My Life with the Lincolns

Twelve-year-old Mina Edelman is convinced that her family members are the Lincolns reincarnate, and she has many coincidences to back her up, such as their Illinois roots, her father’s initials (A.B.E.), and her instinctual preoccupation to protect him from potential assassination. Belief in civil rights is another link, and in this summer of 1966, the news is all about Martin Luther King Jr.’s leadership of the Chicago Freedom Movement in a housing campaign, with which A.B.E., a well-meaning if sometimes awkward suburban furniture salesman, and Mina become deeply involved. Vietnam, interracial dating, machine politics, parental separation, a mass murder, and puberty are also part of the story, which includes some racially derogatory language.

As Easy as Falling off the Face of the Earth by Lynne Rae Perkins

A teenaged boy encounters one calamity after another when his train strands him in the middle of nowhere.

Yours Truly, Lucy B. Parker by Robin Palmer

Sixth grade is hard enough for Lucy B. Parker, but it gets so much worse when her mom announces that she’s going to marry Laurel Moses’s dad. Yes, that Laurel Moses—the TV-movie-music star who makes Hannah Montana look like some random kid from the sticks. Suddenly, Lucy’s life is turned upside down and sideways. All Lucy wants to do is get through the day without totally embarrassing herself too much, but that’s hard to do when you’re the less-pretty, less-talented not-quite sister of a mega superstar.

Lynn Visible by Julia DeVillers

For ninth-grader Lynn Vincent, creating her own festive, funky ensembles has always been a source of fun and self-expression, even though she is often ridiculed, especially by a trendy mean girl, Chasey. When one of her shoe creations unexpectedly catches famous designer Valentyna’s eye, Lynn is chosen as the first “It Girl” for a new online teen-trend magazine. Soon everyone wants to be her friend, and Lynn even gets a marketing offer for national distribution. Issues arise when her creations become mainstream and Lynn must determine what’s right—for her.

Dream of Night by Heather Henson

Once Dream of Night was a champion racehorse, but by the time Jess DiLima gets him he's nearly dead from starvation and pneumonia, and his thin hide is covered in scars. Twelve-year-old Shiloh is scarred, too, both from physical abuse and from the emotional withering of years in foster care. Jess doesn't feel up to the challenge of either one of them, but she knows that she may represent their last chance. Their story is told in third-person, present-tense narration that shifts its focus among the three principals: Jess, Shiloh and Night. WARNING: the scenes and flashbacks of abuse are realistically graphic.

Lies: A Gone Novel by Michael Grant

In this book for older readers, all the grown-ups disappear. They're gone, and the young residents of the FAYZ face ominous new threats, including a death-obsessed cult leader and the resurrection of a buried girl.They say that death is a way to escape. Conditions are worse than ever and kids are desperate to get out. But are they desperate enough to believe that death will set them free? This story picks up shortly after the world-changing events of Gone (2008) and Hunger (2009).

Sports Camp by Rich Wallace

Riley feels like the smallest kid at sports camp. In fact, he is. He just turned eleven in April, but most kids here are twelve, and a few are even thirteen—and gigantic. It’s hard enough for a shrimp like Riley to fit in. He just doesn’t want to be the weak link as his bunk competes for the Camp Olympia Trophy.Riley knows he’s no good at strength and accuracy games like basketball and softball. But when it comes to speed and endurance events, like running and swimming, he’s better than he looks. He’s pretty sure he can place in the top ten—and bring in major trophy points—in the final mile-long swim race across Lake Surprise. But he doesn’t count on being followed by the shadow of Big Joe, the giant vicious snapping turtle of camp lore. Wasn’t that supposed to be a legend?

The Dark Days of Hamburger Halpin by Josh Berk

In this book for older readers, Will Halpin has ditched his former "deaf school" and is now trying to merge into the auditory-able mainstream at Carbon High in eastern Pennsylvania. As the new, overweight kid who has to sit off to the side during classes so he can try to read the lips of both his teachers and his classmates, Will downsizes his social expectations and retreats back into the soundless cocoon of his own skull, but he is always observing, He monitors the school bus mirror and pieces together what all the cool kids are talking about. Most, Will discovers, are focused on being invited to an exclusive party being thrown by popular jock Pat. But Pat dies during a field trip to a defunct coal mine, under and Will reluctantly accepts the unsettlingly friendly overtures of a classmate bent on enlisting him as a partner in amateur sleuthing.

This Means War! by Ellen Wittlinger

In 1962, during the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis, fifth-grader Juliet lives near a growing military base, which has brought in an influx of new kids, including the rowdy Patsy. It’s a good thing, too, because Juliet’s longtime pal Lowell has abandoned her to hang out with boys, including the overgrown bully, Bruce. This division turns into an all-out battle of the sexes when Bruce devises a nine-day competition that tests the strength and bravery of girls versus boys. These increasingly dangerous tests (entering a dog pen, shoplifting) bring most of the children closer together, though for Patsy and Bruce, they only escalate the conflict.

The Cinderella Story by Kay Cassidy

Sixteen-year-old Jess Parker survives by staying invisible. After nine schools in ten years, she's come to terms with life as a perpetual new girl, neither popular nor outcast. At Mt. Sterling High, Jess gets the chance of a lifetime: an invitation to join The Cinderella Society, a secret club of the most popular girls in school, where makeovers are the first order of official business. But there's more to being a Cindy than just reinventing yourself from the outside, a concept lost on Jess as she dives tiara-first into creating a hot new look.With a date with her popular crush and a chance to finally fit in, Jess's life seems to be a perfect fairy tale. That is until the Wickeds--led by Jess's archenemy--begin targeting innocent girls in their war against the Cindys, and Jess discovers her new sisterhood is about much more than who rules Mt. Sterling High School. It's a centuries-old battle of good vs. evil, and the Cindys need Jess on special assignment. But when the mission threatens to destroy her new dream life, Jess is forced to choose between this dream realized and honoring the Sisterhood. What's a girl to do when the glass slipper fits, but she doesn't want to wear it anymore?

The Private Thoughts of Amelia E. Rye

“All a person needs in life is one true friend.” So says Grandpa Thomas, the only member of Amelia’s family who cares about her one bit. That true friend finally arrives when Fancy Nelson, the first Negro kid Amelia has ever seen in person, walks into her fourth grade classroom. As Fancy’s special sort of magic rubs off on Amelia, she slowly comes to understand her trainwreck family and her place in it—and Fancy discovers a surprising secret about her own past.

Three Rivers Rising: A Novel of the Johnstown Flood by Jame Richards

Sixteen-Year-Old Celstia spends every summer with her family at the elite resort at Lake Conemaugh, a shimmering Allegheny Mountain reservoir held in place by an earthen dam. Tired of the society crowd, Celestia prefers to swim and fish with Peter, the hotel’s hired boy. It’s a friendship she must keep secret, and when companionship turns to romance, it’s a love that could get Celestia disowned. These affairs of the heart become all the more wrenching on a single, tragic day in May, 1889. After days of heavy rain, the dam fails, unleashing 20 million tons of water onto Johnstown, Pennsylvania, in the valley below. The town where Peter lives with his father. The town where Celestia has just arrived to join him. This searing novel in poems explores a cross-class romance—and a tragic event in U. S. history.

The Last Best Days of Summer by Valeria Hobbs

For twelve-year-old Lucy Crandall, the last week of August is the most perfect time in the world. It’s the week she gets to spend with Grams at the lake house, canoeing, baking cookies, and glazing pots in Grams’s potting shed. Grams has a way of making Lucy feel centered, like one of the pots on her kick wheel—perfect, steady, and completely at peace. But this summer, Grams doesn’t seem to be exactly the person she once was. And as the week turns into a roller coaster of surprises—some good, some awful—Lucy can’t help but wonder: Will things ever be centered again?

Brightly Woven Alexandra Bracken

When Wayland North brings rain to a region that's been dry for over ten years, he's promised anything he'd like as a reward. He chooses the village elder's daughter, sixteen-year-old Sydelle Mirabel, who is a skilled weaver and has an unusual knack for repairing his magical cloaks. Though Sydelle has dreamt of escaping her home, she's hurt that her parents relinquish her so freely and finds herself awed and afraid of the slightly ragtag wizard who is unlike any of the men of magic in the tales she's heard. Still, she is drawn to this mysterious man who is fiercely protective of her and so reluctant to share his own past. The pair rushes toward the capital, intent to stop an imminent war, pursued by Reuel Dorwan (a dark wizard who has taken a keen interest in Sydelle) and plagued by unusually wild weather. But the sudden earthquakes and freak snowstorms may not be a coincidence. As Sydelle discovers North's dark secret and the reason for his interest in her and learns to master her own mysterious power, it becomes increasingly clear that the fate of the kingdom rests in her fingertips. She will either be a savior, weaving together the frayed bonds between Saldorra and Auster, or the disastrous force that destroys both kingdoms forever.

Alchemy and Meggy Swann by Karen Cushman

In this story of the time of the first Queen Elizabeth, feisty Meggy is sent from her mother’s village to live in London with the father she has never known. She struggles with his disappointment when they meet - not only lame, she is not the son he had expected. Initially, Meggy finds the city a horrible place, but slowly she begins to change her mind after making a few friends and helping her father a little with his alchemy work. When she learns that he has sold arsenic to men who intend to poison their master, she frantically seeks a way to save both the man from his murderers and her father from the law.

Good Fortune by Noni Carter

In this book for older readers, Ayanna Bahati is brutally kidnapped from her African village and shipped to America where she struggles to come to terms with her new life as a slave. Rising from the cotton fields to her master's house, Anna is threatened by the increasingly dangerous world of the plantation. Risking everything, she escapes and makes her way north to freedom and an education, but can she shed the chains of her harrowing past to live the life she has longed for?

The Celestial Globe by Maie Rutkowski

When Prince Rodolfo's monsters attack her, Petra Kronos is spirited away to London. As she struggles to escape, Neel and Tomik sail the high seas, in search of her. Though separated by many miles, the three friends draw closer together in this sequel to The Cabinet of Wonders. This is an adventure-filled novel that includes man-made monsters, the unraveling of a murder mystery, and the hunt for the Celestial Globe, which the prince of Bohemia will do anything to own.

Willowood by Cecilia Galante

There's nothing ten-year-old Lily Sinclair likes about her new life in the city with her single mom. She misses her best friend, who seems to have forgotten her and their secret place, Willowood. She never sees her mom, who's working long hours at her new job. She's managed to make an enemy of the class bully. Mrs. Hiller from across the hall, who takes care of Lily after school, keeps preparing yucky healthy snacks for her. And she can't get her mother to tell her anything about her absent father. Her only source of comfort is her beloved pet gecko, Weemis. Everything changes when Mrs. Hiller introduces Lily to the owner of the Pet Palace, a nearby pet store, and his adult Down's syndrome son, Nate Lily finds herself with an unofficial after school job--and forges a tentative friendship with Nate that's threatened by a dark secret about Nate Lily knows nothing about.

The Red Pyramid by Rick Riordan

This is the first book of the new Kane Chronicles. Brilliant Egyptologist Dr. Julius Kane accidentally unleashes the Egyptian god Set, who banishes the doctor to oblivion and forces his two children to embark on a dangerous journey, bringing them closer to the truth about their family and its links to a secret order that has existed since the time of the pharoahs.

Mockingbird by Kathryn Erskine

Ten-year-old Caitlyn hates recess, with all its noise and chaos. Her counselor, Mrs. Brook, helps her to understand the reasons behind her discomfort and offers advice about how to cope with her Asberger’s Syndrome, make friends, and deal with her grief over her older brother’s death in a recent school shooting.

A Nest for Celeste: A Story About Art, Inspiration, and the Meaning of Home by Henry Cole

Celeste is not your average mouse. She lives alone, quietly weaving baskets under the floor boards of the Oakley Plantation. However, Celeste’s world turns upside down with the arrival of the great naturalist John James Audubon and his assistant Joseph, who have come to study and paint the birds of the Louisiana bayou. Their arrival coincides with Celeste’s sudden displacement from her home below to a guest room upstairs. There she watches young Joseph struggle to create the backgrounds for Audubon’s bird paintings. As the two homesick souls strike up a friendship, the mouse secretly puts her artistic skills to good use; she simultaneously helps Joseph improve his compositions while aiding the wounded birds that Audubon captures for his studies.

Rivals by Tim Green

In this sequel to Baseball Great, 12-year-old Josh LeBlanc has his hands full as he tries to lead his team to victory in the Hall of Fame National Championship Tournament. As a consequence of being purposely beaned in an early-round game, he has to have eye surgery; he is briefly detained after sneaking into the Hall of Fame with his buddy Benji; he thinks he's losing his sort-of girlfriend to the handsome son of a former major league star; and he is interviewed on national TV by legendary announcer Bob Costas. He uncovers a plot on the part of the former major leaguer to fix the games in the tournament and makes an escape by motorboat from a crooked, shotgun-wielding umpire, all the while performing on the field at a nearly superhuman level.

Finally by Wendy Mass

Rory has a list of things she longs to do when she turns 12: stay home alone, shave her legs, babysit, wear makeup, drink coffee . . . So overprotected that she has never ridden in the front seat of a car, Rory can’t wait for her birthday. But those long-anticipated experiences bring some disconcerting surprises.

We the Children (Benjamin Pratt & the Keepers of the School series by Andrew Clements

Sixth-grader Benjamin Pratt is weathering a few storms. His parents have just split up, his school--a landmark in his old New England sailing town--is about to be torn down, and the janitor sneaks him a mysterious gold coin...hours before he dies unexpectedly. The coin, of course, brings Ben and his friend Jill adventures as they try to preserve their school.

The Night Fairy by Laura Amy Schlitz

A bat mistakes Flory, a young fairy, for a moth and crunches up her wings. Falling into a beautiful garden, she lands in a cherry tree and makes her home there. As egocentric as any young child, Flory is sensitive mostly to her own needs and emotions until a series of experiences challenge her assumptions and awaken new feelings within her. When she finds a hummingbird trapped in a spider’s web, she resolves to save the bird, but the task becomes increasingly complex and dangerous.

One Crazy Summer by Rita Williams-Garcia

It is 1968, and three black sisters from Brooklyn have been put on a plane by their father to spend a month with their mother, a poet who ran off years before and is living in Oakland, California. It's the summer after Black Panther founder Huey Newton was jailed and member Bobby Hutton was gunned down trying to surrender to the Oakland police, and there are men in berets shouting "Black Power" on the news. Delphine, 11, remembers her mother, but has heard her grandmother say that her mother is a selfish, crazy woman who sleeps on the street. She and her sisters have a summer like one they never expected.

Mising in Action by Dean Hughes

After his father enlisted during World War II, Jay moved with his mother to her small Utah hometown. After Dad goes missing in action, Jay holds out hope for his return and fantasizes that he must have been a war hero. This wishful thinking helps to prop Jay up against taunting from local boys, who seize on anything or anyone different, such as Jay’s Navajo background or the nearby Topaz internment camp, full of guys who want to get back to California to help the Japs from Japan drop bombs on us. Jay befriends Ken, a Topaz resident doing farm work for his grandfather, and comes face-to-face with some harsh family truths.

The Birthday Ball by Lois Lowry

Princess Patricia Priscilla will soon be 16, marrying age in her kingdom. A birthday ball is planned where suitors will woo her. The very bored princess knows that once she is married, she will not have much freedom, so she swaps clothes with her chambermaid to spend the week as a peasant girl attending the village school. There she meets the handsome, sweetly smart schoolteacher. Meanwhile, the suitors, each awful in his own way, prepare for the ball, as do the princess's parents: the hard-of-hearing queen and the easily distracted king. This is not a kingdom in which royalty is feared; the princess is playful and smart and her servants are cheerful and curious. Everyone is hardworking and upbeat. The princess has a cat named Delicious to whom she always speaks teasingly. For example, when she eyes some birds, the princess tells her, "Don't be malicious, Delicious."

The Total Tragedy of a Girl Named Hamlet by Erin Dionne

Hamlet Kennedy just wants to be your average, happy, vanilla eighth grader. But with Shakespearean scholar parents who dress in Elizabethan regalia and generally go about in public as if it were the sixteenth century, that’s not terribly easy. It gets worse when they decide that Hamlet’s genius sevenyear- old sister will attend middle school with her— and even worse when the Shakespeare project is announced and her sister is named the new math tutor. By the time an in-class recitation reveals that our heroine is an extraordinary Shakespearean actress, Hamlet can no longer hide from the fact that she—like her family—is anything but average.

They Never Came Back by Caroline B. Cooney

Five years ago, 10-year-old Murielle Lyman's wealthy mother and father fled the country after being accused of embezzlement, and their plans to take her with them fell through. Now 15, going by the name Cathy Ferris and living with a kind foster family, she starts summer school in her old tony hometown of Greenwich, CT, hoping to get news of her parents and possibly reconnect with her extended family. But she never expected that her cousin Tommy would recognize her, or that the FBI agent assigned to their case would reappear and want to use her as bait to catch her parents.

Dizzy in Your Eyes: Poems About Love by Pat Mora

A collection of poems written in various forms, each narrated in a different teen voice. According to the author's note, Mora envisioned the flow of the poems as that of a symphony with four movements—an opening focus on love's initial rush, followed by a few bumps in the road, healing after loss of love, and finally the joy of finding new love. Peppered with Spanish, the selections define the love in countless ways.

Lone Wolf (Wolves of Beyond series) by Kathryn Lasky

A wolf pup is left to die by his pack because his malformed foot is considered bad luck. A grizzly bear, Thunderheart, whose cubs have been killed, rescues Faolan and nurtures him until her accidental death. As the young wolf continues on alone, he discovers "the Cave Before Time" with wall paintings portraying the history of the wolves and realizes that he must return to his own kind and learn their ways.

The Batboy by Mike Lupica

After Brian Dudley lands his dream job as a batboy for the Detroit Tigers, he is disappointed when his hero, Hank Bishop, who has been given a final chance by the Tigers after a steroid scandal, proves to be uncommunicative and even hostile. Brian’s parents are divorced, and communication with his dad, an ex–major league pitcher who is working as a coach in Japan, is also difficult. Despite Brian’s efforts to reach out, his father doesn’t respond to e-mails or letters. Brian tries to win over both Hank and his dad.

Crunch by Leslie Connor

Dewey Marriss is stuck in the middle of a crunch.

He never guessed that the gas pumps would run dry the same week he promised to manage the family's bicycle-repair business. Suddenly everyone needs a bike. And nobody wants to wait.

Meanwhile, the crunch has stranded Dewey's parents far up north with an empty fuel tank and no way home. It's up to Dewey and his older sister, Lil, to look after their younger siblings and run the bike shop all on their own.

Each day Dewey and his siblings feel their parents' absence more and more. The Marriss Bike Barn is busier than ever. And just when he is starting to feel crunched himself, Dewey discovers that bike parts are missing from the shop. He's sure he knows who's responsible—or does he? Will exposing the thief only make more trouble for Dewey and his siblings?

The Sixty-Eight Rooms by Marianne Malone

Ruthie thinks nothing exciting will every happen to her until her sixth-grade class visits the Art Institute of Chicago, where she and her best friend Jack discover a magic key that shrinks them to the size of gerbils and allows them to explore the Thorne Rooms-the collection of sixty-eight miniature room decorated for different times and places.

The Dreamer by Pam Munoz Ryan

Neftalí Reyes, who became Pablo Neruda, the great Chilean poet, was born to a domineering father, who wanted his sons to be strong and powerful. But Neftalí and his older brother, Rodolfo, are more interested in books and music than math and business. Neftalí is shy and unsure of himself and feels most at home surrounded by nature or the many interesting objects he collects, like shiny keys, feathers and beautiful stones. His head is full of stories, and he is entranced by the rhythmic sounds of the forests, rivers and jungles. As he grows up, inspired by his uncle, a progressive journalist and activist on behalf of the native Mapuche, Neftalí finds his voice and strength in the written word --- first in political essays and finally in poetry.

This is the fictionalized biography of Neruda's life.

The Mysterious Howling by Maryrose Wood (The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place series)

Found running wild in the forest of Ashton Place, the Incorrigibles are no ordinary children: Alexander, age ten or thereabouts, keeps his siblings in line with gentle nips; Cassiopeia, perhaps four or five, has a bark that is (usually) worse than her bite; and Beowulf, age somewhere-in-the-middle, is alarmingly adept at chasing squirrels. Luckily, Miss Penelope Lumley is no ordinary governess. Only fifteen years old and a recent graduate of the Swanburne Academy for Poor Bright Females, Penelope embraces the challenge of her new position.

Mysteries abound at Ashton Place: Who are the three wild creatures, and how did they come to live in the vast forests of the estate? Why does Old Timothy, the coachman, lurk around every corner? Will Penelope be able to teach the Incorrigibles table manners and socially useful phrases in time for Lady Constance's holiday ball? And what on earth is a schottische?

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Ashes by Kathryn Lasky

In 1932 Berlin, 13-year-old Gaby Schramm witnesses the beginning of Hitler's rise to power, as soldiers become ubiquitous, her beloved literature teacher starts wearing a jewelled swastika pin, and the family's dear friend, Albert Einstein, leaves the country while Gaby's parents secretly bury his books and papers in their small yard.

Drizzle by Kathleen Van Cleve

When drought threatens her family's rhubarb farm, 11-year-old Polly tries to find a way to make it rain again by learning the magical secrets of the farm. 358 pages.

Falling In by Frances O'Roark Dowell

Middle-schooler Isabelle Bean follows a mouse's squeak into a closet in the principal's office and falls into a parallel universe. The children there believe she is the witch who has come to devour them. 245 pages.

Woods Runner by Gary Paulsen

Summary: From his 1776 Pennsylvania homestead, thirteen-year-old Samuel, a highly-skilled woodsman, sets out toward New York City to rescue his parents from the band of British soldiers and Indians who kidnapped them after slaughtering most of their community. 164 pgs.