These are the eighteen summer 2009 book choices for students entering grades 7 or 8 at Briscoe Middle School. Follow the links to get more information about each title.
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Airball: My Life in Briefs Lisa Harkrader
Lexile 700L, AR RL 4.4 – word count 42160
To
help prove that NBA star Brett McGrew is the father he has never known,
uncoordinated Kansas seventh-grader Kirby Nickel braves his coach's ire
and becomes captain of the basketball team. |
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All of the Above Shelley Pearsall
Lexile 1000L, AR RL 5.3 – word count 32,911
Five urban middle school students, their teacher, and other community
members relate how a school project to build the world's largest
tetrahedron affects the lives of everyone involved. |
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Basher Five-Two Captain Scott O'Grady
1040L, AR RL 7.0 – word count 31,956
Nonfiction. U.S. Air Force pilot Scott O'Grady tells how he evaded
capture and stayed alive with little water and no food in enemy
territory after the F-16 he was flying on a peace-keeping mission in
Bosnia was shot down.
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The Boy Who Spoke Dog Clay Morgan
AR RL 4.2 - word count 29,915
After being marooned on an island near New Zealand, Jack, an orphaned
cabin boy from San Francisco, becomes allied with a group of dogs who
protect the local sheep from wild dogs. |
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Crackback John Coy
Lexile 490L, AR RL 3.2 - word count 37,791
Miles barely recalls when football was fun after being sidelined by a
new coach, constantly criticized by his father, and shunned by his best
friend for not taking performance-enhancing drugs. |
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Deep and Dark and Dangerous Mary Downing Hahn
Lexile 650L, AR RL 4.0 - Word count 50,774
When
thirteen-year-old Ali spends the summer with her aunt and cousin at the
family's vacation home, she stumbles upon a secret that her mother and
aunt have been hiding for over thirty years. |
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Down the Rabbit Hole Peter Abrahams
Lexile 680L, AR RL 4.3 – word count 70,449
Like her idol Sherlock Holmes, eighth grader Ingrid Levin-Hill uses her
intellect to solve a murder case in her home town of Echo Falls. Book #
1 in Echo Falls series.
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Escape! The Story of the Great Houdini Sid Fleischman
AR RL 6.6 – word count 29,724
A biography of the magician, ghost chaser, aviator, and king of escape
artists whose amazing feats are remembered long after his death in 1926.
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H.I.V.E. Mark Walden
Lexile 1040L, AR RL 7.5 - word count 65,909
Swept
away to a hidden academy for training budding evil geniuses, Otto, a
brilliant orphan, Wing, a sensitive warrior, Laura, a shy computer
specialist, and Shelby, an infamous jewel thief, plot to escape the
prison known as H.I.V.E. Book #1 in H.I.V.E. series.
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Finding Miracles Julia Alvarez
Lexile 770L, AR RL 4.9 – word count 61,784
Fifteen-year-old
Milly Kaufman is an average American teenager until Pablo, a new
student at her school, inspires her to search for her birth family in
his native country. |
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Fire from the Rock Sharon Draper
Lexile 830L, AR RL 5.0 – word count 59,236
In
1957, Sylvia Patterson's life, that of a normal African American
teenager, is disrupted by the impending integration of Little Rock's
Central High when she is selected to be one of the first black students
to attend the previously all white school. |
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I'd Tell You I'd Love You But Then I'd Have to Kill You
Ally Carter
Lexile 1000L, AR RL 5.9 – word count 66,015
As
a sophomore at a secret spy school and the daughter of a former CIA
operative, Cammie is sheltered from "normal teenage life" until she
meets a local boy while on a class surveillance mission. Book #1 in
The Gallagher Girls series.
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Into the Wild Erin Hunter
Lexile 790L, AR RL 5.6 – word count 62,751
Rusty,
a bored house kitten, is apprenticed by the ThunderClan and must
struggle to fit in when the group of feral cats is threatened by the
enemy ShadowClan. Book #1 in the Warriors series. |
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Peak Roland Smith
Lexile 780L, AR RL 5.0 – word count 63,195
A fourteen-year-old boy attempts to be the youngest person to reach the top of Mount Everest. |
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Perfect Natasha Friend
Lexile 590L, AR RL 3.5 – word count 35,639
Following
the death of her father, a thirteen-year-old uses bulimia as a way to
avoid her mother's and ten-year-old sister's grief, as well as her own. |
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Revenge of the Witch Joseph Delaney
Lexile 840L, AR RL 5.6 – word count 59,544
Young
Tom, the seventh son of a seventh son, starts work as an apprentice for
the village spook, whose job is to protect ordinary folk from "ghouls,
boggarts, and all manner of wicked beasties." Book #1 in Last
Apprentice series. |
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Schooled Gordon Korman
Lexile 740L, AR RL 4.9 – word count 40,313
Cap
lives in isolation with his grandmother, a former hippie, but when she
falls from a tree and breaks her hip, Cap is sent to a foster home
where he has his first experience in a public school. |
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Uglies Scott Westerfeld
Lexile 770L, AR RL 5.2 – word count 87,274
In
Tally's world, reaching 16 brings an operation that turns you from ugly
to pretty and Tally's almost there, but when her friend runs away,
Tally learns about a new side of pretty world and must choose between
betrayal and never turning pretty. Book #1 in the Uglies series. |
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