After moving with her family from New Jersey to California in the late 1950s, sixteen-year-old Bron discovers the world of drag racing

How Far Would You Have Gotten If I Hadn't Called You Back?

Literature & Fiction

HOBBS, VALERIE

Genre Fiction

Puffin

In this beautifully written, moving novel, Valerie Hobbs explores the fine line between safety and stagnation, rootlessness and freedom. Carolina lives with her mother, Melanie, and her baby sister in an old school bus. "Wheels make you free," Melanie says, even though Carolina has to start in a new school every year and leave just when she's getting settled. But this time things are different. First Carolina finds an abandoned baby crow and decides to care for him until he's old enough to fly. Then she meets Stefan, who lives in the mansion near where they've parked the bus. The two become friends, and Carolina starts, little by little, to set down roots. What's going to happen when Melanie wants to hit the road again? “From the start, Hobbs dazzles readers…This is the remarkable story of two outsiders who find it possible, through a friendship, to unlock the doors of their own cages.” —Riverbank Reviews "Readers will find themselves quickly drawn in by Hobbs's strong characters and rapidly unfolding plot." —School Library Journal

Carolina Crow Girl

Children's Books

Animals

Puffin Books

Charlie's Run

Hoping to stop his parents' impending separation and keep them from getting a divorce, eleven-year-old Charlie runs away from their house in the California countryside and finds a ride to the coast. Reprint.

Growing Up & Facts of Life

After her beloved Gran dies, fifteen-year-old Liv goes to California to live with the father she has never known and must adjust to his gruff ways and his life as an abalone diver, so different from her life in New York City. By the author of Carolina Crow Girl. Reprint.

Tender

Defiance

Eleven-year-old Toby Steiner wants to do normal things on his vacation. He wants to hike and race his bike down the hill. He wants to learn to fish out on the lake. He doesn't want to return to the children's hospital where his painful cancer treatment finally ended. When Toby starts spending time with Pearl, a spunky old woman who lives on a nearby farm, and Blossom, her broken-down cow, he sees all the more reason to keep the new lump on his side a secret from his parents. From Pearl he discovers the beauty of poetry, and from Blossom he just might uncover the meaning of life.

Teen & Young Adult

Square Fish

Sheep

The sheep closed in around him like a big, woolly blanket. The puppy had never been so scared or so excited in his life. Soon he was racing, feinting, dodging―learning what it means to be one of the proud breed of Border collies, the finest sheepherders in the world. Then, almost overnight, his life is turned upside down. He finds himself in a series of strange places, with no sheep, his family gone. With nothing but the courage he was born with and a dream, he searches for the life he once knew, gathering names and adventures as he goes. For a short time, he's called Blackie. To the Goat Man, he's Shep. To Hollerin, he's Spot. There's one name that threatens to haunt him forever―Sparky, the name Billy the circus man calls him. But there's another name that he is given, one that finally makes him feel at home. . . .

From the moment their romance begins in eighth grade, Winifred and Bernie are individualists. They pride themselves on being different, and have each other for support through the tough years of high school. So when they consider college, they send off for the same catalogs, promising never to separate. But Bernie's mother dies and Bernie more or less drops out of school, becoming an ordinary guy working away in a tire shop, while Winifred goes about as far from New Jersey as a girl can go: the University of California at Santa Barbara. College is a culture shock to Winifred, but her three savvy roommates teach her how to fit in. By the time Bernie catches up with her again, Winifred has become, well . . . ordinary. Can they rediscover their true selves - and true love? Told from alternating viewpoints, with a sense of humor and a deep appreciation of first love, Valerie Hobbs's novel captures an endearing young couple's search for independence and identity.

Anything But Ordinary

Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)

Winner of the 2008 National Parenting Publications Awards (NAPPA) in the Children's Products competition. A memorable trio of characters, each fighting for independence Eleven-year-old Toby Steiner wants to do normal things on his vacation: he wants to hike and race his bike down the hill and learn to fish out on the lake. The last thing he wants is to return to the children’s hospital where his painful cancer treatment finally ended. When Toby starts spending time with Pearl, a spunky old woman who lives on a nearby farm, and Blossom, her broken-down cow, he sees all the more reason to keep the new lump on his side a secret from his parents. From Pearl he discovers the beauty of poetry, and from Blossom he just might uncover the meaning of life. In this honest and life-affirming novel for young readers, which Suzanne Fisher Staples, author of the Newbery Honor Book Shabanu, calls “beautiful and gripping,” an unforgettable boy learns about the importance of letting things happen on their own and listening to his heart.

Farrar. Straus & Giroux

An adolescent girl, who lives in an old school bus with her free-spirited mother and baby sister, learns life lessons about freedom and confinement when she befriends a wealthy, crippled boy and tries to raise a baby crow.

Jack has finally found a home and a purpose on a farm, where he keeps a flock of sheep safe from coyotes and helps train young pups to do the same. But when two sheep disappear in broad daylight, Jack doesn't know what happened to them. Was it his fault? Is he just getting too old for this job? Still, he's determined not to disappoint his boy, Luke, who thinks that Jack is the smartest and fastest dog around. Then Jack and Luke discover that the animal threatening their farm is far more dangerous than any coyote: it's a rabid wolf. Jack knows that he must gather the courage and strength to protect the ones he loves most―but can an old dog learn new tricks?

Wolf

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by HOBBS, VALERIE. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by HOBBS, VALERIE

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by HOBBS, VALERIE. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

How Far Would You Have Gotten If I Hadn't Called You Back?

Carolina Crow Girl

Charlie's Run

Tender

Defiance

Sheep

Anything But Ordinary

Defiance

Carolina Crow Girl

Wolf