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Chasing the Falconers

Posted on September 15, 2013 by webmaster

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Chasing the Falconers
by Gordon Korman

After their parents’ conviction for treason in a high-profile case, Aiden and Meg Falconer were given a different last name and placed at Sunnydale Farm, a juvenile corrections facility in Nebraska. Still, they remain convinced of their parents’ innocence. At the first opportunity, they escape and make their way across the country toward the family’s summer cottage in Vermont.

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With little chance of evading detection, the children do whatever it takes (lying, breaking and entering, hopping a freight train) to remain free and gather evidence that might overturn their parents’ conviction.

The children finally arrive at their family’s cottage. There, the young fugitives learn that they now have two pursuers: the police and a mysterious man who wants to kill them.

Lexile Level	Content Rating	Number of Pages	Genre	Date Published	ISBN Number
680L	Middle School	154	Adventure	2005	0439651360

Dracula

Posted on September 15, 2013 by webmaster

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Dracula
by Bram Stoker

This novel tells the story of Dracula’s attempt to move from Transylvania to England, and the battle between Dracula and a small group of men and women led by Professor Abraham Van Helsing.
It takes place largely in England and Transylvania during 1893. Jonathan Harker, a newly qualified English solicitor, visits Count Dracula in the Carpathian Mountains on the border of Transylvania, Bukovina, and Moldavia, to provide legal support for a real estate transaction overseen by Harker’s employer.

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Harker is at first enticed by Dracula’s gracious manners but soon realizes that he is Dracula’s prisoner. Wandering the Count’s castle against Dracula’s admonition, Harker encounters three female vampires, called “the sisters”, from whom he is rescued by Dracula. Harker barely escapes from the castle with his life. Not long afterward, a Russian ship, the Demeter, having weighed anchor at Varna, runs aground on the shores of Whitby.

Lexile Level	Content Rating	Number of Pages	Genre	Date Published	ISBN Number
990L	High School	666	Fantasy	2014	1500371432

Son of the Mob

Posted on September 15, 2013 by webmaster

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Son of the Mob
by Gordon Korman

Vince Luca, 17, has a problem. His wealthy family runs the, uh, vending machine business in New York, and Vince is determined not to be part of it. Especially after a hot date is ruined when he finds that his older brother Tommy has conducted some business with Jimmy the Rat and hidden the messy and temporarily unconscious body in the trunk of Vince’s car.

His dad, the King of the Mob, is reasonable, sensible, lots of fun, gives great presents to his kids–and his name strikes the hearts of other mobsters to stone.

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Although Vince keeps a low profile at school, his family connection brings him unwanted advantages, like the birthday Porsche that gets him arrested on stolen vehicle charges, or the football game in which he makes touchdown after touchdown because word has gotten around and nobody is willing to tackle him. Even private conversations at home have to be carried on in the basement because the FBI has bugged the house and an agent is always listening.

Vince’s life is inextricably tangled up with the family business, no matter how hard he tries to stay out of it. How can he show them he’s serious? Then he meets Kendra, and when she innocently reveals that her father’s an FBI agent–that FBI agent–it’s a match made in heaven. He thinks.

Lexile Level	Content Rating	Number of Pages	Genre	Date Published	ISBN Number
690L	Middle School	262	Thriller/Suspense	2002	0786807695

Gospel According to Larry

Posted on September 15, 2013 by webmaster

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The Gospel According to Larry
by Janet Tashjian

Josh Swensen isn’t your average teenager – when he observes America, he sees a powerhouse of consumerism and waste. He’s even tried to do something about it, with his start-up controversial website. But when Josh rises to messiah status of the internet world, he discovers that greed and superficiality are not easily escaped.

Trapped inside his own creation, Josh feels his only way out is to stage his death and be free of his internet alter-ego, “Larry.” But this plan comes with danger, and soon Josh finds himself cut off from the world, with no one to turn to for help.

Lexile Level	Content Rating	Number of Pages	Genre	Date Published	ISBN Number
800L	Middle School	219	Drama	2001	0805063781

Nickel and Dimed

Posted on September 14, 2013 by webmaster

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Nickel and Dimed: or Not Getting By in America
by Barbara Ehrenreich

Millions of Americans work for poverty-level wages, and one day Barbara Ehrenreich decided to join them. She was inspired in part by the rhetoric surrounding welfare reform, which promised that any job equals a better life. But how can anyone survive, let alone prosper, on $6 to $7 an hour? To find out, Ehrenreich moved from Florida to Maine to Minnesota, taking the cheapest lodgings available and accepting work as a waitress, hotel maid, house cleaner, nursing-home aide, and Wal-Mart salesperson. She soon discovered that even the “lowliest” occupations require exhausting mental and physical efforts. And one job is not enough; you need at least two if you intend to live indoors.

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Nickel and Dimed reveals low-wage America in all its tenacity, anxiety, and surprising generosity — a land of Big Boxes, fast food, and a thousand desperate strategies for survival. Instantly acclaimed for its insight, humor, and passion, this book is changing the way America perceives its working poor.

Lexile Level	Content Rating	Number of Pages	Genre	Date Published	ISBN Number
1340L	High School	221	Realistic Ficton	2001	0805063897

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Hole in My Life

Posted on September 14, 2013 by webmaster

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Hole in My Life
by Jack Gantos

In the summer of 1971, Jack Gantos was an aspiring writer desperate for adventure, college cash, and a way out of a dead-end job.

For ten thousand dollars, he recklessly agreed to help sail a sixty-foot yacht loaded with hashish from the Virgin Islands to New York City, where he and his partners sold the drug until federal agents finally caught up to them in a bust at the Chelsea Hotel. For his part in the conspiracy, the twenty-year-old Gantos was sentenced to serve up to six years in prison.

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On the surface, the narrative tumbles from one intense moment to the next as Gantos pieces together the story of his restless final year of high school, his short-lived career as a smuggler, and his time in prison. But running just beneath the action is the story of how Gantos –once he found himself locked up in a small, yellow-walled cell– moved from wanting to be a writer to writing, and how this newly found dedication helped him endure the worst experience of his life.

Lexile Level	Content Rating	Number of Pages	Genre	Date Published	ISBN Number
840L	High School	200	Autobiography	2002	0374399883

Counterfeit Son

Posted on September 14, 2013 by webmaster

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Counterfeit Son
by Elaine Marie Alphin

Cameron Miller’s father was a serial killer who preyed on young boys; when he dies in a police shoot-out, Cameron takes on the identity of Neil Lacey, one of his father’s victims who was abducted and supposedly murdered six years earlier. The Lacey family accepts “Neil” into their home with few questions, but he lives in fear that old dental records and a suspicious police officer will expose his lies. Finally, when someone from Cameron’s past threatens his new family, the 14-year-old must decide whether to tell his “parents” the truth.

Lexile Level	Content Rating	Number of Pages	Genre	Date Published	ISBN Number
830L	Middle School	180	Thriller/Suspense	2000	0152026452

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Fade to Black

Posted on September 12, 2013 by webmaster

Fade To Black
by Alex Finn

HIV-positive Alejandro Crusan, a Florida high-school junior, is the target of bullying at his school. After being attacked in his car by a baseball bat-wielding teenager, Alex is hospitalized to recover from his injuries. Clinton Cole, prejudiced and afraid of catching AIDS, hates Alex and is responsible for tormenting him on several previous occasions. Now he claims he’s innocent. However, Daria, a teen with Downs syndrome, saw Clinton at the scene of the attack; she also witnessed one of the earlier assaults. The teens alternate telling their stories and sharing their secrets, as Alex struggles with the truth about the attack and about the origin of his HIV-positive status.

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Daria’s narration unfolds in free verse, a form that effectively shows both her halting, repetitive speech and the disparity between her inner thoughts and her ability to communicate them.

Lexile Level	Content Rating	Number of Pages	Genre	Date Published	ISBN Number
590L	High School	208	Realistic Fiction	2006	00060568429

Romeo & Juliet

Posted on September 10, 2013 by webmaster

Romeo and Juliet
by William Shakespeare

This magnificent, timeless drama is the world’s most famous tale of “star-crossed lovers.” The young, unshakable love of Juliet and Romeo defies the feud that divides their families–the Capulets and Montagues–as their desperate need to be together, their secret meetings, and finally their concealed marriage drive them toward tragedy.

Lexile Level	Content Rating	Number of Pages	Genre	Date Published	ISBN Number
1260L	High School	336	Drama	2004	0743477111

Honey Baby Sweetheart

Posted on September 10, 2013 by webmaster

Honey Baby Sweetheart
by Deb Caletti

During the summer of her junior year, shy, quiet Ruby McQueen falls in love with the rich boy down the block. After their first motorcycle ride, Travis gives her a beautiful gold chain, and she wears it everywhere. Only later, while on a date with him, does she learn where he gets his gifts he breaks into houses and steals jewelry. Ruby struggles with her conflicted feelings for him. Her parents are separated and hardly stellar examples when it comes to relationships.

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By spending time with the Casserole Queens (her librarian mother’s senior-citizen book group) and listening to their life stories, the teen and her mother finally discover the role models that they’ve been lacking.

Lexile Level	Content Rating	Number of Pages	Genre	Date Published	ISBN Number
900L	High School	308	Drama	2004	06986754

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