Writing in the notebook which her teacher gave her, thirteen-year-old Celiane describes life with her mother and brother in Haiti as well as her experiences in Brooklyn after the family finally immigrates there to be reunited with her father.

After moving from her home in Haiti to her uncle's home in Brooklyn, ten-year-old Gabrielle, feeling bullied and out of place, makes a misguided deal with a witch.

In 1984 in the barrios of Newark, Beatriz Mendez is looking forward to dancing at her fifteenth birthday, because dancing is her true passion in life, but when her brother Juni, gang-leader of the Puerto Rican gang the Diablos, is killed by the rival Haitian Macoute gang she finds herself thrust into the role of gang-leader and drug dealer--until she meets Nassar, a dorky Haitian boy who shares and reignites her passion for dancing.

When she and her family find a cat and, after no luck finding its owner, decide to keep her, Haitian American kindergartener Liline must come up with the perfect name.

After her stepfather is arrested for child abuse, thirteen-year-old Karina's home life improves but while the severity of her older sister's injuries and the urging of her younger sister, their uncle, and a friend tempt her to testify against him, her mother and other well-meaning adults pursuade her to claim responsibility.