brown girl dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson

brown girl dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson
Nancy Paulson Books
2014

From Goodreads:
Raised in South Carolina and New York, Woodson always felt halfway home in each place. In vivid poems, she shares what it was like to grow up as an African American in the 1960s and 1970s, living with the remnants of Jim Crow and her growing awareness of the Civil Rights movement. Touching and powerful, each poem is both accessible and emotionally charged, each line a glimpse into a child’s soul as she searches for her place in the world. Woodson’s eloquent poetry also reflects the joy of finding her voice through writing stories, despite the fact that she struggled with reading as a child. Her love of stories inspired her and stayed with her, creating the first sparks of the gifted writer she was to become

Salt by Helen Frost - 2014

Salt by Helen Frost
Frances Foster Books
138p.


Summary: Twelve-year-olds Anikwa, of the Miami village of Kekionga, and James, of the trading post outside Fort Wayne, find their friendship threatened by the rising fear and tension brought by the War of 1812.

Wild Book, The by Margarita Engle

The Wild Book by Margarita Engle
Harcourt Children's Books
144 pg.

In early twentieth-century Cuba, bandits terrorize the countryside as a young farm girl struggles with dyslexia. Based on the life of the author's grandmother.

May B by Caroline Starr Rose

May B.
Caroline Starr Rose
Schwartz and Wade
231 pg


When a failed wheat crop nearly bankrupts the Betterly family, Pa pulls twelve-year-old May from school and hires her out to a couple new to the Kansas frontier.

Never Forgotten by Patricia McKissack

Never Forgotten by Patricia McKissack
Schwartz and Wade
2011
Unpaged

In eighteenth-century West Africa, a boy raised by his blacksmith father and the Mother Elements--Wind, Fire, Water, and Earth--is captured and taken to America as a slave.

Planet Middle School by Nikki Grimes

Planet Middle School by Nikki Grimes
Bloomsbury
2011
154p.

A series of poems describes all the baffling changes at home and at school in twelve-year-old Joylin's transition from tomboy basketball player to not-quite-girly girl.

Addie on the Inside by James Howe

Addie on the Inside by James Howe
Atheneum Books for Children
2011
206p.

Outspoken thirteen-year-old Addie Carle learns about love, loss, and staying true to herself as she navigates seventh grade, enjoys a visit from her grandmother, fights with her boyfriend, and endures gossip and meanness from her former best friend.

Hurricane Dancers by Margarita Engle

Hurricane Dancers: The First Caribbean Pirate Shipwreck by Margarita Engle
Henry Holt
2011
145p.

Quebrado has been a slave on captain Bernadino de Talavera's pirate ship for years, but when a hurricane sinks the ship and kills most of the crew, Quebrado escapes to safety and finds acceptance and refuge in a nearby village.

Roots and Blues by Arnold Adoff

Roots and Blues: A Celebration by Arnold Adoff
Clarion Books
2011
86p.

Inside Out and Back Again by Thanhha Lai

Inside Out and Back Again by Thanhha Lai
Harper Collins Children
2011
262p


Through a series of poems, a young girl chronicles the life-changing year of 1975, when she, her mother, and her brothers leave Vietnam and resettle in Alabama.