In 1870, Reconstruction brings big changes to the Louisiana sugar plantation where spunky ten-year-old Sugar has always lived, including her friendship with Billy, the son of her former master, and the arrival of workmen from China.

In 1860 Louisiana, eighty-year-old Madame Sylvie decides to sit for a portrait, as horrific stories that span generations from the big house and the fields are revealed. 1860, Louisiana. After serving as mistress of Le Petit Cottage for more than six decades, Madame Sylvie Guilbert has decided, in spite of her family's indifference, to sit for a portrait. It will be a testament to all the hardships she overcame, the glory her life ought to have been....

Twelve-year-old Kingston James is sure his brother Khalid has turned into a dragonfly. When Khalid unexpectedly passed away, he shed what was his first skin for another to live down by the bayou in their small Louisiana town. Khalid still visits in dreams, and King must keep these secrets to himself as he watches grief transform his family. It would be easier if King could talk with his best friend, Sandy Sanders. But just days before he died,...

When eleven-year-old Georgie and her sister Peaches relocate to Bogalusa, Louisiana, with their mother to help their Great Aunt Vie, Georgie becomes involved in the search for the truth about her new friend Markie's mother.

Eleven-year-old tomboy Livie is sure that she is responsible for the accident that has put her mother into a coma, so, trying to make amends, she travels through the Louisiana swamps to get a spell that will make her mother well again.

Fourteen-year-old Calogero Scalise and his Sicilian uncles and cousin live in small-town Louisiana in 1898, when Jim Crow laws rule and anti-immigration sentiment is strong, so despite his attempts to be polite and to follow American customs, disaster dogs his family at every turn.

Bowser is a mutt, just adopted by eleven-year-old Birdie Gaux and her grandmother, but when they all get home to Grammy's bait and tackle shop in the bayou they discover that their prize stuffed marlin has been stolen--so Bowser decides to investigate, and things quickly become complicated and dangerous.

Tara Doucet is grieving for her grandmother, and her family is falling apart around her, but it seems like her grandmother has preplanned an elaborate itinerary for her to follow which will lead her and her sister Riley from Louisiana to a South Pacific island and into danger--and everywhere she turns butterflies follow.

A year after her mother has deserted the family, eleven-year-old Shelby goes to stay with her, deep in the Louisiana bayou, where they both confront old hurts and regrets.

A teenaged girl and her boyfriend must find her older brother after he wanders into their town's swamp and a mysterious girl appears in his place.