While on a camping trip, Detective Peter Decker and his two young charges come across the charred remains of two teenage girls. Embroiled in a disturbing case, Decker's only unifying thread in a network of violence and corruption is the deaths of the two apparently very different young girls.

"Swinging London, Summer 1967. Sixteen-year-old Estella, gifted with talent, ingenuity, and ambition, dreams of becoming a renowned fashion designer. But life seems intent on making sure her dreams never come true. Having arrived in London as a young girl, Estella now runs wild through the city streets with Jasper and Horace, amateur thieves who double as Estella's makeshift family and partners-in-(petty)-crime. How can Estella dedicate herself to...

"I ain't knocked round the city streets all my life for nothin'," proclaims Ragged Dick, the fast-talking boy hero of Horatio Alger's classic rags-to-riches tale. Dick is a plucky street boy who smokes, gambles, and speaks ungrammatically--but he is also honest and hardworking, striving not for wealth and status, but for a steady job, a decent place to sleep, and respectability. A quintessential boy's novel of adventure, romance, and coming of age,...

In the highlands of North Vietnam lies the remote town of Sapa, home to a mosaic of colorful hill tribes. Sapa opened to tourism in the late 1990s and now roughly 200 hill tribe girls aged 7 18 years live independently on the streets of Sapa to sell embroidery. A few years ago Australian film maker Shalom Almond visited Sapa as a tourist and became friends with four Hmong girls. The girls are savvy, street smart and dream of life beyond selling souvenirs....

The memoir of a twelve-year-old boy who grew up in North Korea looks at how he was forced to live on the streets, fend for himself, and live with a gang after his parents disappeared.

"Cal Claxton is determined to reinvent himself as a small town lawyer in the aftermath of his wife's suicide. Once a hardcharging L.A. prosecutor, he now lives in an old farmhouse overlooking the Oregon wine country. When a scruffy, tattooed kid shows up asking for help in solving his mother's cold case murder, Cal wants to say no. But the kid, who calls himself Picasso, has ridden a bike from Portland, and something about his determination touches...

Brought to Moscow in 1990s Russia by his mother's abusive boyfriend, five-year-old Mishka is forced by a gang of homeless children to lie and steal until he finds comfort and love with a pack of dogs. Includes historical note.

"Twelve-year-old street orphan Helene survives by living as a boy and selling copies of the country's most popular newspaper, Le Soir, now turned into Nazi propaganda. Helene's world changes when she befriends a rogue journalist, Marc Aubrion, who draws her into a secret network that publishes dissident underground newspapers. The Nazis track down Aubrion's team and give them an impossible choice: turn the resistance newspapers into a Nazi propaganda...

Razorhurst, 1932. The fragile peace between two competing mob bosses -- Gloriana Nelson and Mr Davidson -- is crumbling. Loyalties are shifting. Betrayals threaten. Kelpie knows the dangers of the Sydney streets. Ghosts have kept her alive, steering her to food and safety, but they are also her torment. Dymphna is Gloriana Nelson's 'best girl, ' experienced in surviving the criminal world, but she doesn't know what this day has in store for her. When...

In order to earn enough money to buy her own passage out of the Afghan refugee camp where she lives, Shauzia dresses like a boy. However, she is forced into panhandling and ends up in jail, gaining hope only when a well-meaning American family rescues her.