The document provides a summer reading list for a teen book club, summarizing several young adult novels that deal with challenging themes. The Outsiders is about rival gangs, My Bloody Life recounts a former gang member's violent experiences, and The Beast explores drug addiction. Go Ask Alice tells the diary of a girl struggling with drugs and running away. Story of a Girl is about a girl dealing with the fallout of a sexual mistake. Twisted follows a boy trying to prove his innocence after being accused of a crime due to his rebellious image.

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Get Lost…And Found
Teen Summer Book Club
Reading List
The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton
Life has not been easy for Ponyboy Curtis. Since his parents’
deaths in a car accident, Ponyboy’s oldest brother Darry has raised
him and his brother Sodapop. The boys belong to a gang of
“greasers,” tough boys from their poor neighborhood who rival the
preppy, rich “socials” (socs), who seem to get all the breaks. After a
violent mistake which forces Ponyboy and his friend to run and hide,
has Ponyboy lost any chance to return home, to better himself, to
rise above?
My Bloody Life by Reymundo Sanchez
This memoir of a former member of the Latin Kings, a notorious
Chicago gang, is chilling and unflinching in its relaying of events.
The violence that the narrator experiences at home as a child
escalates in the bloody life he chooses and loses himself to as a
gang member. If this is all he’s ever known, can he ever really
escape gang life?
The Beast by Walter Dean Myers
Spoon leaves Harlem and his family and girlfriend, Gabi, to attend a
New England prep school. When he returns four months later, Gabi is
no longer the warm, spirited poet she once was, but rather a broken
girl lost to the Beast—drug addiction. Spoon is confused and torn
between wanting to escape the troubles of his neighborhood and
wanting to save those he loves who still live in it.
Go Ask Alice. by Anonymous
Through her diary, we meet an anonymous 15-year old girl who starts
experimenting with drugs and later becomes addicted. She runs
away from home, wanders the streets in various cities trying to make
sense of her life, all the while battling depression and withdrawal. Is
she completely lost, or can she find her way home?
Story of a Girl by Sara Zarr
Everyone makes mistakes. For Deanna, it was having sex with an
older boy in her father’s car at age 13. What made it worse was
having her father catch her in the act. When nobody will let Deanna

2. forget this, life is almost unbearable. This is a story of finding forgiveness and
leaving mistakes in the past.
Twisted by Laurie Halse Anderson
Seventeen-year old Tyler is on probation after spray-painting his
high school. Having spent the summer working off his sentence, he
is suddenly muscular and attractive to girls—very new territory.
Because of his “bad boy” image, everyone accuses Tyler of a
heinous crime. How can he deal with his newfound image and prove
that one mistake does not define who he is?