Great books for kids in middle school
Suggestions from Mt. Lebanon Public Library, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
www.mtlebanonlibrary.org
Unless otherwise noted, all books may be found in
the juvenile fiction section under the author's last name.
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KIDS LIKE ME
Hope was here / Joan Bauer
Hope and her aunt become involved with a diner owner's campaign to oust the town's corrupt mayor.
Waiting for normal / Leslie Connor
Twelve-year-old Addie tries to cope with life in a small trailer, her mother's erratic behavior, and being separated from her beloved stepfather and half-sisters.
Getting Near to Baby / Audrey Couloumbis
Tow sisters come to terms with a tragedy when they stay with their loving, but misunderstood, aunt and uncle.
When Zachary Beaver Came to Town / Kimberly Willis Holt
During the Vietnam War, two Texas boys befriend the “fattest boy in the world.”
Silent to the Bone / E. L. Konigsburg
When a boy loses the ability to speak after he is accused of injuring his infant half-sister, his friend sets out to discover the truth.
As easy as falling off the face of the earth /
Lynne Rae Perkins (young adult -YA PERKINS)
A teenaged boy encounters one comedic calamity after another when he's stranded in the middle of nowhere.
A Fine White Dust / Cynthia Rylant
Thirteen year old Pete falls under the spell of a travelling Preacher Man.
The Wednesday Wars / Gary D. Schmidt
A 7th-grade boy learns about Shakespeare and life in this funny novel set in 1967.
When you reach me / Rebecca Stead
A 12-year-old New York City girl tries to make sense of some mysterious notes from an anonymous source.
So B. It / Sarah Weeks
Raised by her mentally retarded mother and agoraphobic neighbor, a 12-year-old girl decides to find the truth about her past.
HISTORICAL FICTION
Chains : seeds of America / Laurie Halse Anderson
After being sold to a cruel couple in New York City, a slave named Isabel spies for the rebels during the Revolutionary War.
The boy who dared / Susan Campbell Bartoletti
In October, 1942, a 17 year-old boy is imprisoned for distributing anti-Nazi leaflets.
Code Talker : a novel about the Navajo Marines of World War Two / Joseph Bruchac
In World War II, a Navajo boy enlists in the Marines where his native language is used as a secret code.
Carrie’s War / Nina Bawden
In World War II Carrie and her brother are evacuated from London.
Revolution is not a dinner party/ Ying Chang Compestine
In 1972 , 9 year-old Ling, the daughter of two doctors, grows up during China’s Cultural Revolution, which changes everyone’s life.
Hattie Big Sky / Kirby Larson
In 1917, after inheriting a homesteading claim in Montana, 16-year-old orphan Hattie tries to make a home for herself .
Good Night, Mr. Tom / Michelle Magorian
During World War II an abused London boy is sent to live with an old man in the country.
Playing Beatie Bow / Ruth Park
A lonely Australian girl is transported to another family in the 1880s.
Woods runner / Gary Paulsen
In 1776, a 13 year-old boy sets out to rescue his parents from the British soldiers and Indians who kidnapped them after killing most of their community.
Heart of a samurai : based on the true story of Nakahama Manjiro / Margi Preus
In 1841, rescued after a terrible shipwreck, 14-year-old Manjiro, learns new customs as he becomes the first Japanese person to set foot in the United States.
Three rivers rising : a novel of the Johnstown flood / Jame Richards
The evolving friendship of a wealthy girl and a hired hand form the backdrop to the story of the tragic 1889 flood. Told in verse.
Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy / Gary Schmidt
In 1911 Maine, a minister’s son befriends a girl from a poor community founded by former slaves.
A True and faithful narrative / Katherine Sturtevant
In 1680s London, Meg tries to choose between 2 men: one of whom was kidnapped and enslaved in North Africa and the other who helped win his release.
MYSTERIES / ADVENTURES
Vanishing act / John Feinstein
Eighth-grade sports reporters investigate the mysterious disappearance of a Russian tennis player.
The diamond of Drury Lane / Julia Golding
An orphaned girl living at a theater in 1790s London, tries to find a hidden diamond which involves her with street gangs as well as the world of nobility.
The Ghost in the Tokaido Inn/ Dorothy Hoobler
In the 1700s, a Japanese boy who longs to be a samurai becomes an actor to solve a mystery.
The Wreckers / Ian Lawrence
A boy discovers an evil secret about the town he is stranded in after being shipwrecked.
Princess Ben / Catherine Gilbert Murdock
A girl is transformed from sullen, pudgy, graceless Ben into Crown Princess Benevolence.
Airborn / Kenneth Oppel
Aboard a huge airship, 2 kids search for mysterious winged creatures that are said to share the sky.
The Unsinkable Walker Bean / Aaron Renier
In order to save his grandfather, Walker embarks on a dangerous, exciting, scary, and funny quest to the bottom of the ocean floor to return a pearl skull to the witches who made it. (GRAPHIC j RENIER)
A drowned maiden's hair / Laura Amy Schlitz
Eleven-year-old Maud is adopted by three spinster sisters who moonlight as mediums.
The thief / Megan Whalen Turner
In an ancient kingdom, an ingenious thief is offered release from prison if he joins a company of companions on a quest to steal a legendary stone.
SCIENCE FICTION / FANTASY
Book of a thousand days / Shannon Hale
A princess and her maid spend years locked in a tower as punishment, only to escape and be at the mercy of an evil prince .
Skellig / David Almond
In the garage of his new house, Michael finds a mysterious stranger.
The city of Ember / Jeanne DuPrau
In this fantasy, a 12 year-old wants to see new places in her decaying city.
The house of the scorpion / Nancy Farmer
A young clone of the 142-year-old leader of a corrupt empire learns of the fate of other clones like himself.
Incarceron / Catherine Fisher
Claudia, the daughter of the Warden of Incarceron, a futuristic prison with a mind of its own, decides to help a prisoner escape. (young adult -YA FISHER Catherine)
Reckless / Cornelia Funke
While one brother finds adventure in the world behind the mirror, his brother begins to be transformed into a goyl, a living man whose skin is turned to stone.
The graveyard book / Neil Gaiman
Nobody Owens is a normal boy, except that he has been raised the inhabitants of the graveyard.
Rapunzel's revenge / Shannon Hale and Dean Hale (GRAPHIC j HALE)
An Old West retelling of the traditional fairy tale.
House of many ways / Diana Wynne Jones
When Charmain house-sits for her wizarding uncle she finds that his house is much more than it seems.
The new policeman / Kate Thompson
An Irish teenager discovers that time is leaking from his world into the land of the fairies.
KIDS IN OTHER LANDS
Kampung boy / Lat
A boy’s childhood growing up on a rubber plantation in rural Malaysia. (GRAPHIC j LAT)
Shabanu : daughter of the wind / Suzanne Staples
In Pakistan, an 11-year-old girl is pledged in marriage to an older man whose money will help her family.
A faraway island / Annika Thor
In 1939 , two Jewish sisters are evacuated from Austria to an island in Sweden, where they wait for their parents in separate, and very different, foster homes.
NON-FICTION
They called themselves the K.K.K. : the birth of an American terrorist group / Susan Campbell Bartoletti
Documents the history and origin of the Ku Klux Klan .
Charles and Emma : the Darwins' leap of faith / Deborah Heiligman ( young adult—YA 92 DARWIN Charles)The love affair of Charles Darwin, who questioned the existence of God, and his extremely religious wife Emma .
The Road from Home / David Kherdian
Author’s moving biography of his Armenian mother’s childhood in Turkey. (j 92K KHERDIAN Khe)
Years of dust : the story of the Dust Bowl / Albert Marrin ( j 973.916 Mar )
This book introduces the Dust Bowl of the 1930s, one of the worst environmental disasters in American history.
The notorious Benedict Arnold : a true story of adventure, heroism, & treachery / Steve Sheinkin
The life of Benedict Arnold includes the traitorous actions that made him legendary, but also his heroic involvement in the American Revolution. (j 92A ARNOLD She)
POETRY
Borrowed names : poems about Laura Ingalls Wilder, Madam C.J. Walker, Marie Curie, and their daughters / Jeannine Atkins ( young adult -YA 811.6 A84 )
America at war / poems selected by Lee Bennett Hopkins
(j811.08 Hop)
19 varieties of gazelle : poems of the Middle East / Naomi Shihab Nye (j 811 Nye )
Look for these and other great books in
The Children's Library
Mt. Lebanon Public Library
16 Castle Shannon Blvd.
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15228
412.531.1912 2011
www.mtlebanonlibrary.org
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