Books with author Elizabeth Buhmann

A Young Woman's Flight from War and Regime-ChangeXa Lili was just six years old when full-blown combat erupted in war-weary Vietnam. A century of colonial rule, followed by a bitter struggle for independence, had left the country divided, a focal point in the global conflict between Communist and Free World ideologies.When the US withdrew and Vietnam was reunified under Hanoi, Lili was swept up in an unprecedented swell of humanity fleeing a landscape devastated by war. Her story, spanning the years of her childhood to young adulthood, represents the heritage of more than a million Asian-Americans living in the United States today.

Albert lived on a small Caribbean Island called Little Scrub. His best friend had just moved away to Brooklyn, New York and Albert was lonely. He was also short, so short that on the first day of Middle School older kids made up a stupid chant about him: “ Little Man, Little Man, you so small. We didn’t hardly see you at all.” Middle School started out bad, and it got worse. Albert grew quieter and sadder. Then he met Peachy, the leader of a troupe of Mocko Jumbies – stiltwalkers. Stiltwalking was a Caribbean tradition, but Peachy’s Mocko Jumbies did a lot more than walk. They danced and leaped on spindly wooden stilts, arms waving, brilliant costumes shimmering. Albert had never seen anything so amazing. Or so dangerous. Peachy offered to teach him to stiltwalk, but Albert was scared of heights. At the same time he could imagine himself up there, walking tall, high above the ground, high above his problems. He decided he had to try it, but he never imagined how hard it would be.

A light-hearted tale of a boy who gains self-confidence with the help of some timely mentoring. Albert is short -- very short -- and he hates it. His older brothers are tall like his father, but he takes after his petite mother. He wears too-large hand-me-down clothes from his bigger brothers. And worst of all, his very best friend moved away to Brooklyn during the school break. It was all so unfair. Albert is beginning Middle School on Little Scrub, the small Caribbean Island where he lives. As he steps on the bus, and sees the older kids, he feels smaller than ever. They take one look at him and howl with laughter, chanting "Little Man, Little Man, you so small, didn't hardly see you at all." Things go downhill from there, and would've stayed down if it wasn't for an encounter with Peachy, the leader of a troupe of stiltwalkers. The stiltwalkers do a lot more than walk: they dance and leap across the sand on spindly eight-foot high wooden stilts, their brilliantly colored costumes shimmering in the moonlight. Peachy invites Albert to join the high school students he teaches to stiltwalk. It's not an easy decision for Albert. Would they laugh at him even harder than the Middle School kids? And he is queasy about heights. The thought of wobbling around on those skinny wooden sticks makes him woozy with fear. But Albert is won over by the thought that one day he might actually be up there, tall as a palm tree, dancing around without fear or hesitation. Besides, desperate times call for desperate measures and nobody was more desperate than Albert. Slowly, as his stiltwalking improves, Albert finds his self-confidence grows. He becomes less of a target for teasing at school and he makes some new friends.

A light-hearted tale of a boy who gains self-confidence with the help of some timely mentoring. Albert is short -- very short -- and he hates it. His older brothers are tall like his father, but he takes after his petite mother. He wears too-large hand-me-down clothes from his bigger brothers. And worst of all, his very best friend moved away to Brooklyn during the school break. It was all so unfair. Albert is beginning Middle School on Little Scrub, the small Caribbean Island where he lives. As he steps on the bus, and sees the older kids, he feels smaller than ever. They take one look at him and howl with laughter, chanting "Little Man, Little Man, you so small, didn't hardly see you at all." Things go downhill from there, and would've stayed down if it wasn't for an encounter with Peachy, the leader of a troupe of stiltwalkers. The stiltwalkers do a lot more than walk: they dance and leap across the sand on spindly eight-foot high wooden stilts, their brilliantly colored costumes shimmering in the moonlight. Peachy invites Albert to join the high school students he teaches to stiltwalk. It's not an easy decision for Albert. Would they laugh at him even harder than the Middle School kids? And he is queasy about heights. The thought of wobbling around on those skinny wooden sticks makes him woozy with fear. But Albert is won over by the thought that one day he might actually be up there, tall as a palm tree, dancing around without fear or hesitation. Besides, desperate times call for desperate measures and nobody was more desperate than Albert. Slowly, as his stiltwalking improves, Albert finds his self-confidence grows. He becomes less of a target for teasing at school and he makes some new friends.

For most of her life, thirteen-year-old Rachel has lived with her parents on an isolated forestry station in the middle of Vancouver Island. She has never had friends, never known life outside the station and what she has read in books and magazines. So when she learns that she will have to spend the summer with relatives in a village on the coast, she is curious...and scared. With her warm, secure world turned upside-down, Rachel tries to create a set of stepparents by matching up her eccentric Uncle Sharky and sensible "Aunt" Ev. But after she meets her new friend Bosko, her desparate need for a family begins to change.Nobody Asked Me is a touching story about a girl who learns that real-life love is a complicated thing, not always like the romance she's read in books.

Out in the Park one day, children, I met a little boy not bigger than you are, who told me that he liked stories about a boy and a dog and the things they did together. He said that it must be a real boy and a real dog, and there must be other animals in the story, not great, big, fierce ones, but just neighborly ones-animals a boy might, perhaps, meet when he went for walks in the woods-and take pictures of and get to know. So this is the story of the way a real boy and a real dog spent their first summer in the real country; and the fun they had together.