Finding Diverse Books 2024 | Young Teen Fiction & Graphic Novels

Updated December 13, 2023
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Something like home
Arango, Andrea Beatriz
Audiobook
The Pura Belpré Honor winning novel in verse, in which a lost dog helps a lonely girl find a way home to her family . . . only for them to find family in each other along the way. From the Newbery Honor winning author of Iveliz Explains It All. "Trust me: this book will touch...

The ongoing opioid crisis affects people of all ages--including children whose parents are struggling with addiction. This novel in verse by Newbery Honor-winning author features a middle school girl sent to live with her aunt after an attempt to get her parents help sends them to rehab. The verse format is accessible for reluctant readers and the stray puppy Laura trains to be a therapy dog is a big draw for animal lovers.

Income Inequality

No matter the distance
Baldwin, Cindy
Paper Book
An unexpected animal companion helps a girl with cystic fibrosis learn to write her own story in this captivating novel in verse by award-winning author and disabled activist Cindy Baldwin. Penny Rooney has cystic fibrosis, which means she has to do breathing treatments to help her lungs...

Another novel in verse, this one starring a girl with cystic fibrosis who overcomes her anxiety about sharing her writing when she helps an injured dolphin stranded in her backyard creek. Lots of shy and self-conscious tweens will relate to Penny's struggle to find her voice amidst the social dynamics and pressures of middle school.

Disability

The spirit glass
Chokshi, Roshani
Audiobook

The author of the popular Aru Shah series has a new book focusing on Filipino folklore! The Rick Riordan Presents books are always a big hit with young teen readers. (Rick Riordan, author of the Percy Jackson series, selects books that would appeal to his readers and feature world mythology by authors from the cultures they're writing about. He writes a short intro and uses his brand to promote them, but the content is totally generated by the authors themselves.)

Race & Ethnicity | Asian & Pacific Islander

We still belong
Day, Christine
Ebook
A thoughtful and heartfelt middle grade novel by American Indian Youth Literature Honor-winning author Christine Day (Upper Skagit), about a girl whose hopeful plans for Indigenous Peoples' Day (and plans to ask her crush to the school dance) go all wrong--until she finds herself surrounded by...

Set in Seattle, this story takes place in a single day--Indigenous Peoples' Day--and one girl's feelings of both isolation and belonging throughout. I really like the way it balances big picture ideas of heritage and identity with everyday concerns like asking your crush to the big dance. As Walt Whitman might have said: Middle schoolers are vast; they contain multitudes!

Race & Ethnicity | Indigenous

Mexikid : a graphic memoir
Martin, Pedro
Ebook
NEWBERY HONOR AWARD WINNER * An unforgettable graphic memoir about a Mexican American boy's family and their adventure-filled road trip to bring their abuelito back from Mexico "One of those books that kids will pass to their friends as soon as they have finished it."-...

An absolutely true family road trip graphic novel about the time Pedro's family drove to Mexico to bring his grandpa--a Mexican Revolutionary War veteran with a library of epic stories--back to the US to live with them. Hand this one to fans of graphic novel memoirs like Sisters and Chunky. Also available in Spanish!

Language | Spanish


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