, all to herself, does she want anything but? Perhaps most confounding is the "easy girl" reputation that Rianne has gotten stuck with by doing the same things that guys do without judgment or consequence. If they're just being guys, then why can't Rianne just be a girl?
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Leah On The Offbeat
Becky Albertalli
Leah Burke - girl-band drummer, master of deadpan, and Simon Spier's best friend from the award-winning Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda - takes centre stage in this novel of first love and senior-year angst. When it comes to drumming, Leah Burke is usually on beat - but real life isn't always so rhythmic. An anomaly in her friend group, she's the only child of a young, single mum, and her life is decidedly less privileged. And even though her mom knows she's bisexual, she hasn't mustered the courage to tell her friends - not even her openly gay BFF, Simon. So Leah really doesn't know what to do when her rock-solid friend group starts to fracture in unexpected ways. With prom and college on the horizon, tensions are running high. It's hard for Leah to strike the right note while the people she loves are fighting. Especially when she realises she might love one of them more than she ever intended.
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Let's Talk About It: Divorce
Fred Rogers
Discusses healthy ways to deal with what children might be feeling about divorce.
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Let's Talk About Living with a Single Parent
Elizabeth Weitzman
Examines potential problems and issues that might arise in several different kinds of single-parent homes.
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Like Jake and Me
Mavis Jukes
In this Newbery Honor—winning story from 1984, a new family builds a relationship as a stepfather and stepson celebrate their differences and take heart in their similarities.
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Living in Secret
Cristina Salat
Amelia's mother helps her run away from her father who has custody and establish a new home and identity in San Francisco with her mother's girlfriend.
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Living Violet (The Cambion Chronicles, #1)
Jaime Reed
Samara is intrigued by her flirtatious co-worker, Caleb, but his secrets draw Samara into a world that places her loved ones in danger, forcing her to take a risk that will change her life forever.
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Lost!: A Dog Called Bear
Wendy Orr
When Logan's dog runs away as he and his mother are moving to a new home after his parents separate, a girl named Hannah, who longs for a dog of her own, finds him.