"Out of the Dust" by Karen Hesse

Out of the Dust takes place in Oklahoma during the dust bowl of 1934-1935. Billie Joe a long-legged redheaded girl always dreamed of seeking her fortune playing fierce piano where grass grew leaving the stirring dust behind. Billie Joe turns fifteen during the story she finds herself motherless after her father Bayard leaves a pail of kerosene on the stove, it catches fire, Billie throws it out the door catching her pregnant mother on fire and badly burning her hands. She is filled with guilt and blame but it truly was an accident later on her mother died giving birth to her stillborn son Franklin. When the two were buried, it was turning point for Billie Joe and her father. …