- Summer
- Reading
Summer 2020!
This summer is different than usual, so we’re doing things differently. For one, these lists are going to grow throughout the summer, so check back!
For another, we’ve attempted to provide titles that are available online. This means you’ll often see links to the e-book version of the book on the DC Public Library Overdrive shelves. (Even if you live outside the District, if you’re enrolled at GDS, you can get a card. Apply here.) If you want to purchase books for home delivery, please consider ordering from Bookshop.org to support local independent booksellers, including GDS-affiliated Child’s Play.
We hope you find many titles to read from our suggested lists, but there are also many other ways to find reading that fits you and your family. Many public libraries are offering community reads, with the books available online all summer (for example, DCPL’s Family Read: The New Kid). Consider following your favorite authors on social media to see what they’re doing for their fans, as stay-at-home orders extend into summer. A reminder as well, that while our lists are always written with an eye to be windows and mirrors to diverse experiences, you can find more by checking out Welcoming Schools, #WeNeedDiverseBooks, and other booklists from the GDS DEI Resources page.
At GDS, we believe that books can help you change the world by broadening your awareness of characters, situations, and information beyond your current experiences.* Encountering challenging ideas and content in books is part of learning and growing. Depending upon who you are, amongst these books you might encounter uncomfortable, emotionally difficult, or even painful content, ideas or language. Remember, though, that you should never have to grapple with difficult content alone; reading may be a solitary activity, but books can -- and should -- be shared!
“The world is big and small, and books help us navigate. [They are] tools to fight back against some of the ignorance.” -- Jason Reynolds, National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature
* for more about the GDS Library Summer Reading philosophy, see The Hopper Effect
Check It Out
PK–2nd Grade
- Biography
- Non-Fiction
- Picture Books
by Annette Bay Pimentel, illustrated by Nabi Ali
A white girl diagnosed with cerebral palsy at birth, Jennifer Keelan grew up battling-and overcoming-the limitations others set for her. After discovering the world of disability rights activism, she knew she had to use her voice to change things.
- Fiction
by Katy Farina, based on the book by Ann M. Martin
Graphic Novel. Karen Brewer's imagination gets the best of her when she decides that her neighbor, Mrs. Porter--who has wild gray hair, wears black robes, and has a garden full of mysterious herbs--must be a witch. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Picture Books
by Nancy Redd, illustrated by Nneka Myers
As family members braid, brush, twirl, roll, and tighten their hair before bedtime, putting on kerchiefs, wave caps, and other protective items, the little sister can't find her bonnet.
- Biography
- Non-Fiction
- Picture Books
by Sophia Spencer & Margaret Mcnamara; Illustrated by Kerascoët
As an eight-year-old white girl, Sophia Spencer’s passion for the insect world became a national news item. In this picture book, Sophia tells her story in her own words.
- Picture Books
by Sam Wedelich
Chicken Little is NOT afraid of anything. Well, okay, maybe a mysterious BONK to the head can produce panic. But only momentarily. It's not as though she meant to send the barnyard into a tailspin, thinking that the sky was falling. How ridiculous! But can she calm her feathered friends with facts and reason?
- Picture Books
by Jean Reagan, illustrated by Lee Wildish
In this hilarious new addition to Jean Reagan and Lee Wildish's bestselling How to... series, the kids are in charge! Kids can show their grandparents how to choose a great book, find the perfect spot to read together, and use their best reading-out-loud voices. Even after the book is done, there are lots of activities that kids and their grandparents can do together!
- Non-Fiction
by Ashima Shiraishi, illustrated by Yao Xiao
Describes solving a complex problem in terms of rock climbing, which may include false starts, breaking the challenge into smaller parts, and always being thoughtful and persistent.
- Picture Books
by Alex Willan
Jasper the fox and Ollie the sloth have a fort-building contest in their yard.
- Picture Books
by Minh Lê, illustrated by Dan Santat
Iris loves to push the elevator buttons in her apartment building, but when it's time to share the fun with a new member of the family, she's pretty put out. That is, until the sudden appearance of a mysterious new button opens up entire realms of possibility, places where she can escape and explore on her own. But when she's forced to choose between going at it alone or letting her little brother tag along, Iris finds that sharing a discovery with the people you love can be the most wonderful experience of all.
- Fiction
by Lyla Lee, illustrated by Dung Ho
Mindy Kim wants to fit in at her new school, but her favorite lunch leads to scorn, then a thriving business, and finally big trouble. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Picture Books
by Ilima Loomis, illustrated by Kenard Pak
In this cumulative rhyme in the style of "The House That Jack Built," a family celebrates Hawai’i and its culture while serving poi at a luau.
- Biography
- Non-Fiction
- Picture Books
by Helaine Becker, illustrated by Liz Wong
The most powerful pirate in history was a woman who was born into poverty in Guangzhou, China, in the late 18th century. When pirates attacked Zheng Yi Sao's town and the captain took a liking to her, she saw a way out. She agreed to marry him only if she got an equal share of his business. When her husband died, she took command of the fleet.
- Fiction
by Guillaume Perreault, translated by Françoise Bui
Graphic Novel. A white letter carrier who delivers mail across the galaxy in his spaceship finds adventure when he is assigned a new route.
- Picture Books
by Carmen Agra Deedy and Pete Oswald
Rita and Ralph live on neighboring hills and they are best friends, until a silly accident while goofing around ends up with both of them angry and unhappy--and they both need to find a way to heal the break in their relationship. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Biography
- Non-Fiction
- Picture Books
by His Holiness the Dalai Lama, illustrated by Bao Luu
The Dalai Lama uses tales from his childhood to teach lessons about compassion.
- Non-Fiction
- Picture Books
by Miranda Paul, illustrated by Ebony Glenn
Illustrations and easy-to-read, rhyming text encourage the reader to speak up about everything from their own name being mispronounced to someone bringing a weapon to school. Includes author's note about real people who have found their voices, when to speak up, and how to express oneself without speaking.
- Picture Books
by Liz Garton Scanlon, illustrated by Simone Shin
Illustrations and rhyming text explore a community garden and what grows there, from flowers and fruit to friendships.
- Biography
- Non-Fiction
- Picture Books
by Rita Lorraine Hubbard, illustrated by Oge Mora
A picture book biography sharing the true story of the nation's oldest student, Mary Walker, who learned to read at the age of 116.
- Picture Books
by Jamie L.B. Deenihan, illustrated by Lorraine Rocha
A boy is disappointed with his grandfather's gift, until he learns he can use it to build exactly what he wanted with his own two hands... and a little help from Grandpa, of course!
3rd–4th Grades
- Fiction
by Katy Farina, based on the book by Ann M. Martin
Graphic Novel. Karen Brewer's imagination gets the best of her when she decides that her neighbor, Mrs. Porter--who has wild gray hair, wears black robes, and has a garden full of mysterious herbs--must be a witch. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Chad Sell
Graphic Novel. The sketches that Drew, a white girl, draws rarely stay inside Doodleville, the world of her sketch notebook. Together, she and her art club must solve a monstrous problem of their own making. Inspired by the artist’s love of the Art Institute of Chicago.
- Biography
- Non-Fiction
by Kelly Starling Lyons
You've seen the building. Now meet the man whose life went into it.
- Fiction
by Claribel A. Ortega
Shortly before Halloween, Lucely and her best friend, Syd, cast a spell that accidentally awakens malicious spirits, wreaking havoc throughout St. Augustine. Together, they must join forces with Syd's witch grandmother, Babette, and her tubby tabby Chunk, to fight the haunting head-on. Can they reverse the curse to save the town and Lucely's firefly spirits before it's too late?
- Fiction
by Minh Lê
Graphic Novel. When thirteen-year-old Tai Pham inherits his grandmother's jade ring, he soon finds out he has been inducted into a group of space cops known as the Green Lanterns.
- Non-Fiction
by Ashima Shiraishi, illustrated by Yao Xiao
Describes solving a complex problem in terms of rock climbing, which may include false starts, breaking the challenge into smaller parts, and always being thoughtful and persistent.
- Non-Fiction
by Lauren Tarshis, adapted by Georgia Ball
A high-action graphic novel adaptation of this best-selling series debut finds a ten-year-old white boy and his younger sister eagerly exploring the Titanic before a devastating accident changes their lives forever.
- Fiction
by Maia and Alex Shibutani, with Michelle Shusterman
Accompanying their journalist parents to the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, twelve-year-old Andy Kudo and his eleven-year-old sister Mika find themselves immersed in an augmented reality game developed by a former Olympic medalist, that brings players together from all over the world to search Tokyo for virtual medals and clues to the secretive creator's identity.
- Fiction
by Lyla Lee, illustrated by Dung Ho
Mindy Kim wants to fit in at her new school, but her favorite lunch leads to scorn, then a thriving business, and finally big trouble. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Maria Scriven
Graphic Novel. An insecure white middle school student is abandoned by her popularity-minded best friend at the beginning of a new school year before learning how to focus on who she really is, instead of what she isn't.
- Fiction
by Katherine Applegate
In a sequel to The One and Only Ivan, former stray Bob, helped by friends Ivan and Ruby, searches for his lost sister on a journey that is dangerously complicated by an approaching hurricane. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Saadia Faruqi and Laura Shovan
A Pakistani-American student attending a new school and a white, Jewish daughter of a British mother struggling through depression forge an unexpected friendship while taking a South Asian cooking class.
- Fiction
by Guillaume Perreault, translated by Françoise Bui
Graphic Novel. A white letter carrier who delivers mail across the galaxy in his spaceship finds adventure when he is assigned a new route.
- Fiction
by Alex Gino
Rick, an eleven-year-old white boy, has generally tried not to make waves, even though he is increasingly uncomfortable with his father's jokes about girls and his best friend's explicit talk about sex. Now in middle school, he discovers the Rainbow Spectrum club, where kids of many genders and identities can express themselves. Maybe among them he can find new friends and discover his own identity, which may just be to opt out of sex altogether. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Biography
- Non-Fiction
- Picture Books
by His Holiness the Dalai Lama, illustrated by Bao Luu
The Dalai Lama uses tales from his childhood to teach lessons about compassion.
- Fiction
by Gigi D.G. and Paulina Ganucheau
Graphic Novel. Adora and her friends search for a lost runestone with a dark past, determined to find it before Catra and the Horde can use it against Etheria.
- Fiction
by Gillian Goerz
Graphic Novel. When ten-year-olds Shirley, who is white, and Jamila, who is Black and Muslim, meet, Jamila is simply hoping for a friend in her new neighborhood but Shirley is a detective and together they seek a missing gecko. (Releases 7/14)
- Fiction
by Ann Clare LeZotte
Graphic Novel. The author draws on the true history of a thriving 19th-century Deaf community on Martha's Vineyard in the story of a white girl whose lineage is threatened by land disputes with the Wampanoag and a ruthlessly ambitious scientist. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Non-Fiction
- Picture Books
by Miranda Paul, illustrated by Ebony Glenn
Illustrations and easy-to-read, rhyming text encourage the reader to speak up about everything from their own name being mispronounced to someone bringing a weapon to school. Includes author's note about real people who have found their voices, when to speak up, and how to express oneself without speaking.
- Biography
- Non-Fiction
- Picture Books
by Rita Lorraine Hubbard, illustrated by Oge Mora
A picture book biography sharing the true story of the nation's oldest student, Mary Walker, who learned to read at the age of 116.
- Fiction
by Renée Watson
The Hart family of Portland, Oregon, faces many setbacks after Ryan's father loses his job, but no matter what, Ryan tries to bring sunshine to her loved ones. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
5th–6th Grades
- Fiction
by Suzanne Collins
A prequel set in the world of Panem sixty-four years before the events of The Hunger Games begins, on the morning of the reaping of the Tenth Hunger Games. All about President Snow before he took power. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Jewell Parker Rhodes
Suspended unjustly from elite Middlefield Prep, Donte Ellison studies fencing with a former champion, hoping to put the racist fencing team captain in his place. Get @ DPCL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Richard Fairgray
Graphic Novel Series. Spending the summer at a family beach house, a white twelve year-old and his best friend are alarmed by the house's ramshackle condition and the presence of eccentric relatives, before encountering a series of supernatural beings.
- Biography
- Non-Fiction
by Cynthia L. Copeland
Graphic Novel. A four-color graphic memoir in which white author and artist Cindy Copeland comes of age, discovers new talents, and finds her voice as a cub reporter at her local newspaper.
- Fiction
by Gene Luen Yang
Graphic Novel. The former US Ambassador of Young People’s Literature and award-winning graphic novelist turns to his own life, the high school where he teaches, and their strikingly diverse men’s varsity basketball team. Here come the California State Championships!
- Fiction
by Claribel A. Ortega
Shortly before Halloween, Lucely and her best friend, Syd, cast a spell that accidentally awakens malicious spirits, wreaking havoc throughout St. Augustine. Together, they must join forces with Syd's witch grandmother, Babette, and her tubby tabby Chunk, to fight the haunting head-on. Can they reverse the curse to save the town and Lucely's firefly spirits before it's too late?
- Fiction
by Minh Lê
Graphic Novel. When thirteen-year-old Tai Pham inherits his grandmother's jade ring, he soon finds out he has been inducted into a group of space cops known as the Green Lanterns.
- Non-Fiction
by Lauren Tarshis, adapted by Georgia Ball
A high-action graphic novel adaptation of this best-selling series debut finds a ten-year-old white boy and his younger sister eagerly exploring the Titanic before a devastating accident changes their lives forever.
- Fiction
by Kacen Callender
A twelve-year-old boy spends days in the mystical Louisiana bayou to come to terms with a sibling's sudden death, his grief-stricken family and the disappearance of his former best friend amid whispers about the latter's sexual orientation.
- Fiction
by Maia and Alex Shibutani, with Michelle Shusterman
Accompanying their journalist parents to the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, twelve-year-old Andy Kudo and his eleven-year-old sister Mika find themselves immersed in an augmented reality game developed by a former Olympic medalist, that brings players together from all over the world to search Tokyo for virtual medals and clues to the secretive creator's identity.
- Fiction
by Maria Scriven
Graphic Novel. An insecure white middle school student is abandoned by her popularity-minded best friend at the beginning of a new school year before learning how to focus on who she really is, instead of what she isn't.
- Fiction
by Katherine Applegate
In a sequel to The One and Only Ivan, former stray Bob, helped by friends Ivan and Ruby, searches for his lost sister on a journey that is dangerously complicated by an approaching hurricane. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Saadia Faruqi and Laura Shovan
A Pakistani-American student attending a new school and a white, Jewish daughter of a British mother struggling through depression forge an unexpected friendship while taking a South Asian cooking class.
- Fiction
by Alex Gino
Rick, an eleven-year-old white boy, has generally tried not to make waves, even though he is increasingly uncomfortable with his father's jokes about girls and his best friend's explicit talk about sex. Now in middle school, he discovers the Rainbow Spectrum club, where kids of many genders and identities can express themselves. Maybe among them he can find new friends and discover his own identity, which may just be to opt out of sex altogether. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Gigi D.G. and Paulina Ganucheau
Graphic Novel. Adora and her friends search for a lost runestone with a dark past, determined to find it before Catra and the Horde can use it against Etheria.
- Fiction
by Ann Clare LeZotte
Graphic Novel. The author draws on the true history of a thriving 19th-century Deaf community on Martha's Vineyard in the story of a white girl whose lineage is threatened by land disputes with the Wampanoag and a ruthlessly ambitious scientist. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Jessica Kim
When eleven-year-old Korean-American Yumi Chung stumbles into a kids' comedy camp, she is mistaken for another student, so she decides to play the part. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Erin Entrada Kelly
Joining their fellow seventh graders to watch the 1986 Challenger launch, three white siblings struggle with respective difficulties including falling grades, an out-of-control temper, and depressed NASA ambitions. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
7th–8th Grades
- Fiction
by Kelly McWilliams
Raised to believe her community are chosen survivors from a plague that ravaged the planet, white teenager Agnes questions the Prophet’s visions of the impending apocalypse, especially when she has to break rules to get insulin to keep her younger brother alive.
- Fiction
by Suzanne Collins
A prequel set in the world of Panem sixty-four years before the events of The Hunger Games begins, on the morning of the reaping of the Tenth Hunger Games. All about President Snow before he took power. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Elizabeth Acevedo
In this novel-in-verse, two Dominican teenage girls, one in DR and one in New York, lose their fathers in a plane crash. In alternating poems, each learns of hidden family secrets, and of each other. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Gene Luen Yang
Graphic Novel. The former US Ambassador of Young People’s Literature and award-winning graphic novelist turns to his own life, the high school where he teaches, and their strikingly diverse men’s varsity basketball team. Here come the California State Championships!
- Fiction
by Cynthia Leitich Smith
Louise Wolfe breaks up with her first boyfriend after he makes a racist remark about her Native American heritage. For her school newspaper, she begins covering the multicultural casting of the new school play and the racial hostilities it has exposed. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Nicole Melleby
When strong-willed, drama-loving white eighth grader Brie Hutchens tells a lie because she isn't quite ready to come out to her mother, she must navigate the consequences in her relationships with her family, friends, and faith.
- Fiction
by Katherine Locke and Laura Silverman
From stories of confronting their relationships with Judaism to rom-coms with a side of bagels and lox, It's a Whole Spiel features one story after another that says yes, we are Jewish, but we are also queer, and disabled, and creative, and political, and adventurous, and anything we want to be.
- Fiction
by Deborah Wiles
Told through free verse from different points of view -- protesters, students, National Guardsmen, and "townies” -- recounts the story of what happened at Kent State in May 1970, when four white college students were killed by National Guardsmen, and a student protest was turned into a bloody battlefield.
- Fiction
by Scott Reintgen
Trilogy. Elliot, a Black teenager from Detroit, jumps at the chance to compete for a place on a deep-space voyage to another planet. Think Hunger Games combined with The 100. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Nic Stone
Shuri is a skilled martial artist, a genius, and a master of science and technology. But, she's also a teenager. And a princess. This story follows Shuri as she sets out on a quest to save her homeland of Wakanda. A Black Panther novel.
- Non-Fiction
by Jason Reynolds and Ibram X. Kendi
In 2016, Dr. Ibram X. Kendi published Stamped From the Beginning: A Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America. This version goes beyond merely making the content accessible to younger readers, as Dr. Kendi and Jason Reynolds together address the immediacy of young people taking action today. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Joelle Charbonneau
You, the reader, know who detonated the bomb, but these diverse teens stuck inside their bombed-out suburban high school don’t know that the bomber is among them. A fast-paced thriller. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Jennifer Longo
White seventeen-year-old Muir knows not to get attached; she’s been in the foster care system her whole life. But what about when it starts to feel like home? Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Rin Cupeco
Years after the evil Snow Queen desolated the magical kingdom of Avalon, Prince Alexei, his friend Tala, and a ragtag band, inspired by the appearance of the Firebird, try to reclaim their land. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
High School
- Non-Fiction
by Paul Ortiz
A politically charged narrative history of the United States, focusing on the Black and Latinx peoples who built our country. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Kelly McWilliams
Raised to believe her community are chosen survivors from a plague that ravaged the planet, white teenager Agnes questions the Prophet’s visions of the impending apocalypse, especially when she has to break rules to get insulin to keep her younger brother alive.
- Biography
by Robin Ha
Graphic Novel. This memoir follows Korean American cartoonist Ha’s transition from life in Seoul to life in Alabama at age 15, where learning English and dealing with racist peers were only a few of life’s challenges.
- Fiction
by Philipp Meyer
Two young white men dream of a future beyond the factories and abandoned homes of their economically devastated Pennsylvania steeltown home. Recommended by Katherine Dunbar. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Colum McCann
National Book Award winner McCann tells the story of two fathers, one Palestinian, the other Israeli, who come together to work for peace as each mourns the loss of a young daughter in the region’s persistent, senseless bloodshed. Recommended by Richard Avidon. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Samar Mustafah
Afaf, a Muslim Palestinian-American principal at an all-girls school outside of Chicago, has alternately embraced and rejected her religious identity throughout her life. Now caught in a school shooting, chapters alternate between the horrific events of that day and the story of her childhood. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by L.C. Rosen
For gay, white, Jewish sixteen-year-old Randy, his fourth year at an LGBTQIA+ summer camp means it’s finally time to try a new identity in order to get with the love of his life… even if it means pretending to be someone completely different than he really is. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Biography
by Marcelo Hernandez Castillo
Bisexual Mexican American poet Hernandez Castillo shares his personal story of growing up undocumented, and constantly fearful, in California. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Elizabeth Acevedo
In this novel-in-verse, two Dominican teenage girls, one in DR and one in New York, lose their fathers in a plane crash. In alternating poems, each learns of hidden family secrets, and of each other. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by James McBride
September, 1969, in a housing project in Brooklyn: a cranky old church deacon shoots the projects' drug dealer at point-blank range in public. In the aftermath, McBride follows what happens from the POV of several African-Americans, Latinxs, and whites involved. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Gene Luen Yang
Graphic Novel. The former US Ambassador of Young People’s Literature and award-winning graphic novelist turns to his own life, the high school where he teaches, and their strikingly diverse men’s varsity basketball team. Here come the California State Championships!
- Biography
by Jason “Timbuktu” Diakité
Hip-hop star Timbuktu writes about his search for identity as a child with multiracial roots.
- Fiction
by Kacen Callender
Black, trans, seventeen-year-old artist Felix Love, outed at his competitive summer arts program, plots to get revenge. He also hopes to find the love his last name promises. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Non-Fiction
Edited by Michael Chabon and Ayelet Waldman
A collection of essays from some of our greatest thinkers, considering the impacts of various ACLU cases over the last 100 years.
- Fiction
by Abi Daré
Black Nigerian fourteen-year-old Adunni runs away from an arranged marriage, only to find herself enslaved as a servant to a wealthy city family instead of getting the education of which she dreams. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Non-Fiction
by Dana Loesch
Right-leaning Christian political commentator Loesch takes on “cancel culture” and chastises people from all sides for refusing to engage each other with grace and humility.
- Fiction
by Cynthia Leitich Smith
Louise Wolfe breaks up with her first boyfriend after he makes a racist remark about her Native American heritage. For her school newspaper, she begins covering the multicultural casting of the new school play and the racial hostilities it has exposed. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Souvankham Thammavongsa
From the award-winning poet comes these short stories exploring the hopes, desires, and struggles of Lao immigrants and refugees in an unnamed English-speaking city. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Charles Yu
A book that confronts and plays with Asian stereotypes: Chinese American actor Willis Wu dreams of being "Kung Fu Guy" instead of "Background Oriental Making a Weird Face" in a procedural cop show. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Isabel Allende
Fleeing the violence of the Spanish Civil War, a pregnant widow and an army doctor unite in an arranged marriage only to be swept up by the early days of World War II. All major characters are white. (Also available in Spanish: Largo Petalo del Mar.) Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Ben Oliver
The start of a new trilogy called “Maze Runner meets The Matrix.” Black sixteen-year-old Luka lives in a death row prison in a dystopian world where teenagers are kept captive and harvested to sustain the white elite Altered. Luka and his friends must escape The Loop, or die.
- Non-Fiction
by Jack Kornfield
Ever wanted to get started on the practice of Buddhist vipassana meditation, but it seemed too daunting? Here is a how-to guide, broken down for the beginner. Recommended by Nadia Mahdi. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Colson Whitehead
In segregated Tallahassee, Florida during the Jim Crow era, a Black teenage boy is sent to an horrific prison-like reform school. Based on a true story. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Biography
by Hazel Newlevant
Graphic Novel. During her seventeenth summer, white middle-class Newlevant took a summer job with a conservationist crew, clearing ivy from the forest in Portland, Oregon. The experience gave her insight about her privilege and its role in her life.
- Fiction
by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Considered by many to be the first existential novel, this 1864 short novel reads as the rambling memoirs of an unnamed white Russian former civil servant living in St. Petersburg. Translated from Russian. Recommended by Julia Fisher. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Scott Reintgen
Trilogy. Elliot, a Black teenager from Detroit, jumps at the chance to compete for a place on a deep-space voyage to another planet. Think Hunger Games combined with The 100. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Marieke Nijkamp and Manuel Preitano
Graphic Novel. Batman’s ally, The Oracle, finally gets her story told. White teen computer hacker Babs Gordon, shot and paralyzed, finds herself in a rehab center to learn how to adapt to life in a wheelchair, but soon realizes something’s not quite right at the facility.
- Fiction
edited by Patrice Caldwell
16 short stories, by various authors, centering Black female and gender non-conforming characters in fantasy and speculative fiction. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Gish Jen
Climate dystopia meets baseball: In a climate-changed future where the fair-skinned Netted have jobs and live on high ground but the non-white Surplus live day-to-day in swampland, a Surplus girl with a genius for pitching is brought into the world of the Netted to play ball. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Ryan LaSala
Something happened to Kane, a gay white boy in a small Connecticut town, but he can’t remember it, and now he and his racially diverse group of friends are encountering visions and getting caught in immersive fantasy worlds. Called “a colorful, queer fantasy pastiche.” Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Peter Heller
Two white, male Dartmouth students go on a weeks-long canoe trip in the wilds of northern Canada, only to find themselves in a life-and-death struggle for survival. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Natalia Sylvester
Fifteen-year-old Cuban American Mariana’s father is running for president, which puts her in the media spotlight at all times. Is supporting him worth it?
- Fiction
by Vikram Chandra
Now a Netflix miniseries, this adventure/thriller/mystery features the Indian city of Mumbai, where the Sikh detective Sartaj Singh tracks an evil gangster. Recommended by Nadia Mahdi. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Non-Fiction
by Jason Reynolds and Ibram X. Kendi
In 2016, Dr. Ibram X. Kendi published Stamped From the Beginning: A Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America. This version goes beyond merely making the content accessible to younger readers, as Dr. Kendi and Jason Reynolds together address the immediacy of young people taking action today. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Non-Fiction
by Richard Bell
The Underground Railroad took enslaved African-Americans north to freedom. Historian Richard Bell tells about a far more common event: the kidnapping of free Blacks into enslavement. Here he follows the South-bound trail of five particular boys. Recommended by Sue Ikenberry.
- Fiction
by Zadie Smith
In their childhood, two multiracial girls meet in a London tap dancing class. They find their paths intersecting throughout their lives. Recommended by Katherine Dunbar. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Non-Fiction
by Winona Guo and Priya Vulchi
Upon their high school graduation, Guo and Priya realized that their racial literacy education was lacking, so they took upon themselves to spend their gap year traveling the country collecting stories about disparate racial experiences. Here’s their collection.
- Non-Fiction
by Andy Greene
A behind-the-scenes look at NBC’s hit comedy show. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Sebastian Barry
In the aftermath of the Civil War, sixteen-year-old Lakota Sioux orphan Winona grows up on an unconventional home on a farm in Western Tennessee. The war may be over, but violence, rage, and uncertainty abound. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Joelle Charbonneau
You, the reader, know who detonated the bomb, but these diverse teens stuck inside their bombed-out suburban high school don’t know that the bomber is among them. A fast-paced thriller. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Quan Barry
In this humorous sports adventure, the members of 1989 Danver, Massachusetts High School Field Hockey team will do anything -- including tapping into the witchcraft made famous by their Salem ancestors -- to make the state finals. Characters are mostly white. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Fiction
by Jennifer Longo
White seventeen-year-old Muir knows not to get attached; she’s been in the foster care system her whole life. But what about when it starts to feel like home? Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Non-Fiction
by Bernd Heinrich
Acclaimed naturalist Heinrich studied pairs of tree swallows for eight years before compiling this fascinating look into the details of the animals’ lives. With illustrations and photographs.
- Fiction
by Don Delillo
This 1985 National Book Award winning dark comedy follows a white professor’s family when an “airborne toxic event” strikes their Midwestern college town, causing panic and re-evaluation of their lives. Recommended by Julia Fisher. Get @ DCPL Overdrive.
- Non-Fiction
by Sierra Crane Murdoch
In 2009, on the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation in North Carolina, Arikara ex-con Lissa Yellow Bird learned a young, white oil worker had disappeared and no one was looking for her. A tale of true crime, exploring the interlinked lives of the Arikara people and the whites.