Rodzina
by Karen Cushman

The hero of this lively children's historical fiction novel is a mean 12 year old orphan who is desperate for a home. Set in 1881 on the train going west from Chicago to California, this story of the wild, lonely orphans is like something out of Dickens, especially when they remember their desperate lives in the city they left behind.

Rodzina's first-person account of the uproar on the journey makes the dramatic history immediate. "A natural for American history classes." (Booklist)