Young Adult

I have a philosophy about helping struggling boys to read: when in doubt, hand them a Gary Soto novel. This collection of stories for upper elementary and middle school boys deals with the every day issues they face – and adults are too often embarrassed to discuss.

Great for teaching about propaganda and current events, this book chronicles the adventures of Luke, the third child born in a society where families are only permitted to have two children.

One of my favorite crime writers, Parker has finally written a book to introduce young adults to his crafty storytelling. Set in his hometown on the Massachusetts coast right after World War II, fourteen-year-old Bobby deals with typical adolescence issues: puberty, basketball and mystery. Particularly good book for reluctant boy readers.

A teenager witnesses a murder and is given a pill to forget the whole event. Everything would have been fine – if she took the pill. Instead, Norah and a classmate try to figure out the real story, and your middle school students will love the suspense that ensues. Smibert’s book reads like an Orwellian tale.

After a terrible accident, Eva wakes up to find she has been given the body of a chimpanzee. Intrigued yet?

In this, the second Emma Dilemma chapter book, Emma’s dilemma is that the nanny that she loves, Annie, is going away to Ireland for three weeks. Emma and her siblings fear Annie will not return, so they are determined to make life “interesting” for Annie’s substitute. Funny and very easy to read.

Too proud to work fast food, two star basketball buddies, one black and the other white, wound a victim in a robbery to earn extra cash, then wait for the authorities to track them down. What is so interesting to teen readers is the different treatment the two boys receive, making this a great classroom fodder.

Arguably the best of the Sherlock Holmes stories, there is no denying that this is a classic mystery. When I say “classic” in reference to someone like Doyle, though, it is to acknowledge his genius. This is not one of the dry texts that usually pop up on required reading lists at middle schools. Kids that read Doyle’s books usually wind up becoming avid readers, as opposed to kids that are forced to read other dreary things. Do you think I was scarred by a traumatic reading experience in middle school? You betcha, and I did not regain the fun reading habit until I was a junior in college.

Beto says it’s art; the police say it’s graffiti. So when Beto moves to Utah and stumbles upon cave drawings, he is surprised to learn that ancient graffiti is considered art. It is up to Beto to protect the cave drawings from thieves in this intriguing beginning chapter book.

I’ve been on a roll lately, as it seems like every book I pick turns out to be amazing. Thus is the case with Angela Johnson’s riveting story of a 14-year-old girl who discovers her family is not exactly as it seems. Perfect book for discussing the differences in 21^st century families. Who’s to say what a family is supposed to look like? A book that will stick with you days later.

Wow! Yeah, this is the kind of book I would have liked to read when I was a teenage boy. Haugaard immerses the reader in 16^th century Japan. There, the young protagonist Taro (an orphan – of course!) serves the great warlord Takeda and avenges the death of his family. Boys can read this book faster than the Nestle Quik bunny downs a glass of chocolate milk.

For those who often complain of not enough stories with strong female protagonists, I give you Joan Aiken. She has the rare gift of creating tales that girls and boys can appreciate, and all of her books fly off bookcases once teachers and parents treat their children to this first tale of misery, suspense and adventure. A fantastic book.

Subtitled “The Mostly True Story of a Former Bully,” hip hop star 50 Cent’s debut young adult novel makes a great classroom discussion starter about the all-too-prevalent bullying that occurs in schools.

Very popular series with girls. Easy to read and entertaining…a great way to get a lot of disengaged girl readers excited about reading.

Subtitled “Poems of the Terezin Ghetto,” Janeczko – who has written all sorts of wonderful books for teachers to inspire a love of poetry in their students – creates moving first-person accounts of Jews incarcerated in the infamous Czech concentration camp for “artistic” Jews. Good poetry is meant to be read aloud, and this book is the impetus for wonderful classroom lessons about tolerance and humanity gone awry in world history.