Kerry Madden Lunsford: 5 books

Read Kerry Madden's posts on the Penguin Blog. Nelle Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird was published in 1960 and became an instant bestseller. Two years later it was an Academy Award– winning film. Today, it remains standard—and beloved—reading in English classes. But Lee never wanted...

Livy Two is happy that Daddy is finally out of his coma, but the befuddled man who comes home is not the daddy the Weems family once knew. He forgets their names, he wanders off—he won’t even touch his beloved banjo. Set in Appalachia in 1963, this heartwarming, and heart-wrenching, follow-up...

Livy Two has always dreamed of becoming a singer, and her decision to run off to Nashville?s Music Row is made with confidence?she figures the money she?ll bring home will buy the family?s house as well as forgiveness for running away. The Nashville adventure is a disaster, though; even her cherished...

An empowering picture book set in the 1940s about a determined five-year-old girl who embarks on a journey to deliver milk to her neighbors in the holler. Every morning, Ernestine shouts out her window to the Great Smoky Mountains, "I'm five years old and a big girl!" When Mama asks Ernestine--who...

Offsides is both the poignant story of one girl’s coming of age and a delightfully surprising look at American life in the 1970s. Liz Donegal’s world is always on the brink of change. Her dad, an assistant football coach, uproots his family from one place to the next with the changing of the football...