In 1940, when two-time Newbery Medalist Lois Lowry was 3 years old, her father made a home movie of her as she played on a beach in Hawaii, where Lowry’s family lived. Years later, while watching the film, Lowry realized the USS Arizona, the battleship that sank during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, was visible on the horizon. The poignancy of the image stayed with the author and served as one of the inspirations for her book On the Horizon.

Each of On the Horizon’s three sections intertwine Lowry’s personal history with vignettes of sailors stationed at Pearl Harbor the day of the attack and of civilians in Japan, where Lowry moved with her family after the end of the war. Lowry’s desire to connect with and understand other people and their experiences unites the poems. In “Girl on a Bike,” for example, Lowry recalls the day she stopped outside a schoolyard to watch children playing. In an extraordinary coincidence, one of those children, a boy named Koichi Seii, grew up to become the Caldecott Medalist Allen Say. Say and Lowry never met in Japan, but years later, Say recalled seeing Lowry and her green bicycle outside his school that day.

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Lois Lowry takes us behind the scenes of On the Horizon.

Lowry’s experiences—as a young child in Honolulu and a girl who grew up in Japan—provide her with a unique perspective on the major events that bookend World War II. But one of On the Horizon’s greatest strengths is that Lowry expands her gaze and incorporates the experiences of others. Although the USS Arizona was, that day on the beach, so far away as to appear “on the horizon,” Lowry employs a literary zoom lens to capture poignant portraits of the ship’s crew, including the members of the Navy band and commanding officer Captain Isaac Campbell Kidd. In “Captain Kidd,” Lowry links Kidd’s name to memories of her grandmother’s stories of pirates before revealing that, during the attack, Kidd ran to the bridge of the ship: “His Naval Academy ring / was found melted and fused to the mast. / It is not an imaginary thing, / a symbol of devotion so vast.”

Through deceptively plainspoken prose layered with imagery and linguistic artistry, On the Horizon’s remarkable poems are a powerful reminder of our shared humanity in times of conflict and war. Simply put, they are an extraordinary gift from one of America’s most distinguished writers.

Luis and Sutton have nothing in common. Sutton is a coding whiz. Luis devours fantasy films and graphic novels. They wouldn’t like each other much if they happened to meet. But both Luis and Sutton find their comfort zones under attack in Joy McCullough’s debut middle grade novel, A Field Guide to Getting Lost. Luis’s mom and Sutton’s dad are dating, and things are getting serious. Naturally, the grown-ups want the kids to meet.

The first forced gathering is a total disaster; Sutton and Luis don’t click at all. Undeterred, their parents arrange another outing, a hike in Discovery Park. The day takes a frightening turn when Luis and Sutton enter an opening in the underbrush, assuming the tunnel will bring them back to the trail. Instead, they get lost for hours. Their only way out of the situation is to step up and help each other through it.

Author McCullough (Blood Water Paint) has her finger firmly on the pulse of what makes her characters tick. Luis and Sutton are well-drawn, with strong and equally appealing perspectives. Rather than encouraging readers to take sides, McCullough cleverly and subtly urges them to root for Luis and Sutton to find common ground and work together. A Field Guide to Getting Lost is a warmhearted manual for thinking outside the box, persevering through tough circumstances and reaching out for help along the way.

When Stars Are Scattered is the extraordinary story of Omar Mohamed’s experience of growing up in a refugee camp, as told by Mohamed to graphic novelist Victoria Jamieson (Roller Girl).

Omar and his younger brother, Hassan, live a simple and often dull life in a refugee camp in Kenya. Forced to leave their home and their parents behind in a civil war-torn Somalia when they were very young, they have spent the majority of their lives being able to depend only on each other and on Fatuma, the kind-hearted woman who lives in the tent across the path from them. But although they are safe from the war itself, the camp’s resources are scarce. They don’t have enough to eat, let alone access to the medical care that the nonverbal Hassan needs or the education that Omar desperately longs for.

So when Omar has a chance to attend school, he is overjoyed. But the opportunity means that he will have to leave Hassan alone for several hours a day, forcing Omar to choose between improving life for his family in the future and his responsibility to his brother in the present.

Images and text work together beautifully in this graphic novel. Jamieson’s characteristically orderly panel layout makes for a cohesive story that flows effortlessly. Soft lines and simple backgrounds allow dialogue and relationships between characters to take center stage. Jamieson’s illustrations—particularly, the vivid expressions on characters’ faces—enhance and deepen the book’s emotional impact. When Stars Are Scattered is a timely and important story, told in a format that ensures it will be accessible and appealing for readers of all ages.

“Sometimes my life feels like a room with two windows and two moons,” muses Bea, who spends her days being shuttled between her divorced parents’ New York City apartments. She’s excited for her father’s upcoming wedding, not only because she adores his partner, Jesse, but also because she’ll also finally have the sister she’s always longed for—Jesse’s daughter, Sonia, a fellow fifth grader who lives in California.

In The List of Things That Will Not Change, a dazzling middle grade novel from Newbery Medalist Rebecca Stead, Bea’s life is filled to the brim with good friends and wonderfully supportive adults. Sometimes Bea’s life seems downright idyllic, as when her restaurateur father stashes surprise meals in his ex-wife’s fridge, or when Bea and her friend Angus sip soda together in Bea’s father’s restaurant. But Bea has painful eczema and a host of paralyzing worries, not to mention a deeply buried secret that’s quietly gnawing away at her conscience.

Navigating family and friends can be tough, of course. As Bea grows more and more excited about the upcoming nuptials, her father cautions, “Family can turn their backs on you, just like anyone else. I’m sorry to say it.” Stead tackles this delicate theme in grand style, not only celebrating the glorious ways that family and friends can support one another but also showing—in quite a surprise move—how family members can occasionally be backstabbing.

Even for enthusiastic, likable Bea, anger frequently gets the best of her, such as when she violently throws Angus off a chair during a game of musical chairs or when she hits an irritating classmate in the face. Bea resists going to therapy, but her therapist patiently offers helpful advice in session after session, cautioning Bea to try to start “thinking two steps ahead” of her actions and teaching her valuable strategies for corralling her fears.

Plot and characters reveal themselves naturally as The List of Things That Will Not Change unfolds, and small details later reappear to tightly and brilliantly weave together a plethora of themes. Books that successfully address divorce, remarriage and their many complicated repercussions from a child’s point of view are uncommon—and all the more valuable for it.

Stead has proven herself once again to be a masterful storyteller. The List of Things That Will Not Change is a messy but ultimately glorious family celebration that’s not to be missed.

At one time or another, most people find themselves making a quid pro quo deal with the universe. In Sarah Allen’s What Stars Are Made Of, 12-year-old Libby does just that. But rather than asking the universe for fortune or fame, she’s making an unselfish wish: She wants her niece to be born healthy.

Libby is a charismatic and brainy narrator. She was born with Turner syndrome, a genetic condition that means she’s missing an X chromosome. Turner syndrome makes some things more difficult for Libby, but science is not one of them. So when she enters a science contest with an entry about her favorite scientific figure—Cecelia Payne, the woman who discovered what stars are made of—she’s determined to win so that she can use the prize money to help her financially-challenged older sister.

That’s where Libby’s deal with the universe comes in. If Libby wins and gives the money to her sister, the universe will ensure that her niece will be born healthy and not share any of the challenges Libby herself experiences. If she gets her wish, Libby reasons, “Instead of missing a piece in my own body, I’d fix a missing piece in the lives of the people I loved.”

In her stunning debut middle grade novel, Allen, who was also born with Turner syndrome, explores themes of family loyalty and personal resilience and resolve, wrapping them up in a clever story of science, how the universe works and how stars can truly guide the way. What Stars Are Made Of is a tender portrait of a compassionate heroine trying to make things right in her universe and in the lives of the people she loves. Allen is a remarkable new voice in children’s fiction.

Alberta’s life is pretty sweet. Her surfing improves every time she hits the water, she’s got two supportive dads in her corner, and her best friend has a free cone connection at the ice cream parlor. But she still feels like something is missing. She’s being bullied at school, dealing with dumb assumptions from her classmates and weathering insults from her nemesis. It’s hard to not feel isolated when everyone singles her out for being different.

Then Alberta discovers that the new owner of a nearby bed-and-breakfast has a 12-year-old daughter who is also black, and Alberta thinks she’s found her missing piece. Edie is cool—like, from-Brooklyn cool—and they hit it off. When Edie finds a stack of journals in the B&B’s attic, the girls start reading and eventually uncover a historical mystery. As it turns out, they may have roots hidden in more places than they realized.

Award-winning young adult author Brandy Colbert (Little & Lion) makes her middle grade debut with The Only Black Girls in Town. As she does in her books for older readers, she creates characters readers will love spending time with and settings that reward exploration. She also sensitively handles issues of growing up and and growing apart, as well as parents who seem overprotective but may have good cause to care. Colbert’s light touch with weighty subjects results in a novel that dives deep into the impacts of racism, particularly microagressions, with subtlety and nuance.

Equal parts mystery, coming-of-age narrative and coastal California travelogue, The Only Black Girls in Town is an affectionate tribute to friends, both new and old, and the ways they enrich our lives.

The head news editor is 11 years old, the masthead designer likes to wear ruffles, and the newsroom is actually a barn that’s home to a goat named Stuff. Welcome to the first meeting of the Newspaper Club.

Nellie misses her old life in the city, where her parents worked at a fast-paced newspaper. Now her father is away in Japan, and Nellie and her mom have moved to the small town of Bear Creek, where nothing ever happens—or so it seems. The proprietor of the local ice cream parlor, where flavors like Merry Marmalade and Cheery Chocolate Cream abound, is always sad, and the sole newspaper in town is about to shutter its doors. When Bear Creek Park, the only place in town where Nellie gets good reception to talk to her father, closes due to a series of unexplained nuisances, Nellie knows what she has to do. The time has come to start her own newspaper, staffed entirely by cub reporters (that’s newspaper-speak for new journalists) like herself, along with local kids who might just become her new friends.

Beth Vrabel’s The Newspaper Club is a mystery and a friendship story rolled into one; at its climax, both combine for a conclusion that’s remarkably profound. It’s also an affectionate account of the newspaper business, complete with a glossary of newspaper terms for budding cub reporters.

Newbery Honor author Pam Muñoz Ryan (Echo) demonstrates her ability to tell poignant adventure stories with Mañanaland, which is certain to become an instant classic. 

It’s the first day of summer break, and Max is full of the sweet anticipation of weekend visits to the local swimming hole and daily soccer drills to increase his chance of achieving the dream held by every young boy in the village of Santa Maria: making the fútbol team. But almost as soon as Max forms these plans, they begin to fade right before his eyes. His father won’t allow him to go to the elite fútbol clinic that all of his friends will be attending, and even worse, Max soon learns that the mother who left when he was a baby took his birth certificate with her, leaving him no way to register for the team. 

His dreams crumbling, Max takes drastic action and embarks on a quest to find his mother and set everything right. But his family history is not what he thought it was, and Max must uncover many secrets before he can return home. 

Ryan’s unadorned prose offers readers lush depictions of life in Max’s small village, which she populates with characters that spring instantly to life. Max is the kind of protagonist that readers love to root for, equipped with a good heart and growing emotionally along his journey. Though Mañanaland can feel a bit bittersweet at times, Ryan counterbalances this with heartening representations of kindness in the face of adversity and the courage required to live out that ideal.

Black Brother. Black Brother. That’s all Dante hears. It’s the only way anyone sees him. Not as a student, or as a friend, or even as a person. Just as Black Brother. Something has to change. 

In Black Brother, Black Brother by Coretta Scott King Honor author Jewell Parker Rhodes (Sugar), Dante is confronted with the stark realization that merely hoping for change isn’t going to work. He’ll have to make change happen.

Dante and his brother, Trey, both attend Middlefield Prep. But Dante is singled out, mistrusted and unfairly targeted by both students and teachers because his skin is significantly darker than Trey’s. When he is suspended and arrested for something that he didn’t do, Dante knows he must take a risk and fight for justice for himself. Fencing might not seem like the obvious route, but Alan, the lead aggressor in Dante’s bullying, holds the role of team captain, and Dante wants to beat Alan at his own game. He finds an unlikely mentor in Arden, a local youth center employee and former Olympic fencer. 

Rooted in Dante’s heartbreaking search for a place to belong, Black Brother, Black Brother is a moving look at systemic racism and the school-to-prison pipeline. Strong, believable characters drive the action, making readers feel invested in its outcome. This exhilarating and emotional story shows young readers the power in fighting for what you believe and surrounding yourself with people who will fight with you.

Isaac Fitch’s family aren’t big Buckeyes fans. Their house doesn’t have an Ohio State flag waving above the front door, and Isaac doesn’t bleed scarlet and gray like the other 6th graders in his small Ohio town. But rooting for the wrong team is not his only problem.  

His mom is far away, working in China, his best friend has stopped talking to him and he has idiopathic angioedema, a condition that can make his hands swell like sausages and can cover his entire body in red welts at a moment’s notice. Kids at school are less than understanding and give him the nickname “Itch.”   

Despite all this, Isaac goes to great lengths to be accepted. His extreme attempts to make and keep friends underscores the very human need to be part of something bigger than ourselves. But the reckoning Isaac faces in Itch goes beyond the need to be accepted. He must face who he really is and who he wants to be—a tall order for any 12-year-old.

Author Polly Farquhar, who has also been diagnosed with idiopathic angioedema, perfectly depicts Isaac’s experiences. She also artfully conveys the familiar milieu of the 6th grade social order and the difficulties Isaac has in navigating it. The desire to fit in is a theme that will resonate with readers of any age. Isaac’s endearing personality, coupled with Farquar’s strong pacing and distinctive spin on a familiar narrative, will leave readers eager for more books from this debut author.

In order to get out of the nightmare that is her sixth grade lunch period, April takes on the job of Bench Buddy for fourth grade recess, watching over the playground and encouraging conversation and participation. It isn’t long before she notices Joey Byrd, a loner who spends the recess period dragging his feet through the dirt or laying on his back with his eyes closed.

Curious, April talks to Joey, and he eventually divulges that he is making what he calls “spirals of sadness” and other land art with his feet. Land art, April learns, is art made using natural and often “found” materials, such as soil, rocks and plants. It’s usually created on a large scale and best viewed from a high vantage point. As her friendship with Joey grows, April gains an appreciation for what life looks like through Joey’s eyes.

Shelley Pearsall puts upper elementary and middle school life into perspective in Things Seen From Above, a sweet and kindhearted story. As readers make their way through the book’s alternating points of view, with April’s chapters narrated in text and Joey’s primarily in images, they will love seeing Joey’s world unfold right alongside April. A fascinating author’s note reveals that Joey’s character is based on a member of Pearsall’s own family.

Things Seen From Above offers a creative introduction to a unique art form and an appealing story about learning to fit in to a crowd that’s still learning what fitting in truly means.

Ware’s parents have decided this is the summer they’re going to work overtime and save up enough money to buy a house. But just when 11-year-old Ware settles into a routine with his grandmother who’s caring for him, she suffers a fall—and Plan B is the dreaded Rec Camp, complete with fitness drills, peppy chants and stifling “art” projects. Creative, introverted Ware doesn’t need any more reminders that he’s not a “normal kid,” so when he spots a chance to escape, he jumps a fence and lands in a vacant lot, the remnants of a demolished church.

There Ware encounters Jolene, a tough-as-nails girl with an ambition to grow her own forest of papaya plants. When they look at the ruins of the lot, Jolene sees a garden and Ware sees a castle, but the adults around them only see a strip mall. Jolene, who’s seen enough of life to become jaded, is convinced their project is doomed. But Ware, ever optimistic, hatches a plan to try and save this special place.

Sara Pennypacker’s latest novel is a tender celebration of the quirks that make each person different. In an era when many young people are finding their voices as activists, Here in the Real World is also a hopeful account of collective social action. As Ware says, “I don’t want things to be magically what they’re not. I want them to be what they could be. And somebody has to want that, or nothing bad will ever get better.” True to the book’s title, Pennypacker doesn’t impose a fairy-tale ending on Ware’s story—but she does lovingly honor the beauty found in the people and places that too often go overlooked.

Crickets, anyone?

During the summer after seventh grade, Mia Barnes and her parents move from Boston to Vermont to be near her Gram, a retired entomology professor who is recovering from a stroke and running her own business, Green Mountain Cricket Farm. After a series of alarming mishaps, Mia becomes convinced that someone is trying to sabotage the farm, so she and some new friends decide to track down the culprit. Fascinating details about cricket farming (think Thai cricket pizza and chocolate chirp cookies) dovetail nicely with Mia’s mystery, which grows increasingly urgent as it threatens to destroy Gram’s beloved enterprise.

Chirp, Kate Messner’s latest middle grade novel, is a delightful hodgepodge of a book. It’s expertly organized and seamlessly pulls together a variety of intriguing themes in a truly organic way. Mia, like Gram, is also recovering, having badly broken her arm during a gymnastics competition. And she’s nursing an even more invasive, invisible wound that she hasn’t told anyone about: Phil, one of her gymnastic coaches, touched her inappropriately on several occasions, repeatedly holding her too close and too long, as well as texting her to ask for a photo. This disturbing experience has robbed Mia of her confidence and forced her into the habit of trying to remain invisible. Even though Phil is no longer a threat, she realizes, “Once you got in the habit of being small, it was hard to feel safe being your normal size anymore.”

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Read our Q&A with Chirp author Kate Messner.

At her parents’ insistence, Mia enrolls in two summer camps, one for her body (a ninja warrior-style camp) and one for her brain (a young entrepreneurs program). Warrior Camp helps Mia regain her mental confidence and physical strength, while Launch Camp gives Mia innovative ideas about how to make Gram’s cricket farm a success. In Messner’s skilled hands, even business camp becomes exciting, and her sensitive, subtle prose beautifully captures Mia’s thoughts, feelings and actions.

For readers who haven’t experienced anything like what Phil does to Mia, Chirp is an excellent introduction to the difficult but necessary subject, and to the warning signs that are sometimes present. For readers who can personally relate to Mia’s experience, Chirp could well be a lifesaver. Mia eventually finds the courage to tell an understanding adult about her trauma; soon after, she also informs her mother about Phil’s behavior, which launches an investigation. Chockfull of strong female role models, Chirp is a riveting middle grade novel of empowerment that deftly tackles a delicate, imperative subject. Crickets may chirp, but readers will be ready to roar.