Showing titles in Coming of Age

Call Me Athena: Girl from Detroit is a beautifully written novel in verse loosely based on author Colby Cedar Smith’s maternal grandmother. The story follows Mary as she and her family emigrate from Greece to Detroit in the 1930s, creating a historically accurate portrayal of life as an immigrant during the Great Depression, hunger strikes, and violent riots. Mary lives in a tiny apartment with her immigrant parents, her brothers, and her twin sister, and she questions why her parents ever came to America.

When her school announces its plan for year-round instruction, 15-year-old Francesca’s dream of summer art camp seems lost. The only way Francesca can stop the Board of Education from going ahead with its plan is a long shot: she must win the Snow Games, a capture-the-flag, multi-round battle for teens.

Prequel to The Gas Station Girl. My teacher wanted us to write about something that impacted our lives. Boy is she in for a surprise. Don't worry, I toned down the rough language to stay within my high school's writing guidelines. John Jensen’s aunt called me the gas station girl because that’s where John found me after my escape. But before I became the gas station girl, I was a DollarFly girl. All of us came from backgrounds we were running away from. But we weren’t a therapy group, we were teenage prostitutes, lured by the promise of a better life than the ones we left behind. Some...

When Isabel Williams moves to Liverpool, she criticises seemingly everything in Eloise Byrne’s life – her city, her accent, her trademark boldness – so if, when she catches Isabel staring, Eloise feels her pulse race, it must be because they hate each other. It surely couldn’t be for any other reason, could it?

Pondering math problems is Esther Ainsworth’s obsession. If only life’s puzzles required logic. Her stepfather’s solution? Avoidance. He’s exiled the family to Truth or Consequences, New Mexico, to erase a big secret from Esther’s past. So much for the truth. Now for the consequences: an empty swimming pool, a water-sucking cactus outside her window, a goldfish rescued from a church festival, and Esther’s thirst for something real.

Avielle LeBeau is beginning her second year at Briarcliff Prep, and she's got big dreams. Top of the list? Starting her own student life magazine and rooming with her besties Rhyon and Zazie. But a housing mix-up splits Avi from her friends—and to make matters worse, she's rooming with her rival, Fallon Walsh, instead. How does one girl juggle school, a fracturing friendship, living with a mean girl, and getting caught in a potential love triangle between the ex she can't move on from and a friend who’s becoming something more? It's a lot.

A surly, hot wizard. A dangerous calling. A curse killing off students. I’ve dreamed of attending Spellcasters Spy Academy for as long as I can remember. So, imagine my surprise when I get there and discover it’s not the academic utopia I imagined. This place is dangerous as hell. And, I don’t mean the classes or the Samhain Trials, though those aren’t a cakewalk. They say the students in the Culling year - my year - are cursed. Someone, or maybe something, is picking us off, one by one.

A month before graduating from Willowgrove Christian Academy, the principal’s perfect daughter, prom queen Shara Wheeler, kisses Chloe Green and vanishes. On a furious hunt for answers, Chloe discovers she’s not the only one Shara kissed. There’s also Smith, Shara’s long-time sweetheart, and Rory, Shara’s bad-boy neighbour with a crush. Thrown into an unlikely alliance, Chloe, Smith and Rory follow Shara’s trail of annoyingly cryptic clues, and Chloe starts to suspect that there might be more to this small town—and to Shara—than she thought.

When you look like us—brown skin, brown eyes, black braids or fades—everyone else thinks you’re trouble. No one even blinks twice over a missing Black girl from public housing because she must’ve brought whatever happened to her upon herself. I, Jay Murphy, can admit that, for a minute, I thought my sister Nicole just got caught up with her boyfriend—a drug dealer—and his friends. But she’s been gone too long. Nic, where are you? It’s time to step up, to do what the Newport News police department won’t. Bring her home.

Farrington High School Junior, Kate Kellner, has her whole future planned and a list of high-priority goals aligned. This season, she’s going to lead the Fighting Falcons to their first ever Midlands Conference title, break all the school pitching records, and impress a boatload of college recruiters so she can pick where she wants to go after she graduates from high school. But then, one day in the middle of a training session, Grady Hughes walks into her multipurpose room.

Boodini was born and raised in a community in Memphis, Tn. With dreams of becoming a successful entrepreneur despite facing trials and challenges of growing up in the hood.

Princess Casandra, daughter of the Dragon Judge, knows there is nothing she cannot do. No cliff she cannot climb, no fight she cannot win, no man who can best her in a battle of wits. So when her best friend is banished for failing the Dragon Judge’s test, there is no question in her mind. She has to set this right. She has to get her best friend back. She has to rid the world of a slumbering evil her father is too cowardly to face.

Aiden Emerson is an all-star pitcher and the all-around golden boy of Riverton. Or at least he was, before he quit the team the last day of junior year without any explanation. How could he tell people he's losing his vision at 17? Straitlaced Olivia thought she had life all figured out. But when her dream internship falls apart, her estranged mother comes back into her life, and her longtime boyfriend ghosts her right before summer break, she's starting to think fate has a weird sense of humor.

Huda and her sisters can’t believe it when her parents announce that they’re actually taking a vacation this summer . . . to DISNEY WORLD! But it’s not quite as perfect as it seems. First Huda has to survive a 24-hour road trip from Michigan to Florida, with her sisters annoying her all the way. And then she can’t help but notice the people staring at her and her family when they pray in public. Back home in Deerborn she and her family blend right in because there are so many other Muslim families, but not so much in Florida and along the way.

In 1999, 17-year-old Lukas Bradley faces life after coming out in a small town. His best friend has deserted him, his mom doesn't understand him, and he's got no clue what he wants for his life after high school. But he is reminded that life is unpredictable, for better or for worse, when his senior year brings him unexpected betrayal, newfound resilience, an inconvenient romance, and just a dash of magic.

When Astrid is attacked by a creep calling himself a Slayer, it seems like a cruel prank the universe is pulling on her already crappy life. Then Kaden, the most infuriating, stunning boy she’s ever met, arrives and tells her she’s a dragon-kin like him—part dragon, part human. Then Astrid actually shifts into a dragon.

A novel-in-verse about a young girl coming-of-age and stepping out of the shadow of her former best friend. Perfect for fans of Elizabeth Acevedo and Nikki Grimes. With gritty and heartbreaking honesty, Mahogany L. Browne delivers a novel-in-verse about broken promises, fast rumors, and when growing up means growing apart from your best friend.

When high school football star Theo Claverback breaks his leg just weeks after a devastating break-up, he’s forced to call an audible on his summer plans and put his college ones on hold. He soon finds himself in the most unlikely of places for a jock on crutches: the kitchen of an upscale French restaurant, where he’ll work as a prep cook while his heart and leg heal. But it’s in the kitchen where Theo finds new purpose and a new romance. As he becomes a trusted employee to Chef and is welcomed into his inner circle, Theo begins to discover the true costs of running a restaurant.

Moving to Hawthorne was something Tess and her mom never anticipated, but after Tess's mom loses her job, it's their only option. Tess's grandparents welcome them into their home, on the condition that Tess and her mom attend church, something Mom isn't too pleased about. But Tess enjoys the church community, finding a place in youth group and the church choir. Faith fills a void Tess didn't know she had. After a very personal decision goes public, Tess faces daily harassment and rejection by her former friends, and singing in the church choir is no longer an option.

Seventeen-year-old Shae has lived her entire life in awe of the Bards - and afraid of the Blot, a deadly disease spread by ink, which took the life of her younger brother five years ago. Ever since, Shae fears she's cursed. But when tragedy strikes again, and her mother is found murdered with a golden dagger - a weapon used only by the Bards - Shae is forced to act.