Classroom Novels recommended for 13yrs+
Contact your local library to request the title you are looking for. We would encourage teacher's to browse the catalogue for alternative titles also in case your first choice is already on loan. Contact details and open hours for your local library can be viewed here.
At the start of his school holidays, Danny Delaney is looking forward to a trouble-free summer. But he knows that something terrible has happened when his mother returns home one afternoon with two policemen.
Mrs Delaney has hit a small boy with her car. The boy is in a coma and no one knows if he will wake up. Danny’s mother closes herself off, full of guilt, while Danny and his father are left to pick up the pieces of their broken family. |
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Alone It Stands tells the tale of Munster Rugby Team's legendary victory over New Zealand's mighty All Blacks in Thomond Park, Limerick in 1978. In the play six actors play 62 roles including the Munster team, the Kiwis, the two coaches, the ref, the crowd, the press, a pregnant woman, several children and a dog.
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'Once upon a time, there was a boy who lost his mother . . .' As twelve-year-old David takes refuge from his grief in the myths and fairytales so beloved of his dead mother, he finds the real world and the fantasy world begin to blend. That is when bad things start to happen. That is when the Crooked Man comes. And David is violently propelled into a land populated by heroes, wolves and monsters, his quest to find the legendary Book of Lost Things.
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Life is lonely for Kasienka. She misses her old home in Poland, her mother's heart is breaking, and at her new English school friends are scarce. But when someone new swims into her life, Kasienka learns that there is more than one way to stay afloat.This stunning novel from multi-award-winning author Sarah Crossan explores how to pick up the pieces when everything you know is turned on its head and you have to start all over again.
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Anne Frank's diary is among the most enduring documents of the 20th century. It documents her life in hiding from 12 June 1942 to 1 August 1944 in German occupied Amsterdam. First published over sixty years ago, Anne Frank's Diary of a Young Girl has reached millions of young people throughout the world. In July 1942, thirteen-year-old Anne Frank and her family, fleeing the occupation, went into hiding in an Amsterdam warehouse. Over the next two years Anne vividly describes in her diary the frustrations of living in such close quarters, and her thoughts, feelings and longings as she grows up. Her diary ends abruptly when, in August 1944, they were all betrayed.
Inside his home in Derry, Joe Logan’s life is ruled by his tormented father; outside, by the tension and violence of the Troubles. Sometimes his father makes him run errands despite the nearby reports of gunfire. Other times his mother, afraid to be alone with her volatile and war-wounded husband, confines Joe to the home. A bright and sensitive young man, Joe finds solace and freedom in writing—a pursuit encouraged by Kathleen Doherty, a young teacher at a nearby school whom he meets and befriends. In Kathleen, Joe has found a friend who understands him, makes him laugh, and allows him to forget his burdens for a time. But everything changes when his brother, Brendan, arrives home from London, newly energized to join the raging fray, and cavalierly bringing the war straight into their home.
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Raphael is a dumpsite boy. He spends his days wading through mountains of steaming trash, sifting it, sorting it, breathing it, sleeping next to it. Then one unlucky-lucky day, Raphael's world turns upside down. A small leather bag falls into his hands. It's a bag of clues. It's a bag of hope. It's a bag that will change everything!
Todd Hewitt is the only boy in a town of men. Ever since the settlers were infected with the Noise germ, Todd can hear everything the men think, and they hear everything he thinks. Todd is just a month away from becoming a man, but in the midst of the cacophony, he knows that the town is hiding something from him -- something so awful Todd is forced to flee with only his dog, whose simple, loyal voice he hears too. With hostile men from the town in pursuit, the two stumble upon a strange and eerily silent creature: a girl. Who is she? Why wasn't she killed by the germ like all the females on New World? Propelled by Todd's gritty narration, readers are in for a white-knuckle journey in which a boy on the cusp of manhood must unlearn everything he knows in order to figure out who he truly is.
True Grit tells the story of Mattie Ross, who is just fourteen when the coward Tom Chaney shoots her father down in Fort Smith, Arkansas, and robs him of his life, his horse, and $150 cash. Filled with an unwavering urge to avenge her father’s blood, Mattie finds and, after some tenacious finagling, enlists one-eyed Rooster Cogburn, the meanest available U.S. Marshal, as her partner in pursuit, and they head off into Indian Territory after the killer.
"Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry" follows a feisty African-American girl - Cassie Logan - as she grows up in Mississippi during the Great Depression and learns the shocking realities of racism. 'Look out there, Cassie girl, all that belongs to you.' Cassie finds it difficult to understand why the farm means so much to her father. But, as she witnesses the hatred and destruction all around her, she begins to learn the importance of standing up for your rights. The powerful and moving story of growing up during the American Depression.
Bilbo Baggins is a hobbit who enjoys a comfortable, unambitious life, rarely traveling any farther than his pantry or cellar. But his contentment is disturbed when the wizard Gandalf and a company of dwarves arrive on his doorstep one day to whisk him away on an adventure. They have launched a plot to raid the treasure hoard guarded by Smaug the Magnificent, a large and very dangerous dragon. Bilbo reluctantly joins their quest, unaware that on his journey to the Lonely Mountain he will encounter both a magic ring and a frightening creature known as Gollum.