Crosses

By Shelley Stoehr

Meeting Katie is one of the best things that’s ever happened to Nancy. Katie really understands her, something her parents can’t do even when they’re sober. Plus, with Katie Nancy can finally begin to shed her “goody -goody” image. Katie and Nancy cut designs onto their bodies. The physical pain gives them comfort, and a release from their inner pain. But soon, even though their bodies are covered with scars, neither the cutting nor the drugs they take can give them what they are looking for…

Dancing with an Alien

By Mary Logue

Tonia has been looking for the right boy for a while. She doesn’t know that when she finds him he will truly be one of a kind. Branko is on planet Earth with mission. His job is to find a female to help re-populate his planet. He isn’t quite sure what will happen to her on his planet, but he knows that without her his planet will die. His reputation and the honor of his family are on the line. He doesn’t count on caring about the female he finds. Tonia touches him in a way no one else does. Is extra-terrestrial love possible? Does it matter what species you are? Can love transcend all…??

Pawns

By Willo Davis Roberts

Teddi and her older neighbor Mamie have both shared the grief of losing a family member. Teddi is an orphan, her mother a victim of cancer, her father a victim of his own hand. Mamie’s son Ricky has recently been killed in a plane accident. In their grief they have worked out a way to live comfortably together. Then a very young, and very pregnant woman knocks on the door and says, “Hi, I’m Dora, Ricky’s widow” Teddi worries how this will change her relationship with Mamie .She also wonders why Dora doesn’t have any identification and why she doesn’t seem to know much about Ricky. Just who is this woman and what does she want?…

On the Devil’s Court

By Carl Deucker

When Joe moves across the country, away from all the people and things he loves, he counts on his basketball skills to gain him new friends and prestige. Something is wrong though, his skills seem to be failing him. No matter how much he practices nothing seems to go through the hoop-until the day the devil shows up and makes him an offer that is hard to refuse. After all, later on all he has to do is repent and all will be forgiven, right??

Babylon Boyz

By Jess Mowry

Dante and Pook know there’s little likelihood that either will get out of Babylon. In their neighborhood no one has the money to go to college - or to have heart surgery that might save their life. The only people in Babylon with any money are the drug dealers. When one of the dealers, Air Touch, throws a case of pure cocaine out his car window while attempting to flee the police, Dante and Pook face the opportunity of a lifetime. Should they sell the cocaine and use the money for the heart surgery Dante needs and the medical school Pook wants to attend? If they do, how will they keep Air Touch from knowing they were the ones who recovered his stash? And more importantly, how will they live with themselves knowing they contributed to the drug problem crippling their community….

Taken

By Chris Jordan

It is every parent’s nightmare. Their child disappears before their very eyes. One minute he’s there, the next he is not. Opening the door to her home, hoping against hope that her son is there Kate Bickford comes face to face with her son’s abductor. He wants all her money and if she doesn’t follow “the method” the results will be gruesome. Yet, even if she follows the abductors instructions is there any guarantee she will get her son back? And then there’s the frightening little detail that she really doesn’t have much money- and the fact that this seems to be about more than money.

Torn to Pieces

By Margot McDonnell

Anne has always thought her Mom is a little quirky. When her Mom doesn’t come home from one of her long business trips Anne isn’t too surprised. When a few days go by, though Anne knows something is wrong. The phone is disconnected at the hotel her Mother said she would be staying at and a strange man is leaving threatening messages on her answering machine. Why has her Mother always been so mysterious about where she is going ? Why has she never gotten a cell phone so Anne can reach her? Anne’s “grandparents” share her concern and give her a sealed envelope from her Mother that reveals all her Mom’s secrets - secrets that put Anne in great danger and reveal that nothing is as it seems.

Ten Mile River

By Paul Griffin

Ray and Jose do whatever it takes to survive, steal cars for people, smash windshields so the glass repair guy gets business, fish in the river for food. Living in an abandoned station house in Ten Mile Park in New York City, they are NOT going back to foster care or a juvie detention center. Friends till the end, nothing rocks their friendship, not mutual admiration of the lovely Trini, dead bodies along the riverbank, or Ray’s affection for the stray dogs who adopt them. When the cops bust Jose, Ray is on his own for the first time in his life. Decisions must be made.

Deadline

By Chris Crutcher

Ben Wolf has big plans for his senior year. They just don’t include getting a fatal disease and dying. If he can keep it a secret, perhaps he can pull off some of the things he wants to do, perhaps he can cram a lifetime of living into one year. He’s always wanted to play football, even though he’s kind of small. Now, with his diagnosis, he doesn’t have to worry about getting killed, and right now he feels good enough to play. And then there’s Dallas Suzuki, the goddess of his dreams. What’s he got to lose? Keeping this kind of secret isn’t easy though, and is it fair to those who will be left behind?

The Hunger Games

By Suzanne Collins
The ruins of North America have been transformed. The Capital controls everyone and everything. Twelve “slave” districts surround the capital and the Capital keeps them in line by forcing them to send one boy and girl between the ages of 12 and eighteen to fight to the death on live TV. Only one survivor is permitted. Katniss Everdeen volunteers to take her little sister’s place in the games and finds herself competing with, and against, a boy who has been kind to her and her family in the past. Is it possible that they can both survive the impossible? Sequel: Catching Fire

My Father's Son

By Terri Fields

Kevin Windor’s life is pretty routine, going to school, playing basketball, trying to ask the girl of his dreams out…but when news of a serial killer flashes across the evening news Kevin is stunned to see his father’s face looking out at him. This has to be wrong! But…what if it’s not? Why won’t his father see him when he visits the jail? What does he do about the people who think “like father, like son”? Mostly, what does he do if his father really committed these savage crimes?