As a child Great-aunt Alice Rumphius resolved that when she grew up she would go to faraway places, live by the sea in her old age, and do something to make the world more beautiful--and she does all those things, the last being the most difficult of all.

Horrified at the thought of caring for talkative, ten-year-old Rebecca, the spinster aunts nevertheless spend seven difficult years raising their niece, rewarding years for all three inhabitants of the little brick house in a small New England town.

Stunned by the news of her sister's and her brother-in-law's deaths, Sarah Cain journeys to Lancaster County to claim her five orphaned nieces and nephews, who have been brought up as members of the Amish community.

With goblins, trolls, and the house boggart all trying to get them, the Grace children turn to Great Aunt Lucinda for help.

An orphaned girl is sent to live with extended family after her father's sudden death. Emily Starr is forced to leave her relaxed home for a stern environment. She struggles to adjust to her relatives and new classmates on Prince Edward Island.

Free throw specialist Cornell "Dunk" Duncan joins the YMCA summer basketball league all-star team, but after losing his confidence in an important game the seventh-grader makes some decisions about becoming an all-around player.

Talkative, ten-year-old Rebecca goes to live with her spinster aunts, one harsh and demanding, the other soft and sentimental, with whom she spends seven difficult but rewarding years growing up.

Judy's big plans for the summer seem ruined when two of her best friends go away, and then her parents leave her and Stink with Aunt Opal, but a new "thrill-a-delic" plan has her racing toward fun.

"Paige Watts is the ultimate stage mother. The daughter of Hollywood royalty, Paige channels her own acting dreams into making her daughter, Emma, a star. By the age of nine, Emma is playing a central role in a hit TV show. Then everything is shattered by unforeseeable tragedy. Now Emma is living with her aunt Whitney, who had chosen a very different path than her sister. Whitney was always the studious older sister, hating the cult of celebrity that...