Jack Gantos

Despite the calamitous experiences of Aunt Bernice and her awful dog, Ida learns to love her outrageous relative.

Hoping to beat his cousin Percy in the cat show, Ralph allows Sarah to help him spruce up his image and get in shape.

A little monster, having disobeyed his mother by eating the watermelon intended for the family's dessert, suffers for his greed in a subsequent dream.

Sarah's cat Rotten Ralph tries to help her create a school project based on ancient Egypt, but he is more of a hindrance than a help.

Sarah's high-spirited, poorly behaved cat, Ralph, disrupts her aunt's wedding with his outlandish antics.

"Ralph takes a swing through his family tree to find out why he's so rotten"-- Ralph takes a swing through his family tree to find out why he's so rotten.

Irrepressible Joey must draw upon all of his emotional reserves to face his latest challenge. His good-for-nothing dad shows up, having won the lottery and acquired a new identity. Carter Pigza is now Charles Heinz; he's won back Joey's mother, Fran (renamed Maria); and Joey is expected to forgive him his past sins and reinvent himself as Freddy Heinz. Dad has big plans for the family. He's bought a run-down diner and will use his son to drum up business by standing by the roadside in a bee costume. Mom is on a spending spree and pressures Joey to forgive his father and do as he says. But Joey senses how wrong this is, and his struggle is palpable. By the time he concedes, his father has given up on the diner idea and has spent all of his money on losing lottery tickets. As usual, when the chips are down, Carter takes off, just as Fran is about to have a baby. Gantos tells the tale with unfailing humor, delicious wordplay, and many hilarious scenes, but this is the darkest Joey book to date. Carter's unreliability is a given, but Fran Pigza's willingness to buy into the surreal scene is unsettling and underscores the fact that Joey is really on his own. Nevertheless, readers will cheer as his indomitable spirit prevails; he neither rescinds nor regrets his forgiveness, and he is thrilled to have a baby brother. The appearance of Junior Pigza promises a new purpose in Joey's life, the possibility of a future ally in his crazy world, and, perhaps, adventures to come.

Ralph, a very, very, nasty cat, finally sees the error of his ways--or does he?

Rotten Ralph, the cat, is not at all nice to the Christmas visitor.

Sarah's mischievous cat, Rotten Ralph, is sent to feline finishing school, but Sarah finds she liked him better the way he was.

When Rotten Ralph, the cat, fails to win a spot on a baseball team with his friend Sarah, he becomes the "cat boy" instead, still dreaming of proving himself the superstar he imagines himself to be.

Featuring ten all-new, original stories that run the gamut from fantasy to comics to contemporary adventure to nonfiction, and featuring eleven of the most acclaimed, exciting writers for kids working today, this collection is the perfect book for you, whether you use your powers for good or evil.

A young woman named Ivy, who made a shocking discovery in her small western Pennsylvania town when she was seven years old and learned a surprising secret nine years later, questions whether she has inherited the Rumbaugh curse of having excessive love for one's mother.

In the historic town of Norvelt, Pennsylvania, twelve-year-old Jack Gantos spends the summer of 1962 grounded for various offenses until he is assigned to help an elderly neighbor with a most unusual chore involving the newly dead, molten wax, twisted promises, Girl Scout cookies, underage driving, lessons from history, typewriting, and countless bloody noses.

After moving with his unbearable sister to Miami, Florida, Jack tries to break some of his bad habits but finds himself irresistibly drawn to things disgusting, gross, and weird.

On the surface, the narrative tumbles from one crazed moment to the next as Gantos pieces together the story of his restless final year of high school, his short-lived career as a criminal, and his time in prison. But running, just beneath the action is the story of how Gantos - once he was locked up in a small, yellow-walled cell - moved from wanting to be a writer to writing, and how dedicating himself more fully to the thing he most wanted to do helped him endure and ultimately overcome the worst experience of his life.