Recommendations based on "Dustbin Baby"

National Book Award FinalistA heartstrong story of family and romance, tribulation and tenacity, set on the High Plains east of Denver.In the small town of Holt, Colorado, a high school teacher is confronted with raising his two boys alone after their mother retreats first to the bedroom, then altogether. A teenage girl—her father long since disappeared, her mother unwilling to have her in the house—is pregnant, alone herself, with nowhere to go. And out in the country, two brothers, elderly bachelors, work the family homestead, the only world they've ever known. From these unsettled lives emerges a vision of life, and of the town and landscape that bind them together—their fates somehow overcoming the powerful circumstances of place and station, their confusion, curiosity, dignity and humor intact and resonant. As the milieu widens to embrace fully four generations, Kent Haruf displays an emotional and aesthetic authority to rival the past masters of a classic American tradition.

"The best book I read this decade." —Sharon Van Etten in Rolling Stone“Boy Swallows Universe hypnotizes you with wonder, and then hammers you with heartbreak. . . . Eli’s remarkably poetic voice and his astonishingly open heart take the day. They enable him to carve out the best of what’s possible from the worst of what is, which is the miracle that makes this novel marvelous.” —Washington PostA "thrilling" (New York Times Book Review) novel of love, crime, magic, fate and a boy’s coming of age in 1980s Australia, named one of the best literary fiction titles of 2019 by Library Journal.Eli Bell’s life is complicated. His father is lost, his mother is in jail, and his stepdad is a heroin dealer. The most steadfast adult in Eli’s life is Slim—a notorious felon and national record-holder for successful prison escapes—who watches over Eli and August, his silent genius of an older brother.Exiled far from the rest of the world in Darra, a neglected suburb populated by Polish and Vietnamese refugees, this twelve-year-old boy with an old soul and an adult mind is just trying to follow his heart, learn what it takes to be a good man, and train for a glamorous career in journalism. Life, however, insists on throwing obstacles in Eli’s path—most notably Tytus Broz, Brisbane’s legendary drug dealer.But the real trouble lies ahead. Eli is about to fall in love, face off against truly bad guys, and fight to save his mother from a certain doom—all before starting high school.A story of brotherhood, true love, family, and the most unlikely of friendships, Boy Swallows Universe is the tale of an adolescent boy on the cusp of discovering the man he will be. Powerful and kinetic, Trent Dalton’s debut is sure to be one of the most heartbreaking, joyous and exhilarating novels you will experience.

The 40th anniversary edition of the classic Newbery Medal-winning title by beloved author Katherine Paterson, with brand-new bonus materials including an author's note by Katherine herself and a foreword by New York Times bestselling author Kate DiCamillo.Jess Aarons has been practicing all summer so he can be the fastest runner in the fifth grade. And he almost is, until the new girl in school, Leslie Burke, outpaces him. The two become fast friends and spend most days in the woods behind Leslie’s house, where they invent an enchanted land called Terabithia. One morning, Leslie goes to Terabithia without Jess and a tragedy occurs. It will take the love of his family and the strength that Leslie has given him for Jess to be able to deal with his grief.Bridge to Terabithia was also named an ALA Notable Children’s Book and has become a touchstone of children’s literature, as have many of Katherine Paterson’s other novels, including The Great Gilly Hopkins and Jacob Have I Loved.

These prizewinning stories champion the everyday person who tries to do his or her best in demanding and even demeaning situations. The stories in A Common Person and Other Stories, R. M. Kinder’s third short-story collection and the winner of the Richard Sullivan Prize in Short Fiction, expose the disruption in our modern life and the ever-present threat of violence, and, most importantly, they capture the real heroism of everyday people. The characters in these stories, most set deep in the middle of America, seem to invite trouble through their concern for others: a neighbor’s mistreated dog, a boy standing up to a bully, a woman who faces cancer and the loss of love. Kinder’s characters struggle with conflicts common to us all—to treat humans and animals with compassion, to open minds and hearts to diversity, all while balancing the welfare of the individual and the larger community. The characters aren’t always loveable, but they have their moments of grace—they accept responsibility and take stands. These stories, by turns humorous, unsettling, and utterly believable, expose the dangers of ordinary life as their characters perform acts of defiance, determination, and connection. The memorable characters in A Common Person and Other Stories are, like us, doing the best they can, and that is often remarkable and admirable. Considered closely, Kinder shows us, no person is common.

The gruff and surly Mr Thomas Oakley is less than pleased when he is landed with a scrawny little city boy as a guest, but because it is compulsory that each villager takes in an evacuee he reluctantly agrees. It soon becomes obvious to Mister Tom that young Willie Beech is hiding something, and as the pair begin to form an unlikely bond and Willie grows in stature and in confidence he begins to forget the past. But when he has to return to war-torn London to face his mother again he retreats into his shy and awkward ways once more. Goodnight Mister Tom is one of the most touching and powerful stories ever written. As the relationship between Willie and Tom begins to transform them both, Magorian's powerful yet gentle writing tugs at the heart, taking the reader on an incredibly emotional journey that never once stoops to unnecessary sentimentality. --Susan Harrison

“Only Here, Only Now heralds the arrival of an urgent and unique new voice, as engaging and as startling as Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha, Morvern Callar or The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time.”—David PeaceA brilliant new talent writing from lived experience makes his debut with this irresistible and original story in the vein of Young Mungo and Hang the Moon, that pierces the beautiful, brilliant, and lightning-quick mind of a teenage girl growing up with undiagnosed ADHD in working-class Scotland.In the blazing hot summer of 1994, there’s nothing for Cora Mowat to do but hang around in empty parking lots. Stuck in her Mom’s small house and tired of her own restless mind, she’s desperate to break free of the limits of Fife but unsure of what the future holds—if it holds anything at all for a girl like her trying to find her way in the world.After her mother invites a new man to live with them, tensions quickly rise in the cramped house. Gunner is kind but strange, too—a one-eyed shoplifter with more than a few hidden secrets. But when tragedy strikes shortly after, Cora rebels against her small-town existence in search of love, acceptance, and a path to something good. If only she can learn to navigate her grief and everything she thinks she knows about who she is and what she might be capable of, she may finally find the way forward.In this extraordinary debut, drawn from experience but written with riotous imagination, Tom Newlands explores a teenage girl’s coming-of-age in post-industrial Scotland and what it means to yearn for a life that feels out of reach. Vibrant, lyrical and fiercely funny, Only Here, Only Now is a story of identity and family that shines with hope and resilience.

"Startlingly talented . . . he survives the inevitable, apt comparisons to Kurt Vonnegut and writes in a tenderly mordant voice all his own." -Janet Maslin, The New York TimesIn this novel rich in character, Junior Thibodeau grows up in rural Maine in a time of Atari, baseball cards, pop Catholicism, and cocaine. He also knows something no one else knows-neither his exalted parents, nor his baseball-savant brother, nor the love of his life (she doesn't believe him anyway): The world will end when he is thirty-six. While Junior searches for meaning in a doomed world, his loved ones tell an all-American family saga of fathers and sons, blinding romance, lost love, and reconciliation-culminating in one final triumph that reconfigures the universe. A tour de force of storytelling, Everything Matters! is a genre-bending potpourri of alternative history, sci-fi, and the great American tale in the tradition of John Irving and Margaret Atwood.

Four chronically homeless people–Amelia One Sky, Timber, Double Dick and Digger–seek refuge in a warm movie theatre when a severe Arctic Front descends on the city. During what is supposed to be a one-time event, this temporary refuge transfixes them. They fall in love with this new world, and once the weather clears, continue their trips to the cinema. On one of these outings they meet Granite, a jaded and lonely journalist who has turned his back on writing “the same story over and over again” in favour of the escapist qualities of film, and an unlikely friendship is struck. A found cigarette package (contents: some unsmoked cigarettes, three $20 bills, and a lottery ticket) changes the fortune of this struggling set. The ragged company discovers they have won $13.5 million, but none of them can claim the money for lack proper identification. Enlisting the help of Granite, their lives, and fortunes, become forever changed. Ragged Companyis a journey into both the future and the past. Richard Wagamese deftly explores the nature of the comforts these friends find in their ideas of “home,” as he reconnects them to their histories.

Ramona's father has lost his job and all the family are miserable, so Ramona decides to try and cheer them up, in her own inimitable way.

In This Mountain finds Father Tim and Cynthia again living in Mitford, following their stint on Whitecap Island. In the little town that's become America's favorite home-away-from-home, life hums along. Dooley looks toward his career as a vet. Joe Ivey and Fancy Skinner fight a haircut price war that takes no prisoners. Percy steps out on a limb with a risky new menu item at the Grill. Uncle Billy feels new pressure to produce a sure-fire joke and the Man in the Attic returns to Mitford as the town holds its breath to see what happens. Alhough Father Tim dislikes change, he dislikes retirement even more. His wife wins awards, receives bouquets, and gets invited to tour the country. While he stares at a blank page in a proposed book of essays, and fills an occasional pulpit. When he decides to take on a unique and difficult ministry, he feels newly energized. He even begins to think he likes change, until an unexpected event propels him on a painful journey that shakes his faith, his marriage, and the whole town of Mitford. Once again, Jan Karon proves she's "a writer who reflects contemporary culture more fully than almost any living novelist" (Los Angeles Times). As always, she transports us with characters who step off the page and into our hearts, and cheers us with her great sense of fun and magnificent storytelling. So, come home to Mitford. And treat yourself to a rare event in this world: complete satisfaction. - mitfordbooks.com.