American Library Association
(ALA) Best of the Best Selection
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Librarians selected the one hundred titles they
consider to be the best books for young adults from the last half of the
twentieth century. Titles were chosen from the Best Books for Young
Adults Booklists published from 1966 to 2000.
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TITLE & AUTHOR
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SYNOPSIS
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After The First Death*
CORMIER, R |
When a terrorist hijacks a camp bus full of kids, everyone involved
becomes a victim.
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Athletic Shorts: Six Short Stories
CRUTCHER, C |
Six deeply touching stories in which the reader revisits some memorable
characters from the author's distinguished novels.
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Bell Jar
PLATH, S |
Autobiographical novel about a young woman on the brink of madness and
suicide.
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Briar Rose
YOLEN, J |
Yolen's recasting of the Sleeping Beauty is evocatively grounded
in the horror of the Holocaust.
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Catherine, Called Birdie
CUSHMAN, K |
A young girl's hilarious account of her 14th year against a
background of everyday life on a medieval English manor in the year 1290.
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Chinese Handcuffs
CRUTCHER, C |
Dillion Hemingway must pick up the pieces of his own life after his
brother's suicide, plus deal with girlfriend problems and peer pressure.
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Chocolate War
CORMIER, R |
High school politics, cruelty and conformity sparked by the annual
fundraising event.
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Chosen
POTOK, C |
The odyssey of two young men journeying from boyhood to manhood, set
against the background of the conflicts and traditions of Hasidic and
Orthodox Jews.
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Deathwatch
WHITE, R |
Madec was not the kind of man Ben would ordinarily have chosen as a
companion for a quiet hunting trip. He was a cold man who was dangerous
with a gun.
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Downriver*
HOBBS, W |
Jesse and other rebellious teenage members of a wilderness survival
team abandon their adult leader, steal his van and rafts, and brave the
dangerous white waters of the Grand Canyon.
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Ender's Game
CARD, O |
Ender Wiggin's is the result of a genetic breeding program and years of
harsh, unforgiving training. Thinking he is only playing
computer-simulated war games, Ender is really commanding the last great
fleet on earth.
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Eva
DICKINSON, P |
After a terrible accident, a young girl wakes up to discover that she
has been given the body of a chimpanzee.
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Fallen Angels
MYERS, W |
17-year-old Richie Perry, just out of his Harlem high school, enlists
in the Army in the summer of 1967 and spends a devastating year on active
duty in Vietnam.
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Giver
LOWRY, L |
Jonas is given a huge task by the Elders of the Committee - to be
responsible for receiving and keeping all memories of the past.
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Go Ask Alice*
ANONYMOUS |
True and painful diary of a 15-year-old girl's experience with drugs
that eventually leads to her death.
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Handmaid's Tale
ATWOOD, M |
The story is set in a future America where women are categorized in
terms of whether or not they are able to bear children, and function in
the strictly defined roles assigned to them by men.
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Harry Potter And The Sorcerer's Stone (Book 1)
ROWLING, J
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Orphan Harry Potter's life changes when destiny calls and he isenrolled
at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
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Holes *
SACHAR, L |
Stanley Yelnats isn't surprised when a miscarriage of justice sends him
to a juvenile detention center. Subjected to hard labor digging huge
holes, Stanley befriends a fellow inmate and begins to unravel the mystery
surrounding his family's curse.
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Hoops *
MYERS, W |
A young man with a talent for basketball hopes that his game will be
his ticket out of the ghetto.
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I Am The Cheese*
CORMIER, R |
Adam Farmer desperately tries to remember the events surrounding the
mysterious disappearance of his parents.
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I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings
ANGELOU, M |
The moving and beautiful autobiography of a talented black woman
confronting her own life with dignity.
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If You Come Softly*
WOODSON, J |
For 15-year-old Jeremiah, who is black, and Ellie, who is Jewish, the
love they find is special and rare. But can it withstand the prejudice the
world around them feels towards a mixed relationship?
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Ironman
CRUTCHER, C |
When Bo Brewster's angry outbursts at school cost him a spot on the
football team and move him close to expulsion, he finds himself in an
anger management group with hard-edged survivors like himself.
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Jacob Have I Loved*
PATERSON, K |
A twin, overshadowed by her talented and charismatic sister, is
tormented by hate and jealousy.
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Joy Luck Club
TAN, A |
Chronicles the lives of four Chinese women, their forty-year
friendship, and how the death of one member brings her daughter into the
group, creating a new understanding for each.
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Kissing Doorknobs*
HESSER, T |
Tara is bright and funny, but is also troubled with quirky behaviors
she knows are irrational, but can't control - like kissing doorknobs. A
funny and compelling story about obsessive-compulsive behavior, and how it
affects relationships.
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Lyddie*
PATERSON, K |
When Lyddie’s family is tragically separated, she decides to take a
mill job in Lowell, Massachusetts to earn money to reunite them. Working
in the mill under appalling conditions, she must decided if she will fight
for better working conditions, or stay quiet until perhaps it is too late.
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Makes Me Wanna Holler: A Young Black Man in
America
MCCALL, N |
A black Washington Post reporter who served time recounts his life and
brilliantly shows why prison has become a rite of passage for many young
black men.
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Maus: A Survivor Tale
SPIEGELMAN, A |
When Art Spiegelman undertook an epic account of the Holocaust and its
impact on the American son of an Auschwitz survivor in the form of a comic
book featuring mice, cats, and other emblematic animals, few could have
foreseen the masterpiece that resulted.
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Midwife's Apprentice*
CUSHMAN, K |
This is the story of a spirited young woman in Medieval England.
Homeless, nameless and alone, she persuades the village midwife to take
her in.
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Nothing But The Truth
AVI |
A young high school student is suspended for humming "The Star
Spangled Banner" during homeroom and finds himself the focus of a
national news story.
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Peeling The Onion*
ORR, W |
Anna is 17 when a car accident alters her life. Thrust into a world of
pain, fear and disassociation from the layers that made up who she used to
be - her looks, her friends, her karate prowess - Anna slowly comes to see
who she really is.
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Pigman And Me
ZINDEL, P |
A tender yet fast-paced and funny biography revealing a sensitive boy
struggling to overcome the cruelties of life with humor and a little bit
of help from the wise "pigman".
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Rules Of The Road
BAUER, J |
Jenna Boller, employee of a shoe store chain, is hired to drive the
store's elderly president for the summer. Thus begins a cross-country
adventure where she and her employer learn a lot about the rules of the
road - and the rules of life.
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Runner
VOIGT, C |
Bullet Tillerman is a track team who answers to no one. He'd rather be
cut from the team than work with the promising new runner, Tamer Shipp.
But Bullet finds his own rules are becoming too painful to live by.
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Running Loose
CRUTCHER, C |
Louie Banks takes a stand against the coach when he sets the team up to
injure a black player on an opposing team, and learns that you can't be
honorable with dishonorable men.
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Shabanu: Daughter Of The
Wind*
STAPLES, S |
The second daughter of a Pakistani family, Shabanu has been brought up
with more freedom than most Muslim girls. Should she listen to the
stirrings of her own heart when her family insists on an arranged
marriage?
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Sixteen: Short Stories
By Outstanding Writers For Young Adults*
GALLO, D (ed.)
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Sixteen representative short stories by today's best-known writers for
teenagers.
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Slam*
MYERS, W |
17-year-old Greg "Slam" Harris can do it all on the court,
but his grades aren't so hot. When his teachers put pressure on him, he
blows up, and suddenly Slam is going one-on-one with his future.
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Soldier's Heart*
PAULSEN, G |
Charley Goddard, who has never been any place beyond Minnesota, and
thinks war would be a great adventure, lies his way into the Union Army at
the age of 15. Unsparing in the details of what actually happens on the
battlefield.
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Somewhere In The Darkness
MYERS, W |
A teenage boy accompanies his father, who has recently escaped from
prison, on a trip that turns out to be an often painful, time of discovery
for them both. He learns that although some things can't be fixed, they
can be understood - and forgiven.
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Staying Fat For Sarah Burnes
CRUTCHER, C |
When smart, sarcastic Sarah Burns was three years old, her face and
hands were badly burned in a mysterious accident. 15 years later, Sarah's
horrific past finally catches up with her, and it becomes her friend
Eric's mission to help her through the pain.
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Tangerine
BLOOR, E |
Paul Fisher, who is legally blind, has a passion for soccer and a deep
mistrust of his football hero brother, Erik. Why is everyone - except Paul
himself - blind to the terrifying truth about Erik?
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Tears Of A Tiger
DRAPER, S |
Andy is an African-American teenager whose life derails when, after a
long evening of drinking, the car he drives crashes, killing his best
friend. His guilt and despair lead him to turn away from family, friends
and his plans for the future.
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Things They Carried
O'BRIEN, T |
A profound study of men at war and the intangible burdens of soldier -
grief, terror, love, longing.
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For Dancing*
HURWIN, D |
Juliana is dark and serious, close to her family and recently dumped by
her beloved boyfriend Jack; Samantha is blonde and outrageous, playing the
romantic field and angered by her own family's dissolution. It's the
summer before their senior year, and the two girls, longtime best friends,
take turns narrating the events that unfold when Julie discovers that she
has cancer.
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Tomorrow When The War
Began*
MARSDEN, J |
Returning from a camp trip in the Australian bush, Ellie and six of her
friends find their families gone, their homes destroyed, and their country
invaded. Ellie must decide whether to hide, surrender or find a way to
fight.
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Watership Down
ADAMS, R |
Picturesque saga of a maverick band of rabbits that, against all odds,
seek a new home and a better society.
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We Are Witnesses
BOAS, J |
Five Jewish teenagers kept diaries of their lives under Hitler's
twisted rule. Through them unfolds a personal history of the Holocaust and
the hope each had in the face of horror and death.
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Weetzie Bat
BLOCK, F |
This story follows the wild adventure of Weetzie Bat and her Los
Angeles punk friends, Dirk, Duck-Man, and Secret-Agent-Lover-Man.
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Whirligig*
FLEISCHMAN, P |
Offered a chance to atone for causing the death of a young girl,
16-year-old Brent undertakes a rite of repentance, journeying to the four
corners of the USA building whirligigs.
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