New & Coming Soon Chapter Books

Thimble-born from tip to toe, Pocket Bear remembers every moment of his becoming: the glimmering needle, the silken thread, the tender hands as each careful stitch brought him closer to himself. Born during the throes of WWI, he was designed to fit into the pocket of a soldier's jacket, eyes sewn a bit higher than normal so that he always gazed upward. That way, glancing at his pocket, a soldier would see an endearing token of love from someone back home, and, hopefully, a good luck charm. Now, over a century later, Pocket serves as unofficial mayor of Second Chances Home for the Tossed and Treasured, where stuffed toy animals are refurbished and given a fresh opportunity to be loved. He and his best feline friend Zephyrina, known far and wide as "The Cat Burglar," have seen it all, and then some.

Thirteen-year-old Henson Blayze strives to be seen as more than just a football player in his predominantly white small town of Great Mountain, Mississippi, but when a horrific incident compels him to speak out, he must choose between playing football and seeking justice.

A trans girl discovers that her boring mother comes from a powerful and dangerous family of witches.

Boston Globe-Horn Book Award-winning author Brandy Colbert gives The Parent Trap a fresh, funny, and delightfully unexpected update in this story of two girls--one raised by her single father, the other in the foster care system--who meet by chance...only to discover they're identical twins.

Frustrated by how love seems to change those closest to her, twelve soon to be thirteen-year-old Berry sets out to prove that life is better without romance.

Stuck in a van with no A/C and no cell phones on a three-week family road trip across America, Guppie Persaud and her brothers secretly enter a photography contest without their technophobe parents' permission, hoping to win new phones for the whole family.

In this alternating narrative by bestselling author Erin Soderberg Downing, a decades-old family secret is buried within the sand, water, and woods... waiting for cousins Avery and Jax to find it and uncover the truth.

To save the only life he's ever known, a tween vampire has to destroy it first in Defanged, a new speculative middle grade from author H.E. Edgmon.

A boy discovers magic -- along with a hidden darkness -- in his town in this propulsive and heartfelt middle grade novel by Craig Kofi Farmer, author of Kwame Crashes the Underworld.

When Edwin Hodge discovers a priceless Picasso sketch hidden in a poster frame, he becomes an overnight celebrity, but it might just ruin his life.

In a world where all animals have superpowers, Zeb the zebra, Margarine the penguin, and Barry the lemur have the WORST powers of all. Zeb, Margarine, and Barry end up at the back of the line to have the Superpower Supermarket Manager grant them their superpowers and end up getting the short end of the stick. Margarine is granted the special ability to make macaroni and cheese. Barry the lemur is gifted with the power to write neatly. And Zeb the Zebra can now blend in with a crosswalk... Working at a cafe and watching everybody else save the world day in and day out, Zeb, Margarine, and Barry wonder if they will ever get to be superheroes for a day themselves.

Inspired by a true story, Seabird follows the early teen years of Kartini, the daughter of a nineteenth century Javanese regent, who later became a feminist icon. Kartini's forced isolation ignites her desire for freedom and the right to have a say in the decisions that would shape her life.

Twelve-year-old Lila has two goals for the summer:

1. Win back the friends who ditched her for being "too dramatic"

2. Stop being so dramatic

But then Lila's estranged Grandpa Clem dies, throwing a wrench in her plans. Now she'll have to spend the summer in Ohio while her parents decide what to do with Grandpa Clem's creepy Victorian Inn. It's supremely unfair. How can she show off the "new and improved" Lila from so far away?

As her parents head toward divorce, twelve-year-old Evan spends her summer with her best friend Billie, but everything begins to fall apart as Billie drifts away, her mother's health obsession intensifies, and a growing hunger consumes her, just as a sinister presence in the woods emerges, leaving her to wonder if the real monster is inside her.

This captivating coming-of-age story is touching, funny, and beautifully layered, with a fairy-tale ending that only Newbery Medalist Laura Amy Schlitz could deliver. On a gloomy November night, eleven-year-old Tiphany Stokes saves an old lady from collapsing in the street. An antique doll named Gretel watches them, longing for Tiph to rescue her from life in a shop window. Though none of these three characters realizes it, their worlds are about to change: Gretel will no longer be a precious prisoner. The old lady--is she a witch?--will discover the secret hidden in her long-neglected dollhouse. And Tiph--whose parents rejoice that she is "never any trouble"--will become a thief, a dog walker, an actor, and best of all, a friend.

A speculative middle grade novel about three generations of Black girls connected across time and space through a wormhole in their school locker.