In alternating chapters, two teenagers describe how their feelings about themselves, each other, and their families have changed over the years.

After their trailer home and all their belongings are burned, twelve-year-old Ember and her Wiccan family move to a lakeside campground where Ember's anguish over losing her dog, as well as her friendship with the boy she fears started the fire, stops her from making new friends and moving on.

Thirteen-year-old Samantha faces some stiff competition when a new friend is interested in the same boy Samantha has a crush on, and another girl starts an internet version of her business of passing secrets, unread, from one classmate to another.

Outspoken, impulsive Lylice has skipped fifth grade, but she finds that getting along at Susan B. Anthony Middle School is more difficult than she expected, until she befriends another newcomer to the sixth grade.

When her mean, grouchy grandmother in Texas has a heart attack and she and father go to help, twelve-year-old Mieka meets her cousins' family and wishes for their "normal" type of life.

Trinity, Harmony, and Melody, three friends in a rock band, find their relationship threatened by a snobby school clique and their own individual personalities, but they must unite in time to sing for a crowd that needs to hear what they have to say

Ten-year-old Lindsey is continually getting into trouble despite her well-meaning, impulsive efforts to rescue a classmate from bullies, cheer up her depressed uncle, help with her brother's upcoming bar mitzvah, brighten up her neighborhood, and spa

Annie, who maintains a blog advice column under the name "Professor Love," considers herself an expert on the subject of relationships until she gets her dream homecoming date and realizes how much she has to learn about both love and friendship.

In an interview with a young journalist, World Cup hero, El Gato, describes his youth in the Brazilian rain forest and the events, experiences, and people that helped make him a great goalkeeper and renowned soccer star.

After Bette finds an angel coin she puts it in her pocket and forgets it, but soon a woman moves into her building and helps her face her major losses, and when the coin falls to three of her classmates they each find new ways to believe in themselves.