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Summer’s over and it’s time for Sunny Lewin to enter the strange and unfriendly hallways of middle school. When her Gramps calls her from Florida to ask how she’s doing, she always tells him she’s fine. But the truth? Sunny is NOT having the best time. Not only is the whole middle school thing confusing but life at home is confusing, too. Sunny misses her brother Dale, who’s been sent to boarding school. But when Dale comes back, she STILL misses him because he’s changed.

Cammie attends the private Gallagher Academy, a boarding school for spies in training. The only problem is that it’s an all-girls school. So when she meets a boy from town, she has to put her best skills to use to see him without letting him find out her true story, or letting her Mom find out she’s sneaking around. A great chick-lit meets spy story.

When Junior gets a chance to leave the reservation school and attend a far-away white high school, he must deal with prejudice not only from his new schoolmates, but from those he left behind.

Alice was four when her mother died. Though her father and brother do what they can, it’s tough being the only girl in the family. But as Alice begins 6th grade, she learns that there’s more to a person than just good looks. Readers will appreciate Alice’s sturdy but unattractive teacher, Mrs. Plotkins, and grow to respect her as did Alice. Both poignant and funny, this first in the Alice series introduces a girl who grows up literally in each successive installment. As Alice grows, so does the sophistication of the issues with which she deals.

Spoon and Gabi are in love and decide to stay together, even after Spoon leaves Harlem to spend his senior year at a prestigious prep school. When he comes home during break, he discovers that Gabi is addicted to heroin — “the beast.” Will Spoon and Gabi be able to resist the lure of street life and maintain their love for each other?

Twelve-year-old Rahul Kapoor, an Indian-American boy growing up in small-town Indiana, struggles to come to terms with his identity, including that he may be gay.

Emily has had a rough senior year of high school. She has to move from Chicago back to Boston and her boyfriend dumps her! Luckily, Emily meets up with some old friends and the girls complain how boys don’t know how to treat girls. Together, they create a book with a list of ways boys should behave. The girls convince Emily to try out their tips and tricks on Luke, the cutest boy in school. Will Emily finally find a guy who treats her well or will Luke be like all of the rest?

One of the most controversial YA novels of all time, The Chocolate War made its debut in 1974, and quickly became a bestselling — and provocative — classic for young adults. This chilling portrait of an all-boys prep school casts an unflinching eye on the pitfalls of conformity and corruption in our most elite cultural institutions.

Over the course of one summer, Frankie Landau-Banks, a somewhat geeky girl with an unassuming nature, has developed into a 15-year-old with an attention-grabbing figure, a new attitude, and sights set on making changes at her elite boarding school. The teenager also has a new boyfriend who belongs to a long-standing secret society on campus—The Loyal Order of the Basset Hounds, known mostly for silly pranks and a history of male-only membership. With a witty, sharp, and intelligently scheming mind, Frankie manipulates the Loyal Order to do her bidding with pranks meant to make a political statement about the male-dominated and classist nature of the school. (School Library Journal)

Succinct and practical, this guide provides students with the tactics, tools and confidence they need to successfully conduct college level research.

No one wants to take on the 4th grade class at Aesop Elementary: that is until Mr. Jupiter appears on the scene. The new teacher captivates his students while helping them learn a few lessons (remember the school’s name!) along the way.

There are no shortcuts to surviving your first day at a new school — you can’t fix it with duct tape like you would your Chuck Taylors. Things aren’t going so well, but when Malú (María Luisa, if you want to annoy her) assembles a group of like-minded misfits at school and starts a band, she finally begins to feel at home. She’ll do anything to preserve this, which includes standing up to an anti-punk school administration to fight for her right to express herself!

Black and white illustrations and collage art throughout make The First Rule of Punk a perfect pick for fans of books like Roller Girl and online magazines like Rookie.

The novel focuses on Josh Swenson, a teenager who preaches his anti-consumerism beliefs under his online pseudonym of “Larry” and must deal with the sudden popularity of his web presence.

Percy Jackson is a 21st century son of the ancient Greek god Poseidon on the biggest adventure of his young life — a quest to find out who stole Zeus’s lightening bolt! Together with his trusted friends, Percy travels through the United States, battling monsters and hunting the elusive title character.

Nadia loves fun facts. Here are a few about her:

- She collects bobbleheads — she has 77 so far.

- She moved from Egypt to America when she was six years old.

- The hippo amulet she wears is ancient… as in it’s literally from ancient Egypt.

- She’s going to win the contest to design a new exhibit at the local museum. Because how cool would that be?!

(Okay, so that last one isn’t a fact just yet, but Nadia has plans to make it one.)

But then a new kid shows up and teases Nadia about her Egyptian heritage. It’s totally unexpected, and totally throws her off her game. And something else happens that Nadia can’t explain: Her amulet starts glowing! She soon discovers that the hippo is holding a hilarious — and helpful — secret. Can she use it to confront the new kid and win the contest?

Includes sections of black-and-white comics as well as lively black-and-white illustrations throughout.

Deza is the smartest girl in her class in Gary, Indiana, singled out by teachers for a special path in life. But it’s 1936 and the Great Depression has hit Gary hard, and there are no jobs for black men. When her beloved father leaves to find work, Deza, Mother, and her older brother, Jimmie, go in search of him, and end up in a Hooverville outside Flint, Michigan. Jimmie’s beautiful voice inspires him to leave the camp to be a performer, while Deza and Mother find a new home, and cling to the hope that they will find Father. The twists and turns of their story reveal the devastation of the Depression and prove that Deza truly is the Mighty Miss Malone.

Fourteen-year-old Meilin is just trying to get through high school with all the problems that go along with it: boys, boring teachers, and too much homework. As if that wasn’t enough, Meilin finds out that she is the daughter of Sun Wukong, the Monkey King from Asian mythology. Now how’s she going to survive high school?

Margaret Rose Kane loves her uncles, their house and their garden, but holds especially dear the magnificent artistic towers that they’ve built and added to over the past forty years. After her Uncle Alex rescues her from summer camp, Margaret Rose discovers the city council has ordered the demolition of the towers. Growing used to the idea of standing up for herself and what she believes in, Margaret Rose launches a plan to save the towers and art for art’s sake.

A novel-in-verse by an award-winning slam poet, about an Afro-Latina heroine who tells her story with blazing words and powerful truth. Xiomara Batista feels unheard and unable to hide in her Harlem neighborhood. Ever since her body grew into curves, she has learned to let her fists and her fierceness do the talking. But Xiomara has plenty she wants to say, and she pours all her frustration and passion onto the pages of a leather notebook.

Growing up in suburban Detroit, David Hahn was fascinated by science. While he was working on his Atomic Energy badge for the Boy Scouts, David’s obsessive attention turned to nuclear energy.

Parkland Middle School is a place the students call Darkland, because no one in it does much to stop the daily harassment of kids by other kids. Three bullied seventh graders use their smarts to get the better of their tormentors by starting an unofficial e-mail forum at school in which they publicize their experiences. Unexpectedly, lots of other kids come forward to confess their similar troubles, and it becomes clear that the problem at their school is bigger than anyone knew. 

When Raisin moves across the country, she keeps her friends back in California updated with a blog. Since no one in the East will ever see what she’s writing, she can be frank about how she feels. But it doesn’t take long for her to get discovered.

In many ways, Jason Peele is like any other teenager. He hits the books, hangs with his friends, flirts with girls, and omits the full truth of his life from his Aunt Audrey and Uncle Steve, who have raised him since his parents died. But there’s one way that Jason Peele is very different: when he dreams at night, it isn’t about girls; it’s about David Bowie. At sixteen-years-old, Jason is just beginning to understand that he might be gay.

Rowan has too many secrets to write down in the pages of a diary. Now the kids at school say Rowan’s too different to spend time with. He’s not the right kind of girl, and he’s not the right kind of boy. His mom ignores him. And at night, his dad hurts him in ways he’s not ready to talk about yet. But Rowan discovers another way to share his secrets: letters. Letters he attaches to balloons and releases into the universe, hoping someone new will read them and understand. But when he befriends a classmate who knows what it’s like to be lonely and scared, even at home, Rowan realizes that there might already be a person he can trust right by his side.