Because of Winn-Dixie

Ten-year-old Opal Buloni moves to Naomi, Florida, with her father, a preacher. She is lonely, motherless, and friendless in a new town. When she finds a stray dog at the Winn-Dixie grocery store, she claims him and names him after the store. Winn-Dixie becomes Opal's bridge to a community of lonely people — a librarian who is legally blind, an ex-convict who plays guitar, a woman the neighborhood children believe is a witch, and two girls who become unlikely friends. By the end of the summer, Opal has not gotten her mother back, but she has built a family.

India Opal Buloni — called Opal — has just moved to Naomi, Florida, a small town in the rural South. She is ten years old. Her father, whom she calls 'the preacher,' is the new pastor at the Open Arms Baptist Church of Naomi, a congregation so small it meets in a repurposed convenience store. Opal's...