An FBI undercover operation gone bad convinces Rae Gabriella to move near her hometown and work as a private investigator with another former agent. But the small town of Justice, Illinois, is not as safe as she thinks. Attractive and stylish young women, just like Rae, are quietly dropping dead in their hotel rooms--with money and valuables still untouched. When the next victim turns up just a few rooms away from Rae's hotel room, the grieving parents...

In 1937, during the Depression, fifteen-year-old Mary Alice, initially apprehensive about leaving Chicago to spend a year with her fearsome, larger-than-life grandmother in rural Illinois, gradually begins to better understand and admire her grandmother's unusual qualities.

Celebrating the final days of summer, thirteen-year-old Douglas Spaulding and his friends declare war on the stuffy older set of their community, an effort for which the boys plot to stop the courthouse building clock as a means of staying young forever.

A boy recounts his annual summer trips to rural Illinois with his sister during the Great Depression to visit their larger-than-life grandmother.

Gives an overview of the state of Illinois, including its history, geography, people, and living conditions.

"Engaging images accompany information about Illinois. The combination of high-interest subject matter and narrative text is intended for students in grades 3 through 8"--

Reluctantly agreeing to help when an old boyfriend asks her to exonerate his mother for the murder of his sister, V. I. Warshawski is forced to confront ugly politics and violent elements in her hometown.