Most Popular Books by Cynthia DeFelice

Mr. and Mrs. O’Grady are so poor they have just one of everything to share – one potato a day, one chair, one blanket full of holes, and one gold coin for a rainy day. After digging up the last potato in their patch, Mr. O’Grady comes upon a big black object. It’s a pot – no ordinary pot, for what they soon discover is that whatever goes into it comes out doubled! Suddenly the O’Gradys aren’t destitute anymore. But what they really long for is one friend apiece. Can the magic pot give them that? This retelling of a Chinese folktale pays tribute to the author’s Irish heritage, and to the joys of an old marriage, new friendships, and the impulse to share. Using pen and gouache, the artist shows the “simple” characters in all their winning complexity. One Potato, Two Potato is a 2007 Bank Street - Best Children's Book of the Year.

After a thief steals Old Granny's beans while she is asleep at night, she gets some surprising help with catching him.

Erik is preparing for his first-ever hunting trip when he learns that his parents are being deployed to Iraq. A few days later, Erik is shipped off to North Dakota to live with Big Darrell and Oma, grandparents he barely knows. When Erik rescues a dog that''s been stuck by a porcupine, Big Darrell says Erik can''t keep him. But Erik has already named her Quill and can''t bear to give her up. He decides to run away, taking the dog and a shotgun, certain that they can make it on their own out on the prairie. In this story of adventure and survival, Erik learns about the challenges and satisfactions of living off the land, the power of family secrets, and the pain of losing what you love.

The name has haunted my sleep and made my awake hours uneasy for as long as I can remember. Other children whisper that he is part man and part animal -- wild and blood-thirsty. But I know Weasel is real: a man, an Indian fighter the government sent to drive off the Indians -- to "remove them." Weasel has his own ideas about removal... Now that the Shawnees are dead or have left, Weasel has turned on the settlers. Like his namesake, the weasel, he hunts by night and sleeps by day, and he kills not because he is hungry, but for the sport of it...I know what I have to do. Weasel is out there. He could come here and hurt us. Maybe Pa can wait for the day when we''ll have the law to take care of men like Weasel. But I can''t...

The second mystery solved by Allie Nichols, "ghost magnet", from author Cynthia DeFelice, author of The Ghost of Fossil Glen Just a few short weeks ago, sixth-grader Allie Nichols realized that she must be some kind of ghost magnet when she met the spirit of a murdered girl. Now, a new ghost has appeared to her, a handsome young man, and he''s pointed her in the direction of her creepy cafeteria lady, Mrs. Hobbs. Allie has always suspected Mrs. Hobbs of something, and this just confirms it. So do the mysterious fires that keep breaking out every time Allie tries to investigate her. Surely Mrs. Hobbs isn''t going to kill her. Or is she? “Another dangerously thrilling supernatural adventure . . . A diverting and suspenseful ghost story offering a likeable protagonist and a thrilling romantic spark.” —The Horn Book

When her father kills himself after losing his money in the stock market crash of 1929, twelve-year-old Frances, now a penniless orphan decides to hop abroad a freight train and live the life of a hobo.

In the early 1900s, thirteen-year-old Tyler encounters vicious hunters whose actions threaten to destroy the Everglades ecosystem, and as a result joins the battle to protect that fragile environment.

When she investigates the mysterious light up on Hogback Hill, eleven-year-old Hadley finds and befriends a hunchbacked old woman with a tragic past.

In Nelly May Has Her Say, based on an English folktale "Master of All Masters," author Cynthia DeFelice and illustrator Henry Cole team up for a fun-filled romp that makes for a great read aloud. Nelly May Nimble and her twelve brothers and sisters live with their parents in a tiny cottage in the Bottoms, where there''s never enough food to feed so many hungry mouths. Nelly May decides that she is old enough to earn her keep and takes a job as Lord Ignasius Pinkwinkle''s new housekeeper and cook. Along with her many chores, Lord Pinkwinkle also expects Nelly May to learn his own special language. So Nelly May gets to work, using a wet scooperooty to hold the water she mops the floor with and then cooking supper for him, the Most Excellent of All Masters. But late that night, when a spark from the flaming-pop-and-sizzle lands on the fur-faced-fluffenbarker''s wigger-wagger, Nelly May puts her foot down. She''ll save his roof-topped castleorum, but she will not be his fuzzy-dust-and-fooder any longer. A Margaret Ferguson Book

A teenager discovers racism and romance on his father''s farm in author Cynthia DeFelice''s Under the Same Sky. For his fourteenth birthday, Joe Pedersen wants a motorbike that costs nearly a thousand dollars. But his mom says the usual birthday gift is fifty dollars, and his dad wants Joe to earn the rest of the money himself and "find out what a real day''s work feels like." Angry that his father doesn''t think he''s up to the job, Joe joins the Mexican laborers who come to his father''s farm each summer. Manuel, the crew boss, is only sixteen, yet highly regarded by the other workers and the Pedersen family. Joe''s resentment grows when his father treats Manuel as an equal. Compared with Manuel, Joe knows nothing about planting and hoeing cabbage and picking strawberries. But he toughs out the long, grueling days in the hot sun, determined not only to make money but to gain the respect of his stern, hardworking father. Joe soon learns about the problems and fears the Mexicans live with every day, and, before long, thanks to Manuel, his beautiful cousin Luisa, and the rest of the crew, Joe comes to see the world in a whole different way. In her sensitive novel, Cynthia DeFelice explores our dependency on migrant workers and simultaneous reluctance to let these people into our country and into our lives. Under the Same Sky is a Bank Street - Best Children''s Book of the Year.

After moving with his father to upstate New York, twelve-year-old Owen faces a lonely summer . . . until he meets a girl who may be a space alien. One day while running on the trail near his house in upstate New York, Owen McGuire meets a girl with startling green eyes and bloody cuts all over her body who seems to be utterly alone. Her name is Campion, after the wildflower that is an alien species in the area— alien meaning "from someplace else"—and Campion claims to come from someplace else entirely, a planet called Home. She plans to signal her parents to come pick her up in their spaceship. Owen agrees to help, and as he does, he feels happier than he has in a long time: his mother died a year and a half ago, and now he and his workaholic father live together like two planets on separate orbits, in a new house far from his friends. What will he do when Campion asks him to come with her into outer space, away from his lonely life on Earth? In this moving middle grade novel from Cynthia DeFelice, two friendless kids search the night sky for something to believe in—but discover that they''ve found what they need right here on Earth.

Thirteen-year-old Ben Daggett is looking forward to his summer job as first mate on a charter fishing boat on Martha''s Vineyard. Then, on his first day out, he spots a strange object in the water -- a red Porsche. The driver is missing. Donny, an older teenager, knows something, but he''s not telling. Donny has his own car, and Ben would give anything to hang out with him. But Donny''s involved in something shady, and Ben finds out that the price of friendship may be more than he can afford to pay.

For Ben, there''s more involved in the annual Striped Bass Derby than catching the biggest fish. He''s proud of the fact that no one has ever beaten his father''s record which was won before Ben was born. But now Ben overhears two men plotting to win the prize money by cheating! Ben has to stop them, at all costs, but bringing the men to justice turns out to be a chase that almost costs him his life.

After his family dies of consumption in 1849, twelve-year-old Lucas becomes a doctor''s apprentice in this award-winning chapter book from beloved author Cynthia DeFelice, The Apprenticeship of Lucas Whitaker. It''s 1849, and twelve-year-old, Lucas Whitaker is all alone after his whole family dies of a disease called consumption which has swept through the community. Lucas is grief-stricken and filled with guilt. He might have saved his mother, who was the last to die, if only he had listened to news of a strange cure for this deadly disease. Unable to manage the family farm by himself, Lucas finds work as an apprentice to Doc Beecher, doctor, dentist, barber and undertaker. Doc amputates a leg as easily as he pulls a tooth, yet when it comes to consumption, he remains powerless, unwilling to try the cure he calls nonsense. Lucas can''t accept Doc''s disbelief, and he joins others in the dark ritual they believe is their only hope. The startling results teach Lucas a great deal about fear, desperation, and the scientific reasoning that offers hope for a true cure. The Apprenticeship of Lucas Whitaker is a Bank Street - Best Children''s Book of the Year.

The third book about "ghost magnet" Allie Nichols, age 11, who this time is contacted by the restless spirit of a dog. Once again, she shares her ghostly adventure with her best friend, Dub, in this chilling installment, The Ghost of Cutler Creek. Allie Nichols has hardly laid the last spirit to rest when she''s sure that another one is trying to reach her. But how can Allie help a ghost who won''t speak? All she has to go on is a sound—a sort of whine—and a smell. At the same time, a strange boy joins her sixth-grade class. Allie doesn''t understand why L. J. Cutler would start a new school at the end of the year, or why he''s such a surly kid. She wants nothing to do with him. Then Mr. Henry, a teacher she loves, asks Allie to dog-sit Hoover, his golden retriever, while he''s away and to befriend L.J. over the summer. She''s delighted to spend time with Hoover, but she hardly looks forward to visiting L. J. Cutler—until she discovers a connection between L.J., the ghost, and Hoover. "As always, DeFelice tells a gripping, suspenseful story, keeping readers engaged with realistically depicted human as well as animal characters." — The Horn Book