Summer Reading

Mixing poetry, photography, and inspiring stories from athletes and other role models, this book shares life lessons and advice for overcoming obstacles.

*A Cultural Awareness Selection*

This is NOT a history book.
This is a book about the here and now.
A book to help us better understand why we are where we are.
A book about race.

Through a gripping, fast-paced, and energizing narrative written by beloved award-winner Jason Reynolds, this book shines a light on the many insidious forms of racist ideas--and on ways readers can identify and stamp out racist thoughts in their daily lives.

Magic can save you.
Magic can kill you.

Students at the Magisterium are supposed to be safe. Under the watchful eyes of the mages, they are taught to use magic to bring order to a chaotic world.

But now the chaos is fighting back. Call, Tamara, and Aaron should be worrying about things like pop quizzes and magic contests. Instead, after the shocking death of one of their classmates, they must track down a sinister killer… and risk their own lives in the process.

*A Cultural Awareness Selection*

Gene Yang, American Born Chinese tells the story of three apparently unrelated characters: Jin Wang, who moves to a new neighborhood with his family only to discover that he's the only Chinese-American student at his new school; the powerful Monkey King, subject of one of the oldest and greatest Chinese fables; and Chin-Kee, a personification of the ultimate negative Chinese stereotype, who is ruining his cousin Danny's life with his yearly visits. Their lives and stories come together with an unexpected twist in this action-packed modern fable. American Born Chinese is an amazing ride, all the way up to the astonishing climax.

This elegantly written verse novel tells the story of real-life activist Sophie Scholl, her siblings, and friends, as they work together to resist and bring down the Nazi regime. The dangers they face and the brutal punishment they endure result in a compelling read that resonates today.

Ronan Lynch is a dreamer. He can pull both curiosities and catastrophes out of his dreams and into his compromised reality.Jordan Hennessy is a thief. The closer she comes to the dream object she is after, the more inextricably she becomes tied to it.Carmen Farooq-Lane is a hunter. Her brother was a dreamer . . . and a killer. She has seen what dreaming can do to a person. And she has seen the damage that dreamers can do. But that is nothing compared to the destruction that is about to be unleashed. . .

For generations, the Seven Prophets guided humanity. Using their visions of the future, they ended wars and united nations―until the day, one hundred years ago, when the Prophets disappeared.
All they left behind was one final, secret prophecy, foretelling an Age of Darkness and the birth of a new Prophet who could be the world’s salvation . . . or the cause of its destruction. As chaos takes hold, five souls are set on a collision course:
A prince exiled from his kingdom.
A ruthless killer known as the Pale Hand.
A once-faithful leader torn between his duty and his heart.
A reckless gambler with the power to find anything or anyone.
And a dying girl on the verge of giving up

Who can Lena trust to help her find out the truth? Life in East Germany in the early 1980s is not easy for most people, but for Lena, it’s particularly hard. After the death of her parents in a factory explosion and time spent in a psychiatric hospital recovering from the trauma, she is sent to live with her stern aunt, a devoted member of the ruling Communist Party. Visits with her beloved Uncle Erich, a best-selling author, are her only respite. But one night, her uncle disappears without a trace. Gone also are all his belongings, his books, and even his birth records. Lena is desperate to know what happened to him, but it’s as if he never existed. The worst thing, however, is that she cannot discuss her uncle or her attempts to find him with anyone, not even her best friends. There are government spies everywhere. But Lena is unafraid and refuses to give up her search, regardless of the consequences. This searing novel about defiance, courage, and determination takes readers into the chilling world of a society ruled by autocratic despots, where nothing is what it seems.

*A Cultural Awareness Selection*

Gene understands stories—comic book stories, in particular. Big action. Bigger thrills. And the hero always wins.
But Gene doesn’t get sports. As a kid, his friends called him “Stick” and every basketball game he played ended in pain. He lost interest in basketball long ago, but at the high school where he now teaches, it's all anyone can talk about. The men’s varsity team, the Dragons, is having a phenomenal season that’s been decades in the making. Each victory brings them closer to their ultimate goal: the California State Championships.

Once Gene gets to know these young all-stars, he realizes that their story is just as thrilling as anything he’s seen on a comic book page. He knows he has to follow this epic to its end. What he doesn’t know yet is that this season is not only going to change the Dragons’s lives, but his own life as well.

Darrian dreams of writing for the New York Times. To hone his skills and learn more about the power of words, he enrolls in Mr. Ward's class, known for its open-mic poetry readings and boys vs. girls poetry slam. Everyone in class has something important to say, and in sharing their poetry, they learn that they all face challenges and have a story to tell--whether it's about health problems, aging out of foster care, being bullied for religious beliefs, or having to take on too much responsibility because of an addicted parent. As Darrian and his classmates get to know one another through poetry, they bond over the shared experiences and truth that emerge from their writing, despite their private struggles and outward differences

* A Cultural Awareness Selection*

Jay Reguero plans to spend the last semester of his senior year playing video games before heading to the University of Michigan in the fall. But when he discovers that his Filipino cousin Jun was murdered as part of President Duterte's war on drugs, and no one in the family wants to talk about what happened, Jay travels to the Philippines to find out the real story.Hoping to uncover more about Jun and the events that led to his death, Jay is forced to reckon with the many sides of his cousin before he can face the whole horrible truth -- and the part he played in it.

Deja and Josiah are seasonal best friends.

Every autumn, all through high school, they’ve worked together at the best pumpkin patch in the whole wide world. (Not many people know that the best pumpkin patch in the whole wide world is in Omaha, Nebraska, but it definitely is.) They say good-bye every Halloween, and they’re reunited every September 1.
But this Halloween is different—Josiah and Deja are finally seniors, and this is their last season at the pumpkin patch. Their last shift together. Their last good-bye.
Josiah’s ready to spend the whole night feeling melancholy about it. Deja isn’t ready to let him. She’s got a plan: What if—instead of moping and the usual slinging lima beans down at the Succotash Hut—they went out with a bang? They could see all the sights! Taste all the snacks! And Josiah could finally talk to that cute girl he’s been mooning over for three years . . ..
What if their last shift was an adventure?

Ryn manages a graveyard, hewing closely to the old superstitions about how to make sure the dead stay dead. But when Ellis, a mapmaker, comes to town, the "bone houses" become more active than ever.

* A Cultural Awareness Selection*

Neveah Levitz is caught between the worlds of her African American mother and her Jewish father, who are battling through a nasty divorce. As she finds herself identifying more with her Jamaican heritage, her father pressures her to also embrace her Jewishness.

After his mother gets a new job as a professor at the University of Texas, Norris, a Black French Canadian who has lived in Montreal his whole life, has to adjust to high school in Austin, Texas.

Three teenage siblings, Olive, Darwyn, and Charlotte, are sent to spend the summer with their estranged grandmother, Mama Lupe, in her labyrinthine, guestless hotel in Mexico. Their visit goes from banal to bizarre when they unwittingly open portals to parallel dimensions and are transported to strange worlds.

Jordan Banks starts a new school and finds himself torn between his neighborhood in Washington Heights and the posh environment of Riverdale Academy Day School.

Every year, the townsfolk drop paper lanterns into the river to celebrate the Autumn Equinox Festival. This year, Ben and his buddies—plus misfit tagalong Nathaniel—are determined to follow the lanterns as far as they go. They have two rules: No one turns for home, and no one looks back.

A heart-wrenching look at the history of the Warsaw Ghetto, told by comparing the philosophies of Doctor Janusz Korczak, a pediatrician-turned-orphanage-director who championed children’s rights, and Adolf Hitler, a racist fanatic whose policies led to the murder and manipulation of children. This masterfully woven story is meticulously documented and asks tough, resonant questions about good and evil.

In 1940, the passenger ship City of Benares set sail from Britain, carrying 200 passengers, many of them children hoping to escape the ravages of war. Before they could reach safety, the ship was struck by a torpedo, and a tragic race to save the passengers began. Cinematic language, extensive back matter, archival photos and dramatic illustrations bring this suspenseful and devastating story to life.

A true and gripping spy story, this graphic biography describes pivotal moments in the career of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, whose religious faith led him to devote his life to the German Resistance to Hitler. Visual metaphors in the powerful illustrations convey the looming danger.

Books on animal extinction tend to be a bit grim, yet Castaldo’s title provides a glimpse into how human intervention can work, as she examines the journey of a number of species that have almost vanished from the planet! Yet, the author is firm in her admonition that “at the brink” is not the journey these animals should be experiencing!

Spanning the 1930s, Favraeu chronicles the downfall of the U.S. stock market—which pivoted the country into the Great Depression—and accounts the historic events and figures that contributed to the crash.

Spooked details a radio broadcast from 1938 gone awry. H.G. Wells’ War of the Worlds (depicting a Martian invasion) was coming true - or so many thought!

The bond between brothers was never stronger. Drawing on their lifelong correspondence, Heiligman plumbs their journey from an ascetic upbringing in a Protestant parsonage to the auction houses of Europe as Theo develops business acumen, all the while supporting volatile Vincent’s groundbreaking artistic endeavors both materially and emotionally. Their devotion to each other was so profound that there could have been no Vincent van Gogh without Theo.

Just like Life will find a way to survive, in any situation, so will gamers find a way to co-opt whatever nascent technology exist so that they can play and compete in electronic games. This cleverly illustrated graphic novel goes into great detail about paradigm-changing games going back to the very first computers and networks. Truly an all-inclusive catalog of gaming’s history that is effortless to read.

This expressive graphic format memoir traces Walden’s fraught adolescent development among the cut-throat world of competitive ice skating, with panels as precise and exacting as on-ice routines and sequences every bit as climatic.

When Ellery and Ezra are forced to travel to their mother’s remote Vermont hometown, they don’t expect that their classmates will start going missing. When Ellery tries to solve the mystery, she’s drawn into the secrets of the town.

* A Cultural Awareness Selection*

This title features Malala’s and others’ experiences as young people displaced by war and violence. Their tales remind readers that many people around the world have been uprooted from the lives they knew and are struggling to be heard.

Explore the real-world origins of eight popular monsters, including Dracula, werewolves, and Godzilla. Readers will learn how to separate monster fact from monster fiction, investigate detailed drawings of monster anatomy, and learn fun tips for everything from keeping a sea monster in your bathtub to recognizing blood-sucking animals.

*A Cultural Awareness Selection*

Darius Kellner is a Persian American who has always felt out of place. He travels to Iran for the first time to visit family he formerly only knew through his computer screen. As he deals with clinical depression and his family, Darius meets Sohrab, a neighbor who turns best friend, and learns how to be himself.

*A Cultural Awareness Selection*

Ten short stories of young teens as they travel home from school. The stories are woven together as the kids head in different directions on their way home. Each story is poignant and heartfelt with pictures of realistic lives of the neighborhood kids.

An orphaned family of children are monster hunters in the sea, using all the skills they learned from their parents.

In a world where everyone takes wonders like magic spells and dragons for granted, Coco is a girl with a simple dream: She wants to be a witch. But everybody knows magicians are born, not made, and Coco was not born with a gift for magic. Resigned to her un-magical life, Coco is about to give up on her dream to become a witch…until the day she meets Qifrey, a mysterious, traveling magician. After secretly seeing Qifrey perform magic in a way she’s never seen before, Coco soon learns what everybody “knows” might not be the truth, and discovers that her magical dream may not be as far away as it may seem…

Teodoro's family is sinking fast: his father lost his job, his brother returned from Iraq with PTSD, and his parents are struggling to cope. T’s sister spirits her siblings away on a road trip, taking them to reconnect with family, to heal and to find a way forward.

*A Cultural Awareness Selection*

When Lupita discovers Mami has been diagnosed with cancer, she is terrified by the possibility of losing her mother, the anchor of their close-knit Mexican American family.
In the midst of juggling high school classes, finding her voice as an actress, and dealing with friends who don’t always understand, Lupita desperately wants to support her mother by doing anything she can to help. While Papi is preoccupied with caring for Mami, Lupita takes charge of her seven younger siblings. Struggling in her new roles and overwhelmed by change, Lupita escapes the chaos of home by writing in the shade of a mesquite tree, seeking refuge in the healing power of words.

The first time Juli Baker saw Bryce Loski, she flipped. The first time Bryce saw Juli, he ran. That’s pretty much the pattern for these two neighbors until the eighth grade, when, just as Juli is realizing Bryce isn’t as wonderful as she thought, Bryce is starting to see that Juli is pretty amazing. How these two teens manage to see beyond the surface of things and come together makes for a comic and poignant romance.

*A Cultural Awareness Book*

It’s Christmas Eve in Harlem, but twelve-year-old Lolly Rachpaul and his mom aren’t celebrating. They’re still reeling from his older brother’s death in a gang-related shooting just a few months earlier. Then Lolly’s mother’s girlfriend brings him a gift that will change everything: two enormous bags filled with Legos. Lolly’s always loved Legos, and he prides himself on following the kit instructions exactly. Now, faced with a pile of building blocks and no instructions, Lolly must find his own way forward.

Fella and her sister, Zany, take their deceased mother’s ashes and run away to Asheville—the last place they were happy as a family—where they hope to scatter them as per her wishes