The Secret Life of Sparrow Delaney

The Secret Life of Sparrow Delaney by Suzanne Harper

As the seventh daughter of a seventh daughter, Sparrow Delaney has been gifted with strong psychic abilities. But she has kept this gift a secret from everyone, especially her family! They are weird enough as it is. She doesn't want to join the "family business" and be a psychic. She keeps telling her spiritual guides, three ghosts who have appeared to her since early childhood, that her only wish is to be normal. So when she has the opportunity to attend a new high school where nobody knows her or her family, especially her six older sisters, she jumps at the chance! She can start fresh and be totally normal. But in her first class on the first day of school, she sees a ghost. She uses all of her well practiced tricks at avoiding ghosts, but he won't let her be! He keeps appearing to her and pleading with her to help him. But Sparrow is stubborn and she wants not part in his plan, whatever it is!

Gym Candy

Gym Candy by Carl Deuker

Mick Johnson’s life is all about football. His dad, Mike, introduced Mick to football when he was a very little boy. Mike had been a football hero in his day and he wants Mick to follow in his footsteps, making big plays and big headlines. And it could happen. Mick is good, he has real talent and he works really hard. Most importantly, playing football is fun and exhilarating for Mick. He loves the game! In the spring of his eighth grade year, the high school coach invites Mick to come and go through spring training with the varsity team. Mick is ecstatic! After a rough first day, Mick works hard, improving daily and working his way up the depth charts. The following fall, he makes the varsity team as a ninth grader and has a fantastic season. Then comes spring training with a new coach and a new eighth grader who challenges Mick for his spot on the team. Mick knows he has to work hard training all summer to keep his spot on the team. His dad arranges for him to go to a private gym and work out with a personal trainer who offers to give Mick some extra help. But will this “extra” help really work in the end? How far is Mick willing to go to keep his spot on the team? Will it be worth the cost?

Drums, Girls & Dangerous Pie

Drums, Girls & Dangerous Pie by Jordan Sonnenblick

Steven has a mostly normal life for a thirteen year old. Yes, Steven is a self admitted skinny geek and the most beautiful girl in school won’t even look at him. Yes, he has a pesky, although very cute, younger brother, but some things you just have to bear even when they annoy you to no end. (Isn’t this normal for lots of thirteen year olds? Can life be “normal” when you’re thirteen?) But Steven has a passion: playing the drums. And he is a talented drummer, good enough to make the All-City Jazz Band.

“Normal” life ends one morning in October when Steven’s little brother Jeffrey gets sick. In the months that follow, Jeffrey spends weeks in the hospital, Mom takes a leave of absence from her job to take care of Jeffrey, and Dad hardly speaks a word to him. Steven becomes a “microwave Hot Pockets poster child”, while totally checking out on his school work and focusing all of his attention on practicing for the Spring Jazz Concert. But life, with all of its troubles, can’t be avoided forever.

Middle School is Worse Than Meatloaf

Middle School is Worse than Meatloaf: A Year Told Through Stuff by Jennifer L. Holm

Just like everyone else, Ginny Davis’ life has ups and downs, good times and bad. She tells the story of her seventh grade year through a collection of stuff, including birthday wish lists, class assignments, text messages, bank statements, post-it notes and receipts. Lots of big things can happen in a year: your mom can get married, your brother can be sent to military school, your science project can even be eaten by your dog! Read this book for yourself and you decide: Is middle school really worse than meatloaf?

Schooled

Schooled by Gordon Korman

Capricorn Anderson, also known as Cap, has led a sheltered life and that is an understatement! He has lived with just his grandmother Rain on a farm commune. His world is rocked when Rain falls out of a tree and breaks her hip. Social services removes Cap from the commune and plants him in the real world. That means a living in a house not held together with duct tape and enrollment in the local middle school. Everyone knows being the new kid is tough, but what if the new kid has never seen a television, heard of an iPod or Starbucks? What if he only wears homemade shoes and tie-died t-shirts? What happens? Caps becomes the object of a diabolical plan devised by the most popular kid in school to make him the class president and torture him all year long! How could anyone, least of all Cap, survive that?

The Truth About Forever

The Truth About Forever by Sarah Dessen

Macy’s father died a couple of years ago and since then she has strived to live perfectly. She has bottled all of her feelings away and tried to live up to her mother’s expectations: being a good student, having the perfect smart, high achieving boyfriend, following all of the rules. In Macy’s mind, living perfectly means that everything is safe. This summer is starting just as planned. Macy’s boyfriend is going away to Brian Camp, which is just summer camp for really smart kids, and Macy is staying home. She is going to spend the summer improving her vocabulary for the SAT and filling in for her boyfriend, Jason, at the library. But then some unexpected things happen. Macy is offered a new opportunity to work for Wish, a catering business. She makes some new friends and slowly begins to see what she is missing by living perfectly. Then Macy’s sister starts visiting with plans to remodel and redecorate the family beach house, which hasn’t been visited since Macy’s dad died. Both of these things challenge Macy’s perfectly constructed safe life and force her to reconsider the choices she has made since her dad’s death. Will Macy step out and live life or will she stifle her new thoughts and feelings and continue to live ‘perfectly’?

Dairy Queen

Dairy Queen by Catherine Gilbert Murdock

D.J. Schwenk comes from a football family in Red Bend, Wisconsin. He dad has always loved the game, so much so that all of the cows on their diary farm are named for famous players or coaches. Her two older brothers were stars of the local football team. This summer finds D.J. hard at work on the family dairy farm because of her dad’s recent hip surgery. She is doing it all. Then one day Brian Nelson, the quarterback from Red Bend’s biggest rival shows up at the farm. D.J. has agreed to train Brian, he could use some improvement and she knows the game as well as her brothers after having trained with them for years. As D.J. teaches Brian the value of hard work and a good attitude, Brian teaches D.J. the importance of talking and voicing her thoughts. Each of them learns something valuable about themselves during the summer. In D.J.’s case, she remembers how much she loves playing football and that inspires her to try out for the football team this year.

The Mother-Daughter Book Club

The Mother-Daughter Book Club by Heather Vogel Frederick

What would you do if your mother signed you up for a mother-daughter book club with three other sixth grade girls and their moms? Four girls are about to find out! They know each other, but it isn't like they are all best friends. They are too different for that! After all, the group is made up of a jock, a writer, a farm girl and a rich girl. And their moms include the town librarian, a super model, a tree-hugger, and an absent actress. Now they have to read Little Women by Louisa May Alcott and meet every month to discuss the book. Can they survive the book club? Or will it disintegrate? Join four girls and their moms in a year long journey that could bring them closer...or not!

Peak

Peak by Roland Smith

Caught scaling and tagging a New York City skyscraper, Peak is facing a possible 3 years in jail. Then his long absent, mountain climbing father arrives in court to offer a solution to the publicity uproar Peak’s scaling the Woolworth Building has caused: Peak will immediately leave the city with his father. The judge agrees and Peak is off to Thailand or so he thinks. But his father has other plans like leading an expedition to the top of Mount Everest. He brings Peak along and the race is on to get to Peak to the top of the world. Will he make it? Will he survive the climb? Or will he perish like so many others already have?