Title Recommendations based on Grace Gardner
After moving to a new town, troublemaking teen Jim Stark is supposed to have a clean slate, although being the new kid in town brings its own problems. While searching for some stability, Stark forms a bond with a disturbed classmate, Plato, and falls for local girl Judy. However, Judy is the girlfriend of neighborhood tough, Buzz. When Buzz violently confronts Jim and challenges him to a drag race, the new kid's real troubles begin.
It's 1996 in a town called Boring, Oregon, where high school misfits in the AV and drama clubs brave the ups and downs of teenage emotions in the VHS era.
Max Fischer, a precocious and eccentric 15 year-old, who is both Rushmore's most extracurricular and least scholarly student; Herman Blume, a disillusioned industrialist who comes to admire Max; and Rosemary Cross, a widowed first grade teacher who becomes the object of both Max's and Herman's affection.
Dawson's Creek is focused on best high school friends, Dawson Leery, Joey Potter, and Pacey Witter. But their relationships are put to the test after new girl Jen Lindley moves to town and starts to shake things up.
Lina is just like any other fifteen-year-old Lithuanian girl in 1941. She paints, she draws, she gets crushes on boys. Until one night when Soviet officers barge into her home, tearing her family from the comfortable life they've known. Separated from her father, forced onto a crowded and dirty train car, Lina, her mother, and her young brother slowly make their way north, crossing the Arctic Circle, to a work camp in the coldest reaches of Siberia. Here they are forced, under Stalin's orders, to dig for beets and fight for their lives under the cruelest of conditions. Lina finds solace in her art, meticulously-and at great risk-documenting events by drawing, hoping these messages will make their way to her father's prison camp to let him know they are still alive. It is a long and harrowing journey, spanning years and covering 6,500 miles, but it is through incredible strength, love, and hope that Lina ultimately survives. Between Shades of Gray is a novel that will steal your breath and capture your heart.
A teen navigates the complexities of high school, family and her sexuality while dealing with new superpowers. Based on Charles Forsman's graphic novel.
Spotlight is the true story of how The Boston Globe uncovered the massive scandal of child molestation and cover-up within the local Catholic Archdiocese—shaking the entire Catholic Church to its core.
A hard-partying high school senior's philosophy on life changes when he meets the not-so-typical "nice girl."
Saved by the Bell follows five best friends during their time at Bayside High School in Los Angeles. The show covered all walks of high school life, from Zack Morris, the consummate schemer and rabble rouser to A.C. Slater, the amiable jock, to Screech the lovable geek, to Jessie Spano the feminist scholar, to Kelly Kapowski the teenage dream girl. At its best, the show was aspirational, showing a school that had almost zero ties to reality, and seemed to exist in some happier Day-glo universe. You either knew people like them, or you wanted to.
Taking us from Afghanistan in the final days of the monarchy through the horrific rule of the Taliban, The Kite Runner is the heartbreaking story of the unlikely and inseparable friendship between a wealthy Afghan boy and the son of his father's servant, both of whom are caught in the tragic sweep of history. Published in the aftermath of America's invasion of Afghanistan, Khaled Hosseini's haunting writing brought a part of the world to vivid life that was previously unknown.
Murderesses Velma Kelly (a chanteuse and tease who killed her husband and sister after finding them in bed together) and Roxie Hart (who killed her boyfriend when she discovered he wasn't going to make her a star) find themselves on death row together and fight for the fame that will keep them from the gallows in 1920s Chicago.
Dre Johnson grew up in Compton, a tough part of Los Angeles. When he achieved success, he moved a few miles away to a nicer—but much whiter—part of town. He's trying to teach his kids to take pride in their heritage in a mostly-white environment. But his son cares more about field hockey than basketball, and his daughter's new boyfriend is not only white—he's French too!
Pleasantly plump teenager, Tracy Turnblad and her best friend, Penny Pingleton audition to be on The Corny Collins Show. Tracy wins, but scheming Amber Von Tussle and her mother plot to destroy her. Chaos ensues.
Outlander is the story of Claire Randall, who accidentally activated some magical standing stones in the Scottish Highlands and found herself transported back to the 18th century, just before the Jacobite rebellion. She is married to Frank Randall, but he is back in the 20th century. Although Claire is trying to get back to him, she can't help growing attached to a young Scotsman named Jamie.
Charlie is not the biggest geek in high school, but he's by no means popular. Shy, introspective, intelligent beyond his years, caught between trying to live his life and trying to run from it, Charlie is attempting to navigate through the uncharted territory of high school. The world of first dates and mixed tapes, family dramas and new friends. The world of sex, drugs, and music—when all one requires to feel infinite is that perfect song on that perfect drive. Standing on the fringes of life Charlie has a unique perspective of the world around him, but there comes a time to stop being a wallflower and see what it looks like from the dance floor.
