AdLit.org is a national multimedia project offering information and resources to the parents and educators of struggling adolescent readers and writers. AdLit.org is an educational initiative of WETA, the flagship public television and radio station in the nation's capital, and is funded by Carnegie Corporation of New York and by the Ann B. and Thomas L. Friedman Family Foundation.
Social Sciences
A YALSA committee of librarians selected these books to open doors on new worlds, exciting ideas, eccentric personalities, unfamiliar cultures, and distant time periods. Use it to broaden students' horizons as they prepare for college entrance exams and courses.
Naked Economics: Undressing the Dismal Science
Age Level: 16-18
This intriguing and approachable introduction to the field of economics is for all readers who have rejected the topic as tedious, boring and incomprehensible.
The Glass Castle
Age Level: 16-18
This is Jeannette Walls' memoir of growing up in chaos and poverty with a family that prized freedom and unconventionality over comfort and safety.
The Devil's Highway
Age Level: 16-18
Thousands of undocumented immigrants yearly scramble across the U.S.-Mexican border and into an area of the Arizona desert known as the Devil's Highway. Many do not make it out alive. This is the human story of those border crossings told with facts, anger, and poetry.
Terror in the Name of God: Why Religious Militants Kill
Age Level: 16-18
Seeking to understand how religious ardor leads to violence, Stern recounts her dramatic encounters with Christians and Muslims who use terrorism in the name of God.
From Clueless to Class Act: Manners for the Modern Man
Age Level: 16-18
These unstuffy guides to good behavior will help young men and women develop the style and panache to make a good impression in social and professional circles.
Beautiful Boy: A Father's Journey through His Son's Addiction
Age Level: 16-18
A father’s anguished account of his promising son's meth addiction and its painful impact on the entire family is honest, raw, and full of information about the realities of drug addiction.
The Green Book: The Everyday Guide to Saving the Planet One Simple Step at a Time
Age Level: 16-18
Celebrities Ellen DeGeneres, Jennifer Aniston, Tim McGraw, Dale Earnhardt, Jr. and others contribute suggestions of small changes you can make daily to have a positive impact on the health of our planet. Learn how you too can live green!
Colleges That Change Lives
Age Level: Teen
Prospective college students can rely upon Pope's indispensable guide to 41 colleges where education rivals that of the Ivy League universities in producing outstanding graduates.
The Middle of Everywhere: Helping Refugees Enter the American Community
Age Level: 16-18
They come from Laos, Bosnia, Northern Iraq, Sudan, Afghanistan, and the former Soviet Union. War-scarred refugees, searching for freedom, move into cities across the American heartland to face one more challenge — adjusting to life in a strange new land.
Nineteen Minutes
Age Level: 16-18
Seventeen-year-old Peter Houghton wakes up one day, loads his backpack with four guns, walks into the school cafeteria, and kills nine students and one teacher in the span of nineteen minutes. Why?
Hungry Planet: What the World Eats
Age Level: 16-18
Hungry Planet is a photo-chronicle of families around the world, the food they eat, and how uncontrollable forces like poverty, conflict and globalization affect our most elemental human need – food.
A Rare Breed of Love
Age Level: 16-18
The shocking cruelty of legal animal abuse is exposed through the story of Baby, a poodle who lost a leg after years of mistreatment at a puppy mill. Rescued by Jana Kohl, they now work together with celebrity friends and politicians to raise awareness about animal rights.
Out Law: What LGBT Youth Should Know About Their Legal Rights
Age Level: 16-18
Keen introduces LGBT youth to their legal rights and provides examples of young people empowered to stand up for themselves.
Wheelchair Warrior: Gangs, Disability, and Basketball
Age Level: 16-18
This inspiring story follows the transformation of a 16-year-old African American from gang member destined for prison or death to wheelchair athlete playing for the U.S. National Wheelchair Basketball Team.
The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference
Age Level: 16-18
Through entertaining anecdotes Gladwell explains the phenomena of fads, or how little actions can ripple outward until a "tipping point" is reached which results in a dramatic change.
The Elements of Library Research
Age Level: 16-18
Succinct and practical, this guide provides students with the tactics, tools and confidence they need to successfully conduct college level research.
My Start-Up Life
Age Level: 16-18
With a proven track record of more than thirty years in publication, this top-selling career guide has been updated and revised to help first-time job seekers discover and get the right work for them.
What Color Is Your Parachute?
Age Level: 16-18
With a proven track record of more than thirty years in publication, this top-selling career guide has been updated and revised to help first-time job seekers discover and get the right work for them.
Tuesdays with Morrie
Age Level: 16-18
Meet one-of-a-kind college professor Morrie Schwartz, who teaches us all to live fully as he lies dying, and his former student Mitch Albom, who gets a chance to rediscover life through the death of his mentor and friend.
Tweak
Age Level: 14-16
Nic Sheff is destined for a rich life and career until he is derailed by drugs. This wrenchingly honest account of life as a meth addict is the companion book to Beautiful Boy.
Sold
Age Level: 14-16
When 13-year-old Lakshmi is sold into prostitution by her stepfather, she ends up in a brothel in the slums of Calcutta, where her life becomes a nightmare from which she cannot escape. Although a novel, this story reflects a situation that many girls around the world endure today.
A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier
Age Level: 16-18
As a 12-year-old growing up in Sierra Leone, Beah lived a life not unlike a typical American pre-teen, listening to hip hop and hanging out with friends. When civil war comes to his country, however, he is surrounded by death and is forced to survive by becoming a soldier, plied with cocaine and sent on killing sprees. The violence is frequent and not for the squeamish — the book was published for the Adult market — but teens love a tale of overcoming long odds.
