2019 Books for Missouri Students
Kate’s grandmother believes in everyday magic and tells Kate it comes from Believe, Give, and Trust. Now that Kate’s best friend Sofia is spending less time with Kate and Grammy is suffering from Alzheimer’s, Kate is willing to try the magic to get her life back in control.
During the 2016 European terrorist attacks, Ahmed, a Syrian refugee, finds an unlocked house in Brussels and hides in the cellar. Max, an American, finds him and vows to help Ahmed safe, despite the heightened prejudice and paranoia surrounding the refugees and Muslims in general.
Memoir of the childhood of middle grade author and illustrator Jarrett Krosoczka. Jarrett grew up with his grandparents due to his mother having a drug addiction and serving time in prison.
6th graders Mikayla and Lev become wrestling partners and friends. However, at the state competition, only one can be a winner.
Charlie Hernadez grew up listening to the Hispanic mythology told by his grandmother. When his parents disappear after a house fire, Charlie begins to realize that the myths are coming true. He’s a shapeshifter and with his friend, Violet, seeks out the League of Shadows, so that La Cuca can be defeated.
Before she married Malcolm X, Betty grew up being raised by her aunt in Detroit. She becomes involved with the Civil Rights Movement through church and as a volunteer for the Housewives’ League.
Devin wants to be a viral internet sensation and works out a plan wit his friend Addi to make that happen during an NBA game on Valentine’s Day.
Short biographies of 15 women who met the challenges of their daily life by inventing things like windshield wipers, kevlar, and scotchgard.
12-year old Gerome is shot and killed by a police officer while holding a toy gun. He comes back as a ghost and is invisible to everyone except the other ghosts (including historical figure Emmett Till) and Sarah, the daughter of the police officer that killed him.
Online scrabble friends Ben and Charlotte help each other deal with their family issues and middle school drama, while realizing that even though they live in vastly different areas, they have more in common than originally expected.
Prequel to Crossover. Throughout the summer he spends with his grandparents, Chuck plays basketball, listens to jazz music, and learns more about his family.
Brothers Caleb and Bobby Gene spend the summer exploring the woods. Their 16-year old foster neighbor Styx recruits them to help pull off the Great Escalator Trade, continually trading one small thing for something a bit bigger. Before long, the boys are in over their heads, breaking the law, and needing an emergency room.
More than 50 children’s authors and illustrators, including Ellen Oh, Jason Reynolds, and Jacqueline Woodson share their thoughts on becoming an activist, even at a young age.
Marcus Vega visits Puerto Rico with his Down Syndrome brother and mother. Marcus takes this opportunity to explore the island, in hopes he will find the father that left his family 10 years prior.
12-year old Julie takes two of her father’s clients scuba diving. After not listening to safety precautions, the group find themselves needing to survive the dangerous ocean waters (sharks, exposure, dehydration, and hypothermia).
Luis and Maura, two 6th graders, investigate the reason behind the long-term blackout, seeking the knowledge of the town’s homeless Computer Genius teen.
During their 7th grade field trip to Washington DC, Tally is forced to room with Ava, who may be suffering from a eating disorder.
Gwyn’s family has moved from NYC to the rural community of Crow, Iowa, to help her mother’s traumatic brain injury. Gwyn works to prove their strange neighbor is behind the disappearance of her new friend.
Inspirational poem that encourages readers to dream and strive to do whatever it takes to make that dream come true.
Jilly turns to her deaf cyberfriend, Derek, to help her learn how to best help her deaf sister, Emma.
Mason’s learning disabilities lead people to not believe him about the day his friend dies. When his friend, Calvin, also disappears, Mason once again becomes the prime suspect.
Details the life of Frederick Douglass after escaping from slavery. Includes some of Douglass’s photographs throughout his life as a speaker, Presidential advisor, and journalist.
Mia learns the value of friendship and improves on her English writing while her immigrant family runs a hotel for Mr. Yao.
Isabella prepares for her upcoming piano recital while dealing with changes with her parent dynamic (through divorce and remarriage), racial tensions at school, and police brutality.
Anthology of eleven short stories depicting the life of middle school students, in a wide range of writing styles.
5th grader Frederick is sent to a disciplinary camp, where he attempts to be the toughest boy attending. Thankfully, he forms a friendship with Ant Hill, Nosebleed, Specs, and the Professor because they all must work together to survive the impending hurricane.
Rose and Mavis are very different from each other, but those differences don’t keep them from becoming friends. Mr. Duffy is having a tough time recovering from the recent loss of a beloved pet, until the two girls bring him Henry, a lost dog they found on their adventures together.
June loves to read! Her parents find an “inappropriate” book in June’s school library and work to get the school library collection revamped (including the release of the school librarian and cancellation of an author visit). June fights back by using a vacant locker as a Little Free Library.
Noah, partially paralyzed in an accident that killed his father, must learn to navigate middle school, friendship, baseball, and his feelings from a wheelchair.
In Pakistan, Amal holds on to her dreams of becoming a teacher even after she misses school in order to stay home to help take care of her younger siblings and being forced to become an indentured servant to help pay off her family’s debt to the corrupt Khan family.
During World War II, 12-year old Ken Sparks is one of the lucky 90 youth chosen to leave Britain on the ship SS City of Benares headed to seek refuge in Canada. The same day the captain declares they are safe from German’s attacks, the ship is hit by a torpedo and Ben must survive on Lifeboat 12.
12-year old Lucy Callahan has been homeschooled since being struck by lightning (which causes her to be a genius at math). Before she is able to enter college, her grandma asks Lucy to finish one year of middle school, make one friend, join one organization, and read one book.
Cooper Vega befriends the ghost of a 16th-century boy, Roderick Northrop, through the use of his top-of-the-line smart phone, all while Cooper’s new 7th grade class prepares for a production of Romeo and Juliet.
Six middle school students spend an hour each week in the ARTT (a room to talk) room, without any adults to guide their conversations.
Memoir of author Temple Grandin, interspersed with 25 step-by-step STEM projects and historical information about scientists and inventors.
Candice and Brandon follow the puzzle clues left behind in a letter to Candice’s grandmother to learn more about Lambert, South Carolina’s history and find an inheritance meant to correct the past.
After Charlie’s sharecropping father suddenly dies leaving him with no family, Charlie is forced to travel north with the local plantation Cap’n to fulfill his father’s debt.
Nisha keeps a journal filled with letters to her deceased mom to help her process the feelings and events of being a refugee fleeing their home in Pakistan after the end of World War II.
WWII tale told in alternating perspectives between Ray, an American soldier, and Hideki, a citizen of the Okinawa island drafted by the Japanese army. When both men come face to face during a battle, only one will survive, taking the other’s spirit (Mabui) with them.
Memoir of author Vera Brosgol’s first trip to a Russian summer camp, which she wrongly assumes will be just like the other summer camps her non-Russian school friends attend.
Conor is an 11-year old AAA hockey star whose life is absorbed by stick time, and private and team skating lessons. When Sinbad, Conor’s pet Doberman, is diagnosed with cancer, Conor must make difficult choices in order to come up with the money necessary for Sinbad’s treatments.
Biography of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow from birth to their lives of crime that led to their violent deaths.
Langston’s mom has died resulting in his dad moving them from the Alabama country to Chicago. To avoid school bullies, Langston takes a new route home and discovers a public library.
Kiranmala is surprised to find out on her 12th birthday that she is a Princess and must travel to the Kingdom Beyond Seven Oceans and Thirteen Rivers to find her parents. Based on Indian folklore.
Middle schoolers Natalie, Twig, and Dari team up to enter an egg drop competition, in hopes that the prize money will help Natalie’s depressed mom.
Details in verse the accomplishments of NASA and the Apollo missions during the 2979 days after President Kennedy’s speech that challenged America to have a man on the moon within 10 years.
While observing the busy world around them, two children and their grandfather take a moment to appreciate being quiet and still.
When a platypus wanders into a zoo one day, the animals want to know why he should be allowed to join them.
Encourages the reader to enjoy all of the colors, representing feelings, that may be experienced in the course of a day.
When devastating news rattles a young girl’s community, she tries her hardest to respond to it as compassionately and positively as possible.
Pip the newly-hatched chick, and pup become pals and have adventures together, no matter what the weather is like.
Stegothesaurus has little in common with his fellow dinosaurs until he meets an allosaurus that seems as hungry for synonyms as he is.
A platypus and a beaver who love surfing encounter a shark — with unexpected results. Using just the one word “dude” this almost wordless picture book shows how much gnarly fun the dudes have surfing together.
When a boy visits an art museum and one of the paintings comes to life, he has an afternoon of adventure and discovery that forever changes how he sees the world.
This picture-book adaptation of the original novel is full of the intrepid English nanny’s unique brand of whimsical adventure, including a tea party on the ceiling, a visit to the night zoo, and a trip to a shop that sells star
Illustrations and simple, rhyming text encourage the reader to add glitter to everything in sight, until even what should really sparkle is obscured.
Armed with pencils, paints, dreams, and Grandma Addy’s memories of how beautiful the neighborhood once was, Angel and others paint the big wall that had been cold, empty, and cheerless.
In spite of the worsening weather, Izzy the chipmunk sets off to Bear’s den in response to an urgent request from a friend in need.
Egged on by a ground squirrel, a dog named Doug digs miles underground–taking a detour through the White House–until he returns home, goes to bed, and dreams of digging some more
When the class pet bites the finger of Penelope, a tyrannosaurus rex, she finally understands why she should not eat her classmates, no matter how tasty they are.
A lonely old curmudgeon scats away love-seeking homeless kitties before a growing number of them edge their way into his home and heart, in a sweet counting story told through comic artwork and simple, evocative rhymes.
James has a bunch of balloons, each of which holds a special memory, but as his grandfather ages and loses his own balloons, James discovers that he is gaining new ones.
Baby Monkey will investigate stolen jewels, missing pizzas, and other mysteries–that is, if he can manage to figure out how to put his pants on.
Livvy visits her grandmother in Australia after 5 years of being away. In her closet, she discovers her friend, Bob, who needs help figuring out what he is and where he comes from.
Darius has never really fit in at home, and he’s sure things are going to be the same in Iran. His clinical depression doesn’t exactly help matters, and trying to explain his medication to his grandparents only makes things harder. Then Darius meets Sohrab, the boy next door, and everything changes. Soon, they’re spending their days together, playing soccer, eating faludeh, and talking for hours on a secret rooftop overlooking the city’s skyline. Sohrab calls him Darioush—the original Persian version of his name—and Darius has never felt more like himself than he does now that he’s Darioush to Sohrab.
Adib Khorram’s brilliant debut is for anyone who’s ever felt not good enough—then met a friend who makes them feel so much better than okay.
In a place like Gold Fork, sometimes a secret is the only thing that’s really yours. Ana, Davis, Erik, and Georgie know that best. Bound together by a horrible tragedy from their pasts, they forged a friendship that has lasted through high school. In a town full of weekenders, they all know what it’s like to be dead enders, fated to stay trapped in a tourist destination for the rest of their lives. But with the appearance of long-lost family members and an arsonist setting the town ablaze, it’s time to confront the fact that what brought them together years ago might be what ultimately tears them apart.
Eighteen-year-old twins Adina and Tovah have little in common besides their ambitious nature. Viola prodigy Adina yearns to become a soloist and to convince her music teacher he wants her the way she wants him. Overachiever Tovah awaits her acceptance to Johns Hopkins, the first step on her path toward med school and a career as a surgeon.
But one thing could wreck their carefully planned futures: a genetic test for Huntington’s, a rare degenerative disease that slowly steals control of the body and mind. It’s turned their Israeli mother into a near stranger and fractured the sisters’ own bond in ways they’ll never admit. While Tovah finds comfort in their Jewish religion, Adina rebels against its rules. When the results come in, one twin tests negative for Huntington’s. The other tests positive.
These opposite outcomes push them farther apart as they wrestle with guilt, betrayal, and the unexpected thrill of first love. How can they repair their relationship, and is it even worth saving?
In early 1940s Los Angeles, Mexican Americans Marisela and Lorena work in canneries all day then jitterbug with sailors all night with their zoot suit wearing younger brother, Ray, as escort until the night racial violence leads to murder. Includes historical note.
Zelie Adebola remembers when the soil of Orisha hummed with magic. Burners ignited flames, Tiders beckoned waves, and Zelie’s Reaper mother summoned forth souls. But everything changed the night magic disappeared. Under the orders of a ruthless king, maji were killed, leaving Zelie without a mother and her people without hope. Now Zelie has one chance to bring back magic and strike against the monarchy. With the help of a rogue princess, Zelie must outwit and outrun the crown prince, who is hell-bent on eradicating magic for good.
Tareq lives in Syria with his warm and loving family, until the bombs strike. He, his father, and his younger sister are the only survivors, and they have no choice but to go to Raqqa, where they have extended family. But Raqqa is a stronghold for Daesh, the militant group claiming to follow the tennets of Islam, yet who really exist only to enable violence and intolerance. Tareq’s family leave quickly, and Tareq heads to Istanbul with his cousin. From there, reunited with his younger sister, they flee successfully to Greece.
Rumi Seto spends a lot of time worrying she doesn’t have the answers to everything. What to eat, where to go, whom to love. But there is one thing she is absolutely sure of–she wants to spend the rest of her life writing music with her younger sister, Lea. Then Lea dies in a car accident, and her mother sends her away to live with her aunt in Hawaii while she deals with her own grief. Now thousands of miles from home, Rumi struggles to navigate the loss of her sister, being abandoned by her mother, and the absence of music in her life. With the help of a teenage surfer named Kai, who smiles too much and doesn’t take anything seriously, and an eighty-year-old named George Watanabe, who succumbed to his own grief years ago Rumi attempts to find her way back to her music, to write the song she and Lea never had the chance to finish.
Charlie Grant’s older sister is getting married this weekend at their family home, and Charlie can’t wait–for the first time in years, all four of her older siblings will be under one roof. Charlie is desperate for one last perfect weekend, before the house is sold and everything changes. The house will be filled with jokes and games and laughs again. Making decisions about things like what college to attend and reuniting with longstanding crush Jesse Foster–all that can wait. She wants to focus on making the weekend perfect. The only problem? The weekend is shaping up to be an absolute disaster. There’s the unexpected dog with a penchant for howling, house alarm that won’t stop going off, and a papergirl with a grudge. There are the relatives who aren’t speaking, the (awful) girl her favorite brother brought home unannounced, and a missing tuxedo. Not to mention the neighbor who seems to be bent on sabotage and a storm that is bent on drenching everything. The justice of the peace is missing. The band will only play covers. The guests are all crazy. And the wedding planner’s nephew is unexpectedly, distractingly…cute.
Over the course of three ridiculously chaotic days, Charlie will learn more than she ever expected about the family she thought she knew by heart. And she’ll realize that sometimes, trying to keep everything like it was in the past means missing out on the future.
The story of Frankenstein‘s creator is a strange, romantic, and tragic one, as deeply compelling as the novel itself. Mary ran away to Lake Geneva with the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley when she was just sixteen. It was there, during a cold and wet summer, that she first imagined her story about a mad scientist who brought a corpse back to life. Success soon followed for Mary, but also great tragedy and misfortune.
Brazen looks at the lives of twenty-nine charismatic women in history, including Josephine Baker, Betty Davis, and Cheryl Bridges.
Brothers Teodoro and Manny Avila take a road trip to address Manny’s PTSD following his tour in Iraq, and to help T. change his life and win the heart of Wendy Martinez. Includes information and resources about PTSD.
Alex Mata doesn’t want to worry about rumors of alien incursions–he’d rather just skate and tag and play guitar. But when he comes home to find an alien has murdered his parents, he’s forced to confront a new reality- aliens are real, his parents are dead, and nobody will believe him if he tells. On the run, Alex finds himself led to the compound of tech guru Jeffrey Sabazios, the only public figure who stands firm in his belief that aliens are coming.
It’s not the end of the world, but for Rooney Harris it’s starting to feel that way. It’s the beginning of senior year, and her mom just lost her job. Even worse, she isn’t planning to get another one. Instead, she’s spending every waking moment with a group called the Next World Society, whose members are convinced they’ll be leaving Earth behind on November 17. It sounds crazy to Rooney, but to her mother and younger brother it sounds like salvation. As her mom’s obsession threatens to tear their lives apart, Rooney is scrambling to hold it all together. But will saving her family mean sacrificing her dreams or theirs?
Chronicles the life of Barbara Riechmann, once known as Gucia Gomolinska, who grew up as a Jew in the predominantly Catholic Poland during the 1920s and 1930s, explores how she survived after the Nazis invaded Poland, and her immigration to America until her death.
Told from three viewpoints, teens Doris, Nell, and Grant find friendship and the possibility of love while working in Unclaimed Baggage, a store that sells items that went missing during airline travel.
Evan goes from being a nobody to everyone’s hero and a social media superstar after a chance encounter with Connor just before his suicide leads others to believe Evan was his only friend.
Many Americans are angry about economic inequality, and many are working on solutions. Readers will learn how state and local governments, businesses, and ordinary citizens, including young people are fighting to close the gap between rich and poor, to preserve the promises of American democracy, and to give everyone a fair shot at the American Dream.
Thirty-one YA authors share their own struggles with mental illness, ranging from such topics as neurodiversity and addiction to OCD and PTSD.
It is the autumn of 1846 in Ireland. Lorraine and her brother are waiting for the time to pick the potato crop on their family farm leased from an English landowner. But this year is different–the spuds are mushy and ruined. What will Lorraine and her family do? Then Lorraine meets Miss Susannah, the daughter of the wealthy English landowner who owns Lorraine’s family’s farm, and the girls form an unlikely friendship that they must keep a secret from everyone. Two different cultures come together in a deserted Irish meadow. And Lorraine has one question: how can she help her family survive?
An anthology featuring award-winning diverse authors about diverse characters. Short stories, a graphic novel, and a one-act play explore such topics as gentrification, acceptance, untimely death, coming out, and poverty, and range in genre from contemporary realistic fiction to adventure and romance.
The story of 19 men, all from the film industry who are summoned to appear before the House of Representatives Committee on Un-American Activities. All 19 believe that the committee’s investigations into their political views and personal associations are a violation of their First Amendment rights. When the first 10 of these men refuse to give the committee the simple answers it wants, they are cited for contempt of Congress and blacklisted.
At the height of World War I, as battles raged in the trenches and in the air, another struggle for survival was being waged in the most notorious POW camp in all of Germany: Holzminden. A land-locked Alcatraz of sorts, it was home to the most troublesome Allied prisoners. The Grand Escape tells the remarkable tale of a band of pilots who pulled off an ingenious plan and made it out of enemy territory in the biggest breakout of WWI, inspiring their countrymen in the darkest hours of the war.
In 1980 life is hard on the Tuscarora Reservation in upstate New York, and most of the teenagers feel like they are going nowhere: Carson Mastick dreams of forming a rock band, and Maggi Bokoni longs to create her own conceptual artwork instead of the traditional beadwork that her family sells to tourists. But tensions are rising between the reservation and the surrounding communities, and somehow in the confusion of politics and growing up Carson and Maggi have to make a place for themselves.
Tormented throughout middle school, Ellie begins her freshman year with a new look: she doesn’t need to be popular; she just needs to blend in with the wallpaper. But when the unthinkable happens, Ellie finds herself trapped after a brutal assault. She wasn’t the first victim, and now she watches it happen again and again. She tries to hold on to her happier memories in order to get past the cold days, waiting for someone to find her. The problem is, no one searches for a girl they never noticed in the first place.
In Makersville, Indiana, people know all about Ronney. He’s from that mixed-race family with the dad who tried to kill himself, the pill-popping mom, and the genius kid sister. If having a family like that wasn’t bad enough, the local eccentric at the edge of town decided one night to open up all the cages of his exotic zoo–lions, cheetahs, tigers–and then shoot himself dead. Overnight, news crews, gun control supporters, and gun rights advocates descend on Makersville, bringing around-the-clock news coverage, rallies, and anti-rallies with them. With his parents checked out, Ronney is left tending to his sister’s mounting fears of roaming lions, stopping his best friend from going on a suburban safari, and shaking loose a lonely boy who follows Ronney wherever he goes.
Zara and her mother, Nadja, have a strained relationship. Nadja just doesn’t understand Zara’s creative passion for, and self-expression through, photography. And Zara doesn’t know how to reach beyond their differences and connect to a closed-off mother who refuses to speak about her past in Bosnia. But when a bomb explodes as they’re shopping in their local farmers’ market in Rhode Island, Zara is left with PTSD–and her mother is left in a coma. Without the opportunity to get to know her mother, Zara is left with questions–not just about her mother, but about faith, religion, history, and her own path forward.
When Marilyn was seventeen, she fell in love with Angie’s father, James, who was African-American. But Angie’s never met him, and Marilyn has always told her he died before she was born. When Angie discovers evidence of an uncle she’s never met she starts to wonder, what if her dad is still alive, too? So she sets off on a journey to find him, hitching a ride to LA from her home in New Mexico with her ex-boyfriend, Sam. Along the way, she uncovers some hard truths about herself, her mother, and what truly happened to her father.
History buff Ray knows everything about the peculiar legends and lore of his rural Connecticut hometown. Burgerville’s past is riddled with green cow sightings and witches’ curses, but the most interesting thing about the present is the new girl–we’ll call her Jane Doe. Inscrutable, cool, and above all mysterious, Jane seems as determined to hide her past as Ray is to uncover it. As fascination turns to friendship and then to something more, Ray is certain he knows Jane’s darkest, most painful secrets and Jane herself–from past to present. But when the unthinkable happens, Ray is forced to acknowledge that perhaps history can only tell us so much.
Jake Liddell is a hero. At least, that’s what everyone says he is. The military is even awarding him a Silver Star for his heroic achievements–a huge honor for the son of a military family. Now he’s home, recovering from an injury, but it seems the war has followed him back. He needs pills to get any sleep, a young woman is trying to persuade him into speaking out against military recruitment tactics, and his grandfather is already urging him back onto the battlefield. He doesn’t know what to do; nothing makes sense anymore.
What was life really like for Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker in the early 1930s? How did two dirt-poor teens from west Texas morph from vicious outlaws to legendary couple?
Mara and Owen are as close as twins can get, so when Mara’s friend Hannah accuses Owen of rape, Mara doesn’t know what to think. Can her brother really be guilty of such a violent act? Torn between her family and her sense of right and wrong, Mara feels lost, and it doesn’t help that things are strained with her ex-girlfriend, Charlie. As Mara, Hannah, and Charlie come together in the aftermath of this terrible crime, Mara must face a trauma from her own past and decide where Charlie fits into her future.
Each step on Annabelle’s 2,700 mile cross-country run brings her closer to facing a trauma from her past. So that’s what Annabelle does–she runs from Seattle to Washington, DC, through mountain passes and suburban landscapes, from long lonely roads to college towns. She’s not ready to think about the why yet, just the how–muscles burning, heart pumping, feet pounding the earth. But no matter how hard she tries, she can’t outrun the tragedy from the past year, or the person–The Taker–that haunts her.
Followed by Grandpa Ed in his RV and backed by her brother and two friends (her self-appointed publicity team), Annabelle becomes a reluctant activist as people connect her journey to the trauma from her past. Her cross-country run gains media attention and she is cheered on as she crosses state borders, and is even thrown a block party and given gifts. The support would be nice, if Annabelle could escape the guilt and the shame from what happened back home. They say it isn’t her fault, but she can’t feel the truth of that.
In a world that is rapidly descending into chaos, Frey and Rafi are twin sisters, but few people know of Frey’s existence, because she has been raised to be her sister’s body double and lethal bodyguard, while Rafi has been raised to further the family’s political power–but when their father sends Frey in her sister’s place as collateral in a tricky deal, Col, the son of a rival leader, gets close enough to begin to suspect something, and Frey must decide whether to deal with him violently or finally assume her own identity.
Savannah is dreading being home alone with her overbearing mother after her big sister–and best friend–goes off to college. But if she can just get through senior year, she’ll be able to escape to college, too. What she doesn’t count on is that her mother’s obsession with weight has only grown deeper since her appearance on an extreme weight-loss show, and now Savvy’s mom is pressuring her even harder to be constantly mindful of what she eats. Between her mom’s diet-helicoptering, missing her sister, and worrying about her collegiate future, Savvy has enough to worry about. And then she meets George, the cute new kid at school who has insecurities of his own. As Savvy and George grow closer, they help each other discover how to live in the moment and enjoy the here and now before it disappears.
On Easter Sunday of 1873, just eight years after the Civil War ended, a band of white supremacists marched into Grant Parish, Louisiana, and massacred over one hundred unarmed African Americans. The court case that followed reached the highest court in the land. Yet, following one of the most ghastly incidents of mass murder in American history, not one person was convicted.
When recent high school graduate Cameron Carter lands an internship with Congressman Billy Beck in Washington, DC, he thinks it is his ticket out of small town captivity. What he lacks in connections and Beltway polish he makes up in smarts, and he soon finds a friend and mentor in fellow staffer Ariel Lancaster. That is, until she winds up dead.
As rumors and accusations about her death fly around Capitol Hill, Cameron’s low profile makes him the perfect candidate for an FBI investigation that he wants no part of. Before he knows it–and with his family’s future at stake–he discovers DC’s darkest secrets as he races to expose a deadly conspiracy.
Bunny and Nasir have been best friends forever, but when Bunny accepts an athletic scholarship across town, Nasir feels betrayed. While Bunny tries to fit in with his new, privileged peers, Nasir spends more time with his cousin, Wallace, who is being evicted. Nasir can’t help but wonder why the neighborhood is falling over itself to help Bunny when Wallace is in trouble.
Fourteen-year-old Avery Armisted is athletic, rich, and pretty. Sixteen-year-old Kayla Butts is known as “butt-girl” at school. The two girls were friends as little kids, but that’s ancient history now. So it’s a huge surprise when Avery’s father offers to bring Kayla along on a summer trip to Spain. Avery is horrified that her father thinks he can choose her friends and make her miss soccer camp. Kayla struggles just to imagine leaving the confines of her small town.
But in Spain, the two uncover a secret their families had hidden from both of them their entire lives. Maybe the girls can put aside their differences and work through it together. Or maybe the lies and betrayal will only push them and their families farther apart.
For the past eight years, sixteen-year-old Emilia DeJesus has done her best to move on from the traumatic attack she suffered in the woods behind her elementary school. She’s forced down the memories–the feeling of the twigs cracking beneath her, choking on her own blood, unable to scream. Most of all, she’s tried to forget about Jeremy Lance, the boy responsible, the boy who caused her such pain. Emilia believes that the crows who watched over her that day, who helped her survive, are still on her side, encouraging her to live fully. And with the love and support of her mother, brother, and her caring boyfriend, Emilia is doing just that.
But when a startling discovery about her attacker’s identity comes to light, and the memories of that day break through the mental box in which she’d shut them away, Emilia is forced to confront her new reality and make sense of shifting truths about her past, her family, and herself.
Sixteen-year-old Will spends most of his days the same way: Working at the Dollar Only store, trying to replicate his late father’s famous cornbread recipe, and walking the streets of Los Angeles. Will started walking after his father committed suicide, and three years later he hasn’t stopped. But there are some places Will can’t walk by: The blessings store with the chest of 100 Chinese blessings in the back, the bridge on Fourth Street where his father died, and his childhood friend Playa’s house.
An exploration of the Vietnam War from many different perspectives including an American soldiers, a nurse, and a Vietnamese refugee
Legend is correct that Mary Shelley began penning Frankenstein in answer to a dare to write a ghost story. What most people don’t know, however, is that the seeds of her novel had been planted long before that night. By age nineteen, she had been disowned by her family, was living in scandal with a married man, and had lost her baby daughter just days after her birth. Mary poured her grief, pain, and passion into the powerful book still revered two hundred years later, and in Mary’s Monster, author/illustrator Lita Judge has poured her own passion into a gorgeous book that pays tribute to the life of this incredible author.
Darius Kellner speaks better Klingon than Farsi, and he knows more about Hobbit social cues than Persian ones. He’s a Fractional Persian–half, his mom’s side–and his first-ever trip to Iran is about to change his life.
Sophie Orenstein would do anything for Peter Rosenthal-Porter, who’s been on the kidney transplant list as long as she’s known him. Peter, a gifted pianist, is everything to Sophie: best friend, musical collaborator, secret crush. When she learns she’s a match, donating a kidney is an easy, obvious choice. She can’t help wondering if after the transplant, he’ll love her back the way she’s always wanted.
But Peter’s life post-transplant isn’t what either of them expected. Though he once had feelings for Sophie, too, he’s now drawn to Chase, the guitarist in a band that happens to be looking for a keyboardist. And while neglected parts of Sophie’s world are calling to her–dance opportunities, new friends, a sister and niece she barely knows–she longs for a now-distant Peter more than ever, growing increasingly bitter he doesn’t seem to feel the same connection.
Peter fears he’ll forever be indebted to her. Sophie isn’t sure who she is without him. Then one heartbreaking night twists their relationship into something neither of them recognizes, leading them to question their past, their future, and whether their friendship is even worth fighting for.
Imagine turning on the shower and no water comes out. This is what happens to Alyssa and her family along with all the residents of California. The Tap-Out has begun. After years of critical drought, neighboring states have cut California off from all water supplies. Neighbors become enemies. Strangers become allies. Families are changed.
