2024 NATIONAL MEDAL
for Museum and Library Service Finalist

Teens

Last Of The Talons

After the destruction of her entire Talon gang, eighteen-year-old Shin Lina―the Reaper of Sunpo―is forced to become a living, breathing weapon for the kingdom’s most-feared crime lord. All that keeps her from turning on her ruthless master is the life of her beloved little sister hanging in the balance. But the order to steal a priceless tapestry from a Dokkaebi temple incites not only the wrath of a legendary immortal, but the beginning of an unwinnable game…

The Summer Bitter and Sweet

"Lou has enough confusion in front of her this summer. She'll be working in her family's ice-cream shack with...her former best friend, King, who is back in their Canadian prairie town after disappearing three years ago...But when she gets a letter from her biological father...Lou immediately knows that she cannot meet him...While King's friendship makes Lou feel safer...when her family's business comes under threat, she soon realizes that she can't ignore her father forever."

Ballad & Dagger

Sent to stay with her aunt in Prague and witness the humble life of an artist, Ilana Lopez--a biracial Jewish girl--finds herself torn between her dream of becoming a violinist and her immigrant parents' desire for her to pursue a more stable career. When she discovers a forgotten Jewish cemetery behind her aunt's cottage, she meets the ghost of a kindhearted boy named Benjamin, who died over a century ago. As Ilana restores Benjamin's grave, he introduces her to the enchanted side of Prague, where ghosts walk the streets and their kisses have warmth.

The Ghosts Of Rose Hill

Sent to stay with her aunt in Prague and witness the humble life of an artist, Ilana Lopez--a biracial Jewish girl--finds herself torn between her dream of becoming a violinist and her immigrant parents' desire for her to pursue a more stable career. When she discovers a forgotten Jewish cemetery behind her aunt's cottage, she meets the ghost of a kindhearted boy named Benjamin, who died over a century ago. As Ilana restores Benjamin's grave, he introduces her to the enchanted side of Prague, where ghosts walk the streets and their kisses have warmth.

Goddess In The Machine

Bound for humanity's new colony planet, seventeen-year-old Andra wakes up from a cryogenic sleep 1,000 years later than scheduled, forcing her to navigate an unfamiliar planet where technology is considered magic and its practitioners revered as deities.

Everything Sad Is Untrue: (a true story)

"At the front of a middle school classroom in Oklahoma, a boy named Khosrou (whom everyone calls "Daniel") stands, trying to tell a story. His story. But no one believes a word he says. But Khosrou's stories are beautiful, and terrifying, from the momenthis family fled Iran in the middle of the night with the secret police moments behind them, back to the refugee camps of Italy, and further back to Isfahan."

Hunted By The Sky

Trained in warrior magic after the murder of her parents, a girl with a star-shaped birthmark is prophesied to be the downfall of a tyrant king, but the boy she falls in love with owes his loyalty to those hunting her.

Lulu And Milagro's Search For Clarity

"Overachiever Luz 'Lulu' Zavala has straight As, perfect attendance, and a solid ten-year plan...Middle sister Milagro wants nothing to do with college or a nerdy class field trip...On a journey from Baltimore all the way to San Francisco, Lulu and Milagro will become begrudging partners as they unpack weighty family expectations...and maybe even discover the true meaning of sisterhood"