Books with author C.S. Adler

Corey bonds with a beautiful but lame Arabian horse she names Handsome. He not only helps alleviate her loneliness, but is able to encourage the autistic brother of Corey’s school friend to speak. When Corey’s parents separate, her father moves her to a small house on the outskirts of Tucson, Arizona where she must attend a new school for the last weeks of eighth grade. Corey finds making friends difficult. However, there is a small pasture behind the fence in her new backyard. There she could keep Handsome if she could persuade the old man who owns the pasture to let her use it. Her parents reunite, and just when it seems Handsome will become the birthday present Corey longs for, another obstacle appears. Handsome damages himself futher when he balks at climbing into a horse trailer. Only Corey’s determination makes a happy ending possible .

A humiliating experience keeps Mel from riding a horse, but she is happy to do scut work at the dude ranch where her mother works. Every horse she bonds with though is sold off by the arrogant head wrangler. Finally, she develops a special relationship with a wild horse down the road. To make Cheyenne, the mustang, her own, she must risk disaster by agreeing to lead family rides for the ranch. Can she do it?

Fourteen-year-old Kelly doesn't understand why she has been shipped off to stay with her rigid grandparents in Florida. And why does her mother have to stay up north in the hospital and her grandmother refuses to answer her questions? Walking the hot, sunny Florida beach, Kelly remembers her mother's sad stories about shell ladies. Suddenly she realizes they are more than fairy tales. Is it her fault that her darling mother has had a mental breakdown? And do her mother's needs or her own struggle for independence come first?

Rachel realized how much she loves her stepfather, Ben, last summer when he bought her that wide-brimmed blue straw hat. Her mom thought the hat was too expensive, but Ben insisted because the color matched Rachel€™s eyes. Now Rachel is looking forward to a few quiet weeks at the beach again, but suddenly she learns she€™ll be sharing her room with Tina, Ben€™s biological daughter, who will join them this summer. No one can anticipate the upheaval Tina will cause, especially when she arrives with her mother€™s boyfriend€™s son in tow.

“A coming-of-age novel with a refreshingly different twist. Heartwarming but never sentimentalized and thoroughly believable.”—Cyrisse Jaffee, School Library Journal “Adler infuses her first book with sympathy and sharp insights, and she writes with professionalism.”—Publishers Weekly Twelve-year-old Jeremy is sure his summer at his family’s beach cottage is going to be terrible. It’s bad enough having a cast on his leg so he can’t run on the beach or swim with his friends, but to be stuck taking care of Lynette, a timid, seven-year-old girl, is the ultimate torture. Once Lynette arrives, though, Jeremy has to admit that he enjoys the company. She’s stuck in a depression after her mother’s recent drowning, and she doesn’t want to go anywhere near the ocean. To lift Lynette’s spirits, Jeremy invents the Glits, magical creatures who grant wishes. Jeremy and Lynette spend their days building elaborate sand castles for the Glits and becoming close friends, but as summer draws to a close, Jeremy worries about what will happen to Lynette when he’s no longer at her side.