I read this book as a child it was a chapter/easy reader. It was about a Chinese/Japanese girl who lived with a poor (maybe blind) dad. Somehow dad got a bag of rice and she ended up living in the sea with a emperor or water dragon. Title, no clue.
Looking for title and author for newish book, British, contemporary suspense…
Plot highlights: main character is a disturbed divorced woman obsessed with her imaginary child (male). She joins other mothers as they bring or pickup children at the beginning and end of the school day. She deflects not having a child join her at dismissal by saying he must be staying late with teacher and enters school; other mothers leave. She joins mothers in coffee shop most mornings.
This scenario repeats until she meets man at the coffee shop and they strike up a relationship. He is a con artist who befriends lonely women to debunk them and is originally drawn to our main character for this reason. They quickly form a sexual relationship but he remains a bit mysterious and leaves everyday for his ‘secret’ life, to keep pursuing other female victims, one of whom commits suicide and he plays the role of sympathetic suitor/victim to pursue the dead woman’s sister. The main character (Jane?) is suspicious and follows him misinterpreting his relationship with the mystery woman who is now blackmailing him. Main character is successful at sexually manipulating this man, however, and she convinces him they must kill the “son’s” teacher before she reveals main character’s deception…Main character suspects boyfriend of betraying her and starts to slowly poison him. After moving to another school district, Main character is recognized by former mothers group member whom she stalks and kills…
I'm looking for an elementary textbook from 80s or 90s that had a story about Jokey the Dog, another about a cat that goes to a spa, and small things falling from high places.
Children’s picture book available in 1990s. Boy finds a flint arrow head in his garden. Somehow (that night?) he is magically transported back to the time that indigenous First Nations people lived on the land - he sits around their camp fire with them.
I am looking for a book I read years ago, probably in the mid-nineties. It was about a teenager who went to a dance school and I think her name was Sal. Her family was quite poor so they often worried about money. I think she stayed at home with her parents for a while but they lived quite a long way from the school so she had to move closer, and they had an argument about that. Her parents weren’t keen on her going to the school anyway: maybe they wanted her to get a 'sensible job'.
The dance style was contemporary or ballet. I don't know about the location except that it was the UK or USA. It was set in the present day when it was written, but that would have been in the 80s or 90s.
I remember very little of the story. At one point she realised she wasn't as supple as some of the other students so she stayed behind to do extra training. At the very end there is a show by the students and she was doing a solo. She got on stage and decided to abandon the dance she'd planned and just improvise with how the music make her feel. At the end she felt it hadn't gone very well but then got loads of applause.
I think there was a romance element as well with another music student, although it wasn't just a romance tale. I've searched through heaps of lists of young adult dance books and on Google Books but I can't seem to find it.
‘Say Goodnight, Gracie’ by Julie Reece Deaver was suggested on another forum, but it’s not that. The dance aspect is central to the story I’m looking for, whereas it’s just a supporting story in ‘Say Goodnight, Gracie’.
Jean Ure as an author was suggested as well, but most of her books seem to be for slightly younger readers.
I don't think this was amazing literary writing or anything, but for some reason I remember this book and would love to find it again.
This was a book used to discuss prejudices and racism in 5th grade classrooms in the late 90s. The characters in the book go to a general store and are treated poorly by others in the store. The N word is used many times throughout the book. I recall many Mildred D. Taylor books being used in this curriculum, so this could just be a specific chapter in one of her books, rather than the entire book? Perhaps The Friendship? I recall a specific young character in the book really wanting a piece of hard candy from the general store!
Looking for a science fiction novel which starts with an older man on a park bench having a conversation with two or three youths (I think young men, teens). It is a philosophical conversation, mostly about economics and society. The interaction is recorded via a smart device, and uploaded to the worldwide network; it becomes enormously popular, the old man becomes quite wealthy and the teens are viewed as somewhat famous (infamous?) for their part in the conversation as foils, even decades later. This may have been a novella or short story, as well, and may have been by Vernor Vinge or David Brin; it would have come out after 1990 or thereabouts.