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The “Hollywood” where Sammy Santos and Juliana Ríos live is not the West Coast one, the one with all the glitz and glitter. This Hollywood is a tough barrio at the edge of a small town in southern New Mexico. Sammy and this friends—members of the 1969 high school graduating class—face a world of racism, dress codes, war in Vietnam and barrio violence. In the summer before his senior year begins, Sammy falls in love with Juliana, a girl whose tough veneer disguises a world of hurt.

Vince’s family is wealthy, while his new girlfriend is solidly middle class. But the bigger problem is Vince’s father is a mob boss, and his girlfriend’s father works for the FBI. Filled with colorful characters, this book is perfect for reluctant readers.

Have you ever wondered who your ancestors are or how their lives shaped yours? Milkman, a young, African-American man, sets out to discover his ancestry and learns how racism, injustice, and the disparities between the rich and poor have affected his life and his relatives’ lives. 

Damien, the star of the basketball team is headed to college. Junice is trying to hold her family together after tragedy. When these two meet, there is nothing but love, even if Damien’s parents are less than thrilled with his choice. As the drama unfolds, each character tells his/her story through verse, leaving the reader to wonder if Damien and Junice be able to rise above the adversity that surrounds them.

With the Rodney King riots closing in on Black high school senior Ashley and her family, the privileged bubble protecting her from the difficult realities most Black people face, begins to crumble.

The Great Depression changed everything for 11-year-old Oscar and his widowed dad. Oscar’s prized model trains are sold, his dad leaves Illinois to find work in California, and Oscar begins an adventure through time and places after he jumps onto a model train.

Life is harsh in Chennai’s teeming streets, so when runaway sisters Viji and Rukku arrive, their prospects look grim. Very quickly, eleven-year-old Viji discovers how vulnerable they are in this uncaring, dangerous world. Fortunately, the girls find shelter — and friendship — on an abandoned bridge. With two homeless boys, Muthi and Arul, the group forms a family of sorts. And while making a living scavenging the city’s trash heaps is the pits, the kids find plenty to laugh about and take pride in too. After all, they are now the bosses of themselves and no longer dependent on untrustworthy adults. But when illness strikes, Viji must decide whether to risk seeking help from strangers or to keep holding on to their fragile, hard-fought freedom. Washington Post Best Books 2019.

In 1890, seventeen-year-old Chinese American Jo Kuan works by day as a lady’s maid for the cruel Caroline Payne, the daughter of one of the wealthiest men in Atlanta. But by night, Jo moonlights as the pseudonymous author of a newspaper advice column for the genteel Southern lady, “Dear Miss Sweetie.”

Meet Fredrika Bremer, a Swedish suffragette who traveled the world and visited Cuba in 1851. Where other visitors might have been most interested in basking in the luxury of plantation owners, Fredrika sets out to learn about the slaves, free blacks, and poor whites, documenting her experiences in letters and diaries. Margarita Engle has transformed those writings into an intriguing novel written in verse with special attention paid to Cecilia, Fredika’s bright young translator, as well as the overlapping struggles to end slavery and expand women’s rights. 

Are the wealthiest people in America the happiest? Nick Carraway seems to think so until he gets involved with his rich neighbors, including the mysterious Jay Gatsby. Through Nick’s love interest Jordan, and his budding friendship with Jay, Nick discovers that Gatsby’s world is filled with love, betrayal and murder. 

Sixteen-year-old Starr lives in two worlds: the poor neighborhood where she was born and raised and her posh high school in the suburbs. The uneasy balance between them is shattered when Starr is the only witness to the fatal shooting of her unarmed best friend, Khalil, by a police officer. Now what Starr says could destroy her community. It could also get her killed.

The tale of a young Irish-American who aspires to be a reporter, while supporting his widowed mother and siblings by selling newspapers. From the My Name is America series.

Years after he flees Afghanistan, Amir, now an American citizen, returns to his native land and attempts to atone for the betrayal of his best friend before he fled Kabul and the Taliban.

Soledad has always been able to escape into the stories she creates, just like her mother always could. And Soledad has needed that escape more than ever in the five years since her mother and sister died, and her father moved Sol and her youngest sister from the Philippines to Louisiana. After her father leaves, all Sol and Ming have is their evil stepmother, Vea. Sol has protected Ming all this time, but then Ming begins to believe that Auntie Jove — their mythical, world-traveling aunt — is really going to come rescue them. Can Sol protect Ming from this impossible hope?

There are two secrets Evelyn Serrano is keeping from her Mami and Papi: her true feelings about growing up in her Spanish Harlem neighborhood, and her attitude about Abuela, her sassy grandmother who’s come from Puerto Rico to live with them. Then, like an urgent ticking clock, events erupt that change everything. Through it all, Evelyn learns important truths about her heritage and the history makers who shaped a nation. Infused with actual news accounts from the time period, Sonia Manzano, best known as the beloved Maria from Sesame Street, has crafted a gripping work of fiction based on her own life growing up during a fiery, unforgettable time in America, when young Latinos took control of their destinies.

This collection of more than 100 poems that honestly and artfully confront topics ranging from poverty and motherhood to Van Gogh and Mandela is presented in Tupac Shakur’s own handwriting on one side of the page, with a typed version on the opposite side. 

West Indian Lolly Rachpaul, twelve, still reeling from the shooting death of his older brother, begins to find his own way—without gang alliances—when his mother’s girlfriend’s gift of Legos allows him to build a fantastical city at a Harlem community center.

Mimi is not thrilled to be spending her summer in Karachi, Pakistan, with grandparents she’s never met. Secretly, she wishes to find her long-absent father, and plans to write to him in her beautiful new journal. The cook’s daughter, Sakina, still hasn’t told her parents that she’ll be accepted to school only if she can improve her English test score—but then, how could her family possibly afford to lose the money she earns working with her Abba in a rich family’s kitchen? Although the girls seem totally incompatible at first, as the summer goes on, Sakina and Mimi realize that they have plenty in common—and that they each need the other to get what they want most.

“After running away from a group home, 17-year-old Kidd Ellison sets up camp at a beach, where he is put to work by Mr. Red, an aging surfer who runs a maintenance shop. Hardworking and handsome, if somewhat slow, Kidd begins to make friends with some of the camp’s teens, especially Olivia, a blond beauty who wears a ski cap that covers part of her face regardless of the weather. Then Devon, Kidd’s former best friend and nemesis, finds Kidd and threatens to destroy the peaceful life that he has fallen into.” — Booklist

Ever since she got pregnant freshman year, Emoni Santiago’s life has been about making the tough decisions — doing what has to be done for her daughter and her abuela. The one place she can let all that go is in the kitchen, where she adds a little something magical to everything she cooks, turning her food into straight-up goodness. Even though she dreams of working as a chef after she graduates, Emoni knows that it’s not worth her time to pursue the impossible. Yet despite the rules she thinks she has to play by, once Emoni starts cooking, her only choice is to let her talent break free. Golden Kite Award for Young Adult Fiction.