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 Health & Disability:
Physical Disability
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A Church for All
Gayle E. Pitman
Celebrates a diverse community on a Sunday morning at an inclusive church that welcomes all people regardless of age, class, race, gender identity, and sexual orientation. Come to the church for all!
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A Family is a Family is a Family
Sara O'Leary
When a teacher asks the children in her class to think about what makes their families special, the answers are all different in many ways -- but the same in the one way that matters most of all. One child is worried that her family is just too different to explain, but listens as her classmates talk about what makes their families special. One is raised by a grandmother, and another has two dads. One is full of stepsiblings, and another has a new baby.
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After Ever After
Jordan Sonnenblick
Although Jeff and Tad, encouraged by a new friend, Lindsey, make a deal to help one another overcome aftereffects of their cancer treatments in preparation for eighth-grade graduation, Jeff still craves advice from his older brother Stephen, who is studying drums in Africa.
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All Kinds of Friends, Even Green!
Ellen B. Senisi
In a school assignment, seven-year-old Moses, who has spina bifida and uses a wheelchair, reflects that his neighbor's disabled iguana resembles him because they both have figured out how to get where they want to be in different ways than those around them.
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Also Known as Harper
Ann Haywood Leal
Writing poetry helps fifth-grader Harper Lee Morgan cope with her father's absence, being evicted, and having to skip school to care for her brother while their mother works, and things look even brighter after she befriends a mute girl and a kindly disabled woman.
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And Then There Were Four
Nancy Werlin
When five high school students are brought together under mysterious circumstances, they begin to piece together a theory that their parents are working together to kill them all.
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A Picture Book of Helen Keller
David A. Adler
Helen Keller was born in Tuscumbia, Alabama on June 27, 1880. When she was just a year and a half old, she was left blind and deaf from an illness. In a very simple text, the author covers the important facts of Helen Keller's life. Besides her extraordinary work with teacher Anne Mansfield Sullivan, she published several books and was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1964. Her bravery, brilliance, and spirit brought hope to millions of disabled people.
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A Picture Book of Louis Braille
David A. Adler
Presents the life of the nineteenth-century Frenchman, accidentally blinded as a child, who originated the raised dot system of reading and writing used throughout the world by the blind.
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A Plan for Pops
Heather Smith
Lou spends every Saturday with Grandad and Pops. They walk to the library hand in hand, like a chain of paper dolls. Grandad reads books about science and design, Pops listens to rock and roll, and Lou bounces from lap to lap. But everything changes one Saturday. Pops has a fall. That night there is terrible news: Pops will be confined to a wheelchair, not just for now, but for always. Unable to cope with his new circumstances, he becomes withdrawn and shuts himself in his room. Hearing Grandad trying to cheer up Pops inspires Lou to make a plan. Using skills learned from Grandad, and with a little help from their neighbors, Lou comes up with a plan for Pops.
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April Witch
Majgull Azelsson and Linda Schenck
Desirée lies in a hospital bed thinking, dreaming. Born severely disabled, she cannot walk or talk, but she has other capabilities. Desirée is an April witch, clairvoyant and omniscient, traveling through time and space into the world denied her. The woman who gave Desirée up at birth subsequently took in three foster daughters, who know nothing of the existence of their fourth “sister.” Sensing that her own time is short, Desirée has decided that one of the others has lived the life she herself deserved. One day, each of the three women receives a mysterious letter that forces her to examine her past and her present—setting in motion a complex fugue of memory, regret, and confrontation that builds to a shattering climax.
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Apt. 3
Ezra Jack Keats
On a rainy day two brothers try to discover who is playing the harmonica they hear in their apartment building.
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A Real Christmas This Year
Karen Lynn Williams
Twelve-year-old Megan's efforts to provide a real Christmas for her multiply handicapped brother and the rest of the family cause problems with her best friend and some other schoolmates. Megan loves her little brother Kevin, but she still wishes for the kind of social and family life she could have if he weren't multi-handicapped. An accident causes her home life to become chaotic and unhappy again, but with determination and ingenuity--and in the true spirit of the season--Megan manages to make her Christmas dream come true.
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As Brave As You
Jason Reynolds
Scooping poop at his grandparent's house - that sure as heck wasn't the way eleven-year-old Genie expected to be spending his summer. But when his parents send him and his big brother, Ernie, to Virginia to experience the great (not!) outdoors, they're in for some big surprises. First, there are chores galore (picking peas, really?). Second, Grandpop just might be completely off his rocker. The man has a big ol' secret - and once Genie learns what it is, all of Grandpop's oddities start to make sense. Like why he locks himself up in a room that's filled with birds. And why he never - not ever, no sir, no how, no way - steps foot outside. On top of that, Grandpop has a crazy idea for how to celebrate Ernie's fourteenth birthday. Actually, to Genie it isn't so crazy, but Ernie thinks it's completely wack. Genie wonders if that's because Ernie isn't brave enough. but is being brave doing something? Or knowing when not to?
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As I Descended
Robin Talley
Maria Lyon and Lily Boiten are Acheron Academy's power couple. Only one thing stands between them and their perfect future: campus superstar Delilah Dufrey. And Lily and Maria are willing to do anything to keep Delilah from winning the distinguished Cawdor Kingsley Prize. Together, Maria and Lily harness the dark power long rumored to be present on the former plantation that houses their school. When feuds turn to fatalities, and madness begins to blur the distinction between what's real and what's imagined, the girls must find a way to stop what they started.
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A Silent Voice, Volume 1
Yoshitoki Oima
Shoya is a bully. When Shoko, a girl who can’t hear, enters his elementary school class, she becomes their favorite target, and Shoya and his friends goad each other into devising new tortures for her. But the children’s cruelty goes too far. Shoko is forced to leave the school, and Shoya ends up shouldering all the blame. Six years later, the two meet again. Can Shoya make up for his past mistakes, or is it too late?
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A Silent Voice, Volume 2
Yoshitoki Oima
It’s been five years since Shoya Ishida bullied Shoko Nishimiya so badly she left their elementary school, because of one simple difference between them: Shoya can hear, and Shoko can’t. In the intervening time, Shoya’s life has changed completely. Shunned by his friends, Shoya’s longed for the chance to make up for his cruelty. When it finally comes, will he find the voice to tell Shoko he’s changed? And will Shoko listen?
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A Silent Voice, Volume 3
Yoshitoki Oima
Shoya’s decided to do everything he can to make up for how terribly he treated Shoko, his former classmate who can’t hear. But more than the challenge of learning to communicate, it means facing a past he thought he’d left behind forever. Now a reunion with old friends will transform Shoya, and his relationship with Shoko.
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A Silent Voice, Volume 4
Yoshitoki Oima
Once upon a time, Shoya was terribly cruel to Shoko, his elementary school classmate who couldn’t hear. To make up for his past sins, Shoya has devoted himself to repaying the debt of happiness he owes. So when Shoko faces a romantic setback, Shoya assembles some familiar faces from their past for a trip to the amusement park that may just change things for Shoya, too.
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A Silent Voice, Volume 5
Yoshitoki Oima
Despite their tense pasts, Shoya begins to embrace the friend group that used to terrorize Shoko because she couldn’t hear. Now that summer vacation is in full swing, the crew can work together to film Tomohiro’s eccentric movie. Each fun-filled day lazily passes by, but doubt tugs at Shoya’s heavy heart and he is desperate to cling on to meaningful moments before they are gone.
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A Silent Voice, Volume 6
Yoshitoki Oima
Time stands still for both Shoya and Shoko. Triggered by past traumas, Shoya coldly attacked his friends and burnt the bridges he first set out to rebuild. Shoko feels a deep responsibility for this disaster and attempts to pay for it by taking her own life. Meanwhile, each of their friends finally show their true colors. After everything has fallen apart, how will they mend their hearts and put the pieces back together?
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A Silent Voice, Volume 7
Yoshitoki Oima
Shoya’s life hangs on by a thread after he jumped just in time to save Shoko. Despite the despair, Shoko is determined to move forward and get back what she thinks she has ruined… But broken friendships can heal, too. Quietly, but surely, the disbanded crew finds their spirit — the show must go on! As the movie-making reconvenes, the kids begin to transform the world that had once been so cruel to them. What could the future hold for everyone?
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A Step Toward Falling
Cammie McGovern
When their inaction during an attack on a disabled girl earns them community service at a center for people with disabilities, Emily and Lucas bond while trying to make up for their mistake, and wonder if they can make it right with the girl who suffered because of them.
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A Time to Dance
Padma Venkatraman
In India, a girl who excels at Bharatanatyam dance refuses to give up after losing a leg in an accident.
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A Very Special Critter
Gina Mayer and Mercer Mayer
In this wise and funny picture-book adventure, a special student joins Little Critter's class at school. The new student uses a wheelchair, and Little Critter is worried. Will his classmate be very different? Will the class know how to act around him? It's an honest, realistic look at ways kids deal successfully with the unknown -- mixed with a big dollop of Mercer Mayer humor for good measure.
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Babu's Song
Stephanie Stuve-Bodeen
In Tanzania, Bernardi's mute grandfather makes him a wonderful music box and then helps him realize his dream of owning a soccer ball and going to school.