Reality Check (2009) Peter Abrahams
After a knee injury destroys sixteen-year-old Cody's college hopes, he drops out of high school and gets a job in his small Montana town, but when his ex-girlfriend disappears from her Vermont boarding school, Cody travels cross-country to join the search.
Chains: Seeds of America (2008) by Laurie Halse Anderson
After being sold to a cruel couple in New York City, a slave named Isabel spies for the rebels during the Revolutionary War.
Wintergirls (2009) by Laurie Halse Anderson
Eighteen-year-old Lia comes to terms with her best friend's death from anorexia as she struggles with the same disorder.
Because I Am Furniture (2009) Thalia Chaltas
The youngest of three siblings, 14-year-old Anke feels both relieved and neglected that her father abuses her brother and sister but ignores her, but when she catches him with one of her friends, she finally becomes angry enough to take action.
Waiting for You (2009) by Susane Colasanti
Fifteen-year-old high school sophomore Marisa, who has an anxiety disorder, decides that this is the year she will get what she wants--a boyfriend and a social life--but things do not turn out exactly the way she expects them to.
Along for the Ride (2009) by Sarah Dessen
When Auden impulsively goes to stay with her father, stepmother, and new baby sister the summer before she starts college, all the trauma of her parents' divorce is revived, even as she is making new friends and having new experiences such as learning to ride a bike and dating.
If I Stay (2009) by Gayle Forman
While in a coma following an automobile accident that killed her parents and younger brother, seventeen-year-old Mia, a gifted cellist, weights whether to live with her grief or join her family in death.
King of the Screwups (2009) K.L. Going
After getting in trouble yet again, popular high school senior Liam, who never seems to live up to his wealthy father's expectations, is sent to live in a trailer park with his gay "glam-rocker" uncle.
Forever Changes (2008) by Brendan Halpin
Although encouraged to apply to colleges, Brianna Pelletier, a mathematically-gifted high school senior with cystic fibrosis, dwells on her mortality and the unfairness of life.
The Summer I Turned Pretty (2009) by Jenny Han
Belly spends the summer she turns sixteen at the beach just like every other summer of her life, but this time things are very different.
Project Sweet Life (2009) by Brent Hartinger
When their fathers insist that they get summer jobs, three 15-year-old friends in Tacoma, Washington, dedicate their summer vacation to fooling their parents into thinking that they are working, which proves to be even harder than having real jobs would have been.
Sister Wife (2009) Shelley Hrdlitschka
In a remote polygamist community, Celeste struggles to accept her destiny while longing to be free to live her life her way.
Ghostgirl (2008) Tonya Hurley
After dying, high school senior Charlotte Usher is as invisible to nearly everyone as she always felt, but despite what she learns in a sort of alternative high school for dead teens, she clings to life while seeking a way to go to the Fall Ball with the boy of her dreams.
The Carbon Diaires 2015 (2009) By Saci Lloyd
In 2015, when England becomes the first nation to introduce carbon dioxide rationing in a drastic bid to combat climate change, sixteen-year-old Laura documents the first year of rationing as her family spirals out of control.
Dope Sick (2009) by Walter Dean Myers
Seeing no way out of his difficult life in Harlem, 17-year-old Jeremy "Lil J" Dance flees into a house after a drug deal goes awry and meets a weird man who shows different turning points in Lil J's life when he could have made better choices.
Peace Love & Baby Ducks (2009) by Lauren Myracle
Fifteen-year-old Carly's summer volunteer experience makes her feel more real than her life of privilege in
Destroy All Cars (2009) Blake Nelson
Through assignments for English class, 17-year-old James rants against consumerism and his classmates' apathy, puzzles over his feelings for his ex-girlfriend, and expresses disdain for his emotionally-distant parents.
T-Minus: the race to the moon (2009) Jim Ottaviani, Zander Cannon and Kevin Cannon
The whole world followed the countdown to sending the first men to the moon. This is the story of the people who made it happen, both in the rockets and behind the scenes. (non-fiction)
Living Dead Girl (2008) by Elizabeth Scott
When Alice was ten, Ray took her away from her family, her friends: her life. She learned to give up all power, to endure all pain. She waited for the nightmare to be over. Now Alice is fifteen and Ray still has her, but he speaks more and more of her death. He does not know it is what she longs for. She does not know he has something more terrifying than death in mind for her.
Marcelo in the Real World (2009) by Francisco X. Stork
Marcelo Sandoval, a 17-year-old boy on the high-functioning end of the autistic spectrum, faces new challenges, including romance and injustice, when he goes to work for his father in the mailroom of a corporate law firm.
Tales from Outer Suburbia (2008) by Shaun Tan
Fifteen illustrated short stories, some humorous and some haunting, set in the Australian suburbs.
Response (2009) by Paul Volponi
When an African American high school student is beaten with a baseball bat in a white neighborhood, three boys are charged with a hate crime.
After the Moment (2009) Garret Freymann-Weyr
When 17-year-old Leigh changes high schools his senior year to help his stepsister, he finds himself falling in love with her emotionally disturbed friend, although he is still attached to a girl back home.
The Fetch (2009) by Laura Whitcomb
After 350 years as a Fetch, or death escort, Calder breaks his vows and enters the body of Rasputin, whose spirit causes rebellion in the Land of Lost Souls while Calder struggles to convey Ana and Alexis, orphaned in the Russian Revolution, to Heaven.
The Chosen One (2009) Carol Lynch Williams
In a polygamous cult in the desert, Kyra, not yet fourteen, sees being chosen to be the seventh wife of her uncle as just punishment for having read books and kissed a boy, in violation of Prophet Childs' teachings, and is torn between facing her fate and running away from all that she knows and loves.
