Lone Star Reading List

Morgan and Eli, two Indigenous children forced away from their families and communities, are brought together in a foster home in Winnipeg, Manitoba. They each feel disconnected, from their culture and each other, and struggle to fit in at school and at their new home -- until they find a secret place, walled off in an unfinished attic bedroom. A portal opens to another reality, Askí, bringing them onto frozen, barren grounds, where they meet Ochek (Fisher). The only hunter supporting his starving community, Misewa, Ochek welcomes the human children, teaching them traditional ways to survive. But as the need for food becomes desperate, they embark on a dangerous mission. Accompanied by Arik, a sassy Squirrel they catch stealing from the trapline, they try to save Misewa before the icy grip of winter freezes everything--including them.

Suspended unjustly from elite Middlefield Prep, Donte Ellison studies fencing with a former champion, hoping to put the racist fencing team captain in his place.

After the downpour, odd black plants begin to shoot up. They are taking over crop fields, twining up houses, and burrowing below streets. They bloom and throw off toxic pollens-- and they feed. On a remote island, Anaya, Petra and Seth seem immune to the toxic plants. They have some kind of connection-- and they'd better figure it out fast. Because the invasion has already begun ...

When risen corpses called 'bone houses' threaten Ryn's village because of a decades-old curse, she teams up with a mapmaker named Ellis to solve the mystery of the curse and destroy the bone houses forever.

A year after the death of her mother in a restaurant shooting, Nora is left struggling to stay alive when a climbing trip with her father goes terribly wrong.

Sara Martinez is facing years in the juvenile detention system for hacking into the foster care computer system to prove that her foster parents are crooks. But then she gets a second chance when a mysterious man offers her a chance to join a group of MI6 affiliated spies.

The other orphans say Margot is lucky. Lucky to survive the horrible accident that killed her family. Lucky to have her own room because she wakes up screaming every night. And finally, lucky to be chosen by a prestigious family to live at their remote country estate. But it wasn't luck that made the Suttons rescue Margot from her bleak existence at the group home. Margot was handpicked to be a companion to their silent, mysterious daughter, Agatha. At first, helping with Agatha--and getting to know her handsome older brother--seems much better than the group home. But soon, the isolated, gothic house begins playing tricks on Margot's mind, making her question everything she believes about the Suttons . . . and herself. Margot's bad dreams may have stopped when she came to live with Agatha - but the real nightmare has just begun.

Nor once dreamed of seeing the wondrous wealth and beauty of Ilara, the kingdom that's ruled her village for as long as anyone can remember. But when a childhood accident left her with a permanent scar, it became clear that her identical twin sister, Zadie, would likely be chosen to marry the Crown Prince--while Nor remained behind, unable to ever set foot on land. Then Zadie is gravely injured, and Nor is sent to Ilara in her place. To Nor's dismay, her future husband, Prince Ceren, is as forbidding and cold as his home--a castle carved into a mountain and devoid of sunlight. And as she grows closer to Ceren's brother, the charming Prince Talin, Nor uncovers startling truths about a failing royal bloodline, a murdered queen...and a plot to destroy the home she was once so eager to leave. In order to save her people, Nor must learn to negotiate the treacherous protocols of a court where lies reign and obsession rules. But discovering her own formidable strength may be the one move that costs her everything: the crown, Varenia and Zadie

A life-size baby doll who stalks its prey. A flesh-hungry ogre who jingle jangles when he walks. A haunted house just dying for a visitor. What do all these things have in common? In collaboration with the Horror Writers Association, New York Times bestselling author and master of horror Jonathan Maberry has compiled a gruesome collection of terrifying stories--in tribute to Alvin Schwartz's classic Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark series--that will absolutely chill readers to the bone. So turn off your lamps, click on your flashlights, and prepare--if you dare--to be utterly spooked!

Olivia was yelled at for wearing a tank top when she had to keep her sweatshirt wrapped around her waist. Liza got dress coded and Molly didn't, even though they were wearing the exact same outfit. Jessica was pulled over by the principal, missed a math quiz, and her teacher gave her an F. Molly starts a podcast protesting that it's impossible to find shorts that are longer than her fingertips, and that middle school is hard enough without accusing girls of using their bodies as a distraction. As their small rebellion swells into a revolution, the girls are not backing down.

Skye Shin has heard it all. Fat girls shouldn't dance. Wear bright colors. Shouldn't call attention to themselves. But Skye dreams of joining the glittering world of K-Pop, and to do that, she's about to break all the rules that society, the media, and even her own mother, have set for girls like her. She'll challenge thousands of other performers in an internationally televised competition looking for the next K-pop star, and she'll do it better than anyone else. When Skye nails her audition, she's immediately swept into a whirlwind of countless practices, shocking performances, and the drama that comes with reality TV. What she doesn't count on are the highly fat-phobic beauty standards of the Korean pop entertainment industry, her sudden media fame, and scrutiny, or the sparks that soon fly with her fellow competitor, Henry Cho. But Skye has her sights on becoming the world's first plus-sized K-pop star, and that means winning the competition, without losing herself.

When a Connecticut teenager inherits vast wealth and an eccentric estate from the richest man in Texas, she must also live with his surviving family and solve a series of puzzles to discover how she earned her inheritance.

The Gemini Thief is a serial kidnapper, who takes three boys and holds them captive from June 1st to June 30th of the following year. The June Boys endure thirteen months of being stolen, hidden, observed, and fed before they are released, unharmed, by their masked captor. The Thief has eluded authorities for nearly a decade and taken at least twelve boys. Thea Delacroix has reason to believe the Gemini Thief took a thirteenth victim: her cousin, Aulus McClaghen. When one of the kidnapped boys turns up dead, Thea and her friends are determined to find the remaining boys before it's too late.

In a small but turbulent Louisiana town, one boy's grief takes him beyond the bayous of his backyard, to learn that there is no right way to be yourself.

Jack is at the top of his game. He's a senior running back on the football team, dominating every opponent in his way. To everyone else, Jack is totally in control. In reality, he struggles with an eating disorder that controls every aspect of his daily life. When Jack starts using steroids, he feels invincible, but will the steroids help him win the big game, or will he lose everything he's ever worked for?

Fifteen-year-old Simran "Simi" Sangha comes from a long line of Indian vichole -- matchmakers -- with a rich history for helping parents find good matches for their grown children. When Simi accidentally sets up her cousin and a soon-to-be lawyer, her family is thrilled that she has the "gift." But Simi is an artist, and she doesn't want to have anything to do with relationships, helicopter parents, and family drama. That is, until she realizes this might be just the thing to improve her and her best friend Noah's social status. Armed with her family's ancient guide to finding love, Simi starts a matchmaking service-via an app, of course. But when she helps connect a wallflower of a girl with the star of the boys' soccer team, she turns the high school hierarchy topsy-turvy, soon making herself public enemy number one.

In Silver Springs, Arizona, her mother's stories of the monstrous La Llorona are thrilling but unbelievable to science-loving Paola until she and her best friends Dante and Emma take a walk through a cactus field near the Gila River.

A timely, accessible, and beautifully written story exploring themes of food, friendship, family and what it means to belong, featuring sixth-graders Sara, a Pakistani American, and Elizabeth, a white, Jewish girl taking a South Asian cooking class taught by Sara's mom.

After moving to Colorado, deaf seventeen-year-old Maya is forced to attend a hearing school, where she must navigate a new life and prove that her lack of hearing will not stop her from pursuing her dreams. Includes an interview with the author.

Neil Gaiman's Coraline meets Stranger things in a dark and twisted story about a sleepy town with a dark secret-and the three kids brave enough to uncover it.

In 1935, ten-year-old Alex Maki of Bainbridge Island, Washington, is horrified to discover that his new pen pal, Charlie Lévy of Paris, France, is a girl, but in spite of his initial reluctance, their letters continue over the years and they fight for their friendship even as Charlie endures the Nazi occupation and Alex leaves his family in an internment camp and joins the Army.

Seventh-grader Frankie, who has various sensory disorders, is determined to find her missing best friend, Colette, before it is too late.

Best friends Rasheeda and Monique navigate the ups and downs of a teenager's summer, Mo at home in the Cove; Sheeda at a sleepaway ballet intensive.

When Lily, her sister Sam, and their mother move in with her sick grandmother, Lily traps a tiger and makes a deal with him to heal Halmoni.

After being diagnosed with a rare eye cancer, twelve-year-old Ross discovers how music, art, and true friends can help him survive both treatment and middle school.