In the diary account of her journey from Ireland in 1847 and of her work in a mill in Lowell, Massachusetts, fourteen-year-old Mary reveals a great longing for her family.

On his way from Ireland to America to escape the potato famine, young Fergus carves a shillelagh from his favorite blackthorn tree, and each St. Patrick's Day for generations, his story is retold by one of his descendants.

Finley, an unnaturally quiet boy who is the only white player on his high school's varsity basketball team, lives in a dismal Pennsylvania town that is ruled by the Irish mob, and when his coach asks him to mentor a troubled African American student who has transferred there from an elite private school in California, he finds that they have a lot in common in spite of their apparent differences.

In 1863, twelve-year-old Danny and his older sister Kathleen arrive in New York City to start a new life, but they soon find themselves navigating through the same prejudices and struggles they experienced in Ireland.

Finn Reardon, a thirteen-year-old Irish-American newspaper carrier who hopes to be a journalist someday, keeps a journal of his experiences living in New York City in 1899. Includes historical notes.

In 1864, fifth-grader Charlotte befriends an Irish-American girl at school and tries to understand the prejudices between the Irish and the Yankees in her town of Westfield, Massachusetts. Based on historical events.