Popcorn Days and Buttermilk Nights

"Paulsen (a Newbery Honor author) adds another affecting and realistic title to his pantheon of stories about outsiders learning how to become more positive forces in the world."--SLJ

From the city Carley learned rage—can the country bring him peace?

Carley would rather be anywhere but here: a town deep in Minnesota’s farm country, with nothing plentiful except poverty. Still, staying with his uncle David and his family is better than reform school—which was where Carley was heading. Something was eating away at him, making him do crazy, violent things. No one could understand why—least of all Carley himself. But then David takes Carley to his blacksmith forge. And under the grim nights and days of the Minnesota fall, under the glow of hot steel, and the most exhausting work he has ever known, Carley begins to see a way to shape his life.

“A beautiful written message of hope.”—International Checkpoint "Paulsen adds another affecting and realistic title to his pantheon of stories about outsiders learning how to become more positive forces in the world . . . it belongs in every historical fiction collection."--School Library Journal

"A disturbed 14-year-old gains new perspectives while staying with his uncle in a Minnesota farm community in the 1940s, in this novel by the Newbery Honor author."--Publishers WeeklyGary Paulsen is one of the most honored writers of contemporary literature for young readers. He has written more than one hundred book for adults and young readers, and is the author of three Newberry Honor titles: Dogsong, Hatchet, and The Winter Room. He divides his time among Alaska, New Mexico, Minnesota, and the Pacific.