Books with title Diamonds in the Rough

Set in the world of minor league baseball in the 1950s, this imaginative retelling of the Snow White story follows eleven-year-old orphan Whitney Snow as she tries to escape from her villainous aunt who is bent on stealing her inheritance. On the road, Whitney encounters a scruffy minor league baseball team that adopts her as their unofficial team mascot. With the help of these good-hearted players, Whitney learns how to handle the curveballs that life has thrown at her. It's a nostalgic and heartwarming coming-of-age tale that evokes a small-town America that is no more...or perhaps never was.

A powerful novel about the difficulty of doing what is right. Through their love for people, yet ignorance of the unknown, the Finch Family has joined alongside their church and opened their home to an African refugee family who are moving to Connecticut. The Amabo family of four– Andre, Celestine, Mattu, and Alake: father, mother, and teenage son and daughter– arrive in great hope as they have escaped the tyranny of Africa. What the Finch Family doesn’t know is that there are not just four refugees in this Amabo family, but five. As the Amabo family, who have suffered unimaginable horrors, begin to adjust to a life of plenty in the Finches' suburban Connecticut home, and the Finches are learning new lessons of “The Golden Rule”. The life adjustment for all seems flawless.But the fifth refugee does not believe in good will. This lawless rebel has managed to enter America undetected. And the Amabo family has something of his--something that they agreed to carry into the country for him.When Jared, the oldest Finch son, realizes that the good guys are not always innocent, he must make a decision that could change the fates of both the Finches and the Amabos. In this uncommonly penetrating story, Caroline B. Cooney presents a fresh perspective on how doing what is right can be most difficult.

To save her family from financial ruin, Miss Poppy Garrison accepts an unusual proposition to participate in the New York social season in exchange for her grandmother settling a family loan that has unexpectedly come due. Ill-equipped to handle the intricacies of mingling within the New York Four Hundred, Poppy becomes embroiled in one hilarious fiasco after another, doomed to suffer a grand societal failure instead of being deemed the diamond of the first water her grandmother longs for her to become. Reginald Blackburn, the second son of a duke, has been forced to travel to America to help his cousin, Charles Wynn, Earl of Lonsdale, find an American heiress to wed in order to shore up his family estate, which is in desperate need of funds. Reginald himself has no interest in finding an heiress to marry, but when Poppy's grandmother asks him to give etiquette lessons to Poppy, he swiftly discovers he may be in for much more than he bargained for.

What if he couldn’t control it?, What if he didn’t want to?.Alfie Diamond, flat on his back, chilled to the bone in the freezing unforgiving snow.Shocked, dumbfounded but even so secretly excited, still tingling from the thrill, if that was the correct word to use, from his near death experience but then again maybe it was just the mind altering effects of hyperthermia, who knew?.The images that had flashed before him during his “first” mind blowing Awakening were alien to him, jumbled, superfast messed up glimpses of things to come and things off the past but whose past, certainly not his, he would remember surely wouldn’t he?.The faces didn’t register, the language fell on deaf ears and yet he inexplicably felt connected, suddenly his life gained a sense of direction, no more bobbing about like a cork in the open ocean.Purpose and motivation were coming his way that much he had acutely be made aware off as the nerve endings of his brain cells fizzed with adrenaline infused blood.He was on a precipice, he could lay there and continue to stare up at the descending snowflakes, let the raw biting cold take him or he could grab this adventure with both hands steam rolling into a new unknown future, a future born of a secret so far back so distant into the past it would surely send him to hell and back.Evil would seek to destroy him, Good would look to him as a saviour, him a naive curly haired East End boy, youngest of six children, average school grades, slight misfit on the outer edges of the obligatory social groups, not fit enough to be considered a “Jock”, not clever enough for the nerds and certainly not fashionable in his tatty t-shirt, shorts and scruffy trainers to be one of the “beautiful people”, a square peg in a round hole, well this square peg had been enlightened, today Alfie Diamond was re-born and if he ever got up onto his feet again, his first steps would be into a dangerous new world, a world he hoped included the beautiful stranger whose silken long hair trailed across his face as she hovered over him as he slipped in and out of consciousness, a world he hoped would not chew him up and spit him out.

Toby Houser is a young boy age 7 whose parents have divorced. He's faced with several conflicts and disappointments, but instead of dwelling on this he fights back through baseball. His father has moved away and his mother has moved to a neighborhood where there are no children his age. Toby knows nothing about baseball, but he can overcome these obstacles by believing in himself and holding on to his dreams. Toby is determined not to let the disappointments in his life take away his self-esteem. He defeats rejection by pouring his energy into baseball.

I pulled out the picture Cole had given us...my gaze fell on the boy, my uncle. I thought about the sadness in his eyes and what he'd been through at such a young age. And I was shocked to see a bit of me, staring back. After the sudden death of Sky's mother, Sky wants nothing more than to keep her and her two young sisters together. The solution may lie with a newly discovered uncle. But Cole's criminal history and his constant struggle to escape the past are not exactly the stable parental qualities that the authorities are looking for. When Sky and Cole strike a mutually beneficial deal to create an acceptable image, they both get more than they bargained for.

At Long Islands’s private Bennington School, the Diamonds rule supreme. They’re the girls all the boys want to date and all the girls want to be. And fortunately for Marni, she’s right in the middle of them. Best friends with the ringleader, Clarissa, Marni enjoys all the spoils of the ultrapopular: boys, power, and respect. But then Marni gets a little too close to Clarissa’s ex-boyfriend, Anderson.Wrong move. The Diamonds don’t touch each other’s exes. And just like that, Marni is jettisoned from Diamond to lower than Cubic Zirconia.But Marni isn’t about to take her ouster lying down. She has dirt on the Diamonds, and she’s not about to go down without a fight. Everyone knows, the only thing strong enough to cut a Diamond is another Diamond. Ted Michael is a literary agent and first time novelist. He lives in New York, New York.

Everybody has the ability to step up and help those in need. People throughout the world can offer their time, money and love by volunteering.Diamonds in the Ruff is a delightful story about the rewarding world of volunteering, helping those in need, and discovering the inner beauty that is within us all. Readers will cherish this story about a mom and her son volunteering at an animal shelter and their desire to make a difference. They'll be charmed by the son’s compassion and his donation of money to the shelters’ dog grooming fund that helps “Ruff looking” dogs get groomed. The fund enables the dog’s inner beauty to shine, and helps them find their forever homes. Readers will be moved by the imagery the words paint and delighted by the fun illustrations. Most of all, they’ll discover how each of us has the power to help, and make a difference, and with a little spare change, MAKE ANYTHING POSSIBLE!Helping Tales Publishers has committed to make reading be a positive impact on the world by helping those in need one story at a time. In order to fulfill this mission, Helping Tales donates a portion of the proceeds from each sale to select charities. Look for more stories from Helping Tales Publishers on Amazon.com.

A powerful novel about the difficulty of doing what is right. Through their love for people, yet ignorance of the unknown, the Finch Family has joined alongside their church and opened their home to an African refugee family who are moving to Connecticut. The Amabo family of four– Andre, Celestine, Mattu, and Alake: father, mother, and teenage son and daughter– arrive in great hope as they have escaped the tyranny of Africa. What the Finch Family doesn’t know is that there are not just four refugees in this Amabo family, but five. As the Amabo family, who have suffered unimaginable horrors, begin to adjust to a life of plenty in the Finches' suburban Connecticut home, and the Finches are learning new lessons of “The Golden Rule”. The life adjustment for all seems flawless.But the fifth refugee does not believe in good will. This lawless rebel has managed to enter America undetected. And the Amabo family has something of his--something that they agreed to carry into the country for him.When Jared, the oldest Finch son, realizes that the good guys are not always innocent, he must make a decision that could change the fates of both the Finches and the Amabos. In this uncommonly penetrating story, Caroline B. Cooney presents a fresh perspective on how doing what is right can be most difficult.

What if he couldn’t control it?, What if he didn’t want to? Alfie Diamond, flat on his back, chilled to the bone in the freezing unforgiving snow. Shocked, dumbfounded but even so secretly excited, still tingling from the thrill, if that was the correct word to use, from his near death experience but then again maybe it was just the mind altering effects of hyperthermia, who knew? The images that had flashed before him during his “first” mind blowing Awakening were alien to him, jumbled, superfast messed up glimpses of things to come and things off the past but whose past, certainly not his, he would remember surely wouldn’t he? The faces didn’t register, the language fell on deaf ears and yet he inexplicably felt connected, suddenly his life gained a sense of direction, no more bobbing about like a cork in the open ocean, Purpose and motivation were coming his way that much he had acutely be made aware off as the nerve endings of his brain cells fizzed with adrenaline infused blood. He was on a precipice, he could lay there and continue to stare up at the descending snowflakes, let the raw biting cold take him or he could grab this adventure with both hands steam rolling into a new unknown future, a future born of a secret so far back so distant into the past it would surely send him to hell and back. Evil would seek to destroy him, Good would look to him as a saviour, him a naive curly haired East End boy, youngest of six children, average school grades, slight misfit on the outer edges of the obligatory social groups, not fit enough to be considered a “Jock”, not clever enough for the nerds and certainly not fashionable in his tatty t-shirt, shorts and scruffy trainers to be one of the “beautiful people”, a square peg in a round hole, well this square peg had been enlightened, today Alfie Diamond was re-born and if he ever got up onto his feet again, his first steps would be into a dangerous new world, a world he hoped included the beautiful stranger whose silken long hair trailed across his face as she hovered over him as he slipped in and out of consciousness, a world he hoped would not chew him up and spit him out.

Everybody has the ability to step up and help those in need. People throughout the world can offer their time, money and love by volunteering. Diamonds in the Ruff is a delightful story about the rewarding world of volunteering, helping those in need, and discovering the inner beauty that is within us all. Readers will cherish this story about a mom and her son volunteering at an animal shelter and their desire to make a difference. They'll be charmed by the son’s compassion and his donation of money to the shelters’ dog grooming fund that helps “Ruff looking” dogs get groomed. The grooming the fund pays for allows the dog’s inner to show, helping them find their forever homes. Readers will be moved by the imagery the words paint and delighted by the fun illustrations. Most of all, they’ll discover how each of us has the power to help, and make a difference, and with a little spare change, MAKE ANYTHING POSSIBLE! Helping Tales Publishers has committed to make reading have a positive impact on the world by helping those in need one story at a time. In order to fulfill this mission, Helping Tales donates a portion of the proceeds from each sale to select charities. Look for more stories from Helping Tales Publishers on Amazon.com.