Showing results by publisher "Recorded Books" in Geography & Cultures

Our beloved Harlem family is putting the VAN in Vanderbeekers as they hit the highway to give their dad the best birthday surprise EVER! Re-creating a road trip Papa never got the chance to take with his own father, the whole crew is packed and ready for a cross-country adventure. Things get off to a rocky start when the car breaks down on their way to pick up Papa. But they really veer off course when Laney discovers that Jessie and Orlando are interviewing at a college once they get to California.

McKenna Barney is trying to hide her worsening eyesight and has been isolating herself for the last year. But at the request of her little sister, she signs up for a commemorative mail run race in the Canadian wilderness - a race she doesn't know if she can even see to run. Winning would mean getting her disease - and her sister's - national media coverage, but it would also pit McKenna and her team of eight sled dogs against racers from across the globe for three days of shifting lake ice, sudden owl attacks, snow squalls, and bitterly cold nights.

From Boston Globe-Horn Book Award winner Katherine Rundell comes an exciting new novel about a group of kids who must survive in the Amazon after their plane crashes. Fred, Con, Lila, and Max are on their way back to England from Manaus when the plane they're on crashes and the pilot dies upon landing. For days they survive alone, until Fred finds a map that leads them to a ruined city, and to a secret.

Grassina has always lived in the shadow of her perfect older sister, Chartreuse. But when a terrible spell leaves the Kingdom of Greater Greensward in great danger, it is Grassina who finds the magic to set things right.

Twelve-year-old Ji-li Jiang has brains, friends, and a bright future. Then Mao Zedong launches China’s infamous Cultural Revolution. Soon school is suspended and students are getting caught up in the fervor of Mao’s extreme politics. When Ji-li’s family is accused of capitalist crimes, all of her beautiful dreams burst like soap bubbles. Because Ji-li’s grandfather was a landlord, her family is harassed and humiliated. Their home is searched, and they live in constant fear. Nonetheless, Ji-li remains loyal to her beloved Chairman Mao....

Noble Prince Jen is the one person that his father, King Ta'i, trusts enough to send on a mission to the legendary kingdom of Tien-Kuo. The prince eagerly begins his quest bearing only enormous pride and humble gifts. From the onset, however, the young ruler marches headlong into misfortune. Separated from his faithful servant, the prince finds himself fending off murderers, falling prey to trickery, and searching for a village girl who plays a magic flute. But it isn’t until he faces his most challenging personal trial that the he fully realizes the power hidden in each humble gift.

Corinne La Mer isn't afraid of anything. Not scorpions, not the boys who tease her, and certainly not jumbies. They're just tricksters parents make up to frighten their children. Then one night Corinne chases an agouti all the way into the forbidden forest. Those shining, yellow eyes that followed her to the edge of the trees, they couldn't belong to a jumbie. Or could they?

Iqbal, a 13-year-old boy, fights for children's liberation. Bravely, he speaks out against children working long hours in carpet factories in Pakistan.

Cats don’t really have nine lives, but they can visit nine different lives, anywhere, anytime. This is the secret Jason’s cat, Gareth, tells him. When Jason hears this, he begs to go along. Soon cat and boy find themselves in ancient Egypt on the first of nine fantastic adventures. With the wink of an eye, Jason and Gareth are transported to alluring settings in world history. On their travels they meet interesting and famous people, such as St. Patrick, and Leonardo Da Vinci. Whether the destination is Renaissance Italy or revolutionary America, their appearance never fails to cause a stir.

In 1939 the Nazis invade Lodz, Poland, forcing four-year-old Syvia Perlmutter and 270,000 other Jews into a ghetto surrounded by barbed wire and guarded by armed men. Scared and confused, Syvia and the others have no idea how terrible their lives will soon be.

The daughter of Princess Emma and Prince Eadric, 15-year-old Millie is often quite charming. But when she gets angry, she turns into a dragon—not a cute little pink one, but a huge, green-scaled, fire-breathing dragon. Of course, this terrifying sight scares off her friends and family—and any suitors seeking her hand in marriage.

Otto and Sheed are the local sleuths in their zany Virginia town, masters of unraveling mischief using their unmatched powers of deduction. And as the summer winds down and the first day of school looms, the boys are craving just a little bit more time for fun, even as they bicker over what kind of fun they want to have. That is, until a mysterious man appears with a camera that literally freezes time.

Over the course of history, famous people made mistakes that were so monumental they could never escape them, no matter how brilliant their successes! Ferdinand Magellan is credited as the first man to sail around the world...but he only actually made it halfway. His terrible treatment of everyone he met cut his life journey short. Queen Isabella of Spain is remembered for financing Columbus' expeditions - and for creating the Spanish Inquisition.

Fifteen-year-old Francis Tucket has been searching for his parents ever since Pawnees kidnapped him from their wagon train on the Oregon Trail. He owes his survival to a one-armed mountain man, Jason Grimes, who came to his rescue. Now Francis owes his life to the mountain man once again. Unfortunately, it's a debt he'll never be able to repay. Grimes is killed defending Francis and his young friends, Lottie and Billy, from a band of marauding robbers.

Growing up without parents and without schooling, 14-year-old Cloyd is trouble - trouble to himself and everyone else. Sent by his tribe to a home for Indian boys, he is alone and half-wild in remote Utah canyons. As his feeling of isolation turns to desperation, he runs away to find even more trouble. When Cloyd is found and taken to live with an old rancher, he begins to explore the countryside.

Generations of young readers continue to fall in love with Marguerite Henry’s “horse stories.” In one of her most famous, King of the Wind, the author traces the ancestry of the great Kentucky Derby winner, Man o’ War, whose mysterious pedigree is linked to the noble line leading from the Godolphin Arabian.

In 2014, Flint, Michigan, was a cash-strapped city that had been built up, then abandoned by General Motors. As part of a plan to save money, government officials decided that Flint would temporarily switch its water supply from Lake Huron to the Flint River. Within months, many residents broke out in rashes.

Christopher Columbus is one of the most famous explorers of all time, but he was neither the first nor last adventurer to ever stumble upon a great discovery. From the Silk Road of Asia to the icy shores of Antarctica, our knowledge of the world today is in large part due to several intrepid pioneers, risking life and limb for the sake of exploration. After all, setting off into the dark unknown requires an enormous amount of bravery. But every explorer quickly learns that courage and curiosity aren't enough to save you if you can't read a map or trespass on somebody else's land!

For thousands of years, the notion of dragons has struck fear in the hearts of men and women all over the world. The ancient Egyptians believed there was a dragon of darkness that attacked the sun god each day, and in Norway people thought that a dragon gnawed at the roots of the tree that sustained all life on Earth. Around the globe, dragons have been depicted as everything from massive, winged, fire-breathing creatures to beasts sporting a camel’s head, deer’s horns, rabbit’s eyes, and eagle’s claws! Dragons might hoard treasure in caves, or they might be responsible for floods and the death of livestock.

After a blissful babyhood being cared for by her loving mother, Pangolina ventures out alone into the forest to become an independent adult, helped along by wise, older animal companions, including a civet and a bat. But one day, cruel hunters trap Pangolina, putting her into a cage along with her friends, and bring them to a market to be sold as wild game. Pangolina is especially vulnerable, since her scales are prized by humans who believe they have curative powers.