Material appropriate for young adults
In 1992, Amra was a teen in Bihac, Bosnia, when her best friend said they couldn’t speak anymore. Her friend didn’t say why, but Amra knew the reason: Amra was Muslim. It was the first sign her world was changing. Then Muslim refugees from other Bosnian cities started arriving, fleeing Serbian persecution. When the tanks rolled into Bihac, bringing her own city under seige, Amra’s happy life in her peaceful city vanished.
People sometimes have a problem with that last one. Especially her mom. Charlie wants a good relationship with her body, but it’s hard, and her mom leaving a billion weight loss shakes on her dresser doesn’t help. The world and everyone in it have ideas about what she should look like: thinner, lighter, slimmer-faced, straighter-haired. Be smaller. Be whiter. Be quieter.
But there’s one person who’s always in Charlie’s corner: her best friend Amelia. Slim. Popular. Athletic. Totally dope. So when Charlie starts a tentative relationship with cute classmate Brian, the first worthwhile guy to notice her, everything is perfect until she learns one thing–he asked Amelia out first. So is she his second choice or what? Does he even really see her?
Ibn Battuta was no ordinary traveller. Between 1325 CE when he set off and 1354 CE when he finally returned home to stay, he had visited about 40 modern countries and travelled roughly 75,000 miles, going on foot, camel, horse, wagon, boat and even sled.
17-year-old vegan feminist Ellen Lopez-Rourke has one muggy Houston summer left before college. She plans to spend every last moment with her two best friends before they go off to the opposite ends of Texas for school. But when Ellen is grounded for the entire summer by her (sometimes) evil stepmother, all her plans are thrown out the window.
From acclaimed performance poet Sophia Thakur comes a stirring collection of coming-of-age poems exploring issues of identity, difference, perseverance, relationships, fear, loss, and joy. From youth to school to family life to falling in love and falling back out again—the poems draw on the author’s experience as a young mixed-race woman trying to make sense of a lonely and complicated world. With a strong narrative voice and emotional empathy, this is poetry that will resonate with all young people, whatever their background and whatever their dreams
Cane Warriors follows the true story of Tacky’s War in Jamaica in 1760. A powerful young adult tale told through the eyes of Moa, a 14-year-old slave, this fictionalized account of the most significant rebellion of the time is rarely mentioned in history books or taught in schools. The story begins as Moa is awoken in the middle of the night by one of the rebels, who informs him that the revolt will begin on Easter Sunday. Moa’s father doesn’t like the idea of his son joining the rebellion, but his mother gives Moa her blessing. Together, Moa and his 16-year-old best friend Keverton take up arms, learning about brotherhood, courage, faith, and sacrifice along the way. Alex Wheatle’s storytelling and characterization bring to life the issues, pain, and the power structure of the era, along with the hopes and the dreams of the people. In writing this story, Wheatle’s meticulous and extensive research evokes the stories and legends passed down by word of mouth over the centuries.
Cane Warriors is a WOW Recommends: Book of the Month for January 2021.
After school one day, Frankie, a lover of physics and astronomy, has her first sexual experience with quiet and gorgeous Benjamin—and gets her period. It’s only blood, they agree. But soon a gruesome meme goes viral, turning an intimate, affectionate afternoon into something sordid, mortifying, and damaging. In the time it takes to swipe a screen, Frankie’s universe implodes. Who can she trust? Not Harriet, her suddenly cruel best friend, and certainly not Benjamin, the only one who knows about the incident. As the online shaming takes on a horrifying life of its own, Frankie begins to wonder: is her real life over?
Trained in warrior magic after the murder of her parents, a girl with a star-shaped birthmark is prophesied to be the downfall of a tyrant king, but the boy she falls in love with owes his loyalty to those hunting her.
In 1935, ten-year-old Alex Maki of Bainbridge Island, Washington, is horrified to discover that his new pen pal, Charlie Levy of Paris, France, is a girl, but in spite of his initial reluctance, their letters continue over the years and they fight for their friendship even as Charlie endures the Nazi occupation and Alex leaves his family in an internment camp and joins the Army.
An Unexpected Love Quadrangle With A Dash Of Unrequited Love As Two Classmates, A Boy And A Girl, Begin To Fall For Each Other When Each Of Their Best Friends Have Already Fallen For Them. It’s The Last Year Of High School, And Love Is In The Air. Romantic Feelings That Have Been Building Up Over Years Of Friendship Come To Light. When Taichi’s Classmate Futaba Asks Him To Help Her Confess To His Best Friend, Toma, It Sparks The Catalyst That Begins The Sweet And Heart-wrenching Journey Of Their Third And Final Year Of High School. For Some Reason, Taichi Ichinose Just Can’t Tolerate Futaba Kuze. But At The Start Of His Third Year In High School, He Finds Himself In The Same Homeroom As Her, Along With His Childhood Friend And School Sports Star Toma Mita. But One Day Futaba Opens Up To Taichi, Admitting She Has A Crush On Toma And Asking For His Help In Confessing To Him! There’s Just One Problem—toma Seems To Already Have A Secret Crush On Someone Else…