book recommendations for high school

For Strong Girls Who Like Poetry: Elizabeth Acevedo’s The Poet X

If I explain too much of the story, I think the magic of Acevedo’s storytelling will be lost. It’ll feel too much like an average teen angst story. And if I share what made this stand out, I may spoil some parts of the book. So here’s what I’ll say: Acevedo found the voice of the teenage girl and put it into poetry.

Pride by Ibi Zoboi: A Classic Remix

The story follows Zuri as she grapples changes in her community, her family, and in herself. Inspired by Jane Austen’s classic, Pride stays close to the original’s plot points, while at the same time able to stand on its own as a relevant, engaging, and timely tale.

A Book that Broke My Heart: Into the Wild

The fact that he died is not a secret in this book–it’s written on the cover, in the introduction, and the subject of the first chapter. But that did not stop me from wishing that he lived with every turn of the page, that if I talked to the pages of the book, maybe he would handle things differently.