In 1987, Miri Ammerman returns to her hometown of Elizabeth, New Jersey, to attend a commemoration of the worst year of her life -- when a succession of airplanes fell from the sky, leaving her community reeling.

In an attempt to understand why her best friend committed suicide, eighteen-year-old Cody Reynolds retraces her dead friend's footsteps and makes some startling discoveries.

"Ever since her father died three years ago, Julie has had a professional wrestler run a constant commentary on her life that only she can hear"--

Following the death of her father, a thirteen-year-old uses bulimia as a way to avoid her mother's and ten-year-old sister's grief, as well as her own.

"Following the sudden deaths of her father and autistic younger brother, Cedar Lee spends the summer working at a Shakespearean theater festival, making a new friend, and coming to terms with her grief"--

Rather than be placed in a special school for psychologically-challenged students, Dylan, six months from turning eighteen, sets out on the Appalachian Trail, where he makes surprising connections with other hikers.

"There are zero reasons for Theo Ripley to look forward to his family vacation. Not only are he, sister Laura, and nature-obsessed Dad going to Big Bend, the least popular National Park, but once there, the family will be camping. And Theo is an indoor animal. It doesn't help that this will be the first vacation they're taking since Mom passed away. Once there, the family contends with 110 degree days, wild bears, and an annoying amateur ornithologist...

Identical twin teenagers Giselle and Isabelle Boyer have always been inseparable, and expected to stay that way even though their Haitian American parents are separating--but when when the entire family is caught in a car crash, everyone's world is shattered forever.