Books published by publisher Front Street, 2007

Ping-Li is riveted by the fantastical shapes that streak across the sky above a city park. He will make his own kite, he decides, and it will be better than all the rest. He goes to Mr. Fo to buy the supplies, and the man tells him that he must paint his kite -- "or the emperor of the sky will be angry." But on the way home, the boy cannot resist flying his unpainted kite, and incurs the wrath of the emperor. Then Ping-Li's only recourse is to paint the most beautiful kite he can.

Timid Markus Simonsen wants to learn to be himself in this USBBY Outstanding International Book. He is afraid of almost everything. But when he writes fan mail to famous people, he becomes somebody else: a blind widow bound to a wheelchair who longs for an autograph of a famous novelist, or a young sportsman whose career was destroyed by doping. One day Markus writes to the famous actress Diana Mortensen, pretending to be a sensitive millionaire who is able to understand the drawbacks of fame. When she responds, Markus is drawn into a humorous adventure that requires him to invent still more stories. In the end Markus realizes that he wants to experience something more difficult: he wants to be himself.

Graham, Wallace, and Harry will have one glorious week of pure freedom in the outback. No teachers, no school, no homework, no parents breathing down their necks! The boys are elated until they accidentally start a fire that quickly gets out of control in the dry underbrush. No one is prepared; no one can quite believe what is happening. As the adults in a nearby town bumble their way into helping to fight the fire, a group of children is inadvertently trapped by flames and separated from outside help. Pippa and Peter and Gramps and others must make their own way through the conflagration. Separately and together, they all find out what inner resources they have. There are no heroes or villains, just people caught and humbled by an awesome and catastrophic force.

The return of Markus, who's fallen in love again. Today Markus is in love with Ellen Christine; yesterday it was Therese, but that was after Elisabeth; in short, he's been in love with all the girls in his class in just two months of his first year at junior high. His best friend, Sigmund, is always there to help in his humorous pursuits of each girl, but sometimes he gets in the way. Markus's father isn't any help at all; he has only ever been in love with Markus's mother, who died when Markus was very young. With affection and charm, Klaus Hagerup depicts the daily ups and downs, joys and fears of a completely unusual, completely normal teenager and his first steps into the unpredictable world of love. This is the second book in the warm, humorous series about thirteen-year-old Markus."What, again?" Sigmund exclaimed, concerned. "It just isn't normal, Wormster.""I can't help it, Sigmund. It just sort of keeps happening. …""First it was Ellen Christine, then it was Beate, then it was Karianne, then it was Mona, then it was Hanne, then it was Hilde, then it was Turid, then it was Ellen, then it was Lise, then it was Anne Berit. … Then it was Elisabeth, then it was Therese. I mean, that's like pretty much every girl in our class. So who is it now?""Now it's Ellen Christine.""Ellen Christine? What, again?""Yeah," Markus said quietly. "She has such pretty ears. I didn't notice them the first time."Markus Simonsen was in love. For the fifteenth time since starting junior high. That was two months ago.—FROM THE BOOK

Every kid's dream is to be named Most Valuable Player. But how many ever dream that the game is a race around the world (no flying allowed) in just forty days? That's the challenge Adam faces in the Great Global Game. As the player for the Magellan Voyage Project, he competes against others for a four-million-dollar prize! Trackers with blowguns and a nefarious baron don't make things easy.

This memorable novel in verse, a USBBY Outstanding International Book, reveals the tough and tender sides of a young boy growing up in a small, sleepy river town in Australia. Harry swims in the swamp, eats watermelon with his brother and dad, survives schoolyard battles, and races through butterflies in Cowpers Paddock. Life isn't easy--his mother died when he was seven, and he lost his friend Linda in a flood. Harry yearns to get away, but there's a mystery that he needs to solve first.

The woman policeman says why don't you come in here, and so I went. It was a little room with a table and some chairs. That was all. Instead of a window, there was a big mirror. I wouldn't look at that. I didn't want to see myself. I sat down and folded my hands. There was still blood under my nails, so after a minute I put them under the table . . .-From the bookThis is the story of how thirteen-year-old Linda came to be involved in the murder of one man and the suicide of another. The police and her social worker think they know the answer, but they've got it wrong. Here Linda tells her own story. She sees her world and what has happened to her with compelling clarity. Her voice is direct, cool, and ruthlessly honest. She'll persuade you that she is neither victim nor fool - that the facts speak for themselves in this National Book Award Finalist.Like Howie and Laura in The Goats and Celine in Celine, Linda is a character who will captivate you from the first word. This is a life you will never forget.

Albert Scully is the quintessential miserable teenager. He considers himself the "All-American" failure until he meets Mrs. Orpha Woodfin, an eighty-year-old neighborhood eccentric who helps him to see the value of being an individual. Originally published in 1968 - the same year as Paul Zindel's The Pigman and the year after S.E. Hinton's The Outsider - The Dream Watcher heralded the beginning of books written specifically for young adults.

Baby is a teenager in trouble, and her last chance is a foster home with a couple whose idea of fun is dog sledding. Still, it beats going to the juvenile detention center. Baby comes to love the dogs and takes naturally to sledding, but when her old boyfriend, Bobby, shows up, she can't stop herself from running off with him. Life with Bobby goes bad, and Baby has to make some hard decisions.

As a young girl in Budapest in the 1930s, Marika dreams of growing up to be a scientist or maybe an explorer. An older brother who never tells her anything, a beloved rag doll, an embarrassing mother, school, friends--Marika's life revolves around ordinary things until her father decides to build a wall in their home, creating separate living quarters for himself. Why can't they live together, like her friend Zsofi's family?Then, when Marika is fifteen, the Germans occupy Budapest, and war surrounds her. Her ordinary life disintegrates as her friends and family separate. Forced into hiding, Marika begins to understand the fragility and strength of the bonds among family and friends, and gradually she comes to terms with her shattered world.