Holes

'There's an empty notebook lying on the table in the moonlight. It's been there for an age. I keep on saying that I'll write a journal. So I'll start right here, right now. I open the book and write the very first words: My name is Mina and I love the night. Then what shall I write? I can't just write that this happened then this happened then this happened to boring infinitum. I'll let my journal grow just like the mind does, just like a tree or a beast does, just like life does. Why should a book tell a tale in a dull straight line?'

Bradley Chalkers IS the oldest kid in the fifth grade. He tells enormous lies. He picks fights with girls. No one likes him - except Carla, the new school counselor. She thinks Bradley is sensitive and generous, and knows that Bradley could change, if only he weren’t afraid to try. But when you feel like the most-hated kid in the whole school, believing in yourself can be the hardest thing in the world....

If you go down to the woods today... Well, all children know not to, don't they? Tamaya is on a scholarship to the prestigious Woodridge Academy, and every day she and seventh-grader Marshall walk to school together. They never go through the woods. And when they arrive at school, they stop talking to each other - because Marshall can't be seen to be friends with a little kid like Tamaya. Especially not with Chad around. Chad-the-bully, who makes Marshall's life utterly miserable.

There are stories about people who want to live forever. This is not one of those stories.... Alfie Monk is like any other nearly teenage boy - except he's 1,000 years old and can remember the last Viking invasion of England. Obviously no-one believes him. So when everything Alfie knows and loves is destroyed in a fire, and the modern world comes crashing in, Alfie embarks on a mission to find friendship, acceptance and a different way to live...which means finding a way to make sure he will eventually die.

I am drowning in this roaring silence. I am drowning. I'm going to die... Cameron is 13 and desperately in need of a heart transplant when a pioneering doctor approaches his family with a startling proposal. He can give Cameron a new heart - but not one from a human, one from a pig. It's never been done before. It's experimental, risky and very controversial. But Cameron is fed up with just sitting on the side of life, always watching and never doing. He has to try - to become the world's first pig-heart boy.

What happens when innocence is confronted by monstrous evil? Nine-year-old Bruno knows nothing of the Final Solution and the Holocaust. He is oblivious to the appalling cruelties being inflicted on the people of Europe by his country. All he knows is that he has been moved from a comfortable home in Berlin to a house in a desolate area where there is nothing to do and no one to play with.

A truly original debut novel from an extraordinarily talented new voice in children's books. Laugh, cry and wonder at this race-against-time story of a boy who travels back to 1984 to prevent a go-kart accident and save his father's life.... My dad died twice. Once when he was 39 and again four years later, when he was 12. The first time had nothing to do with me. The second time definitely did, but I would never even have been there if it hadn't been for his 'time machine'....

When Elsie, an orphan on the streets of Victorian London, hears about the mysterious Ice Monster - a woolly mammoth found at the North Pole - she’s determined to discover more.... A chance encounter brings Elsie face to face with the creature and sparks the adventure of a lifetime - from London to the heart of the Arctic! Heroes come in all different shapes and sizes in David Walliams’ biggest and most epic adventure yet!  

Fourteen-year-old Lisa Jura was a musical prodigy who hoped to become a concert pianist. But when Hitler's armies advanced on pre-war Vienna, Lisa's parents were forced to make a difficult decision. Able to secure passage for only one of their three daughters through the Kindertransport, they chose to send gifted Lisa to London for safety. As she yearned to be reunited with her family while she lived in a home for refugee children on Willesden Lane, Lisa's music became a beacon of hope.

When Michael is washed up on an island in the Pacific after falling from his parents’ yacht, he struggles to survive on his own. He can’t find food and he can’t find water, and as Michael and his dog curl up to sleep, he knows they cannot last long. But he soon realises there is someone close by, someone who is watching over him and helping him to stay alive.

Turning invisible at will: it's one way of curing your acne. But far more drastic than 13 year-old Ethel Leatherhead intended when she tried a combination of untested medicines and a sunbed. It's fun at first, being invisible. And aided by her friend Boydy, she manages to keep her extraordinary ability secret. Or does she?

From the million-copy bestselling author of The Parent Agency and Birthday Boy comes a wildly entertaining wish-fulfilment adventure that asks the question: what would happen if the strictest head teacher swapped bodies with the naughtiest kid in school?  

Told in the voice of a young soldier, the story follows 24 hours in his life at the front during World War I, and captures his memories as he looks back over his life. Full of stunningly researched detail and engrossing atmosphere, the book leads to a dramatic and moving conclusion.

Is your school just a little too…NORMAL? Maybe you should go to Wayside School. You'll meet Bebe, the fastest draw in art class; John, who only reads upside down; and Sammy, the new kid—he's a real rat. Come on! Hurry up! If you're late for class, Mrs. Gorf will turn you into an app…Oops. Sorry about that. More than 6 million kids have laughed at the wacky stories of Wayside School.

There used to be an empty chair at the back of my class, but now a new boy called Ahmet is sitting in it. He's eight years old (just like me), but he's very strange. He never talks and never smiles and doesn't like sweets - not even lemon sherbets, which are my favourite! But the truth is, Ahmet really isn't very strange at all. He's a refugee who's run away from a war. A real one. With bombs and fires and bullies that hurt people. And the more I find out about him, the more I want to be his friend.