**AN ALA BEST BOOK FOR YOUNG ADULTS PICK • A compelling and raw portrayal of a troubled teenager’s struggle for escape“Alternately cocky, funny and maudlin, [this novel] gets its appeal from Pip’s unnervingly convincing teenage voice.”—The Washington Post**Pip’s desperate to escape his life—he’s been skipping classes, drinking, getting high. Anything and everything to avoid his smug teachers, his sweet but needy little brother, his difficult home life. Now he’s bee...

**AN ALA BEST BOOK FOR YOUNG ADULTS PICK • From the New York Times bestselling author TTYL, comes a poignant young adult story about the power of falling for someone unexpected.“Myracle’s enchanting first novel will reach teens who are wrestling with identity. . . . [A] gem.”—VOYA**It was just a kiss.Kate and Lissa were best friends. Then one night last summer at a drunken party, Kate leaned in to kiss Lissa, and Lissa kissed her ...

There is a big old sledding hill not more than two or three good snowballs’ worth of distance from our home, just behind Hank Macabee’s house. That hill was waiting for me and my brand new toboggan. It’s one of those sneak-up kind of hills with a long slow ride down that picks up speed as it goes with a bump-hump at the end that you never see coming.I didn’t see what was coming next, either.The Christmas tree crashed through Hank Macabee’s bay window. The tree stand clatter...

For the first time in a chapter-book format, Newbery Medal winner Beverly Cleary’s twin characters, Jimmy and Janet, will charm young children with their humorous adventures.Jimmy and Janet are twins, but that doesn't mean they are just alike.When we first meet Jimmy, he wants to dig a real hole. He likes to use a real, grown-up shovel. While he's working, his sister, Janet, pretends to be a bird! She likes to use her imagination. But the twins both like silly jokes, new bo...

Jailed at age sixteen for armed robbery, Nathan Henry was the kind of teenager most parents and teachers have nightmares about. His crime was the culmination of a life lived on the edge: guns and drugs, sex and violence, all set against the ordinary backdrop of a one-stop light town in rural Indiana. Nate's personal history is both disturbing and fascinating. A rough childhood becomes an adolescence full of half-realized violent fantasies that slowly build to the breaking point. But these ...

After almost drowning in a swollen creek, Wes wonders if what his friend Zach says is true: Wes owes a life debt to the old lady who rescued him. It doesn't help that Wes keeps hearing his dead father's voice saying things like, "A man pays his debts, Wes," and "A man always treats a woman with respect, Wes." But how does a guy go about paying back a life debt anyway? And what if it involves a transmission tower, an ice-cream truck and a few sticks of dynamite?

IT WASN’T SUPPOSED to end up like this. But it did.When Theresa brings James to a party as her date, it’s just for the night . . . and he knows that. But when everything goes horribly wrong, James drives his motorcycle off a cliff—and Theresa knows she’s responsible for his death.Theresa tries to run away from the pain, becoming a new young woman with a whole new life. She meets people, of course, but she never really makes connections—she’s too scared she’ll hurt them, too....

When Chris finds a wallet on the street, he tries to return it to its owner. In trouble at home and at school, he is struggling to do the right thing. However, as circumstances slowly start unraveling and his whole life appears headed down the drain, Chris realizes that the person who owns the wallet looks a lot like him and has a life he would do almost anything for. What if he switched identities? What if he became someone else?

A joyride turns deadly in this tale of murder and retributionThe motorcycle appears out of nowhere, thundering down the quiet residential street. By the time it roars back up the block and disappears from view, a little boy is injured and an elderly woman is dead.Salem University outsider Echo Glenn is paying her own way through college by working part time at the school infirmary. She thinks she knows the identity of the Mad Biker in black leather who's been...

From National Book Award winner Pete Hautman, the story of a girl who acts out by stealing cars.Some girls act out by drinking or doing drugs. Some girls act out by sleeping with guys. Some girls act out by starving themselves or cutting themselves. Some girls act out by being a bitch to other girls. Not Kelleigh. Kelleigh steals cars.In How to Steal a Car, National Book Award winner Pete Hautman takes teen readers on a thrilling, scary ride through one suburban girl's turbulent life - one...

**AN EDGAR AWARD WINNER • In this coming-of-age mystery, a young man finds himself drawn into a bizarre chain of events.“This entertaining and thoughtful account is an absorbing snapshot of early 1970s life.”—Kirkus Reviews“[A] suspenseful yarn with a dizzying climax.”—Publishers Weekly, starred review**A dead body. A guy called Rat. And too many coincidences to ignore . . .The dead body found in the Chemanga River has nothing to do with To...

Shaw Sebring is sixteen and trying desperately to understand and accept his father's recent suicide. Moving with his mother halfway across the county in an effort to distance themselves from the awful truth, Shaw lands in a new school and finds that the ghost of his father, a best-selling author, has followed him. Determined that he will not follow in his father's footsteps Shaw tries to chart his own course, until circumstances force him to accept that where, and who, we come from have an...