Copper Sun by Sharon Draper

1. Copper Sunby Sharon Draper Winner of the 2007 Coretta Scott King Award Two fifteen-year-old girls–one a slave and the other an indentured servant–escape their Carolina plantation and try to make their way to Fort Moses, Florida, a Spanish colony that gives sanctuary to slaves.

2. Touching Spirit Bearby Ben Mikaelsen • Within Cole Matthews lies anger, rage and hate. Cole has been stealing and fighting for years. This time he caught Peter Driscal in the parking lot and smashed his head against the sidewalk. Now, Peter may have permanent brain damage and Cole is in the biggest trouble of his life. Cole is offered Circle Justice: a system based on Native American traditions that attempts to provide healing for the criminal offender, the victim, and the community. With prison as his only alternative, Cole plays along. He says he wants to repent, but in his heart, Cole blames his alcoholic mom, his abusive dad, wimpy Peter- everyone but himself- for his situation. Cole receives a one-year banishment to a remote Alaskan island. There, he is mauled by a mysterious white bear of Native American legend. Hideously injured, Cole waits for death. His thoughts shift from anger to humility. To survive, he must stop blaming others and take responsibility for his life. Rescuers arrive to save Cole's body, but it is the attack of the Spirit Bear that may save his soul.

3. Raven’s Gateby Anthony Horowitz • Raven’s Gate is the first in the Gatekeepers series about five young people who must save the world from evil. 14-year-old Matt, a troubled orphan who is in with the wrong crowd. As punishment for being present during an assault, Matt must choose between life with off-putting Mrs. Deverill in a remote Yorkshire village, or jail. As Matt soon learns, Lesser Malling is much worse than jail, because strange and dangerous things are occurring there. Raven's Gate, an ancient portal to the world of evil, is about to be opened, and Matt is to be the blood sacrifice.

4. Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan • This is the first book in the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series, about a contemporary 12-year-old New Yorker who learns he's a demigod. Perseus, aka Percy Jackson, thinks he has big problems. His father left before he was born, he's been kicked out of six schools in six years, he's dyslexic, and he has ADHD. What a surprise when he finds out that that's only the tip of the iceberg: he vaporizes his pre-algebra teacher, learns his best friend is a satyr, and is almost killed by a minotaur before his mother manages to get him to the safety of Camp Half-Blood--where he discovers that Poseidon is his father. But that's a problem, too. Poseidon has been accused of stealing Zeus' lightning bolt, and unless Percy can return the bolt,humankind is doomed.

5. Ugliesby Scott Westerfeld • Tally Youngblood lives in a futuristic society that acculturates its citizens to believe that they are ugly until age 16 when they'll undergo an operation that will change them into pleasure-seeking "pretties." Anticipating this happy transformation, Tally meets Shay, another female ugly, who shares her enjoyment of hoverboarding and risky pranks. But Shay also disdains the false values and programmed conformity of the society and urges Tally to defect with her to the Smoke, a distant settlement of simple-living conscientious objectors. Tally declines, yet when Shay is found missing by the authorities, Tally is coerced by the cruel Dr. Cable to find her and her compatriots–or remain forever "ugly." Tally's adventuresome spirit helps her locate Shay and the Smoke. It also attracts the eye of David, the aptly named youthful rebel leader. Who can Tally trust?

6. twilight by Stephanie Meyer Twilight There are three things that Isabella knows. 1. Edward is a vampire 2. There's a part of him—how big a part, she isn't sure—that truly thirsts for her blood 3. She is unconditionally and irrevocably in love with him. Of course, Isabella never planned on falling in love with a vampire. It's not the kind of thing you put in your dayplanner. Tuesday, 4pm, fall in love with blood-sucking undead monster. Nope. Imagine going to your boyfriend's house for dinner to meet his parents knowing that under other circumstances you'd be the main course. Isabella knows that loving Edward is dangerous. She even suspects that she may be putting her family—everyone else she cares about—at risk. But what Isabella doesn't realize is that Edward and his family aren't the only vampires in town.

7. Among the Hiddenby Margaret Peterson Haddix • Luke has never been to school. He's never had a birthday party, or gone to a friend's house for an overnight. In fact, Luke has never had a friend. Luke is one of the shadow children, a third child forbidden by the Population Police. He's lived his entire life in hiding, and now, with a new housing development replacing the woods next to his family's farm, he is no longer even allowed to go outside. • Then, one day Luke sees a girl's face in the window of a house where he knows two other children already live. Finally, he's met a shadow child like himself. Jen is willing to risk everything to come out of the shadows — does Luke dare to become involved in her dangerous plan? Can he afford not to?

8. Code Orangeby Caroline B. Cooney • Mitty Blake is a talented but underachieving student in advanced biology at a New York City private high school. He is more interested in his friend Olivia than in completing his infectious-disease report, which could keep him from flunking. When he discovers a smallpox scab in an envelope in an old medical book, his research takes an urgent turn as he tries to determine whether he has contracted the disease. Searching for information on the Internet (thankfully, the high-achieving Olivia knows how to use a library), he inadvertently alerts a terrorist group to his situation. They kidnap Mitty with the intention of using him as a human biological weapon against the people of New York.

9. Rules by Cynthia Lord 2007 Middle School AwardSome rules keep us safe, some don’t always seem necessary, and some can usually go without saying ­ Rules like… “Keep your pants on in public,” and “If the bathroom door is locked, KNOCK! (especially if Catherine has a friend over!)” Catherine takes care of her little brother who’s autistic, by writing down important rules like these ones and protecting him when other kids make fun of him. Still, she wants to be a normal kid; make friends with the girl next door and go with a boy to the summer dance. NOT necessarily go with her brother to his occupational therapy appointments. But, while she’d there she finds an unlikely friend. Jason can only communicate by pointing to word cards in a notebook, but he doesn’t really have useful words like “whatever” and “sucks a big one,” so Catherine makes him more. She enjoys getting to know Jason, but would it ruin her chances of being a “normal” 12-year-old if she tells other people about him? (Stella Shafer, MLIS student, iSchool, University of Washington)

10. Sleeping Freshmen Never Lieby David Lubar • Ah, 9th grade.  Freshmen year.  New beginnings.  Scott is looking forward to it and yet he is a bit nervous.  As he readies himself for his big year, his home life seems to get complicated by the return of his older brother and the announcement that his mother is having another baby.  Scott's year doesn't go as planned and through a series of hilarious misadventures, we see him change and grow.  Throughout it all, he writes a series of letters to his yet unborn sibling as a manual for how to survive your freshmen year.  These include lessons in lost friends, unattainable girls, new friends and unexpected secrets from the family.

11. The Invention of Hugo Cabretby Brian Selznick • Orphan, clock keeper, and thief, Hugo lives in the walls of a busy Paris train station, where his survival depends on secrets and anonymity. But when his world suddenly interlocks with an eccentric, bookish girl and a bitter old man who runs a toy booth in the station, Hugo's undercover life, and his most precious secret, are put in jeopardy. A cryptic drawing, a treasured notebook, a stolen key, a mechanical man, and a hidden message from Hugo's dead father form the backbone of this intricate, tender, and spellbinding mystery.

12. Stargirlby Jerry Spinelli • Stargirl, a strange girl, went to a regular school. No one except two people liked her. Stargirl becomes popular, then she is not. Stargirl is strange because she sings Happy Birthday on her ukulele. How does she know everyone's birthday? At the beginning Leo (a boy) gets a porcupine necktie. It does not have a name on the box! Who is it from?

13. House of the Scorpionby Nancy Farmer • At his coming-of-age party, Matteo Alacrán asks El Patrón's bodyguard, "How old am I?...I know I don't have a birthday like humans, but I was born." "You were harvested," Tam Lin reminds him. "You were grown in that poor cow for nine months and then you were cut out of her." To most people around him, Matt is not a boy, but a beast. But for El Patrón, lord of a country called Opium -- a strip of poppy fields lying between the U.S. and what was once called Mexico -- Matt is a guarantee of eternal life. El Patrón loves Matt as he loves himself for Matt is himself. They share identical DNA.

14. Life As We Knew It Life as We Knew It By Susan Beth Pfeffer When scientists predict that an asteroid will collide with the moon, Miranda and her neighbors break out their lawn chairs to watch the spectacular show.  But when the collision pushes the moon closer to the Earth, it sets off devastating tsunamis, earthquakes, and storms.  Through her daily journal entries, Miranda recounts her family’s struggle to survive.  While the book falls firmly into the science fiction genre, it will also appeal to readers who enjoyed Anne Frank’s diary, as the focus of the narrative is on a girl facing grim circumstances and ultimately learning about herself and the nature of hope.   (New Hampshire Isinglass Teen Read Award committee)

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