Middle Grade Fiction

Jennifer Chan (Chinese American) is obsessed with extraterrestrial life, a fascination she shared with her late dad. Biracial (Korean/white) Mallory Moss, always worried about fitting in, may not believe in aliens from other worlds but admires her new neighbor Jennifer’s ability to be herself even as she distances herself from Jennifer once the school year begins.

Sam, white, and Asha, Indian American, both autistic, are best friends until Sam is accepted to Castleton Academy for seventh grade. At Castleton, Sam is bullied until popular girl Prestyn takes a sudden interest in him.

Zhanna Arshanskaya and her sister, Frina, are two talented musicians growing up in Ukraine in the 1930s.

Next to the synagogue, in the building that houses the mikvah (ritual bath), Aviva lives with her mother, Ema, and a dybbuk—visible only to Aviva—who delights in wreaking minor havoc.

The girls in Jillian’s fifth-grade class try hard to look alike. They wear the same bland, neutral colors and ho-hum hairstyles on the same days each week. Jillian, bored by this unofficial uniform, longs to be herself—and speak up more, too—but she’s afraid to stand out.

Eleven-year-old Maizy Chen travels from Los Angeles with her single mom to spend the summer in Last Chance, Minnesota. They are there to help with the family’s Chinese restaurant, the Golden Palace, because her grandfather is ill.

African American Melvin is about to start high school in Spokane, Washington, in the 1950s, following in the footsteps of his high-achieving older brother, Chuck, and older sister, Marian. It would be a daunting prospect even if he didn’t have a stutter.

In 1860, sensitive, sheltered Silas, 12 lives with his father, Martin Bird, and Mittenwool, a ghost who’s been Silas’s companion for as long as he can remember.

Chinese American Mei, 13, lives in a Sierra Nevada lumber camp in 1885. Her father, Hao, is the head cook; her best friend, Bee, is the white daughter of the camp manager.

Twelve-year-old Sofia, Samoan/white, living in New Zealand in the mid-1970s, is chosen to participate in a regional speech competition after wowing with a classroom presentation titled “About Me.”