In the work of historical fiction Caravaggio Signed in Blood, the Renaissance artist is depicted as a brawling, unrepentant, street fighter in Rome, spoiling for his next battle. Equipped with a flashing sword and an eye to mayhem, he encounters...
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Eighty years ago, a nickel was worth something. One nickel could buy candy, a ticket to a movie, and real food for a meal. It was during the Great Depression, and life was far from ideal even in Key West, Florida. Huge mounds of smelly garbage...
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On April 9, 1940, Germany invaded Denmark. The Danish Army put up little resistance, and by that afternoon Germany occupied Denmark. The German government promised the Danes that life would go on normally if they didn’t resist their new overlords...
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How we treat each other does matter; it can sometimes determine who lives and who dies. Betty Glengarry is a force of evil who suddenly arrives one day in the small Pennsylvania farming town of Wolf Hollow. Everywhere she goes, she spreads lies...
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Nightingale is not Raymie’s real last name, but it describes her well. Like Florence Nightingale, Raymie knows how to shed light and rescue the needy. She and two other girls meet at the home of a baton winner in order to learn how to twirl...
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Some of us complain about having it rough. Really? Take a look at fourteen-year-old Joan Skraggs – the only girl in her house — who lives on a poor farm in Pennsylvania with her father and older brothers during the early 1900s. Here is her...
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The first time Steve sees the white-winged wasps he is sure they are really angels. Not only do they look like ethereal creatures, they can also speak to him. They say, “We’ve come because of the baby. We’ve come to help. We can fix what’s wrong...
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They meet on a narrow ledge six stories above the ground in the bell tower of their high school. At first, only one student notices, but dismisses the image because he sees only Theodore “Freak” Finch, a known nutcase. But wait! There is a girl...
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Corn fields. Farmers claim that you can hear the corn grow. And the corn does grow – tall and full –so thick that a person can appear or disappear between the rows. In the underpopulated town of Bone Gap, a beautiful girl from Poland appears in...
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Take one almost twelve-year-old girl, her dearest and only friend Pemberley, a mouse, and a very detailed reading of the mystery novels of Percival Pensive. and you’ve got a really good mystery with murder, money, and mayhem. In Nooks and...
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