9-12 Books | University of Central Florida

This collection contains materials from the DIVerse Families bibliography organized Grades 9-12.

DIVerse Families is a comprehensive bibliography that demonstrates the growing diversity of families in the United States. This type of bibliography provides teachers, librarians, counselors, adoption agencies, children/young adults, and especially parents and grandparents needing to empower their children with materials that reflect their families.

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Symptoms of Being Human

Jeff Garvin

A gender-fluid teenager who struggles with identity creates a blog on the topic that goes viral, and faces ridicule at the hands of fellow students.
Taking Terri Mueller

Norma Fox Mazer

For as long as I can remember, It's just been Daddy and me. I can't remember my mother. I was told she died in an accident when I was four, and that's all I know about her. I don't understand why there isn't even a picture of her. The other thing I don't understand is why we're always moving — different towns — with no explanations. I know something is wrong. It begins with my birth certificate— my only link to my mother. Then I overhear a conversation: Tell terri the truth , Why are we moving all the time? Are we running away from something or someone? What kind of secret is Daddy hiding...and why can't he share it with me.
Taproot

Keezy Young

Blue is having a hard time moving on. He’s in love with his best friend. He’s also dead. Luckily, Hamal can see ghosts, leaving Blue free to haunt him to his heart’s content. But something eerie is happening in town, leaving the local afterlife unsettled, and when Blue realizes Hamal’s strange ability may be putting him in danger, Blue has to find a way to protect him, even if it means…leaving him.
Tash Hearts Tolstoy

Kathryn Ormsbee

Fame and success come at a cost for Natasha "Tash" Zelenka when she creates the web series "Unhappy Families," a modern adaptation of Anna Karenina--written by Tash's eternal love Leo Tolstoy.
Teens & Gay Issues

Hal Marcovitz and George Gallup Jr.

Uses data from the Gallup Youth Survey and other sources to examine issues related to teens and same sex relationships.
Teens with Single Parents: Why Me?

Margaret A. Schultz

Examines the effects of living in a single-parent family, discussing such topics as emotional aspects and economic factors.
Tell Me Again How a Crush Should Feel

Sara Farizan

High school junior Leila's Persian heritage already makes her different from her classmates at Armstead Academy, and if word got out that she liked girls, life would be twice as hard. But when new girl, Saskia, shows up, Leila starts to take risks she never thought she would, especially when it looks as if the attraction between them is mutual, so she struggles to sort out her growing feelings by confiding in her old friends.
Terror at Bottle Creek

Watt Key

Thirteen-year-old Cort's father is a local expert on hunting and swamp lore in lower Alabama who has been teaching his son everything he knows. But when a deadly Gulf Coast hurricane makes landfall, Cort must unexpectedly put his all skills--and bravery--to the test.
Tessa Masterson Will Go to Prom

Brendan Halpin and Emily Franklin

Feeling humiliated and confused when his best friend Tessa rejects his love and reveals a long-held secret, high school senior Luke must decide if he should stand by Tessa when she invites a female date to the prom, sparking a firestorm of controversy in their small Indiana town.
That Inevitable Victorian Thing

E.K. Johnston

In a near-future Toronto where the British Empire never fell, Helena, August, and Margaret are caught off-guard by the discovery of a love so intense they are willing to change the course of the monarchy to keep it.
The 57 Bus

Dashka Slater

One teenager in a skirt. One teenager with a lighter. One moment that changes both of their lives forever. If it weren't for the 57 bus, Sasha and Richard never would have met. Both were high school students from Oakland, California, one of the most diverse cities in the country, but they inhabited different worlds. Sasha, a white teen, lived in the middle-class foothills and attended a small private school. Richard, a black teen, lived in the crime-plagued flatlands and attended a large public one. Each day, their paths overlapped for a mere eight minutes. But one afternoon on the bus ride home from school, a single reckless act left Sasha severely burned, and Richard charged with two hate crimes and facing life imprisonment. The 57 Bus is Dashka Slater's true account of the case that garnered international attention and thrust both teenagers into the spotlight.
The ABC’s of LGBT+

Ashley Mardell

Shares in-depth definitions of LGBT+ terms, and offers personal anecdotes from LGBT+ people.
The Absolute True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

Sherman Alexie

Junior, who is already beaten up regularly for being a skinny kid in glasses, goes to the rich white school miles away. Now he's a traget there as well. How he survives all this is an absolute shining must-read and a triumph of the human spirit.
The Apocalypse of Elena Mendoza

Shaun David Hutchinson

Elena, the first scientifically confirmed virgin birth, acquires the ability to heal by touch at age sixteen, the same year that people start disappearing in beams of light, causing her to wonder if she is bringing about the Apocalypse.
The Arrival

Shaun Tan

In this wordless graphic novel, a man leaves his homeland and sets off for a new country, where he must build a new life for himself and his family.
The Art of Being Normal

Lisa Williamson

David Piper, always an outsider, forms an unlikely friendship with Leo Denton who, from the first day at his new school wants only to be invisible, but when David's deepest secret gets out, that he wants to be a girl, things get very messy for both of them.
The Art of Starving

Sam J. Miller

Matt hasn’t eaten in days. His stomach stabs and twists inside, pleading for a meal, but Matt won’t give in. The hunger clears his mind, keeps him sharp—and he needs to be as sharp as possible if he’s going to find out just how Tariq and his band of high school bullies drove his sister, Maya, away. Matt’s hardworking mom keeps the kitchen crammed with food, but Matt can resist the siren call of casseroles and cookies because he has discovered something: the less he eats the more he seems to have...powers. The ability to see things he shouldn’t be able to see. The knack of tuning in to thoughts right out of people’s heads. Maybe even the authority to bend time and space. So what is lunch, really, compared to the secrets of the universe? Matt decides to infiltrate Tariq’s life, then use his powers to uncover what happened to Maya. All he needs to do is keep the hunger and longing at bay. No problem. But Matt doesn’t realize there are many kinds of hunger...and he isn’t in control of all of them.
The Astonishing Color of After

Emily X.R. Pan

After her mother's suicide, grief-stricken Leigh Sanders travels to Taiwan to stay with grandparents she never met, determined to find her mother who she believes turned into a bird.
The Beauty That Remains

Ashley Woodfolk

Autumn, Shay, and Logan, whose lives intersect in complicated ways, each lose someone close to them and must work through their grief.
The Best We Could Do: An Illustrated Memoir

Thi Bui

Exploring the anguish of immigration and the lasting effects that displacement has on a child and her family, Bui documents the story of her family's daring escape after the fall of South Vietnam in the 1970s, and the difficulties they faced building new lives for themselves.
The Blending of Foster and Adopted Children into a Family

Heather Lehr Wagner and Marvin Rosen

Explores issues facing families confronting the challenges created by adoption and foster care, and identifies steps members of blended families can take to ensure that they have a strong foundation.
The Book of David

Anonymous .

The author of this fictional diary began writing for a class assignment, but soon it became much more to him. As the star player of his high school football team, he faces a lot of pressure and expectation. Not to mention the secret that he's harboring inside. The secret that could change everything. And as David quickly learns, nothing stays secret forever. His innermost thoughts and feelings are chronicled in the diary he left behind.
The Boy in the Dress

David Walliams

Dennis' life is boring and lonely. His mother left two years ago, his truck driver father is depressed, his brother is a bully and, worst of all, "no hugging" is one of their household rules. But one thing Dennis does have is soccer--he's the leading scorer on his team. Oh, and did we mention his secret passion for fashion?
The Boy with Two Lives

Abbas Kazerooni

From the author of the bestselling memoir On Two Feet and Wings, this is the story of refugee Abbas's double life in England: elite schoolboy by day, homeless by night.
The Breakaways

Cathy G. Johnson

Quiet, sensitive Faith starts middle school already worrying about how she will fit in. To her surprise, Amanda, a popular eighth grader, convinces her to join the school soccer team, the Bloodhounds. Having never played soccer in her life, Faith ends up on the C team, a ragtag group that’s way better at drama than at teamwork. Although they are awful at soccer, Faith and her teammates soon form a bond both on and off the soccer field that challenges their notions of loyalty, identity, friendship, and unity. The Breakaways from Cathy G. Johnson is a raw, and beautifully honest graphic novel that looks into the lives of a diverse and defiantly independent group of kids learning to make room for themselves in the world.