Author: Sya Bruce

Fortrose Library
20/03/2014

Books and authors suitable for 12—14 year olds.
All of these titles are engaging and thought provoking; many are the start of a series and all should encourage reluctant readers to both finish them and read further. These titles span a range of reader ability
All titles are available/reservable in the library.

Fortrose Community Library Tel: 01381 622235
Email: fortrose.library@highlifehighland.com
www.highlifehighland.com

When Coraline moves to a new house she is fascinated by the fact that their house is in fact only half a house. Divided into flats years before, the other flat, it soon becomes clear to Coraline, is not quite as cosy and safe as her own.

Spooks galore in this brilliant and fantastic story of life in the graveyard. When Baby Bod escapes a murderer intent on killing his whole family, he is taken in by the graveyard ghosts. In eight chapters, each of which depicts every other year of Bod’s life, a separate story of Bod’s life unfolds and always in the background there is the sinister, haunting presence of a killer. Bod’s curious tale is a masterpiece of original, absorbing and unstoppable storytelling.

The two stories in this exciting novella follow the adventures of the intrepid young Viking Odd. As a brave and solitary twelve-year-old, in the first tale, he endeavours to free three Norse Gods trapped in the bodies of an eagle, a bear and a fox; then, in the second, a few years older, taller and stronger he sets off on a testing and epic journey to the Holy City of Jerusalem. But of course with Neil Gaiman's wit and style the stories transcend the normal and become humorous, rich and layered tales of a life lived courageously.

This spine-tingling, thrill-packed novel has more than enough fear-factor for the most ardent fan of scary stories. Uncle Montague lives alone in a big house, but regular visits from his nephew, Edward, give him the opportunity to recount some of the most frightening stories he knows. As each tale unfolds, it becomes clear that something sinister is in the air.

Billy is a street urchin, pickpocket and petty thief. Mr Creecher is a monstrous giant of a man who terrifies all he meets. Their relationship begins as pure convenience. But a bond swiftly develops between these two misfits as their bloody journey takes them ever northwards on the trail of their target …Victor Frankenstein.

Alex joins his father on a business trip to Amsterdam. During the day he hangs out with the daughter of a family friend. They visit the usual sights but also coffee shops and flea markets off the beaten track. At one of these markets Alex spots an ancient-looking mask. Before he knows what he's doing he buys it. Later, in his hotel room, he feels compelled to put the mask on. Alex is sucked into a parallel Amsterdam, one from centuries before which begins to reveal the dark past of both the building he is staying in and the little girl who once lived there ...edging stealthily towards the terrible twist.

Look, I didn't want to be a half-blood. I never asked to be the son of a Greek God. I was just a normal kid, going to school, playing basketball, skateboarding. The usual. Until I accidentally vaporized my maths teacher. Now I spend my time battling monsters and generally trying to stay alive.

The Red Pyramid: the first book in Rick Riordan's The Kane Chronicles. Percy Jackson fought Greek Gods. Now the Gods of Egypt are waking in the modern world...'I guess it started the night our dad blew up the British museum...' Carter and Sadie Kane's dad is a brilliant Egyptologist with a secret plan that goes horribly wrong. An explosion shatters the ancient Rosetta stone and unleashes Set, the evil god of chaos...Set imprisons Dr Kane in a golden coffin and Carter and Sadie must run for their lives.

Teenager Lily suffers horribly at the hands of the school bullies. Teased about her appearance and everything else she retreats miserably into her shell. Meeting an old woman in the woods, Lily is introduced to the crows. Soon she finds she has new friends and, with them, new powers. Gradually Lily builds up her confidence and puts it to the test at Kyle’s Halloween party. Suddenly Lily is a new person. An inventive and empowering story about the importance of self-belief. DYSLEXIA FRIENDLY

Amber's family think she's gone to Cornwall on holiday, but really she's left home. She's forging a new life - new housemates, new job and (with a little luck) new boyfriend. She feels bad because her mother and Poppy need her, but she's got to make the break, get out of their clutches. Then Amber falls ill and her family come to look after her. Something in the house responds to Poppy's presence, something malign and threatening. When Poppy moves into the attic, it gets even stronger, until evil seems to permeate everywhere and Amber thinks she might never be able to escape...This is a chilling and absorbing novel from a brilliant storyteller.

There are six things very wrong with my life: 1. I have one of those under-the-skin spots that will never come to a head but lurk in a red way for the next two years. 2. It is on my nose. 3. I have a three-year-old sister who may have peed somewhere in my room. 4. In fourteen days the summer hols will be over and then it will be back to Stalag 14 and Oberfuhrer Frau Simpson and her bunch of sadistic 'teachers'. 5. I am very ugly and need to go into an ugly home. 6. I went to a party dressed as a stuffed olive.

Twelve-year-old villain, Artemis Fowl, is the most ingenious criminal mastermind in history. His bold and daring plan is to hold a leprechaun to ransom. But he's taking on more than he bargained for when he kidnaps Captain Holly Short of the LEPrecon (Lower Elements Police Reconnaissance Unit). For a start, leprechaun technology is more advanced than our own. Add to that the fact that Holly is a true heroine and that her senior officer Commander Root will stop at nothing to get her back and you've got the mother of all sieges brewing!

John Smith is not your average teenager. He regularly moves from small town to small town. He changes his name and identity. He does not put down roots. He cannot tell anyone who or what he really is. If he stops moving those who hunt him will find and kill him. But you can't run forever. So when he stops in Paradise, Ohio, John decides to try and settle down. To fit in. And for the first time he makes some real friends. People he cares about - and who care about him. Never in John's short life has there been space for friendship, or even love. But it's just a matter of time before John's secret is revealed. He was once one of nine. Three of them have been killed. John is Number Four. He knows that he is next...

The first in the Cherub series. Terrorists, secret agents and covert missions are the theme of this highly entertaining book. James Choke is a normal 11 year old boy with no father and a dead mother. He's taken into care while his sister Lauren goes to live with her hated father. CHERUB, a school where children learn survival skills, combat and weaponry, recruits James and he is sent on a top-secret mission. Realistic and gritty, this is pure classic teen fiction.

Hugely entertaining, this captivating story is also thought provoking about the perils of having way too much money. Joe Spud is the richest twelve-year-old in the world; he has everything his heart desires – except happiness. As one disaster follows another, Joe and his father both learn the hard way what really matters. David William’s third book for children is a neat combination of hilarity and morality in the best spirit of the master story-teller of the genre, Roald Dahl.

The first hilarious book in Barry's AFTERWORLDS sequence. Drake has just met the Horsemen of the Apocalypse but is that really the end of the world? Pratchett meets Python in this dark comic fantasy with plenty of action, perfect for 11+ boys Drake is surprised to find three horsemen of the apocalypse playing snakes and ladders in his garden shed. He's even more surprised when they insist that he is one of them. They're missing a Horseman, having gone through several Deaths and they think that Drake is the boy for the job.

When a freak asteroid knocks the moon from its orbit, everything in 15 year old Miranda’s life is changed. All her teenage problems get swept to one side as she and her family have to re-learn everything - just to survive. A terrific adventure in which Miranda and those around her have to find the courage, strength and resources just to keep going

Prize-winning Patrick Ness displays brilliant new skills of sensitivity in this hauntingly touching story of how a boy deals with the looming threat of his mother’s death from cancer. Haunted by a monster in his dreams, denied much information by his family and treated as a weirdo by his class mates and a ‘special case’ by his teachers, Conor struggles to get to grips with the devastating emotions which threaten to overwhelm him.

Imagine you're the only boy in a town of men. And you can hear everything they think. And they can hear everything you think. Imagine you don't fit in with their plans. Todd Hewitt is just one month away from the birthday that will make him a man. But his town has been keeping secrets from him. Secrets that are going to force him to run.

You're dead Scarlett...Previously a poor taste jibe from school frenemies, now a statement of fact. Scarlett is absolutely mortified (in more ways than one) to discover that she's accidentally killed herself while trying to get out of a school trip. Even worse, she's taken her entire family with her. Life as a ghost is pretty dull - if only some of her friends were dead too...

Interwoven with tales of World War I, this is a story about growing up, moving on and the strength of a family. Things haven't been going so well for fifteen-year-old Esther Armstrong. With her brother Max - her closest ally - absent, she's forced to face everything alone, not least her parents' heated arguments. As the summer holidays stretch endlessly ahead, she's desperate for something, anything, to divert her attention. Then she finds some letters hidden in the walls of her family home, sent by a soldier to his sweetheart from the trenches of WWI.

Momentum is an action-packed thriller with a warm heart but a disturbing message of what can happen in a broken society. The setting is a disintegrating London in a not too distant future. Power supplies are unreliable and the streets are unsafe. Factions rule the city and there is constant danger from the Kossaks who shoot freely as they keep the peace violently. Teenager Hunter is one of the privileged Citizens but he searches for a life with more meaning in the run-down homes of the Outsiders. Hunter's involvement brings great risks but through it he learns the importance of real feelings.

Scarlett's in trouble at school. Again. With black fingernails and dyed ketchup-red hair, she's not your average twelve-year-old Londoner. So her mum--sick of trying to get her into another school--ships Scarlett to her father's cottage in Ireland. Having to learn Gaelic in a one-room schoolhouse and enduring a new stepmum and younger stepsister is just too much. Scarlett wants to leave--until she meets Kian. He seems too good to be true with his dark, rugged looks, kind nature, and horse named Midnight. As Kian helps Scarlett let go of her anger, she begins to accept her family, her friendships, and most of all, her dreams.

Deals with the three points of view - of Gary, constantly victimised by the school bully in a nasty, name-calling and vindictive way; the bully's friend, David and a new girl to the school, Zoe.

Joe and Ash are best friends. Ash is the leader, Joe the one who follows. Then one night after a party, Joe and Ash come across a holdall, seemingly abandoned by the side of the road. They open it up ...and find GBP20,000 in cash. Of course they're going to hand it straight to the police. Aren't they? Or is all that money just too tempting? Whoever has lost it won't notice if a bit goes missing, will they? And that is precisely when the trouble starts ...

Johnny and his friends have finished school for the summer. One sweltering day, on their way back from a water fight at the park, they spot an old lady who has wound them up by bursting their football. They make a bad decision. The boys pedal up to the old lady's parked car and commit a drive-by soaking, before pedalling away as quickly as they can. When Johnny discovers that the old lady suffered a heart attack after the drive-by and subsequently died, he is totally guilt-stricken. And when Johnny wakes up in a cold sweat in the middle of the night, feeling a presence in his room, he believes that he's being haunted and the strain starts to show ...

Charlie's found his secret talent: skateboarding. It's his one-way ticket to popularity. All he's got to do is practice, and nothing's going to stop him - not his clumsiness, not his overprotective mum, nothing. Except Charlie isn't the only one in his family hiding a massive secret, and his next discovery will change everything.

She's just a New York City girl living with her artist mom… News flash: Dad is prince of Genovia. (So that's why a limo always meets her at the airport!) Downer: Dad can't have any more kids. (So no heir to the throne.) Shock of the century: Like it or not, Mia is prime princess material. Well, her father can lecture her until he's royal-blue in the face about her princessly duty no— way is she moving to Genovia and leaving Manhattan behind. But what's a girl to do when her name is PRINCESS AMELIA MIGNONETTE GRIMALDI THERMOPOLIS RENALDO?

When the air is clear, sixteen year-old Drew Ferran can pick up the scent of a predator. When the moon breaks through the clouds, a terrifying fever grips him. And when a vicious beast invades his home, his flesh tears, his fingers become claws, and Drew transforms.

Spencer's mate Zac has decided he wants to be a real teenager and Spencer is disgusted - he's not interested in girls, skateboards or expensive trainers. A hilarious yet insightful story about growing up for teen boys everywhere. DYSLEXIA FRIENDLY.

The Lazarus Serum can bring you back from the dead. Only thing is, it turns you into a Pale. Jed can't imagine anything worse, but then the choice is taken out of his hands…
DYSLEXIA FRIENDLY.

Sarah finds herself responsible for freeing the soul of a frustrated ghost, who will punish her severely if she fails. Everything depends on her unlocking the strange silver box that appeared in her room one night. But will freeing the ghost turn out to be a huge mistake? And why is Matt, her weird Goth stepbrother, so interested in the box? Supernatural tale that will make readers want to leave the light on - A cracking ghost story.
DYSLEXIA FRIENDLY.

Mog might be a loser, but he's not as much of a loser as Duffy. So when Duffy tries to get in with Mog's best friend, Mog takes action. But when he lands Duffy in the rancid stream behind the school, Mog has no idea how far the ripples will spread …
DYSLEXIA FRIENDLY.

A bleakly poetic tale about one boy's determination to save a badger cub from the destructive hands of a local gang. When Nicky finds Jezbo and his gang digging up a badger set, there's not a lot he can do to save them. But one badger cub has escaped - can Nicky save it?
DYSLEXIA FRIENDLY.

Nat's sister Sandy speaks to the dead. It's a gift, and a good way to make a living. Only thing is, it isn't true. So imagine Nat and Sandy's surprise when the dead start to speak back. But it seems the dead are the least of their problems…
DYSLEXIA FRIENDLY.