Book Connections: Schooled by Gordon Korman

Cap has never been to regular school. He doesn't look like a regular teenager. In fact - he's never lived in the real world. But when his grandmother gets hurt, he has no choice but to live in a totally foreign world. For the students of C Average High School, he's an oddity, a strange fish - until they start to see the world from his point of view.

I was thirteen the first time I saw a police officr up close. He was arresting me for driving without a license."

Book Connections: Every Soul a Star by Wendy Mass, The Misfits by James Howe

Book Categories: Different points of view, Fish out of Water, Bullies, Big Cast of Characters

Book Status: In the classroom library

Book Connections: Millicent Min: Girl Genius by Lisa Yee

Millicent is painfully smart, to the point where she pushes people away from her. Then summer begins, along with college classes, forced volleyball playing and tutoring of the awful Stanton Wong. Can Millicent keep her real self secret from her new friend Emily, or is she going o lose everything?

"I have been accused of being . . . an over achiever and a compulsive perfectionist like those are bad things."

Book Connections: Totally Emily Ebers and Stanton Wong Flunks Big Time by Lisa Yee, The Betrayal of Bindy McKenzie, A Wrinkle in Time, Ramona

Book Categories: Smart Kids, Don't Judge a Book By Its Cover, A Tangle of Lies

Book Status: In the classroom library

Book Connections: The Watcher by James Howe

She sits on the stairs, watching the beach. Watching the perfect family - mum, dad, older boy, younger sister. Watching the perfect lifeguard, with his reflective sunglasses.

This is written by the same author as Totally Joe and The Misfits, but where you feel like you're right there with the characters in those books, in this one you feel like you too are watching.

The bitter taste of lead brought her to her senses. How long had she been sitting there, lost in thought?

Book Connections: Letters from the Inside by John Marsden

Book Categories: Mystery, Families, Beach Holidays

Book Status: In classroom library

Book Connections: The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin

The Westing Game is a mystery. 16 people have been selected to unravel it. But while they're unraveling it, the story also opens out, allowing us to learn more and more about the people who have been selected.

Sunset Towers filled suddenly, with people whose names were already printed on the mailboxes. When these apparent strangers are all thrown together, they discover a lot about themselves and each other.

Who were these people, the specially selected tenants? They were mothers and fathers and children. A dressmaker, a secretary, an inventor, a doctor, a judge. One was a bookie, one was a burglar, one was a bomber, and one was a mistake.

Book Connections: The Mixed Up Files, The Wright Three, Hunger Games, Sherlock Holmes

Book Categories: Mystery, Games, Big Cast of Characters

Book Status: In the classroom library

Book Connections: The Thief by Megan Whalen Turner

The Thief, the first book of a series by Megan Whalen Turner, tells the story of Gen, thief extraordinaire. Languishing in the King's jail after stealing the King's seal (and boasting about it), Gen suddenly finds himself released and pressed into service to steal for the king.

'There's something I want you to steal. Do this for me and I'll see that you don't go back to prison. Fail to do this for me, and I will still make sure that you don't go back to prison.'

Book connections: The Hobbit (J.R.R. Tolkien) about a Hobbit heading out with a band of dwarves to have a very big adventure. Obernewtyn (Isobelle Carmody) about a girl with special gifts who is sent away to a secluded community.

Book Categories: Fantasy without Dragons, Mythology, Kings and Queens, Books with a Twist

Book Status: In classroom library

Book Category: Beach Holidays

The Watcher

Book Category: Families

The Watcher