Thirteen-year-old Nyle learns about relationships and death when fifteen-year-old Ezra, who was exposed to radiation leaked from a nearby nuclear plant, comes to stay at her grandmother's Vermont farmhouse.
Uprooted following the death of their father, nine-year-old Vinnie and her five-year-old brother, Mason, cope in different ways--one in silence--but both with the help of Lupe, the flip-flop girl.
Sophie does not enjoy energetic, assertive Wendell's weekend visit until the very end, when she learns to assert herself and finds out Wendell can be fun to play with after all.
In 1943, during the German occupation of Denmark, ten-year-old Annemarie learns how to be brave and courageous when she helps shelter her Jewish friend from the Nazis.