Books for Middle Schoolers
Great picks for middle school readers.
(Updated December 2022) (GN= Graphic Novel)
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Amari and the Night Brothers
Amari has been struggling since her older brother went missing. When she receives an invitation to the summer camp he attended, she is shocked to discover he actually worked at the Bureau of Supernatural Affairs and that she also possesses magical abilities.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Iveliz Explains It All
Iveliz has enough going on dealing with the loss of her father and her beloved abuela’s worsening Alzheimer’s. She has to put her mental health first, even when family members don’t approve.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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The Blackbird Girls
Valentina and Oksana have always been enemies, since Oksana’s father told her not to associate with Valentina’s Jewish family. Then the nuclear reactor in Chernobyl where both fathers work explodes, and the girls are forced to rely on each other for survival.
Format: Book
Availability: All copies in use
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Miss Quinces
Suyapa wants to spend her summer hanging with friends and reading manga, but a family trip home to Honduras throws a wrench in her plans. Her family wants her to have a traditional quinceañera, but Sue has ideas of her own. GN
Format: Graphic Novel
Availability: Available
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Starfish
Ellie has always lived by her self-imposed "Fat Girl Rules," made necessary by the cruelty of her classmates, family, and the world around her. Can she learn to break free of these rules and feel joy in her body?
Format: Book
Availability: All copies in use
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Freestyle
Cory's faltering grades get him grounded from dance group practice, but his tutor Sunna proves to be just as good at yo-yoing as academics. GN
Format: Graphic Novel
Availability: Available
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Invisible
Five very different middle schoolers are assigned to complete their service hours in the school’s cafeteria by an administration who groups them together because they’re Latine. GN
Format: Graphic Novel
Availability: All copies in use
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The Last Cuentista
Earth is about to be destroyed by a comet, and Petra and her family are among the few who are sent to another planet to restart civilization. After decades of induced sleep, Petra discovers that everyone’s memories have been erased and she is the only one who remembers the past.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Linked
Link, Michael, and Dana attend a school that seems perfectly ordinary until someone draws a swastika on a locker and everyone bonds to combat the unexplained anti-Semitism.
Format: Book
Availability: All copies in use
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African Town
Alternating perspectives of enslaved people and enslavers chronicle the voyage of the Clotilda and the African people illegally brought to the United States in this powerful novel-in-verse, as they endure horrors and build community.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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