"How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.” – Anne Frank
 
Youth change-makers do exist, on family, community, and global levels, although some of their names are more familiar than others.
 
Probably one of the most well-known, Malala Yousafzai, at age 17, became the youngest Nobel Peace Prize laureate in history from her work as a global advocate for girls' rights and education.
 
Working to save our planet are Greta Thunberg, Vanessa Nakate, Isra Hirsi, Xiuhtezcatl Roske-Martinez, and Jamie Margolin, teen climate change activists. Fionn Ferreira, a high school student, invented a new method of extracting microplastics from the water.
 
When Mohamad Al Jounde was 12, Mohamad escaped from Syria to Lebanon; after just six months, he worked with friends to set up a school for refugees, which has, since then, helped more than 7,000 pupils settle and integrate into their new country. Naomi Wadler is a 13-year-old activist on gun violence and discrimination against African American girls. And Salvador Gómez-Colón created the Light and Hope for Puerto Rico campaign to distribute solar-powered lamps and hand-powered washing machines when Hurricane María devastated Puerto Rico in 2017. David Hogg, Jaclyn Corin, Emma González, Cameron Kasky, and Alex Wind, students at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, sparked the #NeverAgain movement for stricter gun regulation.
 
Many began at a very early age. Mari Copeny from age 8, when she wrote to president Obama, has worked for water access and to raise awareness for the Flint Water Crisis. She also works to bring resources to the children of Flint, Michigan. Melati and Isabel Wijsen, at ages 10 and 12, began the movement to ban all plastic bags in Bali; by the end of 2022, Bali plans to ban all single-use plastic. And at age 11, Marley Dias began working tirelessly for diverse representation in story.
 
Many of these names are unfamiliar to our youth who many times feel powerless, but stories of tweens and teens justice and change seekers, fictional and real, enable them see their how they can make a difference.

Pictured are 45 novels featuring characters who made a difference, a sampling of novels I have read in the past 5 years or so.
My goal, as always in any thematic listing, is diversity in authors, characters, settings, reading level and interest levels, and format—prose, verse, and graphic. For historical Justice & change Seekers, see my reviews of Historical Fiction novels (https://www.literacywithlesley.com/historical-fiction-book-reviews.html).
Below are reviews of 33 that I have read most recently.
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Amal Unbound by Aisha Saeed
 It is immediately apparent why this novel was one of the books chosen for the 2018 #Global Read Aloud—well written, well-developed characters, strong adolescent female protagonist, and contemporary issues.
 
Twelve-year-old Amal lives in a rural Pakistani village where she is the eldest daughter of a small landowner, who like everyone else owes money to the greedy, corrupt landlord. She goes to school and dreams of becoming a teacher. After a run-in with the landlord’s son, she is required to work on the Khan estate to repay her father’s debt, an impossible feat since the servants are charged for lodging and food. As she becomes part of the household, connects with the other servants, and learns more about the unlawful Khan family, she has to decide how much to risk to save the villages, her friends, and her future. She is counseled by her new teacher, “You always have a choice. Making choices even when they scare you because you know it’s the right thing to do —that’s bravery.” (210)
 
I am adding Amal Unbound to my list of novels featuring my 4 guest blogs on Strong Girls in MG.YA literature. She reminds me of such adolescents as Serafina (Serafina’s Promise by Ann E. Burg) and Valli (No Ordinary Day by Deborah Ellis).
 
As author Aisha Saeed wrote in her Author’s Note, “Amal is a fictional character, but she represents countless other girls in Pakistan and around the world who take a stand against inequality and fight for justice in often unrecognized but important ways.” In this way novels and characters can function as maps to
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Attack of the Black Rectangles by Amy Sarig King
“Between the crazy rules around here, my dad being, well, my dad, , and now this [Ms. Sett admonishing Mac to “keep what you learn at home out of my lessons”] I’m done hoping adults do the right thing. I’m done thinking they have our best interests at heart.” (97)
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Mac and his family and friends live in the perfect town: No accidents. No crime. No Halloween. No junk food. No “bad” words. No skipping church. And a curfew. It is a town governed by rules made by adults. “These adults join Ms. Sett in letter writing, sitting on the town council and committees, and making rule after rule after rule. They seem to believe that rules equal safety‑by making more rules, they are keeping us all safe and keeping the town’s reputation spotless.” (2)
 
Mac, a sixth grader; his mother, a hospice worker; and his grandfather, a Vietnam War veteran and meditator, ignore the rules. Mac’s father doesn’t follow the rules, any rules, because he no longer lives with them and he sclaims he is an alien sent to study people and that granddad’s car, when fixed, will be his spaceship. But actually all it will be is stolen by Mac’s dad.
 
When Mac, his best friend Denis, and his friend/crush Marci are assigned Ms. Sett as their English teacher, they are ambivalent. She seems to be a cool teacher—book club choice reading, writing what you want, and little homework, but she also is the same lady who writes those letters to the paper upholding the town’s rules and not teaching truths, like the truths about Columbus. Also, when Mac, Denis, Marci, Aaron, and Hannah (Hoa) choose Jane Yolen’s The Devil’s Arithmetic,  a story about the Holocaust, for book club, they notice black triangles drawn over some of the words.
 
Puzzled, Mac, Denis, and Marci go to the local bookstore to look at an uncensored copy of the novel. “They crossed out the word ‘breasts’—as if we don’t know what breasts are.” “What grade are you guys in again?” Greg asks. “Sixth,” Marci answers. “Old enough to have actual breasts, so I don’t understand the problem.” (43)
 
The three friends meet with the principal to report and find out who censored the books. But she doesn’t appear to see a problem. “I should have been born in a time when adults didn’t pretend something is okay when it’s not. I don’t know if that time ever existed.” (77)
 
Mac writes to author Jane Yolen about the censorship of her book, also sharing some problems about his dad; he keep the communication a secret from his friends. Next the three take the problem to the School Board and with the help of Mac’s grandfather, stage protests on Saturdays in town, speaking with some of the passing citizens. They find more censored books in Ms. Sett’s closet and stage a sit-down protest in the school hallway.
 
When their proposal is scheduled for the  emergency School Board meeting, they find more community support than imagined and some surprising adults advocating on their behalf: Marci’s dad, an attorney; Mac’s mother; Aaron’s dad, who may believe the earth is flat but speaks emotionally about freedom of speech; and one surprise supporter.
After all these meetings, protests, rule changings—and a school dance, Mac has learned two things: No one is ever just one thing. And not everyone is telling the truth. (4)
 
Amy Sarig King's powerful story for middle-grade readers is about censorship, rules, relationships, truths, and the power of words.
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Audacity by Melanie Crowder
 Clara Lemlich, a 23-year-old Ukrainian immigrant, rose to a position of power in the women's labor movement, becoming the voice that incited the famous Uprising of the Twenty Thousand in 1909. (PBS)
 
Audacity has become one of my all-time favorites historical novels and some of the best writing I have read. I usually choose books about more contemporary issues, but I am finding the same issues appearing throughout history, wearing different masks. Unfortunately oppression, intolerance, and treatment of refugees are not past, and we still need people unafraid to stand for their own rights and those of others.

Audacity relates the true story of Clara Lemlich, a Russian Jewish immigrant with dreams of an education who sacrifices everything to fight for better working conditions for women in the factories of Manhattan's Lower East Side in the early 1900's.
 
Lyrically related in verse, the use of parallelism and the purposeful placement of the words is as effective as the words themselves. A great mentor text for poetry study.

The novel includes the history behind the story and a glossary of terms. What a wonderful "text" for a social studies class!
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Birds on the Brain by Uma Krishnaswami
Renni is passionate about birds—watching them, learning about them, protecting them and their nests. When she has to choose a survey project for her science class, she and her best friend Yasmin choose birds and books. Unfortunately their third best friend Amil is not interested in birds and in a huff, he joins another group.
 
Renni and Yasmin talk to people for their survey and tell them about Bird Count India, part of a global project, but find the Count in their town is being blocked by the mayor.
 
Renni learns that sometimes passions clash and sometimes good intentions are thwarted, but with a lot of brainstorming and support from friends, family, and grownups, such as Book Uncle, people can collaborate and solve problems.
 
A wonderful story, with lots of information about birds and solar energy, for grades 3 and up about working together.
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Consider the Octopus by Nora Raleigh Baskin and Gay Polisner
 "Consider the octopus, dude, duh,” I say out loud to myself because sometimes it helps to talk to someone. “That part is the important part. The octopus.” (88)
 
And the pink octopus avatar starts the chain of events which lead 12-year-old Sydney Miller (not marine biologist Dr. Sydney Miller of the Monterey Bay Aquarium) and her goldfish Rachel Carson to Oceana II, a ship researching the Great PGP.
 
When seventh-grader Jeremy JB Barnes, under the custody of his recently-divorced mother, chief scientist of the Oceana II, finds himself accompanying her on her mission “to sweep and vacuum up approximately eighty-eight thousand tons of garbage” called the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, he was less than enthusiastic. “I like the ocean plenty from the beach.”
 
Until the high school SEAmester students arrive, he is the only adolescent on board. But tasked with the job of inviting well-known scientists to the join them, JB inadvertently sends the invitation to the wrong Sydney Miller who jumps at the chance, looking for something to do this summer now that her best and only friend has moved away. Sydney and her grandmother agree, “It’s synchronicity” (91), the simultaneous occurrence of events which appear significantly related but have no discernible causal connection. “What psychologist Carl Jung called ‘meaningful coincidences’…” (228) However, “These signs we see all the time, the universe, these coincidences that we give meaning? They only work if we want them to…” (12)
 
And Sydney and Jeremy want these signs to work. Hiding Sydney on the ship, sometimes in plain sight with the help of two of the SEAmster girls, Sydney and JB hatch a plan to bring about the publicity the mission needs to retains its grant. “Maybe we’re here because we’re supposed to be here. Maybe the two of us are supposed to do something really important.” (144)
 
When you put two of my favorite authors together, what do readers get? A fun, important adventure with engaging characters who present two voices, representing two perspectives, and who show that, according to news reporter Damian Jacks, “Mark my words: kids and our youth. That’s who’s going to really help change things..… Kids, not adults, are the future of our planet.” (171)
 
And there is a lot of science and information about the polluting of the oceans. “It’s amazing how many people still don’t know how much waste—garbage,” she corrects herself, “is floating in the middle of the Pacific.” (226)
 
Readers learn about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch and its importance to our environment.  Besides the garbage that is killing sea life—birds and fish, this affects all of us.
 
Because every drop of water we have, all of it, circles around, evaporates into the sky, and comes back down as rain, or mist, or snow. It sinks into the ground and fills rivers, ponds, lakes, reservoirs, and the well in my backyard.
Water I shower with. Cook with.
And drink.
No new water is ever made.
This is all we’ve got. (167)
 
An important read, this novel could be included in an environmental impacts study in ELA or science classes, leading to more research on the topic.
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Fast Pitch by Nic Stone
 Twelve-year-old Shanice Lockwood is captain of a softball team, the Firebirds, the only all-Black softball team in the Dixie Youth Softball Association. She comes from a long line of batball players—her father, her grandfather PopPop, her great-grandfather. Her one goal is for her team to win the state championship.
 
But her goal shifts when she meets her Great-Great Uncle Jack, her Great-Grampy JonJon’s brother.
 
Shanice’s father had to quit baseball when he blew out his knee, his father had to stop playing to support his family, but why did JonJon quit when he was successfully playing for the Negro American League and was one of the first Black players recruited to the MLB? When Shanice is taken to Peachtree Hills Place to meet her sometimes-senile uncle, he tells her that JonJon  “didn’t do what they said he did…He was framed.” (46) “My brother ain’t no thief. He didn’t do it…But I know who did.” (47)
 
And Shanice is off on a quest to research the incident that caused her great grandfather to leave baseball and to see if she, with Jack’s information and JonJon’s leather journal, can clear his name while still trying to lead her softball team to victory.
 
Fast Pitch is a fun new novel by Nic Stone, full of batball, adventure, a little mystery, peer and family relationships, Negro League history, prejudice, and maybe a first crush.
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From the Desk of Zoe Washington by Janae Marks
 Statistics affecting our children:

• The rate of wrongful convictions in the United States is estimated to be somewhere between 2 percent and 10 percent. When applied to an estimated prison population of 2.3 million, that means 46,000-230,000 innocent people are locked away. Once an innocent person is convicted, it is next to impossible to get the individual out of prison. Wrongful convictions happen for several reasons; one is bad lawyering by unprepared court-appointed defenders. (Chicago Tribune. March 14, 2018)
• African-American prisoners who are convicted of murder are about 50% more likely to be innocent than other convicted murderers. (National Registry of Exonerations, 2017)
• Currently, an estimated 2.7 million children—or 1 in 28 of those under the age of 18—have a biological mother or father who is incarcerated. According to the National Resource Center on Children and Families of the Incarcerated, approximately 10 million children have experienced parental incarceration at some point in their lives.

 
All the lying was wrong. But maybe it was okay to do something wrong if you were doing it for the right reason. (180)
 
Zoe Washington, a rising 7th grader who loves baking and aspires to be the first Black winner of the “Kids Bake Challenge” and publish her own cookbook, is in a fight with her former best friend Trevor, and is not looking forward to a summer without him and her other best friends Jasmine and Maya. But her life changes when, on her 12th birthday, she receives a letter from Marcus, her biological father, a man who she has never met because he has been in prison from before her birth—for murder.
 
For the longest time, I didn’t care whether or not I knew my birth father. I had my parents, and they were all I needed. But [Marcus’] letters were making me feel that a part of me was missing, like a chunk of my heart. I was finally filling in that hole. (121)
 
Zoe decides to write back, and as she and Marcus exchange letters and music recommendations, she begins to suspect that he doesn’t seem like a murderer. He admits that he did not kill the victim and that there was an alibi witness whom his lawyer never contacted.
 
Since her mother has forbidden communication with Marcus (and has been confiscating his letters for years), Zoe confides in her grandmother who explains, “People look at someone like Marcus—a tall, strong, dark-skinned boy—and they make assumptions about him. Even if it isn’t right. The jury, the judge, the public, even his own lawyer‑they all assumed Marcus must be guilty because he’s Black. It’s all part of systemic racism.” (133)
 
Zoe researches the Innocence Project, and she and Trevor, friends again, go on a search for Marcus’ alibi witness in a plan to first prove to herself that Marcus is innocent and  if so, to exonerate him.
 
This is a truly valuable story to begin important conversations about social justice and disparities.
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Front Desk by Kelly Yang
 Ten-year-old Mia moves to the head of my “Strong Girls in MG/YA Lit” as she becomes an activist and champion of those who cannot, or will not, stand up for themselves [“You don’t get it, kid. I’ve been fighting my whole life. I’m done. It’s no use fighting—people are gonna be the way they’re gonna be” (105)], teaches others the wrongs of prejudice and injustice, and forms a community from her neighbors, patrons, and fellow immigrants.

Mia and her parents emigrated from China to the United States for a more “free” life. In China her parents were professionals; in America they feel lucky to find a job managing a motel. But the owner, Mr. Yao, is unkind, unjust, cheap, and prejudiced. He reduces their salaries until they are working for lodging and a life of poverty. And while this is a novel about Mia who manages the front desk and helps her parents temporarily hide other Chinese immigrants who have been mistreated, it is really a novel of culture, prejudice, bullying, community, and, most of all, the power of writing. “It was the most incredible feeling ever, knowing that something I wrote actually changed someone’s life.” (218)

In America there are two roller coasters, and people are born to a life on one or the other, but Mia and her friend Lupe, whose family came from Mexico, have decided to break that cycle. Although bullied in school and warned by her mother that she will never be a “native” English writer, Mia develops her writing skills to help Hank gain employment after a wrongful arrest, free “Uncle” Zhang whose ID and passport were being held by his employer, share her story with her teacher and classmates, and finally persuade friends and strangers to take a chance on her family.

Mia is a representative of the “nearly twenty million immigrant children currently living in the United States, 30 percent of whom are living at or below poverty.” (Author’s Note). As such, this book will serve as a mirror for many readers, a map for others looking for ways to navigate young adolescent life, especially in a new culture, and as a window for those who will learn empathy for others they may see as different. Author Kelly Yang also shares the autobiographical elements of the novel in her Author’s Note.

Front Desk, with its very short chapters and challenging topics would be a meaningful and effective 10-minute read-aloud to begin Grade 4-7 daily reading workshop focus lessons. I would suggest projecting Mia’s letters since they show her revisions as she seeks to improve her language skills and word choices.
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Haven Jacobs Saves the Planet by Barbara Dee
 Although maybe we all had stuff in common with penguins. Maybe we were all standing on shrinking ice. Knowing it was shrinking and not knowing what to do about it. If there was even anything we could do at all. (15)
 
Eco-anxiety is defined as “extreme worry about current and future harm to the environment caused by human activity and climate change.” A new survey of 10,000 young people in 10 countries finds climate change causing widespread, deeply felt anxiety. (Medical News Today) More than 45% of young people in [the] survey said their feelings about climate change "negatively affected their daily life and functioning." (World Economic Forum)
 
Seventh grader Haven Jacobs suffers from “eco-anxiety.” She bites her nails, can’t sleep, and has stomach upsets. She also starts “doomscrolling,” endlessly watching videos about environmental disasters. Her grades in social studies, the class with her favorite teacher, suffer as she begins to find studying history pointless.
 
Haven is also having trouble with her friends, mostly her old friend Archer, her best friend Riley,  and Riley’s new friend Em. I hadn’t told Archer how I felt about him avoiding me at school. I hadn’t told Em how I felt about the sleepover business. I hadn’t even told Riley how I felt about her telling me she’d left Em’s sleepover when actually she hadn’t. It was strange: I squabbled with Carter all the time, but sometimes when it came to my friends, I was kind of a wimp, wasn’t I? (97) Things start building as her eco-anxiety and friendship complications increase. Right then I had this feeling: I don’t understand anything. Not just what was happening with the river, but with people, too. I never used to feel this way, but now, all of a sudden, everything felt like a giant mystery, with no identification chart. (108)
 
When her science class embarks on the annual study of the town’s local river, Haven and her classmates discover that the river has changed a lot since her older brother’s class conducted the same study. There were no longer any frogs and the pollution-sensitive macroorganisms appear to have died. Their hypothesis is that someone is polluting the river, and the only new industry in Belmont is Gemba, her father’s employer.
 
One of the things [Ms. Packer] taught me this year is that if you can’t do great things, you should do small things greatly. (267) Haven organizes a river cleanup, but even though the whole town shows up, not many are come to her information booth to hear about the state of their river, and even though everyone participated in the river cleanup, they left as much trash on shore as they took from the river. Sensing the failure, Haven organizes a Memorial Day protest which turns into a sleepover (which actually does end up solving her friendship problems).
 
With the support of her older brother Carter, her parents, and her new friend Kenji, son of the glass plant manager, Haven overcomes her fear of public speaking and addresses the town council—with some results. Sometimes change was scary, like what was happening to the planet. But when it came to people—including older brothers—sometimes change could be kind of amazing. (257)
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Illegal by Fancisco Stork
 Francisco’s Stork’s 2017 novel Disappeared takes place in Juarez, Mexico, and depicts sex trafficking, the cartel, murder, poverty, betrayal, abandonment.
 
Sara Zapata, a young reporter for a local paper, is committed to finding and saving the young women she learns are being kidnapped, including her best friend Linda, despite the warnings of her boss and the threats to herself and her family.
 
Sara’s younger brother Emiliano, whose life has been affected by his father’s abandonment—of the family and his native Mexico—is looking for a better life, for ways to make money to pay the family bills and win the love of his wealthy girlfriend.
 
The siblings find in following their consciences, helping others, and making moral choices, they need to do what is right—not what is easy or even safe, and must sacrifice, or revise, their personal goals. To save their lives, Sara and Emiliano escape to the United States to find a better life and to bring the cartel who is trafficking the women to justice. They cross the border and are attacked in the dessert.
 
Sara turns herself over to the authorities, certain that she meets the requirements for asylum but, as her time in the detention facility grows longer and she observes women being mistreated and deported for no reason, she questions her assumptions. I imagined that all I had to do was show the authorities the evidence of actual persecution, of actual threats, such as people machine-gunning our house in Juarez.… I saw my case as fitting within the legal reasons for asylum under the law of the United States. Was I wrong about the United States? (31) She finds that The whole process of who gets asylum and who gets detained, who gets a bond and who gets released, who gets a visa and who gets deported. I mean, it’s not as rational as I imagined it would be. (34)
 
Meanwhile Emiliano enters the country illegally and goes to Chicago with his father, planning to turn Linda’s evidence against the cartel over to the proper authorities. He also finds America to be less than welcoming. As he tells his new friend Aniela, “I think that in Mexico I feel like I belong all the time. I never feel not wanted like I do here sometimes. Here I’m always looking over my shoulder even when no one is there.…knowing that you belong and are wanted is major.” (251)
 
When Sara’s attorney is killed and she is placed in solitary confinement and Emiliano finds he can no longer trust his father, tensions escalate. A study of government corruption and the asylum process, this sequel to Disappeared is a thriller that will hook the most reluctant adolescent reader. Enough background is given in Illegal that it may not be completely necessary to read Disappeared first but it would surely enhance the reading.
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Kingdom of Dust by Lisa Stringfellow
“Storytelling is universal and is as ancient as humankind.… It exists (and existed) to entertain, to inform, and [most importantly] to promulgate cultural traditions and values.” (education.nationalgeographic.org)
 
Twelve-year-old Amara has no memory of any family other than Zirachi who found the baby in a basket on her doorstep. Since then they have lived together on their farm in Danel. “I pray that Zirachi and I never have to leave our home.” (ARC 13) However, in Danel and the whole of Kun there has been no rain, no plants, no green fields with animals grazing, and Zare, the great desert, is taking over the land. People are starving even though they pray and give harvest gifts to Oala, the goddess. The land, formerly lush and green, has always been ruled by a child of Oala, but the present king took the throne by force. And the griots, storytellers of the culture and memory, no longer exist.
 
When King Udo comes to the New Yam Festival and sees Amara and the crescent-shaped birthmark on her neck, soldiers are sent to capture her. She escapes with the help  and magic of an old woman she met in the marketplace, and, traveling to an island fortress, learns that it is up to her—and only her—to rescue the true child of Oala, a daughter, and save the kingdom. Griot Uchendu, who has been in hiding with the few existing griots ever since Udo took over with the help of those who turned away from the goddess, tells Amara, “I’m sorry child. I send you on a difficult journey, but it is one that none but you can complete. May Oala guide your steps and give you strength.” (ARC 94)
 
With twists and turns, battles, captures, and rescues, villains and surprising heroes, this West African fantasy folktale will hold the attention of all readers. Many times fantasy worlds are difficult to envision but, perfectly-crafted, readers will be able to picture Kun, understand its culture, and follow the hero’s journey. The novel is so well-written that teachers and writers will use passages as mentor texts.
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Lia Park and the Missing Jewel by Jenna Yoon
 All I ever wanted was to be part of IMA, fight monsters, and be one of the four protectors of the world. (6)
 
Twelve-year old Lia is born in a world where magical powers count. And she has none—or at least none that she can identify. Her best friend Joon has magical powers and a chance to pass the exam for the International Magic Agency-sponsored school and become a great agent. Even Lia’s parents, her Umma and Appa, who are only desk agents, have “very low doses of magic.”
 
I turned twelve a few months ago. Normally, I was pretty good at Taekkyeon. But I couldn’t concentrate today. Feelings of dread welled up in the pit of my stomach. I knew how all this would end. Not well. (2)
 
So Lia decides she will stay at the normal school and become popular. I’d really thought that if I had no powers, I could still be somebody by being part of the popular group. (46) But when she defies her parents instructions and goes to the birthday party of Dior, her wealthy and most popular classmate, Lia unwittingly releases some magic, and all chaos is unleashed. She returns home to find her sitter Tina dead in the driveway and her parents kidnapped by the evil diviner Gaya.
 
Following her parents’ cryptic clues, Lia and Joon are transported to her Halmoni’s (grandmother’s) house in Korea where Lia learns her real family history and that “When you were born, your power had already manifested.… But it was dangerous, because the monsters sensed it too. That you were different.” (90)
 
Lia decides she has to make things right. All this was my fault.…It was because of me that my parents were kidnapped and were being held hostage by Gaya.”
 
What follows is edge-of-the-seat adventure that will keep readers reading and worrying and hoping as Lia follows clues and tries to find—and then secure—the jewel that Gaya demands and, using all her wits and spells, determines what to do to get back her parents (and Joon) without giving the power back to Gaya.
 
Readers will learn a bit about Korean culture and folklore as they race through this adventure with the newest superhero.
 
I have reviewed many novels where young adolescents show resilience and courage to “save the day,” sometimes for the adults in their families, but none are as fantastically spellbinding as Jenna Yoon’s Lia Park.
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Make a Little Wave by Kerry O'Malley Cerra

“One girl can’t save all the sharks in the ocean. But I’m not giving up on saving as many as I can.” (ARC 187)
 
Much to my delight, I have discovered a new teen justice and change seeker, eighth grader Savannah Braden. Sav and her family just moved from Orlando to Sandy Dunes, Florida. Living on the beach is not Savanah’s dream. In fact, ever since viewing the movie JAWS, she has feared the ocean—and sharks.
 
Missing her best friend Maisy, although they are “ interconnected like seaweed,” the first possible friend Savannah meets is Tanner Markell who is in her classes and Marine Club, is popular, and whose family owns the local charter fishing business. Invited to the opening of his family’s swanky restaurant, Sav is served shark fin soup. When she finds out what she is eating, she throws up, leaves the restaurants, and starts researching the inhumane ways shark fins are obtained and the applicable laws for buying and selling shark fins. She then finds her passion—saving the sharks.
 
But this passion turns more into a vendetta against the Markells and their restaurant, and Sav talks two classmates, Rav and Belen, into helping her close the restaurant or at least serving shark fin soup; she then decides to also close down their fishing business. With noble intentions but in typical 13-year-fashion, she initiates schemes that are harmful (setting out roaches in the restaurant and pumping water into the gas tank of the charter boat), gets in a lot of trouble, and alienates her new friends—and even Maisy. “It’s hard to make friends when you’re making waves.” (ARC 233) She also posts pictures of Tanner and Grant catching a shark (which dies upon release), her actions verging on cyberbullying.
 
Attending the Coalition for Sharks meetings, Savannah gathers the courage to participate in a family shark dive and realizes that she needs to change her tactics and speak out, a task that is very difficult for her, to actually help save the sharks. “Is this what Mom and Dad meant about doing the right thing the right way? Maybe it’s about focusing on what I’m fighting FOR, instead of only what I’m fighting AGAINST.” ARC 270)
 
Full of three-dimensional characters—Tanner, older sister Arbor, Maisy, Rav (a/k/a Benedicta), as well as quirky characters such as Tanner’s grandfather, Mr. Hopewell, and a main character who also shows readers something about navigating life as a Deaf teen with cochlear implants. Readers will learn quite a lot about sharks, and this novel would fit well in a science unit.
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Moxie by Jennifer Mathieu
 “moxie”- force of character, determination, nerve.

Testosterone, football, and the football players run East Rockport High School in a small Texas town. All monies are funneled to the football team, and “Make me a sandwich” is the boys’ code for telling girls to stay in their place (even during classes). While girls are subject to humiliating dress code checks, football players get away with T-shirts displaying crude sexist rhetoric.
 
Good girl, don’t-rock-the-boat Vivian, the daughter of a feminist, at least in her own high school days, has had enough and, anonymously begins creating and posting vines from a group called “Moxie,” encouraging the high school girls to take action.
 
As some girls eagerly join the movement—bake and craft sales for the girls’ soccer team, protests of the Dress Code crackdowns, and labeling the lockers of boys who subject them to a Bump 'n' Grab “game," others are concerned about the ramifications of joining, and it is not until a rape attempt by the star football player, son of the principal—is disregarded that most of the high school girls—and a few boys—cross popularity and racial barriers and find their Moxie.
 
It occurs to me that this is what it means to be a feminist. Not a humanist or an equalist or whatever. But a feminist. It’s not a bad word. After today it might be my favorite word. Because really all it is is girls supporting each other and wanting to be treated like human beings in a world that’s always finding ways to tell them they’re not. (269).
 
Moxie is a must-read for high school students.
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Not Another Banned Book by Dana Alison Levy
“How dare they take our books away. How dare they say that these books, which show us our own secrets in more beautiful ways, are wrong, dangerous, ugly, dirty, or whatever they think. How DARE THEY?” (ARC 185)

For the last two years since her brother’s death, eighth-grader Molly has had a complicated life. Overcome with grief, her parents had stopped “parenting” and it was up to Molly to make sure that the family had food and that her little sister got to school. But even though her best friend turned into “Miss Popularity” and dumped Molly as a “downer,” Molly has gathered a very supportive and interesting group of friends: the “touchy-feely” Kait and her 7th-grader super-athletic brother, Alex; Mic who is one of the few Black kids in school and gets confused with the other Black males by teachers and is becoming a rock star with his band; and Alice whose outrageous and innovative costumes challenge the school dress code—and the Assistant Principal.

Besides her friends, Molly finds refuge in Ms. Lewiston’s Book Club (LBC) attended once a week by Molly, her close friends, a few other nerdy friends, and on and off by random students, including Molly’s former friend, Amelia. Book Club is also a place for sharing ideas and personal feelings. When books that they have been reading are challenged and taken off the shelves and Ms. Lewiston is put on leave, Molly and her friends make it their goal to find out who complained and ended their Book Club. Molly wants revenge. “It’s not that we want revenge, exactly—a lie, since that’s exactly what I want—but we need to understand who did this and why so we can figure out how to counter it.” (ARC 123)

During this time, Molly’s parents finally have become present and, sadly for Molly, have decided to sell the house where her brother Seth lived. She becomes overwhelmed by the fact that their campaign to save the books and LBC is failing and their favorite author answers their letter (and video) but can’t/won’t help them, and she can’t talk to her friends about losing her house. ”All of these problems, and I can’t do anything. I can’t stop the drumbeat that thumps ‘do something do something’ against my chest.” (ARC 122)

But working together, the LBC friends find a solution to at least combat book banning—if not saving the LBC—before graduation and an important lesson that Molly learns is, as Ms. L said, "Everyone is fighting their own battles. You can't know what someone's got going on in their own life." (ARC 283)
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Omar Rising by Aisha Saeed
 What about the boys on the other side of the wall? Picking whatever activities they’d like because they were born into families who can pay their tuition. [The headmaster] is right. I’m lucky. But it’s hard to feel that way right now. (ARC, 50)
 
Omar lives in a one-room hut with his mother, a servant for the family of Omar’s best friend Amal. When Omar is accepted to the prestigious Ghalib Academy for Boys as a scholarship student, his whole town celebrates. He is aware that his future opportunities have widened, but he is particularly excited about the extracurricular activities, especially the astronomy club since he has always wanted to be an astronomer.
 
At school Omar immediately makes friends—Marwan and Jabril from Orientation; Kareem, his roommate and one of the scholarship kids along with Naveed, and soon others, especially when they observe Omar’s soccer skills. The only unfriendly person appears to be their neighbor Aiden. And Headmaster Moiz, the English teacher for the scholarship students or, as he says, “kids like you,” who appears to take an instant dislike to Omar. Despite having the academics to be accepted, the scholarship kids find the studies difficult, no matter how hard they study.
And then they find out that Scholar Boys are not permitted to join any activities or sports; instead they have to do hours of chores.
 
Back home, everyone was proud of me.
Back home, everyone was jostling for me to be part of their team.
But I’m not home now. (ARC, 56)
I’m the kid doing chores. Who can’t do any of the fun after-school activities. Struggling to keep up with my classes. (ARC, 153)
 
Omar and Naveed and the others fulfill their work hours, mainly in the kitchen with the chef Shauib and his son Basem where Omar finds he has some talent and where they can keep their secret from the other students (who think they are just nerds, studying all the time). Marwan acts like we think being stuck in a room on a Friday night instead of out having fun is what we want to do. He doesn’t get it. Because he can’t. (ARC, 109)
 
But the boys find out that the system is rigged. Most of the Scholar Boys are not expected to stay beyond the first year. Studying together with the other scholarship boys, night and day, Omar does well in science and math but continues to do poorly in English until he asks the Headmaster to tutor him.. “Finding out how hard it was to actually stay at this school, I’d started pushing away my dreams, afraid it would hurt more if it all crashed down. But maybe holding onto your dreams is how you make your way through.” (ARC, 117) He raises his grades but it is not enough; SBs are to maintain an A+.
 
For his art class final project, Omar studies Shehzil Maik, a local artist who works in many mediums to promote justice, equality, and resistance. With her influence, he designs his own collage, “Stubbornly Optimistic.” During his presentation Omar shares the injustice he and the other Scholar Boys are facing. We might go to the same school, but the rules are completely different for us.… We might be in the same classes but we are from different classes. (ARC, 176)
 
However, when the school unites to fight the discrimination, he finds that art can be a catalyst for change. This is a story of a young boy who is not only strong and resilient but one who is willing to make a difference for himself and future boys.
 
Note: This novel is a companion novel to Saeed’s Amal Unbound; even though a sequel in time, it can be read independently.
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Operation Frog Effect by Sarah Scheerger
 When their teacher explains the Butterfly Effect, “It’s the idea that a small change in one thing can lead to big changes in other things…Anything and everything we do—positive or negative, big or small—can influence other people and the world.” (153, 155) and tasks her 5th graders to think about what they could do within their social-issues projects to make a difference, they do—with repercussions they did not imagine.
 
Told through their daily journals, readers learn about the lives and feelings of the eight students in Mrs. Graham’s classroom. Emily, whose two best friends have “outgrown” her, struggles through the year wondering if she will have friends again; when she is left to team with other students, she is upset but may have found newer, truer friends. Kayley is honest to a fault since she always knows best; she tells everyone, even the teacher, what is best and what to do, not afraid to burn bridges since she will be attending a private middle school next year. Aviva is caught in the middle. She still wants to be friends with Emily and do what’s right but is manipulated by what Kayley thinks. Sharon writes her journal in free verse; a typical loner, she hopes for letters in her desk mailbox as she slowly becomes part of a group of friends. Cecilia was born in America but addresses her journal entries to her Abuelita in Mexico, her mother coming to America for a better life for her child. Blake, who loses his home, draws his entries and turns out to be a tech whiz, while Henry writes his journal as scenes and makes jokes, slowly tearing down Kayley’s defenses. Kai, Taiwanese son of professors, is a voracious reader and wants to “be the kind of person who does something.” (230)
 
And Mrs. Graham is the teacher who forces them to think. When she tells them their first-day seats are their teams for the year, some students rebel but they slowly begin to perform and feel like teams, even friends. When Sharon has the idea that her team should experience a night of homelessness as “full immersion” in their social-issues project, serious consequences result, and it is up to the class to fix them—to make the big changes and influence their community. Named Operation Frog Effect in honor of the class frog they saved, the students learn to be part of a team and of a classroom community.
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Patron Saints of Nothing by Randy Ribay
 There was a time I thought getting older meant you’d understand more about the world, but it turns out the exact opposite is true. (296)

Jason Reguero has his life planned out, at least as much as any typical 17-year-old. He will finish his senior year, play video games with his best friend Seth, attend Michigan in the Fall, graduate, and get a job, even though he has no idea what he wants to do and has not found anything that has awakened a passion .

In fact, Jay seems somewhat adrift until he receives the news that his seventeen-year-old cousin, Jun, was killed in the Philippines by government officials under President Duterte’s war on drugs, accused of being a drug addict and pusher. Jun’s father, as head of the police force, refuses a funeral or any type of memorial.

The last time Jay saw Jun was when his family, whose family had moved to the U.S. so the three siblings could be more “American” like their mother, was when they were ten and were like brothers. They had written back and forth until Jay got caught up in his own life and stopped answering Jun’s letters. Jun, questioning the political regime and the church, had moved from his restrictive father’s house and was thought to be living on the streets. Feeling guilty for having abandoned his cousin, Jay uses his Spring Break to fly to the Philippines to investigate Jun’s death, the reason he was really killed, and why no one—other than his sisters, Grace and Angel—mourns his death.

Jay is introduced to Grace’s friend Mia, a student reporter, and together they investigate Jun’s last few years. They find that Jun’s story is not that simple. “I was so close to feeling like I had Jun’s story nailed down. But no. That’s not how stories work, is it?. They are shifting things that re-form with each new telling, transform with each new teller. Less a solid, and more a liquid talking the shape of its container.” (281)

Ribay's coming-of-age novel, Jay finds some answers, and some more questions, challenging his preconceptions. But he also begins discovering his Filipino heritage and his identity as a Filipino-American. He finds a passion which determines his future—at least for now.

We all have the same intense ability to love running through us. It wasn’t only Jun. But for some reason, so many of us don’t use it like he did. We keep it hidden. We bury it until it becomes an underground river. We barely remember it’s there. Until it’s too far down to tap. (265)

This is a YA novel for mature readers about identity, family, heritage, and truth. Readers will also learn a lot about Filipino history and contemporary politics.
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Property of the Rebel Librarian by Allison Varnes
 Censorship is a growing threat that infringes on our foundational rights. The year 2017 saw an increase in censorship attempts and a revitalized effort to remove books from communal shelves to avoid controversy. In 2017 the ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom tracked 354 challenges to library, school and university materials. Of the 416 books challenged or banned, the Top 10 Most Challenged Books were

1. Thirteen Reasons Why written by Jay Asher
2. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian written by Sherman Alexie
3. Drama written and illustrated by Raina Telgemeier
4. The Kite Runner written by Khaled Hosseini
5. George (now  titled Melissa) written by Alex Gino
6. Sex is a Funny Word written by Cory Silverberg and illustrated by Fiona Smyth
7. To Kill a Mockingbird written by Harper Lee
8. The Hate U Give written by Angie Thomas
9. And Tango Makes Three written by Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson and illustrated by Henry Cole
10. I Am Jazz written by Jessica Herthel and Jazz Jennings

 Reasons for banning: suicide, same-sex relationship, gender identification, drug use, profanity,
promoting sex education, LGBT characters, sexual violence, violence, use of the N-word, and thought to “lead to terrorism” and “promote Islam.”
 
Many times when I read articles about books being banned in schools, particularly books such as the Harry Potter series, Charlotte’s Web, the dictionary, and ironically, Fahrenheit 451,  I feel clueless. Can this happen? Why? Who is in charge of these bannings?
 
Well, in Allison Varnes new middle-grades novel, Property of the Rebel Librarian, I found those people—parents, PTSA members, school board members, administrators, those who we trust to educate our children, are the ones taking barrels of books out of the school library, leaving empty shelves.
 
It all started with one book. Seventh grader model student, band member, non-dater, and avid reader June Harper is relentlessly supervised by her parents. She and her college-student sister Kate are being groomed as future doctors, no preferences requested, no dating until age 16. But June is caught by her Dad reading a book called The Makings of a Witch. Not only was she reading the contraband, but the novel had been given to her by the school librarian. “It’s our job to protect you.” (4) The parents have the librarian suspended and institute a school library “book extraction for quality control.” The board passes resolutions prohibiting classroom use and independent reading of books containing “profanity, drugs, violence, rock/rap music, witchcraft, drinking, smoking, or rebellion of any kind.” And banning them from unsupervised distribution (59). Students are threatened with disciplinary action and teachers with termination.
Just when you think people cannot be more narrow-minded, June’s parents take every single book off her bedroom shelf. They plan to read every book and return only those deemed “quality reading material.” They eventually return some of the books, and, miraculously, Old Yeller has been cured and the other books have also had passages altered. Not only are books being banned but “appropriate” books have been censored.
 
One day on the way to school, having lost the people she thought were her friends, June discovers a LITTLE FREE LIBRARY. She takes a book and an idea is born. With her new friend Matt she begins a lending library of banned books from the empty locker next to hers, checking books out under Superhero names in her notebook “Property of the Rebel Librarian.” Now everyone in the underground knows her; she meets readers she never knew—the eighth-grade popular kids make up quite a surprising number. “Everywhere I look, kids line the hallways with oversized textbooks in their laps. At lunchtime and after school, their sneakers dangle off sidewalk benches. I don’t have to look to see what they are doing. I already know. Reading.” (119)
 
As she and her fellow readers take too many risks for their right to read and the library is discovered, a reporter asks June, “So if you could say one thing to America, what would that be?” Her reply, “Don’t tell me what to read.” (246)
 
This is a novel for all bibliophiles and those who question banning and believe in the right to read—starting with this book.
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Rima’s Rebellion by Margarita Engle
 I dream of being legitimate
 
My father would love me,
society could accept me,
strangers might even admire
my short, simple first name
if it were followed
by two surnames
instead of
                  one. (53)
 
Twelve-year-old Rima Marin is a natural child, the illegitimate child of a father who will not acknowledge her.
 
I am a living, breathing secret.
 
Natural children aren’t supposed to exist.
Our names don’t appear on family trees,
our framed photos never rest affectionately
beside a father’s armchair, and when priests
write about us in official documents,  
they follow the single surname of a mother
with the letters SOA,
meaning sin otro apellido,
so that anyone reading
will understand clearly
that without two last names
we have no legal right to money
for school uniforms, books, papers, pencils,
shelter,
or food. (11)
 
Rima, her Mama, and her abuela live in poverty, squatting in a small building owned by her wealthy father. Her mother is a lacemaker and her abulela—a nurse during the wars for independence from Spain—works as a farrier and founded La Mambisa Voting Club whose members are fighting for voting rights, equality for “natural children,” and the end of the Adultery Law which permits men to kill unfaithful wives and daughters along with their lovers.
 
Taking place from 1923 to 1936, Rima also joins La Mambisas; becomes friends with her acknowledged, wealthy half-sister, keeping her safe when she defies their father, refusing arranged marriage and becomes pregnant by her boyfriend; falls in love; and becomes trained as a typesetter, printing revolutionary books and posters for suffrage.
 
Over the thirteen years she grows from a girl who cowers from bullies who call her “bastarda,” finding confidence only in riding Ala, her buttermilk mare,
to an adolescent, living in the city and fighting dictatorship with words—hers and others:
 
absorb[ing] the strength of female hopes,
wondering if this is how it will be
someday
when women
can finally
vote. (43)
 
to a young married woman and mother voting in her first election:
 
Voting rights are our only
Pathway to freedom from fear. (167)
 
In this new novel of historical fiction, Rima joins author Margarita Engle’s other strong women, real and fictitious, in their fight for the people of Cuba—Liana of Your Heart My Sky; Gertrudis Gómez de Avellaneda or Tula, The Lightning Dreamer: Cuba's Greatest Abolitionist; Rosa of The Surrender Tree: Poems of Cuba’s Struggle for Freedom; and Paloma of Tropical Secrets: Holocaust Refugees in Cuba. 
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Safe Harbor by Padma Venkatraman
“I want to be comfortable moving from place to place,
to thrive like transplanted marram grass,
which spreads roots and lifts its head high
above shifting dunes.” (ARC 81)
 
When Geetha’s parents split up, she and her mom leave her grandparents, family, and dog in India and move to America for a new start. Here Geeta is bullied by the girls at school, especially “shiny-smile girl,” leader of the pack of mean girls. But Geeta is determined not to tell the teacher or her mother who has battled with depression, and she takes solace in her flute.
 
When she meets Miquel, and they help save a seal pup and then retore a dune, she finds not only a friend but a new mission, cleaning up the beach. Through this undertaking, she makes new friends and becomes a part of a community.
 
Visiting the rescued seal, whom they named Santo, Geeta composes and plays a song for him, which seems to help him improve as he also makes new friends and readies to return to the sea.
“I nod, remembering something Apa said to me once:
‘Music is a language all creatures understand.
Musical notes are like love notes connecting all living beings.’” (ARC 107)
 
This is a sensitively-told story about identity, friendship, and community as well as our interconnectedness and responsibility to the environment and other living things.
 
A beautifully and lyrically written verse novel, excerpts can be employed as mentor texts for writing lessons and for poetry study. For example, when speaking to their family in India,
“I think of cell towers sending out radio waves
through which thoughts stream,
sadness shifts, and laughter surges,
Waves on which love leaps
across millions of miles,
tireless and unsinkable, pulsing like an unstoppable heart.” (ARC 127)
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Same Page by Elly Swartz

“I pass June and her  new friends. I don’t look in their direction, but as I walk by, I hear one of the girls say in a mocking, obnoxious voice, ‘Hi, FrankenStein,’ then start laughing.
I’m about to say something when I hear, ‘Stop it!’
It’s June. ‘It’s not funny now,’ she says, her voice strong. ‘It wasn’t funny in the bathroom. You weren’t funny on the camping trip or in the movie theater either.’ She lets out a big breath. ‘Also, you saying that you’re just kidding doesn’t make any of it okay.’” (244)
 
SAME PAGE is not just a story about book banning; it is a story about learning to speak out.
 
Bess meets new student June on the school camping trip where June is being bullied by two other girls. Bess who tackles problems head on wants to confront the girls or tell the teacher, “But June said no.” (15) However, the girls become friends and together they win president and vice president of the sixth grade.
 
One of Bess’ campaign promises was a book vending machine, and when the PTO funds the purchase, she and June, with the librarian Mr. Jasper, choose the books which will be given out upon students’ birthdays.
 
But shortly after the machine is filled, Bess notices that some of the books are missing. It turns out that a parent has complained about some of the books and demanded that they be removed. That parent is June’s mother! And June is afraid to stand up to her. “You’re not understanding me.” June sounds kind of angry now. “My mother isn’t like your moms. Anger sticks to her and piles up.” (84)
 
The most unexpected and shocking concern June’s mother raises—and June echoes—is that readers shouldn’t be burdened with stories of the past. Bess’ much-loved grandmother was a Holocaust survivor. “My brain spins. How could June say those things? How could someone I like, someone I care about, someone I thought was my friend, not be on the same page about this? How could she think things that are so hurtful, so wrong, so opposite of anything I could ever believe?” (88)
 
Bess is invited to join the Book Warriors, a group of Mr. Jasper’s colleagues trying to eradicate book banning. She expands the group to include students and devises a plan to help residents of the community learn about the books that are being banned—Book Warriors distribute the banned books around town with notes explaining their value. “I hope that once others know what the books are about and that they’re important to lots of kids, they’ll realize there’s nothing to be scared of and stop trying to ban them. I know this may not make these people like the books, and that’s fine. I just want them to stop trying to prevent kids who might like these stories from being able to read them in school.” (103) But Bess discovers that there are minds that can’t be changed.
 
However, she still has hopes for June. Maybe June doesn’t really feel like her mother; maybe they are on the same page. “That’s what June doesn’t get. Being brave isn’t about doing stuff when you’re not scared; it’s about doing stuff when you are.” (131) It takes a missing dog to find out if June can be brave.
 
Filled with wonderful, sometimes colorful characters—the little brother Avi who has “fishes” (anxiety) and an imaginary friend; her BFF Emmy who becomes good friends with another girl Zee but still makes sure to include Bess also; Knox, June’s 8th-grade brother who is not afraid of standing up to their mother and becomes a Book Warrior (and maybe Bess’ crush); the Book Warriors, Bess’ father, a baker who fuels the Warriors with treats, and her supportive mother.
 
This is a novel of book banning, community, friendships, family relationships, acknowledging other perspectives., and standing up and speaking out.
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Singing with Elephants by Margarita Engle
 Poetry is a dance of words on the page. (1)
 
Poetry is like a planet…
Each word spins
orbits
twirls
and radiates
reflected starlight. (10)
 
“Poetry,”
she said,
“can be whatever you want it
to be.” (25)
And poetry is what connects a lonely girl with a new neighbor who turns out to be Gabriela Mistral, the first Latin American (and only Latin American woman) winner of a Nobel Prize in Literature.
 
Poetry also helps this young girl to find her words and her courage to face a grave injustice.
Oriol is an 11-year-old Cuban-born child whose veterinarian parents moved to Santa Barbara where
the girls at school
make fun of me for being
small
brownish
chubby
with curly black hair barely tamed
by a long braid…
…call me
zoo beast
…the boys call me
ugly
stupid
tongue-tied
because my accent gets stronger
when I’m nervous, like when
the teacher forces me to read
out loud (7-8)
 
Oriol’s friends are her animals and the animals she helps with in their clinic and on the neighboring wildlife zoo ranch. She learns veterinary terminology from her parents and poetry terms from her new friend.
When the elephant on the zoo ranch owned by a famous actor gives birth to twins and one is taken from her family by the actor and held captive, Oriol, with the help of her mentor, her family, and her new friends, fight to reunite the baby with her mother and twin.
Readers learn Spanish phrases and quite a lot about poetry, animal rights, Gabriela Mistral, xenophobia, and courage.
courage
is a dance of words
on paper
as graceful as an elephant
the size of love (99)
 
I read this beautiful book, a must for grade 3-8+ classrooms and libraries, in an afternoon. I feel it is Cuban-American poet, the national 2017-19 Young People’s Poet Laureate, Margarita Engle’s, best writing although I have enjoyed, learned from, reviewed, and recommended a great many of her verse novels. As part of a poetry unit or a social justice unit, Oriol’s story will speak to readers and help move them to passion and action.
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Song for a  Whale by Lynne Kelly
 This is a story of isolation and the need for connection and belonging.
 
Iris is twelve years old and deaf as was her grandfather—her closest ally—and her grandmother who is grieving her husband’s death and has isolated herself. At her school Iris is somewhat isolated as the only Deaf student. The only person she feels close to is her adult interpreter. The other students may try to include her in their conversations, especially an annoying girl who thinks she know sign language, but Iris gives up as she “tries “to grab any scrap of conversation” (64) and communicate better with her father.
 
In one of her classes Iris learns of Blue 55, a hybrid whale who sings at a level much higher than other whales and cannot communicate with any other whales. As a result he belongs to no pod and travels on his own, isolated. Iris decides to create and record a song that Blue 55 can hear and understand. “He keeps singing this song, and everything in the ocean swims by him, as if he’s not there. He thinks no one understands hi,. I want to let him know he is wrong about that.” (75)
 
Iris is a master at fixing old radios and feels without the storeowner for whom she fixes radios, she “wouldn’t know I was good at anything.” (68). With her knowledge of acoustics, Iris records a song at his own frequency for Blue 55, mixing in his song and the sounds of other sanctuary animals and sends it to the group in Alaska who are trying to track and tag him.
 
On a “run-away” cruise to Alaska, Iris and her grandmother reconnect; her grandmother makes new connections to others and finds a place she now needs to be; Iris connects with Blue 55 giving him a place to belong; and Iris is finally able to request to go to a new school that has a population of Deaf students with Wendell, her Deaf friend.
 
Scattered within the story are the heartbreaking short chapters narrated by Blue 55.
 
Readers will learn about whales, about acoustics, abut Deaf culture, and even more importantly, about those who may feel isolated and the need for belonging in this well-written new novel by Lynne Kelly, a sign language interpreter.
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Tear This Down by Barbara Dee
Especially this year, voting is on our minds, but we rarely stop to think what a privilege it is, especially for those of us, women (among others), who did not always have the right, and how hard the battle was on those early women. Barbara Dee’s newest Justice & Change Seeker, Freya Stillman, traces this history in her small town.
 
Seventh grader Freya Stillman has opinions—or “o-questions”—but, because of that, not many friends. She has always challenged the popular attitudes, such as “How come we never read any [whole-class] books about girls?” Her family has lived in Wellstone for over 200 years since her great+ grandfather and his younger sister emigrated from Ireland during the potato famine.
 
When Freya decides to research the town founder, Benjamin Wellstone, she finds that even though he did many good things for society, he believed strongly that women should not have the vote. And then Freya has a mission! Since everything in the town is named after Wellstone, she would like to change the names, but she settles on the idea of tearing down the statue of Wellstone. “If people knew the actual truth about this guy, what he really thought about this town‑including us—I bet they wouldn’t put his name on everything. And give him a statue, and a whole big parade on his birthday.” (28)
 
When her history teacher suggests she change her research focus, Freya learns about the suffragists of the area, especially the town local, Octavia Padgett ,who was jailed, lost her husband and young daughters to the cause, and suffered other indignities in her fight for the vote, and, by coincidence, has a connection to Freya’s family.
 
Even more settled on her quest of ridding the town of Wellston influence, Freya and her new friend Callie write a post about the statue in the town blog but feels even the positive commenters didn’t take them seriously. “So maybe this is our own Declaration of Suffrage, doomed to disappear, I thought. How was it possible that 170-some years after those first suffragists, people were still ignoring women? And girls, too? What did we have to do to get people to listen—march in the streets Get arrested like Octavia Padgett? Go on a hunger strike?”
 
While they didn’t get themselves arrested, after a lot of bad, but typical, adolescent decisions and misguided activities to tear the state down, Freya has made new friends, regained old friends, supported a friend in his quest for art, found that she may have misjudged a peer or two, gotten closer to her mother and grandmother, discovers protest art from her new librarian friend—and decides to build up the positive rather than tear down the negative. “’I’m not saying forget what [Wellstone] said.’ Mr. Clayton’s eyes were kind. ‘I think you’re right—people should know the whole story about someone they call a hero. I just mean shift your focus from tearing down the statue and erasing his name from everything.” (233)
 
Very much like her fictional peer eighth-grader Savannah Braden of Make a Little Wave, who said, “Maybe it’s about focusing on what I’m fighting FOR, instead of only what I’m fighting AGAINST.” (270), Freya learns—and teaches our tween and teen readers—what is means to fight for justice, by making what changes one realistically can.
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The Boy at the Back of the Class by Onjali Q. Rauf
 I read this darling, wonderful novel that deals with important issues—diversity, bullying, intolerance, and refugee children—in one day because I didn’t want to stop reading. I fell in love with the narrator right away, a British 9-year-old upstander.

A new student joins Alexa’s class, but he doesn’t talk to anyone, he disappears during every recess, and he has a woman who helps him with his work. And even though she has what some might term a challenging life herself—her father died when she was younger, her mum works two jobs to make ends meet and isn’t at home very much, and they have to be really careful about spending money, Alexa never sounds like she is complaining. Alexa and her three best friends, Josie, Tom, and Michael, a very diverse group of 9-year-olds, make it their mission to become friends with Ahmet. They give him gifts and then invite him to play soccer, where he excels, and they try to keep him safe from Bernard the Bully and his racist remarks and threats, which, it turns out, Ahmet can handle.

When they learn that Ahmet is a refugee from Syria, escaping on foot and in a lifeboat from bad people and bombs, the four friends are concerned. But when Alexa learns that his little sister died on the crossing and Ahmet does not know where his parents are and then learns from the news that the border is closing to refugees the next week, she puts a plan, the Greatest Idea in the World, in motion. She will ask the Queen to find Ahmet’s parents and keep the border open for them. When that plan seems to fail, the friends move on to the Emergency Plan.

I found it amazing that a novel on such a complicated subject could be handled so well and so thoroughly in a book for readers age 8-13. This book indeed will generate important conversations—and maybe some research and news article reading.
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The Do More Club by Dana Kramaroff
This is a story of anti-Semitism, racism, fat shaming, bullying, and intolerance, but it is also a story of community, acceptance, respect, and doing better by doing more.

Sixth grader Josh Kline has moved to a new school where there is not much diversity and he is the only Jewish student. When someone paints swastikas all over the middle school building, he decides not to tell anyone that he is Jewish.
 
…our school
where every kid looks the same and
believes the same thing.
it’s as if
the sameness
is what made this
act of hate
possible. (24)

The superintendent holds an assembly for students to
come together
to fight this
act of cowardice. (22)

The assembly, led by facilitators Tag, Laurie, and Raymond, introduces ice-breaker activities, and the students are divided into groups that are to meet once a week. But Josh thinks
“nothing’s gonna change.” (39)

Through his group, Josh befriends Nat, who other students call “fat,” and tries to support her. On her “Iceberg” (what’s below the surface) page, Nat writes,
"Blond hair
green eyes and
FAT.”

Josh reads her page and tells her,
there’s more to you than that,”
i try to say
but she cuts me
off.
“it’s all they see,”
she whispers. (92)

Through their group activities, Josh learns that everyone is less perfect than they may seem. Even their teacher-facilitator, Mr. G., the only Black teacher in the school, shares that he has experienced many acts of racism.

As he becomes more aware of the challenges others face, Josh notices a seventh grade student who is the only Black student in the school and it gets him thinking,
“I think about Marcus
tonight
about how his skin color is there for
everyone
to see
but my being
jewish
is invisible. (71)

When Josh finds the courage to share that he is Jewish, one member of the group, Gavin, who has not participated in the activities, calls him “a dirty Jew, a piece of trash” and, uncharacteristically, Josh hits him.
…gavin fought with words and
my fists were the
only thing I could think of
to get him to be quiet. (113)

But eventually—after a peace rally where the rabbi, the mayor, the inman from the mosque, and the reverend from the church speak and many of Josh's new friends’ families attend and much thought and introspection, Josh decides to start a club for the school’s club period, a club for “repairing the world.”

And the Do More Club is born:
do more good?
do more kindness?
do more
repairing of the world?
yeah. (191)
When Josh announces his club to the school, he states,
“we are kids
but we can make
a difference.” (228)
And the fifty 6th, 7th, and 8th graders who join the club do make a difference—through stickers, rocks with slogans, and notes on lockers. When something horrible happens to his home and to Marcus, Josh almost gives up but decides,
…i’m not a coward
and can face all the hard parts
life
throws at me. (298)

This is a story that will empower many readers to believe in themselves, to look at their peers in new ways, and to “do more.”
A perfect novel in verse for book clubs which provide safe spaces for the hard conversations Josh's story will inspire.
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The Long Ride by Maria Padian
 You know, it’s a lot easier to be one side or the other. It’s harder to be in the middle. People don’t like the middle. That’s the bravest thing of all. (178)
 
Jamila, Josie, and Francesca are best friends of mixed race in 1971 Queens, NY. Their plans for starting seventh grade with each other and their white schoolmates at the neighborhood junior high school change when they become part of social experiment—integration. Francesca’s parents send her to a private school where she doesn’t fit, while Josie and Jamila take a long bus ride to a predominately black school in a much rougher neighborhood. They hope they may fit in better there, but Jamila is too white for the girls and Josie is no longer in the advanced classes and worries about her future. The girls don’t fit into their new school neighborhood and their new friends don’t fit into their neighborhood.
 
As they try to navigate seventh grade, boyfriends, teachers, classes, narrator Jamila’s anger, and Josie’s shyness, Jamilla realizes, “if anyone had told me this was what being in junior high would be like: Your best friend is silent beside you. You’re skinny and knock-kneed and you get lost easily. You aren’t at the top of the Ferris Wheel. I’d have said: You can have it. (60)
 
The world seemed to have changed. …I’m starting to notice that something bigger s going on in the city. Everyone is edgier, angry. You can feel it in the way people squint through the bus windows.
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The Wolves Are Waiting by Natasha Friend
 Nora Melchionda was a typical high school girl. She played a sport, earned good grades, wore fashionable clothes, and had a group of friends, an older brother and a younger sister. Her father was Athletic Director of Faber, the local college, and her hero.
 
Then one night Nora attends the college frat fair, a fundraiser for the fraternities. And she wakes up on the golf course, surrounded by her former best friend and Adam Xu, a boy from school. The last thing she remembers is someone handing her a root beer. Adam explains how he was practicing his baseball hitting, found her, and chased off the three boys who, most likely, had roofied her and were planning to rape her, and called Cam.
 
“They took off her clothes, and they wrote on her body, and they hung her underwear on a stick like some kind of trophy.” (139)
 
Nora wants to forget what happened. “It didn’t happen to you. It happened to me. And if I say it’s over, it’s over.” (50), but Adam and Cam are determined to investigate and find out who the boys were and what exactly happened, especially when they begin hearing of other stories by young women of the college and the town. “Help me find out who they are,” [Cam] said. “Please. Before they do it to someone else.” (110)
 
Through technology and good legwork, they trace the young men to Alpha Phi Beta, the Faber fraternity for athletes, Nora’s father’s fraternity, and discover that what happened to Nora was part of a pledge game.
 
The story is told in alternating chapters narrated from the perspective of Nora, Cam, Adam Xu, and Asher, Nora’s older brother, a well-meaning high school senior who learns a lesson himself. “You tried to tell me. ‘When you wear things that are too short’—she shook her finger and made her voice deep—‘guys think it’s an invitation.’” He shook his head. ‘I said some guys. I didn’t mean—.’”(139)
 
With her new supporters and her mother and younger sister, Nora decides she has the strength to make a difference and end this sexual harassment and abuse.
 
An important, even vital, well-told story for adolescent girls—and especially—boys, Natasha Friend’s newest novel joins a too-small group of other novels about this crucial topic. Assaults among people under the age of 18 are common: 18% of girls and 3% of boys say that by age 17 they have been victims of a sexual assault or abuse at the hands of another adolescent (theconversation.com). Females ages 16-19 are 4 times more likely than the general population to be victims of rape, attempted rape, or sexual assault. Among undergraduate students, 26.4% of females and 6.8% of males experience rape or sexual assault through physical force, violence, or incapacitation. These statistics are incomplete as only 20% of female student victims, age 18-24, report to law enforcement. (RAINN.org).
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Thirst by Varsha Bajaj
 Over and over she chants, like it’s a mantra. “You’re not alone. You’re very brave.”
And slowly I begin to believe [Shanti]. (61)

Minni lives in Mumbai in an area of extreme poverty with little access to water. She goes to school, trying to graduate and make a better life, while her mother gathers water, cooks for the family, and works as a maid for a wealthy family. Her father works long hours at his tea stand, and her brother had to drop out of school and cuts vegetables in a restaurant, dreaming of becoming a chef. The people in her area wait long hours in line every morning for water which then has to be boiled to be safe.
 
One night Minni, her brother Sanjay, his friend Amit, and Minni’s best friend witness water being stolen by members of the Water Mafia, men who then sell it to the rich. Sanjay and Amit are seen by the  thieves and have to leave town. Then Minni’s mother becomes ill and goes to stay with family who can care for her, and Minni has to balance getting and boiling the morning water, trying to arrive at school on time so she won’t be locked out, her studies, cooking for her father and herself, and covering her mother’s job working for Anita Ma’am, her daughter Pinky also a 12-year-old, and Pinky’s father mother who demeans and insults Minni.
 
Besides her best friend Faiza, many community members have faith in and support Minni. As she writes in her journal,
Your family is always part of you,
In your blood and in your memories.
Your true friends are with you too.
They hold you in their hearts and walk besides you.
So that even the days you walk by yourself,
            You’re not alone. (78)
 
Minni wins a coveted scholarship to a Sunday computer class where the American instructor becomes yet another ally and where she works to design an app that might help with the time her community members lose standing in water lines each morning.
 
When working at Pinky’s lavish apartment, she notices,
Water flows through the taps in Pinky’s bathroom.
The tap doesn’t need s marigold garland wrapped around it.
Money, not prayers, makes the water flow. (73)
 
And when she recognizes the man in charge of the water theft, she knows she has to do something to stop the stealing of water.
 
The next day doubts fill my head. Why do I think I can change anything? Who am I? A mere twelve-year-old girl who is struggling to pass seventh grade. Whose family is just scraping by in this city of millions. Then I remember all the fights I’ve witnessed in the water lines.
When there’s not enough water to go around, there’s anger fear, and frustration.…I can’t back away. I have to act, to do somethings. (155)
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Wei to Go by Lee Y. Miao
 A runner, a home-run wannabe, and a lacrosse trainee get off a subway exit in Kowloon. (227) No, this is not the opening line of a joke. It actually is the middle of an adventure starring Elizabeth Wei Pettit, Kipp Wei Pettit, and their mother.

When she finds out that the design firm her father founded is about to face a corporate takeover by the Black Turtle Group based in Hong Kong and her family would have to move away from her bestie, her maybe-crush, and her softball team (before finally getting a wristband for her first homerun), Ellie decides to save Avabrand. She talks her mother into accepting a trip to Hong Kong won in a contest—and take her along. Unfortunately, her annoying younger sports-minded brother also has to go, but, on the positive side, he is a human GPS, and navigation is definitely not Ellie’s strong point. One family and two kids with one middle name. Three months before seventh grade and I’m traveling across the Pacific to save my dad’s company. With my little brother—ugh! (45)

After many cryptic clues, dead ends, and sharp turns involving two brothers—Mr. Han (Ellie’s Chinese heritage teacher in the U.S.) and Gerard (BT’s CEO), and a lot of resilience lead to a face-off and hopefully a win:

I straighten myself up. I can go for it.
My family will not be kicked off our front porch.
I will stay in my school.
I will stay in my home.
Kipp will stay on his lacrosse team when he makes it.
Mom will stay with her job.
Dad will stay with his company. (268)

There is another positive side to the trip. When I found out the world is bigger than my family and me, I didn’t know I’d literally be running around in a new place far from home. (271)
 
Asian-American Ellie and the readers learn a lot about Hong Kong, Chinese culture, sports, the business world, and the support of other people. I had lots of help. [Mr. Han] nudged me at first. I had Kipp and Mom. I thought about things that Dad, my softball coach, my English teacher, and my bestie said to me. Even my next-door neighbor and her two little boys. They were all with me at different times. (269)
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Wings in the Wild by Margarita Engle
2018: Teen refugees from two different worlds. Soleida, the bird girl, is fleeing an oppressive Cuban government who has arrested her parents, protesters of artistic liberty, their hidden chained-bird sculptures exposed during a hurricane; she is stranded in a refugee camp in Costa Rica after walking thousands of miles toward freedom. Dariel is fleeing from a life in California where he plays music that communicates with wild animals but also where he and his famous parents are followed by paparazzi and his life is planned out, complete with Ivy League university. When a wildfire burns his fingertips, he decides to go with his Cuban Abuelo to interview los Cubanos de Costa Rica for his book. And then he decides to stay to study the environment.
 
When Soleida and Dariel meet, he helps her feel joy—and the right to feel joy—again, and they  fall in love, combining their shared passions for art and music, artistic freedom, and eco-activism into a human rights and freedom-of-expression campaign to save Soleida’s parents and other Cuban artists and to save the endangered wildlife and the forests through a reforestation project. This soulful story, beautifully and lyrically written by the 2017-19 Poetry Foundation's Young People's Poet Laureate Margarita Engle is not as much a story of romance but of a combined calling to save the planet and the soul of the people—art. Soleida and Dariel join my Tween and Teen Justice & Change Seekers whose stories are reviewed in https://www.literacywithlesley.com/justice--change-seekers.html.
 
Wings in the Wild also reintroduces two of my favorite characters, Liana and Amado [search my review of Your Heart—My Sky], who “became local heroes by teaching everyone how to farm during the island’s most tragic time of hunger.” (5) This is the 10th Margarita Engle verse novel (and memoirs) that I have read and recommended and from which I have learned about Cuban history.
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Wonder Woman: Tempest Tossed by Laurie Halse Anderson
 Wonder Woman is the most popular female comic-book superhero of all time. In 1941she emerged, the creation of lawyer-psychologist-professor William Marston, fully formed as an adult to chronicle the growth in the power of women. Readers of DC comics knew her as Princess Diana of Themyscira but how did she become the symbol of truth, justice and equality.

Author Laurie Halse Anderson, somewhat of a Wonder Woman herself, a woman of strength, compassion, and empathy, approachable and full of warmth, speaking truths and working for justice, was the perfect person to bring Wonder Woman to life. In Tempest Tossed she teamed with artist Leila del Duca to fill in the adolescent years of Diana, tossed from her homeland on her 16th birthday as she tries to save refugees, becoming a refugee herself exiled in America. In her new homeland, she finds danger and injustice and joins those who fight to make a difference.

Tempest Tossed shows the strength of women but most of all the power adolescents can wield when they find their purpose.
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Your Heart—My Sky: Love in the Time of Hunger by Margarita Engle
 I began learning about the history of Cuba through Cuban-American poet Margarita Engle’s memoir, Enchanted Sky. I continued my study, learning more Cuban history through the stories of Tula, The Lightning Dreamer: Cuba’s Greatest Abolitionist; though the story of Rosa in The Surrender Tree: Poems Of Cuba’s Struggle For Freedom; with Daniel, one of the Holocaust refugees in Cuba in Tropical Secrets; and the story of Fefa (based on Engle’s grandmother) in The Wild Book. But there is still more history to learn.
 
Your Heart—My Sky: Love in The Time of Hunger introduced me to a different, more contemporary era, “el period especial en tiempos de paz.” The government’s name for the 1990s is “the special period in times of peace,” but in reality is a period of extreme hunger resulting from the loss of Soviet aid, the US trade embargo, and the government prohibition of the growing, buying, and selling of agricultural products. Even though the 1991 Pan Am Games are being held in Havana, where visitors and athletes are sure to find food, the people in the towns face starvation, their food rations reduced even more.
 
No witnesses.
We are like an outer isle
            Off the shore of another island.
                                                            Forgotten. (3)
My parents quietly call it tourist apartheid.
Everything for outsiders.
                        Nothing for islanders. (Liana, 6)
 
Readers are introduced to the disastrous effects of these policies on the citizens through the three narrators: Liana, Amado, and the Singing Dog who serves as a matchmaker between, and a guard of, the two adolescents.
 
Liana and Amado are both rebels in their own ways: Liana skips la escuela al campo “a summer of forced so-called-volunteer farm labor,” possibly giving up college or a government-assigned tolerable job, spending her days looking for food. Amado has made a pact with his brother who is in jail for speaking against the government. He is worried that he won’t be able to keep his promise to avoid the mandatory military service—“men have to serve in the reserves until they’re fifty”—and promote peace, possibly joining his brother in prison.
 
Maybe I should let myself be trained to kill,
become a soldier, gun-wielding, violent,
a dangerous stranger, no longer
me. (Amado, 24)
 
In beautiful lyrical verse, lines that caused me to re-read and savor, Liana and Amado meet and fall in love,
 
The pulse in my mind wanders away
From hunger, toward something I can barely name.
A spark
of wishlight
on the dark horizon’s
oceanic warmth. (Liana, 35)
 
Liana meets Amado’s grandparents who are growing vegetables and fruits in hidden gardens, and she is given seeds to start her own gardens. She dreams of starting a kitchen restaurant.
 
Everything has changed inside our minds
So that we are intensely aware of our ability
To seize control of hunger,
Transforming food
Into freedom. (110)
 
Amado and Liana help fleeing refugees, even though
 
Leaving the island is forbidden by law
And it is equally illegal
To know that someone is planning to flee. (95)
 
When Amado receives a note from his brother releasing him from their pact, he secretly plans their rafting escape. But the indecision brought about by the precariousness of the trip cause them to reconsider.
 
All we have in our shared hearts
is one imaginary raft--
How shall we use it?
Climb aboard or set it loose,
Let that alternate future
drift away? (Liana and Amado, 197)
 
A beautiful story of a terrible time in Cuban history and two resilient families connected by love (and a singing dog).
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For lessons and strategies to group and read these novels in Book Clubs where readers can work together, see Talking Texts: A Teacher’s Guide to Book Clubs across the Curriculum.

See other reviews of recently published, read, and recommended novels by topics for Grades 4-12 in the drop-down menu under BOOK REVIEWS.