Brooklyn, Bugsy, and Me — Lynea Bowdish

Sam gets used to a new home and an old relative

In the summer of 1953, nine-year-old Sam and his mom move to Brooklyn to live with his grandfather. Mom has lost her job and has no prospects back home in West Virginia. So Sam leaves his friends and his fishing and his fabulous countryside and squeezes into Gramps's small, hot, noisy apartment with Mom -- and Dad (in an urn, where he's been since dying in the war). Right away, Sam feels unwelcome. And what's to like about Brooklyn? Then he meets Tony and discovers egg creams and stickball and even a wonderful new kind of fishing. Above all, he finds that his grandfather is not a "cold, unfriendly" man -- and that it was up to Sam to reach out to him, and to figure out why people call him Bugsy.