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2011 Mark Twain Award Nominees

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“Look,” Dad says, “We’re glad that you’re OK and that the two of you have obviously made up. It was Kylie who suggested we check the gift pile, and sure enough, we found the empty box of cards. We figured sooner or later you’d wind up here. I just never would have expected this from you, Amanda.” He turns to Leo. “From either of you.”

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11 Birthdays

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Taft clambered across the slanted roof to the gargoyle that stood twisted open, the door behind it a dark

rectangle in the morning light. He plunged down the gloomy stairs and was lost to view.

Christina followed more carefully, annoyed that he had forgotten to duck as he crossed the rooftop. What if

someone on the ground had been looking up? He could have ruined everything.

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Secret of Zoom

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When they were a few minutes down the path, Jessica took a deep breath and turned to Marybeth. “Marybeth, I owe

you a really big apology. I've been an idiot the last few days and I haven't paid much attention to you because I was

trying to be friends with Ariel. I'm really sorry. Marybeth shrugged. “That's okay,” she said. “At first I wanted to be friends with her, too, but now I'm glad she

didn't like me.”

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Storm Chaser

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The ambulance guys put my brother on a backboard and lifted him onto a rolling stretcher. While both teams stood by with their helmets in hand, Chris was wheeled into the ambulance as my mother climbed in alongside him. Everything

was so quiet that, even from where I stood, I could hear Dad say to Mom, “I'll meet you at the

hospital.”

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• Captain Nobody

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The clouds are clearing, revealing a stunning blue sky. The guys on the roof drop what they're doing and reel back in astonishment. Up and

down the street, people leave their houses and offices to look up in wonder.

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Mudville

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Winston nodded, not daring to let his smile falter. This was exactly what he'd been afraid of. Mr. Garvey

was nobody's favorite teacher. The students in his advanced math class dreaded being called upon—if they got an answer wrong, Mr. garvey was more than happy to make fun of them in fromt of the whold class. It was

even rumored that Mr. Garvey once made his entire Mathletes team cry after they had lost a crucial match.

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Potato Chip Puzzles

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The day the “For Sale” sign first went up, his parents had told him there was nothing for him to worry about. They were always

telling him there was nothing to worry about, that they wouldn't be leaving Valley, that he wasn't going to have to change schools, that Valley was too small for him to have to worry about being far from Abby or any of his other friends. They were just looking for a smaller house, one that fit what his mom liked to call their “new

circumstances.”

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Million Dollar Throw

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Mom and Dad walk up with long French bread in a paper bag and a bakery box tied with blue ribbon. “There you are, Mom. Are we all set now?” she asks Nonna.“She got lost, Mom” I try to tell her about Hassan and the delivery truck, but she just puts her hand on Nonna's shoulder. Dad takes the eggplant from her and holds her elbow when we step up on the curb.“It is awfully busy here today.” Mom pats Nonna's shoulder again. “It's tough to find anyone in this crowd.”

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The Brilliant Fall of Gianna Z

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It’d been a good three days: Crackers and cheese for breakfast, TV; crackers and cheese for lunch, TV; crackers

and cheese for dinner, TV; bed. Nothing to think about but TV and cheese. A perfect world.

Then I ran out of cheese.There wasn’t anything left in the freezer. The veggie

drawer in the fridge had drippy brown lettace and stinky carrots. A container of milk sat on the shelf. I opened it. It smelled awful, too, so I put the cap back on and shoved it

to the back of the fridge.

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Love, Aubrey

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How could this be happening the day after Catherine’s mom had her operation? What were the chances that these two girls, the only ones in the exchange program—the first Thunder Creek had ever had—would have something bad happen to their families almost on the same day? Trouble wasn’t supposed to come in fours, with the fourth being worst of all! It didn’t make sense, it wasn’t fair, it wasn’t even likely, and yet—it was real.

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Faith, Hope, and Ivy June

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“As soon as I read 'Lilacs in Summer,' I knew you hadn't written it,” I told her. “I'd seen it before. I wasn't sure where I'd read it, but I knew you weren't the author. I didn't want to use the computer here because I didn't know how long it would take me to find the poem and I didn't want to be interrupted, so I went to the library. I Googled the title and it popped up instantly.”

Her hands were shaking so much, the paper rattled. She laid it on the bed.

“Are you going to show this to my parents?” she asked.

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Runaway Twin

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It's me Grandma comes to first. I slide down from the saddle and Grandma is right there, hugging me tight and saying “Thank God” over and over again, and I say, “I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Grandma. I just . . . and then he . . . and I didn't know what to do.”

“Don't be sorry,” she says, stroking the ashes out of my hair. “He wasn't alone; I didn't want him to be alone. And you're here. You're alive.”

And she pulls back enough to look me in the face. “What would I tell your dad if I lost you?”

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Heart of a Shepherd

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After a while Jessica sniffed and stared at the ruins of the burning barn with its lost supply of winter feed. Her eyes traveled to the still form of Duncan's horse. Their mother said that things always looked better by daylight. But this time it wouldn't matter how brightly the sun shone tomorrow. This disaster wouldn't ever look any better.

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Storm Chaser

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They filed through the lobby and back toward the conference room. The teams had blown out of there hours earlier like a stampede of bulls, but on the return trhip, they were a much more subdued group—exhausted, muscles sore from all the walking and running, voices hoarse from yelling. It had been a great day, and even when you figured in the cheater and his own single-minded math teacher, Winston had to admit he'd had a fun time. Thank goodness his friends had been here.

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Potato Chip Puzzles

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Lenny's eyes were wide and staring, and his lips were purple. “Why did they do this? I'm respected! I'm loved! Everybody thinks I'm wonderful!”

Danny shook his head. “We don't even like you Lenny.” He paused, looking troubled. “And you said we were garbage.”

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Secret of Zoom

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“Close your eyes,” he says. I do. My heart beats like it's going to thump right out of my chest and keep thumping across my desk. And it thumps even faster when I remember that this is exactly how kisses always start in movies, with the whole closed eyes thing. Is he going to kiss me? I;m not ready for this. I wish I'd put on some Chapstick. I'm thinking about opening my eyes for a peek, when he drops my hand, and I hear him rummaging through his bag again.

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The Brilliant Fall of Gianna Z

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“They played that song in Baltimore when Carey Nye came out to pitch. It was his theme song,

you, like Mariano Rivera has with that song about the Sandman. All then pitchers have theme

songs now.”

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Mudville

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When I finally opened my eyes, the morning sun was streaming in. I looked down the length of the bed, past the enormous white mound of my foot's plaster cast, and was amazed to see my own desk and my own closet.

“Welcome home,” came JJ's voice from my bedside. “Sleep enough?”

I turned to find her and Cecil munching on a couple of waffles and shuffling through stacks of newspapers.

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Captain Nobody

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“Look, Brenda, if that's your name. If you are going to trust me with Snickers, who loves you and who is your loyal companion, then you should be able to trust me enough to tell me the truth.”

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Runaway Twin

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“You don't have to be brave,” he says, real quiet. “Neither of us does. A man's life is not so much about courage. You just have to keep going. You have to do what you've promised, brave or not.”

“But I don't want you to go, Dad,” I whisper, and then I hug him as hard as I can and say it over and over: “Don't go, Dad. Don't. Don't go.”

And dad hugs me, and he says nothing, but I can feel him cry.

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Heart of a Shepherd

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“You're sure about this,” his mom said.“Mom,” he said. “I have to do something. It's like a

game I can't sit out. Her dad losing his job and the insurance just clinched it. They're barely going to be able to send Abby to Perkins. And besides, we're going to be fine now. I mean money-wise. Aren't we?”

She was smiling again. “We're going to be fine. How could we not be.”

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Million Dollar Throw

Name This NovelThere we all were, frozen in that one moment, so happy. I had

thought we were gone forever, but it wasn’t true. My family would never come back to me, but I did have little things, little reminders. This picture. And Mom still there, and getting better. And memories.

Holding the picture in front of me I closed my eyes. I cvould still see it. I could feel the memories right there, close, but they weren’t drawing me inside like they sometimes did. I thought about Mom and whether I should go to her, and about Dad and Savannah, and then I chose the memory I wanted, and waited for it to fill me.

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Love, Aubrey

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Leo jumps up again. “Hostile? Hostile? We've been trapped in the same day over and over again, because of YOU, and you don't expect us to be hostile?”

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11 Birthdays

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“That’s another thing—no phone. Deep in the hollows, whenever the people in one house want to talk to the other, somebody has to be the messenger. They pray before meals like we do. The grandfather, Papaw, folds his hands in front of him and bosw his head. He praued for the Lord to bless me, their guest, and I think that’s about the most welcome I ever felt anywhere.”

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Faith, Hope, and Ivy June