https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES Check out some of our student's favorite books! en-us 2020-08-30 04:07:37 UTC 2023-02-23 06:50:26 UTC hello@padlet.com https://padlet.net/icons/png/1f4da.png ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/706982458 It all starts when Marisa picks up the wrong cell phone. When she returns it to Rene, she feels curiously drawn to him. But Marisa and Rene aren't exactly a match made in heaven. For one thing, Marisa is a chola; she's a lot of girl, and she's not ashamed of it. Skinny Rene gangles like a sackful of elbows and wears a calculator on his belt. In other words, he's a geek. So why can't Marisa stay away from him?   ]]> 2020-08-30 04:12:33 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/706982458 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/706984414 You'd think a knife in the ribs would be the end of things, but for Chuy, that's when his life at last gets interesting. He finally sees that people love him, faces the consequences of his actions, finds in himself compassion and bravery . . . and even stumbles on what may be true love.

A funny, touching, and wholly original story by one of the finest authors writing for young readers today. ]]> 2020-08-30 04:16:34 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/706984414 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/706985656 Berlin, 1942: When Bruno returns home from school one day, he discovers that his belongings are being packed in crates. His father has received a promotion and the family must move to a new house far, far away, where there is no one to play with and nothing to do. A tall fence stretches as far as the eye can see and cuts him off from the strange people in the distance.
 
But Bruno longs to be an explorer and decides that there must be more to this desolate new place than meets the eye. While exploring his new environment, he meets another boy whose life and circumstances are very different from his own, and their meeting results in a friendship that has devastating consequences.]]> 2020-08-30 04:19:18 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/706985656 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/706986241 When Brittany Ellis walks into chemistry class on the first day of senior year, she has no clue that her carefully created "perfect" life is about to unravel before her eyes. She's forced to be lab partners with Alex Fuentes, a gang member from the other side of town, and he is about to threaten everything she's worked so hard for-her flawless reputation, her relationship with her boyfriend, and the secret that her home life is anything but perfect.

Alex is a bad boy and he knows it. So when he makes a bet with his friends to lure Brittany into his life, he thinks nothing of it. But soon Alex realizes Brittany is a real person with real problems, and suddenly the bet he made in arrogance turns into something much more.

Neither Brittany nor Alex is prepared for the most surprising chemical reaction of all--love.]]> 2020-08-30 04:20:29 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/706986241 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/706989416 Kristina Georgia Snow is the perfect daughter: gifted high-school junior, quiet, never any trouble. But on a trip to visit her absentee father, she meets a boy who introduces her to crank. At first she finds it freeing, but soon Kristina's personality disappears inside the drug. What began as a wild, ecstatic ride turns into a struggle through hell for her mind, her soul, and her life.]]> 2020-08-30 04:25:55 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/706989416 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708092054 A drug deal goes south and a cop has been shot. Lil J's on the run. And he's starting to get dope sick. He'd do anything to change the last twenty-four hours, and when he stumbles into an abandoned building, it actually might be possible. . . .

Elements of magical realism intensify this harrowing story about drug use, violence, perceptions of reality, and second chances.

This ALA Quick Pick for Reluctant Young Adult Readers earned multiple starred reviews and was described as "vivid," "nuanced," and "intriguing." Booklist said: “Myers’ narrative strategy is so inherently dramatic that it captures his readers’ attentions and imaginations, inviting not only empathy but also thoughtful discussion.”

]]> 2020-08-31 06:09:24 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708092054 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708094726 Delia loves Double Dutch. And she's good at it. Really good. So good that her team has a chance to win the World Double Dutch Championships this year -- Delia is sure of it. What she is less sure of is her chance of passing the school's state exam, because Delia has been using her success at Double Dutch to mask a secret that could jeopardize her place on the team, and also her future.

Delia's not the only one with a secret. Her potential boyfriend, Randy, has one too -- his dad has been missing for weeks, and Randy hasn't told anyone for fear he'll be put in a foster home. But he is running out of money and getting scared.

The one thing that isn't a secret is that their classmates, the Tolliver twins, are out to cause trouble. With their skull caps, angry demeanors, and hints of violence emanating from even the way they stalk down the school halls, they seem to enjoy intimidating the other kids. But will they cross the line from intimidation to violence?

With consummate skill and an uncanny ability to capture how real kids think, act, and feel, Tears of a Tiger author Sharon M. Draper weaves these three stories tighter and tighter, creating a novel that tingles with suspense and emotion.]]> 2020-08-31 06:11:39 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708094726 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708096515 Eighteen-year-old Eli discovers a shocking secret about his life and his family while working for a Nobel Prize-winning scientist whose specialty is genetic engineering.]]> 2020-08-31 06:13:08 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708096515 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708098687 In order to develop a secure defense against a hostile alien race's next attack, government agencies breed child geniuses and train them as soldiers. A brilliant young boy, Andrew "Ender" Wiggin lives with his kind but distant parents, his sadistic brother Peter, and the person he loves more than anyone else, his sister Valentine. Peter and Valentine were candidates for the soldier-training program but didn't make the cut—young Ender is the Wiggin drafted to the orbiting Battle School for rigorous military training.

Ender's skills make him a leader in school and respected in the Battle Room, where children play at mock battles in zero gravity. Yet growing up in an artificial community of young soldiers Ender suffers greatly from isolation, rivalry from his peers, pressure from the adult teachers, and an unsettling fear of the alien invaders. His psychological battles include loneliness, fear that he is becoming like the cruel brother he remembers, and fanning the flames of devotion to his beloved sister.

Is Ender the general Earth needs? But Ender is not the only result of the genetic experiments. The war with the Buggers has been raging for a hundred years, and the quest for the perfect general has been underway for almost as long. Ender's two older siblings are every bit as unusual as he is, but in very different ways. Between the three of them lie the abilities to remake a world. If, that is, the world survives.]]> 2020-08-31 06:14:59 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708098687 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708099333 Despite the tumor-shrinking medical miracle that has bought her a few years, Hazel has never been anything but terminal, her final chapter inscribed upon diagnosis. But when a gorgeous plot twist named Augustus Waters suddenly appears at Cancer Kid Support Group, Hazel’s story is about to be completely rewritten.

Insightful, bold, irreverent, and raw, The Fault in Our Stars brilliantly explores the funny, thrilling, and tragic business of being alive and in love.]]> 2020-08-31 06:15:34 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708099333 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708101740 One morning in the small town of Coldwater, Michigan, the phones start ringing. The voices say they are calling from heaven. Is it the greatest miracle ever? Or some cruel hoax? As news of these strange calls spreads, outsiders flock to Coldwater to be a part of it.

At the same time, a disgraced pilot named Sully Harding returns to Coldwater from prison to discover his hometown gripped by “miracle fever.” Even his young son carries a toy phone, hoping to hear from his mother in heaven.

As the calls increase, and proof of an afterlife begins to surface, the town—and the world—transforms. Only Sully, convinced there is nothing beyond this sad life, digs into the phenomenon, determined to disprove it for his child and his own broken heart.

Moving seamlessly between the invention of the telephone in 1876 and a world obsessed with the next level of communication, Mitch Albom takes readers on a breathtaking ride of frenzied hope.

]]> 2020-08-31 06:17:30 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708101740 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708103460 Eddie is a wounded war veteran, an old man who has lived, in his mind, an uninspired life. His job is fixing rides at a seaside amusement park. On his 83rd birthday, a tragic accident kills him, as he tries to save a little girl from a falling cart. He awakes in the afterlife, where he learns that heaven is not a destination. It's a place where your life is explained to you by five people, some of whom you knew, others who may have been strangers. One by one, from childhood to soldier to old age, Eddie's five people revisit their connections to him on earth, illuminating the mysteries of his "meaningless" life, and revealing the haunting secret behind the eternal question: "Why was I here?"]]> 2020-08-31 06:18:59 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708103460 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708106364 Tigers don’t cry—or do they? After the death of his longtime friend and fellow Hazelwood Tiger in a car accident, Andy, the driver, blames himself and cannot get past his guilt and pain. While his other friends have managed to work through their grief and move on, Andy allows death to become the focus of his life. In the months that follow the accident, the lives of Andy and his friends are traced through a series of letters, articles, homework assignments, and dialogues, and it becomes clear that Tigers do indeed need to cry.]]> 2020-08-31 06:21:27 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708106364 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708108601 When Dr. Louis Creed takes a new job and moves his family to the idyllic, rural town of Ludlow, Maine, this new beginning seems too good to be true. Yet despite Ludlow's tranquility, there's an undercurrent of danger that lingers...like the graveyard in the woods near the Creeds' home, where generations of children have buried their beloved pets. 

Behind the "pet sematary", there is another burial ground, one that lures people to it with seductive promises...and ungodly temptations. A blood-chilling truth is hidden there - one more terrifying than death itself and hideously more powerful. An ominous fate befalls anyone who dares tamper with this forbidden place, as Louis is about to discover for himself.... 

]]> 2020-08-31 06:23:22 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708108601 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708112690 Life at 15 isn't easy for a girl if she's shy and hates the way she looks. Each day is heaven or hell, depending on who talks to her, or who doesn't. So when she's finally accepted by a group, she doesn't refuse their party games, even if it means taking LSD. Soon she's taking little pills to wake up and others to go to sleep, and the days begin to blur. Leaving the secure, middle-class circle of her family, she travels into a nightmare realm of hustlers and dealers. Homeless, driven by drug highs and lows, she sometimes tries to regain control over her life. But it's much easier to just get high again.

Based on a 15-year-old's diary, Go Ask Alice is the intimate account of one girl's fatal journey into the world of drug addiction. Poignant and unflinchingly honest, her story is a tragedy that is repeated in towns and cities across the country.

]]> 2020-08-31 06:26:31 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708112690 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708115822 Marriage can be a real killer. One of the most critically acclaimed suspense writers of our time, New York Times best seller Gillian Flynn, takes that statement to its darkest place in this unpausable masterpiece about a marriage gone terribly, terribly wrong. The Chicago Tribune proclaimed that her work "draws you in and keeps you reading with the force of a pure but nasty addiction." Gone Girl's toxic mix of sharp-edged wit and deliciously chilling prose creates a nerve-fraying thriller that confounds you at every turn.

On a warm summer morning in North Carthage, Missouri, it is Nick and Amy Dunne's fifth wedding anniversary. Presents are being wrapped and reservations are being made when Nick's clever and beautiful wife disappears from their rented McMansion on the Mississippi River. Husband-of-the-Year Nick isn't doing himself any favors with cringe-worthy daydreams about the slope and shape of his wife's head, but passages from Amy's diary reveal the alpha-girl perfectionist could have put anyone dangerously on edge.

Under mounting pressure from the police and the media - as well as Amy's fiercely doting parents - the town golden boy parades an endless series of lies, deceits, and inappropriate behavior. Nick is oddly evasive, and he's definitely bitter - but is he really a killer?

As the cops close in, every couple in town is soon wondering how well they know the one that they love. With his twin sister, Margo, at his side, Nick stands by his innocence. Trouble is, if Nick didn't do it, where is that beautiful wife? And what was in that silvery gift box hidden in the back of her bedroom closet?

With her razor-sharp writing and trademark psychological insight, Gillian Flynn delivers a fast-paced, devilishly dark, and ingeniously plotted thriller that confirms her status as one of the hottest writers around.

]]> 2020-08-31 06:29:03 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708115822 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708117723 Computer whiz Teddy and his family are sent reeling after his little sister Tina is killed in the crossfire of a drive-by shooting. Teddy wants revenge and begins planning how to get it; luckily the police interrupt his scheme before he can act. Now he's been placed into the capable hands of Mariana Diaz, the tough probation officer who just might save him from himself.

]]> 2020-08-31 06:30:44 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708117723 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708118987 Kaeleigh and Raeanne are 16-year-old identical twins, the daughters of a district court judge father and politician mother running for U.S. Congress. Everything on the surface seems fine, but underneath run very deep and damaging secrets.

When the girls were nine, Daddy turned to his beloved Kaeleigh in ways a father never should. Raeanne needs to numb the pain of not being Daddy's favorite; Kaeleigh wants to do everything she can to feel something normal, even if it means cutting herself and vomiting after every binge.

How Kaeleigh and Raeanne figure out just what it means to be whole again when their entire world has been torn to shreds is the guts and heart of this powerful, disturbing, and utterly remarkable book.

]]> 2020-08-31 06:31:45 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708118987 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708120463 A brilliant, luminous story of first love, family, loss, and betrayal for fans of John Green, David Levithan, and Rainbow Rowell.

Jude and her brother, Noah, are incredibly close twins. At thirteen, isolated Noah draws constantly and is falling in love with the charismatic boy next door, while daredevil Jude surfs and cliff-dives and wears red-red lipstick and does the talking for both of them. But three years later, Jude and Noah are barely speaking. Something has happened to wreck the twins in different and divisive ways…until Jude meets a cocky, broken, beautiful boy, as well as an unpredictable new mentor. The early years are Noah's story to tell. The later years are Jude's. What the twins don't realize is that they each have only half the story, and if they could just find their way back to one another, they’d have a chance to remake their world.

This radiant, fully alive novel from the critically acclaimed author of The Sky Is Everywhere will leave you breathless and teary and laughing - often all at once.

]]> 2020-08-31 06:32:54 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708120463 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708122354 Earthy, magical, and utterly charming, this tale of family life in turn-of-the-century Mexico became a best-selling phenomenon with its winning blend of poignant romance and bittersweet wit. The classic love story takes place on the De la Garza ranch, as the tyrannical owner, Mama Elena, chops onions at the kitchen table in her final days of pregnancy. While still in her mother's womb, her daughter to be weeps so violently she causes an early labor, and little Tita slips out amid the spices and fixings for noodle soup. This early encounter with food soon becomes a way of life, and Tita grows up to be a master chef. She shares special points of her favorite preparations with listeners throughout the story.]]> 2020-08-31 06:34:30 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708122354 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708123320 When we first meet 14-year-old Susie Salmon, she is already in heaven. This was before milk carton photos and public-service announcements, she tells us; back in 1973, when Susie mysteriously disappeared, people still believed things like that didn't happen.

In the sweet, untroubled voice of a precocious teenage girl, Susie relates the awful events of her death and her own adjustment to the strange new place where she finds herself. It looks a lot like her school playground, with the good kind of swing sets.

With love, longing, and a growing understanding, Susie watches her family as they cope with their grief: her father embarks on a search for the killer, her sister undertakes a feat of amazing daring, her little brother builds a fort in her honor, and they begin the difficult process of healing.

This story of seemingly unbearable tragedy is transformed into a suspenseful and touching narrative about family, memory, love, heaven, and living.

]]> 2020-08-31 06:35:11 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708123320 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708125798  When Thomas wakes up in the lift, the only thing he can remember is his name. He’s surrounded by strangers—boys whose memories are also gone.
   Outside the towering stone walls that surround them is a limitless, ever-changing maze. It’s the only way out—and no one’s ever made it through alive.
   Then a girl arrives. The first girl ever. And the message she delivers is terrifying: Remember. Survive. Run.]]> 2020-08-31 06:37:02 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708125798 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708126749 Nitta Sayuri tells us in a voice at once haunting and startlingly immediate of her life as a geisha. Her story begins in a poor fishing village in 1929, when, as a nine-year-old girl with unusual blue-gray eyes, she is taken from her home and sold into slavery to a renowned geisha house. We witness her transformation as we enter a world where appearances are paramount; where a girl's virginity is auctioned to the highest bidder; where women are trained to beguile the most powerful men; and where love is scorned as illusion.

It is a unique and triumphant work of fiction - at once romantic, erotic, suspenseful - and completely unforgettable.

]]> 2020-08-31 06:37:49 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708126749 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708129028 A mysterious island.

An abandoned orphanage.

A strange collection of very curious photographs.

It all waits to be discovered in Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, an unforgettable novel that mixes fiction and photography in a thrilling reading experience. As our story opens, a horrific family tragedy sets sixteen-year-old Jacob journeying to a remote island off the coast of Wales, where he discovers the crumbling ruins of Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children. As Jacob explores its abandoned bedrooms and hallways, it becomes clear that the children were more than just peculiar. They may have been dangerous. They may have been quarantined on a deserted island for good reason. And somehow—impossible though it seems—they may still be alive.

A spine-tingling fantasy illustrated with haunting vintage photography, Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children will delight adults, teens, and anyone who relishes an adventure in the shadows.]]> 2020-08-31 06:39:37 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708129028 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708131087 Sometimes I feel like I have walked into the middle of a movie. Maybe I can make my own movie. The film will be the story of my life. No, not my life, but of this experience. I'll call it what the lady who is the prosecutor called me: Monster.

FADE IN: INTERIOR COURT. A guard sits at a desk behind STEVE. KATHY O'BRIEN, STEVE's lawyer, is all business as she talks to STEVE.

O'BRIEN
Let me make sure you understand what's going on. Both you and this King character are on trial for felony murder. Felony murder is as serious as it gets....When you're in court, you sit there and pay attention. You let the jury know that you think the case is as serious as they do....

STEVE
You think we're going to win?

O'BRIEN (seriously)
It probably depends on what you mean by "win".

]]> 2020-08-31 06:41:18 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708131087 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708132897 An electrifying first novel that shocks by its language, its circumstances, and its brutal honesty, Push recounts a young black street-girl's horrendous and redemptive journey through a Harlem inferno. For Precious Jones, 16 and pregnant with her father's child, miraculous hope appears and the world begins to open up for her when a courageous, determined teacher bullies, cajoles, and inspires her to learn to read, to define her own feelings and set them down in a diary.]]> 2020-08-31 06:42:51 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708132897 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708135164 Fat, clumsy Simon Glass is a nerd, a loser who occupies the lowest rung on the high school social ladder. Everyone picks on him―until Rob Haynes shows up. Rob, a transfer student with charisma to spare, immediately becomes the undisputed leader of the senior class. And he has plans for Simon.
Rob enlists the help of his crew―wealthy, intellectual Young, ladies' man Bob, and sweet, athletic Coop―in a mission: turn sniveling Simon from total freak to would-be prom king. But as Simon rises to the top of the social ranks, he shows a new confidence and a devious side that power-hungry Rob did not anticipate. And when Simon uncovers a dangerous secret, events darken. The result is disquieting, bone-chilling . . . and brutal.]]> 2020-08-31 06:44:49 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708135164 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708136726 Cameron: "Deep inside, you know that whoever gets up in your face gets there because he knows you're nothing, and he knows that you know it too."

Carla: "What I'm trying to do is to get by, not even get over, just get by."

Leonard: "I have bought a gaw-juss weapon. It lies beneath my bed like a secret lover, quiet, powerful, waiting to work its magic."

Statement of Fact: 17-year-old white male found dead in the aftermath of a shooting incident at Madison High School in Harrison County.

Conclusion: Death by self-inflicted wound.

]]> 2020-08-31 06:46:15 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708136726 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708137738 Maleeka suffers every day from the taunts of the other kids in her class. If they're not getting at her about her homemade clothes or her good grades, it's about her dark, black skin. When a new teacher, whose face is blotched with a startling white patch, starts at their school, Maleeka can see there is bound to be trouble for her too. But the new teacher's attitude surprises Maleeka. Miss Saunders loves the skin she's in. Can Maleeka learn to do the same?]]> 2020-08-31 06:47:07 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708137738 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708138950 Lakshmi is a thirteen-year-old girl who lives with her family in a small hut on a mountain in Nepal. Though she is desperately poor, her life is full of simple pleasures, like playing hopscotch with her best friend from school and having her mother brush her hair by the light of an oil lamp. But when the harsh Himalayan monsoons wash away all that remains of the family's crops, Lakshmi's stepfather says she must leave home and take a job to support her family. He introduces her to a glamorous stranger who tells her she will find her a job as a maid in the city. Glad to be able to help, Lakshmi journeys to India and arrives at "Happiness House" full of hope. But she soon learns the unthinkable truth: she has been sold into prostitution.

An old woman named Mumtaz rules the brothel with cruelty and cunning. She tells Lakshmi that she is trapped there until she can pay off her family's debt - then cheats Lakshmi of her meager earnings so that she can never leave. Lakshmi's life becomes a nightmare from which she cannot escape. Still, she lives by her mother's words - simply to endure is to triumph - and gradually, she forms friendships with the other girls that enable her to survive in this terrifying new world. Then the day comes when she must make a decision - will she risk everything for a chance to reclaim her life?

]]> 2020-08-31 06:48:00 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708138950 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708140120 From her first moment at Merryweather High, Melinda Sordino knows she's an outcast. She busted an end-of-summer party by calling the cops - a major infraction in high-school society - so her old friends won't talk to her, and people she doesn't know glare at her. She retreats into her head, where the lies and hypocrisies of high school stand in stark relief to her own silence, making her all the more mute. 

But it's not so comfortable in her head, either - there's something banging around in there that she doesn't want to think about. Try as she might to avoid it, it won't go away, until there is a painful confrontation. Once that happens, she can't be silent - she must speak the truth. 

In this powerful audiobook, an utterly believable, bitterly ironic heroine speaks for many a disenfranchised teenager while learning that, although it's hard to speak up for yourself, keeping your mouth shut is worse. 

]]> 2020-08-31 06:48:54 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708140120 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708141837 Ty Johnson knows survival. The supply game’s in his blood. And now that he’s taken over his pop’s business, Ty’s smarts and skills have earned him some serious street cred. But Alyse knows nothing about Ty’s reputation, and he’s determined to keep it that way. She’s too beautiful, too brainy, too straight-laced to ever get involved with someone who deals. As long as Ty walks the line, life’s pretty sweet.

Then one slip—one serious competitor—and things turn ugly fast. Suddenly Ty’s got to rethink his whole strategy. And for the #1 dealer on the streets, strategy is not just about staying ahead. It’s about staying alive.]]> 2020-08-31 06:50:13 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708141837 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708142967 Elena Gilbert is a high school golden girl, used to getting what she wants. And who she wants. But when the boy she's set her sights on - the handsome and haunted Stefan - isn't interested, she's confused. She could never know the real reason Stefan is struggling to resist her:

Stefan is a vampire, and Elena's in danger just by being around him. What's more, Stefan's dark, dangerous vampire brother Damon has just arrived in town. And wherever Damon goes, trouble always follows.

]]> 2020-08-31 06:51:09 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708142967 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708144461 A beautiful and distinguished family.

A private island. 

A brilliant, damaged girl; a passionate, political boy. 

A group of four friends - the Liars - whose friendship turns destructive. 

A revolution. An accident. A secret. 

Lies upon lies. 

True love. 

The truth. 

We Were Liars is a modern, sophisticated suspense novel from National Book Award finalist and Printz Award honoree E. Lockhart. 

Listen to it. 

And if anyone asks you how it ends, just lie.

]]> 2020-08-31 06:52:17 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708144461 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708146731 "Yaqui Delgado wants to kick your ass." That’s what some girl tells Piddy Sanchez one morning before school. Too bad Piddy doesn’t even know who Yaqui Delgado is, let alone what she’s done to piss her off. All Piddy knows is that Yaqui hates her - and she better watch her back because Yaqui isn’t kidding around. At first Piddy just focuses on trying to find out more about the father she’s never met and how to balance honors courses with her weekend job at the neighborhood hair salon. But as the harassment escalates, avoiding Yaqui and her gang starts to take over Piddy’s life. Is there any way for Piddy to survive without closing herself off and running away from her problems?]]> 2020-08-31 06:54:02 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708146731 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708148595 "In the summer of 1991 I was a normal kid. I did normal things. I had friends and a mother who loved me. I was just like you. Until the day my life was stolen. For eighteen years I was a prisoner. I was an object for someone to use and abuse. For eighteen years I was not allowed to speak my own name. I became a mother and was forced to be a sister. For eighteen years I survived an impossible situation. On August 26, 2009, I took my name back. My name is Jaycee Lee Dugard. I dont think of myself as a victim. I survived. A Stolen Life is my story in my own words, in my own way, exactly as I remember it."]]> 2020-08-31 06:55:26 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708148595 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708151416 Experience a bold take on this classic autobiography as it’s performed by Oscar-nominated Laurence Fishburne. 

In this searing classic autobiography, originally published in 1965, Malcolm X, the Muslim leader, firebrand, and Black empowerment activist, tells the extraordinary story of his life and the growth of the Human Rights movement. His fascinating perspective on the lies and limitations of the American dream and the inherent racism in a society that denies its non-White citizens the opportunity to dream, gives extraordinary insight into the most urgent issues of our own time. 

The Autobiography of Malcolm X stands as the definitive statement of a movement and a man whose work was never completed but whose message is timeless. It is essential for anyone who wants to understand the African American experience and America as a whole. 

]]> 2020-08-31 06:57:34 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708151416 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708153550 In 2013 Assata Shakur, founding member of the Black Liberation Army, former Black Panther and godmother of Tupac Shakur, became the first ever woman to make the FBI's most wanted terrorist list. 

Assata Shakur's trial and conviction for the murder of a white State Trooper in the spring of 1973 divided America. Her case quickly became emblematic of race relations and police brutality in the USA. While Assata's detractors continue to label her a ruthless killer, her defenders cite her as the victim of a systematic, racist campaign to criminalise and suppress Black nationalist organisations. 

This intensely personal and political autobiography reveals a sensitive and gifted woman, far from the fearsome image of her that is projected by the powers that be. With wit and candor, Assata recounts the formative experiences that led her to embrace a life of activism. With pained awareness she portrays the strengths, weaknesses and eventual demise of Black and white revolutionary groups at the hands of the state.

]]> 2020-08-31 06:59:02 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708153550 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708154999 When it exploded onto the literary scene in 1945, Black Boy was both praised and condemned. Orville Prescott of the New York Times wrote that "if enough such books are written, if enough millions of people read them maybe, someday, in the fullness of time, there will be a greater understanding and a more true democracy." Yet from 1975 to 1978, Black Boy was banned in schools throughout the United States for "obscenity" and "instigating hatred between the races."

The once controversial, now classic American autobiography measures the brutality and rawness of the Jim Crow South against the sheer desperate will it took to survive as a black boy. Enduring poverty, hunger, fear, abuse, and hatred while growing up in the woods of Mississippi, Wright lied, stole, and raged at those around him - whites indifferent, pitying, or cruel, and blacks resentful of anyone trying to rise above their circumstances. Desperate for a different way of life, he made his way north, eventually arriving in Chicago, where he forged a new path and began his career as a writer. At the end of Black Boy, Wright sits poised with pencil in hand, determined to "hurl words into this darkness and wait for an echo." Seventy-five years later, his words continue to reverberate.

]]> 2020-08-31 07:00:05 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708154999 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708157598 Dave was in first grade when his unstable alcoholic mother began attacking him. Until he was in fifth grade, she starved, beat, and psychologically ravaged her son. Eventually denying even his identity, Dave's mother called him an "it" instead of using his name. Relentlessly, she drove him to the brink of death before authorities finally stepped in. With faith and hope, Dave grew determined to survive. He also knew that he needed to share his story.]]> 2020-08-31 07:02:05 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708157598 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708158890 Reyna Grande vividly brings to life her tumultuous early years in this “compelling...unvarnished, resonant” (BookPage) story of a childhood spent torn between two parents and two countries. As her parents make the dangerous trek across the Mexican border to “El Otro Lado” (The Other Side) in pursuit of the American dream, Reyna and her siblings are forced into the already overburdened household of their stern grandmother. When their mother at last returns, Reyna prepares for her own journey to “El Otro Lado” to live with the man who has haunted her imagination for years, her long-absent father.

Funny, heartbreaking, and lyrical, The Distance Between Us poignantly captures the confusion and contradictions of childhood, reminding us that the joys and sorrows we experience are imprinted on the heart forever, calling out to us of those places we first called home.

]]> 2020-08-31 07:03:07 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708158890 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708160615 "Do you remember the hospital, Colton?" Sonja said. "Yes, mommy, I remember," he said. "That's where the angels sang to me."

When Colton Burpo made it through an emergency appendectomy, his family was overjoyed at his miraculous survival. What they weren't expecting, though, was the story that emerged in the months that followed - a story as beautiful as it was extraordinary, detailing their little boy's trip to heaven and back.

Colton, not yet four years old, told his parents he left his body during the surgery - and authenticated that claim by describing exactly what his parents were doing in another part of the hospital while he was being operated on. He talked of visiting heaven and relayed stories told to him by people he met there whom he had never met in life, sharing events that happened even before he was born. He also astonished his parents with descriptions and obscure details about heaven that matched the Bible exactly, though he had not yet learned to read.

]]> 2020-08-31 07:04:25 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708160615 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708163522 Written in solitary confinement, Kody Scott’s memoir of sixteen years as a gangbanger in Los Angeles was a searing best-seller and became a classic, published in ten languages, with more than 300,000 copies in print in the United States alone. After pumping eight blasts from a sawed-off shotgun at a group of rival gang members, twelve-year-old Kody Scott was initiated into the L.A. gang the Crips. He quickly matured into one of the most formidable Crip combat soldiers, earning the name “Monster” for committing acts of brutality and violence that repulsed even his fellow gang members. When the inevitable jail term confined him to a maximum-security cell, a complete political and personal transformation followed: from Monster to Sanyika Shakur, black nationalist, member of the New Afrikan Independence Movement, and crusader against the causes of gangsterism. In a document that has been compared to The Autobiography of Malcolm X and Eldridge Cleaver’s Soul on Ice, Shakur makes palpable the despair and decay of America’s inner cities and gives eloquent voice to one aspect of the black ghetto experience today.]]> 2020-08-31 07:06:55 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708163522 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708165246 Looking for an escape from childhood abuse, Reymundo Sanchez turned away from school and baseball to drugs, alcohol, and then sex and was left to fend for himself before age 14. The Latin Kings, one of the largest and most notorious street gangs in America, became his refuge and his world, but its violence cost him friends, freedom, self-respect, and nearly his life. This is a raw and powerful odyssey through the ranks of the new Mafia, where the only people more dangerous than rival gangs are members of your own gang, who in one breath will say they'll die for you and in the next will order your assassination.]]> 2020-08-31 07:08:22 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708165246 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708166915 "With a bolt of lightning on my kicks... The court is SIZZLING. My sweat is DRIZZLING. Stop all that quivering. Cuz tonight I'm delivering," announces dreadlocked 12-year old Josh Bell. He and his twin brother, Jordan, are awesome on the court. But Josh has more than basketball in his blood. He's got mad beats, too, that tell his family's story in verse in this fast and furious middle grade novel of family and brotherhood from Kwame Alexander.

Josh and Jordan must come to grips with growing up on and off the court to realize breaking the rules comes at a terrible price, as their story's heart-stopping climax proves a game changer for the entire family.

]]> 2020-08-31 07:09:45 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708166915 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708168518 When Marvin Johnson's twin, Tyler, goes to a party, Marvin decides to tag along to keep an eye on his brother. But what starts as harmless fun turns into a shooting, followed by a police raid.

The next day, Tyler has gone missing, and it's up to Marvin to find him. But when Tyler is found dead, a video leaked online tells an even more chilling story: Tyler has been shot and killed by a police officer. Terrified as his mother unravels and mourning a brother who is now a hashtag, Marvin must learn what justice and freedom really mean.

Tyler Johnson Was Here is a stunning account of police brutality in modern America.

]]> 2020-08-31 07:11:06 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708168518 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708175578 Orange Is the New Black meets Walter Dean Myer's Monster in this gritty, twisty, and haunting debut by Tiffany D. Jackson about a girl convicted of murder seeking the truth while surviving life in a group home.

Mary B. Addison killed a baby.

Allegedly. She didn't say much in that first interview with detectives, and the media filled in the only blanks that mattered: a white baby had died while under the care of a churchgoing black woman and her nine-year-old daughter. The public convicted Mary, and the jury made it official. But did she do it?

There wasn't a point to setting the record straight before, but now she's got Ted - and their unborn child - to think about. When the state threatens to take her baby, Mary's fate now lies in the hands of the one person she distrusts the most: her momma. No one knows the real Momma. But does anyone know the real Mary?

]]> 2020-08-31 07:16:55 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708175578 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708177752 When sixteen-year-old Tariq Johnson dies from two gunshot wounds, his community is thrown into an uproar. Tariq was black. The shooter, Jack Franklin, is white.

In the aftermath of Tariq's death, everyone has something to say, but no two accounts of the events line up. Day by day, new twists further obscure the truth.

Tariq's friends, family, and community struggle to make sense of the tragedy, and to cope with the hole left behind when a life is cut short. In their own words, they grapple for a way to say with certainty: This is how it went down.

How It Went Down is a timely story by acclaimed author Kekla Magoon who won the Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe Award for The Rock and the River, and whose book X :A Novel (written with Ilyasah Shabazz) was longlisted for the National Book Award.

This title has Common Core connections.]]> 2020-08-31 07:18:52 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708177752 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708179193 Moss Jeffries is many things—considerate student, devoted son, loyal friend and affectionate boyfriend, enthusiastic nerd.

But sometimes Moss still wishes he could be someone else—someone without panic attacks, someone whose father was still alive, someone who hadn’t become a rallying point for a community because of one horrible night.

And most of all, he wishes he didn’t feel so stuck.

Moss can’t even escape at school—he and his friends are subject to the lack of funds and crumbling infrastructure at West Oakland High, as well as constant intimidation by the resource officer stationed in their halls. That was even before the new regulations—it seems sometimes that the students are treated more like criminals.

Something will have to change—but who will listen to a group of teens?

When tensions hit a fever pitch and tragedy strikes again, Moss must face a difficult choice: give in to fear and hate or realize that anger can actually be a gift.]]> 2020-08-31 07:20:05 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708179193 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708180215 A bag of chips. That’s all sixteen-year-old Rashad is looking for at the corner bodega. What he finds instead is a fist-happy cop, Paul Galluzzo, who mistakes Rashad for a shoplifter, mistakes Rashad’s pleadings that he’s stolen nothing for belligerence, mistakes Rashad’s resistance to leave the bodega as resisting arrest, mistakes Rashad’s every flinch at every punch the cop throws as further resistance and refusal to STAY STILL as ordered. But how can you stay still when someone is pounding your face into the concrete pavement?

There were witnesses: Quinn Collins—a varsity basketball player and Rashad’s classmate who has been raised by Paul since his own father died in Afghanistan—and a video camera. Soon the beating is all over the news and Paul is getting threatened with accusations of prejudice and racial brutality. Quinn refuses to believe that the man who has basically been his savior could possibly be guilty. But then Rashad is absent. And absent again. And again. And the basketball team—half of whom are Rashad’s best friends—start to take sides. As does the school. And the town. Simmering tensions threaten to explode as Rashad and Quinn are forced to face decisions and consequences they had never considered before.

Written in tandem by two award-winning authors, this four-starred reviewed tour de force shares the alternating perspectives of Rashad and Quinn as the complications from that single violent moment, the type taken directly from today’s headlines, unfold and reverberate to highlight an unwelcome truth.]]> 2020-08-31 07:21:00 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708180215 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708181913 Sixteen-year-old Starr Carter moves between two worlds: the poor neighborhood where she lives and the fancy suburban prep school she attends. The uneasy balance between these worlds is shattered when Starr witnesses the fatal shooting of her childhood best friend Khalil at the hands of a police officer. Khalil was unarmed.

Soon afterward, his death is a national headline. Some are calling him a thug, maybe even a drug dealer and a gangbanger. Protesters are taking to the streets in Khalil’s name. Some cops and the local drug lord try to intimidate Starr and her family. What everyone wants to know is: what really went down that night? And the only person alive who can answer that is Starr.

But what Starr does—or does not—say could upend her community. It could also endanger her life.

]]> 2020-08-31 07:22:24 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708181913 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708183393 In kindergarten, Jarrett Krosoczka's teacher asks him to draw his family, with a mommy and a daddy. But Jarrett's family is much more complicated than that. His mom is an addict, in and out of rehab, and in and out of Jarrett's life. His father is a mystery -- Jarrett doesn't know where to find him, or even what his name is. Jarrett lives with his grandparents -- two very loud, very loving, very opinionated people who had thought they were through with raising children until Jarrett came along.

Jarrett goes through his childhood trying to make his non-normal life as normal as possible, finding a way to express himself through drawing even as so little is being said to him about what's going on. Only as a teenager can Jarrett begin to piece together the truth of his family, reckoning with his mother and tracking down his father.

Hey, Kiddo is a profoundly important memoir about growing up in a family grappling with addiction, and finding the art that helps you survive.]]> 2020-08-31 07:23:42 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708183393 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708184652 My disease is as rare as it is famous. Basically, I’m allergic to the world. I don’t leave my house, have not left my house in seventeen years. The only people I ever see are my mom and my nurse, Carla.
 
But then one day, a moving truck arrives next door. I look out my window, and I see him. He's tall, lean and wearing all black—black T-shirt, black jeans, black sneakers, and a black knit cap that covers his hair completely. He catches me looking and stares at me. I stare right back. His name is Olly.
 
Maybe we can’t predict the future, but we can predict some things. For example, I am certainly going to fall in love with Olly. It’s almost certainly going to be a disaster.]]> 2020-08-31 07:24:50 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708184652 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708186352 By age twelve, Luis Rodriguez was a veteran of East Los Angeles gang warfare. Lured by a seemingly invincible gang culture, he witnessed countless shootings, beatings, and arrests and then watched with increasing fear as gang life claimed friends and family members. Before long, Rodriguez saw a way out of the barrio through education and the power of words and successfully broke free from years of violence and desperation.

Achieving success as an award-winning poet, he was sure the streets would haunt him no more—until his young son joined a gang. Rodriguez fought for his child by telling his own story in Always Running, a vivid memoir that explores the motivations of gang life and cautions against the death and destruction that inevitably claim its participants.]]> 2020-08-31 07:26:12 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708186352 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708187762 Travel with Art Rodriguez as he dreams of his past. He experiences an unpleasant childhood full of difficult obstacles that could have profoundly impaired his chance for a normal life. Life appears hopeless during those young years as he struggles to discover who he really is and at the same time contends with his dictatorial father. Travel with him as he takes you through the California Youth Authority, the prison system for young offenders. In this story, which brings laughter and tears, both young and old can find comfort in knowing that when life appears bleak and there seems to be no hope, events in life can change. In 1975 Art Rodriguez started a successful business in San Jose, the city in which he was born. Grow with him in his life and experience with him the hardships and successes of a new business.]]> 2020-08-31 07:27:22 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/708187762 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/709361988 Offering a rarely seen female perspective on gang life, this raw and powerful memoir tells not only of one woman’s struggle to survive the streets but also of her ascent to the top ranks of the new mafia, where the only people more dangerous than rival gangs were members of her own. At age 5 Sonia Rodriguez’s stepfather began to abuse her; at 10 she was molested by her uncle and beaten by her mother when she told on him; and by 13 her home had become a hangout for the Latin Kings and Queens who were friends with her older sister. Threatened by rival gang members at school, Sonia turned away from her education and extracurricular activities in favor of a world of drugs and violence. The Latin Kings, one of the largest and most notorious street gangs in America, became her refuge, but its violence cost her friends, freedom, self-respect, and nearly her life. As a Latin Queen, she experienced the exhilarating highs and unbelievable lows of gang life. From being shot at by her own gang and kicked out at age 18 with an infant daughter to rejoining the gang and distinguishing herself as a leader, her legacy as Lady Q was cemented both for her willingness to commit violence and for her role as a drug mule.]]> 2020-08-31 16:38:10 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/709361988 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/727984970 “Another day finished,gracias a Dios.”

Seventeen-year-old Marisa’s mother has been saying this for as long as Marisa can remember. Her parents came to Houston from Mexico. They work hard, and they expect Marisa to help her familia. An ordinary life―marrying a neighborhood guy, working, having babies―ought to be good enough for her.

Marisa hears something else from her calc teacher. She should study harder, ace the AP test, and get into engineering school in Austin. Some days, it all seems possible. On others, she’s not even sure what she wants.

When her life at home becomes unbearable, Marisa seeks comfort elsewhere―and suddenly neither her best friend nor boyfriend can get through to her. Caught between the expectations of two different worlds, Marisa isn’t sure what she wants―other than a life where she doesn’t end each day thanking God it’s over.

But some things just can’t wait…

]]> 2020-09-08 16:21:05 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/727984970 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/727993383 Brooklyn, 1998. Biggie Smalls was right: Things done changed. But that doesn’t mean Quadir and Jarrell are cool letting their best friend Steph’s music lie forgotten under his bed after he’s murdered - not when his rhymes could turn any Bed-Stuy corner into a party. 

With the help of Steph’s younger sister, Jasmine, they come up with a plan to promote Steph’s music under a new rap name: the Architect. Soon, everyone wants a piece of him. When his demo catches the attention of a hotheaded music label rep, the trio must prove Steph’s talent from beyond the grave. 

As the pressure of keeping their secret grows, Quadir, Jarrell, and Jasmine are forced to confront the truth about what happened to Steph. Only, each has something to hide. With everything riding on Steph’s fame, they need to decide what they stand for or lose all they’ve worked so hard to hold on to - including each other.

]]> 2020-09-08 16:22:38 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/727993383 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728005039 Monday Charles is missing, and only Claudia seems to notice. Claudia and Monday have always been inseparable—more sisters than friends. So when Monday doesn’t turn up for the first day of school, Claudia’s worried.

When she doesn’t show for the second day, or second week, Claudia knows that something is wrong. Monday wouldn’t just leave her to endure tests and bullies alone. Not after last year’s rumors and not with her grades on the line. Now Claudia needs her best—and only—friend more than ever. But Monday’s mother refuses to give Claudia a straight answer, and Monday’s sister April is even less help.

As Claudia digs deeper into her friend’s disappearance, she discovers that no one seems to remember the last time they saw Monday. How can a teenage girl just vanish without anyone noticing that she’s gone?

]]> 2020-09-08 16:24:43 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728005039 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728021000 Sixteen-year-old Bri wants to be one of the greatest rappers of all time. Or at least win her first battle. As the daughter of an underground hip hop legend who died right before he hit big, Bri’s got massive shoes to fill.

But it’s hard to get your come up when you’re labeled a hoodlum at school, and your fridge at home is empty after your mom loses her job. So Bri pours her anger and frustration into her first song, which goes viral . . . for all the wrong reasons.

Bri soon finds herself at the center of a controversy, portrayed by the media as more menace than MC. But with an eviction notice staring her family down, Bri doesn’t just want to make it—she has to. Even if it means becoming the very thing the public has made her out to be.  

Insightful, unflinching, and full of heart, On the Come Up is an ode to hip hop from one of the most influential literary voices of a generation. It is the story of fighting for your dreams, even as the odds are stacked against you; and about how, especially for young black people, freedom of speech isn’t always free.

]]> 2020-09-08 16:27:33 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728021000 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728032067 Xiomara Batista feels unheard and unable to hide in her Harlem neighborhood. Ever since her body grew into curves, she has learned to let her fists and her fierceness do the talking.

But Xiomara has plenty she wants to say, and she pours all her frustration and passion onto the pages of a leather notebook, reciting the words to herself like prayers—especially after she catches feelings for a boy in her bio class named Aman, who her family can never know about.

With Mami’s determination to force her daughter to obey the laws of the church, Xiomara understands that her thoughts are best kept to herself. So when she is invited to join her school’s slam poetry club, she doesn’t know how she could ever attend without her mami finding out. But she still can’t stop thinking about performing her poems.

Because in the face of a world that may not want to hear her, Xiomara refuses to be silent.

]]> 2020-09-08 16:29:30 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728032067 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728043277 Ever since she got pregnant freshman year, Emoni Santiago’s life has been about making the tough decisions—doing what has to be done for her daughter and her abuela.

The one place she can let all that go is in the kitchen, where she adds a little something magical to everything she cooks, turning her food into straight-up goodness.

Even though she dreams of working as a chef after she graduates, Emoni knows that it’s not worth her time to pursue the impossible. Yet despite the rules she thinks she has to play by, once Emoni starts cooking, her only choice is to let her talent break free.

]]> 2020-09-08 16:31:34 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728043277 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728052948 Perfect Mexican daughters do not go away to college. And they do not move out of their parents’ house after high school graduation. Perfect Mexican daughters never abandon their family.
 
But Julia is not your perfect Mexican daughter. That was Olga’s role.
 
Then a tragic accident on the busiest street in Chicago leaves Olga dead and Julia left behind to reassemble the shattered pieces of her family. And no one seems to acknowledge that Julia is broken, too. Instead, her mother seems to channel her grief into pointing out every possible way Julia has failed.
 
But it’s not long before Julia discovers that Olga might not have been as perfect as everyone thought. With the help of her best friend, Lorena, and her first love (first everything), Connor, Julia is determined to find out. Was Olga really what she seemed? Or was there more to her sister’s story? And either way, how can Julia even attempt to live up to a seemingly impossible ideal?...]]> 2020-09-08 16:33:22 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728052948 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728070947 "The true stories I've written in this book are my living nightmares. My greatest hope is that the lessons the stories offer will help you make better choices than I did." Stanley "Tookie" Williams, cofounder of the notorious Crips gang, is a death-row inmate. But in his two decades of incarceration, Williams has also become a respected author and activist whose dedication to ending gang warfare in the lives of inner-city children has earned him a 2001 Nobel Peace Prize nomination. In this award-winning bookwhich has drawn praise from educators, government leaders, and families alikeWilliams describes the brutal reality of being an inmate. He debunks myths of prisons as "gladiator schools" with blunt, riveting stories of overwhelming homesickness, the terror of solitary confinement, and the humiliation of strip-searches. Williams' words are a frank challenge to adolescent readers to educate themselves, make intelligent decisions, and above all, not to follow in his footsteps.]]> 2020-09-08 16:36:37 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728070947 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728079929 A plunge into Los Angeles gang life, Locas is the story of two girls under the pressure of urban warfare. "Murray perfectly captures the patois and fury of the Mexican women of the East L.A. neighborhood Echo Park." -- Publishers Weekly]]> 2020-09-08 16:38:15 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728079929 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728093823 On May 6, 2013, Amanda Berry made headlines around the world when she fled a Cleveland area home and called 911, saying: "Help me, I'm Amanda Berry.... I've been kidnapped, and I've been missing for 10 years."

A horrifying story rapidly unfolded. Ariel Castro, a local school bus driver, had separately lured Berry, Gina DeJesus, and Michelle Knight to his home, where he kept them chained in the basement. In the decade that followed, the three were raped, psychologically abused, and threatened with death. Berry bore a child - Jocelyn - by their captor.

Drawing upon their recollections and the diaries they kept, Amanda Berry and Gina DeJesus describe a tale of unimaginable torment, and Pulitzer Prize-winning Washington Post reporters Mary Jordan and Kevin Sullivan interweave the events within Castro's house with the ongoing efforts to find the missing girls.

The full story behind the headlines - including shocking information never previously released - Hope is a harrowing yet inspiring chronicle of three women whose courage, ingenuity, and resourcefulness ultimately delivered them back to their lives and families.

]]> 2020-09-08 16:40:48 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728093823 ntancioco https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728102057 This is the story of Paul, a sophomore at a high school like no other: The cheerleaders ride Harleys, the homecoming queen used to be a guy named Daryl (she now prefers Infinite Darlene and is also the star quarterback), and the gay-straight alliance was formed to help the straight kids learn how to dance.

When Paul meets Noah, he thinks he’s found the one his heart is made for. Until he blows it. The school bookie says the odds are 12-to-1 against him getting Noah back, but Paul’s not giving up without playing his love really loud. His best friend Joni might be drifting away, his other best friend Tony might be dealing with ultra-religious parents, and his ex-boyfriend Kyle might not be going away anytime soon, but sometimes everything needs to fall apart before it can really fit together right.

This is a happy-meaningful romantic comedy about finding love, losing love, and doing what it takes to get love back in a crazy-wonderful world.]]> 2020-09-08 16:42:17 UTC https://padlet.com/ntancioco/CCHSSTUDENTFAVORITES/wish/728102057