Books for Mature Readers

F And          Speak                              Anderson, M.T.

A traumatic event near the end of the summer has a devastating effect on Melinda's freshman year in high school.

F And          Feed                               Anderson, M. T. 

In a future where most people have computer implants in their heads to control their environment, a boy meets an unusual girl who is in serious trouble.

F And          The Pox Party                      Anderson, M. T. 

Various diaries, letters, and other manuscripts chronicle the experiences of Octavian, a young African American, from birth to age sixteen, as he is brought up as part of a science experiment in the years leading up to and during the Revolutionary War.

F Asi          Foundation                         Asimov, Isaac  

As the Galactic Empire declines, psychohistorian Hari Seldon and his band of psychobiologists form the Foundation, designed to be the nucleus of an eventual ideal universal ruling corporation.

F Cal          Wild Roses                         Caletti, Deb   

Seventeen-year-old Cassie learns about the good and bad sides of love when she falls for a gifted young musician while living with her mother and brilliant, yet disturbed, violinist stepfather.

F Cal           Honey, Baby, Sweetheart           Caletti, Deb  

In the summer of her junior year, sixteen-year-old Ruby McQueen and her mother, both nursing broken hearts, set out on a journey to reunite an elderly woman with her long-lost love and in the process learn many things about "the real ties” that bind people to one another.

F Cla          Childhood's End                    Clarke, Arthur

Invaders who are intellectually, technologically and militarily superior to humans take over the earth in a seemingly benevolent way.

F Cri          Congo                              Crichton, M.

Three adventurers trek into the Congo in search of the diamonds of the Lost City of Zinj.

F Cru          Ironman                            Crutcher, Chris

While training for a triathlon, seventeen-year-old Bo attends an anger management group at school which leads him to examine his relationship with his father.

F Cru          Whale Talk                         Crutcher, Chris       

Intellectually and athletically gifted, TJ, a multiracial, adopted teenager, shuns organized sports and the gung-ho athletes at his high school until he agrees to form a swimming team and recruits some of the school's less popular students.

F Dra          Copper Sun                         Draper, Sharon  

Two fifteen-year-old girls, one a slave and the other an indentured servant, escape their Carolina plantation and try to make their way to Fort Moses , Florida , a Spanish colony that gives sanctuary to slaves.

F Fra          Wrecked                           Frank, E. R.

After a car accident seriously injures her best friend and kills her brother's girlfriend, sixteen-year-old Anna tries to cope with her guilt and grief, while learning some truths about her family and herself.

F Fra          Friction                           Frank, E. R. 

When a new girl at the private school Alex attends starts rumors about Alex's favorite teacher, Alex and her eighth-grade classmates are not sure how to act around him or with each other.

F Fra          America : a Novel                   Frank, E. R.

Teenage America , a not-black, not-white, not-anything boy who has spent many years in institutions for disturbed, antisocial behavior, tries to piece his life together.

F Gre          I Never Promised You a Rose Garden  Greenberg, J.

Chronicles the three-year battle of a mentally ill, but perceptive, teenage girl against a world of her own creation, emphasizing her relationship with the doctor who gave her the ammunition of self-understanding with which to destroy that world of fantasy.

F Hau          Mr. Was: a Novel                   Hautman, Pete

After his dying grandfather tries to strangle him, Jack Lund discovers a door that leads him fifty years into the past and involves him in events that determine his own future.

F Hen          Shock Point                        Henry, April

Fifteen-year-old Cassie Streng is determined to expose her stepfather after learning that he is giving a dangerous experimental drug to his teenaged psychiatric patients, but he sends her to a boot camp for troubled teens in Mexico in order to keep her quiet.

F Her          Dune                               Herbert, Frank

Opposing forces struggle for control of the universe when the archenemy of the cosmic emperor is banished to a barren world where savages fight for water.

F Heu          Dante's Daughter                   Heuston, K.

In fourteenth-century Italy, Antonia, the daughter of Dante Alighieri, longs for a stable family and home while developing her artistic talent and seeking a place for herself in a world with limited options for women.

F Hux          Brave New World                    Huxley, Aldous

A satirical novel about the utopia of the future, a world in which babies are decanted from bottles and the great Ford is worshipped.

F Kno          A Separate Peace                   Knowles, John

Two American school boys are affected by the increasing tension of the last year of peace preceding America 's entrance into World War II.

F Kno          Dreamhunter                        Knox, Elizabeth

In a world where select people can enter "The Place" and find dreams of every kind to share with others for a fee, a fifteen-year-old girl is training to be a dreamhunter when her father disappears, leaving her to carry on his mysterious mission.

F Kno          Dreamquake                         Knox, Elizabeth

While investigating the government's involvement in the disappearance of her father, Tziga Hame, and the decline of the art of projecting dreams, dreamhunter Laura learns more about "The Place."

F Lee          To Kill a Mockingbird              Lee, Harper

Presents a fortieth anniversary edition of the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel in which Scout Finch, the young daughter of a local attorney in the Deep South during the 1930s, tells of her father's defense of an African-American man charged with the rape of a white girl.

F Mik          Tree Girl                         Mikaelsen, Ben

When, protected by the branches of one of the trees she loves to climb, Gabriela witnesses the destruction of her Mayan village and the murder of nearly all its inhabitants, she vows never to climb again until, after she and her traumatized sister find safety in a Mexican refugee camp, she realizes that only by climbing and facing their fears can she and her sister hope to have a future.

F Mit          Gone with the Wind                 Mitchell, M.

After the Civil War sweeps away the genteel life to which she has been accustomed, Scarlett O'Hara sets about to salvage her plantation home.  Willful and pampered Scarlett O'Hara's strength of character carries her through the deprivations of the Civil War, but her infatuation with Ashley Wilkes keeps her from recognizing her true love until it is too late.

F Mye          The Glory Field                    Myers, Walter

Follows a family's two-hundred year history, from the capture of an African boy in the 1750s through the lives of his descendants, as their dreams and circumstances lead them away from and back to the small plot of land in South Carolina that they call the Glory Field.

F Mye          Fallen Angels                      Myers, Walter 

Seventeen-year-old Richie Perry, just out of his Harlem high school, enlists in the Army in the summer of 1967 and spends a devastating year on active duty in Vietnam .

F Mye          Shooter                            Myers, Walter 

Written in the form of interviews, reports, and journal entries, the story of three troubled teenagers ends in a tragic school shooting.

F Na           Wait for Me                        Na, An

As her senior year in high school approaches, Mina yearns to find her own path in life but working at the family business, taking care of her little sister, and dealing with her mother's impossible expectations are as stifling as the Southern California heat, until she falls in love with a man who offers a way out.

F Nai          The Other Side of Truth            Naidoo, Beverley

Smuggled out of Nigeria after their mother's murder, Sade and her younger brother are abandoned in London when their uncle fails to meet them at the airport and they are fearful of their new surroundings and of what may have happened to their journalist father back in Nigeria .

F Nap          Breath                             Napoli , Donna

Elaborates on the tale of "The Pied Piper," told from the point of view of a boy who is too ill to keep up when a piper spirits away the healthy children of a plague-ridden town after being cheated out of full payment for ridding Hameln of rats.

F Pat          The Great Gilly Hopkins             Paterson, K. 

An eleven-year-old foster child tries to cope with her longings and fears as she schemes against everyone who tries to be friendly.

F Per          Criss Cross                        Perkins, Lynne

Teenagers in a small town in the 1960s experience new thoughts and feelings, question their identities, connect, and disconnect as they search for the meaning of life and love.

F Plu          The Body of Christopher Creed      Plum-Ucci, Carol

Torey Adams, a high school junior with a seemingly perfect life, struggles with doubts and questions surrounding the mysterious disappearance of the class outcast.

F Plu          The She                            Plum-Ucci, Carol

After his parents are lost at sea, Evan Barrett and his older brother leave their seaside home in West Hook to escape bad memories, but years later even worse questions emerge when Evan is asked to help a fellow student deal with another sea-related tragedy.

F Pri          The Sterkarm Handshake             Price, Susan

Having traveled to a sixteenth century border clan in England through a tunnel created by a twenty-first century company, Andrea must decide in which era she will live.

F Sin          The Jungle                         Sinclair, Upton

The horrifying conditions of the Chicago stockyards are revealed through this narrative of a young immigrant's struggles in America .

F Smi          A Tree Grows in Brooklyn            Smith, Betty

The joys and hardships faced by Francie Nolan and her close-knit family living in Brooklyn in the early 20th century.

F Str          Chanda's Secret                    Stratton, Allan

Chandra Kabelo, a sixteen-year-old in a small South African town, faces down shame and stigma in her efforts to help friends and family members who are dying of AIDS.

F Whi          The Once and Future King           White, T. H.

Tells the story of the youth and reign of King Arthur, the establishment of the Round Table, and the search for the Holy Grail.

F Wol          New Found Land: a Novel            Wolf, Allan

The letters and thoughts of Thomas Jefferson, members of the Corps of Discovery, their guide Sacagawea, and Captain Lewis's Newfoundland dog, all tell of the historic exploratory expedition to seek a water route to the Pacific Ocean .

F Zus          The Book Thief                     Zusak, Markus

Trying to make sense of the horrors of World War II, Death relates the story of Liesel, a young German girl whose book-stealing and story-telling talents help sustain her family and the Jewish man they are hiding, as well as their neighbors.