When her father suddenly quits his job, the almost-ten-year-old, friendless Penny and her neglectful parents leave their privileged life in the city for a ramshackle property in the eccentric town of Thrush Junction, Tennessee.

When an eleven-year-old boy takes over a friend's newspaper route in July, 1959, in Memphis, his debilitating stutter makes for a memorable month.

Working at a fancy farm that trains horses for the Kentucky Derby, Savannah tries to deflect the attention of the owner's son as she pursues her dream of becoming a jockey.

Twelve-year-old Olive suffers from brittle bone disease and has been homeschooled all her life. When she is finally allowed to attend school in person, she soon discovers fitting in is not that easy. Olive hopes to find the magical wish-granting hummingbird that supposedly lives nearby. If she can prove herself worthy, maybe her deepest wish will be granted. - adapted from run-on sentence provided.

Twelve-year-old Abbey's world is turned upside-down by both personal and national events of September 11, 2001, as well as their aftermath, but finds greater strength through art, friendship, and family.

Upon graduating from high school in the tiny town of Starling, Tennessee, aspiring country singer Retta Lee Jones manages to get herself to Nashville, where, in spite of some bad luck and hard times, she tries to persevere in pursuing her dreams.

Twelve-year-old Randi, unhappy about moving from Brooklyn to Deer Creek, Tennessee, after her mother's death, soon finds new friends and a case to solve surrounding a stolen time capsule and rumors of a centuries-old treasure.

The son of a Pentecostal preacher faces his personal demons as he and his two outcast friends try to make it through their senior year of high school in rural Forrestville, Tennessee without letting the small-town culture destroy their creative spirits and sense of self.

When she is almost sixteen years old, Rosemary decides she is sick of being overweight, mocked at school and at Heavenly Hair--her mother's beauty salon--and feeling out of control, and as she slowly loses weight, she realizes that she is able to cope with her mother's cancer, having a boyfriend for the first time, and discovering that other people's lives are not as perfect as they seem from the outside.