​Entering Grade 9

HISTORICAL FICTION

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African Town
by Charles Waters and Irene Latham
In 1860, long after the United States outlawed the importation of enslaved laborers, 110 men, women and children from Benin and Nigeria were captured and brought to Mobile, Alabama aboard a ship called Clotilda. They were secretly sold  to various plantations, where they made desperate attempts to maintain their culture and survive.  At the end of the Civil War, the survivors created a community for themselves they called African Town, which still exists to this day. ​
I Must Betray You
​​by Ruta Sepetys
Living under Nicolae Ceaușescu's brutal dictatorship in Romania 1989, Cristian is blackmailed by the secret police to become an informer. He’s left with only two choices: betray everyone and everything he loves—or use his position to creatively undermine the most notoriously evil dictator in ​
They Went Left 
by Monica Hesse
When Zofia entered Auschwitz with her family they were all sorted left to right, Only she and her brother went right and lived, the rest went left. This mystery follows Zofia through the aftermath of her time in Auschwitz as she tries to locate her brother in a country trying to heal.
Last Night at the Telegraph Club
by Malinda Lo
Growing up in Chinatown in San Francisco in 1950 is hard enough. The Red Scare is gripping the U.S. and second generation immigrant Lily Hu must constantly maintain her "good daughter" persona for her family and teachers. When Lily meets Kath Miller and Lily discovers that she has feelings for her, both girls' lives become even more complicated. 
All the Light We Cannot See
​by Anthony Doerr
The story of a blind French girl and a German boy whose paths collide in occupied France as both try to survive the devastation of World War II.
Code Name Verity
by Elizabeth Wein
In 1943, a British fighter plane crashes in Nazi-occupied France and the survivor tells a tale of friendship, war, espionage, and great courage as she relates what she must do to survive while keeping secret all that she can.
City of Thieves
by David Benioff
​During the Siege of Leningrad, two boys captured by the Nazis are given a second chance when they are charged with securing 12 eggs for a colonel's daughter's wedding cake. 
Everything Sad is Untrue (a true story) 
by Daniel Nayeri
Khosrou (known as Daniel to his classmates) stands in front of his hostile Oklahoman middle school class and captivates his classmates with the epically fantastical story of his family, their life in Iran, and their lives as refugees.  
The Awakening of Malcom X: A Novel
​ by Ilyasah Shabazz & Tiffany D. Jackson
A narrative account of the activist's adolescent years in jail, written by his daughter Ilyasah Shabazz along with 2019 Coretta Scott King-John Steptoe award-winning author, Tiffany D. Jackson.
Sag Harbor
by Colson Whitehead
Benji Cooper is one of the few Black students at his elite prep school in Manhattan in 1985. But every summer, Benji escapes to the Hamptons, to Sag Harbor, where a small community of Black professionals have built a world of their own.
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