New Releases by Penny Draper

Will his big break kill his career before it even starts Robin’s got everything it takes to be a principal dancer: the body, the feet, the strength and the passion. But his devil-may-care attitude plays havoc with discipline at the Premier Dance School. One more prank may be one too many. That’s why everyone is shocked when he’s the only student dancer picked to understudy with the company, even though the choice makes sense—Robin is cast as Puck, the annoying trickster fairy in A Midsummer’s Night Dream. Shock turns to horror when the principal dancer is injured and Robin has to perform instead. The other dancers don’t think he can pull it off, and even Robin wonders if it’s too much too soon. This short novel is a high-interest, low-reading level book for middle-grade readers who are building reading skills, want a quick read or say they don’t like to read! The epub edition of this title is fully accessible.

Jack Gordon and Henry Addison meet when the Great Lakes cruise ship, the Noronic, docks at Ward Island, just before the ship catches fire – with Henry on board.

One cold day in 1929, a tsunami strikes the Burin Peninsula in Newfoundland and suddenly twelve-year-old Murphy is doing a man's work, saving lives and caring for the people he loves.

Nell helps in her father's lighthouse on the Vancouver Island coast but when a ship crashes on the rocks will she be able to actually save lives?

Instead of fishing for “channel cats” with his great-grandfather in southern Manitoba, thirteen-year-old Finn Armstrong winds up fight-ing the Red River Flood of 1997, the biggest flood since 1826.

Ella is surprised by her birthday gift from her father: a Brownie camera and the advice to seek pictures of things that ‘don’t belong’. This is how Ella first notices Billy, a boy at her school. They become good friends, although Ella is sure Billy is keeping something from her. Ella soon realizes there are others to whom the ‘don’t belong’ tag applies. They include herself! Helping out at her mother’s IODE group, Ella finds out about women’s rights – or the lack of them. When Ella’s mother’s purse is raided, suspicion falls on Billy. Then, just as Ella is learning more about both her mother and her mysterious friend, the cyclone arrives, and it’s the substandard housing of the poor that’s worst-hit. How can Ella, armed only with her camera, help her friend? Praise for Ice Storm: “Draper covers the terror and impact of the storm. She also weaves in a subtle environmental message about overreliance on electricity...an unusual story of survival.” – Kirkus Reviews Praise for Graveyard of the Sea: “the author makes the setting of her Newfoundland tale as satisfying as the smell of seafood chowder”; “readers are...sensually and emotionally embedded in 12-year-old Murphy’s life in the outport” – Canadian Children’s Book News

Twelve-year-old cousins Alice and Sophie are a study in contrasts. Alice is tall and athletic with brunette hair, she lives in Montreal with just her dad, and she's a figure skater with a lot of talent and a bit of an attitude. Sophie is short and blonde and she lives on a dairy farm just south of the city, with her mom and dad and her spooky little brother Sebastian, and she loves nothing so much as looking after their herd of cows. Their differences kept the cousins from getting along in the past but now, ever since Alice's mom passed away, they have been best friends. Then, in January, it starts to rain and it just won't stop. Of course, it turns to ice as it hits the ground, and causes big trouble. First, the roads are closed, then the power lines start coming down and the electricity is gone. Alice struggles to stay warm alone in the dark, because her dad works for Quebec Hydro and is working around the clock. Meanwhile Sophie is with her family fighting to look after their dairy cows without the benefit of power to run the water pumps, the milking machines or anything else. Two different girls have to find the strength within themselves to survive their drastic situations. Penny Draper takes readers into the lives and hearts of two very real characters at the same time as she takes them into a very real disaster from the recent past.

At 4:00 a.m., April 29, 1903, Nathalie lies awake in the booming coal town of Frank, at the base of Turtle Mountain, listening for the whistle of a train - the Spokane Flyer, bringing her American cousin Helena for a visit. Instead, Nathalie hears rocks tumbling down the mountain onto the town and the railway track. She and her mother are safe, but what about others? As she helps search for survivors, desperate questions fill her mind. How many have died? Will the men inside the mine be safe? Will the train be stopped in time? That morning, the northeast face of Turtle Mountain dropped one hundred million tons of limestone on the town. Seventy-six people died, but twenty-three were rescued from under the rocks, seventeen escaped from the mine, and the Flyer was stopped in time. This is a beautifully written novel, with engaging characters and authentic historical detail. It's a story of discovery, as Nathalie - Nattie to her friends - finds her own strengths and skills and the courage to use them.