Golden Sowers

Nebraska Golden Sower Award

2008-2009 Intermediate Nominees 
 
Armstrong, Alan W.  WHITTINGTON.  
Whittington, a feline descendant of Dick Whittington’s famous cat of English folklore,
appears at a run-down barnyard plagued by rats and restores harmony while telling his ancestor’s
story.
 
Auch, Mary Jane.  WING NUT.    
When twelve-year-old Grady and his mother relocate yet again, they find work taking
care of an elderly man, who teaches Grady about cars, birds, and what it means to have a home.
 
Clements, Andrew.  ROOM ONE: A MYSTERY OR TWO.  
Ted Hammond, the only sixth grader in his small Nebraska town’s one-room
schoolhouse, searches for clues to the disappearance of a homeless family.
 
Gutman, Dan.  SATCH AND ME.  
With his ability to travel through time using vintage baseball cards, Joe takes Flip with
him to find out whether Satchel Paige really was the fastest pitcher ever.
 
 
Hart, Alison.  ANNA’S BLIZZARD.  
Having never excelled at schoolwork, twelve-year-old Anna discovers that she may know a few things about survival when the 1888 Children’s Blizzard traps her and her classmates in their Nebraska schoolhouse.
 
Hicks, Betty.  OUT OF ORDER.  
Four youngsters, ages nine to fifteen, narrate one side of the story of their newly blended family’s adjustment, interwoven with grief and loss.
 
Lord, Cynthia.  RULES.  
Frustrated at life with an autistic brother, twelve-year-old Catherine longs for a normal
existence but her world is further complicated by a friendship with a young paraplegic.
 
Lowry, Lois.  GOSSAMER.  
While learning to bestow dreams, a young dream giver tries to save an eight-year-old boy from the effects of both his abusive past and the nightmares inflicted on him by the frightening Sinisteeds.
 
Whelan, Gloria.  LISTENING FOR LIONS.  
Left an orphan after the influenza epidemic in British East Africa in 1919, thirteen-year-
old Rachel is tricked into assuming a deceased neighbor’s identity to travel to England, where her only dream is to return to Africa and rebuild her parents’ mission hospital.
 
Wiles, Deborah.  EACH LITTLE BIRD THAT SINGS.  
Comfort Snowberger is well acquainted with death since her family runs the funeral
parlor in their small southern town, but even so the ten-year-old is unprepared for the series of heart-wrenching events that begins on the first day of Easter vacation with the sudden death of her beloved great-uncle Edisto.


Nebraska Golden Sower Award
2008-2009 Young Adult Nominees 

Broach, Elise.  SHAKESPEARE’S SECRET.
Named after a character in a Shakespeare play, misfit sixth-grader Hero becomes
interested in exploring this unusual connection because of a valuable diamond supposedly hidden in her new house, an intriguing neighbor, and the unexpected attention of the most popular boy in school.
 
Carey, Janet Lee.  DRAGON’S KEEP.
In 1145 A.D., as foretold by Merlin, fourteen-year-old Rosalind, who will be the twenty-
first Pendragon Queen of Wilde Island, has much to accomplish to fulfill her destiny, while hiding from her people the dragon’s claw she was born with that reflects only one of her mother’s dark secrets.
 
Cooney, Caroline B.  A FRIEND AT MIDNIGHT.
After rescuing her younger brother abandoned at a busy airport by their divorced father,
fifteen-year-old Lily finds her faith in God sorely tested as she struggles to rescue herself from the bitterness and anger she feels.
 
Gray, Dianne E.  TOMORROW, THE RIVER.
In 1896, fourteen-year-old Megan joins her sister and family on their steamboat for the
summer riding up the Mississippi River towards St. Paul, Minnesota, and through all of their adventures, Megan realizes what is her “true calling.”

Hobbs, Will.  CROSSING THE WIRE.  
Fifteen-year-old Victor Flores journeys north in a desperate attempt to cross the Arizona
border and find work in the United States to support his family in central Mexico.
 
Lupica, Mike.  HEAT.
Pitching prodigy Michael Arroyo is on the run from social services after being banned
from playing Little League baseball because rival coaches doubt he is only twelve years old and he has no parents to offer them proof.