Identifying and reviewing those books published for adults but that also have appeal to high school students keeps nearly 30 school and public librarians busy as professional critics. In 2007, this review crew—who work with teens in California, Michigan, Minnesota, Alberta, New Hampshire, Virginia, and Washington—read and considered whether to recommend each of more than 600 adult titles. Because this column’s policy is “recommend only,” fewer than half that number were reviewed. So, we’re already starting off with a group of “better” books. How to differentiate the “best” from these? Well, that takes even more reading and critical thinking and discussion. These bests all sport a few things in common, whether fiction or nonfiction: excellent writing, thought-provoking and engaging content, and topics of keen interest to teens. Beyond that, each one–like a gem–is unique.—Francisca Goldsmith, Chair, Adult Books for High School Students Committee

Fiction

ABOUET, Marguerite, Aya. tr. from French. illus. by Clement Oubrerie. Drawn & Quarterly. Tr $19.95. ISBN 978-1-894937-90-0. The perennial themes of adolescent friendship, careless romance, and family expectations are made vivid in this graphic novel, set nearly 30 years ago on the Ivory Coast. AMIRREZVANI, Anita. The Blood of Flowers. Little, Brown. Tr $23.99. ISBN 978-0-316-06576-4. A 17th-century Persian village girl must employ both her rug-making skills and her emotional strength to ensure the survival of herself and her mother. A fascinating novel that offers both well-developed characters and an intimacy with another culture. CAÑÓN, James. Tales from the Town of Widows. HarperCollins. Tr $24.95. ISBN 978-0-06-114038-9. In a small Colombian village, soldiers kill or kidnap the men and traumatize the women and children. In this postapocalyptic setting, culture must be reinvented by the survivors, a reality that many teens experience on a smaller scale. HILL, Joe. 20th Century Ghosts. Morrow. Tr $24.95. ISBN 978-0-06-11497-5. Suspenseful, clever, and at times horrifying, this collection of short stories offers much to fantasy and horror fans and also to those who appreciate drama and suspense. LEMIRE, Jeff. Essex County: Tales from the Farm. vol. 1. illus. by author. Top Shelf Productions. pap. $9.95. ISBN 978-1-891830-88-4. This graphic novel, with its well-constructed plot and chunky black-and-white images, delivers a powerful look at tragedy and how to move on after it strikes. MCKENZIE, Elizabeth. MacGregor Tells the World. Random. pap. $12.95. ISBN 978-1-4000-6225-6. MacGregor West, orphaned as a boy, is desperate at 22 to piece together the truth of his mother’s life, hoping to discover his own identity in the process. His questions and search will resonate with youth who are gaining new independence. MURR, Naeem. The Perfect Man. Random. pap. $13.95. ISBN 978-0-8129-7701-1. Blending gothic fiction, coming-of-age novel, and mid-century melodrama, Murr has created a character who tries to overcome his outsider status by becoming that “perfect man” about whom his foster mother, a romance author, writes. PORTES, Andrea. Hick. Unbridled. pap. $14.95. ISBN 978-1-932961-32-4. In a narrative alternating between 13-year-old Luli’s adventures hitchhiking toward Las Vegas and introspective flashbacks that provide details of her impoverished home and school life, the heroine personifies the human will to survive. SWANN, Leonie. Three Bags Full: A Sheep Detective Story. tr. from German by Anthea Bell. Doubleday. Tr $22.95. ISBN 978-0-385-52111-6. Led by the smartest sheep in the world, the flock of a murdered shepherd takes up the fine art of detection and discovers how peculiar humans seem to be both in their customs and their strange beliefs. Both humor and insight engage readers in this definitely unsheepish and unique mystery.

Nonfiction

BEAH, Ishmael. A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier. Farrar. Tr $22. ISBN 978-0-374-10523-5. The author, now a child-rights advocate, deftly recounts his experiences as a boy drafted into soldiering in Sierra Leone in the 1990s and shows how an individual’s life can be changed by both interior and exterior forces. BOESE, Alex. Elephants on Acid: And Other Bizarre Experiments. Harcourt. pap. $14. ISBN 978-0-15-603135-6. Just weird and icky enough to engage, without descending to freak-show exploitation, this collection shows how scientific investigation is, indeed, a strange art. COLQUHOUN, Kate. Taste: The Story of Britain through Its Cooking. Bloomsbury. Tr $34.95. ISBN 978-1-59691-410-0. Regaled with the eye and insights of a storyteller, thousands of years of British history are described in terms of available foodstuffs of each epoch and the imaginative—and often frightening—methods employed for preparing them. GONICK, Larry. The Cartoon History of the Modern World, Part 1: From Columbus to the U.S. Constitution. illus. by author. HarperCollins. pap. $17.95. ISBN 978-0-06-076004-5. The cartoonist depicts, with both wit and authority, modern history from the Protestant Reformation, through the British defeat of the Spanish Armada and the Copernican model of the Universe, to the American Revolution. KOLATA, Gina. Rethinking Thin: The New Science of Weight Loss-and the Myths and Realities of Dieting. Farrar. Tr $24. ISBN 978-0-374-10398-9. Kolata makes a powerful case for a dispassionate examination of the facts, divorced from the diet industry’s promises and hype. PREGRACKE, Chad with Jeff Barrow. From the Bottom Up: One Man’s Crusade to Clean America’s Rivers. National Geographic. Tr $26. ISBN 978-1-4262-0100-4. Disgusted as a boy with the state of the Mississippi River, the author took action to clean it up, eventually founding a successful environmental and educational organization. His story serves as a model for anyone who wants to take action and make a difference. PUNKE, Michael. Last Stand: George Bird Grinnell, the Battle to Save the Buffalo, and the Birth of the New West. HarperCollins. Tr $25.95. ISBN 978-0-06-089782-6. The extinction of the buffalo would have been a blot on our national heritage; fortunately, Grinnell, an independent environmentalist, prevented that from happening through personal action and contributing to policy planning. RAPP, Emily. Poster Child: A Memoir. Bloomsbury. Tr $23.95. ISBN 978-1-59691-256-4. Featured as a March of Dimes poster child, successful as an amputee skier, and a Fulbright Scholar to Korea, Rapp describes her greatest personal victory as her acceptance of herself as someone with faults and defects, some of which were in her power to change while accepting that others were simply part of her being. RODRIQUEZ, Deborah. Kabul Beauty School. Random. Tr $24.95. ISBN 978-1-4000-6559-2. Afghani women, denied education and seldom allowed to leave their homes, found themselves empowered to support themselves and their families through an organization called Beauty Across Borders, which Rodriguez, herself a hairdresser, joined in 2002. Like most of the participants, Rodriguez has been changed by her experiences outside the social milieu in which she was raised. TRAM, Dang Thuy. Last Night I Dreamed of Peace: The Diary of Dang Thuy Tram. Harmony. Tr $19.95. ISBN 978-0-307-34737-4. Diarist Dang Thuy Tram’s clear voice, passionate for life while confronting the bombing of her homeland, provides a window on the Vietnam War two generations later.