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As a graduate student, Venkatesh began exploring the housing projects of Chicago and befriended members of a Chicago gang (after the gang briefly kidnapped him.) Venkatesh reports on the underground economy at work and the allure of gang membership, and makes suggestions for reaching out to gang members.

Ryan Smithson was in high school on September 11, 2001, but the events of that day made him determined to join the military. Here, in his own, sometimes unpolished but always authentic words, he tells of the joys, fears, even boredom of being stationed in Iraq as an army engineer.

Tanya Lee Stone deftly uses new research to illuminate the dramatic facts behind the 2013 film of the same name, focusing both on the girls captured on camera and many others. She examines barriers to education in depth—early child marriage and childbearing, slavery, sexual trafficking, gender discrimination, and poverty—and shows how removing these barriers means not only a better life for girls, but safer, healthier, and more prosperous communities.

In three interwoven biographies, Weller chronicles the life and times of three tradition-breaking women singer-songwriters who came of age in the late 1960s.

This novel is told mostly through a collection of short stories that feature the interactions of Eliot Rosewater, the primary trustee of the philanthropic Rosewater Foundation, and the people of Rosewater County, Indiana. Eliot, a drunk and a volunteer firefighter, has decided to actually give money to the needy, an action which calls into question his sanity by his family and their legal counsel.

Take a metaphysical journey into man’s first science, the search for meaning, as you try to deliver a package to the smartest man in the world who won’t take it until you understand.

All sixteen-year-old Cameron wants is to get through high school with a minimum of effort. It’s not a lot to ask. But that’s before he’s given some bad news: he’s sick and he’s going to die. Hope arrives in the form of Dulcie, a loopy punk angel/possible hallucination with a bad sugar habit. She tells Cam there is a cure — if he’s willing to go in search of it. With the help of Gonzo, a death-obsessed, video-gaming dwarf, and a yard gnome who just might be the Viking god Balder, Cam sets off on a road trip through America into the heart of what matters most.

A family with a talkative grandmother comes across a hardened and extremely dangerous criminal, The Misfit. Can the grandmother convince him to leave her family alone or will they be his next victims?

An essential and accessible anthology of some of the best contemporary and classic poetry.

Piri, now 17, resides with a Swedish family while she searches for news of family and friends who also might have survived the Nazi concentration camps. Although the Swedes accept her as their own daughter, she strives to hold on to her own identity and dreams of finding her blood relatives. The novel is dedicated to the many people who assisted the Jews in their efforts to find their families after the war.

In Katsa’s world, those with a Grace, or special talent, such as singing or storytelling, are marked by eyes that are different colors. Katsa’s Grace is killing, which she has tempered to fighting and been put to use by her manipulative uncle, one of the kings of the seven kingdoms, to torture people. Katsa despises her uncle and being forced to hurt people so she moonlights as a rescuer as part of a secret council she’s formed to promote fairness and honesty over cruelty and abuses of power.

Take a humorous, green road trip with the author and his college buddy in a converted 1980’s Mercedes from Vermont to California, and learn a little about how to be more eco-friendly along the way.

It’s 1895, and after the suicide of her mother, 16-year-old Gemma Doyle is shipped off from the life she knows in India to Spence, a proper boarding school in England. Lonely, guilt-ridden, and prone to visions of the future that have an uncomfortable habit of coming true, Gemma’s reception there is a chilly one. To make things worse, she’s been followed by a mysterious young Indian man, a man sent to watch her. But why? What is her destiny? This is Book 1 in the Gemma Doyle Trilogy.

Imagine that you’re going through one of the hardest parts of your life—being a teenager—when your parents are killed in a horrific car crash. Now you, your 17-year-old sister, and your three-year-old brother are on your own. Imagine what that would be like. Then read this book and find out.

When legendary R&B artist Korey Fields spots Black seventeen-year-old Enchanted Jones at an audition, her dreams of being a famous singer take flight. Until Enchanted wakes up with blood on her hands and zero memory of the previous night. 

Wendell Scott figured he was signing up for trouble when he became NASCAR’s version of Jackie Robinson in the segregated 1950s. For the next two decades, Scott chased a dream through crashes, health problems, money troubles, and repeated encounters with discrimination. Hard Driving is the dramatic story of one man’s dogged determination to live the life he loved, and to compete, despite daunting obstacles, at the highest level of his sport.

Like the style challenges on Project Runway, this book takes unusual objects (items found in a hardware store, like washers, bolts, etc.) and turns them into attractive jewelry. Even beginners will find projects at their level.

Five months ago, Valerie Leftman’s boyfriend, Nick, opened fire on their school cafeteria. Shot trying to stop him, Valerie inadvertently saved the life of a classmate, but was implicated in the shootings because of the list she helped create. A list of people and things she and Nick hated. The list he used to pick his targets.

Now, after a summer of seclusion, Val is forced to confront her guilt as she returns to school to complete her senior year. Haunted by the memory of the boyfriend she still loves and navigating rocky relationships with her family, former friends, and the girl whose life she saved, Val must come to grips with the tragedy that took place and her role in it, in order to make amends and move on with her life.

Jennifer Brown’s critically acclaimed novel now includes the bonus novella Say Something, another arresting Hate List story.

Teenager Kip Russell dreams of space travel, but what happens when alien “Wormfaces”, hostile to Eerth and humanity, kidnap him and force him to stand trial for humanity’s disregard for peace and the environment?

Seth Barham was still reeling from his father’s death a few years ago. Feeling lost and abandoned, Seth meets Jimmy and the two quickly become best friends. Jimmy introduces Seth to baseball and helps pull Seth out of his funk. Together, they face high school, making the baseball team, and dealing with peer pressure to drink at parties. Will Seth make good decisions? Will Jimmy’s choices have dire consequences?

Kate and her astrophysicist grandfather share a special bond, so when her grandfather disappears and his lab is attacked by an alien outsider, Kate must find him and the secret of his most important project. Book one of The Heroic Adventures of Kate trilogy.

When Louise Wolfe’s first real boyfriend mocks and disrespects Native people in front of her, she breaks things off and dumps him over e-mail. It’s her senior year, anyway, and she’d rather spend her time working on the school newspaper. The editors pair her up with Joey Kairouz, the ambitious new photojournalist, and in no time the paper’s staff find themselves with a major story to cover: the school musical director’s inclusive approach to casting The Wizard of Oz has been provoking backlash in their mostly white, middle-class Kansas town. As tensions mount at school, so does a romance between Lou and Joey — but as she’s learned, “dating while Native” can be difficult. In trying to protect her own heart, will Lou break Joey’s?

Shy and softhearted Charlie Spring sits next to rugby player Nick Nelson in class one morning. A warm and intimate friendship follows, and that soon develops into something more for Charlie, who doesn’t think he has a chance. But Nick is struggling with feelings of his own, and as the two grow closer and take on the ups and downs of high school, they come to understand the surprising and delightful ways in which love works. First volume in the Heartstopper series.

Sam is a metal-head. Sure, he bangs his head, drinks, and smokes, but none of that has ever kept him from getting great grades at his prep school. Then he starts dating Melissa. Real raw language and a fast pace make this a good choice for reluctant readers too.