London: Dolphin Paperback (Orion), (1996.). SIGNED - Newbery Honor-award winning book for older children and young adults. SIGNED on the title page. A marvelous book for all ages, the story of a young girl, eleven-year-old Nhamo who flees from her village and family when she is told she must marry a cruel older man with three wives. The two-day trip becomes nearly a year long struggle for survival, as she learns to escape drowning, starvation, the dangers of the forest and crocodile infested waters, and learns to cope with her aloneness, in part by coming close to the world of African spirits and the soft voice of her dead mother. National Book Award Finalist and 1997 Newbery Honor Book. Includes a glossary, a brief history of Zimbabwe and Mozambique (where the author lived for many years), and an explanation of the belief system of the Shona. 287 pp. ISBN: 185881622X.

New York: Orchard Books - Scholastic, (2003.) dj. SIGNED hardcover - Newbery Honor-award winning book for older children and young adults. SIGNED on the title page. A marvelous book for all ages, the story of a young girl, eleven-year-old Nhamo who flees from her village and family when she is told she must marry a cruel older man with three wives. The two-day trip becomes nearly a year long struggle for survival, as she learns to escape drowning, starvation, the dangers of the forest and crocodile infested waters, and learns to cope with her aloneness, in part by coming close to the world of African spirits and the soft voice of her dead mother. National Book Award Finalist and 1997 Newbery Honor Book. Includes a glossary, a brief history of Zimbabwe and Mozambique (where the author lived for many years), and an explanation of the belief system of the Shona. This edition includes a new preface by Farmer. Map. 309 pp. Cover art by Bryan Collier. ISBN: 0-439-471443.

New York: Atheneum, 2002. dj. SIGNED hardcover first edition - This young adult novel, set in the not very distant future, was the unprecedented winner of 3 major awards: the 2002 National Book Award for Young People's Literature, the 2003 Newbery Honor Award and the 2003 Prinz Honor Award. This is the story of Matt, a young boy who is the clone of El Patron, the 140 year old drug lord of a new empire carved out between the border of Mexico and called Opium. Dust jacket praise from Ursula K. Le Guin who said ' It is a pleasure to read science fiction that's full of warm, strong characters - people who are really fond of one another, children who are ignorant and vulnerable, powerful evildoers whom one can pity...' SIGNED on the title page. 380 pp. ISBN: 0-689-852223.

New York: The Viking Press, (1940) dj. Hardcover first edition - Uncommon first edition of this classic of children's literature, set among migrant workers in California's Central Valley during the Depression. A Newbery Honor book and on Horn Book's best books of the year list. Written by a librarian who worked with migrant children in Fresno, this book was one of the first "realistic" books for children - Howard Pease in his essay "Without Evasion" praised Gates as a rare exception among children's writers: "Only at infrequent intervals do you find a story intimately related to this modern world, a story that takes up a modern problem and thinks it through without evasion. Of our thousands of books, I can find scarcely half a dozen that merit places on this almost vacant shelf in our libraries; and of our hundreds of authors, I can name only three who are doing anything to fill this void in children's reading. These three authors - may someone present each of them with a laurel wreath - are Doris Gates, John R. Tunis, and Florence Crannell Means." But in addition to its realism, this is also a tribute to the power of imagination as 10 year old Jenny sees the blue willow plate as a symbol of the home she desires so strongly. Illustrated with soft black and white drawings by Paul Lantz. 171 pp.