Elysian
7th Grade - 8th Grade
Whatever You Say I Am, Bozza.
The life and times of Eminem.
Bad Boy, Myers.
Fighting and
writing in
Open mic: a way to deal.
Feed,
Hackers in your head.
Hope Was Here, Bauer.
Waiting tables, falling for the cook.
Paint Me Like I Am, WritersCorps.
Teen voices from
urban
Whale Talk, Crutcher.
An excellent book about boys, athletics and personal honor.
Stargirl, Spinelli.
What is normal?
Al Capone Does My Shirts, Choldenko.
Living on
An Acquaintance With Darkness, Rinaldi.
Historical fiction. Civil war times.
Artemis Fowl, Colfer. (a short series)
A 12-year-old criminal mastermind.
Because of Winn-Dixie, DiCamillo.
Even better than the movie!
(Try her other books, too!)
The Canning Season, Horvath.
National Book Award
Winner. Ratchet
Dragon's Gate, Yep.
Teenage Chinese boy
lives with his mother while his uncle and father go to
Echohawk, Durrant.
A boy raised by Mohicans in the 1730's is sent to an English settlement for schooling.
George Washington, Spymaster: How the Americans Outspied the British and Won the Revolutionary Wary, Allen.
A concise narrative traces Washington's use of spies and makes a convincing case for the role that espionage played in defeating the British. Full of details about invisible ink, codes and double agents, the discussion often draws parallels between 18th c deceptions and the methods and vocabulary of modern espionage.
The Golden Compass,
Lyra and her daemon. Part of a trilogy.
Gold Dust, Lynch.
Baseball, friendship.
Granny Torrelli Makes Soup, Creech.
Granny helps Rosie work out problems with a friend.
(A wonderful author of many books.)
Habibi, Nye.
Arab-American girl
moves from US to
Handbook for Boys: a Novel, Myers.
16-year-old Jimmy,
on probation for assault, talks about life with three old men in a
Homeless Bird, Whelan.
An arranged
marriage in
Hoot, Hiaasen.
Funny story of a
boy trying to save a colony of owls in
House of Scorpion, Farmer.
Newbery Honor Book, National Book Award Winner.
Kira-Kira, Kadohata.
Japanese family
trying to adjust to small town in rural
Kit's Wilderness, Almond.
Ghosts of the past
haunt a coal mining town in
Lily's Crossing, Giff.
Summer in 1940's in
Looking for Alaska, Green.
16-year-old Miles' first year at Culver Creek Prep School in Alabama includes good friends and great pranks, but is defined by the search for answers about life and death after a fatal car crash. Printz award winner.
Make Lemonade, Wolf.
14-year-old LaVaughn babysits for two children of a teenage mom.
A Northern Light, Donnelly.
In 1906, 16-year-old Mattie, determined to attend college and be a writer against the wishes of her father and fiance, takes a job at a summer inn where she discovers the truth about the death of a guest. Based on a true story. Printz Honor winner.
Red Scarf Girl: a Memoir of the Cultural Revolution , Jiang.
The author's frightening first-hand account of China's cultural revolution from 1966-1969.
Redwall, Jacques.
Part of a great series.
Red Sky at Morning, Bradford.
Classic coming-of-age story set during WWII. A wonderful book.
A Single Shard, Park.
13-year-old Korean orphan longs to learn how to throw celadon ceramics.
Speak,
A traumatic summer event has devastating effects on a girl's freshman year in H.S.
Surviving the Applewhites, Tolan.
Newbery Honor Book. Jake gets kicked out of school and must be homeschooled by the eccentric Applewhites.
Time and Again, Finney.
Transported from the mid-20th c. to NYC in 1882, Si Morley walks the fashionable "Ladies' Mile" of Broadway, is enchanted by the jingling sleigh bells in Central Park, and solves a 20th-c mystery by discovering its 19th c. roots. Falling in love with a beautiful young woman, he ultimately finds himself forced to choose between his lives in the present and the past.
Whirligig, Fleischman.
Brent makes a fatal mistake and is sent on a journey of repentance.
A Wrinkle in Time, L'Engle.
A classic.
The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, Brashares.
Thrift shop pants hold seemingly magical qualities. A short series.
Ender's Game, Card.
With the use of games, Ender must save the planet.
The Chocolate War, Cormier.
Jerry Renault, high school student, must decide whether to challenge the authorities.
(Check out the other books by this wonderful author.)
Silent to the Bone, Konigsburg.
Why is Bramwell unable to speak?
(Another great author. Try her other books, too.)
Our Eleanor, Fleming.
Get to know Eleanor Roosevelt.
Uglies, Westerfeld.
In a future where everyone is Pretty, Tally Youngblood must betray her best friend to the government or stay Ugly forever. A series.
Girls for Breakfast, Yoo.
Graduating senior Nick Park can't understand why girls have never liked him as much as he has liked them. Is it because he's Korean?
Travel Team, Lupica.
Sports, kids, life. One of several good books by this author.
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, Smith.
The American masterpiece of a young girl's coming of age and beginnings of wisdom in turn-of-the-century New York. A wonderful, moving story.
A Wizard of Earthsea, LeGuin.
First book of the Earthsea Trilogy.
How I Live Now, Rosoff.
15-year-old Daisy is sent from Manhattan to England to visit her aunt and cousins. Her aunt goes away on business shortly after Daisy arrives. The next day, bombs go off as London is attacked and occupied by an unnamed enemy. War is everywhere and Daisy and cousins must lead each other into a world that is unknown in the scariest, most elemental way. Printz award winner.
Poetry:
The Flag of
Childhood:
Poems from the
Girl Coming in for a Landing: a Novel in Poems, Wayland.
Heart to Heart: New Poems Inspired by 20th Century American Art, Greenberg.
Love That Dog, Creech.
Witness, Hesse.
Inch by Inch: 45 Haiku by Issa
I Am the Darker Brother: an Anthology of Modern Poems by African Americans, Adoff.
Motion: American Sports Poems, Blaustein.
Cool Salsa:
Bilingual Poems on Growing Up Latino in the
The World According to Dog: Poems and Teen Voices, Sidman.
The Pain Tree and Other Teenage Angst-Ridden Poetry, Watson and Todd.
Movin': Ten Poets Take Voice, edited by Dave Johnson.
What Have You Lost? Poems selected by Naomi Shihab Nye.
SlowDance
HeartBreak Blues,
by