MABELVALE MAGNENT MIDDLE SCHOOL RECOMMENDED …



[pic]MABELVALE MAGNET MIDDLE SCHOOL RECOMMENDED READING

|Book Title |Author |Description |

|Forged by Fire |Susan Draper |When his loving aunt dies, Gerald suddenly is thrust into a new home filled with anger and abuse. A brutal stepfather with a flaming temper |

| | |and an evil secret makes Gerald miserable, and the only light in his grim life is Angel, his young stepsister. Gerald and Angel grow close as|

| | |he strives to protect her from Jordan, his abusive stepfather, and from their substance-addicted mother. But Gerald learns, painfully, that |

| | |his past can’t be extinguished, and that he must be strong enough to face Jordan in a final confrontation, once and for all |

|The Dark is Rising |Susan Cooper |On his 11th birthday, Will Stanton discovers that he is the last of the Old Ones, destined to seek the six magical Signs that will enable the|

| | |Old Ones to triumph over the evil forces of the Dark. |

|Over Sea, Under |Susan Cooper |Three children on vacation in Cornwall find an ancient manuscript which sends them on a dangerous quest that entraps them in a battle between|

|Stone | |the forces of the Light and Dark. |

|Watson's Go To |Christopher Paul |The ordinary interactions and everyday routines of the Watson’s, an African-American family living in Flint, Michigan, are drastically |

|Birmingham |Curtis |changed after they go to visit Grandma in Alabama in the summer of 1963. |

|Brown Angels |Walter Dean Myers |A collection of poems, accompanied by photographs, about African – American children living around the turn of the century. |

|The Hobbit |J.R.R. Tolkien |Bilbo Baggins, a respectable well –to-do hobbit, lives comfortably in his hobbit hole until the day the wandering wizard Gandalf chooses him |

| | |to take part in an adventure from which he may never return. |

|Sister of the Traveling |Ann Brashares |Four best girlfriends spend the biggest summer of their lives enchanted by a magical pair of pants. |

|Pants | | |

|Hoot |Carl Hiassen |Roy is new to his small Florida community, becomes involved in another boy’s attempt to save a colony of burrowing owls from a proposed |

| | |construction site. |

|Eragon |Christopher Paolini |In Aagaesia, a fifteen-year-old boy of unknown lineage called Eragon finds a mysterious stone that weaves his life into an intricate tapestry|

| | |of destiny, magic, and power. |

|Nightjohn |Gary Paulsen |Twelve-year-old Sarny’s brutal life as a slave becomes even more dangerous when a newly arrived slave offers to teach her how to read. |

|Loch |Paul Zindel |Loch and his younger sister join their father on a scientific expedition searching for enormous prehistoric creatures sighted in a Vermont |

| | |lake, but it soon becomes obvious that the expedition’s leaders aren’t interested in preserving the creatures. |

|The People Could Fly |Virginia Hamilton |Retold African American folktales of animals, fantasy, the supernatural, and desire for freedom, born of the sorrow of slaves, but passed on |

| | |in hope. |

|Roll of Thunder Hear |Mildred D. Taylor |Sequel: Let the circle be unbroken; Newbery Medal, 1977. An African-American family living in |

|My Cry | |Mississippi during the Depression of the 1930s is faced with prejudice and discrimination which its children do not understand. |

|Sounder |William Armstrong |An angry, young African American boy is transformed through the relationship of his devoted dog, Sounder, and the gift of learning to read. |

|M.C. Higgins, the |Virginia Hamilton |As a slag heap, the result of strip mining, creeps closer to his house in the Ohio hills, fifteen years old |

|Great | |M.C. is torn between trying to get his family away and fighting for the home they love. |

|Amos Fortune, Free |Elizabeth Yates |The life of an eighteenth-century African prince who, after being captured by slave traders, was brought to Massachusetts where he was a |

|Man | |slave until he was able to buy his freedom at the age of sixty. |

|A Voice that Challenged a |Russell Freedman |Gives an account of the great African American vocalist, Marian Anderson, which considers her life and musical career in the context of the |

|Nation: Marian Anderson | |history of civil rights in this country. |

|Among the Hidden |Margaret Peterson |Luke, a third child, lives in a future where each family is allowed to have only two children. Because his parents broke the law when they |

| |Haddix |let him live, Luke must remain a secret. |

|Autumn Street |Lois Lowry |When her father leaves to fight in WWII, Elizabeth goes with her mother and sister to her grandfather's house, where she learns to face up to|

| | |the always puzzling and often cruel realities of the adult world. |

|Chasing Vermeer |Blue Balliett |A cryptic letter about a centuries-old crime is delivered to three people. This 'kid's' version of 'The DaVinci Code' will keep them |

| | |spellbound. |

|Tale of Despereaux |Kate DiCamillo |The story of a mouse, a princess, some soup, and a spool of thread. |

|Red Scarf Girl |Ji-li Jiang |The author tells about the happy life she led in China up until she was twelve-years-old when her family became a target of the Cultural |

| | |Revolution, and discusses the choice she had to make between denouncing her father and breaking with her family, or refusing to speak against|

| | |him and losing her future in the Communist Party. |

|The Clay Marble |Minfong Ho |In the late 1970s twelve-year-old Dara joins a refugee camp in war-torn Cambodia and becomes separated from her family. |

|The Birchbark House |Louise Erdrich |Omakayas, a seven-year-old Native American girl of the Ojibwa tribe, lives through the joys of |

| | |Summer and the perils of Winter on an island in Lake Superior in 1847. |

|Esperanza Rising |Pam Munoz-Ryan |Thirteen year old Esperanza, the pampered daughter of a rich landowner and her mother are forced to leave their life of wealth and privilege |

| | |in Mexico after her father is killed. They end up in a Southern California farm labor camp and begin a vastly different life where they must |

| | |adapt to the harsh circumstances facing Mexican farm workers on the eve of the Great Depression. |

|Habibi |Naomi Shihab Nye |When fourteen-year-old Liyanne Abboud, her younger brother, and her parents move from St. Louis to a new home between Jerusalem and the |

| | |Palestinian village where her father was born, they face many changes and must deal with the tensions between Jews and Palestinians. |

|A Girl Named Disaster |Nancy Farmer |While journeying to Zimbabwe, eleven-year-old Nhamo struggles to escape drowning and starvation and in so doing comes close to the luminous |

| | |world of the African spirits. |

|Year of Impossible |Sook Nyul Choi |A young Korean girl survives the oppressive Japanese and Russian occupation of North Korea during the 1940s, to later escape to freedom in |

|Good-Byes | |South Korea. |

|Baseball in April |Gary Soto |A collection of eleven short stories focusing on the everyday adventures of Hispanic young people growing up in Fresno, California. |

|The House on Mango |Sandra Sisneros |A young girl living in a Hispanic neighborhood in Chicago ponders the advantages and disadvantages of her environment and evaluates her |

|Street | |relationships with family and friends. |

|Shabanu |Suzanne Fisher |Eleven-year old Shabanu, the daughter of a nomad in the Cholistan Desert of present-day Pakistan, is pledged in marriage to an older man |

| |Staples |whose money will bring prestige to the family, and must either accept the decision, as is the custom, or risk the consequences of defying her|

| | |father’s wishes |

|The Chosen |Chaim Potok |Recounts the story of Reuven Malter and Danny Saunders—one an orthodox Jew, the other the son of a Hasidic rabbi—and the course of their |

| | |friendship as they grow up in Brooklyn. |

|Bud, Not Buddy |Christopher Paul |Ten-year-old Bud, a motherless boy living in Flint, Michigan, during the Great Depression, escapes a bad foster home and sets out in search |

| |Curtis |of the man he believes to be his father—the renowned bandleader, H.E. Calloway of Grand Rapids. |

|A Single Shard |Linda Sue Park |Tree-ear, a thirteen-year-old orphan in medieval Korea, lives under a bridge in a potters’ village, and longs to learn how to throw the |

| | |delicate celadon ceramics himself. |

|I Rode a Horse of Milk |Dianne Lee Wilson |In early fourteenth-century China, Oyuna tells her granddaughter of her girlhood in Mongolia and how love for her horse enabled her to win an|

|White Jade | |important race and bring good luck to her family. |

|In the Year of the Boar & |Betty Bao Lord |In 1947, a Chinese child comes to Brooklyn where she becomes Americanized at school, in her apartment building, and by her love for baseball.|

|Jackie Robinson | | |

|Journey to Topaz |Yoshiko Uchida |After the Pearl Harbor attack an eleven-year-old Japanese-American girl and her families are forced to go to an alien’s camp in Utah. |

|The Heart of a Chief |Joseph Bruchac |An eleven-year-old Penacook Indian boy living on a reservation faces his father’s alcoholism, a controversy surrounding plans for a casino on|

| | |a tribal island, and insensitivity toward Native Americans in his school and nearby town. |

|Skeleton Man |Joseph Bruchac |After her parents disappear and she is turned over to the care of a strange “great-uncle,” Molly must rely on her dreams about an old Mohawk |

| | |story for her safety and maybe even for her life. |

|Cousins |Virginia Hamilton |Cammy loves her family - except for her cousin Patty Ann. Though she knows she shouldn’t feel this way she can’t help it. Patty Ann is too |

| | |perfect to like, too perfect to be a friend. |

|Darnell Rock |Walter Dean Myers |Darnell Rock is not the kind of kid who volunteers to write for the school newspaper - it sounds too much like work. But this is Darnell’s |

|Reporting | |last chance to pull himself together and make a positive contribution to his school. |

|Handbook for Boys: A Novel |Walter Dean Myers |Sixteen-year-old Jimmy, on probation for assault, talks about life with three old men in a Harlem barbershop and hears about the tools he can|

| | |use to get what he wants. |

|Heaven |Angela Johnson |Fourteen-year-old Marley’s seemingly perfect life in the small town of Heaven is disrupted when she discovers that her father and mother are |

| | |not her real parents. |

|The Legend of Buddy |Sheila Moses |The Legend of Buddy Bush is a moving historical narrative told through the words of a young girl who confronts adversity in the 1940’s North |

|Bush | |Carolina. The day Uncle Goodwin “Buddy” Bush came from Harlem all the way back to Rehobeth Road in Rich Square, North Carolina, is the day |

| | |Pattie Mae Sheats’ life changes forever. |

|Miracle's Boys |Jacqueline |Twelve-year-old Lafayette’s close relationship with his older brother Charlie changes after Charlie is released from a detention home and |

| |Woodson |blames Lafayette for the death of their mother. |

|Money Hungry |Sharon G. Flake |All thirteen-year-old Rasberry can think about is making money so that she and her mother never have to worry about living on the streets |

| | |again. |

|The Skin I'm In |Sharon G. Flake |Thirteen-year-old Maleeka, uncomfortable because her skin is extremely dark, meets a new teacher with a birthmark on her face and makes some |

| | |discoveries about how to love who she is and what she looks like. |

|Slam |Walter Dean Myers |Seventeen-year-old Greg “Slam” Harris is counting on his noteworthy basketball talents to get him out of the inner city and give him a chance|

| | |to succeed in life, but his coach sees things differently. |

|Somewhere in the |Walter Dean Myers |A Newbery Honor Book Award- Fourteen year old Jimmy has a difficult time growing up in Harlem. After nine years, his father returns, and |

|Darkness | |suddenly, Jimmy wants to know him. The two set out on an incredible journey of understanding and forgiveness. |

|Series of Unfortunate |Lemony Snickett |After the death of their parents, three Baudelaire children must depend on each other and their wits when it turns out that the distant |

|Events | |relative who is appointed their guardian is determined to use any means necessary to get their fortune. |

|Trouble Don't Last |Shelley Pearsall |Samuel, an eleven–year-old Kentucky slave, and Harrison, the elderly slave who helped raise him, attempt to escape to Canada via the |

| | |Underground Railroad. |

|The Gospel According to |Janet Tashjian |Seventeen-year-old Josh, a loner-philosopher who wants to make a difference in the world, tries to maintain his secret identity as the author|

|Larry | |of a Web site that is receiving national attention. |

|The Princess Diaries |Meg Cabot |A series of humorous diary entries that chronicles the life and times of a New York City ninth grader. |

|Series | | |

|Sweet Whispers, Brother |Virginia Hamilton |Tree knew whatever secrets his whispered message held, she must follow Brother Rush through the magic mirror, and find out the truth about |

|Rush | |them all. |

|Out of the Dust |Karen Hesse |A terrible accident has transformed Billie Jo’s life, scarring her inside out. She is left to find peace in the bleak landscape of Oklahoma. |

|The Cay |Theodore Taylor |The Cay tells of a man and boy's struggle for survival and their efforts to adjust or die. |

|Letter from a Slave | |A slave girl writes letters about the inappropriate advances made by her masters. |

|Girl | | |

|The Contender |Robert Lipsyte |17-year-old High School dropout tries to change his street life to become a boxing champion but his old friends make it very difficult to |

| | |move towards a better life. |

|Bronx Masquerade |Nikki Grimes |This story of teenagers in the Bronx who come to know and understand one another and themselves through poetry they begin to share in their |

| | |high school English class. |

| | |ALA BEST, Coretta Scott King Award |

|The Giver |Lois Lowry |In a tightly controlled society where all seems perfect, 12 year old Jonas is chosen to be the one to receive its secrets from an old man |

| | |known as the giver. What he learns from him changes everything. CHOSEN TO BE THE ONE TO RECEIVE ITS SECRETS FROM AN OLD MAN KNOWN AS THE |

| | |GIVER. WHAT HE LEARNS FROM THE GIVER , CHANGES EVERYTHING |

|When Zachary Beaver |Kimberly Willis Holt |During the summer of 1971 in a small Texas town, Toby and his best friend, Cal, meet the bad tempered star of a sideshow act, 600-pound |

|Came to Town | |Zachary, the fattest boy in the world. |

|Hatchet |Gary Paulsen |After a plane crash, thirteen - year - old Brian spends fifty -four days in the wilderness, learning to survive with only a hatchet given him|

| | |by his mother and learning also to survive his parents divorce. |

|And Then There Were |Agatha Christie |Ten strangers are lured to an Indian island by a mysterious host who accuses each of murder. They begin to share their darkest secrets and |

| | |die. |

|The Red Badge of |Stephen Crane |Written thirty years after the civil war, this story describes the horrors of battle through the eyes of young Henry Fleming who was swept up|

|Courage | |by events and joined the union army. |

|The Lily B. Series |Elizabeth Cody |Her parents are uninteresting. Her father drives the speed limit in the fast lane. Her mother cares so much about being tidy that she makes |

| |Kimmel |their beds while staying at motels. Excitement skyrockets when Lily meets the glamorous LeBlanc family, who dress amazingly, and care about |

| | |the important things in life, such as the environment and vegetarianism. |

|The Cheetah Girls |Deborah Gregory |Aimed at preteens, this collection features 13 books about five feisty multicultural teens: Galleria, Chanel, Dorinda, Anginette, and |

|Series | |Aquanette who meet and become best friends at Fashion Industries High School in New York City. |

|The House of Dies |Virginia Hamilton |This is a mystery about a young black boy’s house that once played a part in the Underground |

|Drear | |Railroad. |

|My Brother Sam is |James Lincoln Collier |This gripping novel of the American Revolution “does not glorify war and raises all the necessary questions about the effectiveness of |

|Dead |& Christopher Collier |violence.” Newberry Medal |

|Ties that Bind, Ties that |Lensey Namioka |Unaware of the consequences of her refusal to have her feet bound, Ailin learns the harsh realities of being an adolescent girl living |

|Break | |outside the Chinese traditions. |

|Flowers for Algernon |Daniel Keyes |This novel portrays a dramatic medical experiment and its implications for society. Thirty-year old retarded Charlie Gordon is turned into a |

| | |genius, as is his friend, Algernon, a white mouse. |

|Things Fall Apart |Achebe |This tragedy of a leading member of the Obi tribe in Africa in the days when white men were first appearing on the scene and gives students a|

| | |historic lesson in African American history. |

|Cool Salsa; Bilingual Poems|Mari L. Carlson |Poems are presented in both English and Spanish. The poems echo the stories of Latino teenage life. The book features renowned writers, Gary |

|on Growing Up Latino | |Soto, Sandra Cisneros, and Gaspar de Alba. |

|Rosa Parks: My Story |Rosa Parks |Rosa Parks refuses to give up her seat on a segregated bus in Alabama. |

|Gifted Hands |Ben Carson |Carson’s autobiography is an inspiring story of an inner-city kid’s struggle to overcome low grades and poor self-esteem. |

|Jazmin's Notebook |Nikki Grimes |Jazmin’s got her notebook, filled to the brim with poetry, laughter, and her own irrepressible views on life, Harlem, and just about |

| | |everything else. |

|The Bluest Eye |Toni Morrison |Set in the author’s girlhood hometown of Lorain, Ohio, it tells the story of black, eleven-year-old |

| | |Pecola Breedlove. Pecola prays for her eyes to turn blue so that she will be as beautiful and beloved as all the blond, blue-eyed children in|

| | |America. |

|Holes |Louis Sachar |Stanley has been unjustly sent to a boys’ detention center, Camp Green Lake, where the boys build character by spending all day, every day, |

| | |digging holes exactly five feet wide and five feet deep. |

|Circle of Gold |Candy Dawson |When Mattie’s father was alive, everything seemed perfect. But her world changed when he died. |

| |Boyd | |

|Maniac Magee |Jerry Spinelli |He wasn’t born with the name Maniac Magee. He came into this world named Jeffrey Lionel Magee, but when his parents died and his life |

| | |changed, so did his name. |

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