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 Diverse Families by Subject:
-
Happy in Our Skin
Fran Manushkin and Lauren Tobia
Bouquets of babies sweet to hold: cocoa-brown, cinnamon, and honey gold. Ginger-coloured babies, peaches and cream, too--splendid skin for me, splendid skin for you! A delightfully rhythmical read-aloud text is paired with bright, bustling art from the award-winning Lauren Tobia, illustrator of Anna Hibiscus, in this joyful exploration of the new skin of babyhood.
-
Harbor Me
Jacquline Woodson
It all starts when six kids have to meet for a weekly chat--by themselves, with no adults to listen in. There, in the room they soon dub the ARTT Room (short for "A Room to Talk"), they discover it's safe to talk about what's bothering them--everything from Esteban's father's deportation and Haley's father's incarceration to Amari's fears of racial profiling and Ashton's adjustment to his changing family fortunes. When the six are together, they can express the feelings and fears they have to hide from the rest of the world. And together, they can grow braver and more ready for the rest of their lives.
-
Hard Love
Ellen Wittlinger
After starting to publish a zine in which he writes his secret feelings about his lonely life and his parents' divorce, sixteen-year-old John meets an unusual girl and begins to develop a healthier personality.
-
Hard to Be Six
Arnold Adoff
A six-year-old boy who wants to grow up fast learns a lesson about patience from his grandmother.
-
Harriet gets Carried Away
Jessie Sima
While shopping with her two dads for supplies for her birthday party, Harriet, who is wearing a penguin costume, is carried away by a waddle of penguins and must hatch a plan in order to get herself back to the store in the city.
-
Harry and Willy and Carrothead
Judith Caseley
Harry was born with no left hand. When he got to school, the kids asked him what was wrong with his arm. "Nothing," said Harry. "That's my prosthesis." Harry's hand didn't keep him from being a good baseball player -- or a good friend. Harry and Willy and Carrothead are three of the most real kids you are apt to meet between book covers, and you will like them as much as they like each other!
-
Hatchet
Gary Paulsen
After a plane crash, thirteen-year-old Brian spends fifty-four days in the Canadian wilderness, learning to survive initially with only the aid of a hatchet given to him by his mother, and learning also to survive his parents' divorce.
-
Head Case
Sarah Aronson
Seventeen-year-old Frank Marder struggles to deal with the aftermath of an accident he had while driving drunk that killed two people, including his girlfriend, and left him paralyzed from the neck down.
-
Heart of Iron
Ashley Poston
Seventeen-year-old Ana is a scoundrel by nurture and an outlaw by nature. Found as a child drifting through space with a sentient android called D09, Ana was saved by a fearsome space captain and the grizzled crew she now calls family. But D09 -- one of the last remaining illegal Metals -- has been glitching, and Ana will stop at nothing to find a way to fix him. Ana's desperate effort to save D09 leads her on a quest to steal the coordinates to a lost ship that could offer all the answers. But at the last moment, a spoiled Ironblood boy beats Ana to her prize. He has his own reasons for taking the coordinates, and he doesn't care what he'll sacrifice to keep them. When everything goes wrong, she and the Ironblood end up as fugitives on the run. Now their entire kingdom is after them -- and the coordinates -- and not everyone wants them captured alive. What they find in a lost corner of the universe will change all their lives -- and unearth dangerous secrets. But when a darkness from Ana's past returns, she must face an impossible choice: does she protect a kingdom that wants her dead or save the Metal boy she loves?
-
Heart of Mine: A Story of Adoption
Dan Hojer and Lotta Hojer
Offers young readers a story about adoption as two parents explain how their daughter, Tu Thi, came into their lives from a country so very far away.
-
Heart Picked: Elizabeth's Adoption Tale
Sara Crutcher
Six-year-old Elizabeth is excited to have her dad visit school today but worries some of her classmates might notice they don't look alike. How will Elizabeth respond when her friend says, "That's your dad? You don't look like him."
-
Heather Has Two Mommies
Lesléa Newman
Heather's favorite number is two. She has two arms, two legs, and two pets. And she also has two mommies. When Heather goes to school for the first time, someone asks her about her daddy, but Heather doesn't have a daddy. Then something interesting happens. When Heather and her classmates all draw pictures of their families, not one drawing is the same.
-
Heavy Vinyl: Riot on the Radio (#1)
Carly Usdin
Starry-eyed Chris has just started the dream job every outcast kid in town wants: working at Vinyl Mayhem. It's as rad as she imagined; her boss is BOSS, her co-workers spend their time arguing over music, pushing against the patriarchy, and endlessly trying to form a band. When Rosie Riot, the staff's favorite singer, mysteriously vanishes the night before her band's show, Chris discovers her co-workers are doing more than just sorting vinyl...Her local indie record store is also a front for a teen girl vigilante fight club!
-
Heidi (Classic Starts)
Johanna Spyri and Lisa Church
When Heidi's Aunt Dete brings the orphaned girl to live with her grandfather, no one can imagine the bitter, solitary old man caring for a child. But, to everyone's surprise, the two grow to love each other - and Heidi blossoms in her new home.
-
Helen Keller: Toward the Light
Stewart Graff and Polly Anne Graff
A biography of the blind and deaf woman who rose above her physical disabilities to international renown and who helped other handicapped persons to live fuller lives.
-
Hello Goodbye Dog
Maria Gianferrari
Zara's dog, Moose likes nothing more than being with her favorite girl. However, dogs aren't allowed at school, so Moose has to stay home. Moose, though, is determined to always find her way back to Zara by escaping over and over again. Finally with a great idea and a little bit of training the two friends find a way to be together all day long.
-
Hello, Groin
Beth Goobie
When Dylan Kowolski agrees to create a display for her high school library, she has no idea of the trouble it's going to cause—for the school principal, her family, her boyfriend Cam and his jock friends, and her best friend Jocelyn. And for Dylan herself. If only her English class had been studying a normal, run-of-the-mill, mundane book like Lord of the Flies instead of Foxfire things wouldn't have gotten so twisted. Then the world wouldn't have gone into such a massive funk. And then Dylan wouldn't have had to face her deepest fear and the way she was letting it run her life.
-
Hello, Lulu
Caroline Uff
Simple text and illustrations introduce Lulu and her family, Lulu's pets, best friend, and new shoes.
-
Hello, My Name is Octicorn
Kevin Diller and Justin Lowe
The octicorn--half octupus and half unicorn--introduces himself and tells readers why, though strange and unique, octicorns make great friends.
-
Hello, Sailor!: The Hidden History of Gay Life at Sea
Paul Baker and Jo Stanley
Explores the meaning of gay life for sea-faring men. This book presents a strand of British history, and tells stories of lives lived against the odds.
-
Helping Sophia
Anastasia Suen
When Sophia's helper is absent, her fellow third-graders help out by learning how to push her wheelchair.
-
Henry the Boy
Molly Felder
This is not a story about a heron or a robot or a chicken but an ordinary boy with daily struggles, triumphs, and an extraordinary imagination.Henry uses forearm crutches decorated with animal stickers. He sometimes feels out of place at school, especially when he gets made fun of, but through his own rich imagination and his friendship with Joel, Henry learns to define himself on his own terms.
-
Henry Wants More!
Linda Ashman
Whether spending time with Papa, singing songs with Grandma, playing games with Lucy, or racing with Charlie, toddler Henry wears his family out until bedtime, when Mama is the one who wants more.
-
Here I Am
Patti Kim
Newly arrived from their faraway homeland, a boy and his family enter into the lights, noise, and traffic of a busy city in this dazzling wordless picture book. The boy clings tightly to his special keepsake from home and wonders how he will find his way.
-
Here's a Penny
Carolyn Haywood
Follows the adventures of six-year-old William, an adopted boy nicknamed Penny for his copper-colored hair, as he attends a Halloween party, adopts kittens, and finds an older brother to join his family.