"Raw in its emotions and psychologically astute." — The Chico Enterprise-RecordAt eighteen, after a turbulent and bewildering childhood, Natalie, dubbed the family liar, sets out to uncover what kept her family in constant chaos. She traces her family’s shifting stories and struggles with a devastating doubt: “Was it all my fault?”From multiple-award-winning author Teri Kanefield comes a story about dismantling the past to build a future.From multip...

"An excellent resource for teachers and librarians from middle school up, especially as we enter the semiquincentennial year of 2026." (New York Times Book Review)Meet the rebels, robbers, radicals, determined teenagers, and ordinary Americans who shaped our Constitutional rights.The first ten amendments of the U.S. Constitution—known as the Bill of Rights—include the guarantee that no person may be deprived of life, liberty, or pr...

Award-winning author Teri Kanefield's biography of Alexander Hamilton for young readers is the first in the Making of America series.The America that Alexander Hamilton knew was largely agricultural and built on slave labor. He envisioned something else: a multi-racial, urbanized, capitalistic America with a strong central government. He believed that such an America would be a land of opportunity for the poor and the newcomers. But Hamilton's vision put h...

Before the Little Rock Nine, before Rosa Parks, before Martin Luther King Jr. and his March on Washington, there was Barbara Rose Johns, a teenager who used nonviolent civil disobedience to draw attention to her cause. In 1951, witnessing the unfair conditions in her racially segregated high school, Barbara Johns led a walkout—the first public protest of its kind demanding racial equality in the U.S.—jumpstarting the American civil rights movement. Ridiculed by the white superintendent and...

This biography for young readers explores the life of the controversial seventh U.S. president, as well as his successes, failures, and legacy.Born in the Carolina backwoods, Andrew Jackson joined the American Revolutionary War at the age of thirteen. After a reckless youth of gunfights, gambling, and general mischief, he rose to national fame as the general who defeated the British in the Battle of New Orleans.Jackson ran for president as a political outsi...

To bridge our deepest divides, we must first understand them.“This is a book for any common-sense person who has looked around at the political division and outrage-fueled information environment and said, ‘What the hell is going on?’ or ‘How did we get here?’”—Dannagal Young, Professor of Communication and Political Science at the University of Delaware“Kanefield synthesizes insights from prominent scholars across different academic fields to give us a deeper under...

This biography for young readers examines the life of the sixteenth U.S. president and the constitutional issues that arose during his administration.Praise by many as America's greatest president, Abraham Lincoln guided the country through the Civil War and was the Great Emancipator who freed the enslaved and paved the way for the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments. Lincoln was denounced by others as a tyrant who trampled the Constitution, denied indi...

Children are taught much about the men who shaped early America, but history-shaping colonial women remain largely unknown and undiscussed. The Extraordinary Suzy Wright sets about to change that, telling the little-known story of Quaker Susanna (Suzy) Wright (1697–1784), a renowned poet and political activist. Suzy helped settle the Pennsylvania frontier, where she acted as legal counselor to her less literate neighbors, preparing wills, deeds, indentures, and other contracts. Surviving d...

This biography for young readers examines the life of a brilliant lawyer who successfully argued the case that ended legal racial segregation in America.Thurgood Marshall, the great grandson of a slave, was born at a time when African Americans were denied equal rights in America. Segregation was legal. Lynching was common. In some places, African Americans were entirely excluded from public life; they were forbidden to enter public parks and museums or use public s...

This biography for young readers examines the life of an American who advocated for women's rights and the abolishment of slavery.Susan B. Anthony was born into a world in which men ruled women. A man could beat his wife, take her earrings, have her committed to an asylum based on his word alone, and take her children away from her. While the young nation was ablaze with the radical notion that people could govern themselves, "people" were understood to be white and...

This biography for young readers explores the life of the thirty-second president, who lifted the United States from depression to global leadership.When Franklin D. Roosevelt was first elected president in 1933, America was in the throes of the Great Depression—the worst economic crisis in U.S. history—and the world was experiencing a menacing rise in Nazism and other dangerous extremists. Throughout his four presidential terms, Roosevelt was a steady and inspiring...

Lies destroy. Disinformation tears at the fabric of democracy.A Firehose of Falsehood: The Story of Disinformation breaks down disinformation tactics and offers tools for defending and restoring truth.From Darius I of ancient Persia (522-486 BCE), to blood libel of the Middle Ages, to Soviet disinformation tactics and modern election deniers, Teri Kanefield and Pat Dorian show how tyrants and would-be tyrants deploy disinformation to gain power.