When the Dirty Thirties dries up rural America, farmers desert their land and flood to the cities where rooms can be rented, but alleys are free. After July’s daddy closes the door behind him and never looks back, July and her mama are forced to survive in those awful alleys. Then July’s mama dies, and the young girl is tossed into an orphanage. She remembers her mama telling her about a grand-pa and grandma she has never met. Now July is on a train headed for a small town somewhere in Kansas. Will her grandparents take her in as one of their own? And what dangers await her in this strange new place?

ISBN 978-0989066754, Paperback, 130 pages

Mama is gone and ten-year-old July has been sent to live in Plevna with grandparents she has never met. She is the new girl in school, and Priscilla, the classroom “princess.” “God tells us to turn the other cheek,” Gramps says. Then, her new teacher is replaced by an old enemy. July soon finds herself in court when that awful Mrs. Drunyon, “The Dragon,” again insists that July has stolen her wedding ring. Mama had given July this ring before she died. What if the court does not believe her and finds July guilty of theft?

ISBN 978-0997495379, Paperback, 152 pages

Living with her grandparents hasn’t turned out so badly for July, especially since the truth about who owns her mama’s wedding ring is out in the open. But now the worst possible thing has happened, and the news about “The Dragon,” Helen Drunyon’s true identity has shocked everyone in town and left July confused and suspicious. She dreads returning to school and facing Priscilla Overton’s torments. The one bright spot among all these challenges is the box of her father’s boyhood keepsakes she has been given, but it also contains a mystery she has decided she must solve!

ISBN 978-0999115794, Paperback, 184 pages