MORROW HOUSE
READING LIST
Note: Book descriptions are from Follett Library
Resources: "Titlewave" http://www.titlewave.com
Mrs. Schuster's Reading Journal
| Nonfiction | |||
| Classics | Fantasy | Mystery & Detective Stories | |
| Newbery Award Winners | |||
| Science Fiction | Sports | Survival Fiction | |
| Westward Expansion | |||
| Web Sites for Children's Literature | |||
FRIDELL, RON
Decoding Life: Unraveling the Mysteries of the Genome
Looks at advances that have been made in decoding and understanding the human genome, discusses ways in which scientists hope to use that information to cure and prevent disease, explores some of the moral and ethical issues involved in genetic manipulation, and examines the application of such techniques to plants and animals.
GOODALL, JANE
The Chimpanzees I Love: Saving Their World and Ours
Dr. Jane Goodall provides an account of her life studying
chimpanzees at the Gombe National Park in Tanzania, and shares what she has
learned from her observations. Includes photographs and discussion of ways to
protect the chimpanzees and their habitats. http://www.janegoodall.org/
FLEISCHMAN, SID
Escape: The Story of the Great Houdini
A biography of the magician, ghost chaser, aviator, and king of escape artists whose amazing feats are remembered long after his death in 1926.
HAWKING, STEPHEN
A Brief History of Time
Provides an introduction to today's scientific ideas about the cosmos and reviews past theories. Also covers black holes, quarks, antimatter, and other mysteries of physics.
JENNINGS, PETER (adapted by Jennifer
Armstrong)
The Century for Young People
Contains eyewitness accounts of historical events that took place throughout the twentieth century, including the Wright brothers first flight, the first radio broadcast, the landing on Normandy beach, watching the Challenger shuttle explode, and other major events.
LEKUTON,
JOSEPH
Facing the Lion: Growing up Maasai on the African Savanna
A warrior in two worlds. A member of the Masai people describes his life as he grew up in a northern Kenya village, traveled to America to attend college, and became an elementary school teacher in Virginia.
(Grades 7 up)
LEWIS, MICHAEL
The Blind Side: Evolution of a Game
(Football) Details the life of University of Mississippi football player Michael Oher, who was raised by a crack addicted mother and adopted at the age of sixteen by a wealthy family, and explores the rising importance and salary of the offensive left tackle in the game of football.
(Grades 7 up)
LEVINE, KAREN
Hana's Suitcase
A biography of a Czech girl who died in the Holocaust, told in alternating chapters with an account of how the curator of a Japanese Holocaust center learned about her life after Hana's suitcase was sent to her.
HOOSE, PHILLIP
The Race to Save the Lord God Bird
Tells the story of the ivory-billed woodpecker's extinction in the United States, describing the encounters between this species and humans, and discussing what these encounters have taught us about preserving endangered creatures. http://www.philliphoose.com/
OPDYKE, IRENE GUT with Jennifer Armstrong
In My Hands: Memories of a Holocaust Rescuer
Recounts the experiences of the author who, as a young Polish girl, hid and saved Jews during the Holocaust.
(Grades 7-8)
SCHULMAN, MARK
Attack of the Killer Video Book: Tips and Tricks for Young Directors
Offers students advice and tips for shooting videos, with information on every aspect of video production, including scriptwriting, camera work, special effects, editing, and more.
BRADBURY,
RAY
Farenheit 451
After learning that books are a vital part of a culture he never knew, a book-burning official in a future fascist state clandestinely pursues reading until he is betrayed. Includes a 2003 introduction by the author.
BRONTE,
CHARLOTTE
Jane Eyre
In early nineteenth-century England, an orphaned young woman accepts employment as a governess and soon finds herself in love with her employer who has a terrible secret.
CORMIER,
ROBERT
The Chocolate War
A high school freshman discovers the devastating consequences of refusing to join in the school's annual fund raising drive and arousing the wrath of the school bullies.
CRANE, STEPHEN
The Red Badge of Courage
Story of a young Union soldier under fire for the first time during the Civil War.
GOLDING, WILLIAM
Lord of the Flies
After a plane crash strands them on a tropical island while the rest of the world is ravaged by war, a group of British schoolboys attempts to form a civilized society but descends into brutal anarchy.
(Grades 7-8)
HENRY, MARGUERITE
King of the Wind
1949 Newbery Medal for Children's Literature. Traces the abuses and triumphs of the Arabian stallion who became a founding sire of the Thoroughbred breed, and of the mute Arabian boy who tended him as long as he lived.
HINTON, S.E.
The Outsiders
Rivalry between rich and poor gangs in 1960s Oklahoma leads to the deaths of three teenagers and intense soul-searching for one of the youths involved, a sensitive fourteen-year-old writer named
Ponyboy. (Grades 7-8)
JUSTER, NORTON
The Phantom Tollbooth
Milo travels through a magical tollbooth and begins a journey to the Kingdom of Wisdom, where he and a "watch" dog named Tock try to end the feud between numbers and words.
LEE, HARPER
To Kill a Mockingbird
Scout Finch, the young daughter of a local attorney in the Deep South during the 1930s, tells of her father's defense of an African-American man charged with the rape of a white girl.
(Grades 7-8)
McCAUGHREAN,
GERALDINE (Retold by)
Gilgamesh
Ages 9 and up - A retelling, based on seventh-century B.C. Assyrian clay tablets, of the wanderings and adventures of the god king,
Gilgamesh, who ruled in ancient Mesopotamia (now Iraq) in about 2700 B.C., and of his faithful companion,
Enkidu.
ORWELL,
GEORGE
Animal Farm
A political satire in which the animals take over running the farm, but find their utopian state turning into a dictatorship.
PATON, ALAN
Cry, the Beloved Country
Zulu pastor Stephen Kumalo travels to Johannesburg on an errand for a friend and to visit his son, Absalom, only to learn Absalom has been accused of murdering white city engineer and social activist Arthur Jarvis and stands very little chance of receiving mercy.
(Grades 7-8)
1984
Depicts life in a totalitarian regime of the future. (Grades 7-8)
RAWLINGS, MARJORIE KINNAN
The Yearling
A young boy living in the Florida backwoods is forced to decide the fate of a fawn he has lovingly raised as a pet.
SHAKESPEARE, WILLIAM
Adaptations by Bruce Coville
Excellent simplified retellings; illustrated; 42 pages
Hamlet; A Midsummer's Night Dream; Macbeth; Romeo & Juliet; Twelfth Night
SMITH, BETTY
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
Young Francie Nolan experiences the problems of growing up in a Brooklyn, New York slum.
(Grades 7-8)
STEINBECK, JOHN
The Red Pony
Ownership of a beautiful red pony teaches ten-year-old Jody about life and death.
(Grades 7-8)
TWAIN, MARK
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Huck, escaping from his father, who had imprisoned him in a lonely cabin, meets Jim, a runaway slave, on Jackson's Island on the Mississippi River. Together they float down the Mississippi.
(Grades 7-8)
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
The adventures of a mischievous young boy and his friends growing up in a Mississippi River town in the nineteenth century.
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's
Court
Hank Morgan, a Conneticut Yankee, is hit over the head with a crowbar during a fight, and wakes up in King Arthur's kingdom of Camelot.
The Prince and the Pauper
When young Edward VI of England and a poor boy who resembles him exchange places, each learns something about the other's very different station in life.
WHITE, T.H.
The Sword in the Stone
Wart, as young Arthur is called, becomes a wiser, more thoughtful person and a worthy king as a result of Merlin's lessons.
ALMOND, DAVID
Skellig
Unhappy about his baby
sister's illness and the chaos of moving into a dilapidated old house, Michael
retreats to the garage where he finds a mysterious stranger who is something
like a bird and something like an angel.
BRAY, LIBBA
A Great and Terrible Beauty
After the suspicious death of her mother in 1895, sixteen-year-old Gemma returns to England, after many years in India, to attend a finishing school where she becomes aware of her magical powers and ability to see into the spirit world.
(Grades 7-8)
Rebel Angels
Gemma and her friends from the Spence Academy return to the realms to defeat her foe, Circe, and to bind the magic that has been released.
(Grades 7-8)
CHABON, MICHAEL
Summerland
The ferishers, little creatures who ensure perfect weather for Summerland, recruit Ethan Feld, one of history's worst baseball players, to help them in their struggle to save Summerland, and ultimately the world, from giants, goblins, and other legendary, terrible creatures.
(500 pages. Reading level: 5.8)
COLFER, EOIN
Artemis Fowl (and sequels)
When a twelve-year-old evil genius tries to restore his family fortune by capturing a fairy and demanding a ransom in gold, the fairies fight back with magic, technology, and a particularly nasty troll.
http://www.eoincolfer.com/
COLLINS, SUZANNE
Gregor the Overlander (and sequels)
When eleven-year-old Gregor and his two-year-old sister are pulled into a strange underground world, they trigger an epic battle involving humans, bats, rats, cockroaches, and spiders while on a quest foretold by ancient prophecy. http://www.suzannecollinsbooks.com/
COVILLE, BRUCE
Jeremy Thatcher, Dragon Hatcher
Small for his age but artistically talented, twelve-year-old Jeremy Thatcher unknowingly buys a dragon's egg.
Note: This book inspired author Christopher Paolini to write Eragon.
Into the Land of Unicorns
Having jumped off the church roof and into the fantastic Land of Luster, Cara joins Lightfoot the unicorn in the search for the Unicorn Queen Arabella Skydancer.
Sequel: Song of the Wanderer.
De MARI, SILVANA
The Last Dragon
Translated from the Italian. After his village is ruined by a flood, Yorsh, the world's last elf, reads writing on ancient ruins and realizes that in order to stop the torrential rains, he must find the only remaining dragon.
FUNKE, CORNELIA
http://www.corneliafunkefans.com/
Inkheart.
Twelve-year-old Meggie learns that her father Mo, a bookbinder, can "read" fictional characters to life when an evil ruler named Capricorn, freed from the novel "Inkheart" years earlier, tries to force Mo to release an immortal monster from the story.
Inkspell
When Dustfinger finds a crooked storyteller who can read him back to Inkscape, he leaves his apprentice Farid behind; but Farid seeks out Meggie and the two follow him back into the enchanted book.
The
Thief Lord
Orphaned brothers Prosper and Bo, having run away from their cruel aunt and uncle, decide to hide out in Venice where they fall in with the Thief Lord, a thirteen-year-old boy who leads a crime ring of street
children.
HALE, SHANNON
The Goose Girl
Princess Anidori, on her way to marry a prince she has never met, is betrayed by her guards and her lady-in-waiting and must become a goose girl to survive until she can reveal her true identity and reclaim the crown that is rightfully hers.
HOROWITZ, ANTHONY
Gatekeepers Trilogy
Raven's Gate - Bk #1
"After a failed burglary attempt, fourteen-year-old Matt is sent to the
country under an experimental government sponsored reform program. He's pursued
by witches and learns of his predestined role as a gatekeeper to hold back an
ancient impending evil." Horn Book (Fall 2005)
Evil
Star -
Bk #2
Nightrise
- Bk #3
JACQUES, BRIAN
http://www.redwall.org/
Redwall (and prequels & sequels)
When the peaceful life of ancient Redwall Abbey is shattered by the arrival of the evil rat Cluny and his villainous hordes, Matthias, a young mouse, determines to find the legendary sword of Martin the Warrior which, he is convinced, will help Redwall's inhabitants destroy the enemy.
LEAVITT, MARTINE
Keturah and Lord Death
When Lord Death comes to claim sixteen-year-old Keturah while she is lost in the King's Forest, she charms him with her story and is granted a twenty-four hour reprieve in which to seek her one true love.
L'ENGLE, MADELEINE
A Wrinkle in Time
Three extraterrestrial beings take Meg and her friends to another world.
LEVINE, GAIL CARSON
Fairest
In the Kingdom of Ayortha, Aza, an unattractive woman with a magical voice, learns to balance her appearance with her talent, meanwhile, her singing attracts both Prince Ijori, who cannot resist it, and Queen Ivi, who plots to use it to benefit herself.
LOWRY, LOIS
Gossamer
While learning to bestow dreams, a young dream giver tries to save an eight-year-old boy from the effects of both his abusive past and the nightmares inflicted on him by the frightening
Sinisteeds.
MACDONALD, GEORGE
The Princess and the Goblin
A little princess is protected by her friend Curdie from the goblin miners who live beneath the castle.
First published in 1872. A classic fantasy.
MCKINLEY, ROBIN
Beauty
Kind Beauty grows to love the Beast at whose castle she is compelled to stay and through her love releases him from the spell which had turned him from a handsome prince into an ugly beast.
Grade 7 up reading level.
The Blue Sword
Harry, bored with her sheltered life in the remote orange-growing colony of Daria, discovers magic in herself when she is kidnapped by a native king with mysterious powers.
The Hero and the Crown
Aerin, with the guidance of the wizard Luthe and the help of the blue sword, wins the birthright due her as the daughter of the Damarian king and a witchwoman of the mysterious, demon-haunted North.
(Newbery Medal/Honor 1985)
PAOLINI,
CHRISTOPHER
Eragon
In Aagaesia, a fifteen-year-old boy of unknown lineage called Eragon finds a mysterious stone that weaves his life into an intricate tapestry of destiny, magic, and power, peopled with dragons, elves, and monsters.
(Sequel: Eldest)
PATTOU,
EDITH
East
A young woman journeys to a distant castle on the back of a great white bear who is the victim of a cruel
enchantment.
PRATCHETT,
TERRY
A Hat Full of Sky
Tiffany Aching, a young witch-in-training, learns about magic and responsibility as she battles a disembodied monster with the assistance of the six-inch-high Wee Free Men and Mistress
Weatherwax, the greatest witch in the world.
The Wee Free Men
Tiffany, a young witch-to-be in the land of Discworld, teams up with the Wee Free Men, a clan of six-inch-high blue toughs, to rescue her baby brother and ward off a sinister invasion from Fairyland.
PULLMAN, PHILIP
"His Dark Materials" Trilogy - An essential fantasy classic.
The Golden Compass -
Book 1
Accompanied by her daemon, Lyra Belacqua sets out to prevent her best friend and other kidnapped children from becoming the subject of gruesome experiments in the Far North.
The
Subtle Knife -
Book 2
Sequel to: The golden compass. As the boundaries between worlds begin to dissolve, Lyra and her daemon help Will Parry in his search for his father and for a powerful, magical knife.
The
Amber Spyglass
- Book 3
The third and final book in "His Dark Materials" trilogy. Lyra and Will find themselves at the center of a
battle between the forces of the Authority and those gathered by Lyra's father,
Lord Asriel.
RIORDAN, RICK
Percy Jackson & The Olympians Trilogy
The Lightning Thief - Bk #1
Percy, expelled from six schools for being unable to control his temper, learns the truth from his mother that his father is the Greek god Poseidon, and is sent to Camp Half Blood where he is befriended by a satyr and the demigod daughter of Athena who join him in a journey to the Underworld to retrieve Zeus's lightning bolt and prevent a catastrophic war.
The
Sea of Monsters - Bk #2
The Titan's Curse - Bk #3
ROWLING, J.K.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (and sequels)
Rescued from the outrageous
neglect of his aunt and uncle, a young boy with a great destiny proves his worth
while attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
SACHAR, LOUIS
Holes
As
further evidence of his family's bad fortune which they attribute to a curse on
a distant relative, Stanley Yelnats is sent to a hellish correctional camp in
the Texas desert where he finds his first real friend, a treasure, and a new
sense of himself.
Small Steps
Sequel to: Holes. Three years after being released from Camp Green Lake, Armpit is trying hard to keep his life on track, but when his old pal X-Ray shows up with a tempting plan to make some easy money scalping concert tickets, Armpit reluctantly goes along.
TOLKIEN, J.R.R.
The Hobbit &
The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring; The Two Towers; The Return of
the King
The story of a grand quest to keep the Ring of Power from falling into the hands of the evil
Sauron.
WHITE, T.H.
The Sword in the Stone
Wart, as young Arthur is called, becomes a wiser, more thoughtful person and a worthy king as a result of Merlin's lessons.
YOLEN, JANE
Sword of the Rightful King: A Novel of King Arthur
Merlinnus the magician devises a way for King Arthur to prove himself the rightful king of England--pulling a sword from a stone--but trouble arises when someone else removes the sword first.
ABRAHAMS, PETER
Down the Rabbit Hole: An Echo Falls Mystery
Like her idol Sherlock Holmes, eighth-grader Ingrid Levin-Hill uses her intellect to solve the murder of an eccentric local woman in her hometown of Echo Falls.
(Riveting murder mystery!)
BAILLIETT,
BLUE
Chasing Vermeer
When seemingly unrelated and strange events start to happen and a precious Vermeer painting disappears, eleven-year-olds Petra and Calder combine their talents to solve an international art scandal.
HOOBLER, DOROTHY
The Demon in the Teahouse
Sequel to: The ghost in the Tokaido Inn. In eighteenth-century Japan, fourteen-year-old
Seikei, a merchant's son in training to be a samurai, helps his patron investigate a series of murders and arson in the capital city of Edo, each of which is associated in some way with a popular geisha.
The Ghost in the Tokaido Inn
While attempting to solve the mystery of a stolen jewel, Seikei, a merchant's son who longs to be a samurai, joins a group of kabuki actors in eighteenth-century Japan.
POE, EDGAR ALLAN
Edgar Allan Poe's Tales of Mystery and Madness
The black cat -- The masque of the Red Death -- Hop Frog -- The fall of the house of Usher. Presents color-illustrated renditions of four of Edgar Allan Poe's horror tales, including "The Black Cat," "The Masque of the Red Death," "Hop-Frog," and "The Fall of the House of
Usher."
RASKIN, ELLEN
The Westing Game
The mysterious death of an eccentric millionaire brings together an unlikely assortment of heirs who
must uncover the circumstances of his death before they can claim their
inheritance.
REISS, KATHRYN
Paperquake: A Puzzle
Certain that she is being drawn by more than coincidences
into the lives of people living nearly 100 years ago, Violet, who feels like the
odd sister in a set of triplets, searches for clues to help her avert an
imminent tragedy. A popular Morrow House title.
CREECH, SHARON
Love that Dog
A young student, who comes to love poetry through a personal understanding of what different famous poems mean to him, surprises himself by writing his own inspired poem.
COLLINS, BILLY
Sailing Alone Around the Room
"Collins, that rarest of creatures, a truly popular living poet, is currently poet laureate, an appointment well celebrated with this fertile gathering of nearly 100
poems. On every delectable page, Collins performs nimble feats of the imagination and gives voice to an emotion we foolishly trivialize and condemn: pure pleasure.
... Collins moves stealthily toward the essentials, quietly celebrating the
simple and reflective life and gently reminding readers to respect and treasure our
species' tenuous place on the great thrumming web of life." Booklist (August 2001 (Vol. 97, No.
22)
KENNEDY, CAROLINE, Selected by
A Family of Poems
"This collection features over one hundred poems cherished by Kennedy's family. Appealing to a broad audience, most of the verses are traditional, but a number are contemporary, many from different cultures. Muth's sensitive watercolors, often on expansive double-page spreads, extend the poems. Two pages of "Foreign Poems in Their Original Languages" are included."
Horn Book (Spring 2006)
PANZER, NORA
Celebrate America in Poetry and Art
Booklist (Vol. 91, No. 6 (November 15, 1994))
Gr. 4-7. "... thoughtfully conceived volume with paintings, sculpture, drawings, and photographs from the National Museum of American Art at the Smithsonian. With diversity as her cornerstone, editor Panzer has divided the book into five sections: the country's landscape, its melting pot makeup, city and rural life, American history, and American pastimes."
Note: This title is available in the Bergen County public libraries, but may be
difficult to find in bookstores.
WAYLAND, APRIL HALPRIN
Girl Coming in for a Landing
A collection of over 100 poems recounting the ups and downs of one adolescent girl's school year.
WOODSON, JACQUELINE
Locomotion
Inspired by his teacher, eleven-year-old Lonnie begins to write about his life in a series of poems in which he discusses his feelings about his friends, his foster mom, his little sister Lili, and the death of his parents.
ALVAREZ, JULIA
Before We Were Free
In the early 1960s in the Dominican Republic, twelve-year-old Anita learns that her family is involved in the underground movement to end the bloody rule of the dictator, General Trujillo.
ANDERSON, LAURIE HALSE
Fever, 1793
Sixteen-year-old Matilda Cook, separated from her sick mother, learns about perseverance and self-reliance when she is forced to cope with the horrors of the yellow fever epidemic in Philadelphia in 1793.
BAUER, JOAN
"Joan Bauer explores difficult issues with humor and hope. Her books have won numerous awards, among them the Newbery Honor Medal, the LA Times Book Prize, the Christopher Award, and the Golden Kite Award of the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators.
http://www.joanbauer.com/jbhome.html
Rules of the Road
Sixteen-year-old Jenna gets a job driving the elderly owner of a chain of successful shoe stores from Chicago to Texas to confront the son who is trying to force her to retire, and along the way Jenna hones her talents as a saleswoman and finds the strength to face her alcoholic father.
Best Foot Forward
Sequel to Rules of the Road. Between school and Al-Anon meetings, Jenna helps Mrs. Gladstone cope with escalating problems that result from the merger of Gladstone Shoes with Shoe Warehouse Corporation, while managing a new employee with a shoplifting record.
CHOLDENKO, GENNIFER
Al Capone Does My Shirts
A twelve-year-old boy named Moose moves to Alcatraz Island in 1935 when guards' families were housed there, and has to contend with his extraordinary new environment in addition to life with his autistic sister.
(Newbery Medal/Honor 2005)
CREECH, SHARON
Absolutely Normal Chaos
Thirteen-year-old Mary Lou grows up quickly during the summer while learning about romance, homesickness, death, and her cousin's search for his biological father.
Chasing
Redbird
Thirteen-year-old Zinnia Taylor uncovers family secrets and self truths while clearing a mysterious settler trail that begins on her family's farm in Kentucky.
Walk Two Moons
After her mother leaves home suddenly, thirteen-year-old Sal and her grandparents take a car trip retracing her mother's route. Along the way, Sal recounts the story of her friend Phoebe, whose mother also left.
CURTIS, CHRISTOPHER PAUL
Bud, Not Buddy
Ten-year-old Bud, a motherless boy living in Flint, Michigan, during the Great Depression, escapes a bad foster home and sets out in search of the man he believes to be his father--the renowned bandleader, H.E. Calloway of Grand Rapids.
(Newbery Honor 2000)
The Watsons Go to Birmingham
The ordinary interactions and everyday routines of the Watsons, an African-American family living in Flint, Michigan, are drastically changed after they go to visit Grandma in Alabama in the summer of 1963.
(Newbery Honor 1996)
DONNELLY, JENNIFER
A Northern Light
In early nineteenth-century England, an orphaned young woman accepts employment as a governess and soon finds herself in love with her employer who has a terrible secret.
(Grades 7-8)
GANTOS, JACK
Joey Pigza Swallowed the Key
To the constant disappointment of his mother and his teachers, Joey has trouble
paying attention or controlling his mood swings when his prescription meds wear
off and he starts getting worked up and acting wired. Sequel: Newbery Honor - Joey
Pigza Loses Control. Thought provoking page-turners.
HAHN, MARY DOWNING
Hear the Wind Blow
With their mother dead and their home burned, a thirteen-year-old boy and his little sister set out across Virginia in search of relatives during the final days of the Civil War.
HENKES,
KEVIN
Olive's Ocean
On a summer visit to her grandmother's cottage by the ocean, twelve-year-old Martha gains perspective on the death of a classmate, on her relationship with her grandmother, on her feelings for an older boy, and on her plans to be a writer.
HESSE, KAREN
Music of the Dolphins
Using sophisticated computer technology, a fifteen-year-old girl who has been raised by dolphins, records her thoughts about her reintroduction to the human world.
HOROWITZ, ANTHONY
Stormbreaker (Alex Rider series)
After the death of the uncle who had been his guardian, fourteen-year-old Alex Rider is
coerced to continue his uncle's dangerous work for Britain's intelligence agency, MI6.
Extremely popular series. You will be hooked after reading the first.
INGOLD, JEANETTE
Mountain Solo
Tess, a violin prodigy who has been playing since age three, throws away all her training and talent to start a new life with her father in Montana, where she realizes having a normal life isn't always so normal.
KLAGES, ELLEN
Green Glass Sea
(Manhattan Project) While her father works on the Manhattan Project, eleven-year-old gadget lover and outcast Dewey Kerrigan lives in Los Alamos Camp, and becomes friends with Suze, another young girl who is shunned by her peers.
KONIGSBURG,
E.L.
The Outcasts of 19 Schuyler Place
Upon leaving an oppressive summer camp, twelve-year-old Margaret Rose Kane spearheads a campaign to preserve three unique towers her grand uncles have been building in their back yard for over forty years.
Silent
to the Bone
When he is wrongly accused of gravely injuring his baby half-sister, thirteen-year-old Branwell loses his power of speech and only his friend Connor is able to reach him and uncover the truth about what really happened.
LARSON, KIRBY
Hattie Big Sky
Newbery Honor, 2007. Frontier and pioneer life, Montana. Sixteen-year-old Hattie Brooks inherits her uncle's homesteading claim in Montana in 1917 and encounters some unexpected problems related to the war in Europe.
LORD, CYNTHIA
Rules
Frustrated at life with an autistic brother, twelve-year-old Catherine longs for a normal existence but her world is further complicated by a friendship with an young paraplegic.
MAGORIAN,
MICHELLE
Good Night, Mr. Tom
A battered child learns to embrace life when he is adopted by an old man in the English countryside during World War II.
MARTIN, ANN M.
Belle Teal
Belle Teal Harper's entrance into fifth-grade in the early 1960s brings many changes and challenges as her Gran's memory begins to slip, her mom spends long hours away at work, and her class gets two new students, including an African-American boy.
A Corner of the Universe
The summer that Hattie turns twelve, she meets the childlike uncle she never knew and becomes friends with a girl who works at the carnival that comes to Hattie's small town.
The Doll People with Laura
Godwin
A family of porcelain dolls that has lived in the same house for one hundred years is taken aback when a new family of plastic dolls arrives and doesn't follow The Doll Code of Honor.
MEAD,
ALICE
A Year of No Rain
In 1999, when rebel soldiers come to their village in southern Sudan, Stephen and his friends escape but hope to be able to return again.
MEYER,
CAROLYN
Meyer writes excellent historical fiction. For an extensive list, go to her
website, http://www.readcarolyn.com/
Marie,
Dancing
A fictionalized autobiography of Marie Van Goethem, the impoverished student from the Paris Opera ballet school who became the model for Edgar Degas's famous sculpture, "The Little Dancer."
(Grades 7-8)
Patience,
Princess Catherine
In 1501 fifteen-year-old Catherine of Aragon arrives in England to marry Arthur, the eldest son of King Henry VII, but soon finds her expectations of a happy settled life radically changed when Arthur unexpectedly dies and her future becomes the subject of a bitter dispute between the kingdoms of England and Spain.
MEYER, STEPHENIE - Morrow House
Favorite!
Twilight
(A Vampire Romance)
When seventeen-year-old Bella leaves Phoenix to live with her father in Forks, Washington, she meets an exquisitely handsome boy at school for whom she feels an overwhelming attraction and who she comes to realize is not wholly human.
New Moon (Sequel to Twilight)
When the Cullens, including her beloved Edward, leave Forks rather than risk revealing that they are vampires, it is almost too much for eighteen-year-old Bella to bear, but she finds solace in her friend Jacob until he is drawn into a "cult" and changes in terrible ways.
MIKAELSON,
BEN
Touching Spirit Bear
After his anger erupts into violence, fifteen year-old Cole, in order to avoid going to prison, agrees to participate in a sentencing alternative based on the Native American Circle Justice, and he is sent to a remote Alaskan Island where an encounter with a huge Spirit Bear changes his life.
(Grades 6-8)
ORLEV,
URI
Run, Boy, Run
Based on the true story of a nine-year-old boy who escapes the Warsaw Ghetto and must survive throughout the war in the Nazi-occupied Polish countryside.
(Grades 7-8)
PAULSEN,
GARY
Hatchet
After a plane crash, thirteen-year-old Brian spends fifty-four days in the wilderness, learning to survive with only the aid of a hatchet given him by his mother, and learning also to survive his parents' divorce.
Sequels. (Survival, adventure)
Soldier's
Heart
Eager to enlist, fifteen-year-old Charley has a change of heart after experiencing both the physical horrors and mental anguish of Civil War combat.
(Grades 7-8)
PECK,
RICHARD
The River Between Us
During the early days of the Civil War, the Pruitt family takes in two mysterious young ladies who have fled New Orleans to come north to Illinois.
RYAN, PAM MUNOZ
Becoming Naomi Leon
When Naomi's absent mother resurfaces to claim her, Naomi runs away to Mexico with her great-grandmother and younger brother in search of her father.
Esperanza Rising
Esperanza and her mother are forced to leave their life of wealth and privilege in Mexico to go work in the labor camps of Southern California, where they must adapt to the harsh circumstances facing Mexican farm workers on the eve of the Great Depression.
SCHLITZ, LAURA AMY
A Drowned Maiden's Tale
In the early twentieth century, young orphan Maud Flynn hopes to finally be loved when she is adopted by the elderly Hawthorne sisters, but she is instead roped into the family's crooked seance business.
SCHMIDT, GARY
First Boy
Dragged into the political turmoil of a presidential election year, fourteen-year-old Cooper Jewett, who runs a New Hampshire dairy farm since his grandfather's death, stands up for himself and makes it clear whose first boy he really is.
Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy
In 1911, Turner Buckminster hates his new home of Phippsburg, Maine, but things improve when he meets Lizzie Bright Griffin, a girl from a poor, nearby island community founded by former slaves that the town fathers--and Turner's--want to change into a tourist spot.
SPINELLI, JERRY
Crash
Seventh-grader John "Crash" Coogan has always been comfortable with his tough, aggressive behavior, until his relationship with an unusual Quaker boy and his grandfather's stroke make him consider the meaning of friendship and the importance of family.
Stargirl
Stargirl, a teen who animates quiet Mica High with her colorful personality,
suddenly finds herself shunned for her refusal to conform.
WHELAN, GLORIA
Angel on the Square
In 1913 Russia, twelve-year-old Katya eagerly anticipates leaving her St. Petersburg home, though not her older cousin Misha, to join her mother, a lady in waiting in the household of Tsar Nicholas II, but the ensuing years bring world war, revolution, and undreamed of changes to her life.
Homeless Bird
Thirteen-year-old Koly enters into an ill-fated arranged marriage and must either suffer a destiny dictated by India's customs or find the courage to oppose tradition.
The Impossible Journey
"A companion to Angel on the square"--Cover. In 1934, thirteen-year-old Marya and her younger brother, Georgi, set out alone on a long and arduous journey into Siberia to find their mother after she and their father are exiled for opposing Stalin.
WINTHROP, ELIZABETH
Counting on Grace
Twelve-year-old Grace Forcier and her friend Arthur, taken out of school and put to work in a Vermont textile mill in 1910, are championed by their teacher who urges them to write the National Child Labor Committee, an action only Grace seems to realize will have serious repercussions.
WOODSON, JACQUELINE
Behind You
After fifteen-year-old Jeremiah is mistakenly shot by police, the people who love him struggle to cope with their loss as they recall his life and death, unaware that 'Miah is watching over them.
(Grades 7-8)
If You Come Softly
After meeting at their private school in New York, fifteen-year-old Jeremiah, who is black and whose parents are separated, and Ellie, who is white and whose mother has twice abandoned her, fall in love and then try to cope with peoples' reactions.
(Grades 7-8)
YEE, LISA
In a series of journal entries, eleven-year-old child prodigy Millicent Min records her struggles to learn to play volleyball, tutor her enemy, deal with her grandmother's departure, and make friends over the course of a tumultuous summer.
YEP, LAURENCE
Dragonwings
In the early twentieth century a young Chinese boy joins his father in San Francisco and helps him realize his dream of making a flying machine.
ZEVIN, GABRIELLE
Elsewhere
After fifteen-year-old Liz Hall is hit by a taxi and killed, she finds herself in a place that is both like and unlike Earth, where she must adjust to her new status and figure out how to "live."
DUPRAU, JEANNE
City of Ember
In the city of Ember, twelve-year-old Lina trades jobs on Assignment Day to be a Messenger to run to new places in herdecaying but beloved city, perhaps even to glimpse Unknown Regions.
People of Sparks
Lina and Doon are thrilled to see their people join them above ground in the vibrant village of Sparks, but suspicion and prejudice soon turn the villagers and newcomers against each other.
FARMER, NANCY
The Ear, the Eye, and the Arm
In 2194 in Zimbabwe, General Matsika's three children are kidnapped and put to work in a plastic mine, while three mutant detectives use their special powers to search for them.
(Newbery Medal/Honor)
The House of the Scorpion
In a future where humans despise clones, Matt enjoys special status as the young clone of El Patron, the 142-year-old leader of a corrupt drug empire nestled between Mexico and the United States.
HADDIX, MARGARET PETERSON
Among the Hidden (Shadow Children series)
In a future where the Population Police enforce the law limiting a family to only two children, Luke has lived all his twelve years in isolation and fear on his family's farm, until another "third" convinces him that the government is wrong.
ADLER, C.S.
Winning
"Vicky is thrilled to be on the eighth-grade tennis team, until she realizes that her new playing partner Brenda is ruthless about winning and will even cheat to do so."
BROOKS, BRUCE
The Moves Make the Man
"An African-American boy and an emotionally troubled white boy in North Carolina form a precarious friendship."
LIPSYTE,
ROBERT
The Contender
"A Harlem high school drop-out escapes from a gang of punks into a boxing gym. He learns being a contender is hard and often discouraging work and that you don't know anything until you try."
LUPICA, MIKE
Heat
"Pitching prodigy Michael Arroyo is on the run from social services after being banned from playing Little League baseball because rival coaches doubt he is only twelve years old and he has no parents to offer them proof."
Travel Team
"After he is cut from his travel basketball team--the very same team that his father once led to national prominence--twelve-year-old Danny Walker forms his own team of cast-offs that might have a shot at victory."
MYERS, WALTER DEAN
Hoops
A teenage basketball player from Harlem is befriended by a former professional player who, after being forced to quit because of a point shaving scandal, hopes to prevent other young athletes from repeating his mistake.