An adventurous young girl uses her imagination to escape her reality, but it is spinning out of reach.

Ramona Quimby, is a grade-school student with a big imagination. So big, in fact, that she often clashes with her no-nonsense teacher Mrs. Meacham. When Ramona's upbeat dad Robert loses his job, the family--including her teenage sister Beezus, and their practical-minded mother--must make major adjustments, like Dad learning how to run the house. Ramona dreams up various plans to make money so that she can save their house, but because everybody in the family seems too preoccupied to help her with her own worries, she turns to the one person who always has time for her: Aunt Bea. But even Aunt Bea is distracted these days because of her ex-boyfriend, the Quimbys' next-door neighbor Hobart.—Lesley M. Sweeting