Category: Name That Book Request

I’ve been searching for a book I read aged about 8 in 1990 it’s a bit younger that YA. There is a young boy called Joe. Joe helps his family who own an italian restaurant. He has an aunt Maria.  He meets an old lady who lives inside an old broken traditional carousel. The old lady dies and the family end up making the carousel part of the restaurant. Absolutely no idea what it’s called or who wrote it but how want to share with my own 7 year old

The book is a series i believe and it involves a whistle of some kind, there’s also sand involved? I feel like there might be sand and whistle in the title even. It’s magical I believe, happening either in the desert or in a made up place – I vaguely remember a scene of MC getting to a town/village square and having to climb somewhere to blow the whistle? That could be very wrong and I misremembered it.  It involves fighting and such, probably YA considering it was in our school’s library. It’s definitely a series and the books have different titles, this is just the one i remember mostly. 

I’ve been trying to find this one for so long I’m starting to think I made it up. I read it in school and have even reached out to friends who were in my class to try to figure it out, but no one remembers it. Here’s what I remember… The cover: In my memory the paperback cover had a light yellow background with black or grey silhouette-type images of a fence, a person, maybe a dog, and some kind of tree (dogwood? Willow? I thought the type of tree was part of the title, like “under the something tree,“ but years of Googles and library searches makes me think probably no).  The story: The protagonist was a boy. He and his mom (who was a murderer? or mentally ill?) lived at a farm-like-institution. I think his mom wasn’t always there, or she was put in solitary or something.  He helped out the lady in charge with the other residents (possibly all adult women) of the farmstitution. One of the residents closest to his age he killed accidentally or almost killed while playing and splashing because she didn’t have a nose or ears, just slits. Either way she got super sick afterward with pneumonia or something and he felt guilty and was sad he had no one to play with. 

I read a short story about the end of the world, I’m sure it started with “nobody really remembered the exact date it started raining. Everyone knew that whenever that day was, it hadn’t stopped”. It then goes on to describe one guys’ attempt to drive his family to the top of a mountain while the world continues to flood.

i’ve been trying to find this book since i remembered it like 5 years ago. i remember them being in highschool. typical girl with grey eyes, mouse brown hair thinks she’s too plain and boring. she somehow gets with the bad boy and they have a whirlwind probably toxic relationship. i remember it being a series where he dies at some point (i think saving her)?? not sure. i remember reading at the back under the author bio that it was loosely based on her life and something like the guy dying saving her had happened to her. i think the second book had a cover that had both of them together maybe, i know for certain it was autumnal, very orange like set in a park during autumn.

I have one that’s been a head-scratcher. My mom checked it out from the library, I read just enough of it to get hooked, but she hated it so didn’t keep it long enough for me to read more.  As I recall it centers around a rather isolated community who lives either on an island or a sparsely inhabited seascape area. Main character is a “medicine woman” type of person, whose love interest is out to sea. She’s being wooed by someone she doesn’t like, but because of the community’s laws/customs, if her man doesn’t come back within a certain period of time she’ll have to marry the smarmy dude. Anyway, meanwhile, she’s doing her medicine thing. The community has a very low survival rate for infants, and newborns/new mothers are kept fairly isolated for ?a month? after the birth, during which time most infants die. The mother is then expected to act like nothing happened. The MC’s best friend loses an infant this way, and the MC is a little confused at why her friend is grieving so deeply, because after all it was expected that the baby would die. Their falling out leaves the MC unsupported when her love interest doesn’t return as expected.  I think there’s a hint of magical realism, and I don’t recall that it was tied to any real-world place or time, although the vibe I got was maybe mid-1800s far north Atlantic – Outer Hebrides, Faroe Islands, that type of setting. I’ve been asking for years with no joy. 

I am looking for a book that I read approximately around 2014. I believe it had a green and purple cover. it may have had the word “soda pop” and a cup or a can on it?  the narrator is a chubby boy in high school who plays an instrument (i believe trombone) in the marching band. the marching band gets funding from the vending machine, but the school for some reason redirects it to the cheerleading team. the plot is the main characters trying to get funding back for the band. there is a love interest who works in a donut shop. 

I read a book sometime in 2011. I know for a fact that the title is simply “Winter.” I am pretty sure the author is a man. Vaguely, I remember that the girl is sent to her extended family in a rural area. I’m pretty sure there’s a graveyard involved at some point, maybe her parents died? I truly can’t remember. But the girl in the book is definitely named Winter. I know this isn’t much to go on, and this isn’t time sensitive.

I read it in 2013 and I vividly remember it being about a young girl who moved to/lives in a small town by the sea. The book itself has something to do with whales and/or narwhals (pretty sure either of those animals are in the title).  The major plot point follows the girl and her friend interacting with this social recluse and finding out more about him (I’m almost certain he’s called the ‘Birdman’ but don’t quote me on that). His backstory turned out to be kind of harrowing where he burnt down a house in his youth by accident and has lived with the trauma ever since, with the town community fully shunning him.  Considering whale/narwhals are in the title of the book, its a little shocking that I don’t remember any parts which involved either animal. (🙁) Regardless, I would love it if you could help me in my search! I’ve tried a few times but nothing came up. The cover of the book is also a full art of a rainy/cloudy day at the beach Or a sea animal in the ocean, it had a lot of blues. 

I think it was called me something bride. Bride left husband and then married the other guy. Sentence I remember is, she put her hand on his thigh and he stayed it with his.