BEST FOOT FORWARD
Joan Bauer
G. P. Putnam's Sons
ISBN: 0399234748
Ages 12-up
208 pages

In Joan Bauer's companion novel to RULES OF THE ROAD, Jenna Boller has returned from her life-altering trip to Texas. She has a new job as assistant to Madeline Gladstone, Director of Quality Control for Gladstone Shoes, and a handsome protégé named Tanner Cobb. But balancing all these responsibilities with her needy family and the pressures of junior year isn't easy, especially when she's uncovering nefarious dealings at a mysterious shoe factory called Plant 453 and her protégé happens to be a shoplifter.

BILLY THE KID: A Novel
Theodore Taylor
Harcourt Children's Books
ISBN: 0152049304
Ages 12-up
224 pages

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William H. "Billy the Kid" Bonney Jr. isn't afraid to take risks in Theodore Taylor's fictional tale of the real-life legend. But during a train heist near his hometown, the odds catch up with him when a passenger recognizes the 19-year-old outlaw. A number of people are hunting him --- Sheriff Willis Monroe, Billy's own cousin and former best friend; Billy's two-timing partners; and a conniving posse that wants both Billy and the sheriff dead.

THE CLOUD CHAMBER
Joyce Maynard
Atheneum/An Anne Schwartz Book
ISBN: 068987152X
Ages 11-14
288 pages

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When Nate Chance arrives home from school, he sees two police cars and an ambulance in his yard. Somehow his father has been wounded by a gunshot. Nate sees him stagger across the yard, and then watches as the police take him away. Nobody in the family will say what happened, but Nate is determined to get some answers. If he can just win first prize at the science fair with his amazing cloud chamber project, then he will get to go to the state finals, near the hospital where his dad has been locked away.

GIRLS DINNER CLUB
Jessie Elliot
HarperCollins
ISBN: 006059540X
Ages 12-up
256 pages

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The love of Junie's life for the past year is suddenly acting like a crazed puppy.

Celia's dad has found the most ridiculous woman in all of Manhattan --- and decided, after fifteen years of being single, to date her.

Danielle's hot-guy-in-a-band ex-boyfriend is trying to convince her that he's "changed."

Three girls from the same Brooklyn neighborhood couldn't appear more different. But there's nothing like love, loss, and a few good recipes to bring them together.

GIRLS FOR BREAKFAST
David Yoo
Delacorte Press
ISBN: 0385731922
Ages 14-up
304 pages

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Nick loves girls. But he hasn't had a date ever since he discovered the opposite sex in the third grade, and he's convinced himself that this is solely based on the fact that he's the only Korean American teenager in Renfield --- the fifth richest (and WASPiest) town in Connecticut. Is it all in his head, or are his suspicions that his heritage is keeping him from dating beautiful women true?

HITCH
Jeanette Ingold
Harcourt Children's Books
ISBN: 0152047476
Ages 12-up
288 pages

As a teenager growing up during the Depression, Moss Trawnley doesn't have any reason to enjoy his youth. In search of opportunity, Moss lies about his age and heads west to join Roosevelt's Civilian Conservation Corps. While working to protect Montana's wildlife, he goes to school, makes lifelong friends, falls in love, and finds what he almost lost in the crisis of the Great Depression --- himself.

THE MINISTER'S DAUGHTER
Julie Hearn
Atheneum
ISBN: 0689876904
Ages 12-up
272 pages

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Conceived on May Morning, Nell is claimed by the piskies and faeries as a merrybegot, one of their own. She is a wild child: herb gatherer and healer, spell-weaver and midwife...and, some say, a witch.

Grace is everything Nell is not. She is the Puritan minister's daughter: beautiful and refined, innocent and sweet-natured...to those who think they know her. But she is hiding a secret --- a secret that will bring everlasting shame to her family should it ever be revealed.

The fates of these two girls collide when Grace and her younger sister, Patience, are suddenly spitting pins, struck with fits, and speaking in fevered tongues. The minister is convinced that his daughters are the victims of witchcraft. And all signs point to Nell as the source of the trouble.

MY BROTHER'S KEEPER
Patricia McCormick
Hyperion Books for Children
ISBN: 0786851732
Ages 10-14
192 pages

Ever since Toby's father left, things have been off-balance. Toby's mother seems deflated and resigned, and his little brother Jake is exhibiting odd signs of stress. Toby struggles to keep his family together even as things are falling apart. Despite his efforts, though, Jake is drifting farther and farther away, and only Toby knows why --- Jake is becoming increasingly dependent on drugs. Toby tries to cover up for Jake and spare his mother yet another disappointment, but his attempts backfire and only add to the growing tension between the brothers --- until Jake finally goes much too far.

PRETTY THINGS
Sarra Manning
Dutton Children's Books
ISBN: 0525475222
Ages 14-up
256 pages

Friendships shift and relationship melodrama rules during a summertheater production of "The Taming of the Shrew" in Sarra Manning's follow-up to GUITAR GIRL, as Brie, Charlie, Walker and Daisy fall in and out of love and hate with each other. Their four voices alternate throughout the narrative, revealing the delicious inside scoop on each player's secret thoughts and exposing the real person inside.

A ROOM ON LORELEI STREET
Mary E. Pearson
Henry Holt Books for Young Readers
ISBN: 0805076670
Ages 14-up
272 pages

In an attempt to escape the suffocating responsibility of her alcoholic mother and the controlling guilt of her grandmother, 17-year-old Zoe rents a small room from Opal Keats, an eccentric old lady who has a difficult past of her own. Zoe promises never to go crawling back to her family, but with all odds against her, can she make ends meet without any help from her loved ones? Zoe struggles with this worry and the guilt of abandoning her mother as she goes to extraordinary lengths to keep the room on Lorelei Street.

SUGAR RUSH
Julie Burchill
HarperTempest
ISBN: 0060776196
Young Adult
288 pages

When Kim has to transfer from her posh school to Ravendene Comprehensive, the notoriously violent local school, she's understandably scared. But then she meets Maria Sweet, better known as Sugar. Sugar is beautiful and wild, the queen bee of Ravendene, and Kim falls under her spell. Soon Kim is partying with Sugar night and day, and as Kim leaves her good-girl past far behind, she realizes she's falling in love --- with her best friend.

VALIANT: A Modern Tale of Faerie
Holly Black
Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing
ISBN: 0689868227
Ages 12-up
320 pages

When 17-year-old Valerie Russell runs away to New York City, she begins hanging out with a gang of squatters who live in the city's labyrinthine subway system. Lolli speaks of monsters that are in the subway tunnels, and Luis claims he can make deals with creatures that no one else can see. When a bewildered Val allows Lolli to talk her into tracking down the hidden lair of the creature for whom Luis and his brother Dave have been dealing, Val finds herself bound into service by a troll named Ravus. As Val grows to know him, she finds herself torn between her affection for an honorable monster and her fear of what her new friends are becoming.

Series Books

Fear Street Nights Trilogy

MOONLIGHT SECRETS: Book One
R. L. Stine
Simon Pulse
ISBN: 0689878648
Ages 12-up
160 pages

Shadyside has changed a lot. The teens at Shadyside High are savvy, rich, and not intimidated by the old Fear Street lore. They sneak out at night to go to Nights, a hot new club built on the site of the Fear family mansion, and explore a dark world that is all their own. These young people think they're safe under the moonlight, but the evil of Fear Street never dies. It has returned in a different shape to claim new victims.

Fearless FBI

KILL GAME: A Gaia Moore Novel
Francine Pascal
Simon Pulse
ISBN: 0689878214
Ages 16-up
272 pages

Francine Pascal's bestselling Fearless series is all grown-up. Gaia Moore is out of college and has been recruited to join the world's leading crime-fighting organization. At FBI training camp in Quantico, Gaia will become a part of an unparalleled team. She will learn the strict codes and procedures of the FBI, and be pushed to her body and mind's utmost limits. She will also learn how to hunt serial killers --- and she will catch one.

Hover Car Racer

CRASH COURSE: Book 1
Matthew Reilly
illustrated by Pablo Raimondi
Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing
ISBN: 1416902252
Ages 10-up
224 pages

Jason Chaser, a 14-year-old hover car racing phenom, is ready to take the world by storm. His first stop though is the prestigious International Race School, where he has to match skill and will against tyrannical instructors, sabotaged equipment, and the planet's best teenage fliers. Among them are Jason's hometown rival Barnaby Becker; American Ariel Piper, the first girl ever to be accepted into race school; and a mysterious driver in black, who never seems to lose.

All eight installments of this high-octane series were available in 2004 on Matthew Reilly's website as a free e-book, which was featured on both Teenreads.com and Kidsreads.com.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

QUEEN OF THE SLAYERS
Nancy Holder
Simon Spotlight Entertainment
ISBN: 1416902414
Ages 16-up
352 pages

With the closing of the Hellmouth and the awakening of hundreds of potential slayers, Buffy Summers thought she had overturned the Slayer's self-sacrifice and earned herself a much-deserved break. But the Forces of Darkness don't accept defeat graciously.

Willow's magickal distribution of the slayer essence left girls across the world discovering their latent power. But then comes word that a number of these girls are being coerced to join an army of slayers --- governed by the mysterious "Queen of the Slayers."

Xander is sent to Africa to learn more about the origin of the slayer essence. Instead, he returns to report that, alarmingly, there's not enough good in the world to counteract the overabundance of evil, and that the deciding apocalypse is drawing much too near.

Picking up just after the Buffy series finale on the WB, QUEEN OF THE SLAYERS offers fans an exclusive look into the lives of these much-missed characters.

Charmed

THE WARREN WITCHES
Simon Spotlight Entertainment
ISBN: 0689878761
Ages 16-up
320 pages

Family is more important to the Charmed Ones than anything, including magic. Piper, Phoebe, and Paige are Warren witches --- the latest in a long line of women with incredible supernatural strength. This Charmed short story collection recounts never-before-told tales of the Warren/Halliwell family from 18th century Salem to present-day San Francisco, as throughout history the Warren witches have worked their magic to save Innocents and rid the world of evil.

Mates, Dates

MATES, DATES, AND GREAT ESCAPES
Cathy Hopkins
Simon Pulse
ISBN: 0689876955
Ages 12-up
160 pages

A school trip to Florence seems like the perfect escape for Lucy. She wants time away from Tony, who is pressuring her to take their relationship further. In Italy she meets an American boy and thinks he might be the ideal way to get over Tony. He seems to be the perfect gentleman, and Italy introduces Lucy to a world of culture and sophistication. But will she really be able to move on from Tony?

THE MATES, DATES GUIDE TO LIFE, LOVE, AND LOOKING LUSCIOUS
Cathy Hopkins
Simon Pulse
ISBN: 1416902791
Ages 12-up
160 pages

What happens when Lucy, Nesta, Izzie, and T. J. get together and start talking? They come up with all kinds of solutions to life's little problems and some of the bigger ones as well. One topic is boys: what they want, where to find them, how to be a great kisser --- everything you really need to know. Health, fashion and beauty tips also can be found in this must-have book for fans of the Mates, Dates series.

The Party Room Trilogy

LAST CALL: Book Three
Morgan Burke
Simon Pulse
ISBN: 0689872275
Ages 16-up
256 pages

The Prep School Killer is dead. Finally Kirsten can move on and leave the nightmare of her best friend Sam's murder behind her. Kirsten is at NYU now, but she still returns to the Party Room on the Upper East Side of Manhattan --- where the horror all began. But it's quiet now.

Then the killer strikes again. And again. The culprit wasn't Kyle after all. In the final installment of this heart-stopping trilogy, someone is looking to settle a major score.