Difficult Family Relationships

This unforgettable novel tells a universal coming-of-age story about Taja Brown, a young African American girl growing up in Houston, Texas, and deftly and beautifully explores the universal struggles of growing up, battling family expectations, discovering a sense of self, and finding a unique voice and purpose. Told in 53 short, episodic, moving, and iridescent chapters, Calling My Name follows Taja on her journey from middle school to high school.

Choices do matter and forgiveness is possible. Jack Fountain knows that what's happened to his family sounds like the most horrible soap opera anyone could ever write. But it happened to Jack; his parents; his sisters, Smithy and Madison - and to his baby brother, Tris. What made it worse was that the media wanted to know every detail. Now it's almost Tris' third birthday, and every thing's starting again.

It all starts when Marisa picks up the wrong cell phone. When she returns it to Rene, she feels curiously drawn to him. But Marisa and Rene aren’t exactly a match made in heaven. For one thing, Marisa is a chola; she’s a lot of girl, and she’s not ashamed of it. Skinny Rene gangles like a sackful of elbows and wears a calculator on his belt. In other words, he’s a geek. So why can’t Marisa stay away from him?

There are two things that Corinne Parker knows to be true: that she is in love with Maggie Bailey, the captain of the rival high school's cross-country team and her secret girlfriend of a year, and that she isn't ready for anyone to know she's bisexual. But then Maggie dies, and Corinne quickly learns that the only thing worse than losing Maggie is being left heartbroken over a relationship no one knows existed. And to make things even more complicated, the only person she can turn to is Elissa—Maggie's ex, and the single person who understands how Corinne is feeling.

When Emma Sasha Silver loses her eyesight in a nightmare accident, she must relearn everything from walking across the street to recognizing her own sisters to imagining colors. One of seven children, Emma used to be the invisible kid, but now it seems everyone is watching her. And just as she's about to start high school and try to recover her friendships and former life, one of her classmates is found dead in an apparent suicide. Fifteen and blind, Emma has to untangle what happened and why - in order to see for herself what makes life worth living.

Quincy and Biddy are both graduates of their high school's special ed program, but they couldn't be more different: suspicious Quincy faces the world with her fists up, while gentle Biddy is frightened to step outside her front door. When they're thrown together as roommates in their first "real world" apartment, it initially seems to be an uneasy fit.

Filled with the zany enthusiasm that has made Lele into Vine's most viewed star, this charming novel is proof that high school is a trip. From crushing your crushes (what's up with that hot transfer student, Alexei?) to throwing Insta-fake parties with your BFFs and moaning over homework (GAH) with your frenemies, high school is a roller coaster of exhilarating highs and totally embarrassing lows.

Karina Ahmed has a plan. Keep her head down, get through high school without a fuss, and follow her parents’ rules - even if it means sacrificing her dreams. When her parents go abroad to Bangladesh for four weeks, Karina expects some peace and quiet. Instead, one simple lie unravels everything. Karina is my girlfriend. Tutoring the school’s resident bad boy was already crossing a line. Pretending to date him? Out of the question. But Ace Clyde does everything right. Though Karina agrees, she can’t help but start counting down the days until her parents come back.

Francesca is at the beginning of her second term in Year 11 at an all boy's school that has just started accepting girls. She still misses her old friends, and, to make things worse, her mother has had a breakdown and can barely move from her bed.

Felicity Becker loves watching an event come together. There’s something magical about crafting an experience people will remember. So when her mom gets engaged, Felicity sees the wedding as the perfect opportunity to show off her skills. After Felicity’s friend Nancy offers up her family’s apple orchard as a venue, wedding planning gets even better. But the more time Felicity and Nancy spend together dress shopping and hunting for mismatched china, the more it starts to seem like there might be something besides friendship between them.

Fanboy has never had it good, but lately his sophomore year is turning out to be its own special hell. The bullies have made him their favorite target, and his best (and only) friend seems headed for the dark side (sports and popularity). But then fanboy meets Kyra, a.k.a. Goth Girl, he finds an outrageous, cynical friend who shares his love of comics as well as his hatred for jocks and bullies.

Leo can’t remember what happened the night of the accident. All she knows is that she left the party with her older sister, Nina, and Nina’s boyfriend, East. And now Nina is dead, killed by a drunk driver and leaving Leo with a hole inside her that’s impossible to fill. East, who loved Nina almost as much as Leo did, is the person who seems to most understand how she feels, and the two form a friendship based on their shared grief. But as she struggles to remember what happened, Leo discovers that East remembers every detail of the accident—and he won’t tell her anything about it.

Eden had her best friend Katie—she didn’t need anyone else. But then there was Truman. Katie’s older brother, the artist. The recluse. The boy with the innocent smile and the dangerous eyes. Eden had never really known Truman—not until the night of Katie’s accident. That was the night they’d finally let each other into their orbits—only to have the sky come crashing down on them.

Martin Conway comes from a family filled with heroes and disgraces. His grandfather was a statesman who worked at the US Embassy in London during WWII. His father is an alcoholic who left his family. His sister is an overachieving Ivy League graduate. And Martin? Martin is stuck in between—floundering. But during the summer after 7th grade, Martin meets a boy who will change his life forever. Jimmy Harker appears one night with a deceptively simple question: Will you help?

Fifteen-year-old Jo Chastain is about to take on her biggest con yet - impersonating a missing girl. The Lovecrafts are a wealthy Boston family with ties to the unsolved mystery of Vivienne Weir, who went missing at age nine. When Jo takes on Vivi's identity, the Lovecrafts give her everything she could want: love, money, security, and proximity to their intriguing daughter, Temple. But nothing is as it seems in the Lovecraft household, and as hidden crimes reveal themselves, Jo must choose between an illusion of safety or escaping the danger around her.

When Caroline's little brother is kidnapped, his subsequent rescue leads to the discovery of Ethan, a teenager who has been living with the kidnapper since he was a young child himself. In the aftermath Caroline can't help but wonder what Ethan knows about everything that happened to her brother, who is not readjusting well to life at home. And although Ethan is desperate for a friend, he can't see Caroline without experiencing a resurgence of traumatic memories.

Graduation was supposed to be a relief. Except Quinn can't avoid the barrage of well-intentioned questions about her college plans. Why does no one understand that it's hard for her to think about the future - or feel as if she even deserves one - when her best friend is dead? Spending the summer with her aunt on the Jersey shore may just be the fresh start Quinn so desperately needs. And when she meets Malcolm, a musician with his own haunted past, she starts to believe in second chances. Can Quinn find love while finding herself?

Parker Santé hasn't spoken a word in five years. While his classmates plan for bright futures, he skips school to hang out in hotels, killing time by watching the guests. But when he meets a silver-haired girl named Zelda Toth, a girl who claims to be quite a bit older than she looks, he'll discover there just might be a few things left worth living for.

The small town of Cryers Cross is rocked by tragedy when an unassuming freshman disappears without a trace. Kendall Fletcher wasnt that friendly with the missing girl, but the angst wreaks havoc on her OCD-addled brain.

Though everyone in the village of  Tres Montes thinks Sonia Ocampo is blessed, she knows she is nothing but a fraud. She’s spent her life listening to the hopes and wishes of her neighbors and family, but when a classmate dies despite her prayers, she is forced to realize that she has no special powers - no way to prevent bad things from happening.