Biographies 
Showing 1 - 12 of 12
There are a total of 148 valid entries on the list.
1. The 57 bus
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Average Rating:
3.3 stars
Description:
"One teenager in a skirt. One teenager with a lighter. One moment that changes both of their lives forever. If it weren't for the 57 bus, Sasha and Richard never would have met. Both were high school students from Oakland, California, one of the most diverse cities in the country, but they inhabited different worlds. Sasha, a white teen, lived in the middle-class foothills and attended a small private school. Richard, a black teen, lived in the crime-plagued...
Average Rating:
2.6 stars
Description:
In a series of personal essays, prominent journalist and LGBTQIA+ activist George M. Johnson explores his childhood, adolescence, and college years in New Jersey and Virginia. From the memories of getting his teeth kicked out by bullies at age five, to flea marketing with his loving grandmother, to his first sexual relationships, this young -adult memoir weaves together the trials and triumphs faced by Black queer boys.
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Berlin, 1936. The Olympic finals of the eight-oared rowing race. Germany, Italy, USA. The American boat touches the finish line first, beating all odds and sending Hitler away in a silent rage. In the midst of the Great Depression, the nine rowers showed the world what true grit really meant. They were western, working-class boys who never expected to beat the elite teams of the East Coast and Great Britain, yet they did. At the center of the tale...
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Average Rating:
3.7 stars
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"The author shares her childhood memories and reveals the first sparks that ignited her writing career in free-verse poems about growing up in the North and South"--
Raised in South Carolina and New York, Woodson always felt halfway home in each place. In vivid poems, she shares what it was like to grow up as an African American in the 1960s and 1970s, living with the remnants of Jim Crow and her growing awareness of the Civil Rights movement. Touching...
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"From relationships and makeup to divorce and disordered eating, Laurie Boyle Crompton recounts the humor and heartbreak of her coming of age in rural Pennsylvania and New York City during the 1970s and '80s"--
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"Jiordan's family was never quite like everyone else's, with her father's mood swings, her mother's attempts at normalcy, and her two older sisters with a different last name. But on the surface, they fit in. Until the day the FBI came knocking on the door. After that, her father's mood plunged to a dangerous new low. After that, there was an investigation into his business and a sentencing in court. Soon Jiordan's father would have to leave home,...
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Average Rating:
5 stars
Description:
"This is YA nonfiction. It's the memoir of a boy named Sungju who grew up in North Korea and, at the age of twelve, was forced to live on the streets and fend for himself after his parents disappeared. Finally, after years of being homeless and living with a gang, Sungju is reunited with his maternal grandparents and, eventually, his father"--
"Every Falling Star, the first book to portray contemporary North Korea to a young audience, is the intense...
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Average Rating:
4.4 stars
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In 1972, when she was seven, Firoozeh Dumas and her family moved from Iran to Southern California, arriving with no firsthand knowledge of this country beyond her father's glowing memories of his graduate school years here. More family soon followed, and the clan has been here ever since. Funny in Farsi chronicles the American journey of Dumas's wonderfully engaging family: her engineer father, a sweetly quixotic dreamer who first sought riches on...
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Average Rating:
3.8 stars
Description:
Mishna Wolff grew up in a poor black neighborhood with her single father, a white man who truly believed he was black. "He strutted around with a short perm, a Cosby-esque sweater, gold chains and a Kangol--telling jokes like Redd Fox, and giving advice like Jesse Jackson. You couldn't tell my father he was white. Believe me, I tried," writes Wolff. And so from early childhood on, her father began his crusade to make his white daughter down. Unfortunately,...
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"The story of Jordan Romero, who at the age of 13 became the youngest person ever to reach the summit of Mount Everest. At age 15, he reached the summits of the world's 7 highest mountains"--
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Average Rating:
4.5 stars
Description:
The teenage surfer who lost her arm in a shark attack in 2003 describes how she has coped with this life-altering event with the help of her faith, the changes in her life, and her return to the sport she loves. In this moving personal account of faith and fortitude, internationally ranked surfer Bethany Hamilton tells how she survived a shark attack that cost her arm--but not her spirit. They say Bethany Hamilton has saltwater in her veins. How...
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Average Rating:
5 stars
Description:
The deep and enduring friendship between Vincent and Theo Van Gogh shaped both brothers' lives. They shared everything, swapping stories of lovers and friends, successes and disappointments, dreams and ambitions. Heiligman draws on the letters Vincent wrote to Theo during his lifetime to weave a tale of two lives intertwined as Theo supported Vincent's struggles to find his path in life.