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:
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When Christmas Feels Like Home
Gretchen Griffith
When his family moves from a small Mexican village to North Carolina, Eduardo asks how soon he will feel at home, and slowly his Tio Miguel's seemingly impossible replies come true until, at last, he can put out the Nativity scene he carved with his grandfather.
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When Dad Killed Mom
Julius Lester
When Jenna and Jeremey's father kills their artistic mother, they struggle to slowly rebuild a functioning family.
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When Dad Was Away
Karen Littlewood
When Milly's dad is sent to prison, she feels angry and confused. She can't believe her dad won't be at home to read her stories. But soon Mum takes Milly and her brother Sam to visit Dad in prison, and a week later a special package arrives at home - a CD of Milly's favourite animal stories, read especially for her by Dad.
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When Friendship Followed Me Home
Paul Griffin
Ben Coffin has never felt like he fits in. A former foster kid, he keeps his head down at school to avoid bullies and spends his afternoons reading sci-fi books at the library. But all that changes when he finds a scruffy abandoned dog named Flip and befriends the librarian's daughter, Halley. For the first time, Ben starts to feel like he belongs in his own life. Then everything changes, and suddenly Ben is more alone than ever. But with a little help from Halley's magician father, Ben discovers his place in the world and learns to see his own magic through others' eyes.
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When Grown-Ups Fall in Love
Barbara Lynn Edmonds
This book is a sweet poem which shows families with mom and dad, two moms, and two dads. The large, colorful illustrations are great for group storytime or for one child sitting on your lap. Suitable for reading to children from newborns to 7-year-olds. The book also includes coloring pages as well as space for children to write their own family stories. Gay-friendly preschool literature is a long overdue resource for parents and teachers, both gay and straight. The author wants children with gay parents to feel included in the world of children's literature, and also wants to help straight parents provide their children with books which promote an appreciation of diversity.
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When Heaven Fell
Carolyn Marsden
When her grandmother reveals that the daughter that she had given up for adoption is coming from America to visit her Vietnamese family, nine-year-old Binh is convinced that her newly-discovered aunt is wealthy and will take care of all the family's needs.
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When I Grow Up...
Paula Vasquez
All of the children in Miss Ester's class know what they want to be like when they grow up: their families! And each family is special and unique. Readers will be surprised and delighted to find that Johnny the duckling's mom and dad have curly tails, stubby noses, and hooves. Johnny and his classmates make it easy for parents to show their little ones that there are many types of families, and they're all made of love.
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When I Met You: A Story of Russian Adoption
Adrienne Ehlert Bashista
A mother describes her daughter's life before and after she was adopted from Russia.
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When Jessie Came Across the Sea
Amy Hest
When a young girl from a poor eastern European village learns that she must leave her beloved grandmother for a new life - and a new love - in America, they both feel that their hearts will break. The sure and inspired narrative by award-winning author Amy Hest is paired with paintings by P.J. Lynch that glow with warmth and carefully observed detail, creating an unforgettable tribute to the immigrant experience.
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When Katie's Parents Separated
Sarah Ferguson, Duchess of York
Katie learns that there are both good and bad things about her parents no longer living together.
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When Mom and Dad Separate: Children Can Learn to Cope with Grief from Divorce
Marge Heegaard
Encourages children to sort out their painful feelings about the divorce of their parents through drawings.
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When My Parents Forgot How to Be Friends (Let's Talk About It!)
Jennifer Moore-Mallinos
Explores children's feelings when parents divorce.
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When She Was Good
Norma Fox Mazer
The death of her abusive, manipulative older sister prompts seventeen-year-old Em to remember their unpleasant life together, with their parents and then later on their own.
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When She Was White: The True Story of a Family Divided by Race
Judith Stone
During the worst years of official racism in South Africa, the story of one young girl came to symbolize the injustice, corruption, and arbitrary nature of apartheid. Born in 1955 to a pro-apartheid white couple, Sandra Laing was officially registered and raised as a white child. But at a school for whites, she was mercilessly persecuted because of her dark skin and frizzy hair. Her parents attributed her appearance to an interracial union far back in family history. Their neighbors, however, thought Mrs. Laing had committed adultery with a black man. The family was shunned. When Sandra was ten, she was reclassified as "coloured." As a teenager, she eloped with a black man, her parents disowned her, and having known only the privileged world of the whites, she chose to begin again in a poor, all-black township, where life was a desperate struggle against a legal system designed to enslave.
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When Something Feels Wrong: A Survival Guide about Abuse for Young People
Deanna S. Pledge
Provides checklists, journaling ideas, and other positive ways of dealing with being physically, sexually, and/or emotionally abused, emphasizing the importance of talking about what has happened and getting help.
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When the Black Girl Sings
Bil Wright
Adopted by white parents and sent to an exclusive Connecticut girls' school where she is the only black student, fourteen-year-old Lahni Schuler feels like an outcast, particularly when her parents separate, but after attending a local church where she hears gospel music for the first time, she finds her voice.
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When This World Was New
D. H. Figueredo
When his father leads him on a magical trip of discovery through new fallen snow, a young boy who emigrated from his warm island home overcomes fears about living in New York.
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When We Were Good
Suzanne Sutherland
The year 2000 isn't starting out too well for Toronto high school senior Katherine Boatman. Not only has her oldest friend ditched her for yet another boyfriend, her beloved grandmother died on New Year's Eve, leaving a void of goodness in her life that Katherine's not sure how to fill. While overwhelmed with sadness and self-doubt, Katherine unexpectedly finds new love, both for Toronto's underground music scene and for her would-be savior: a straight-edge, loudmouthed misfit named Marie.
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Where I Belong
Mary Downing Hahn
Eleven-year-old Brendan Doyle doesn't get along with his foster mother, he's failing fifth grade, and he's bullied mercilessly by a band of boys in his class. Then Brendan meets two potential friends--an eccentric old man and a girl from summer school--and he sees that there may be hope for him after all.
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Where the Heart Is
Jo Knowles
It’s the first day of summer and Rachel's thirteenth birthday. She can't wait to head to the lake with her best friend, Micah. But as summer unfolds, every day seems to get more complicated. Her “fun” new job taking care of the neighbors’ farm animals quickly becomes a challenge, whether she’s being pecked by chickens or having to dodge a charging pig at feeding time. At home, her parents are more worried about money than usual, and their arguments over bills intensify. Fortunately, Rachel can count on Micah to help her cope with all the stress. But Micah seems to want their relationship to go beyond friendship, and though Rachel almost wishes for that, too, she can’t force herself to feel “that way” about him. In fact, she isn’t sure she can feel that way about any boy — or what that means. With all the heart of her award-winning novel See You At Harry's, Jo Knowles brings us the story of a girl who must discover where her heart is and what that means for her future.
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While You Were Sleeping
Stephanie Burks
Describes two women's excitement when they learn that their new baby is born.
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White Oleander
Janet Fitch
When Ingrid, a brilliant but obsessed poet, is sent to prison for murder, her only child Astrid must find a place for herself as she journeys through a series of foster homes. With determination and humor, Astrid confronts the challenges of loneliness and poverty, and strives to learn who a motherless child in an indifferent world can become.
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White Rabbit
Caleb Roehrig
Rufus Holt is having the worst night of his life. It begins with the reappearance of his ex-boyfriend, Sebastian―the guy who stomped his heart out like a spent cigarette. Just as Rufus is getting ready to move on, Sebastian turns up out of the blue, saying they need to "talk." Things couldn’t get worse, right? Then Rufus gets a call from his sister April, begging for help. He and Sebastian find her, drenched in blood and holding a knife beside the dead body of her boyfriend, Fox Whitney. April swears she didn’t kill Fox. Rufus knows her too well to believe she’s telling him the whole truth, but April has something he needs. Her price is his help. Now, with no one to trust but the boy he wants to hate yet can’t stop loving, Rufus has one night to clear his sister’s name . . . or die trying.
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Who's in a Family?
Robert Skutch
Who is in a family, and in particular, who is in your family? Chances are, your family is unique, like no one else's, and that's just fine!
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Who's In My Family?: All About Our Families
Robie H. Harris
Nellie and her little brother Gus discuss all kinds of families during a day at the zoo and dinner at home with their relatives afterwards.