If Only by Carole Geithner (ages 10 and up)

A stunning debut about one girl’s journey through loss and grief. Corinna’s world is crushed after her mother dies of cancer. How does she get through the funeral, trays of ziti, a father who can’t communicate, the first day of school, Mother’s Day, people who don’t know what to say, and the entire eighth-grade year? The emotional power of If Only is informed by Carole’s more than twenty years of experience as a clinical social worker, working with scores of children who have had a parent die, as well as adults whose childhoods were shaped by parent loss.