“My dad was going to die. My sweet, loving, caring, and wonderful-in-every-way dad was going to leave me before he could watch my sister and me grow up.” At the tender age of fifteen, Sarah Caldwell learned that her father had been diagnosed with ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis) and had only a short time left to live. In moments her life went from texting friends, going to gymnastics practice and family vacations by the sea to watching her father’s rapid, irreversible deterioration, a process that plunged her into deep depression. But Jim Caldwell was a man whose indomitable spirit in the face of his suffering provided the ultimate inspiration for Sarah to transform her depression into a journey of healing and love. She learned to accept her and her father’s fate and became determined not to waste a moment of the time she had left with him. When her father passed away, leaving Sarah to face life without her beloved dad, she was determined again to continue on the path of hope and strength, making sense of her loss and honoring his life by helping raise awareness of ALS and money for desperately-needed research for a cure. With a special foreword by former pro-football player Steve Gleason, Just To Make You Smile is the rare, honest, compassionate and bold account of a young adult’s process of watching a parent get ill and die, and the inspiration she hopes to impart by sharing her grieving process, deep inner growth and healing. By telling her story in its entirety, from the lowest depths of grief and depression to the heights of finding her inner strength, making a difference and carrying on her father’s fighting spirit, she hopes to touch the lives of others, especially kids with a sick parent, letting them know they are never alone on this difficult journey.

Raina Telgemeier's #1 New York Times bestselling, Eisner Award-winning graphic memoir based on her childhood! Raina just wants to be a normal sixth grader. But one night after Girl Scouts she trips and falls, severely injuring her two front teeth. What follows is a long and frustrating journey with on-again, off-again braces, surgery, embarrassing headgear, and even a retainer with fake teeth attached. And on top of all that, there's still more to deal with: a major earthquake, boy confusion, and friends who turn out to be not so friendly.

In this sweet and gentle picture book, Bear wakes one day to find his Smile gone and enlists his friends to help him find it. Bear and Smile are always together. They wake up together, swim by the waterfall together, and eat honey together. But one day, Bear wakes up and Smile is nowhere to be found. With the help of his woodland friends, will Bear be able to find his Smile again? This tender and special debut picture book explores sadness with a light touch and shows that sometimes a good friend can make all the difference.

Celebrate your individuality with this picture book that honors all the wonderful things that make you . . . you. “A picture-book celebration of individuality and diversity. . . . Affirming and welcome.” —Kirkus “In all the world over, this much is true: You’re somebody special. There’s only one YOU.” This feel-good book reassures kids that, whoever and whatever they are, it’s awesome being YOU! Expertly written to include all kinds of children and families, it embraces the beauty in a range of physical types, personalities, and abilities. Kids will love discovering and recognizing themselves in these pages—and they’ll feel proud to see their special qualities acknowledged. Adorable illustrations by Rosie Butcher show a diverse community that many will find similar to their own.

Emerging With Wings is a love story. Danielle Bernock takes you with her on her raw yet graceful journey from an invisible cage full of agony and shame, to the incomprehensible joy of validation, love and the empowerment of personal freedom. She unveils how this cage was built as well as how she obtained her freedom. Many things she did not know kept her in the dark, one being the harmful effects of multiple childhood traumas that went unaddressed which fed that darkness and a pervasive fear. The love story reveals a LOVE that secretly carried and protected her despite the lies that grew in that darkness, organized for destruction. This LOVE came and never gave up. The LOVE of one she calls The Pursuer. You are invited into her story. Enter it, share its elegance and in it see The Pursuer for yourself, in your story, for your freedom.

It's the first snowfall of winter and the little girl in this story is filled with that sense of wonder we all experience when the world turns white. She builds a snowman and gives him a twig smile so that they may share a moment of happiness and know the promise of a friendship that will be renewed each year. Told through a simple narrative and with stunning illustrations, this is a book that focuses on the bonds of love and friendship and the pleasure we can give to each other with just a smile: messages that are perfect for the Christmas season.