Young Adult (ages 14-18)

Material appropriate for young adults

A Rose for the Anzac Boys

The story starts in 1915. Midge Macpherson is at school in England, having been sent there from New Zealand after her father’s death. Her brothers are both serving in the war; her younger brother was last heard of at the Gallipoli campaign earlier that year. Her cousins are serving in the British army. Keen to ‘do their bit’ for the war effort, Midge and her school friends, Ethel and Anne, start up a canteen behind the front in France. Anne, daughter of English aristocracy, can’t wait to escape her inevitable future of being married off to someone ‘suitable’, and Ethel, a Yorkshire lass, six foot tall and built like a rugby player, isn’t exactly debutante material.

As the war goes on, the girls start to see the consequences of the ‘noble cause’ they’re supporting, graphically illustrated by letters from Midge’s brother Dougie, her aunt Lallie (who is running a hospital ward in Alexandria), and a couple of Australians also serving on the front, Gordon Marks and Harry Harrison. Midge, resourceful for her years, is ‘borrowed’ by the ambulance service, thus witnessing at close hand the carnage of the battlefields, and hearing the stories of those who come back. She sings songs to the dying, learns to tolerate hit-and-miss anaesthesia and twelve-hour shifts, and meets some remarkable people. She accepts a birthday gift of a drawing, done by a blinded soldier, of a vase of roses. And, on her return to New Zealand, discovers that her world has changed, and she must seek out her future in Australia.

A Proper Place

The fourth in the very successful series about Kevin (a Catholic) and Sadie (a Protestant) who meet (The Twelfth Day of July), grow up and fall in love (Across the Barricades) and leave Belfast to marry and find some peace (Into Exile). A Proper Place finds them still in Liverpool, with a two-room flat and baby Brendan, and coping with Kevin’s sullen seventeen-year-old brother, Gerald;’ but a job and a tied cottage on a Cheshire farm offer a new direction

The Twelfth Day of July

Sadie is Protestant, Kevin is Catholic – and on the tense streets of Belfast their lives collide. It starts with a dare – kids fooling around – but soon becomes something dangerous. Getting to know Sadie Jackson will change Kevin’s life forever. But will the world around them change too?

Hostages to Fortune

When the death of Kevin’s employer confronts him and his wife Sadie with the sudden loss of both job and home, an uncertain future looms up before them. Sequel to “A Proper Place.”

Abe In Arms

abePortraying the pressures of teens to live a normal life while facing mental illness, this suspenseful young adult novel follows the journey of success-bound Abe, who struggles with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. A senior in high school, with a loving and wealthy adoptive family, Abe is on track for a big scholarship and an open future. Suddenly, horrific flashbacks rip him back to war-torn Africa, where five years previously he lost his mother, sister, friends, and almost his own life to torturous violence. During therapy, he uncovers even darker moments from his past that make him question how he survived. This action-filled thriller will open the eyes and hearts of teenagers to the lives of young people who have been exposed to profound violence around the world.

Cleopatra’s Moon

“The Luxe” meets the ancient world in the extraordinary story of Cleopatra’s daughter. Selene has grown up in a palace on the Nile with her parents, Cleopatra and Mark Antony–the most brilliant, powerful rulers on earth. But the jealous Roman Emperor Octavianus wants Egypt for himself. When war finally comes, Selene faces the loss of all she’s ever loved. Forced to build a new life in Octavianus’s household in Rome, she finds herself torn between two young men and two possible destinies–until she reaches out to claim her own.

White Crow

Some secrets are better left buried; some secrets are so frightening they might make angels weep and the devil crow. Thought provoking as well as intensely scary, White Crow unfolds in three voices. There’s Rebecca, who has come to a small, seaside village to spend the summer, and there’s Ferelith, who offers to show Rebecca the secrets of the town but at a price. Finally, there’s a priest whose descent into darkness illuminates the girls’ frightening story.

Secret Heart

Living with his mother in a small village on the edge of the suburbs, shy, often inarticulate, Joe Maloney frequently dreams of a beautiful, elusive tiger whose significance begins to be clear after he befriends a young trapeze artist who comes to town with a shabby traveling circus.

High Riders, Saints and Death Cars: A Life Saved by Art

Nicholas Herrera started life as a mischievous, dyslexic boy, born into one of the old Spanish families of New Mexico. Bad teachers and poor schooling helped him to lose himself in drugs, drinking, riding motorcycles and driving fast cars. A near-death experience, a wonderful mother and a fascination with making art saved him. Today Nicholas Herrera is one of the most noted Santeros in the US. His work is displayed in folk-art galleries across the country and is collected by the Smithsonian. He is noted for the highly personal, political nature of his work and his innovative treatment of what can sometimes be a rather bland art form designed to sell to tourists. His work is intensely personal and even confessional. A survivor of alcoholism and drug addiction, which almost led to his death in a terrible car crash, Herrera is now sober and remarkably productive. His art is his life and his life is his art. Extraordinarily charismatic, Herrera is the grandson, nephew and son of artists. His young daughter is now following in his footsteps.