Karen Hesse

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Karen Hesse's Latest Book

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  • Bibliography:
    28 Books
  • First Book:
    March 1991
  • Latest Book:
    October 2022
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Multi-Author Series List

Dear America

A Light in the Storm: The Civil War Diary of Amelia Martin, Fenwick Island, Delaware, 1861 (Sep-1999)

Book List in Order: 28 titles

  • Wish on a Unicorn

    Now I didn't believe a broken-down old unicorn could make wishes come true . . . not for a minute. But what if it could?Mags has a lot to wish for -- a nice house with a mama who isn't tired out from work; a normal little sister; a brother who doesn'...

  • Letters from Rifka

    Rifka dreams of a life in America, but she may never get there. Rifka and her family have fled Russia's brutal treatment of the Jews for a new life in America. But the path to freedom is full of terrible obstacles -- the humiliating scrutiny of do...

  • Poppy's Chair

  • Lester's Dog

    Illus. in full color. "A sensitive story about a boy who, with the help of a deaf freind, conquers his fear of a neighbor's dog that bit him years earlier. In the process, he saves a kitten and befriends an elderly, recently widowed man. Carpenter's ...

  • Lavender

    Codie loves to spend time with her favorite aunt, Alix. Her aunt is a talented seamstress, and Codie knows that the perfect gift for Alix's new baby is a handmade blanket. Codie wants to have the blanket done before the baby is born. Suddenly, th...

  • Sable

    The Newbery Medal Awardâ€"winning author “turns out an exemplary chapter book with this superbly structured work about a girl and her dog” (Publishers Weekly, starred review).Tate is overjoyed when a scrawny mutt turns up in the yard one day. She...

  • Phoenix Rising

    Nyle Sumner is an orphan. And in spite of the fact that she and her grandmother live a good life on a Vermont sheep farm, she cannot forget that her father abandoned her. She cannot forget that her mother died in the back room of the farmhouse when N...

  • A Time of Angels

    OUT OF THE BLUE When war separates Hannah from her parents in 1918, she moves to her aunt's crowded tenement in Boston's West End. Together, Hannah and Tanta Rose struggle to protect Hannah's two young sisters, but when a deadly influenza epidemic st...

  • The Music Of Dolphins

    Mila becomes famous around the world when she is rescued from an unpopulated island off the coast of Florida. Years ago, Mila went missing from a boat crash, and she has been raised by dolphins from the age of four. Researchers teach Mila language...



  • Out of the Dust

    • / General Fiction
    • Buy Buy

    “Dust piles up like snow across the prairie...” A terrible accident has transformed Billie Jo's life, scarring her inside and out. Her mother is gone. Her father can't talk about it. And the one thing that might make her feel better -- playing...

  • Just Juice

    Juice Faulstich lives with her pa and ma and four sisters in the North Carolina hills. Working with her hands comes easy to Juice, but not school. This year, she's back again in Miss Hamble's third grade. Letters and numbers still don't make sense to...

  • Come on, Rain!

    Newbery Medalist Karen Hesse recreates the body and soul-renewing experience of a summer downpour after a sweltering city heat wave."Come on, rain!" Tess pleads to the sky as listless vines and parched plants droop in the endless heat. Up and down th...

  • A Light in the Storm: The Civil War Diary of Amelia Martin, Fenwick Island, Delaware, 1861

    Dear America

    Newbery Medal winner Karen Hesse's Civil War diary, A LIGHT IN THE STORM, is now back in print!In 1861, Amelia Martin's father is stripped of his post as a ship's captain when he is caught harboring the leader of a slave rebellion. Now he is an assis...

  • Stowaway

    It is known that in the summer of 1768, Captain James Cook sailed from England on H.M.S Endeavour, beginning a three-year voyage around the world on a secret mission to discover an unknown continent at the bottom of the globe. What is less known is t...

  • A Time for Angels

  • Young Nick's Head

    The year is 1768. Nicholas Young's mind is made up. He's had enough! Enough of the cruel butcher to whom he is apprenticed and enough of his indifferent father lurking somewhere in the background of his existence. He's had enough of the squalor of hi...

  • Witness

    MANY VOICES, ONE TOWN. LEANORA SUTTER, ESTHER HIRSH, MERLIN VAN TORNHOUT, JOHNNY REEVES... These characters are among the unforgettable cast inhabiting a small Vermont town in 1924--a town that turns against its own when the Ku Klux Klan moves in. N...

  • The Stone Lamp

    The story of Hanukkah is the story of triumph of light over darkness, of the small miracles that give hope to an entire people. In a series of eight powerful and evocative free-verse poems, award-winning author Karen Hesse captures the resilient spir...

  • Aleutian Sparrow

    In June 1942, seven months after attacking Pearl Harbor, the Japanese navy invaded Alaska's Aleutian Islands. For nine thousand years the Aleut people had lived and thrived on these treeless, windswept lands. Within days of the first attack, the enti...



  • Cats in Krasinski Square

    Newbery medalist Karen Hesse tells a harrowing, true story about life in the Warsaw Ghetto during WWII.

    When Karen Hesse came upon a short article about cats out-foxing the Gestapo at the train station in Warsaw during WWII, she couldn't get ...

  • Brooklyn Bridge

    It's the summer of 1903 in Brooklyn and all fourteen-year-old Joseph Michtom wants is to experience the thrill, the grandeur, and the electricity of the new amusement park at Coney Island. But that doesn't seem likely. Ever since his parents--Russian...

  • Spuds

    Newbery medalist Karen Hesse has crafted a heartwarming story set in the backwoods of Maine that glows with integrity, love, and true family values.


    Ma's been working so hard, she doesn't have much left over. So her three kids decide to do...

  • Nell

    in What You Wish For

    A stellar collection from Newbery medalists and bestselling authors written to benefit Darfuri refugees With contributions from some of the best talent writing for children today, What You Wish For is a compelling collection of affecting, inspirin...

  • Safekeeping

    Radley’s parents had warned her that all hell would break loose if the American People's Party took power. And now, with the president assassinated and the government cracking down on citizens, the news is filled with images of vigilante groups, fr...

  • My Thumb

    I love my thumb, I truly do, it tastes of pears and carrot stew. It's like a hug, an "I love you." My mom hoped in a year or two there'd be some things that I outgrew, and some I have, but never you. Kids who suck their thumbs know there's no...

  • Night Job

    With lyrical narration and elegant, evocative artwork, Newbery Medalist Karen Hesse and illustrator G. Brian Karas share the nighttime experience of a father and child. When the sun sets, Dad’s job as a school custodian is just beginning. What i...

  • Nights with Dad

    A luminous and lyrical tribute to the enduring, everyday sort of love between a boy and his father.When the sun sets, Dad's night shift as a school caretaker is just beginning. What is it like to work at night, while the rest of the city is asleep? T...

  • Granny and Bean

    From a stellar creative team, the lyrical story of a grandmother and grandchild as they share an intimate adventure by the windy sea—and make a stop for teatime.Their laughter rose; full of joy, it spilled ’cross sand, through mist, as th...

Award-Winning Books by Karen Hesse

Cats in Krasinski Square
2004 Parents Choice Award (Fall) (1998-2007) -- Gold
2007 California Young Reader Medal -- Picture Bk/Older Reader
Letters from Rifka
1992 Sydney Taylor Book Award -- Older Readers
2012 Phoenix Award -- Children's Literature
The Music Of Dolphins
1998 Keystone to Reading Book Award -- Intermediate
Out of the Dust
1998 Bookseller's Choice -- Young Adults
1998 Newbery Medal -- Children's
1998 Scott O Dell Award for Historical Fiction -- Historical Fiction
Phoenix Rising
1998 Heartland Award -- Young Adult


Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Karen Hesse has published 28 books.

Karen Hesse does not have a new book coming out soon. The latest book, Granny and Bean, was published in October 2022.

The first book by Karen Hesse, Wish on a Unicorn, was published in March 1991.

No. Karen Hesse does not write books in series.
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