Home, Sweet, Home.

By Madison J. Ganzer

Home, Sweet, Home. follows the adventures of Emma Williams, Vanessa Williams, and Shaylee Williams as they go from Sacramento on a boxcar, Paris on a plane, and Hollywood on a private jet. Emma and Vanessa just want to find their mom again as their foster parent treats them badly morning and night even as their real parent is ready to have them back. Shaylee, their mom, is an actor making it big in Hollywood. She wants, with all her heart, to find the kids she lost so long ago. Will they find each other? Or will their family go up in flames? Read Home, Sweet, Home. to find out.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Nov 21, 2016
• ISBN: 9781524558253

Madison J. Ganzer

Madison J. Ganzer was born and raised in Grand Junction, Colorado. She has one younger sister, Sadie, and a white Labrador retriever named Max. She likes to do aerobic silks and craft with her friend Honor. Currently she has only one book published, but she plans on writing a trilogy called The Other Half of Me, which follows a biologist and his daughter on a ship, studying marine life. As of this writing, Madison is in seventh grade and is twelve years old. She got the idea of Home Sweet Home in fourth grade for a writing assignment. What was once a two-paged assignment became a published book. Madison looks forward to writing more books in the near future.

Book preview

PROLOGUE

I NEVER WANTED TO run away, but I was forced to do it. Being a foster kid wasn’t easy, especially when my real mom was cities away fro m me.

My foster mother was never nice to any of us—there were ten kids living in the same foster home. She was always drunk and away from the house, which really sucked because when she got home… It was just too ugly to talk about it. I think she probably just wanted us for the money she got from the state for keeping us.

When I heard my real mom was getting her act together, I wondered why I was still here.

I pulled my ratty sheets up to my chest. Right there, right then, I decided I was going home.

This is how it all started . . .

Emmy! You have to wake up! my sister Vanessa shouted from the bottom bunk of the shabby bunk bed.

Huh? Why? I answered, clambering down from the top bunk.

School—that’s why! she replied, still shouting.

Oh, I said. I was dumbfounded that my six-year-old sister remembered that I had forgotten to set the alarm.

I threw some clothes on, and grabbed a cereal bar and my duffel bag. Then rushed down the California streets toward school.

CHAPTER 1

Emma

A T SCHOOL, EVERYTHING was the same as it had always been. Math, blah, blah, blah. English Language Arts, blah, blah, blah.

As my teacher, Ms. Malcolm, blathered on, I carried out my plan on paper.

Ms. Malcolm, may I please use the restroom? I asked, hand raised.

She nodded and waved her pointer to excuse me.

I secretly grabbed the duffel bag I had brought to school and headed to my destination: Hollywood.

I kicked out the window of the restroom and leaped out. The glass cut my ankle pretty badly. It felt broken. But I knew Mistress K., my foster mother, wouldn’t pay the hospital bill if her life depended on it.

After grabbing my suitcase from behind the building, instead of turning left at Seventh Street, which was my usual route, I made a right turn on Fifth Street and headed downtown. California was pretty easy to navigate, but that didn’t mean it was small. I had only gotten to the border of Sacramento when the sky started making its way to pitch-blackness.

I sat down on the side of the road to eat one of the extra cereal