Appelt, Kathi. Kissing Tennessee and Other Stories from the Stardust Dance.
Graduating eighth graders relate their stories of love and heartbreak that have brought them to Dogwood Junior High's magical Stardust Dance.

Ayers, Katherine. Macaroni Boy.
In 1933 when the Great Depression hits Pittsburgh, Mike Costa has more than enough problems. Everyday he's taunted by the class bully because he's Italian. He's worried about how his family will make it through the tough times they're facing. But mostly he's worried about his grandpa who is losing his memory and getting sick. Mike's job is to check the rattraps in the basement every morning for dead rats and he notices that there are fewer rats in the traps and more dead ones in the street. He wonders if there's a connection between the rats and the hoboes who've died and his grandfather's illness.

Bauer, Joan. Squashed.
As a sixteen-year-old pursues her two goals--growing the biggest pumpkin in Iowa and losing twenty pounds herself--she strengthens her relationship with her father and meets a young man with interests similar to her own.

Bloor, Edward. Tangerine.
Twelve-year-old Paul, who lives in the shadow of his football hero brother Erik, fights for the right to play soccer despite his near blindness and slowly begins to remember the incident that damaged his eyesight.

Creech, Sharon. Bloomability.
When her aunt and uncle take her from New Mexico to Lugano, Switzerland, to attend an international school, thirteen-year-old Dinnie discovers an expanding world and her place within it.

Creech, Sharon. Walk Two Moons.
After her mother leaves home suddenly, thirteen-year-old Sal and her grandparents take a car trip retracing her mother's route. Along the way, Sal recounts the story of her friend Phoebe, whose mother also left.

Curtis, Christopher Paul. The Watsons Go to Birmingham--1963.
The ordinary interactions and everyday routines of the Watsons, an African American family living in Flint, Michigan, are drastically changed after they go to visit Grandma in Alabama in the summer of 1963.

Cushman, Karen. The Ballad of Lucy Whipple.
In 1849, twelve-year-old California Morning Whipple, who renames herself Lucy, is distraught when her mother moves the family from Massachusetts to a rough California mining town.

Farmer, Nancy. A Girl Named Disaster.
While fleeing from Mozambique to Zimbabwe to escape an unwanted marriage, Nhamo, an eleven-year-old Shona girl, struggles to escape drowning and starvation and in so doing comes close to the luminous world of the African spirits.

Fine, Anne. Flour Babies.
When his class of underachievers is assigned to spend three torturous weeks taking care of their own "babies" in the form of bags of flour, Simon makes amazing discoveries about himself while coming to terms with his long-absent father.

Fine, Anne. The Tulip Touch.
Natalie, who lives in the large hotel managed by her father, has a dangerous friendship with Tulip, the wildly uncontrollable girl on a neighboring farm.

Frank, Lucy. Oy, Joy!
Although her ailing uncle creates problems for her whole family when he moves in with them, Joy survives his bungling attempts at matchmaking even as she plays the game herself.

Freeman, Suzanne. The Cuckoo's Child.
Eleven-year-old Mia refuses to believe that her parents are not coming back after they're reported lost at sea.

Greene, Bette. Summer of My German Soldier.
Sheltering an escaped German prisoner of war is the beginning of some shattering experiences for a 12-year-old Jewish girl in Arkansas.

Grunwell, Jeanne Marie. Mind Games.
Each of the six seventh graders who are part of the Mad Science Club writes a report on their investigation of ESP for the science fair. Their project led them to win the Maryland State Lottery. The book includes charts, newspaper clippings and personal narratives from each student.

Hesse, Karen. The Music of Dolphins.
After rescuing an adolescent girl from the sea, researchers learn she has been raised by dolphins and attempt to rehabilitate her to the human world.

Holt, Kimberly Willis. Keeper of the Night.
"My mother died praying on her knees. Her rosary beads were still in her hands when we found her. She left no note, said no good-byes, gave no last hugs or kisses. Only the empty bottle of sleeping pills that had rolled under her bed proved that she had meant to leave." Thirteen-year old Isabel is left taking care of her brother and sister as her father stops speaking and retreats to his fishing boat. No one at her school or her village in Guam mentions her mother and Isabel worries that she can't remember her. Isabel's brother begins to carve "I hate you" into his bedroom wall and her little sister has nightmares. But Isabel has lots of people who help her to keep going.

Holt, Kimberly Willis. When Zachary Beaver Came to Town.
During the summer of 1971 in a small Texas town, thirteen-year-old Toby and his best friend Cal meet the star of a sideshow act, 600-pound Zachary, the fattest boy in the world.

Jacques, Brian. The Redwall Series.
The continuing saga of the animals of Redwall Abbey.

Konigsburg, E.L. The View from Saturday.
Four students, with their own individual stories, develop a special bond and attract the attention of their teacher, a paraplegic, who chooses them to represent their sixth-grade class in the Academic Bowl competition.

Koss, Amy Goldman. The Girls.
Each of the girls in a middle-school clique reveals the strong, manipulative hold one of the group exerts on the others, causing hurt and self-doubt among the girls.

L'Engle, Madeleine. A Wrinkle in Time.
Meg Murry and her friends become involved with unearthly strangers and a search for Meg's father, who has disappeared while engaged in secret work for the government.

Levine, Gail Carson. Ella Enchanted.
In this novel based on the story of Cinderella, Ella struggles against the childhood curse that forces her to obey any order given to her.

Lowry, Lois. The Giver.
Given his lifetime assignment at the Ceremony of Twelve, Jonas becomes the receiver of memories shared by only one other in his community and discovers the terrible truth about the society in which he lives.

Lowry, Lois. Number the Stars.
In 1943, during the German occupation of Denmark, ten-year-old Annemarie learns how to be brave and courageous when she helps shelter her Jewish friend from the Nazis.

Mack, Tracy. Drawing Lessons.
Twelve-year-old Rory begins to lose the passion for making art that she shares with her father after she finds him kissing his female model and fears for the safety of her parents' marriage.

McKinley, Robin. The Hero and the Crown.
Aerin, with the guidance of the wizard Luthe and the help of the blue sword, wins the birthright due her as the daughter of the Damarian king and a witchwoman of the mysterious, demon-haunted North.

McNeil, J.D. The Last Codfish
Fifteen-year-old Tut lives in squalor with his fisherman father on the coast of Maine. His English teacher and a new neighbor girl are determined to turn his life around and force him to speak, which he has not done since his mother's death, a death for which he feels responsible.

Naylor, Phyllis Reynolds. Ice.
When thirteen-year-old Chrissa is sent to her paternal grandmother's farm, she learns more about her absent father and some of the reasons for her distant relationship with her mother.

Osborne, Mary Pope. Adaline Falling Star.
Feeling abandoned by her deceased Arapaho mother and her explorer father, Adaline Falling Star runs away from the prejudiced cousins with whom she is staying and comes close to death in the wilderness, with only a mongrel dog for company.

Paterson, Katherine. Jip: His Story.
While living on a Vermont poor farm during 1855 and 1856, Jip learns his identity and that of his mother and comes to understand how he arrived at this place.

Peck, Richard. A Long Way from Chicago.
A boy recounts his annual summer trips to rural Illinois with his sister during the Great Depression to visit their larger-than-life grandmother.

Pullman, Philip. The His Dark Materials trilogy: The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, The Amber Spyglass.
The continuing saga of Lyra, her daemon Pantalaimon, her search for her father, and her efforts to save her world as well as ours from destruction.

Rennison, Louise. Angus, Thongs, and Full-Frontal Snogging: Confessions of Georgia Nicolson.
Presents the humorous journal of a year in the life of a fourteen-year-old British girl who tries to reduce the size of her nose, stop her mad cat from terrorizing the neighborhood animals, and win the love of handsome hunk Robbie.

Rowling, J.K. The Harry Potter series: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.
Follow Harry's exploits at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

Sachar, Louis. Holes.
As further evidence of his family's bad fortune which they attribute to a curse on a distant relative, Stanley Yelnats is sent to a hellish correctional camp in the Texas desert where he finds his first real friend, a treasure, and a new sense of himself.

Shalant, Phyllis. Beware of Kissing Lizard Lips.
Zach is small for a sixth-grader and the girls at school make fun of him, but when one girl in his class starts showing him some tae kwon do moves and teaching him about martial arts, things begin to change.

Spinelli, Jerry. Crash.
Seventh-grader John "Crash" Coogan has always been comfortable with his tough, aggressive behavior, until his relationship with an unusual Quaker boy and his grandfather's stroke make him consider the meaning of friendship and the importance of family.

Spinelli, Jerry. Maniac Magee.
After his parents die, Jeffrey Lionel Magee's life becomes legendary, as he accomplishes athletic and other feats which awe his contemporaries.

Thesman, Jean. The Ornament Tree.
When fourteen-year-old Bonnie moves to her cousin's boardinghouse in Seattle in 1918, she learns about life from the boarders and progressive women who live and work there.

Voigt, Cynthia. Homecoming.
Abandoned by their mother, four children begin a search for a home and an identity.

Wolff, Virginia Euwer. Bat 6.
In small town, post-World War Oregon, twenty-one 6th grade girls recount the story of an annual softball game, during which one girl's bigotry comes to the surface.