Marion Dane Bauer

When his friend drowns, Joel is terrified to tell both sets of parents.

Judy Blume

Faced with the difficulties of growing up and choosing a religion, a 12-year-old girl talks to her private God.

Eleanor Coerr

Twelve-year-old Sadako is hospitalized with the atom-bomb disease, leukemia. The Hiroshima girl attempts to fold one thousand paper cranes to test the legend that doing so will make a sick person well. See Sadako, and Mieko and the Fifth Treasure.

Susan Cooper

Twelve-year-old Emily and her family accidentally brings a boggart—a mischievous spirit—to their Canadian home from Scotland. Look for the sequel, "The Boggart and the Monster."

Paula Danziger and Ann Martin

After 12-year-old Tara*Starr moves away, she continues her long-distance friendship with Elizabeth with letters.

Bart DeClements

A fifth-grade class, repelled by an overweight new student with serious problems at home, finally learns to accept her.

Michael Dorris

Morning Girl, who loves the day, and her younger brother, Star Boy, who loves the night, take turns describing their life on an island in Pre-Columbian America.

Carol Fenner

Fifth-grader Yolanda, who is smart, tough and big for her age, takes care of her little brother and convinces everyone that he is a musical genius.

Louise Fitzhugh

Eleven-year-old Harriet keeps a notebook with her observations about her friends, but when her classmates find out the results are unforgettable. See the sequel, The Long Secret.

Bette Greene

Eleven-year-old Beth Lambert wonders if allowing Philip Hall to win first place is worth it to win his affection.

Joanne Hyppolite

Seth, a Haitian-American boy, befriends Samona, an African American known as the wildest girl in fifth grade

Annette Curtis Klause

While journeying to a distant planet to see her parents, 12-year-old Puck befriends a troubled alien and finds mystery.

E. L. Konigsburg

Running away with her younger brother to live in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, 12-year-old Claudia has an adventure that changes her forever.

Kathryn Lasky

Twelve-year-old Zippy keeps a diary of her family's new life in New York City in 1903-1904. See other books in the “Dear America” series.

Lois Lowry

Anastasia’s tenth year is filled with good things, like falling in love and getting to know her grandmother, and bad things, like finding out she’s going to have a baby brother. See other books about Anastasia and her little brother Sam.

Walter Dean Myers

J FIC M

Fourteen-year-old Mouse and his friends fall in and out of love and search for a treasure one summer in Harlem.

Cynthia Rylant

J FIC R

Twelve-year-old Summer and her Uncle Ob search for the strength to go on living, after the death of the aunt who raised her.

Alfred Slote

J FIC S

Eleven-year-old Jason tries to enlist the school custodian as a coach for his little league team.

Gary Soto

J FIC S

When they learn that Rudy Herrera and Alex Garcia, two fifth-grade class clowns, plan to run against them in the school elections, Miata and Ana know that they face a difficult race.

Yoshiko Uchida

J FIC U

A young girl grows up in a Japanese-American family in California in the 1930s. See the sequel, The Best Bad Thing.

Sylvia Waugh

J FIC W

A family of life-size rag dolls, living in England and pretending to be human, is threatened when the house’s owner announces a visit. See other books about the Mennyms.

Jill Hauser

J 500.2078 H

More than 50 fun, safe, and inexpensive experiments you can mix, grow, and build.

Michael Pellowski

J 741.5 P

Learn how to create and draw your own comic strip or comic book.

African-American Poets

J 811.08 M

Traditional and contemporary poems about the African-American experience.

R. L. Stine

J B STINE

Stories from the life of the master of children’s horror books, R. L. Stine.