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| Alexie, Sherman |
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian
Fourteen-year-old Arnold "Junior" Spirit, budding cartoonist and reservation punching bag is actually looking forward to high school until he realizes that the education he will receive at the reservation high school will be inferior to one off the reservation. So he makes the decision to attend school twenty-two miles away in an all white town in order to become better educated. Although his parents support his decision, they all face varying degrees of wrath from the reservation community. As the only Native American at his new high school, excepting the school mascot, Junior also girds himself to be on the receiving end of some hatred.
At turns hiliarious and heartbreaking, this narrative is full of surprises and Junior Spirit is a unique and remarkable character. The story contains some profanity and frank discussion of masturbation, which though completely expected, normal and within context, might offend some.
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| Bell, Julia |
Massive
This was a difficult read.
Carmen tells the story of her dysfunctional family. Her mother
is a recovering bulemic, having spent months in a hospital, while
Brian, her step-father , took care of her. He is the only father
she has ever known and he loves her unconditionally. Her mother
watches everything that Carmen eats and even goes so far as to
call her fat. While Brian is away on business, Carmen's mom decides
to make a "career move," steals Brian's car and moves
back home to Birmingham, England. Carmen is devastated and not
only has to start all over in a new school, but meets relatives
she never knew, watches as her mother's eating disorder spirals
out of control and develops her own eating disorder. |
| Glenn, Mel |
Split Image
Laura Li is perfect in every way. Beautiful, smart and hard-working.
Her parents have immigrated from China, her father, a businessman,
whom she adores, is rarely home and her mother makes constant
demands for excellence and devotion. This novel in blank verse
takes place at Tower High School, home of Glenn's previous books.
She has the difficult task of assimilating into American culture
and achieving the American Dream while maintaining her old culture.
Everyone thinks they know Laura, they've labeled her and pigeon-holed
her and all are shocked when she finally takes a stand. |
| Frank, E.R. |
America
This book is very difficult
to read. The chapters shift from "now" to "then"
and back again as America, a mixed race fifteen-year-old boy
tells of "getting lost in the system," found, then
lost again. Bewilderment and betrayal impact on this boy's ability
to trust and believe in himself and have hope. There is profanity
and some violence (including sexual abuse) in this book which
may upset or offend some. This book is not recommended for anyone
below grade 8. |
| Frank, E.R. |
Wrecked
Sixteen-year-old Anna is suffering from Post-traumatic-stress disorder in the aftermath of a car accident which severely injured her drunk best friend and killed the driver of the other car. The driver happened to be Cameron, her brother's girlfriend. She swerved into Anna's lane to avoid hitting something hit Anna's car head-on. It was an accident, but Anna is filled with guilt, remorse and rage- at her father, her mother, her brother, her best friend, but most of all at herself.
Her father is tyrannical and controlling, her mother doesn't intervene, her brother isn't dealing with his loss very well and her best friend has a problem with alcohol. Eventually her father gives her permission to go into EMDR therapy to cope with her problems.
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| Friedman, Robin |
Nothing
Parker is a high school senior who has been groomed by his Princeton alum father to follow in his footsteps into Princeton - not Harvard or Yale. As a result, Parker is at the top of his class, by a hair, involved in sports and almost every other activity or club which will look good on is college resume. On top of that, he is cute and seemingly nice. But he has a secret. He has begun binging and purging in order to cope with the stress in his life.
The story is told in chapters that are narrated by Parker which alternate with chapters that are free verse poems from his younger sister Danielle's point-of-view. She lives in Parker's shadow and both resents and loves her brother fiercely. She is the first and only person to recognize what is happening to Parker.
This book is a quick, intense read highlighting the fact that eating disorders are not just "girl" diseases. The description of life in upper middle class communities where the competition to get into the "right" schools is cutthroat is spot on.
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| Friend, Natasha |
Lush
Thirteen-year-old Samantha Gwynn is not only trying to cope with middle school, her rapidly developing body which is bringing her a ton of unwanted attention and mourning the loss of her best guy friend; she is also keeping her father's alcoholism a secret and becoming angrier by the day as he spirals out of control and her ineffectual mother tries to "breathe through it." She takes refuge in her public library even though the librarian is not exactly warm and begins an anonymous correspondence via a book about whales with "AJK," whom she assumes is the high school girl she has been observing.
Just as in Friend's previous novel, Perfect, we find an engaging, sympathetic, imperfect but likeable protagonist, with imperfect but likeable parents and a realistic sounding ending. Friend did a wonderful job of portraying the watchfulness of the child of an alcoholic parent as well as the emotions which veer from hatred to protectfulness in the matter of seconds.
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| Gallo, Don, Editor |
What are You Afraid of? Stories about Phobias
Eleven stories from popular young adult authors about phobias, or excessive, irrational fears. My favorites were Alex Flinn's agoraphobic teenage boy, David Lubar's geek with a well-founded fear of cats, and Heidi Stempl and Jane Yolen's touching story of a younger brother with an irrational fear of public speaking. |
| Hautman, Pete |
Invisible
Seventeen-year-old Dougie is
a bit different. He has a strange sense of humor, doesn't know
how to make small-talk and can't talk to girls, at all. He has
a hobby about which he is obsessive, building a scale model of
the Golden Gate Bridge out of match sticks. He would be lonely
if it weren't for his best friend, Andy. Andy is a football star
and very popular, but always seems to turn up when Dougie needs
him most.
As Dougie tells his story, it becomes evident
that something is not quite right. Dougie begins to make a series
of choices which turns his existence as invisible outsider to
scapegoat.
Hautman tells a masterful story. It is
taut without a wasted word. He reminds us that there is a person
behind the loser label and that maybe that person is suffering.
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| Hautman, Pete |
No Limit
Denn Doyle can't wait until his sixteenth birthday. He wants to drive. He has been steadily socking away money he is making from his landscaping business and has his eye on a used Camaro. Denn's life changes on the day his is hit while riding home from work on his skateboard, by a city bus and walks away from the accident. He considers himself lucky, even though he has to replace his weedwhacker. So when he is invited to play in a card game, he says yes even though he really doesn't know how to play, and wins.
Denn tells his story in this first person narrative and he is quite likeable, even as he begins to isolate himself the more he becomes immersed in the psychology of playing cards and gambling.
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| Hautman, Pete |
All In
Unlike No Limit, which is told in the first person by Denn Doyle; this sequel is told from three points-of-view, but only one of them is told in the first person. Denn is now seventeen and has driven his Camaro to Las Vegas. He has a chunk of change from the sale of the restaurant he won from Art Kingston and he is going big time in Vegas. His winning streak turns into a losing streak and he can't figure out why until he loses the last of his money in a fixed game which his girlfriend is dealing. He discovers that he has been set up by Kingston from the start and sets about trying to get back at Kingston in a Million Dollar Winner Takes All tournament. The only problem is the $10,000 entry fee. |
| Lynch Chris |
Freewill
This book is not for everyone. It is told in the second person
which I find difficult to read. It is the story of a high school
boy, named Will, who is attempting to come to terms with his
feelings. He is stuck in a special high school called Hopeless
High. He is stuck in a wood shop class where he begins to create
wood sculptures and installs them in various places around town.
The book turns into a mystery when teenagers in the area begin
to commit suicide at the spots where he has installed his works. |
| McCormick, Patricia |
Cut
Callie is a fifteen-year-old
girl who feels her life spinning out of control. She begins cutting
herself and after she is discovered, she is placed in an institution
called Sea Pines (renamed Sick Minds by the patients) with other
girls her age with disorders such as bulimia and substance abuse.
She retreats into a world of silence. |
| Mikalsen, Ben |
Touching Spirit Bear
The jacket of this book recommends
it for ages 10 and up, but I would recommend this book for ages
12 and up due to some potentially upsetting scenes in the book.
Cole Matthews is an angry boy who blames everyone else for his
problems except himself, including the boy he beat unconscious
and caused disabling brain trauma. He is given an alternative
to jail in the form of Circle Justice. He thinks he has beaten
the system again, until he meets up with Spirit Bear. |
| Ned Vizzini |
It's Kind of a Funny Story
This IS kind of a funny story about teenage depression. While I feel that the book is for students in high school due to some of it's content, it is excellent. Craig Gilnor is clinically depressed. The opening line of the book is, "It's hard to talk when you want to kill yourself." Craig studied obsessively to get into an exclusive New York City prep high school because you have to do well in the right kind of school to get into the right kind of college so that you can get the right kind of job and not be homeless. The problem is that the day he got into the high school was the last happy day in his life because while he is bright, the rest of the students are far brighter and have to work less hard that Craig works to get a 93. In this school, a 93 is average.
And so Craig slides into a depression that becomes so deep, he is planning his suicide. Luckily, he has a supportive, intact family and as depressed as he is, he still takes their feelings into account and consults a book his mother had bought about coping with loss. The book advises that he call a suicide hotline and he does. The hotline suggests that he check into an emergency room where he voluntarily checks himself into a short-term psychiatric ward.
This book authentically portrays teenage depression and is not all doom and gloom. There are some genuinely laugh-out-loud moments as well as touching ones.
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