Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

Title: Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist
Author: Rachel Cohn and David Levithan
Publication Date: 2006
Number of Pages: 183
Genre: Young Adult Fiction
Geographical Setting: New York City
Time Period: late 2000s
Series: N/A

Plot: Nick meets Norah at the club where his band is playing. He asks her to be his girlfriend for five minutes to avoid the girl who broke his heart. These five minutes turn into a night-long first date full of moments of passion, awkward silences and some great music.

Subject Headings: music scene, boy meets girl, bands, New York City, broken hearts, true love, straight edge

Appeal: story is told by both title characters in alternating chapters, nice guy doesn’t “finish last” message, music and pop culture references, popular movie adaptation, Nick is a bassist for a queercore band but he is not gay, both characters are straight edge, Norah is Jewish and some talk of concepts of Judaism, coarse language and descriptions of sexual experiences

If you liked Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist, you might enjoy: Robin Benway’s Audrey, Wait! Susane Colasanti’s When it Happens.

Gender Blender

Title: Gender Blender
Author: Blake Nelson
Publication Date: 2006
Number of Pages: 182
Genre: Young Adult Fiction (age 10 &up)
Geographical Setting: Seattle, Washington
Time period: mid-late 2000s
Series: N/A

Plot: At George Wilson Middle School something very unlikely and very inconvenient has happened. Tom Witherspoon and Emma Baker have switched bodies! And now they are about to learn how hard it is to be a girl and to be a boy.

Subject Headings: gender roles, middle school

Appeal: Balanced perspective of the trials and tribulations of both boys and girls experiences in the middle school years. Events of puberty and physical development are presented.

If you liked Gender Blender, you might enjoy: Terence Blacker’s Boy2Girl. James Howe’s The Misfits.

Looking for Alaska

Title: Looking for Alaska
Author: John Green
Publication Date: 2005
Number of Pages: 221
Genre: Young Adult Fiction
Geographical Setting: boarding school in Alabama
Time period: mid 2000s
Series: N/A

Plot: Sixteen year old Miles “Pudge” Halter has left his uneventful life in Florida to attend Culver Creek Boarding School in Alabama. Immediately there is a promise of adventure as he makes friends with his prank-planning roommate, the Colonel, and the fascinating Alaska Young. Pudge falls for Alaska and is drawn into her world of danger, literature, sadness and self-destruction.

Subject Headings: boarding school, drunk driving, pranks, friendship

Appeal: Awarded the Michael L. Printz Award from the ALA. Death of a parent. Teens without parental supervision. Teen involvement with drinking, smoking, some drug use, sex. Famous last words play a prominent role. Battles between the have and have nots. Loyalty and friendship.

If you liked Looking for Alaska, you might enjoy: Jay Asher’s Thirteen Reasons Why. Curtis Sittenfeld’s Prep. Gregory Galloway’s As Simple as Snow.

The Lovely Bones

Title: The Lovely Bones
Author: Alice Sebold
Publication Date: 2002
Number of Pages: 328
Genre: Fiction
Geographical Setting: suburban Pennsylvania (outside of Philadelphia)
Time period: 1970s
Series: N/A

Plot: Fourteen year old Susie is raped and murdered by a neighborhood man. From her heaven, she watches her family, friends, the community and her murderer throughout the years.

Subject Headings: murder, rape, crimes against teens, murder victim’s family, heaven

Appeal: Sebold’s heaven is one where wishes are granted, a personalized heaven that may be shared with others there when wants overlap—this is not a religious heaven. The description of the rape and murder is chilling but not salacious or exploitive. Family dynamics—mother/daughter, father/daughter, husband/wife, older sister/younger sister. Life of a mother who still desires her life as a woman first (her freedoms, her intellectual life). Families of murder victims and their lives after the event, the search for the killer, the search for closure.

If you liked The Lovely Bones, you might enjoy: Russell Banks’ The Sweet Hereafter. Anne Ursu’s Spilling Clarence. Laura Moriarty’s The Center of Everything.

the first part last

Title: the first part last
Author: Angela Johnson
Publication Date: 2003
Number of Pages: 131
Genre: Young Adult fiction
Geographical Setting: New York City, Brooklyn
Time Period: early 2000s
Series: N/A

Plot: Bobby is enjoying his teenage life of friends, parties and his girlfriend, Nia. On his sixteenth birthday, Nia tells him that she is pregnant. Now everything is changing and Bobby has to grow up fast. Both their parents and the social worker try to convince the two teens that the only way they will have a normal life again is to give the baby up for adoption.

Subject Headings: teen parents, teen father, teen pregnancy, African-American

Appeal: ALA Michael L. Printz Award for Excellence in Young Adult Literature, Coretta Scott King Award Winner, the story unfolds by going back and forth between “then” and “now,” empowering story of young African-American male taking responsibility for his baby daughter, grandparents experience of helping to raise grandchild, teens making decisions about their reproductive options including adoption

If you liked the first part last, you might enjoy: Sharon G. Flake’s Who Am I Without Him? Sharon M. Draper’s November Blues.

Tyrell

Title: Tyrell
Author: Coe Booth
Publication Date: 2006
Number of Pages: 310
Genre: Young Adult fiction
Geographical Setting: Bronx, New York
Time Period: mid 2000s
Series: N/A

Plot: Tyrell has a lot to worry about even though he is only fifteen. He stopped going to school and has to live in a homeless shelter with his irresponsible mother and younger brother. All he wants is to be able to take care of his girl but how can he with no job or money? He has a plan but he doesn’t want to end up in jail, like his dad.

Subject Headings: inner city teens, poverty, homelessness, homeless shelter, jail, DJ, African-American

Appeal: parent in jail, temptations of quick money by selling drugs, the realities of living in roach-infested homeless shelters/hotels, use of street lingo but not so much as to alienate readers, some descriptions of sexual acts, writer once worked with teenagers and families in crisis in the Bronx

If you liked Tyrell, you might enjoy: E.R Frank’s Life is Funny. Walter Dean Myer’s Street Verse. Allison Van Diepen’s Street Pharm. Kate Morgenroth's Jude.

Whale Talk

Title: Whale Talk
Author: Chris Crutcher
Publication Date: 2001
Number of Pages: 220
Genre: Young Adult fiction
Geographical Setting: Pacific Northwest (small town outside of Spokane, Washington)
Time Period: early 2000s
Series: N/A

Plot: Multi-racial teen, T.J. Jones, has quite a bit of athletic ability but he chooses not to participate in high school team sports. You see, he has little problem with being told what to do and has had some problems since his biological mom had to give him up. He has two supportive parents now but the Cutter Athletic Department and the Wolverines Too (a booster club of high school grads who can’t let go of their glory days) don’t make life too easy for him or some of the other “misfits” of the school. So T.J. has a plan to take them all on and it starts with the assembling of the first Cutter swim team—the All-Night Mermen—and the goal of attaining the symbol of what is so screwed up with Cutter High—the varsity letterman’s jacket.

Subject Headings: high school, sports, bullying, abuse, swim team, adoption, multi-racial

Appeal: Protagonist is multi-racial: African American, Japanese and White. Protagonist sticks to his ideals and beliefs in the face of harassment and bullying and is even cocky. Incidents of bullying. Child of adoption, mother abused drugs. Protagonist participates in therapy and also helps with younger children who are in therapy. Literature for boys. Athleticism is important to many of the boys and the sense of being a part of a team is emphasized.

If you liked Whale Talk, you might enjoy: Chris Lynch’s Slot Machine. Rich Wallace’s Wrestling Sturbridge. Terry Davis’s Vision Quest

The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy and Goth Girl

Title: The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy and Goth Girl

Author: Barry Lyga

Publication date: 2007

Number of pages: 311

Genre: Young Adult fiction

Geographical Setting: small town/suburban America

Time Period: mid 2000s

Series: planned sequel for fall 2009 titled Goth Girl Rising

Plot Summary: Fanboy is a really smart high school sophomore who is considered a geek by many or a punching bag or just invisible. His parents are divorced and he lives with his pregnant mom and her new husband, the “step-fascist.” Keeping him going is the most important thing in his life—his own (secret) graphic novel that he has been creating with his ancient and constantly crashing computer. He soon meets Kyra, a.k.a. Goth Girl, whose shares his love of comics and disdain for pretty much everybody at school. Finally he has met someone who just might understand him but women can be complicated.

Subject Headings: friendship, comic books, graphic novels, high school, geeks, bullying, suicide, jocks

Appeal: Mentions of comic books/graphic novels and their authors will appeal to fans of this genre however, there is not so much insider information that would exclude other readers, death of a parent by cancer, teens coping with bullies, teens coping with their own rage/anger, teens coping with stepfamilies, there is some toying with ideas of school shootings and the outcast student creating a “hit list”, but there is never a real threat for this level of violence, a School Library Journal Best Book of the Year

If you liked The Astonishing Adventures…., you might enjoy: John Green’s An Abundance of Katherines. Gail Giles’ Playing in Traffic. K.L. Going’s Fat Kid Rules the World.

The Misfits

Title: The Misfits
Author: James Howe
Publication date: 2001
Number of pages: 274
Genre: Young Adult fiction
Geographical Setting: Upstate New York

Time Period: 2000s
Series: sequel is Totally Joe

Plot Summary: Four best friends are misfits in their Upstate New York town for various reasons: being overweight, being a too-tall know-it-all, being a hooligan and being gay. They decide to create a third party for their middle school election to represent everyone who has ever been called a name.

Subject Headings: best friends, bullying, name-calling, middle school, student council elections

Appeal: Howe wrote novel in response to his own daughter’s difficult time in seventh grade, shows that mean names are not just words to many kids, heroes of the book are unconventional but still relatable by many readers, middle school expereince including first crushes, death of parent by cancer

If you liked The Misfits, you might enjoy: 13: Thirteen Stories that Capture the Agony and Ecstasy of Being Thirteen, edited by Howe. Stephen Chbosky’s The Perks of Being a Wallflower. S.E. Hinton’s The Outsiders. Jeff Kinney’s Diary of a Wimpy Kid.

forever...

Title: forever...
Author: Judy Blume
Publication date: 1975
Number of pages: 192
Genre: Young Adult fiction
Geographical Setting: suburban New Jersey
Time Period: mid 1970s
Series: N/A

Plot Summary: Katherine meets Michael at a New Year’s party. There is an instant attraction between them and they soon begin dating each other exclusively. Katherine comes from a very open family without many rules including no curfew and a grandmother who sends her information from Planned Parenthood. She isn’t very wild though, gets decent grades, plays tennis very well and is still a virgin. Michael wants to have sex with Katherine but is understanding of her hesitance and takes things slow (as much as he can and as much as Katherine insists). As they negotiate and explore their romantic and sexual relationship, Katherine learns more about her own responsibilities that come with having sex. As their senior year is coming to an end, they have professed their love to one another and make plans for their summer together and their future afterwards.

Subject Headings: first love, high school graduation, first sexual experiences, teen sex, teen pregnancy, homosexuality, 1970s, birth control, Planned Parenthood

Appeal: written by one of America’s #1 children’s and young adult authors, frequently challenged book, candid discussion of sex and sexuality, colloquial language, sex in the 1970s before HIV/AIDS, experience of first love as a teen and belief it will last “forever,” giving a baby up for adoption as a teen, self responsibility to obtain birth control and use birth control, dilemma of the realization of sexual desires for someone other than one’s boyfriend

If you like forever..., you might enjoy: Judy Blume’s Deenie. Louise Rennison’s Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging. Sarah Dessen’s Someone Like You. Stephie Davis’ Smart Boys and Fast Girls.

Eagle Blue

Title: Eagle Blue. A Team, A Tribe, And a High School Basketball Season in Arctic Alaska
Author: Michael D’Orso
Publication date: 2006
Number of pages: 323
Genre: Nonfiction, biography
Geographical Setting: village of Fort Yukon, Arctic Alaska
Time Period: 2004-05
Series: N/A

Plot Summary: Writer D’Orso spent a winter with the high school boys’ basketball team, the Fort Yukon Eagles. The remote village of Fort Yukon is eight miles above the Arctic Circle and is home to around 600 people—mainly Athabascan Gwich’in Natives. D’Orso invites the reader into the lives of the boys and their coach as he follows along with him as they play their home games and fly to many of the away games. D’Orso also reveals the history and lives of many of the people of Fort Yukon including the high incidents of alcoholism, domestic violence and school dropouts but also their native pride and pride for their basketball team.

Subject Headings: basketball, high school sports, Native Alaskans, family, community, isolation, alcoholism, survival, tradition, ANWR (Arctic National Wildlife Refuge), ANCSA (Alaskan Native Claims Settlement Act), Athabascan Gwich’in

Appeal: Native Alaskan history and modern struggles including clashes with tradition, dealing with suicide, teen pregnancy, domestic violence and alcoholism in families, boys’ experiences in team sports, life above the Arctic Circle including -50 degree winters and near-continual darkness, small close-knit community, the school attempting to survive on very little money and resources, non-Native peoples’ experiences living in the Athabascan Gwich’in community, Arctic Alaskan experience of natives as opposed to the life of an inexperienced backpacker like Christopher McCandless (see Jon Krakauer’s Into the Wild)

If you liked Eagle Blue, you might enjoy: Buzz Bissinger’s Friday Night Lights. Peter Jenkin’s Looking for Alaska. Velma Wallis’ Raising Ourselves: A Gwich'in: Coming of Age Story from the Yukon River.

The Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants

Title: The Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants

Author: Ann Brashares

Publication date: 2001

Number of pages: 376

Genre: Young Adult fiction
Geographical Setting: Washington DC/Maryland, Greece, Baja California, Charleston, SC

Time Period: early 2000s

Series: yes, first of the series

Plot Summary: Four teen girls are all very different from one another. If their mothers had not taken aerobic classes together when they were pregnant, they probably wouldn’t be the best friends they are today. They are about to face their first summer apart from one another. They plan to write letters but most importantly to share the Pants. Carmen didn’t think much about this pair of cheap thrift store jeans she bought until she and each of her friends tried them on. “Magically,” they fit each of their very different body types beautifully. They make their pact to share the jeans equally all summer and to share the experiences they have wearing them. The beautiful Lena travels to Greece to spend the summer with her grandparents. Athletic Bridget is off to an elite soccer camp in Baja California. Hot-headed Carmen, whose parents are divorced, is visiting her dad in South Carolina and rebellious Tibby is staying home to work for minimum wage at Wallman’s and film her documentary.

Subject Headings: friendship, best friends, teen girls, first love, travel, cancer, childhood leukemia, divorce, coming of age, summer

Appeal: best friends coming of age together and through separate experiences, successful film adaptation in 2005, divorced parents, remarriage of parents and new stepfamily, characters display different “types” of teen girls for a wide range of readers to relate to—the misunderstood beauty, the jock, the artsy girl, the bi-racial teen of divorced parents with a Puerto Rican mother and father starting a new “All-American” family, first sexual experiences touched on but are not explicit, death of a young girl from leukemia, death of a parent by suicide

If you liked The Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants, you might enjoy: Susan McBride’s The Debs. Caroline B. Cooney’s Family Reunion. Rebecca Wells’ The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood. More for male readers, Randy Powell’s Three Clams and an Oyster.

Monster

Title: Monster
Author: Walter Dean Myers
Publication date: 1999
Number of pages: 281
Genre: Young Adult Fiction
Geographical Setting: Harlem, Manhattan Detention Center
Time Period: late 1990s
Series: N/A

Plot Summary: Steve Harmon is an amateur filmmaker on trial for murder. He is accused of being a lookout for a drugstore robbery where the owner of the store was killed. Steve tells his story of his incarceration and trial and some of his life before being arrested through the medium of a screenplay he is writing. Was he the lookout or just in the wrong place at the wrong time? Throughout his screenplay and diary entries, Steve reveals the frightening conditions of a prison and the nightmare of spending most of his life behind bars.

Subject Headings: racism, prejudice, African American experience, jail, prison, violence, American legal system, teens in jail, screenplay

Appeal: use of illustrations, diary-like entries in handwriting typeface combined with protagonist’s screenplay, literature for young men, teens surviving in an adult world, challenging and thought-provoking subject and dilemmas to open up discussion and dialogue by readers, African American inner city lives and realities, Coretta Scott King Honor, ALA Best Book for Young Adults and Quick Pick for Reluctant Readers

If you liked Monster, you might enjoy: Walter Dean Myer’s Shooter. Virginia Walter's Making Up Megaboy.

The City of Ember

Title: The City of Ember
Author: Jeanne DuPrau
Publication date: 2004
Number of pages: 270
Genre: Fiction, Young Adult, grades 4-7
Geographical Setting: fictional city of Ember
Time Period: unknown, far into the future
Series: yes, first of the Books of Ember

Plot Summary: When you turn 12 in the City of Ember, you are assigned your life job. Lina Mayfleet and Doon Harrow are not very happy with their luck and decide to trade jobs-Lina gets to be a Messenger, running all through Ember’s streets and Doon will get to explore the underground as a Pipeworker (and get a good look at that generator). The people of Ember have lived just fine for the last 250 years or so. “Daytime” is regulated and there is no sunlight or moonlight but rather the yellowish glow from flood lamps throughout the city. Light bulbs are becoming more precious as it seems the supplies are getting low. Blackouts are happening more frequently and are lasting longer. Beyond the town limits are the pitch-black Unknown Regions. Without “movable light,” venturing here is nearly impossible. That is until Lina and Doon make an exciting and puzzling discovery.

Subject Headings: the future, survival, fantasy, science fiction, dystopia

Appeal: an ALA notable book, movie adaptation in 2008, moral dilemmas dealing with stealing and lying, death of parents due to illness, children with adult responsibilities, children as heroes, often characterized as “science fiction for people who don’t like science fiction,” suspenseful first book of a series, a dystopian view of a future for humanity

If you liked The City of Ember, you might enjoy: Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials series. Margaret Peterson Haddix’s The Shadow Children series. Philip Reeve’s The Hungry City Chronicles.

American Born Chinese

Title: American Born Chinese

Author: Gene Luen Yang

Publication date: 2006

Number of pages: 240

Genre: graphic novel
Geographical Setting: San Francisco’s Chinatown, an American middle class town, China of ancient folktales

Time Preiod: 1980s-90s

Series: N/A

Plot Summary: Jin Wang is a Chinese American middle school student who only wants to fit in with the rest of his white classmates. Rumors about his culture spread quickly amongst the other students making it difficult to pursue his first crush. He also resists being friends with the only other Asian boy in school who is a reminder of how different Jin is his classmates. Jin’s story of growing up as an outsider is intertwined with the Chinese folk tale of the Monkey King and the ethnic stereotype of a character named Chin-Kee.

Subject Headings: racism, assimilation, Chinese-American culture, first love, cultural stereotypes, puberty

Appeal: first graphic novel recognized by the National Book Foundation, first generation American story, colored by cartoonist Lark Pien, ethnic stereotypes, learning to be comfortable in your own skin, young boy’s experiencing the embarrassing effects of puberty

If you liked American Born Chinese, you might enjoy: Sherman Alexie’s The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian. Marjane’s Satrapi’s Persepolis.

The Chocolate War

Title: The Chocolate War
Author: Robert Cormier
Publication date: 1974
Number of pages: 272
Genre: Young Adult fiction
Geographical Setting: New England (fictional Monument, Massachusetts)
Time Period: early 197os
Series: sequel Beyond the Chocolate War

Plot Summary: Jerry Renault is a high school freshman at the all-boys Trinity Catholic and has recently lost his mother to cancer. The secret society of The Vigils, made up of students, rule the school. The Vigils assign tasks of cruel pranks to students with no option to disobey. The acting headmaster, Brother Leon, has decided to secretly recruit them to help with the annual school chocolate sale. Brother Leon expects the students to sell much more than they had in the past in order to protect his overspending of the school budget for the sale. The Vigils assign Jerry to boycott the chocolate sale for ten days. After the ten days, Jerry decides to defy The Vigils, Brother Leon and the school by continuing his refusal to sell the chocolates. His defiance is not accepted lightly.

Subject Headings: bullying, hazing, Catholic school, defiance of authority, pessimism, individuality, peer pressure

Appeal: all-boys Catholic school setting, struggle to be an individual in the face of power structure of an institution, lack of parental involvement, often on banned books list, winner of several awards including ALA Best Books for Young Adults and a New York Times Outstanding Books of the Year, 1988 movie adaptation, book for boys, standing up to bullies, death of a parent to cancer

If you liked The Chocolate War, you might enjoy: William Golding’s The Lord of the Flies. Laurie Halse Anderson’s Speak. Walter Dean Myer’s Shooter.

Seventeenth Summer

Title: Seventeenth Summer
Author: Maureen Daly
Publication date: 1942
Number of pages: 285
Genre: Young Adult fiction/romance

Geographical Setting: Fond du Lac, Wisconsin
Time Period: early 1940s
Series: N/A

Plot Summary: After the summer, Angie Morrow is going off to college in Chicago. Her mother has never really allowed her to go out much but then Angie meets the handsome Jack Duluth. They start dating and the feelings of falling in love begin to stir in Angie for the first time. But she only has three months until college and along with the excitement of romance the tears of the end of her seventeenth summer may also come.

Subject Headings: romance, first love, summer, girl meets boy, the 1940s

Appeal: author credited with launching young adult literature, written when author was 2o and in college, young people’s experience in the 1940s, young woman’s life during the summer before college, Midwest experience in the 1940s, writing is diary-like, coming of age

If you liked Seventeenth Summer, you might enjoy:
Judy Blume’s Forever. Dandi Daly Mackall’s Eva Underground. Sarah Dessen’s Just Listen. Madeleine L’Engle’s And Both Were Young and Camilla.

The Catcher in the Rye

Title: The Catcher in the Rye
Author: J.D. Salinger
Publication date: 1951
Number of pages: 288
Genre: fiction

Geographical Setting: New York City, Agerstown, PA, a sanatorium in California

Time Period: shortly after WWII, late 1940s/early 1950s
Series: N/A

Plot Summary: Holden Caulfield narrates his experiences in New York City following his expulsion from a prep school. Holden tells his story a year later from a mental facility in Hollywood. He criticizes the other students and faculty of his school as “phony” and describes leaving in the middle of the night to take a train to New York. Instead of returning to his family right away, he checks into a derelict hotel. His days in the city involve loneliness and drunkenness and beatings. He loathes the hypocrisy of the world around him but idealizes the innocence and purity of children like his sister.

Subject Headings: conformity, growing up, cynicism, idealism, brother/sister relationships, individualism, mental breakdown, prostitute

Appeal: often on banned books lists, coming of age, first person narrative, slang and obscene language, self-reflection after mental breakdown, sexual experiences

If you liked The Catcher in the Rye, you might enjoy: Stephen Chbosky’s The Perks of Being a Wallflower. Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

The Outsiders

Title: The Outsiders
Author: S.E. Hinton
Publication date: 1967
Number of pages: 192
Genre: teen fiction

Geographical Setting: Oklahoma City

Time Period: late 1960s
Series: N/A

Plot Summary: Recently orphaned Pony Boy Curtis is 14 years old and growing up on the East Side of town with his brothers and friends. They are in the poor class known as the Greasers and are very different from the other kids from the wealthy West Side who are known as Socs (short for Socials). One terrible night changes Pony Boy and his best friend Johnnys’ lives forever. Now Pony Boy questions everything about his life as a Greaser and his place in a world amongst other people like the Socs.

Subject Headings: friendship, loyalty, cliques, orphans, poverty, outsiders, gangs, 1960s

Appeal: author wrote novel when she was 16, coming of age, gang rivalries, violence and abuse in families, young adult heroes, older brother as head of household, have and havenots, ALA’s top 100 “Frequently Challenged Books,” film version from 1983

If you liked The Outsiders, you might enjoy: other S.E. Hinton novels like Tex, Rumble Fish, That Was Then, This is Now. J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye. Walter Dean Myers’ The Scorpions.

The Complete Maus

Title: The Complete Maus: A Survivor’s Tale
Author: Art Spiegelman
Publication date: 1973, 1986
Number of pages: 296
Genre: graphic novel

Geographical Setting: Poland, Auschwitz concentration camp, upstate New York

Time Period: late 1930s, the Second World War, 1970s, 1980s
Series: two books in this collection, “My Father Bleeds History” & “And Here My Troubles Began”

Plot Summary: Spiegelman, born after WWII, interviews his father about his experiences as a Jew living in Nazi-occupied Poland. In the first book, Spiegelman’s father, Vladek, recounts his life in pre-war Poland and marriage to Art’s mother and his enlistment in the army. Tales of life in the ghetto and their hidings as the Final Solution is put into effect by the Nazis are depicted in Spiegelman’s drawings. The second book depicts his father’s experiences in a concentration camp and his survival and new life in America. Spiegelman uses animal as characters with the Jews depicted as mice and the Germans as cats.

Subject Headings: the Holocaust, survival, Hitler, Nazis, the Jews, concentration camps, biography, memoir

Appeal: biographical, father and son relationship, historical fiction, Holocaust literature, effects of war on families, graphic novel, comic book, Young Adult Literature, suicide by a parent, winner of Pulitzer Prize, survivor guilt, anthropomorphic characters

If you liked the Maus books, you might enjoy: Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis- graphic novel about a young Iranian girl’s life during the Islamic Revolution through the Iran-Iraq war. E. Tina Tito’s Teen Witnesses to the Holocaust, Liberation: Teens in the Concentration Camps and the Teen Soldiers Who Liberated Them.

Weetzie Bat

Title: Weetzie Bat

Author: Francesca Lia Block

Publication date: 1989

Number of pages: 109

Genre: fiction, Young Adult fiction
Geographical Setting: L.A., Hollywood
Time Period: 1980s

Series: yes, first in the Weetzie Bat series

Plot Summary: Weetzie is an offbeat individual living in Hollywood. A child of divorce, nobody understands Weetzie. She has a bleached-blond flattop and wears vintage clothes. She meets her best friend Dirk in high school who takes her slam-dancing at clubs in L.A. Dirk reveals to her that he is gay and this is just fine with her. They go “duck-hunting” together and dream about their true loves. Dirk’s grandmother gives Weetzie a gift that grants her three wishes. Both Weetzie and Dirk meet their true loves and live in a fairytale-like cottage together. They make underground films that are successful and have a baby they raise together. Their lives are not completely a fairy tale but their love for each other is allows them close to happily ever after.

Subject Headings: love, individuality, blended families, homosexuality, filmmaking, punk-style, death, suicide, nontraditional families, children out of wedlock, L.A., Hollywood, alcoholism, three wishes, “duck-hunting”

Appeal: fairy tale-like, love story, 1950s style and film references, punk fashion, beginning of AIDS epidemic, minimalist-style of writing, poetic-style of writing, Charlotte Zolotow Book, lonely teenage girls could identify with Weetzie, characters’ own vernacular, rape incident, 1980s Hollywood club scene, loss of parent by suicide, alcoholic parent

If you liked the Weetzie Bat series, you might enjoy: Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar, Clara Vidal's Like a Thorn, Nadine Monem’s Riot Grrrl: Revolution girl Style Now!

Gossip Girl

Title: Gossip Girl #1: A Novel

Author: Cecily Von Ziegesar – Narrator: Gossip Girl

Publication date: 2002

Number of pages: 208

Genre: teen fiction
Geographical Setting: New York City
Time Period: 2000s

Series: yes, first in the Gossip Girl series

Plot Summary: The narrator remains anonymous as the reader wonders if she too is part of the privileged world of the NYC teens attending the prestigious private schools, partying and buying expensive designer clothes. Selena is surrounded by controversy as rumors fly about whether or not she is a sex fiend and a drug addict. Blair is bulimic and in love with Nate. But Nate has hooked up with her former best friend Selena. Dan is in love with Serena and his younger sister Jenny idolizes her. Rumors and gossip about boys, sex, parties and clothes fill this book.

Subject Headings: teens, private school, NYC, drinking, partying, drugs, eating disorders, gossip, rich kids, mean girls

Appeal: designer clothes, shopping, privileged lifestyles, website reveals more exploits of the characters, superficial/fluff reading, omnipresent narrator , TV series, sex without consequences

Similar Authors and Works (Fiction): Zoey Dean- The A-List Series. Melissa de la Cruz- The Au Pairs series.

Hatchet

Title: Hatchet
Author: Gary Paulsen
Publication date: 1987
Number of pages: 195
Genre: Children’s /Young Adult Fiction (ages 9-13)
Geographical Setting: Canadian wilderness
Time Period: 1980s/present
Series: yes, first in the “Brian” books

Plot Summary: Brian Robeson is a fairly ordinary thirteen year old boy from the city. His parents have recently divorced and he is on his way to visit his father in the Canadian wilderness, taking with him a secret about his mother’s reasons for the split. For this trip he must travel in a single engine plane with only the pilot as his company. The plane goes down after the pilot suffers a massive heart attack and lands well off the flight’s original course in the isolated Canadian wilderness. With only his mother’s gift of a hatchet and a desire to live, he must survive alone on the resources he discovers and tools he devises.

Subject Headings: survival, divorce, wilderness, plane crash, Canadian wilderness, hatchet, nature, adventure, boyhood

Appeal: Newberry Honor Book, exciting first novel in a series, literature for boys, one main character, close third person point of view, triumph of individual, realistic fiction

Similar Authors and Works (Fiction): Scott O’Dell- Island of the Blue Dolphins, a young Indian girl is the sole survivor of an isolated island of the coast of California for eighteen years. Jean Craighead George- My Side of the Mountain, a young boy survives alone in the Catskill Mountains.

Similar Authors and Works (Nonfiction): Gary Paulsen- Guts: The True Stories behind “Hatchet” and the Brian Books.

A Northern Light

Title: A Northern Light
Author: Jennifer Donnelly- Narrator: Mattie Gokey
Publication date: 2003
Number of pages: 396
Genre: Fiction, Historical Fiction
Geographical Setting: Adirondack Mountains (New York State), North Woods
Time Period: 1906
Series: N/A

Plot Summary: A talented and budding writer, Mattie Gokey has promised her dying mother that she will always take care of her father and younger siblings on the failing family farm. This entails her missing school often and possibly giving up her dreams of moving to New York City and studying to be a writer. She has the chance to save up money for her enrollment at Barnard College when she gets a summer job at a fancy hotel in the Adirondacks. Here she enjoys freedoms to live the life of a young woman but feels the pull from her family responsibilities and her new romance with the handsome Royal Loomis. Royal is not interested in her books and words but he has awakened feelings in Mattie which she has never experienced. When the body of hotel guest Grace Brown is found in the lake and her male companion missing, Mattie discovers the truth about Grace’s life and death in the letters she left with her.

Subject Headings: young adult, Adirondack Mountains, abortion, murder, first love, farm life, young motherhood, feminism, poverty, racism, family

Appeal: Named a Printz Honor Book by the ALA, author’s first young adult novel, historical details, struggle/suffering, hopeful

Similar Authors and Works (Fiction): Theodore Dreiser- An American Tragedy, novel was inspired by the Chester Gillette murder case.

Similar Authors and Works (Nonfiction): Grace Brown- Grace Brown’s Love Letters, the victim’s letters to her murderer (currently out of print).

Twilight

Title: Twilight
Author: Stephenie Meyer - Narrator: Bella Swan
Publication date: 2005
Number of pages: 544 (paperback)
Genre: Fantasy Fiction, Young Adult
Geographical Setting: Olympic Peninsula of Washington State & Phoenix, Arizona
Time Period: 2000s
Series: book one of four of The Twilight Saga

Plot Summary: Bella has decided to move from her mother and sunny Phoenix to rainy and dreary Forks, WA to live with her dad, Charlie. She has accepted her circumstances as the new girl in school and an awkward relationship with her chief of police father but she is not prepared for the hostility and disgust she encounters from one boy at school, the beautiful and striking Edward Cullen. Eventually, Bella and Edward find themselves intrigued by one another and unable to resist their obvious attraction. Bella begins to learn the truth about Edward and his beautiful but very aloof family- they are vampires. Her love for Edward does not leave room for any fear of his and his family’s true nature. However, their love is not without its complications. A threatening force has come to Forks. Bella and everyone she cares for are in danger and she follows a course that may cause her to both lose and save her one true love.

Subject Headings: fantasy, vampires, love and romance, teenagers, Pacific Northwest, Phoenix, daughter/father relationships, first love, high school, “star-crossed lovers”

Appeal: exciting first of a series, book to film in 2008, pacing is slower but appropriate for teen readers, smart but ordinary girl attracts beautiful boy, suspenseful

If you liked Twilight, you might enjoy: Kimberly Pauley- Sucks to Be Me: The All-True Confessions of Mina Hamilton, Teen Vampire (maybe), Mina’s parents are vampires. Mina must decide whether or not to become one also. Right now she is more interested in hanging out with her best friend and getting a prom date than taking her vampire training classes. Heather Brewer- Chronicles of Vladimir Tod series, A good choice for boys, so far two books are available. Vladimir Tod is half vampire and half human. Both of his parents died mysteriously and he must navigate his teen years trying to be “normal” and fight his thirst for blood. Octavia Butler- The Fledgling, vampires and humans have developed a symbiotic realtionship