2024 Lone Star Reading List Announced

The Lone Star Reading List is developed by public and school librarians from the Texas Library Association’s Young Adult Round Table. The purpose of the list is to encourage students in grades 6, 7, or 8 to explore a variety of current books.

In Carl Hiaasen’s Wrecker, a teenager comes across a speedboat that has run aground on a sand flat. The men in the boat don’t want Wrecker (his real name, Valdez Jones VIII) to call for help—in fact, they’ll pay him to forget he ever saw them.

In A First Time for Everything, Dan is a middle schooler who gets bullied and often feels invisible. This book is a graphic memoir based on bestselling author Dan Santat’s awkward middle school years and the trip that changed his life.

These are just two examples of the stories on this list that will move, entertain, and inspire middle school students.

• Alexander, Kwame – The Door of No Return
• Barry, Michelle A. – Plotting the Stars: Moongarden
• Bayron, Kalynn– The Vanquishers
• Bow, Erin – Simon Sort of Says
• Carvalho, Rebecca – Salt and Sugar
• Day, Christine – We Still Belong
• Everett, Sarah – The Probability of Everything
• Fawcett, Heather – The Grace of Wild Things
• Feldman, Jacquetta Nammar – The Puttermans Are in the House
• Glaser, Karina Yan – A Duet for Home
• Greenwald, Tommy – Dinged
• Hardinge, Frances – Unraveller
• Healy, Christopher – No One Leaves the Castle
• Hiaasen, Carl – Wrecker
• Horwitz, Sarah Jean – The Demon Sword Asperides
• Landers, Melissa – Lumara
• Lewis, Kayvion – Thieves’ Gambit
• López, Diana – Los Monstruos: Felice and the Wailing Woman
• Morris, Chad and Shelly Brown – Virtually Me
• Oh, Ellen (editor) – You Are Here: Connecting Flights
• Perry, Adam – Ghosts Come Rising
• Pla, Sally J. – The Fire, the Water, and Maudie McGinn
• Salazar, Aida – A Seed in the Sun
• Santat, Dan – A First Time for Everything
• Schmidt, Gary D. – The Labors of Hercules Beal
• Siddiqui, Maleeha – Bhai for Now
• Swinarski, Claire – What Happened to Rachel Riley?
• Warga, Jasmine – A Rover’s Story
• Waters, Charles & Traci Sorell – Mascot
• Wein, Elizabeth – Stateless

The Lone Star Reading List is not designed to support any particular curriculum. Librarians are not required or expected to purchase every book on the list. Due to the diversity in age range and topics, librarians should follow their local collection development policies and guidelines when considering which titles to purchase for their library.