The Death of Jayson Porter

Author	Paul B. Janeczko
ISBN	0763622354

In his first full-length poetic work, celebrated poetry anthologist Paul B. Janeczko creates a stirring fictional account of the 1944 Hartford circus fire.

One summer afternoon in 1944, hundreds of circus lovers crowded under the big top in Hartford, Connecticut, breathlessly waiting...

Author	Steven Herrick
ISBN	1741751292

Opening Sentence: “…They named me Eddie after Mum’s father who died before I was born…”
Eddie Holding lives with his family on the edge of Burruga in NSW Australia. Burruga is a coal mining town and Eddie yearns to leave school and start work down the in the mine. His father, Albert, has...

Author	Thalia Chaltas
ISBN	0670011991

Home is supposed to be a place you belong. It's supposed to be parents who are there and siblings who bug you and a life that feels comfortable. It's not supposed to be an absentee mother or a drowned sister. But that's Vera's reality, and she can't stand it anymore. So she runs. She ends up in an old mining...

Author	Alma Fullerton
ISBN	0060778512

Your mother's suicide attempt has left her in a coma from which she's never waking up. You know that she wouldn't want to live like this, but could you really help her die? Here you are, making the hardest decision of your life and there's no one to help you: Your father has disappeared into depression. Your...

Author

Terri Fields

A look at the effects of one girl's suicide on her high school

"I can feel
The whispering of the hallway walls
Growing louder as the groups gather.
Each clique adding to its morning input.

"Did you hear?"
"Who told you?"
"Do you think it's really true?"

New...

Author

Carole Boston Weatherford

Before the legend of Billie Holiday, there was a girl named Eleanora. In 1915, Sadie Fagan gave birth to a daughter she named Eleanora. The world, however, would know her as Billie Holiday, possibly the greatest jazz singer of all time. Eleanora's journey into legend took her through pain, poverty,...

Author	Marlene Carvell
ISBN	0525475478

In prose poetry and alternating voices, Marlene Carvell weaves a heartbreakingly beautiful story based on the real-life experiences of Native American children. Mattie and Sarah are two Mohawk sisters who are sent to an off-reservation school after the death of their mother. Subject to intimidation...

Author	Allan Wolf
ISBN	0763628581

A coming-of-age road story with a supernatural twist — and a compulsively readable poetic novel about identity and belonging.

Zane Guesswind has just killed his grandfather, or so he believes. So he steals the 1969 Plymouth Barracuda his long-gone father left behind and takes off on a manic...

Author	Hope Anita Smith
ISBN	0805072020

So many unanswered questions weigh down thirteen-year-old C.J. as he struggles to understand why his father walked out. His father is back now, though C.J. is not as quick to forgive as the other members of his family. He still feels the weight of responsibility that fell on his shoulders when Daddy was...

Author	Susan Taylor Brown
ISBN	1582461805

When her mom runs away from home, Rachel is left behind with her emotionally distant father and many questions she cannot answer. Over time, she learns the truth about her mom. But it's only when she learns the truth about her dad, the rock- immoveable and always there for her to lean on-that Rachel can...

Author	Mel Glenn
ISBN	0060004819

Everyone has an image of Laura Li, the most popular girl in school: “stone hearted,” “warmhearted,” “conceited deceiver,” “humble achiever,” “a virgin,” “the hottest girl in the world.”

Award-winning poet Mel Glenn weaves a brilliant web of authentic voices...

Author	Walter Dean Myers
ISBN	0385321384

WALTER DEAN MYERS returns to the world of 145th Street: Short Stories to show how love can be found, and thrive, in the most unlikely places. Curtis finds love in Iraq as he struggles to stay alive in a war he doesn't want to fight, and Letha discovers her own beauty in the love of her child. There is the "good...

Author	Robin Bowman
ISBN	1884167691

Robin Bowman’s five-year journey into the heart of teenage America created a series of 414 “collaborative portraits,” wherein she shares her discoveries of a generation now coming of age. In searing and intimate photographs, presented alongside the young people’s voices of passion, pride,...

Author	Jen Bryant
ISBN	0375827528

Imagine you are Bruno Richard Hauptmann, accused of murdering the son of the most famous man in America.

In a compelling, immediate voice, 12-year-old Katie Leigh Flynn takes us inside the courtroom of the most widely publicized criminal case of the 20th century: the kidnapping and murder...

Author	Tracie Vaughn Zimmer
ISBN	0618618678

JoEllen’s parents divorced when she was very young, so she was used to splitting her time between them, shuttling four blocks from one Cincinnati apartment to another. But when her dad moved to the old family farm last year, her life was suddenly divided. Now on weekdays she’s a city girl, called...

Author	G. Neri
ISBN	1584302798

Three moves is all it takes to change the outcome of the game.

In Marcus's world, battles are fought everyday on the street, at home, and in school. Angered by his sister's death and his father's absence, and pushed to the brink by a bullying classmate, Marcus fights back with his fists.

One...

Author	Phil Earle
ISBN	0141331356

Being Billy is the award-winning first novel by Phil Earle.

***Heroic, Phil Earle's hugely anticipated third novel is out on 24 April 2013***

Faces flashed before my eyes.
And for every face there was a time that they had let me down.
Each punch that landed was revenge, my chance...

Author	Jessica Blank
ISBN	1423106423

Why would anyone choose to live on the streets? There is Eeyore, just twelve years old when she runs away from her priveleged home, harboring a secret she's too ashamed to tell anyone. Rusty is a sensitive gay teen who winds up alone when his older boyfriend ditches him in Hollywood. Squid has gone through...

Author	Jorja Leap
ISBN	0807044563

When Jorja Leap began studying Los Angeles gang violence in 2002, she encountered a myriad of proposed solutions to the seemingly intractable “gang problem” and set out to discover what was really going on. The stakes—then and now—could not be higher: a child or teenager is killed by gunfire...

Author	Patrick Jones
ISBN	0802780776

The nail that sticks out farthest gets hammered the hardest.

Flint Southwestern High School is run by a cult: the jockarchy. And Bret Hendricks could never fit into their conformity cult. Bret doesn't mind standing out from the crowd when he's on stage acting or singing in his band. And he feels...

Author

Sharon G. Flake

This collection of original stories and poems provides rare insight into the minds of adolescent African American boys. There's Tow-Kaye, getting married at age seventeen to the love of his life, who's pregnant. James writes in his diary about his twin brother's terrible secret, while Tyler explains...

Author	Valerie Sherrard
ISBN	1554552451

“There are rules for what I’ve done.  Specific punishments for crimes against friendship.” Laren Olivier knows the rules, but her attraction to a friend’s ex-boyfriend is strong.  She tells herself that if she and Scott can keep their new romance a secret, no one will get hurt.  But Laren...