In contemporary times, a fifteen-year-old creative writing whiz is sent to a gifted creatives summer camp in Massachusetts, where he meets a young male trombonist. As the two become friends and the writer gets to know the trombonist’s family and their troubles, he turns the trombonist and his dying sister into novel characters. Everything changes when the trombonist discovers the writer’s manuscript.

Two men putting on a production for their New York theater company seek out a legendary, elderly actor, but upon finding him, they meet a man as dilapidated as the theater he once worked for.

A four-year-old Southern boy can read novels but has never spoken a word in his life. When he goes to his family's Fourth of July picnic, he must decide whether it is the appropriate moment to speak—or if there ever will be one.

A sixteen-year-old girl spends a summer reading on a swing, dodging the expectations and pressures from her mother, father, and best friend.

A rambunctious teenager with an inquisitive mind causes much grief for all his New England family and neighbors when he visits them in the summer of 1914, on the eve of World War I.

A young boy eagerly waits all year for his mare to birth a colt. The barn hand promises the boy that he will make sure nothing happens to the colt, but keeping his promise comes at a tragic cost.

As he witnesses his neighbor being kidnapped, Kyle must make a choice to either defy his strict, overbearing parents or remain silent.

A creative writing teacher sits through a conference with one his favorite students. He takes us on a journey through the characters in the story, and in his life.

Though most of a prep school's students are away for the long weekend, a few boys stay behind at the dorms and are invited to dinner with a wealthy boy and his stepmother. At the dinner, the stepmother's attitude and appearance are just as alluring as the food, but the wealthy student acts strange and detached the whole evening.

A middle-aged man and his wife struggle to keep up with their teenage daughter who they just adopted six months ago, especially when she takes interest in a boy her age.