2024 NATIONAL MEDAL
for Museum and Library Service Finalist

Fiction

Screaming at the Ump

Twelve-year-old Casey lives with his father and grandfather at their family-run umpire school, and as he deals with middle school and his mother's unwelcome return, he stumbles on a sensational story that has him questioning his dream of becoming a journalist.

Weird Kid

Jake Wind is trying to stay under the radar. Whose radar? Anyone who might be too interested in the fact that he has shapeshifting abilities he can’t control. Or that his parents found him as a ball of goo when he was a baby.

Keeping his powers in check is crucial, though, if he wants to live a normal life and go to middle school instead of being homeschooled (and if he wants to avoid being kidnapped and experimented on, of course).

Crash

Seventh-grader John "Crash" Coogan has always been comfortable with his tough, aggressive behavior, until his relationship with an unusual Quaker boy and his grandfather's stroke make him consider the meaning of friendship and the importance of family.

The Comeback

Twelve-year-old Maxine Chen dreams of being a figure skating champion, but a remarkably talented new girl at the arena and a racist classmate at school test her resolve.

Game Over Pete Watson

"When videogame obsessed Pete Watson discovers his dad is not only a super-spy but has been kidnapped and is now trapped inside a video game, he has to use his super gaming skills and enter the game to rescue him. And if he succeeds, who will save Pete from his massive crush on Callie Midwood?"

Nikki on the Line

Thirteen-year-old Nikki Doyle's dreams of becoming a basketball great feel within reach when she's selected to play on an elite-level club team. But in a league with taller, stronger, and faster girls, Nikki suddenly isn't the best point guard. In fact, she's no longer a point guard at all, which leaves her struggling to figure out who she is and how she fits in.

Ghost

A National Book Award Finalist for Young People's Literature
Nominated as one of America's best-loved novels by PBS's The Great American Read

Coming Up Short

Seventh-grader Bea is the star short stop on her softball team, which is going to the league championship, but her world has just been turned upside down by the news that her father has been suspended from his law practice because he used some of his clients' money to pay bills; worse the news has been spread by another lawyer online, and that lawyer happens to be the father of Bea's almost boyfriend, Xander; now her fielding skills are slipping, and Bea does not know which is more difficult--dealing witheither pity or snickering from her schoolmates, learning to throw again, or forgiving h

Defending Champ

When the girls soccer team learns it has been canceled due to budget cuts, they come up with a plan to raise the necessary funds through a face-off with the boys' team, which is led by sneering superstar Chase Gwinn.