The Diverse Families bookshelf was created and funded through numerous grants. Due to lack of additional grants and the loss of key personnel, the project has come to an end. We have tremendously enjoyed creating this database and hope that it can help bring readers and books together.
Browse by Race & Culture:
Biracial/Multiracial
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The Throne of Fire
Rick Riordan
Ever since the gods of Ancient Egypt were unleashed in the modern world, Carter Kane and his sister Sadie have been in trouble. As descendants of the House of Life, the Kanes have some powers at their command, but the devious gods haven't given them much time to master their skills at Brooklyn House, which has become a training ground for young magicians. And now their most threatening enemy yet -- the chaos snake Apophis -- is rising. If they don't prevent him from breaking free in a few days' time, the world will come to an end. In other words, it's a typical week for the Kane family. To have any chance of battling the Forces of Chaos, the Kanes must revive the sun god Ra. But that would be a feat more powerful than any magician has ever accomplished. First they have to search the world for the three sections of the Book of Ra, then they have to learn how to chant its spells. Oh, and did we mention that no one knows where Ra is exactly?
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The Window
Michael Dorris
When ten-year-old Rayona's Native American mother enters a treatment facility, her estranged father, a Black man, finally introduces her to his side of the family, who are not at all what she expected.
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They Called Themselves the KKK: The Birth of an American Terrorist Group
Susan Campbell Bartoletti
Documents the history and origin of the Ku Klux Klan from its beginning in Pulaski, Tennessee, and provides personal accounts, congressional documents, diaries, and more.
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Things Too Huge to Fix by Saying Sorry
Susan Vaught
A family mystery leads Dani Beans to investigate the secrets of Ole Miss and the dark history of race relations in Oxford, Mississippi.
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Three Little Words
Sarah N. Harvey
When Sid leaves his foster family on their remote island home in search of the mother he doesn't remember and a brother he's never met, he's ill-prepared for the surprises he finds.
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Through My Window
Tony Bradman
When Jo is sick and has to stay home from school, her mother promises her a special surprise, and all day long she waits eagerly to see what it might be.
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Tolerance
Kimberley Jane Pryor
Explains what tolerance is, describes different ways it can be expressed, and discusses why it should be practiced.
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Transracial Adoption: Children and Parents Speak
Constance Pohl
Explores the issues related to interracial and international adoptions, using interviews with black, biracial, Asian, and Hispanic young people who were adopted into white or biracial families.
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Trevor's Story: Growing Up Biracial
Bethany Kandel
Ten-year-old Trevor Sage-El describes his life at home and at school, his feelings about being the son of a white mother and a black father, and what he likes and does not like about being biracial.
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Tripping on the Color Line: Black-White Multiracial Families in a Racially Divided World
Heather M. Dalmage
Through interviews with individuals from black-white multiracial families, together with sociological analysis, this study examines the challenges faced by people living in such families, and explores how their experiences demonstrate the need for rethinking race in America.
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Twenty Yawns
Jane Smiley
Featuring lyrical text and beautiful illustrations, this bedtime tale from Pulitzer Prize winner Jane Smiley and Caldecott Honor recipient Lauren Castillo evokes the splashy fun of the beach and the quietude of a moonlit night, with twenty yawns sprinkled in for children to discover and count. As her mom reads a bedtime story, Lucy drifts off. But later, she awakens in a dark, still room, and everything looks mysterious. How will she ever get back to sleep?
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Two Mrs. Gibsons
Toyomi Igus
The biracial daughter of an African American father and a Japanese mother fondly recalls growing up with her mother and her father's mother, two very different but equally loving women.
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Unplugged: Ella Gets Her Family Back
Laura Pedersen
Upset that her family is so focused on the screens on their various electronic devices that they no longer talk, laugh, and play games together, Ella takes all of their chargers and small devices.
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Unspoken (The Lynburn Legacy #1)
Sarah Rees Brennan
Kami Glass is in love with someone she's never met--a boy she's talked to in her head since she was born. This has made her an outsider in the sleepy English town of Sorry-in-the-Vale, but she has learned ways to turn that to her advantage. Her life seems to be in order, until disturbing events begin to occur. There has been screaming in the woods and the manor overlooking the town has lit up for the first time in 10 years. The Lynburn family, who ruled the town a generation ago and who all left without warning, have returned. Now Kami can see that the town she has known and loved all her life is hiding a multitude of secrets--and a murderer. The key to it all just might be the boy in her head. The boy she thought was imaginary is real, and definitely and deliciously dangerous.
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Up From the Sea
Leza Lowitz
A novel in verse about the March 2011 tsunami that sent Japan into chaos, told from the point-of-view of Kai, a biracial teenaged boy. The March 2011 tsunami devastated Kai's coastal Japanese village, and he lost nearly everyone and everything he cares about. When he's offered a trip to New York to meet kids whose lives were changed by 9/11, Kai realizes he also has a chance to look for his estranged American father. Visiting Ground Zero on its tenth anniversary, Kai discovers that the only way to make something good come out of the disaster back home is to return there and help rebuild his town.
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Vengeance Road
Erin Bowman
When Kate Thompson’s father is killed by the notorious Rose Riders for a mysterious journal that reveals the secret location of a gold mine, the eighteen-year-old disguises herself as a boy and takes to the gritty plains looking for answers and justice. What she finds are devious strangers, dust storms, and a pair of brothers who refuse to quit riding in her shadow. But as Kate gets closer to the secrets about her family, she gets closer to the truth about herself and must decide if there's room for love in a heart so full of hate.
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Violet
Tania Duprey Stehlik
Violet's mother is red, and her father is blue--so why isn't she red or blue? Why is she purple? Upset and confused, Violet goes to her mother. Using paints, her mother shows her that when you combine red and blue, you get violet!
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Wait and See
Tony Bradman
It's Saturday, and Jo has some pocket money to spend. So Jo and her mum go shopping, while Dad stays at home to make lunch for them all. But what should she spend her money on? She'll have to wait and see.
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Waiting for Baby
Rachel Fuller
A young child learns what to expect when his new sibling is born and comes into his life. On board pages.
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War of the Eagles
Eric Walters
During World War II near Prince Rupert, British Columbia, Jed comes to better understand and take pride in his British and native Tsimshian ancestry through caring for an injured eagle at a military fort and losing his Japanese Canadian best friend to an internment camp.
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We Adopted You, Benjamin Koo
Linda Walvoord
Nine-year-old Benjamin Koo Andrews, adopted from Korea as an infant, describes what it's like to grow up adopted from another country.
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W.E.B. Du Bois (Biographies of Biracial Achievers)
Jim Whiting
Highlights the life and accomplishments of the African American scholar and leader who devoted himself to gaining equality for his people.
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Welcome to Bordertown
Holly Black and Ellen Kushner
Stories and poems set in the urban land of Bordertown, a city on the edge of the faerie and human world, populated by human and elfin runaways.
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Whale Talk
Chris Crutcher
Intellectually and athletically gifted, TJ, a multiracial, adopted teenager, shuns organized sports and the gung-ho athletes at his high school until he agrees to form a swimming team and recruits some of the school's less popular students.
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What are You?: Voices of Mixed-Race Young People
Pearl Fuyo Gaskins
Many young people of racially mixed backgrounds discuss their feelings about family relationships, prejudice, dating, personal identity, and other issues.