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Young Adult Books
The following lists contain a selection of books to satisfy the wide variety of reading levels and interests of 7th and 8th grade readers. Many of these titles address the issues of adolescence and are for mature readers. Most of the authors listed have written other books at this level. To see a title's Lexile number, click on the title and then click on the "Full Record" tab.
Click here for the latest pdf version of all suggested titles.
Adventure
Biographies, Autobiographies & Memoirs
Crime & Punishment
Fantasy
Historical Fiction
Humor
In Other Lands
LGBTQ
Misfits & Outcasts
Mysteries & Thrillers
Nonfiction
Novels in Poems
Relationships
School, Friends & Growing Up
Science Fiction
Dystopian Science Fiction
Short Stories
Sports
Vampires, Werewolves & Zombies
War
New Book Reviews
Reading Level: Grades 6 and up
What sort of person becomes a Rhodes Scholar (one of the most prestigious academic honors in the world) and then signs on to become a Navy SEAL? Eric Greitens will take you on his journey that led him from refugee camps in Rwanda and Bosnia, the slums of Bolivia, the rigors of Navy SEAL training to the battlefields of Iraq and then home. In this adaptation for teens of his best-selling novel you will meet an extraordinary person you will not soon forget.
Reading Level: Grades 6 and up
Xanthe Jane (don't call her Xanthe) has always loved vampires, as stories, but she knows they aren't real. Then one night she is woken up by a cellphone playing the theme from Dracula and discovers that she is in a coffin, in her grave, and her vampire sire is exhuming her. When her sire is chased off before she can finish digging Jane up, Jane is left to figure out how she could be a vampire when she's never been bitten and what is she supposed to do now, in this tongue-in-cheek vampire novel.
Reading Level: Grades 4 - 9
Why would anyone want to steal the body of President Abraham Lincoln? The answer involves counterfeiters and the newly fledged Secret Service. Written like a heist caper, Lincoln's Grave Robbers details a little known part of history that really didn't have much impact, but it's sure fun to read about.
Reading Level: Grades 8 and up
This tense well crafted thriller opens with 16-year-old Noa waking up on a metal table in a warehouse with an incision in her chest. Much like a young Dragon Tattoo's Lisbeth Salander Noa is a tough, smart orphan who has been mistreated by the system and was able to use her considerable computer skills to establish a life on the border of society. After her escape, she meets up with wealthy, privileged Peter who has hacked his way into some files in his father's office. Both teens find themselves on the run. Will they elude capture long enough to get some answers? Who are these men who are chasing them and why are they after Noa and Peter? What has done to Noa? What is the connection to Peter's family?
WARNING: This is the first book in a trilogy. Book one leaves you hanging. You'll want to keep reading, but you can't.
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Grades 7 & Up
Sophie's mother runs a sanctuary for bonobo chimpanzees in the Democratic Republic of Congo, in Africa. While visiting from America for a few weeks, Sophie rescues a bonobo from a man in the markets of Kinshasa. Otto, the badly abused bonobo, quickly bonds with Sophie, but she knows she must leave him soon to return to her father in the United States.
When the Congolese president is assassinated, and armed revolution breaks out across the entire country, Sophie's status as U.S. citizen means she can safely be extracted and returned to her home in the States... but it also means she must leave her Congolese friends at the sanctuary... and she must leave Otto.
Forced into a UN rescue van against her will, to be returned home, Sophie makes a daring decision and jumps from the van to return and care for Otto. A dangerous choice... especially when the sanctuary is attacked. Sophie and Otto miraculously escape into the gated bonobo enclosure while everyone else there is brutally murdered. Sophie and Otto must survive both the wilds of the jungle enclosure and the wild anger of revolutionaries trying to destroy the country.
Gripping and beautifully written, this powerful novel about survival in the face of many types of danger may redefine your definitions of human and animal.
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Find more books by Eliot Schrefer.
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