REALISTIC FICTION

All Alone In the Universe                                              Perkins, Lynne Rae

            Summary:  Debbie is dismayed when her best friend Maureen starts spending time with ordinary, boring Glenna.

A Door Near Here                                                       Quarles, Heather

            Summary:  Four siblings struggle to maintain a seminormal home life when their single mother’s alcoholism becomes debilitating.

 The Afterlife                                                                 Soto, Gary

Summary:  A senior at East Fresno High School lives on as a ghost after his brutal murder in the restroom of a club where he had gone to dance.

 Boy of My Dreams                                                       Sheldon, Dyan

Summary:  Mike and her best friend Hope breathlessly await meeting the guys of their dreams and falling in love, but after Mike thinks that she has found the perfect boy there seems to be some question of whether he is her destiny.

 Breathing Underwater   (M)                                         Flinn, Alexandra

Summary:  Sent to counseling for hitting his girlfriend, Caitlin, and ordered to keep a journal, sixteen-year-old Nick recounts his relationship with Caitlin, examines his controlling behavior and anger, and describes living with his abusive father.

 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time          Haddon, Mark

Summary:  Despite his overwhelming fear of interacting with people, Christopher, a fifteen-year-old boy, decides to investigate the murder of a neighbor’s dog and uncovers secret information about his mother.

Cut (M)                                                                       McCormick, Patricia

Summary:  While confined to a mental hospital, thirteen-year-old Callie slowly comes to understand some of the reasons behind her self-mutilation, and gradually starts to get better.

 Driver’s Ed                                                                   Cooney, Caroline B.

            Summary:  Three teenagers’ lives are changed forever when they thoughtlessly steal a stop sign from a   
            dangerous intersection and a young mother is killed in an automobile accident there.

The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things (M)  Mackler, Carolyn

Summary:  Feeling like she does not fit in with the other members of her family, who are all thin, brilliant, and good-looking, fifteen-year-old Virginia tries to deal with her self-image, her first physical relationship, and her disillusionment with some of the people closest to her.

 Everything on a Waffle                                      Horvath, Polly

Summary:  Eleven-year-old Primrose, who lives in a small fishing village in British Columbia, recounts her experiences and all that she learns about human nature and the unpredictability of life in the months after her parents are lost at sea.

 The First Part Last (M)                                                            Johnson, Angela

Summary:  Bobby’s carefree teenage life changes forever when he becomes a father and must care for his adored baby daughter.  (Printz Award)

 Flipped                                                             Van Draanen, Wendelin

            Summary:  In alternating chapters, two teenagers describe how their feelings about themselves, each other, and their families have changed over the years.

The Game (M)                                                             Toten, Teresa

Summary:  Fourteen-year-old Dani wakes to find herself in Riverwood Clinic, a psychiatric treatment facility for teens, and must deal with her substance abuse problem and her confused memories of the Game that she has played with her sister Kelly all of her life.

 Give a Boy a Gun (M)                                                  Strasser, Todd

            Summary:  Interweaves the voices of students, teachers, friends,and gunmen in a fictional story about two heavily armed students,Gary and Brendan, who hold their classmates hostage at a school dance after being tormented by football players and teachers.  Includes real-life statistics on guns and violence.

 Godless                                                                        Hautman, Pete

Summary:  When sixteen-year-old Jason Bock and his friends create their own religion to worship the town’s water tower, what started out as a joke begins to take on a power of its own.

 Hanging on to Max       (M)                                          Bechard, Margaret

Summary:  When his girlfriend decides to give their baby away, seventeen-year-old Sam is determined to keep him and raise him alone.

 Hard Love (M)                                                            Wittlinger, Ellen

            Summary:  After starting to publish a zine in which he writes his secret feelings about his lonely life and his parents’ divorce, sixteen-year-old John meets an unusual girl and begins to develop a healthier personality.

Hidden Talents                                                 Lubar, David

            Summary:  When thirteen-year-old Martin arrives at an alternative schoo for misfits and problem students, he falls in with a group of boys with psychic powers and discovers something surprising about himself.

Hoops                                                                          Myers, Walter Dean

            Summary:  A teenage basketball player from Harlem is befriended by a former professional player who, afer being forced to quit because of a point shaving scandal, hopes to prevent other young athletes from repeating his mistake.

How I Live Now (M)                                                   Rosoff, Meg

Summary:  To get away from her pregnant stepmother in New York City, fifteen-year-old Daisy goes to England to stay with her aunt and cousins, with whom she instantly bonds, but soon war breaks out and rips apart the family while devastating the land. (Printz Award)

Iceman                                                                         Lynch, Chris

            Summary:  Fourteen-year-old Eric, a ruthless hockey player prone to violence on the ice, tries to reconcile his own needs with those of his parents.

 If I Should Die Before I Wake                          Nolan, Han

            Summary:  As Hilary, a Neo-Nazi initiate, lies in a coma, she is transported back to Poland at the onset of World War II into the life of a Jewish teenager.

 Ironman                                                                        Crutcher, Chris

            Summary:  While training for a triathlon, seventeen-year-old Bo attends an anger management group at school which leads him to examine his relationship with his father.

 Izzy, Willy-Nilly                                                            Voight, Cynthia

            Summary:  A car accident causes fifteen-year-old Izzy to lose one leg and face the need to start building a new life as an amputee.

 Kira-kira                                                                      Kadohata, Cynthia

Summary:  Chronicles the close friendship between two Japanese-American sisters growing up in rural Georgia during the late 1950s and early 1960s, and the despair when one sister becomes terminally ill. (Newberry Award)

 Kissing Doorknobs                                                       Hesser, Terry

            Summary:  Fourteen-year-old Tara describes how her increasingly strange compulsions begin to take over her life and affect her relationships with her family and friends. (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder)

 Memories of Summer                                                   White, Ruth

Summary:  In 1955, thirteen-year-old Lyric finds her whole life changing when her family moves from the hills of Virginia to a town in Michigan and her older sister Summer begins descending into mental illness. 

 Monster                                                                       Myers, Walter Dean

            Summary:  While on trial as an accomplice to a murder, sixteen-year-old Steve Harmon records his experiences in prison and in the courtroom in the form of a film script as he tries to come to terms with the course his life has taken. (2000 Printz Award Winner)

 Nothing to Lose                                                            Flinn, Alex

Summary:  A year after running away with a traveling carnival to escape his unbearable home life, sixteen-year-old Michael returns to Miami, Florida, to find that his mother is going on trial for the murder of his abusive stepfather.

Olive’s Ocean                                                              Henkes, Kevin

Summary:  On a summer visit to her grandmother’s cottage by the ocean, twelve-year-old Martha gains perspective on the death of a classmate, on her relationship with her grandmother, on her feelings for an older boy, and on her plans to be a writer.

Out of Control                                                              Mazer, Norma

            Summary:  After joining his two best friends in a spontaneous attack on a girl at their school, sixteen-year-old Rollo finds that his life is changed forever. (Sexual Harassment)

 Out of the Fire                                                              Froese, Deborah

Summary:  Dayle, a sixteen-year-old girl dealing with the typical teen problems of relationships, boys, school, and family, is faced with a whole new set of complications when she is badly burned in an accident and a friend seriously injured.

 Phoenix Rising, Or, How To Survive Your Life   Grant, Cynthia D.                    

            Summary:  Helen’s death at eighteen from cancer shatters the lives of  her parents and siblings, especially younger sister Jessie who tries to cope with her feelings of pain and confusion by reading pages from Helen’s diary.

Pictures of Hollis Woods                                              Giff, Patricia Reilly

Summary:  A troublesome twelve-year-old orphan, staying with an elderly artist who needs her, remembers the only other time she was happy in a foster home, with a family that truly seemed to care about her.

 Rules of the Road                                                         Bauer, Joan

            Summary:  Shoe saleswoman Jenna “drives” her way to a new self-awareness.

Say Goodnight Gracie                                                   Deaver, Julie Reese

            Summary:  Best friends separated by tragedy.

 Shattering Glass                                                            Giles, Gail

Summary:  When Rob, the charismatic leader of the senior class, turns the school nerd into Prince Charming, his actions lead to unexpected violence.

Shooter                                                                        Myers, Walter Dean

Summary:  Written in the form of interviews, reports, and journal entries, the story of three troubled teenagers ends in a tragic school shooting.

Silent to the Bone (M)                                                  Konigsbur, E. L.

            Summary:  Who dropped the baby?  For sophisticated audience.

 Slot Machine    (Also: Ice Man)                                    Lynch, Chris

            Summary:  When overweight thirteen-year-old Elvin Bishop is sent to camp at St. Paul’s Seminary Retreat Center, he and his two best friends are forced to try out various sports in order to find out where they belong.

 So B. It: a novel                                                            Weeks, Sarah

Summary:  After spending her life with her mentally retarding mother and agoraphobic neighbor, twelve-year-old Heidi sets out from Reno, Nevada, to New York to find out who she is.

Someone Like You (M)                                                           Dessen, Sarah

            Summary:  Halley’s junior year of high school includes the death of her best friend Scarlett’s boyfriend, the discovery that Scarlett is pregnant, and Halley’s own first serious relationship.

Sons of Liberty                                                 Griffin, Adele

            Summary:  When thirteen-year-old Rock helps his friend Liza run away from home, he wonders whether escaping from his own troubled family would be an act of patriotism or of treason.

 So Yesterday: a novel                                                   Westerfeld, Scott

Summary:  Hunter Braque, a New York City teenager who is paid by corporations to spot what is “cool,” combines his analytical skills with girlfriend Jen’s creative talents to find a missing person and thwart a conspiracy directed at the heart of consumer culture.

Speak  (M)                                                                  Anderson, Laurie

            Summary:  A traumatic event near the end of the summer has a devastating effect on Melinda’s freshman year in high school. (Date Rape) (Also: Catalyst)

 Stargirl                                                                         Spinelli, Jerry

            Summary:  In this story about the perils of popularity, the courage of  nonconformity, and the thrill of first love, an eccentric student named Stargirl changes Mica High School forever.

 Staying Fat For Sarah Byrnes                                       Crutcher, Chris

            Summary:  The daily class discussions about the existence of God, abortion, suicide and other contemporary issues serve as a backdrop for a high-school senior’s attempt to answer a friend’s cry for help. (Abuse)

 Stuck in Neutral                                                            Trueman, Jerry

            Summary:  Boy with cerebral palsy bout to become a murder victim.

Surviving the Applewhites                                             Tolan, Stephanie S.

Summary:  Jake, a budding juvenile delinquent, is sent for home schooling to the arty and eccentric Applewhite family’s Creative Academy, where he discovers talents and interests he never knew he had.

Swallowing Stones                                                        McDonald, Joyce

            Summary:  Dual perspectives reveal the aftermath of seventeen-year-old  Michael MacKenzie’s birthday celebration during which he discharges an antique Winchester rifle and unknowingly kills the father of high school classmate Jenna Ward.  

 Tears of a Tiger                                                            Draper, Sharon

Summary:  The death of high school basketball star Rob Washington in an automobile accident affects the lives of his close friend Andy, who was driving the car, and many others in the school.

Telling Christina Goodbye                                             McDaniel, Lurlene

Summary:  Christina’s friends and loved ones must learn to cope when she is killed and two other high school seniors are injured in a car accident.

Touching Spirit Bear                                                     Mikaelsen, Ben

            Summary:  After his anger erupts into violence, Cole, in order to avoid going to prison, agrees to participate in a sentencing alternative based on the native American Circle Justice, and he is sent to a remote Alaskan Island when an encounter with a huge spirit bear changes his life.

 True Believer    (M)                                                      Wolff, Virginia Euwer

Summary:  Living in the inner city amidst guns and poverty, fifteen-year-old LaVaughn learns from old and new friends, and inspiring mentors, that life is what you make it – an occasion to rise to.

Vote for Larry                                                              Tashjian, Janet

Summary:  Not yet eighteen years old, Josh, a.k.a. Larry, comes out of hiding and returns to public life, this time to run for President as an advocate for issues of concern to youth and to encourage voter turnout. (Sequel to Gospel According to Larry)

Whirligig                                                                       Fleischman, Paul

            Summary:  While traveling to each corner of the country to build a whirligig in memory of the girl whose death he causes, sixteen-year-old Brian finds forgiveness and atonement. (Drunk Driving)

 Winter                                                                          Marsden, John

Summary:  For twelve years Winter has been haunted by her memories, now, at sixteen, the time has come for her to meet the future by stepping into the past, where she may learn the real circumstances of her parents’ deaths. 

You Don’t Know Me   (M)                                          Klass, David

Summary:  Fouteen-year-old John creates alternative realities in his mind as he tries to deal with his mother’s abusive boyfriend, his crush on a beautiful, but shallow classmate and other problems at school.

 (M) Mature Audience

11/06