Promise Boys

Promise Boys, a trailblazing, blockbuster YA mystery about three teen boys of color who must investigate their principal's murder to clear their own names 

Don't Cry for Me

A Black father makes amends with his gay son through letters written on his deathbed in this wise and penetrating novel of empathy and forgiveness,  

In the Key of Us

In Grand Rapids, Michigan, Andi is grappling with grief following the death of her mother. Zora is exhausted by trying to please her success-oriented parents. Both feel very much alone. Until a summer music camp brings them together.The only two Black girls at camp in a sea of white children, Andi and Zora slowly begin to connect and reveal their deepest fears and dreams. 

Yellowface

With its totally immersive first-person voice, Yellowface grapples with questions of diversity, racism, and cultural appropriation, as well as the terrifying alienation of social media. 

This memoir of a young White woman with Crouzon syndrome explores growing up with facial differences in an ableist, beauty-obsessed society. Ariel and her twin sister, Zan, were born with a rare condition that affected the growth of their skull bones. 

The novel is divided into 108 short chapters whose length helps Everett build the tension and urgency of the plot. The Trees follows a string of murders of white people in Money, Mississippi, that imitate the real life lynching of Emmett Till, a young Black boy, in the 1950s. 

This fun and refreshing coming-of-age story follows Charlie, a fat brown girl on a journey of self-acceptance while the world (including her mother) is telling her she needs to be thinner, lighter, and quieter. 

Trust is a 2022 novel written by Hernan Diaz. The novel was published by Riverhead Books. Set predominantly in New York City and focusing on the world of finance, the novel is a metafictional look at a secretive financier and his wife. 

For seven years, Myra has grieved the loss of her oldest daughter, Row, who was stolen by her father after a monstrous deluge overtook their home in Nebraska. Then, in a violent confrontation with a stranger, Myra suddenly discovers that Row was last seen in a far-off encampment near the Arctic Circle. 

When the California drought escalates to catastrophic proportions, one teen is forced to make life and death decisions for her family in this harrowing story of survival from New York Times bestselling author Neal Shusterman and Jarrod Shusterman. 

Fifteen-year-old Mari Pujols believes that the baby she's carrying will finally mean she'll have a family member who will love her deeply and won't ever leave her—not like her mama, who took off when she was eight; or her papi, who's in jail; or her abuela, who wants as little to do with her as possible. 

The Edge of Summer by Erica George is a sincere story of first love and first loss, but also of marine conservation. Following a summer marine biology intern, this one contains plenty of descriptions of efforts to save the whales and a realistic main character who comes to learn from her mistakes. 

A contemporary YA summer Cape Cod romance featuring poets divided by centuries. Michaela Dunn, living on present day Cape Cod, dreams of getting into an art school, something her family just doesn't understand. 

 Declan Taylor is furious at the world. After winning state as a freshman starting pitcher, he accidentally messes up his throwing arm. Despite painful surgery and brutal physical therapy, he might never pitch again. 

Fire is a fantasy novel by Kristin Cashore, a companion book to her debut novel, Graceling. It tells the story of a young monster in the shape of a human who is hated because of her difference and supernatural abilities. The novel debuted at number four on The New York Times Best Seller list and won several awards. 

When identities cross boundaries, with love that knows no bounds. From platonic and romantic love to grief and heartbreak, these stories explore navigating life at the intersection of identities, and what it means to grow up surrounded by a multitude of traditions, languages, cultures, and interpersonal dynamics. 

Could magick be real? Nate remains skeptical until he picks up the witchfinder's serpent--a powerful, demonic bracelet that wraps itself around his arm and permanently imbeds itself into his flesh. Now Nate must confront the truth about Aunt Celia's unlikely ancestry--as well as his own. 

I think it's a book that will be talked about for a long time to come and should be read and taught. An important piece of historical fiction in verse, African Town chronicles the last group of Africans brought illegally to America to be enslaved, and the heritage they left by building what is now Africatown, Alabama. 

A Texas teen comes face-to-face with a cousin's ghost and vows to unmask the murderer. Elatsoe—Ellie for short—lives in an alternate contemporary America shaped by the ancestral magics and knowledge of its Indigenous and immigrant groups. She can raise the spirits of dead animals—most importantly, her ghost dog Kirby.

Year of the Reaper follows Cas, a young lord who is finally on his way home after being held as a prisoner for three years and surviving a plague. When someone targets the royal family, Cas finds himself teaming up with Lena, a historian, to find the mysterious assassin. 

“All My Rage” is a poignant novel by Sabaa Tahir that delves into the lives of two Pakistani American teenagers, Salahudin and Noor, grappling with their familial circumstances and societal prejudices in a small Californian desert town known as Juniper. 

Seventeen-year-old Cristian Florescu dreams of becoming a writer, but Romanians aren't free to dream; they are bound by rules and force. Amidst the tyrannical dictatorship of Nicolae Ceaușescu in a country governed by isolation and fear, Cristian is blackmailed by the secret police to become an informer. 

This fearless debut novel explores racism, injustice, and self-expression through the story of a promising Black football star in Louisiana. The system is rigged. For guys like Russell Boudreaux, football is the only way out of their small town. 

A Deadly Education is set at Scholomance, a school for the magically gifted where failure means certain death (for real)—until one girl, El, begins to unlock its many secrets. There are no teachers, no holidays, and no friendships, save strategic ones. 

Teen boy gets hard lessons on dating, friendship, and toxic masculinity. Delbert Rainey Jr. has never been great at dating. He's been in love with the same girl since kindergarten—Kiera Westing—but has never made a move. And despite his legendary reputation, thanks to an infamous basement party, he is still a virgin. 

Stuck in a Seattle trailer park, Laz finds baseball helps him escape from the world of poverty and drugs. When he gets an opportunity to pitch for the rich kids across town, he has a chance to get drafted by the major leagues. 

In Project Hail Mary, Ryland Grace wakes up from a coma with a bunch of tubes sticking out of him (including that spot where the sun don't shine) and realizes that he has no memory of what happened — and eventually, through a bit of complicated science, realizes and remembers that he's the sole survivor of a mission ... 

The Honeys is a genre defying book about Mars, a genderqueer teenager who travels to his sister's former summer camp to investigate the circumstances of her bizarre death. 

The Weight of Blood (2022) is a young adult horror novel by Tiffany D. Jackson. Drawing inspiration from Stephen King's Carrie, the novel features a biracial teenage girl with magical powers whose years of abuse from her father and bullying from her peers lead to disastrous consequences. 

Petra has a rare water allergy. Seth is a foster kid with strange scars on his arms. The three seemingly have nothing in common, but when an invasive fast-growing plant species begins taking over the Earth, it appears they do. They are the only three who are immune to the dangerous plant and its poisonous pollen.