Books with author Michael Denman

A road novel for young readersTwelve-year-old Sidney T. Mellon has an unfortunate name considering that his head is round and much too large for his body, his red hair stands straight up in a long crew cut, and his expression is perpetually flushed. A cantaloupe is what usually comes to mind. So does the nickname Melonhead.What chance does Sidney have, looking like this, yo-yoing back and forth between Seattle and Los Angeles, living part of each year with each of his divorced parents? He is disconnected from both distracted parents; he is disconnected from his own distracted self. No wonder he gets on a bus in Los Angeles one day and heads for New York City, making up ridiculous names and stories about himself at the drop of a hat whenever he meets somebody new. But each of the people Sidney meets on his diesel-powered journey across America contributes something to his understanding of who he is and where he's going. What he will do when he gets there, what he will discover about the unhappiness in his life, he has no idea. He just knows that he has to find out.

In the real world, Cosmos DeSoto is a twelve-year-old boy who lives with his mother, Viva. When he's not at school, he helps her with the catering business she is desperately trying to keep alive. When he's not doing either of those, he's buried in his imagination, leading his other life, that of Cosmos DeSoto, private detective. When Viva is hired to provide food for the crew of a movie company, Cosmos is off on his greatest adventure. While he works with his mother on the real film, his imagination takes him into the fantastic world of the movie, TEETH, when the star hires him to protect her life.

When Miles Freely falls out of a tree, his life begins to take unexpected turns, in small and not so small ways. He experiences failure and success, surprise and heartbreak. Miles shares his ups and downs with his mother and grandfather and his two best friends, Snoddy and Bloom. At the the end, when Miles is at his lowest, he achieves his greatest goal.