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Jasmine and Chelsea are best friends who go to a school where everyone is required to be a part of a club. They are both unhappy with their clubs because they aren't focusing on the things Jasmine and Chelsea want to focus on. They have noticed some problems in their school and in the world, and they want to make some changes. They get permission to start their own feminist club called Write Like a Girl.
In Write Like a Girl Jasmine and Chelsea publish their writing on a blog, and the blog blows up. Their posts about racism, sexism, and body image have really resonated with other people. They have hundreds of people at school and other places reading what they wrote. When the girls try to be more active about making some changes in their school, the school threatens to shut down their club. Will they listen to the school? Or will they not let their voices be silenced? Watch Us Rise is a great book about social activism and how students can absolutely make a change. I adored everything about this powerful book. Author: Margaret Peterson Haddix
Published: 2019 Chess, Emma, and Finn are siblings. They live with their mom. One day on the news they see that three siblings with their exact same first and middle names and their exact same birthdays have been kidnapped. What a strange coincidence! What is even weirder, though, is the way their mom reacts to the news. She starts getting secret phone calls and then she says that she unexpectedly has to take a short trip for work. The kids will be staying with someone they don't even know while she is away. After their mom leaves, she checks in with them occasionally with texts. However, something seems off about her texts. Soon Chess, Emma, and Finn start to think that she might never come back. It is up to them to figure out the connection between their mom and the missing kids before it is too late. The Strangers is a really interesting read that science fiction and mystery readers will love! It is the first book in a series. Adapted for Young Readers
Author: Trevor Noah Published: 2019 Born a Crime is a fantastic memoir by Trevor Noah, comedian and host of The Daily Show. Noah writes about growing up as the son of a white father and black mother in South Africa during a time when it was illegal for people of different races to have kids together. He was literally born a crime. Apartheid was extreme racial segregation in South Africa from 1948 to 1991. Even though black South Africans outnumbered white South Africans, white South Africans were treated by the government as superior. The black South Africans were further divided into different tribes with different languages, and they were all inferior. The government passed many laws to keep the separation of different races, including the immorality act, stating that it was illegal to be romantically involved with someone from a different race. Noah write about how biracial people like him just didn't really exist during that time. He was never white, but he also was never black, so he didn't ever fit in. He writes about living with his step-father, Abel, a man who drank far too much and took it out on his family. He writes about how he was a troublemaker when he was younger and the different ways he tried to make money. Born a Crime is beautifully and hilariously written. One minute I was in awe of how terrible a story he was writing about was and the next minute I was laughing at something else he wrote. Absolutely fantastic read! Author: Zetta Elliott
Published: 2018 Jaxon's mom is making him spend the day with someone she calls "Ma" because she has to go to court to keep from getting kicked out by her landlord. No, Ma is not his grandmother--that's just what everyone calls her. Jaxon is not excited, especially when he finds out how grouchy Ma seems. Soon Jaxon discovers that Ma is actually a witch who has an important job. She has to get three baby dragons back to the magical world, and because Jaxon is there, he needs to help her get the job done. When their journey takes an unexpected turn, Jaxon needs to take over and get the job done. Dragons in a Bag is a great fantasy for late elementary and early middle grade readers. Author: Tanaz Bhathena
Published: 2018 At the beginning of the book, Zarin, a sixteen-year-old girl, and her male classmate Porus, are found dead in a car in Saudi Arabia. Zarin has a bad reputation, known for being romantically involved with multiple boys. Porus is a sweet boy who has pined after Zarin for years. What everyone finds concerning, besides the fact that they are dead, is that they are alone together. In Saudi Arabia, an unmarried girl and boy shouldn't ever be alone with each other. The rest of the book is told through multiple viewpoints, piecing together the story of who these two kids are and how they ended up in the car together, dead. A Girl Like That deals a lot of important issues including sexual assault and sexism. Author: Gayle E. Pitman
Published: 2019 The Stonewall Riots were a series of riots by members of the LGBTQ community in 1969 that were a major starting point in the modern LGBTQ movement. By presenting objects that relate to LGBTQ history starting from the 1800s and going up through the riots in the 60s, the author tells the story and gives the context readers need in order to understand what led to the Stonewall Riots. I loved the format of this book. It really gave us a complete story. Fantastic for readers who like history or are interested in LGBTQ issues. Author: Ashley Herring Blake
Published: 2019 Sunny just had a heart transplant. For her "new life," as she calls it, she has a couple major goals. The first is to find a new best friend. Her ex-best friend Margot moved on and found new friends who could actually leave the house and hang out when Sunny was really sick. Plus there was that night that Sunny doesn't want to talk about. Her other big goal is to kiss a boy, something she has never done before. Sunny has lived with Kate ever since she was four-years-old when her Mom gave Kate guardianship over Sunny. Now that she has had her heart transplant, she finds that her Mom wants back in the picture, and Sunny isn't quite sure she wants that. Quinn has just moved to the area. She has blue hair and is unlike anyone Sunny has met before. They decide to become best friends and try to accomplish Sunny's goal of finding a boy to kiss. As they get closer, Sunny starts to question if that is the really her goal anymore. The Mighty Heart of Sunny St. James is a beautiful story about love and discovering who you are. I absolutely adored Sunny, Quinn, and Kate. Just as good as Blake's Ivy Aberdeen's Letter to the World. Author: Alexandra Diaz Published: 2016 When Jaime's cousin Miguel is murdered by the Alphas, a terrible gang, Jaime knows that he is next. After all, it was both Miguel and Jaime who refused to join the gang and are now being punished. Left with only one choice, Jaime and his cousin Angela must leave Guatemala for the United States, where they can live with Jaime's older brother. The problem? They won't be able to get there legally and instead will have to face unimaginable dangers as they try to make it to the United States so they can survive. The Only Road is a heartbreaking story about a terribly difficult decision a family must make in order for two of them to have a chance at surviving. This is such an important book right now. It reminds me of the poem "Home" by Warsan Shire. Here is a short segment: "you have to understand, Finley is staying with grandparents she has never before for the summer because her parents are having issues and need some time alone. Finley has always had dark days where she has a hard time functioning. She doesn't know what causes them, but she worries that there is something seriously wrong with her, so she doesn't tell anyone about them. Her dark days and the fact that she is spending the summer with relatives she has never met before mean that this summer will be terrible. At her grandparents' house, she spends her time creating stories in her notebook about a magical forest called Everwood, and then Finley realizes that Everwood could actually be the forest behind her grandparents' house. Soon she and her cousins each have a part they play in the Everwood game, only it's not really a game to Finley.
Finley starts to wonder why she has never met this family before, and why they never really talk about her dad while she's there. When Finley and her cousins discover an old abandoned house in the woods with three graves, she uncovers a mystery that has been years in the making. Some Kind of Happiness is a great combination of fantasy, mystery, and realistic fiction. |
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