Julie is excited to take care of Lucy, a talking parrot, while her friend Ivy is on vacation. But soon she realizes that she has taken on more than she can handle. Then Julie discovers that an old friend is hiding secrets from her. Could he be responsible for the strange things happening at Ivy's house? Or is someone, or something, else to blame? A Looking Back section describes the wild parrots of Telegraph Hill, plus the increase in vegetarianism in the 1970s.
Rebecca is put in charge of the new neighbors' baby and a kidnapper is on the loose in New York City! So when a strange boy shows up asking a few too many questions about the baby, Rebecca starts to worry. Could the child be in danger? Includes an illustrated Looking Back essay about household duties of young girls in 1914.
As Cécile exits a crowded showboat after enjoying a lavish Floating Circus, she stumbles-and when she gets up, she realizes that the cameo necklace she borrowed from her aunt is no longer on her neck. Knowing that the necklace was the last gift Tante Tay's husband gave her before he died, Cécile is desperate to find it. As she tracks down the people in the crowd who were near her when she fell, her search takes her into many corners of New Orleans, from a society tea party to the crowded...
Marie-Grace can't wait to begin her journey up the Mississippi River with her father. The steamboat they're traveling on is the biggest and fanciest boat Marie-Grace has ever seen. It's crowded with all sorts of interesting passengers, including Wilhelmina Newman, a girl her age. Wilhelmina is traveling alone, and she's carrying a secret in one of her trunks-clues to hidden Gold Rush treasure. Marie-Grace and Wilhelmina have to unravel the clues to find the gold-and...
Rebecca loves everything about summer camp, but making friends turns out to be harder than she expected. What secret is her bunkmate hiding and why? When camp pranks start getting out of hand and a girl goes missing, Rebecca is determined to find out what's really going on at Camp Nokomis. At the end of the story, the Looking Back section provides interesting facts about summer camps in Rebecca's time.