• Topic Guide
  • Staff-Created List

JoCoLibrary - Race Reads - Teen Contemporary Fiction

Race Project KC's recommendations for books exploring race issues in the United States.

Johnson County Library

60 items

  • Michael's parents are leaders of a new anti-immigrant political party called Aussie Values which is trying to halt the flood of refugees from the Middle East; Mina fled Afghanistan with her family ten years ago, and just wants to concentrate on…
    Book, 2017New York : Scholastic Press, 2017. — TEEN FICTION AbdelFat Randa
  • 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.
    Book, 2018New York, NY : HarperTeen, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers, 2018. — TEEN FICTION Acevedo Elizabet
  • A terrifying, futuristic United Sates where Muslim-Americans are forced into internment camps, and seventeen-year-old Layla Amin must lead a revolution against complicit silence.
    Book, 2019New York ; Boston : Little, Brown and Company, 2019. — TEEN FICTION Ahmed Samira 03/2019
  • Fourteen-year-old twin basketball stars Josh and Jordan wrestle with highs and lows on and off the court as their father ignores his declining health.
    Book, 2014Boston : Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, [2014] — J FICTION Alexande Kwame
  • In the game of life, sometimes other people hold all the controls. Or so it seems to VZ. Four months have passed since his best friend Ed was killed by a white man in a Brooklyn parking lot. When Singer, the man who killed Ed, is found dead in the…
    Book, 2023New York : Katherine Tegen Books, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers, 2023. — TEEN FICTION Allen Charlene 01/2023
  • A delightfully fun deconstruction of ethnocentrism and skewed perception starring an archivist and a historian. Each is an expert on the long history of hatred and war between the elven and goblin kingdoms, paired together as part of a diplomatic…
    Book, 2018Somerville, Massachusetts : Candlewick Press, 2018. — TEEN FICTION Anderson M.T.
  • When Zach, a white boy from Philly, moves to a racially divided town, he befriends Black siblings Capri and Justin, but when the police murder one of their friends, the town erupts into an all-out war, with Capri, Justin, and Zach caught in the…
    Book, 2022New York : Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, 2022. — TEEN FICTION Alyse Charity 12/2022
  • Two eighth-graders from very different backgrounds, Robeson "Crease" Battlefield and Pacino Clapton, discover in afterschool detention that they have a great deal in common.
    Book, 2010New York : Scholastic Press, 2010. — TEEN FICTION Barnes Derrick
  • Black Enough

    Stories of Being Young & Black in America

    A collection of short stories explore what it is like to be young and black, centering on the experiences of black teenagers and emphasizing that one person's experiences, reality, and personal identity are different than someone else.
    Book, 2019New York, NY : Balzer + Bray, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers, [2019] — TEEN FICTION Black
  • J.B., Ramón, and Trey, students of the Urban Promise Prep School, must follow the school's strict rules, but when their principal is murdered, the three boys must band together to track down the real killer before they are arrested.
    Book, 2023New York : Henry Holt Books for Young Readers, 2023. — TEEN FICTION Brooks Nick 01/2023
  • Black Girl Unlimited

    the Remarkable Story of a Teenage Wizard

    Brown, Echo,
    From age six through her high school valedictory speech, believing she and her mother are wizards helps young Echo cope with poverty, hunger, her mother's drug abuse, and much more.
    Book, 2020New York : Christy Ottaviano Books, Henry Holt and Company, 2020. — TEEN FICTION Brown Echo 01/2020
  • When Reed and Olivia left home, they never imagined they'd find themselves questioned, searched, and thrown to the ground by police looking for suspects in recent crimes. As their worst fears become reality, they must find a way to "prove" their…
    Book, 2023Austin, TX : Blink, 2023. — TEEN FICTION Buckmire Brian 01/2023
  • Best friends Rasheeda and Monique navigate the ups and downs of a teenager's summer, Mo at home in the Cove; Sheeda at a sleepaway ballet intensive.
    Book, 2020New York, NY : Greenwillow Books, an Imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers, [2020] — TEEN FICTION Chase Paula 10/2020
  • When Marvin Johnson's twin brother, Tyler, is shot and killed by a police officer, Marvin must fight injustice to learn the true meaning of freedom.
    Book, 2018Boston ; New York : Little, Brown and Company, 2018. — TEEN FICTION Coles Jay
  • Twelve-year-old Kasienka and her mother have immigrated to Coventry, England from Poland, searching for Kasienka's father, but everyone is unfriendly except for an African neighbor and a boy Kasienka meets at the swimming pool, which is her only…
    Book, 2013New York, N.Y. : Bloomsbury, 2013. — J FICTION Crossan Sarah
  • Sixteen-year-old Danny searches for his identity amidst the confusion of being half-Mexican and half-white while spending a summer with his cousin and new friends on the baseball fields and back alleys of San Diego County, California.
    Book, 2008New York : Delacorte Press, c2008. — TEEN FICTION DelaPena Matt
  • Liliana Cruz does what it takes to fit in at her new nearly all-white school, but when family secrets come out and racism at school gets worse than ever, she must decide what she believes in and take a stand.
    Book, 2020New York : Atheneum, [2020] — TEEN FICTION DeLeon Jennifer 08/2020
  • Nima doesn't feel understood. By her mother, who grew up far away in a different land. By her suburban town, which makes her feel too much like an outsider to fit in and not enough like an outsider to feel like that she belongs somewhere else. At…
    Book, 2021New York : Make Me A World, [2021] — [Fic] 23
  • When Nova, Lovett High School's first black homecoming queen, is murdered the night of her coronation, her best friend, Duchess, finds an unlikely ally in her search for the killer--her prime suspect, Tinsley, the white rival nominee for queen.
    Book, 2023New York : Delacorte Press, [2023] — TEEN FICTION Emill Jumata 01/2023
  • When best friends Tom and Jason leave New York City for an elite, sports-focused boarding school in Virginia to play football, they find some coaches and teammates to be steeped in racism.
    Book, 2017New York : Farrar Straus Giroux, 2017. — TEEN FICTION Feinstei John