From the author of the acclaimed Blood Water Paint, a new contemporary YA novel in prose and verse about a girl struggling with guilt and a desire for revenge after her sister’s rapist escapes with no prison time.
Em Morales’s older sister was raped by another student after a frat party. A jury eventually found the rapist guilty on all counts–a remarkable verdict that Em felt more than a little responsible for, since she was her sister’s strongest advocate on social media during the trial. Her
NaN
Novel
Young Adult
2/9/2021
Latinx/Hispanic
Ghost Boys
Jewell Parker Rhodes
General List
EYNov23
High
0
1
Middle School
High School
Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
EYNOV23
11/2/2023
Only the living can make the world better. Live and make it better.
Twelve-year-old Jerome is shot by a police officer who mistakes his toy gun for a real threat. As a ghost, he observes the devastation that's been unleashed on his family and community in the wake of what they see as an unjust and brutal killing.
Soon Jerome meets another ghost: Emmett Till, a boy from a very different time but similar circumstances. Emmett helps Jerome process what has happened, on a journey towards recognizi
If there’s one thing seventeen-year-old Maverick Carter knows, it’s that a real man takes care of his family. As the son of a former gang legend, Mav does that the only way he knows how: dealing for the King Lords. With this money he can help his mom, who works two jobs while his dad’s in prison.
Life’s not perfect, but with a fly girlfriend and a cousin who always has his back, Mav’s got everything under control.
Until, that is, Maverick finds out he’s a father.
Suddenly he has a baby, Seven
NaN
Novel
Young Adult
Fiction
1/12/2021
Yes
Black
Like Home
Louisa Onome
General List
EYNov23
High
0
0
Middle School
High School
Random House Children’s Books
EYNOV23
11/2/2023
Fans of Netflix's On My Block, In the Heights, and readers of Elizabeth Acevedo and Ibi Zoboi will love this debut novel about a girl whose life is turned upside down after one local act of vandalism throws her relationships and even her neighborhood into turmoil.
Chinelo, or Nelo as her best friend Kate calls her, is all about her neighborhood Ginger East. She loves its chill vibe, ride-or-die sense of community, and her memories of growing up there. Ginger East isn't what it used to be, thoug
NaN
Novel
Young Adult
Fiction
2/23/2021
Black
A List of Cages
Robin Roe
General List
EYNov23
High
0
0
High School
Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
EYNOV23
11/2/2023
When Adam Blake lands the best elective ever in his senior year, serving as an aide to the school psychologist, he thinks he’s got it made. Sure, it means a lot of sitting around, which isn’t easy for a guy with ADHD, but he can’t complain, since he gets to spend the period texting all his friends. Then the doctor asks him to track down the troubled freshman who keeps dodging her, and Adam discovers that the boy is Julian—the foster brother he hasn’t seen in five years.
Adam is ecstatic to be r
NaN
Young Adult
Fiction
12/5/2017
Yes
Yes
Tokyo Ever After
Emiko Jean
General List
EYNov23
High
0
0
High School
Flatiron Books
EYNOV23
11/2/2023
Izumi Tanaka has never really felt like she fit in—it isn’t easy being Japanese American in her small, mostly white, northern California town. Raised by a single mother, it’s always been Izumi—or Izzy, because “It’s easier this way”—and her mom against the world. But then Izzy discovers a clue to her previously unknown father’s identity… and he’s none other than the Crown Prince of Japan. Which means outspoken, irreverent Izzy is literally a princess.
In a whirlwind, Izzy travels to Japan to me
NaN
Young Adult
Novel
Fiction
POC Representation
5/18/2021
Yes
Asian/Pacific Islander
Yes
Out of Darkness
Ashley Hope Pérez
General List
EYNov23
High
0
0
High School
Holiday House
EYNOV23
11/2/2023
"This is East Texas, and there's lines. Lines you cross, lines you don't cross. That clear?" New London, TX. 1937. Naomi Vargas is Mexican American. Wash Fuller is Black. These teens know the town's divisive racism better than anyone. But sometimes the attraction between two people is so powerful it breaks through even the most entrenched color lines. And the consequences can be explosive.
Naomi and Wash dare to defy the rules, and the New London school explosion serves as a ticking time bomb i
Clem can make anybody, even his grumpy older sisters, smile with his jokes. But when his family receives news that his father has died in the infamous Port Chicago disaster, everything begins to fall apart. Clem's mother is forced to work long, tough hours as a maid for a wealthy white family. Soon Clem can barely recognize his home--and himself. Can he live up to his father's legacy?
In her award-winning trilogy, Lesa Cline-Ransome masterfully recreates mid-twentieth century America through th
As graphic artist Rhea Ewing neared college graduation in 2012, they became consumed by the question: What is gender? This obsession sparked a quest in which they eagerly approached both friends and strangers in their quiet Midwest town for interviews to turn into comics. A decade later, this project exploded into a sweeping portrait of the intricacies of gender expression with interviewees from all over the country. Questions such as “How do you Identify” produced fiercely honest stories of dea
Murder most fowl? In this sardonic and campy YA thriller, an anxious, introverted nonbinary teen birder somehow finds themself investigating a murder with their neighbor/fellow anime lover, all while falling for a cute girl from their birding group...and trying not to get killed next.
Sixteen-year-old Bianca Torre is an avid birder undergoing a gender identity crisis and grappling with an ever-growing list of fears. Some, like Fear #6: Initiating Conversation, keep them constrained, forcing th
NaN
Young Adult
Novel
Fiction
Detective/Mystery
Queer Representation
4/11/2023
YES
Anxiety
Ander & Santi Were Here
Jonny Garza Villa
General List
EYNov23
High
0
0
High School
Wednesday Books
EYNOV23
11/2/2023
Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe meets The Sun is Also a Star in this YA contemporary love story from Jonny Garza Villa, Ander & Santi Were Here, about a nonbinary Mexican American teen falling for the shy new waiter at their family’s taqueria.
Finding home. Falling in love. Fighting to belong.
The Santos Vista neighborhood of San Antonio, Texas, is all Ander Martínez has ever known. The smell of pan dulce. The mixture of Spanish and English filling the streets. And, es
NaN
Novel
Young Adult
Fiction
POC Representation
Queer Representation
5/2/2023
YES
Latinx/Hispanic
Yes
Forever is Now
Mariama J. Lockington
General List
EYNov23
High
0
0
High School
Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)
EYNOV23
11/2/2023
A poignant and lyrical young adult novel-in-verse about a Black teen coming of age in an anxiety-inducing world, from the author of For Black Girls Like Me and In the Key of Us.
I'm safe here.
That's how Sadie feels, on a perfect summer day, wrapped in her girlfriend's arms. School is out, and even though she’s been struggling to manage her chronic anxiety, Sadie is hopeful better times are ahead. Or at least, she thought she was safe. When her girlfriend reveals some unexpected news and the t
NaN
Novel
Young Adult
Fiction
Black Representation
5/23/2023
YES
Anxiety
agoraphobia
Black
Yes
The Luis Ortega Survival Club
Sonora Reyes
General List
EYNov23
High
0
0
High School
Balzer + Bray
EYNOV23
11/2/2023
Ariana Ruiz wants to be noticed. But as an autistic girl who never talks, she goes largely ignored by her peers—despite her bold fashion choices. So when cute, popular Luis starts to pay attention to her, Ari finally feels seen.
Luis’s attention soon turns to something more, and they have sex at a party—while Ari didn’t say no, she definitely didn’t say yes. Before she has a chance to process what happened and decide if she even has the right to be mad at Luis, the rumor mill begins churning—th
NaN
Young Adult
Novel
Fiction
Queer Representation
Immigrant Representation
POC Representation
5/23/2023
autism
Latinx/Hispanic
Yes
The Life and Crimes of Hoodie Rosen
Isaac Blum
General List
EYNov23
High
0
0
Middle School
High School
Philomel Books
EYNOV23
11/2/2023
Hoodie Rosen's life isn't that bad. Sure, his entire Orthodox Jewish community has just picked up and moved to the quiet, mostly non-Jewish town of Tregaron, but Hoodie's world hasn't changed that much. He's got basketball to play, studies to avoid, and a supermarket full of delicious kosher snacks to eat. The people of Tregaron aren’t happy that so many Orthodox Jews are moving in at once, but that’s not Hoodie’s problem.
That is, until he meets and falls for Anna-Marie Diaz-O’Leary—who happen
NaN
Novel
Historical Fiction
Young Adult
9/13/2022
Judaism
A Snake Falls to Earth
Darcie Little Badger
General List
EYNov23
High
0
0
Middle School
High School
Levine Querido
EYNOV23
11/2/2023
A Snake Falls to Earth is a breathtaking work of Indigenous futurism. Darcie Little Badger draws on traditional Lipan Apache storytelling structure to weave another unforgettable tale of monsters, magic, and family. It is not to be missed.
Nina is a Lipan girl in our world. She's always felt there was something more out there. She still believes in the old stories.
Oli is a cottonmouth kid, from the land of spirits and monsters. Like all cottonmouths, he's been cast from home. He's found a new
NaN
Novel
Young Adult
11/23/2021
Yes
Indigenous
Indigenous
From a Whisper to a Rallying Cry: the Killing of Vincent Chin and the Trial that Galvanized the Asian American Movement
Paula Yoo
General List
EYNov23
High
0
0
Middle School
High School
Norton Young Readers
EYNOV23
11/2/2023
America in 1982: Japanese car companies are on the rise and believed to be putting U.S. autoworkers out of their jobs. Anti–Asian American sentiment simmers, especially in Detroit. A bar fight turns fatal, leaving a Chinese American man, Vincent Chin, beaten to death at the hands of two white men, autoworker Ronald Ebens and his stepson, Michael Nitz.
Paula Yoo has crafted a searing examination of the killing and the trial and verdicts that followed. When Ebens and Nitz pled guilty to manslaugh