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"Through the unforgettable stories of five Atlanta families, this landmark work of journalism exposes a new and troubling trend-the dramatic rise of the "working homeless" in cities across America. The working homeless. In a country where hard work and determination are supposed to lead to success, there is something scandalous about this phrase. But skyrocketing rents, low wages, and a lack of tenant rights have produced a startling phenomenon: People...
2) Crenshaw
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Raining Cats and Dogs
2024 Bluestem List Read-a-Likes (SCPL-YS)
Friendship Stories (WPL-Youth)
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2024 Bluestem List Read-a-Likes (SCPL-YS)
Friendship Stories (WPL-Youth)
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Description
Jackson and his family have fallen on hard times. There's no more money for rent, and not much for food, either. His parents, his little sister, and their dog may have to live in their minivan. Again. Crenshaw is a cat. He's large, he's outspoken, and he's imaginary. He's been gone for four years, but has come back into Jackson's life to help him. Can an imaginary friend be enough to save this family from losing everything?
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This book tells the story behind bestselling author Danielle Steel's crusade to help the homeless of San Francisco. In her powerful memoir His Bright Light, the author opened her heart to share the devastating story of the loss of her beloved son. In this new memoir, she shows us how she transformed that pain into a campaign of service that enriched her life beyond what she could imagine. For eleven years, she took to the streets with a small team...
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"Margaret Atwood puts the human heart to the ultimate test in an utterly brilliant new novel that is as visionary as The Handmaid's Tale and as richly imagined as The Blind Assassin. Stan and Charmaine are a married couple trying to stay afloat in the midst of an economic and social collapse. Job loss has forced them to live in their car, leaving them vulnerable to roving gangs. They desperately need to turn their situation around and fast. The Positron...
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Poverty-stricken Joseph bravely rides out all the storms life keeps throwing at him. -- Provided by publisher.
Joe Oak is used to living on unsteady ground. His mom can't be depended on as she never stays around long once she gets "the itch," and now he and his beloved grandmother find themselves without a home. Fortunately, Joe has an outlet in his journals and drawings and takes comfort from the lessons of comic books -- superheroes have a lot...
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Poverty Awareness Month
2023 Best Adult Fiction & Nonfiction (SCPL)
Best Non Fiction of 2023
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2023 Best Adult Fiction & Nonfiction (SCPL)
Best Non Fiction of 2023
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Description
"The Pulitzer Prize-winning, bestselling author of Evicted reimagines the debate on poverty, making a new and bracing argument about why it persists in America: because the rest of us benefit from it. The United States, the richest country on earth, has more poverty than any other advanced democracy. Why? Why does this land of plenty allow one in every eight of its children to go without basic necessities, permit scores of its citizens to live and...
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January 2026 | Poverty Awareness Month
OBD NY Times 100 Best Books of the 21st Century - ADULT
Pulitzer Prize Nonfiction
OBD NY Times 100 Best Books of the 21st Century - ADULT
Pulitzer Prize Nonfiction
Description
"[The author] takes us into the poorest neighborhoods of Milwaukee to tell the story of eight families on the edge. Arleen is a single mother trying to raise her two sons on the 20 dollars a month she has left after paying for their rundown apartment. Scott is a gentle nurse consumed by a heroin addiction. Lamar, a man with no legs and a neighborhood full of boys to look after, tries to work his way out of debt. Vanetta participates in a botched...
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2024 Bluestem List Read-a-Likes (SCPL-YS)
2025 Caudill Nominees
2025 Rebecca Caudill Award
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2025 Caudill Nominees
2025 Rebecca Caudill Award
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Description
It's June's first day at Huey House, and as if losing her home weren't enough, she also can't bring her cherished viola inside. Before the accident last year, her dad saved tip money for a year to buy her viola, and she's not about to give it up now. Tyrell has been at Huey House for three years and gives June a glimpse of the good things about living there: friendship, hot meals, and a classical musician next door. Can he and June work together to...
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When ten year-old orphan Peter Augustus Duchenne encounters a fortune-teller in the marketplace one day and she tells him that his sister, who is presumed dead, is in fact alive, he embarks on a remarkable series of adventures as he desperately tries to find her.
10) Paper things
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When Ari's mother died four years ago, she had two final wishes: that Ari and her older brother, Gage, would stay together always, and that Ari would go to Carter, the middle school for gifted students. So when nineteen-year-old Gage decides he can no longer live with their bossy guardian, Janna, Ari knows she has to go with him. But it's been two months, and Gage still hasn't found them an apartment. He and Ari have been "couch surfing," staying...
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Living in the family car in their small North Carolina town after their father leaves them virtually penniless, Georgina, desperate to improve their situation and unwilling to accept her overworked mother's calls for patience, persuades her younger brother to help her in an elaborate scheme to get money by stealing a dog and then claiming the reward that the owners are bound to offer.
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"Hollis Brown is stuck. Born to a blue-collar American Dream, Hollis lives in a rotting small town where no one can afford to leave.Hollis's only bright spots are his two best friends, cool girls Annie and Yulia, and the thrill of fighting his classmates. As if his circumstances couldn't get worse, a chance encounter with a mysterious stranger named Walt results in a frightening trap. After unknowingly making a deal at the crossroads, Hollis finds...
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AMPL April Reading Challenge
AMPL May Reading Challenge
NYT Nonfiction Bestsellers
OBD Memoir March - ADULT
AMPL May Reading Challenge
NYT Nonfiction Bestsellers
OBD Memoir March - ADULT
Description
"Part memoir, part historical and social analysis, J. D. Vance's Hillbilly Elegy is a fascinating consideration of class, culture, and the American dream. Vance's grandparents were "dirt poor and in love." They got married and moved north from Kentucky to Ohio in the hopes of escaping the dreadful poverty around them. Their grandchild (the author) graduated from Yale Law School, a conventional marker of their success in achieving upward mobility for...
15) The fourth stall
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Bullying Awareness Month (kids)
McClure Battle of the Books 2025-2026
OBD Funny Books - YOUTH
School Stories (kids)
McClure Battle of the Books 2025-2026
OBD Funny Books - YOUTH
School Stories (kids)
Description
Sixth-graders Mac and Vince operate a business charging schoolmates for protection from bullies and for help to negotiate conflicts peacefully, with amazing challenges and results.
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Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month (WPLD)
Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month (Youth)
Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month: Kids (May 2023)
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Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month (Youth)
Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month: Kids (May 2023)
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Description
Abandoned by their father and living in poverty with their heartless stepmother in Louisiana, two sisters from the Philippines, twelve-year-old Sol and six-year-old Ming, learn the true meaning of family.
17) On the come up
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"Sixteen-year-old Bri wants to be one of the greatest rappers of all time. Or at least win her first battle. As the daughter of an underground hip hop legend who died right before he hit big, Bri's got massive shoes to fill. But it's hard to get your come up when you're labeled a hoodlum at school, and your fridge at home is empty after your mom loses her job. So Bri pours her anger and frustration into her first song, which goes viral . . . for all...




