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Middle School
Unless otherwise noted, all books may be found in the juvenile fiction section under the author’s last name.
KIDS LIKE ME
Almost Home / Joan Bauer
Sixth-grader Sugar and her mother lose their beloved house and experience the harsh world of homelessness.
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
Two 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
A teenaged boy encounters one comedic calamity after another when he’s stranded in the middle of nowhere.
My Sister Lives On the Mantelpiece / Annabel Pitcher (YA Pitcher)
With his family still grieving over his sister’s death in a terrorist bombing seven years earlier, twelve-year-old Jamie is far more interested in his cat, his birthday Spiderman T-shirt, and keeping his new Muslim friend Sunya a secret from his father.
A Fine White Dust / Cynthia Rylant
Thirteen year old Pete falls under the spell of a travelling Preacher Man.
Okay For Now / Gary D. Schmidt
As the new kid in town with no friends, an abusive father, and a louse for an older brother, 14-year-old Doug Swieteck has all the stats stacked against him until he finds an ally in Lil Spicer–a fiery young lady.
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
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, nine-year-old Ling, the daughter of two doctors, grows up during China’s Cultural Revolution, which changes everyone’s life.
The Wild Book / Margarita Engle
In early twentieth-century Cuba, bandits terrorize the countryside as a young farm girl struggles with dyslexia.
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 .
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.
A True and Faithful Narrative / Katherine Sturtevant
In 1680s London, Meg tries to choose between two men: one who 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.
The Apothecary / Maile Meloy
A fourteen-year-old American girl’s life unexpectedly transforms when she moves to London in 1952 and gets swept up in a race to save the world from nuclear war.
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 (j GRAPHIC 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.
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 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 (YA FISHER Catherine)
Claudia, the daughter of the Warden of Incarceron, a futuristic prison with a mind of its own, decides to help a prisoner escape.
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 (j GRAPHIC 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 Hunchback Assignments / Arthur Slade
In Victorian London, fourteen-year-old Modo, a shape-changing hunchback, becomes a secret agent for the Permanent Association, which strives to protect the world from the evil machinations of the Clockwork Guild.
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 (j GRAPHIC LAT)
A boy’s childhood growing up on a rubber plantation in rural Malaysia.
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.
NONFICTION
They Called Themselves the K.K.K.: The Birth of an American Terrorist Group / Susan Campbell Bartoletti (j 322.42 Bar)
Documents the history and origin of the Ku Klux Klan.
Charles and Emma: The Darwins’ Leap of Faith / Deborah Heiligman (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 (j 92K KHERDIAN Khe)
Author’s moving biography of his Armenian mother’s childhood in Turkey.
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.
One Times Square: A Century of Change at the Crossroads of the World / Joe McKendry (j 917.471 McK)
This book explores the story of this fascinating intersection, from its beginnings as a dirt road, through the district’s decades of postwar decay, to its renewal as a glittering, tourist-friendly media mecca.
POETRY
Borrowed Names: Poems About Laura Ingalls Wilder, Madam C.J. Walker, Marie Curie, and Their Daughters / Jeannine Atkins (YA 811.6 A84)
America at War / poems selected by Lee Bennett Hopkins (j 811.08 Hop)
19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East / Naomi Shihab Nye (j 811 Nye)
Suggestions from the Mt. Lebanon Public Library Children’s Department
Updated February 2013
KIDS LIKE ME
Almost Home / Joan Bauer
Sixth-grader Sugar and her mother lose their beloved house and experience the harsh world of homelessness.
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
Two 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
A teenaged boy encounters one comedic calamity after another when he’s stranded in the middle of nowhere.
My Sister Lives On the Mantelpiece / Annabel Pitcher (YA Pitcher)
With his family still grieving over his sister’s death in a terrorist bombing seven years earlier, twelve-year-old Jamie is far more interested in his cat, his birthday Spiderman T-shirt, and keeping his new Muslim friend Sunya a secret from his father.
A Fine White Dust / Cynthia Rylant
Thirteen year old Pete falls under the spell of a travelling Preacher Man.
Okay For Now / Gary D. Schmidt
As the new kid in town with no friends, an abusive father, and a louse for an older brother, 14-year-old Doug Swieteck has all the stats stacked against him until he finds an ally in Lil Spicer–a fiery young lady.
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
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, nine-year-old Ling, the daughter of two doctors, grows up during China’s Cultural Revolution, which changes everyone’s life.
The Wild Book / Margarita Engle
In early twentieth-century Cuba, bandits terrorize the countryside as a young farm girl struggles with dyslexia.
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 .
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.
A True and Faithful Narrative / Katherine Sturtevant
In 1680s London, Meg tries to choose between two men: one who 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.
The Apothecary / Maile Meloy
A fourteen-year-old American girl’s life unexpectedly transforms when she moves to London in 1952 and gets swept up in a race to save the world from nuclear war.
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 (j GRAPHIC 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.
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 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 (YA FISHER Catherine)
Claudia, the daughter of the Warden of Incarceron, a futuristic prison with a mind of its own, decides to help a prisoner escape.
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 (j GRAPHIC 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 Hunchback Assignments / Arthur Slade
In Victorian London, fourteen-year-old Modo, a shape-changing hunchback, becomes a secret agent for the Permanent Association, which strives to protect the world from the evil machinations of the Clockwork Guild.
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 (j GRAPHIC LAT)
A boy’s childhood growing up on a rubber plantation in rural Malaysia.
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.
NONFICTION
They Called Themselves the K.K.K.: The Birth of an American Terrorist Group / Susan Campbell Bartoletti (j 322.42 Bar)
Documents the history and origin of the Ku Klux Klan.
Charles and Emma: The Darwins’ Leap of Faith / Deborah Heiligman (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 (j 92K KHERDIAN Khe)
Author’s moving biography of his Armenian mother’s childhood in Turkey.
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.
One Times Square: A Century of Change at the Crossroads of the World / Joe McKendry (j 917.471 McK)
This book explores the story of this fascinating intersection, from its beginnings as a dirt road, through the district’s decades of postwar decay, to its renewal as a glittering, tourist-friendly media mecca.
POETRY
Borrowed Names: Poems About Laura Ingalls Wilder, Madam C.J. Walker, Marie Curie, and Their Daughters / Jeannine Atkins (YA 811.6 A84)
America at War / poems selected by Lee Bennett Hopkins (j 811.08 Hop)
19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East / Naomi Shihab Nye (j 811 Nye)
Suggestions from the Mt. Lebanon Public Library Children’s Department
Updated February 2013