Novels in Verse for Tweens and Teens
Stories told in verse about every topic under the sun.
Love That Dog - Abridged
By Sharon Creech
Narrated by Scott Wolf / 35 minutes
The Newbery Medal-winning author of Walk Two Moons, Sharon Creech, brings readers a story with enormous heart. This middle grade audiobook is an excellent choice for tween readers in grades 5 to 6, especially during homeschooling. It’s a fun way to keep your child entertained and engaged while not in the classroom.
Love That Dog shows how one boy... Read more »
The Poet X
By Elizabeth Acevedo
Narrated by Elizabeth Acevedo / 3 hours 30 minutes
The Poet X
“The Poet X is written and narrated by Elizabeth Acevedo. It is a novel made up of poems by a teenager, Xiomara Batista, growing up in Harlem. Acevedo's narration is wonderful and brings the story to life. Xiomara's dad is MIA even though he lives at home; her mother is extremely religious and pushes her faith onto her daughter; her twin brother is quiet and also working through his own feelings; she starts her first relationship with a guy; and all the time Xiomara is told what she can and cannot do, gets accosted by men, has to defend herself because no one else will, is questioning God and has no one to open up to. She releases her pent of feelings in a notebook. It isn't until her new English teacher introduces her to spoken poetry that she realizes that is what she is meant to be: a poet. This is a lovely story of a young, misunderstood girl, coming of age and showing the world that she is worth it. Great for adults who enjoyed Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson and extremely relevant literature for the #metoo movement.”
Kelly, M. Judson Booksellers
Other Words for Home
By Jasmine Warga
Narrated by Vaneh Assadourian / 3 hours 49 minutes
Other Words for Home
“The new words, tasting like America, on our lips." A beautifully-written story of a young Syrian girl's journey to Cincinnati and learning to live her everyday life of a school kid in America. Jude struggles to be brave in making new friends, in auditioning for the school play and in thinking of her brother and father back home.”
Ernio, River Bend Bookshop
Brown Girl Dreaming
By Jacqueline Woodson
Narrated by Jacqueline Woodson / 3 hours 54 minutes
A New York Times bestseller and National Book Award winner
Jacqueline Woodson, the acclaimed author of Another Brooklyn, tells the moving story of her childhood in mesmerizing verse.
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... Read more »
Out of the Dust
By Karen Hesse
Narrated by Marika Mashburn / 2 hours 9 minutes
Billie Jo has a great deal to forgive: her father for causing the accident that killed her mother; her mother for leaving when Billie Jo needed her most; and herself for being the cause of her own sorrow. Daddy's too wrung out to help her, and there's no one else to care. So at fourteen, Billie Jo must heal herself - even if it means tearing up... Read more »
Zorgamazoo
By Robert Paul Weston
Narrated by Alan Cumming / 3 hours 11 minutes
Are You a Believer in Fanciful Things? In Pirates and Dragons and Creatures and Kings?
Then sit yourself down in a comfortable seat, with maybe some cocoa and something to eat, and I'll spin you the tale of Katrina Katrell, a girl full of courage (and daring, as well!), who down in the subway, under the ground, saw something fantastical roaming... Read more »
Inside Out and Back Again
By Thanhha Lai
Narrated by Doan Ly / 2 hours 30 minutes
Vietnam-born author Thanhha Lai bursts onto the literary scene with Inside Out & Back Again-her National Book Award-winning debut. Written in rich, free-verse poems, this moving tale follows a young Vietnamese girl as she leaves her war-torn homeland for America in 1975. With Saigon about to fall to the communists, 10-year-old HA, her... Read more »
The Red Pencil
By Andrea Davis Pinkney
Narrated by Shane W. Evans / 3 hours 12 minutes
"Amira, look at me," Muma insists. She collects both my hands in hers. "The Janjaweed attack without warning. If ever they come-- run."
Finally, Amira is twelve. Old enough to wear a toob, old enough for new responsibilities. And maybe old enough to go to school in Nyala-- Amira's one true dream.
But life in her peaceful Sudanese village is... Read more »
The Crossover
By Kwame Alexander
Narrated by Corey Allen / 2 hours 16 minutes
Fourteen-year-old twin basketball stars Josh and Jordan wrestle with highs and lows on and off the court as their father ignores his declining health. Review Quotes: "This novel in verse is rich in character and relationships. . . . Poet Alexander deftly reveals the power of the format to pack an emotional punch." --"Kirkus, " starred review... Read more »
Long Way Down
By Jason Reynolds
Narrated by Jason Reynolds / 1 hour 43 minutes
Jason Reynolds’s Newbery Honor, Printz Honor, and Coretta Scott King Honor–winning, #1 New York Times bestselling novel Long Way Down is now a gripping, galvanizing graphic novel, with haunting artwork by Danica Novgorodoff.
Will’s older brother, Shawn, has been shot.
Dead.
Will feels a sadness so great, he can’t explain it. But in his... Read more »
Crank
By Ellen Hopkins
Narrated by Laura Flanagan / 4 hours 31 minutes
Kristina Georgia Snow is the perfect daughter: gifted high school junior, quiet, never any trouble. But on a trip to visit her absentee father, she meets a boy who introduces her to crank. At first she finds it freeing, but soon Kristina’s personality disappears inside the drug. What began as a wild, ecstatic ride turns into a struggle through... Read more »
SHOUT
By Laurie Halse Anderson
Narrated by Laurie Halse Anderson / 3 hours 48 minutes
SHOUT
“The best yet from Laurie Halse Anderson! A gripping and amazing memoir in verse - her words will haunt your thoughts and dreams. You will laugh, and cry, and wish that the world is not so hard for so many.”
Jenny, The Homer Bookstore