Entering Grade 8

REALISTIC FICTION

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Punching the Air
by Ibi Zoboi and Yusef Salaam
Amal Shahid has always been an artist and a poet. But even in a diverse art school, because of a biased system he’s seen as disruptive and unmotivated. Then, one fateful night, an altercation in a gentrifying neighborhood escalates into tragedy. “Boys just being boys” turns out to be true only when those boys are white. 
Dear Martin
by Nic Stone
Justyce attends an elite private school but has begun to question the effect the school is having on his identity as a black American teenager. He feels caught between two worlds, and to process it he begins to write a journal to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Speak
by Laurie Halse Anderson
Melinda has been a social outcast ever since she called the cops on an end of summer party so she retreats into herself, but there is something bigger consuming her, and she needs to confront it. (Novel or graphic novel)
All My Rage
by Sabaa Tahir
In past Pakistan, Misbah weds Toufiq in an arranged marriage that results in a move to California after upheaval at home. Now they run a small hotel in the Mojave Desert. Their son Sal and family friend Noor hold a connection bound by their history and the challenges they face due to Islamophobia, racism, and more. When his mother's health fails and his father battles alcoholism as he grieves, the financial and maintenance aspects of the hotel fall to Sal.
This is Where it Ends by Marieke Nijkamp
Told from 4 perspectives over the course of 54 minutes; a school shooter locks the students and teachers of an Alabama high school in the auditorium and opens fire.
All American Boys
by Jason Reynolds
Rashad is the victim of a brutal beating by a police officer. Another boy, Quinn, witnesses the beating and the two alternate telling  their stories. 
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