The Plum Tree War

At the end of the summer, nine-year-old Robert Ott's life is chugging along very smoothly. How quickly life can change!

"Remember me?" the girl said, puffing away her bearlike dog. "I'm Harriet. Most of my friends call me Harri. Do you like to be called Robbie or Bobby?"

Just as he is particular about his room, his desk at school, and his cherished backyard plum tree, Robert Ott is particular about his name. It is clear only minutes into his cousin's yearlong visit that she's out to take over everything.

No turf is sacred. Harri makes herself at home in the Ott household and then in Robert's fourth-grade classroom. But when she moves in on his beloved plum tree, Robert declares war!

The Plum Tree War is one of Bonnie Pryor's funniest, most perceptive novels, in which two quarrelsome fourth-grade cousins discover how much they really have in common.