If You Want to Read Something Profound
These powerful stories pack an emotional punch.
Speak Up by Miranda Paul and Ebony Glenn
A diverse class of students learn that when something really matters, one voice can make a big difference. Early grades
Woke: A Young Poet’s Call to Justice by Mahogany L. Browne et al
Poetry is a great medium for social change, and these inspiring poems by poets including Brown, Elizabeth Acevedo, and Olivia Gatwood, will make kids want to express their ideas about justice and injustice through poems and art, too. Early grades
Small Matters by Heather Ferranti Kinser
Powerful images from an electron scanning microscope show how tiny details can make a big difference in this eye-opening picture book. Early grades
Smack Dab in the Middle of Maybe by Jo Watson Hackl
Cricket believes she can bring her vanishing mama back if she finds the secret room that featured in so many of her childhood stories — so takes her only clue (a coin from a Mississippi ghost town) and sets off into the woods to find the truth about her family. Middle grades
Sylvia and Aki by Winifred Conkling
Sylvia and Aki faced different kinds of prejudice: Sylvia’s family had to start a legal battle to get her into school, and Aki’s family was relocated to an internment camp during World War Two. By coincidence, Sylvia’s family rents the house that Aki’s family was forced to leave behind. Middle grades
Clap When You Land by Elizabeth Acevedo
Like all of Acevedo’s work, the language in this verse narrative is the star. When their father’s plane crashes, two sisters — one in New York City and one in the Dominican Republic — discover each other’s existence and their father’s double life. High school
Parachutes by Kelly Yang
Class conflict, the Asian diaspora, and rape culture come together in this story about a wealthy international student from Shanghai who rents a room from a Filipino-American family. High school
Flyaway by Kathleen Jennings
In this eerie fairy tale, a rural Australian girl investigates the disappearance of her two older brothers. High school
Lose Your Mother: A Journey along the Atlantic Slave Route by Saidiya Hartman
You may well want to add this chronicle of the author’s journey along a slave route in Ghana to your high school history reading list — it’s a fascinating (and sad) look at a side of history we often gloss over. High school
This was originally published in the summer 2020 HSL reading guide.
A Note About Affiliate Links on HSL: HSL earns most of our income through subscriptions. (Thanks, subscribers!) We are also Amazon affiliates, which means that if you click through a link on a book or movie recommendation and end up purchasing something, we may get a small percentage of the sale. (This doesn’t affect the price you pay.) We use this money to pay for photos and web hosting. We use these links only if they match up to something we’re recommending anyway — they don’t influence our coverage. You can learn more about how we use affiliate links here.