Central Kansas Library System

Winner of the 2002 Man Booker Prize for Fiction Pi Patel is an unusual boy. The son of a zookeeper, he has an encyclopedic knowledge of animal behavior, a fervent love of stories, and practices not only his native Hinduism, but also Christianity and Islam. When Pi is sixteen, his family emigrates from India to North America aboard a Japanese cargo ship, along with their zoo animals bound for new homes. The ship sinks. Pi finds himself alone in a lifeboat,...

In this tongue-in-cheek take on classic themes in children's literature, the four Willoughby children set about to become "deserving orphans" after their neglectful parents embark on a treacherous around-the-world adventure, leaving them in the care of an odious nanny.

Orphaned Meira, a fierce chakram-wielding warrior from the Kingdom of Winter, must struggle to free her people from the tyranny of an opposing kingdom while also protecting her own destiny.

" ... Like the movie, this book tells an unhappy tale about three very unlucky children, who despite being pleasant lead unpleasant lives. From the very beginning of this volume, when the children are driving down a bad-smelling road toward a house full of mysterious beasts, continuing on to the last page of this distressing story, disaster lurks at their heels. Unlike the movie, however, this book does not contain moving pictures"--Jacket flap.

A classic tale of an orphan growing up in the 1800's of England. Intimately rooted in the author's own biography and written as a first-person narrative, "David Copperfield" charts a young man's progress through a difficult childhood in Victorian England to ultimate success as a novelist, finding true love along the way. Jeremy Tambling's provocative Introduction reveals subtle themes relevant today in Dickens' favorite work.

Catastrophes and misfortune continue to plague the Baudelaire orphans after they're sent to live with fearful Aunt Josephine who offers little protection against Count Olaf's treachery.

Summer, 1943. The King and Queen choose to send their youngest daughter, Princess Charlotte, to live with a noble family in the country. Despite her headstrong nature, the princess's fragile health poses far too great a risk for her to remain in war-torn London. She arrives in Yorkshire under an alias; only her guardians know her true identity. Charlotte befriends a young evacuee, trains with her cherished horse - and falls deeply in love with her...

On the run after being falsely accused of murder, the three Baudelaire orphans find themselves in the Heimlich Hospital, with the evil Count Olaf in close pursuit.

"Jude was seven years old when her parents were murdered and she and her two sisters were stolen away to live in the treacherous High Court of Faerie. Ten years later, Jude wants to belong there, despite her mortality. But many of the fey despise humans. Especially Prince Cardan, the youngest and wickedest son of the High King. To win a place at the Court, she must defy him--and face the consequences. In doing so, she becomes embroiled in palace intrigues...

In the aftermath of the Civil War, an aging itinerant news reader agrees to transport a young captive of the Kiowa back to her people in this exquisitely rendered, morally complex, multilayered novel of historical fiction from the author of Enemy Women that explores the boundaries of family, responsibility, honor, and trust.In the wake of the Civil War, Captain Jefferson Kyle Kidd travels through northern Texas, giving live readings from newspapers...