A summary of the 2014-2015 Georgia Peach Book list

1. The Georgia Peach Books
2014-2015
(Scan the QR code to view a Book Trailer—check back for updates)

2. Eleanor & Park / Rainbow Rowell
Eleanor is the new girl in town, and she's never felt more
alone. All mismatched clothes, mad red hair and chaotic
home life, she couldn't stick out more if she tried. Then
she takes the seat on the bus next to Park. Quiet, careful
and - in Eleanor's eyes - impossibly cool, Park's worked out
that flying under the radar is the best way to get by.
Slowly, steadily, through late-night conversations and an
ever-growing stack of mixed tapes, Eleanor and Park fall in
love. They fall in love the way you do the first time, when
you're 16, and you have nothing and everything to lose.
Set over the course of one school year in 1986, Eleanor
and Park is funny, sad, shocking and true - an exquisite
nostalgia trip for anyone who has never forgotten their
first love

3. Winger / Andrew Smith
Ryan Dean West is a fourteen-year-old boy at a
boarding school for rich kids. He's living in Opportunity
Hall, the dorm for troublemakers, and rooming with the
biggest bully on the rugby team. And he's madly in love
with his best friend Annie, who thinks of him as a little
boy. With the help of his sense of humor, rugby
buddies, and his penchant for doodling comics, Ryan
Dean manages to survive life's complications and even
find some happiness along the way. But when the
unthinkable happens, he has to figure out how to hold
on to what's important, even when it feels like
everything has fallen apart.

4. All Our Yesterdays / Cristin Terrill
Em is locked in a bare, cold cell with no comforts. Finn is in
the cell next door. The Doctor is keeping them there until
they tell him what he wants to know. Trouble is, what he
wants to know hasn't happened yet. Em and Finn have a
shared past, but no future unless they can find a way out.
The present is torture - being kept apart, overhearing each
other's anguish as the Doctor relentlessly seeks answers.
There's no way back from here, to what they used to be, the
world they used to know. Then Em finds a note in her cell
which changes everything. It's from her future self and
contains some simple but very clear instructions. Em must
travel back in time to avert a tragedy that's about to unfold.
Worse, she has to pursue and kill the boy she loves to change
the future .

5. Of Beast and Beauty / Stacey Jay
In the domed city of Yuan, the blind Princess Isra, a Smooth Skin,
is raised to be a human sacrifice whose death will ensure her city’s
vitality. In the desert outside Yuan, Gem, a mutant beast, fights to
save his people, the Monstrous, from starvation. Neither dreams
that together, they could return balance to both their worlds.
Isra wants to help the city’s Banished people, second-class citizens
despised for possessing Monstrous traits. But after she enlists the
aid of her prisoner, Gem, who has been captured while trying to
steal Yuan’s enchanted roses, she begins to care for him, and to
question everything she has been brought up to believe.
As secrets are revealed and Isra’s sight, which vanished during her
childhood, returned, Isra will have to choose between duty to her
people and the beast she has come to love.

6. March: Book One / John Lewis, Andrew Aydin
Congressman John Lewis (GA-5) is an American icon, one of
the key figures of the civil rights movement. His
commitment to justice and nonviolence has taken him
from an Alabama sharecropper's farm to the halls of
Congress, from a segregated schoolroom to the 1963 March
on Washington, and from receiving beatings from state
troopers to receiving the Medal of Freedom from the first
African-American president.

7. Out of Nowhere / Maria Padian
At Enniston High School, Tom Bouchard has it made: captain and star
of the soccer team, boyfriend to one of the prettiest, most popular
girls, and third in his class, likely to have his pick of any college, if he
ever bothers filling out his applications. But life in his idyllic small
Maine town quickly gets turned upside down after the events of 9/11.
Enniston has become a "secondary migration" location for Somali
refugees, who are seeking a better life after their country was
destroyed by war—they can no longer go home. Tom hasn't thought
much about his Somali classmates until four of them join the soccer
team, including Saeed. He comes out of nowhere on the field to make
impossible shots, and suddenly the team is winning, dominating even;
but when Saeed's eligibility is questioned and Tom screws up in a big
way, he's left to take responsibility for his actions. Saeed and his
family came out of nowhere and vanish just as quickly. And Tom may
find himself going nowhere, too, if he doesn't start trying to get
somewhere.

8. The 5th Wave / Rick Yancey
The Passage meets The Hunger Games in The 5th Wave - a
gripping new series from Carnegie-shortlisted Rick Yancey.
After the 1st wave, only darkness remains. After the 2nd,
only the lucky escape. And after the 3rd, only the unlucky
survive. After the 4th wave, only one rule applies: trust no
one. Now, it's the dawn of the 5th wave. On a lonely stretch
of highway, Cassie runs from Them. The beings who only
look human, who roam the countryside killing anyone they
see. Who have scattered Earth's last survivors. To stay alone
is to stay alive, until Cassie meets Evan Walker. Beguiling
and mysterious, Evan may be her only hope for rescuing her
brother and even saving herself. Now she must choose:
between trust and despair, between defiance and surrender,
between life and death. To give up or to get up. Cassie
Sullivan gets up

9. Me, Him, Them & It / Caela Carter
When Evelyn decided to make her parents mad with
a bad reputation, she wasn't planning to ruin her
valedictorian status. She also wasn't planning to fall
for Todd. And she definitely wasn't planning on
getting pregnant. When Todd turns his back on her,
Evelyn's not sure where to go. Can a distant mother,
a cheating father, an angry best friend, and a
(thankfully) loving aunt with adopted daughters of
her own help Evelyn make the heart-wrenching
decisions that follow?

10. Tragedy Paper / Elizabeth LaBan
Tim Macbeth, a seventeen-year-old albino and a recent transfer
to the prestigious Irving School, where the motto is “Enter here
to be and find a friend.” A friend is the last thing Tim expects or
wants—he just hopes to get through his senior year unnoticed.
Yet, despite his efforts to blend into the background, he finds
himself falling for the quintessential “It” girl, Vanessa Sheller,
girlfriend of Irving’s most popular boy. To Tim's surprise, Vanessa
is into him, too, but she can kiss her social status goodbye if
anyone ever finds out. Tim and Vanessa begin a clandestine
romance, but looming over them is the Tragedy Paper, Irving’s
version of a senior year thesis, assigned by the school’s least
forgiving teacher.
Jumping between viewpoints of the love-struck Tim and Duncan,
a current senior about to uncover the truth of Tim and Vanessa,
The Tragedy Paper is a compelling tale of forbidden love and the
lengths people will go to keep their love

11. Torn / David Massey
Witnesses to a mystery on the battlefield, a British medic and
an American Navy SEAL confront Afghanistan's fog of war.
In war-torn Afghanistan, a girl walks right into a hail of
bullets: Elinor watches it with her own eyes. The young
British army medic risks the line of fire to rescue her, only to
realize the girl is gone.
To find the missing, mysterious child, Elinor enlists the help
of an American Navy SEAL. But in all the confusion, with
coalition troops fighting every day to maintain a fragile
peace, does Ben have something to hide?
Elinor came to Afghanistan with the hope of changing hearts
and minds: What she's about to discover will make her
question everything she ever believed about love and war.

12. Just One Day / Gayle Forman
When sheltered American good girl Allyson "LuLu"
Healey first meets laid-back Dutch actor Willem De
Ruiter at an underground performance of "Twelfth
Night" in England, there's an undeniable spark. After
just one day together, that spark bursts into a flame,
or so it seems to Allyson, until the following morning,
when she wakes up after a whirlwind day in Paris to
discover that Willem has left. Over the next year,
Allyson embarks on a journey to come to terms with
the narrow confines of her life, and through
Shakespeare, travel, and a quest for her almost-true-love,
to break free of those confines.

13. Yaqui Delgado Wants to Kick Your Ass / Meg
Medina
One morning before school, some girl tells Piddy Sanchez
that Yaqui Delgado hates her and wants to kick her ass.
Piddy doesn’t even know who Yaqui is, never mind what
she’s done to anger her. Word is that Yaqui thinks Piddy is
stuck-up, shakes her stuff when she walks, and isn’t Latin
enough with her white skin, good grades, and no accent.
And Yaqui isn’t kidding around, so Piddy better watch her
back. At first Piddy is more concerned with 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 or running away
Winner of the 2014 Pura Belpré Award

14. Openly Straight / Bill Konigsberg
Rafe is a normal teenager from Boulder, Colorado. He plays
soccer. He's won skiing prizes. He likes to write.
And, oh yeah, he's gay. He's been out since 8th grade, and he isn't
teased, and he goes to other high schools and talks about
tolerance and stuff. And while that's important, all Rafe really
wants is to just be a regular guy. Not that GAY guy. To have it be
a part of who he is, but not the headline, every single time.
So when he transfers to an all-boys' boarding school in New
England, he decides to keep his sexuality a secret -- not so much
going back in the closet as starting over with a clean slate. But
then he sees a classmate breaking down. He meets a teacher who
challenges him to write his story. And most of all, he falls in love
with Ben . . . who doesn't even know that love is possible

15. In the Shadow of Blackbirds / Cal Winters
In 1918, the world seems on the verge of apocalypse.
Americans roam the streets in gauze masks to ward off
the deadly Spanish influenza, and the government ships
young men to the front lines of a brutal war, creating an
atmosphere of fear and confusion. Sixteen-year-old Mary
Shelley Black watches as desperate mourners flock to
séances and spirit photographers for comfort, but she
herself has never believed in ghosts. During her bleakest
moment, however, she’s forced to rethink her entire
way of looking at life and death, for her first love—a boy
who died in battle—returns in spirit form. But what does
he want from her?

16. Steelheart / Brandon Sanderson
Ten years ago, Calamity came. It was a burst in the sky that
gave ordinary men and women extraordinary powers. The
awed public started calling them Epics. But Epics are no friend
of man. With incredible gifts came the desire to rule. And to
rule man you must crush his wills. Nobody fights the
Epics...nobody but the Reckoners. A shadowy group of ordinary
humans, they spend their lives studying Epics, finding their
weaknesses, and then assassinating them. And David wants in.
He wants Steelheart - the Epic who is said to be invincible.
The Epic who killed David's father. For years, like the
Reckoners, David's been studying, and planning - and he has
something they need. Not an object, but an experience. He's
seen Steelheart bleed. And he wants revenge

17. Shadow Society / Marie Rutkoski
Darcy Jones doesn't remember anything before the day she
was abandoned as a child outside a Chicago firehouse. So she
isn't surprised that she doesn't recognize Conn, the new boy
at her high school, even though he seems to know her, or at
least know something about her.
When Conn betrays Darcy, she realizes that she can’t rely on
anything—not herself, not the laws of nature, and certainly
not him. Darcy decides to infiltrate the Shadow Society and
uncover the Shades’ latest terrorist plot. What she finds out
will change her world forever . . .

18. My Friend Dahmer / Derf Backderf
"You only think you know this story. In 1991, Jeffrey Dahmer,
the most notorious serial killer since Jack the Ripper, seared
himself into the American consciousness. To the public,
Dahmer was a monster who committed unthinkable
atrocities. To Derf Backderf, 'Jeff' was a much more complex
figure: a high school friend with whom he had shared
classrooms, hallways, and car rides. In [this story], a haunting
and original graphic novel, writer-artist Backderf creates a
surprisingly sympathetic portrait of a disturbed young man
struggling against the morbid urges emanating from the deep
recesses of his psyche-- a shy kid, a teenage alcoholic, and a
goofball who never quite fit in with his classmates. With
profound insight, what emerges is a Jeffrey Dahmer that few
ever really knew, and one readers will never forget.

19. Orleans / Sherri Smith
After a string of devastating hurricanes and a severe
outbreak of Delta Fever, the Gulf Coast has been
quarantined. Now, years later, a new primitive society
has been born over the wall.
Fen de la Guerre is living with the O-Positive blood
tribe in the Delta when they are ambushed. Left with
her tribe leader’s newborn, Fen is determined to get
the baby to a better life over the wall before her blood
becomes tainted. Fen meets Daniel, a scientist from
the Outer States who has snuck into the Delta illegally.
Brought together by chance, kept together by danger,
Fen and Daniel navigate the wasteland of Orleans. In
the end, they are each other’s last hope for survival.

20. Criminal / Terra Elan McVoy
Nikki’s life is far from perfect, but at least she has Dee. Her
friends tell her that Dee is no good, but Nikki can’t imagine
herself without him. He’s hot, he’s dangerous, he has her
initials tattooed over his heart, and she loves him more than
anything. There’s nothing Nikki wouldn’t do for Dee.
Absolutely nothing.
So when Dee pulls Nikki into a crime—a crime that ends in
murder—Nikki tells herself that it’s all for true love. Nothing
can break them apart. Not the police. Not the arrest that
lands Nikki in jail. Not even the investigators who want her to
testify against him.
But what if Dee had motives that Nikki knew nothing about?
Nikki’s love for Dee is supposed to be unconditional…but even
true love has a limit. And Nikki just might have reached hers.

21. Living with Jackie Chan / Jo Knowles
This isn’t how Josh expected to spend senior year. He thought
he’d be hanging out with his best friends, Dave and Caleb, driving
around, partying, just like always. But here he is, miles from
home — new school, new life, living with his Jackie-Chan-obsessed
uncle, Larry, and trying to forget. But Josh can’t forget.
So many things bring back memories of last year and the night
that changed everything. Every day the pain, the shame, and the
just not knowing are never far from his thoughts. Why is he such
a loser? How could he have done what he did? He finds some
moments of peace when he practices karate with Stella, the girl
upstairs and his one real friend. He wonders if they could be
more than friends, but Stella’s jealous boyfriend will make sure
that doesn’t happen. And maybe it doesn’t matter. If Stella knew
the truth, would she still think he was a True Karate Man

22. Credits:
• Book covers from Alibris.com
• Summaries from Alibris and amazon.com
• Book Trailers used are the official publisher’s trailers if present:
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