The Magic Beads

Age range 6 to 9

It's seven-year-old Lillian's first day at a new school, and she's got butterflies in her tummy. When she learns she has to bring something for Show and Tell at the end of the week, her butterflies turn into grasshoppers. Lillian and her mother have just moved away from Lillian's abusive father and into a family shelter, leaving behind all of their possessions. Every day that Lillian anxiously watches her classmates bring toys in to share, the creatures in her stomach change and grown, until finally, she realizes that imagination can make anything magical, even an ordinary string of beads.