Writer Susan Stoderl
creating stories with soul
Sophia of the Bright Red Sneakers Series
Mission 1: All in a Day's Work
A Middle-Grade Detective Series for Ages 8-12 Years.
Being brilliant eleven-year-olds in a competitive Eighth Grade Honors Class is a minute-by-minute challenge. After a Central Park zookeeper is the victim of a suspicious hit-and-run accident, Super Sleuths Sophia MacGregor and Pedro Gonzalez investigate the zookeeper’s questionable replacement with the help of their telepathic animal friends. When they uncover a plot by Russian poachers to abduct Jack the Polar Bear, instead of battling middle school snobs and bullies, they find themselves targeted by the Russian mob!
Now in eBook, paperback, & audiobook.
Middle-Grade Detective Series
Multicultural Books for Kids
New York City for Kids Book
Middle-Grade School Life
Middle-Grade Amateur Sleuths
Middle-Grade Mystery Series
Magical Realism
Make Your Own Family
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Mission 2: Unexpected Visitors
A Middle-Grade Adventure Mystery Series for Ages 9-13 Years.
Enslaved twins Jeb and Liza, with their father Elijah Kingman, embark on a perilous journey on the Maritime Underground Railroad from Edenton, NC. They navigate the treacherous Great Dismal Swamp, facing snakes, mosquitoes, and relentless slavers. During a massive electrical storm, a rift in time and space transports them to 2022, where they land in the Central Park Zoo, surprising Sophia, Pedro, and their animal friends. The “Twins Forever Free” mission must save them from the Cru Crew’s bullying and threats of exposure when the Crew discover a slave notice with pictures of Jeb and Liza.
Middle-Grade Time Travel
Historical Time Travel Middle Grade
Middle Grade Historical
Books About Fugitive Slaves
Middle-Grade Detective Series
Middle-Grade Amateur Sleuths
Middle-Grade Mystery Series
Magical Realism Middle Grade Novel
Make Your Own Family
Available June 2026
Mission 3: The Wall
A Middle-Grade Adventure Mystery Series for Ages 9-13 Years.
Who would think a dull school walking tour of Lower Manhattan could turn dangerous when Sophia, Pedro, Jeb, and Liza step onto Wall Street?
Their new Economics teacher, the smug yet brilliant Mr. Gum, insists his Johnson Samuel Calder Academy AP Economics class learn the concept of power over money. The atmosphere shifts as the tour guide points to the shrapnel scars still embedded in the wall from the 1920 bombing of 23 Wall Street. The streets tilt as time fractures. Secrets buried deep beneath the stones claw their way to the surface.
Tragedy stacked on tragedy flickers past the Fabulous Four like a runaway sepia film. Jeb and Liza recognize the feeling. They’ve fallen through history before. Something has awakened beneath Wall Street, and it wants to be seen. Ignoring it isn’t an option, and investigating it could be deadly. When history breaks through the present, it demands answers.
Middle-Grade Time Travel
TimeTravel Kids Book
Middle-Grade Historical Fiction
Books About Fugitive Slaves
Middle-Grade Detective Series
New York City for Kids Book
Multicultural Books for Kids
New York City History for Kids
Middle-Grade School Life
Historical Mystery 1920s
Book
in
Progress
Sophia of the Bright Red Sneakers Novelettes
Jefferson Market,
Courthouse and Prison
Blackwell's Prison,
Asylum, and Workhouse
Shirtwaist Factory
Ruins
Sophia Meets Pedro
Prequel to Mission 1: All in A Day's Work
Sophia MacGregor and Pedro Gonzalez share a common goal. Each wants to escape their boring fifth-grade class and find a genuine friend. Taking the middle school placement tests at the James Samuel Calder Academy achieves both goals. After their acceptance into the eighth-grade honors program, memories of fifth-grade fade. Even better, each now has a best friend and partner in crime.
Sophia and Pedro discover their next adventure at a book-and-pizza event at the Jefferson Market Library. The historic Greenwich Village library was once the notorious Jefferson Market Courthouse. The authorities tried the Triangle Shirtwaist strikers in the corrupt Night Court, the same room as the book event. Sophia and Pedro soon uncover the truth. The very reasons the workers went on strike led to the tragic Triangle Shirtwaist Fire, only eleven months after the strike’s end.
Tragedies occur, and justice may sometimes fail, but Sophia and Pedro discover their calling to defend what is right.
Middle-Grade Historical Fiction
Middle-Grade Detective Series
Shirtwaist Factory Fire
Choose Your Own Family
New York City for Kids Book
Multicultural Books for Kids
New York City History for Kids
Middle-Grade School Life
The Secrets of Elspeth MacGregor
A Bonus Novelette About Family Relationships and Being an Orphan for Ages 9-13 Years.
A year after losing her grandmother, Nana, twelve-year-old Sophia still feels lost. Nana never told Sophia much about her family. That changes when she finds an old key among Nana’s things. The key unlocks a hidden chest filled with papers that reveal her family’s past.
Just as Sophia begins to heal, she learns the truth about her parents’ deaths. Henry, a former FBI agent, and his nephew Lionel, a New York City police officer, explain that her parents’ death was not an accident. Her father planned to expose his employer for falsifying drug test results. Before he could, hired thugs forced her parents’ car over a cliff on their way home to San Francisco.
Sophia finds comfort in finding out how much her parents loved her. One day, she hopes to seek justice against those who escaped it.
Magical Realism Middle Grade
Middle Grade Family Dynamics
Middle Grade Loss of Parents
Middle Grade Orphans
Choose Your Own Family
