Revolution, Civil War, and Reconstruction Books & Novels
Westward Expansion Books & Novels
✯Boundless
by Kenneth Oppel James is a railroad executive traveling with his son Will on the first journey of the Boundless, the largest train ever assembled. Among the 947 cars is a circus, and Will befriends Maren, a beautiful high wire walker. Will learns that a plot is afoot to steal treasure, including the golden spike, from the vault-like mausoleum car. Oh and don't forget about BIGFOOT! |
Immigration Books & Novels
Dragon's Gate
by Laurence Yep Set in and around 1867, this coming-of-age story combines Chinese and United States (particularly California) history in the tale of Otter, a 14-year-old Chinese boy who is forced to flee his country and join his father and uncle in California. There his unrealistic expectations of life in the U.S. come up against the reality of the Chinese immigrants' harsh experiences there. |
Dragonwings
by Laurence Yep Will Windrider take to the skies? Moon shadow is eight years old when he sails from China to join his father, Windrider, in America. Windrider lives in San Francisco and makes his living doing laundry. Father and son have never met. But Moon Shadow grows to love and respect his father and to believe in his wonderful dream. And Windrider, with Moon Shadow's help is willing to endure the mockery of the other Chinese, the poverty, the separation from his wife and country'even the great earthquake'to make his dream come true. |
Grandfather's Journey
by Allen Say Home becomes elusive in this story about immigration and acculturation, pieced together through old pictures and salvaged family tales. Both the narrator and his grandfather long to return to Japan, but when they do, they feel anonymous and confused: "The funny thing is, the moment I am in one country, I am homesick for the other." |
Industrialization & Progressive Era Books & Novels
The Jungle
by Upton Sinclair Upton Sinclair's dramatic and deeply moving story exposed the brutal conditions in the Chicago stockyards at the turn of the nineteenth century and brought into sharp moral focus the appalling odds against which immigrants and other working people struggled for their share of the American dream. |
World War I Books & Novels
Terrorist: Gavrilo Princip, the Assassin Who Ignited World War I
by Lois Lowry Little is known about Gavrilo Princip, the young Serbian nationalist who assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and set in motion the events leading to World War I. The 9/11 attacks in New York City caused the Henrik Rehr to wonder what drove ordinary people to become terrorists. This gripping graphic novel imagines the details that drove the young man from poverty-stricken Bosnia to contemplate murder as the only possible solution. |
War Horse
by Michael Morpurgo In 1914, Joey, a beautiful bay-red foal with a distinctive cross on his nose, is sold to the army and thrust into the midst of the war on the Western Front. With his officer, he charges toward the enemy, witnessing the horror of the battles in France. But even in the desolation of the trenches, Joey's courage touches the soldiers around him and he is able to find warmth and hope. But his heart aches for Albert, the farmer's son he left behind. Will he ever see his true master again? |
1920's & Great Depression Books & Novels
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✯No Promises in the Wind
by Christopher Paul Curtis This novel takes place in 1932 during the Great Depression. The book is about growing up during the Great Depression, that meant growing up fast as young Josh soon learned. |
✯Al Capone Does My Shirts
by Gennifer Choldenko Is a historical fiction novel for young adults by author Gennifer Choldenko. In this story, Moose Flanagan and his family move from Santa Monica to Alcatraz Island. The move was caused by the father's new job positions as an electrician and as a guard in the well known Alcatraz prison. Bud, Not Buddy
by Christopher Paul Curtis It's 1936, in Flint, Michigan. Ten-year-old Bud may be a motherless boy on the run, but he's on a mission. His momma never told him who his father was, but she left a clue: posters of Herman E. Calloway and his famous band, the Dusky Devastators of the Depression! Bud's got an idea that those posters will lead to his father. Once he decides to hit the road and find this mystery man, nothing can stop him. |
World War II Books & Novels
Number the Stars
by Lois Lowry It’s 1943 in Nazi-occupied Denmark, and the Jews are about to be rounded up and sent to the death camps. Annemarie Johannesen’s best friend Ellen Rosen is Jewish. The Johannesen family helps Ellen’s parents go into hiding and take Ellen into their own home, pretending she is part of their family. Narrated by 10-year-old Annemarie, this book vividly portrays the Nazi threat and the courage it takes to help friends while possibly endangering your own family. This moving and suspenseful book is based on true events. |
✯The Book Theif by Markus Zusak Death himself narrates the World War II-era story of Liesel Meminger from the time she is taken, at age nine, to live in Molching, Germany, with a foster family in a working-class neighborhood of tough kids, acid-tongued mothers, and loving fathers who earn their living by the work of their hands. ✯Elephant Run
by Roland Smith The main character is Nicholas Freestone, a 12 year-old boy, tamed and simple, who is sent to live by his mother with his father on the family teak plantation, which requires toughness and strength, to escape the bombing in London. When the Japanese invade Burma, they take over the plantation, sending Nick's father, Jackson Theodore Freestone III, to a prison camp. Leaving Nick to escape and try to save his father with the help of some friends and with the danger of some enemies. |
The Boy in the Striped Pajamas
by John Boyne Young Bruno lives a wealthy lifestyle in prewar Germany along with his mother, elder sister, and SS Commandant father. The family relocates to the countryside where his father is assigned to take command a prison camp. A few days later, Bruno befriends another youth, strangely dressed in striped pajamas, named Shmuel who lives behind an electrified fence. Bruno will soon find out that he is not permitted to befriend his new friend as he is a Jew, and that the neighboring yard is actually a prison camp for Jews awaiting extermination. |
Cold War & Civil Rights Movement Books & Novels