Below you will find print and digital titles about family issues in our SHS Learning Commons collection and the Libby collection from the Scott County Library.
Nigeria Jones
by
Sixteen-year-old Nigeria Jones has grown up with her family as part of a Black separatist movement led by her father, Kofi Sankofa. When her mother abruptly leaves, Nigeria believes it's only temporary and she steps in to fill her mother's role, caring for her younger brother and filling in where necessary for the movement. But as she realizes her mother wanted her to attend a nearby Quaker school that her father disapproved of and sees misogynistic motivations within the movement, she takes bold steps towards a future of her own choosing.
Alma Presses Play
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Half-Chinese, half-Jewish teenager Alma feels her life is split in half everywhere--from her parents who are fighting half the time and the other half silent to her body being halfway grown to adulthood. Feeling lost in a year of seeming constant change and loss--friends moving away, go-nowhere romances, divorces--Alma finds herself depending on her Walkman and favorite music to begin building her life whole.
The Girl I Am, Was, and Never Will Be
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In this part memoir and part work of speculative fiction, author Shannon Gibney relates her experiences growing up as a mixed-Black transracial child adopted by White parents. To relate the scope of her feelings and her life story, she writes parallel stories of a fictional Erin Powers, the name her birth mother gave her when she was born, and Shannon Gibney a young biracial girl searching for information about her birth parents, interspersed with documents, letters, interviews, and photographs. In one timeline, Erin Powers grows up as the daughter of Shannon's alcoholic birth mother, who had a brief, complicated relationship with her father. In the other, Shannon reads books, listens to podcasts, and contacts organizations, diligently searching for her origins and trying to make sense of who she is. Along the way, she meets up with Erin through a portal that puts her in contact with her Black father for the first time.
Family Style
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In this graphic novel memoir, Vietnamese American Thien Pham uses different types of food to signify and explore his experiences as a refugee who fled Vietnam with his family, spent time in Thailand in a refugee camp, and resettled in California. As Thien recounts his efforts to recover from his trauma, find happiness, and live out the American Dream, different foods came to signify his struggles and triumphs and became an important source of self-discovery, healing, and hope.
Far from the Tree
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Being the middle child has its ups and downs. But for Grace, an only child who was adopted at birth, discovering that she is a middle child is a different ride altogether. After putting her own baby up for adoption, she goes looking for her biological family, including— Maya, her loudmouthed younger bio sister, who has a lot to say about their newfound family ties. Having grown up the snarky brunette in a house full of chipper redheads, she’s quick to search for traces of herself among these not-quite-strangers. And when her adopted family’s long-buried problems begin to explode to the surface, Maya can’t help but wonder where exactly it is that she belongs. And Joaquin, their stoic older bio brother, who has no interest in bonding over their shared biological mother. After seventeen years in the foster care system, he’s learned that there are no heroes, and secrets and fears are best kept close to the vest, where they can’t hurt anyone but him.
Furia
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Camila Hassan is a talented seventeen-year-old Argentinean soccer player who dreams of playing in North America. It's a dream she must keep secret from her strict mother and abusive father, who would never approve of a girl playing sports. When her team wins the local cup and she has the opportunity to play in the South American tournament, Camila is thrilled but worried, because she'll need her parent's permission to go.
Not the Girls You're Looking For
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In this coming-of-age novel, Lulu Saad considers herself both American and Arab, which in her American classmates' eyes makes her a terrorist, while her Muslim family disapproves of her American lifestyle. Tackling her junior year at her Texas prep school with a chip on her shoulder, Lulu makes a significant, impetuous mistake that could cost her more than she bargained for.
Take Me with You When You Go
by
When eighteen-year-old Bea runs away from home with no explanation, her brother Ezra is shocked and hurt. He knows life with their neglectful mother and abusive stepfather isn't easy, but he hates being left behind. He finds an email address Bea leaves for him and the siblings begin communicating. Bea tells Ezra that she received a message that prompted her to finally leave her life behind. Meanwhile, things get much worse for Ezra and he flees to the home of his Black boyfriend. As Bea learns more about their family's past, the siblings help each other survive and find a way forward.
The Complicated Calculus (and Cows) of Carl Paulsen
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Fifteen-year-old Carl Paulsen lives with his father and little sister on a dairy farm in southern Minnesota, but he and his father are struggling with how to address the future of their farm, a legacy of Carl's late mother. In addition, Carl is trying to come to terms with his crush on Andy Olnan, a city boy recently transplanted to farm life from Minneapolis who seems to return his feelings. As he struggles to be accepted for who he is, Carl begins to discover the same in the people who mean the most to him.
When My Heart Joins the Thousand
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Alvie Fitz, who is autistic, is quietly waiting to turn eighteen and be legally emancipated. She works at the zoo and lives independently in a small apartment. One day she meets Stanley, a boy with chronic physical issues, and falls for him. She sees Stanley as her chance to have a physical relationship. Soon romance blossoms, but when Stanley tells Alvie he loves her, she panics, loses her job, and becomes homeless. It is only with Stanley's help that Alvie can face her past, get her life back on track, and find happiness.
We Deserve Monuments
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Seventeen-year-old biracial Avery Anderson's life is turned upside down when she and her parents move to Bardell, Georgia, to live with her terminally ill grandmother, Mama Letty. Avery's mom and Mama Letty have a strained relationship, but they won't tell Avery what caused it. Fortunately, Avery befriends Simone Cole, her Black next-door neighbor who she begins to fall for, and Jade Oliver, the White daughter of the town's most prominent family. As Avery begins to unpacks Bardell's racist past, she learns more about her own family's tragic connection to the town and about the unsolved murder of Jade's mother.
Chloe and the Kaishao Boys
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Instead of staying in the Philippines, studying business, and joining the family company like the perfect Liang daughter, seventeen-year-old Chinese Filipina Chloe is preparing to leave for college in America to become an animator. She rolls her eyes when her father sets her up on a series of arranged dates in hopes of convincing her to stay close for college instead. But when she actually begins to fall for one of the guys, Chloe must choose between staying, or following her dreams and leaving everyone she loves behind.
Indivisible
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Mexican American high school junior and aspiring actor Mateo Garcia's life is turned upside down when his undocumented parents are arrested by ICE. Feeling pressure to run his family's New York bodega and care for his younger sister, Mateo suddenly doesn't know where he fits in as an American, while the stress of surviving and worry threaten to overwhelm him.
With the Fire on High
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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.
Since We Last Spoke
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Neighbors Aggi Frank and Max Granger are teenagers in love, but when a fatal car accident occurs involving their older siblings, the two families are torn apart and a restraining order between the two households pushes Aggi and Max apart. A year later they meet at a party which ends the long bout of silence. Then the unthinkable happens, and the two must confront their families so that both sides can heal.
This Train Is Being Held
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Williams's latest novel feels like if West Side Story were about two teens who met on a train. Alex and Isa are Latinx, but their families and lives could not be more different. After several chance-encounters on the New York City subway, they start seeing each other for real. With themes of privilege, mental health, and diaspora, this love story is bound to pack a punch.
Everything We Never Had
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Presents a multiple perspectives story that follows four generations of Filipino American men who face different challenges in their lives and pass down their own flaws, values, and virtues to their children. In 1930, sixteen-year-old Francisco Maghabol leaves the Philippines in search of a better life in California, but as he barely gets by on his earnings from picking apples and faces increasing violence from white men in town, he starts to question whether he should have left in the first place. In 1965, Emil refuses to follow in the footsteps of his labor organizer father, Francisco, and is determined to prove he has what it takes to make it in the United States. In 1983, Chris faces challenges as he tries to connect to his Filipino roots and prove that his overbearing father Emil can't control his life. In 2020, Enzo's world changes forever when his abrasive grandfather moves in during a global pandemic, and he attempts to heal the decades-long rift between his father and grandfather.
This Indian Kid: a Native American Memoir (Scholastic Focus)
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Memoir of Native American Creek and Cherokee author Eddie Chuculate. Chronicles Chuculate's childhood, a time marked by shuffling between different households and fourteen different schools over only nine years, and works up through his life learning to love his Cherokee and Creek gifts and traditions and learning to live true to himself in the midst of white, small-town American culture.
Monstrous
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Born in South Korea and adopted as a baby by a white couple, Sarah has never known anything about her birth family, and she has always felt out of place. She constantly feels like an outsider in the small rural farming community where she lives with her parents and sister, and she faces extreme bullying from her classmates at school. Sarah finds an escape through art and becomes obsessed with anime and cosplay, but her vivid imagination has a down side, as she begins expressing her emotions in a disruptive, often violent way. As she grows older and the bullying gets worse, Sarah must find a way to come to terms with her identity and accept herself for who she is.
American Panda
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At seventeen, Mei should be in high school, but skipping fourth grade was part of her parents’ master plan. Now a freshman at MIT, she is on track to fulfill the rest of this predetermined future: become a doctor, marry a preapproved Taiwanese Ivy Leaguer, produce a litter of babies. With everything her parents have sacrificed to make her cushy life a reality, Mei can’t bring herself to tell them the truth—that she (1) hates germs, (2) falls asleep in biology lectures, and (3) has a crush on her classmate Darren Takahashi, who is decidedly not Taiwanese. But when Mei reconnects with her brother, Xing, who is estranged from the family for dating the wrong woman, Mei starts to wonder if all the secrets are truly worth it. Can she find a way to be herself, whoever that is, before her web of lies unravels? From debut author Gloria Chao comes a hilarious, heartfelt tale of how, unlike the panda, life isn’t always so black and white.
The Kids Are Gonna Ask
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After Thomas and Savannah McClair's mother dies, the twins begin a journey to find their biological father. When they start a podcast interviewing people from their mother's past in order to find their father, they are thrust into the spotlight and a national debate about privacy.
Lulu and Milagro's Search for Clarity
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Baltimore sisters Lulu and Milagro Zavala are close, but have very different focuses. Lulu wants to go away to college and devotes her time to getting good grades. Milagro gives her attention to her boyfriend Pablo, with schoolwork coming in at the bottom of her priority list. When their older sister Clara returns home from Iowa on college break, something has changed and Clara won't talk about it.
Summer Bird Blue
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Rumi Seto spends a lot of time worrying she doesn’t have the answers to everything. What to eat, where to go, whom to love. But there is one thing she is absolutely sure of—she wants to spend the rest of her life writing music with her younger sister, Lea. Then Lea dies in a car accident, and her mother sends her away to live with her aunt in Hawaii while she deals with her own grief.
When We Make It
by
In this novel-in-verse, fourteen-year-old Sarai navigates life in her Brooklyn neighborhood, chronicling all that she sees around her--from her hard-working, single Puerto Rican mother, to changes in the neighborhood that are squeezing out immigrants like her, to the voices that tell her she won't amount to anything--and offering her own thoughts about her future and what's real.
Frankly in Love
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As the son of Korean immigrants in Southern California, high school senior Frank Li is expected to find a nice Korean girl to marry. But instead, Frank falls for a white classmate who his parents will never approve of. He meets another Korean American, Joy Song, who is in a similar situation. They agree to be a couple in front of their parents in order for Frank and Joy to be with who they really want, but as their fake relationship becomes more real, they both wonder if they really know anything about love.
Saint Anything
by
Sydney's charismatic older brother, Peyton, has always been the center of attention in the family but when he is sent to jail, Sydney struggles to find her place at home and the world until she meets the Chathams, including gentle, protective Mac, who makes her feel seen for the first time.
A Pho Love Story
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For years, the Mais and the Nguyens have been at odds, having owned competing, neighboring pho restaurants. Teenagers Bao and Linh, who’ve avoided each other for most of their lives, both suspect that the feud stems from feelings much deeper than friendly competition. But then a chance encounter brings Linh and Bao in the same vicinity despite their best efforts and sparks fly, leading them both to wonder what took so long for them to connect. Can Linh and Bao find love in the midst of feuding families and complicated histories?
When We Were Strangers
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After her father suffers a sudden heart attack and dies, seventeen-year-old Evie Parker returns home from the hospital to discover that her father was planning to leave her and her mother. Not wanting to further devastate her mother, Evie opts to keep her father's plans a secret by unpacking his suitcases and putting everything back where it was.
Apple in the Middle
by
A biracial girl, Apple, rejected her Native American ancestry after suffering a racist epithet, but can't seem to be accepted by either the white or Native cultures. One summer, her father sends her to spend time on the Turtle Mountain Indian Reservation to engage with her Native American relatives. Reluctantly, she tries to find a connection, especially to her dead mother, and in the process of learning more about her heritage, learns to take pride in where she came from. Additionally, she has to contend with an angry Indian man who dated Apple's mother in high school and is furious at her for marrying a white man. He decides to turn his rage and vengeance on her daughter.
Almost American Girl
by
Graphic novel in which a South Korean girl named Chun and her single mother leave for America on vacation and end up staying after her mother announces she's getting married. Chun changes her name to Robin and tries to fit in at her local high school where she doesn't know the language. When her mother enrolls her in a comics drawing class, she begins to feel more at home in the United States.
Slider
by
After David accidentally puts $2,000 on his mom's credit card, he begins training as a competitive eater in order to win the money back. And as he trains, he has to keep an eye on his kid brother, who has special needs, and on his friends, Cyn and HeyMan, who are becoming more than friends.
The Brothers Torres
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Sophomore Frankie finally finds the courage to ask his long-term friend, Julianne, to the Homecoming dance, which ultimately leads to a face-off between a tough senior whose family owns most of their small, New Mexico town, and Frankie's soccer-star older brother and his gang-member friends.
If You're Not the One
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College student Anisa Shirani, a young Pakistani American Muslim woman, tries to lead the perfect life and prepares to marry Isaac Jamil. But when she sees Isaac flirting with someone else, she accepts an offer from Marlow Greene, a Jamaican boy who's Black and Indian, to help Anisa win Isaac back. Just as Anisa and Marlow are growing closer, Ani's parents announce they're divorcing, upending Anisa's perfect world.
An Appetite for Miracles
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Hoping to help her grandfather recover his fading memories, sixteen-year-old Danna Mendoza begins cooking favorite recipes that he used to review. Unfortunately, her mother doesn't agree with this plan, thinking it's only exacerbating what she views as Danna's weight issues. Teenage Raúl Santos supports his pastor uncle's ministry by playing guitar for the elderly in their community, including Danna's grandfather. Playing becomes his escape from dealing with the trauma of his mother's wrongful incarceration and how she's changed since returning back into his life. When Danna and Raúl meet, they feel an instant attraction and become each other's support as they navigate the difficulties of their lives and discover its hidden joys.
All the Things We Never Knew
by
When they meet for the first time at a high school basketball tournament, Carli and Rex have an immediate connection. While Rex is ESPN's high school basketball player of the year, Carli wants to quit basketball. As the two draw closer, family secrets, basketball, and disappointments complicate their budding romance.
An Emotion of Great Delight
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In 2003, Muslim American teen Shadi is crumbling from sadness and stress, very little of which is related to the hatred she's feeling from peers at school due to the recent 9/11 attacks. Shadi's brother was killed in a car accident and the resulting stress on her family likely led to her father's heart attack and her mother's deep depression. Feeling alone and floundering, Shadi's only lifeline is her former friend's brother Ali, who becomes a source of support--and maybe something more--during this time of family and political turmoil.
Color Me In
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Growing up in an affluent suburb of New York City, sixteen-year-old Nevaeh Levitz never thought much about her biracial roots. When her Black mom and Jewish dad split up, she relocates to her mom's family home in Harlem and is forced to confront her identity for the first time. Nevaeh wants to get to know her extended family, but because she inadvertently passes as white, her cousin thinks she's too privileged, pampered, and selfish to relate to the injustices African Americans face on a daily basis. In the meantime, Nevaeh's dad decides that she should have a belated bat mitzvah instead of a sweet sixteen, which guarantees social humiliation at her posh private school. But rather than take a stand, Nevaeh does what she's always done when life gets complicated: she stays silent.Only when Nevaeh stumbles upon a secret from her mom's past, finds herself falling in love, and sees firsthand the prejudice her family faces that she begins to realize she has her own voice. And choices. Will she continue to let circumstances dictate her path? Or will she decide once for all who and where she is meant to be?
I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter
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Julia refuses to conform to her Mexican family's expectations of her, wanting to become a writer instead of following her older sister Olga on the path of community college, part-time job, and taking care of their parents. Then, Olga dies mysteriously, and her best friend Angie hints to Julia that there may have been more to Olga than everyone thought. Julia and her best friend, Lorena, investigate, and in the meantime Julia has to figure out how to fall in love with Connor, a white boy whom she is sure could never understand her family.
The Poet X
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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.
Simone Breaks All the Rules
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New Jersey private school senior Simone Thibodeaux teams up with her friends to create a bucket list of all the experiences she'd like to have in her final year of high school that her Haitian immigrant parents have been denying her--beginning with selecting her own prom date. However, her decisions and actions lead to unintended consequences as she comes to recognize the beauty of her heritage and her family's love and sacrifices.
This Time Will Be Different
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Seventeen-year-old CJ Katsuyama's family sold their flower shop to a white man for next to nothing while they were interned during World War II. Thirty years later, the family bought the store back from that family, the McAllisters, who had prospered in the interim. Now the shop is in financial trouble and CJ's mother works for McAllister Venture Capital. CJ's mother pushes CJ to make something of her life, but CJ only seems to excel at arranging flowers, and she feels aimless. When secrets about the McAllister patriarch come to light, CJ and a group of student activists find something to rally behind, though it causes friction in the community and between CJ and her mother.
How You Grow Wings
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Cheta, sharp-tongued and stubborn, is always ready to fight back whereas her sister Zam is timid and tries to avoid her confrontational mother and sister whenever possible. When Zam is invited to live with her aunt's family, she suddenly suddenly experiences wealth like she's never imagined, and Cheta grows jealous and runs away from home. As the siblings traverse their own paths, they must overcome generational trauma, domestic abuse, colorism, and classism. But when their paths cross again, the sisters must decide what they both want for the future.
From Here
by
Luma Mufleh, founder of Fugees Family, a nonprofit that supports refugee children in the United States, provides a memoir of her experiences as a refugee. Growing up as a Muslim in Jordan, Luma knew as a preteen that she was attracted to girls, but didn't have words for her homosexuality. After getting accepted into college in the United States, Luma came out to her parents, but they wanted her immediately returned to them. Knowing she could be killed, Luma applied for asylum in the United States and began the long journey to becoming a citizen where she could live as her authentic self, while simultaneously loving her heritage and helping her family accept who she is.
Patron Saints of Nothing
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Beautiful Sophie and ugly Agatha, best friends, are taken by the School Master to the School for Good and Evil, where children are trained to be fairy tale heroes and villains. But when Sophie is sent to the School for evil, and Agatha to princess classes, the shocked girls think it's a mistake and try to switch; but unseen forces work to reveal their true identities.
Lock and Key
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When she is abandoned by her alcoholic mother, high school senior Ruby winds up living with Cora, the sister she has not seen for ten years, and learns about Cora's new life, what makes a family, how to allow people to help her when she needs it, and that she too has something to offer others.
Love, Lucas
by
Taking some time off at her Aunt Jo's beach house in California to help her cope with her grief, Oakley Nelson discovers a notebook of letters her late brother, Lucas, had written to her but never sent. The letters help Oakley somewhat, and Lucas writes that he wants her to move on after he has passed--but Oakley never imagined moving on would mean falling for Carson, a surfer boy. However, Oakley wonders how she can have happiness again when Lucas never even got the chance.
