Most Popular Books by Karen Bass

Sid is good enough to play drums for her school's best rock and roll band, but how far is she willing to go to get the gig?

Key selling features Seventeen-year-old Ben finds himself the main suspect in a robbery when his date steals from a store and makes him the unwitting getaway driver. This fast-paced chase story will leave readers in suspense and appeal to those who enjoy stories about crime and law enforcement. The story features a male protagonist and explores themes of loyalty and trust in a way that will relate to readers from all backgrounds. Enhanced features (highly-readable font, cream paper, larger trim size) to increase reading accessibility for dyslexic and other striving readers. A Junior Library Guild (JLG) Gold Standard Selection. Author Karen Bass is the award-winning author of a number of novels for young adult readers. /li>

After a childhood cut short by war and the harsh strictures of Nazi Germany, sixteen-year-old Wilm is finally tasting freedom. In spite of the scars World War II has left on his hometown, Leipzig, and in spite of the oppressive new Soviet regime, Wilm is finding his own voice. It's dangerous, of course, to be sneaking out at night to leave messages on police buildings. But it's exciting, too, and Wilm feels justified, considering his family's suffering. Until one mission goes too far, and Wilm finds he's endangered the very people he most wants to protect. Award-winning author Karen Bass brings readers a fast-paced story about a boy fighting for self-expression in an era of censorship and struggle.

A troubled Alberta teen spending a summer in Germany discovers the story of a teen with real problems--pregnant and alone in the maelstrom of Nazi WWII.

Kurt Schreiber can hardly believe his luck when his grade 12 German exchange lands him in Zethen, a town just east of Berlin where his beloved grandfather had grown up in the 1930's. Although Kurt had questioned his grandfather about his life in Germany, he received no answers so is determined to clarify his grandfather's past if only to silence the horrible dreams he endures in which, as a German soldier, he kills helpless civilians. Then at his great-grandparents' gravesite he meets an old man, Wolfgang Brandt, his grandfather's best childhood friend. As Kurt tries to escape the local bully and finds himself falling in love with Marta, Brandt's granddaughter, he slowly drinks in Brandt's war-time story about his grandfather's real actions during the war. As the war story climbs to a gripping climax, Kurt and Marta save the bully's brother from drowning in a vicious electrical storm. Kurt brings Wolfgang back to Canada for a visit to re-connect with his old friend, and makes plans to attend university in Berlin.-- Publisher.

This book closely follows the structure of the television series. In addition words, pictures, and graphics provide an eyewitness experience and reveal the mechanisms of the different events. Each chapter is set in a different location on our planet and shows how immensely powerful natural forces can drive chain reactions involving everything from microscopic organisms to entire tracts of rainforest, ultimately culminating in a spectacular natural event.

Angry over his family’s recent move and current enforced holiday in Halifax, twelve-year-old Laz Berenger rebels against a guided tour of the Citadel and sets out to explore on his own. In one dark tunnel, his St. Christopher medal burns suddenly hot. There’s a strange smell, and Laz blacks out. When he wakes up, everything happens at once. A sword is put to his throat. Men who look like extras from Pirates of the Caribbean hand him over to a ship’s captain who strips him and takes his medal. He is declared a French spy. Laz realizes, to his horror, that it is 1745 and he is trapped in time. These English colonists, still loyal to King George, are at war with the French. To earn his freedom, Laz must promise to spy on the French at the fortification of Louisbourg. But once in Louisbourg, Laz earns a job as runner to the kind Commander Morpain and learns to love both the man and the town. How will Laz find a way to betray the inhabitants of Louisbourg? How else can he hope to earn back his St. Christopher medal, which is surely his key to returning to his own time? The award-winning author of The Hill and Graffiti Knight has written an enthralling, swash-buckling time-slip adventure for middle-grade readers centered on a fascinating period in North American history.

Key Selling Points In Blood Donor, a teen misses curfew and ends up being kidnapped by a strange organization with an unsettling clientele. The book explores dysfunctional families and the challenges young adults face as they enter the world. A thrilling drama with a startling, unexpected revelation: the teens' blood is being used as an anti-aging treatment. Karen Bass has written several award-winning books for teens including the R. Ross Annett Award winner Graffiti Knight. New, enhanced features (dyslexia-friendly font, cream paper, larger trim size) to increase reading accessibility for dyslexic and other striving readers.

Jared’s plane has crashed in the Alberta wilderness, and Kyle is first on the scene. When Jared insists on hiking up the highest hill in search of cell phone reception, Kyle hesitates; his Cree grandmother has always forbidden him to go near it. There’s no stopping Jared, though, so Kyle reluctantly follows. After a night spent on the hilltop—with no cell service—the teens discover something odd: the plane has disappeared. Nothing in the forest surrounding them seems right. In fact, things seem very wrong. And worst of all, something is hunting them. Karen Bass, the multi-award-winning author of Graffiti Knight and Uncertain Soldier, brings her signature action packed style to a chilling new subject: the Cree Wîhtiko legend. Inspired by the real story of a remote plane crash and by the legends of her Cree friends and neighbours, Karen brings eerie life—or perhaps something other than life—to the northern Alberta landscape in The Hill.

Seventeen-year-old Erich is a prisoner of war working at a northern Alberta logging camp. Twelve-year-old Max goes to school—reluctantly—in the nearby town. The two would be unlikely friends, except that neither has anyone else to turn to. At the height of World War II, nobody wants to befriend a German. It doesn’t matter that Erich was forced into the military by his father, or that Max was proudly born in Canada. They are both easy targets for the locals’ grief and anger against the Nazis. The other prisoners are no more welcoming, distrustful of Erich’s perfect English and his dislike for Nazism. Still, when a series of accidents shake the logging camp, they pressure Erich to question the Canadians and find the saboteur—even if his questions get him into trouble. Caught between angry prisoners and suspicious captors, Erich is afraid to take any action at all. It is only when Max’s schoolyard tormentors cross a dangerous line that Erich realizes that his real loyalties lie not with a regime or a country, but with his friend.

The Caribbean is the embodiment of paradise - crystal blue waters, magical coral reefs and lush tropical forests. Yet behind its tranquil beauty, the Caribbean conceals many dark and mysterious secrets. This work includes photographs of these islands.

À la suite de l’écrasement d’un avion privé, le fils adolescent d’un millionnaire entreprend de grimper la colline voisine pour appeler des secours, mais un jeune autochtone de la nation Cri le prévient : la colline est maudite.