Dell-Laurel Leaf, 2004, c2002
Sixteen-year-old Rose Nolan arrives on Ellis Island in 1911 in the hopes of starting a new life, but after most of her family is sent back to Ireland, she must find her own way in a new country and fend for herself and her younger sister.
Accelerated Reader: 4.4
Ballad of Lucy Whipple, by Karen Cushman
Clarion Books, 1996
In 1849, twelve-year-old California Morning Whipple, who renames herself
Lucy, is distraught when her mother moves the family from Massachusetts
to a rough California mining town.
Reading Level: 5.5; Accelerated Reader: 5.8
Bandit's moon, by Sid Fleischman
Greenwillow Books, 1998
Twelve-year-old Annyrose, left behind when her brother joins the Gold
Rush, escapes the unscrupulous woman she is staying with and sets out
on a grand adventure with the notorious bandit Joaquin Murieta and his
band of outlaws. Reading Level: 4.5; Accel. Reader: 4.2
Knopf , Distributed by Random House, 2002
In the early 1960s in the Dominican Republic, twelve-year-old Anita learns that her family is involved in the underground movement to end the bloody rule of the dictator, General Trujillo.
Reading Level: 7.3; Accelerated Reader: 5.6
Bull Run, by Paul Fleischman
HarperCollins Publishers, 1993
"A Laura Geringer book." Northerners, Southerners, generals,
couriers, dreaming boys, and worried sisters describe the glory, the horror,
the thrill, and the disillusionment of the first battle of the Civil War.
Reading Level: 6.4
Accelerated Reader: 5.3
Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, 1987
In 1742, Marguerite left France with her grandmother and uncle to seek a home in America. A year later, 13-year-old Marguerite is alone in the world and a "bound-out girl" on her way to Maine. Reading Level: 6.0; Accelerated Reader: 6.2
Catherine, Called Birdy, by Karen Cushman
Clarion Books, 1994
The daughter of an English country knight keeps a journal in which she
records the events of her life, particularly her longing for adventures
beyond the usual role of women and her efforts to avoid being married
off. Reading Level: 7.4; Accelerated Reader: 6.4
Crispin : the cross of lead by Avi, 1937-
Hyperion Books, 2002
Falsely accused of theft and murder, an orphaned peasant boy in fourteenth-century
England flees his village and meets a larger-than-life juggler who holds
a dangerous secret.
Reading Level: 5.3
Accelerated Reader: 5.0
Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 2002.
Sixteen-year-old Billy Calder, son of a British soldier and a Mohawk woman, leaves school to join Tecumseh in his efforts to prevent the Americans from taking any more land from the Indians in the Northwest Territory.
Reading Level: 8.1; Accelerated Reader: 6.1
Fair Weather, by Richard Peck
Dial Books, 2001
In 1893, thirteen-year-old Rosie and members of her family travel from
their Illinois farm to Chicago to visit Aunt Euterpe and attend the World's
Columbian Exposition which, along with an encounter with Buffalo Bill
and Lillian Russell, turns out to be a life-changing experience for everyone.
Reading Level: 6.3; Accelerated Reader: 4.7
Delacorte Press, 2003
Despite observing his father's illness and the suffering of the fire-eating Mr. McNulty, as well as enduring abuse at school and the stress of the Cuban Missile Crisis, Bobby Burns and his family and friends, living in England in 1962, still find reasons to rejoice in their lives and to have hope for the future.
Reading Level: 6.0; Accelerated Reader: 3.6
Orchard, 2002
Profiles Little John, from his quiet life before joining Robin Hood through his adventures protecting a beautiful lady when she is wrongfully accused of murdering her husband.
Reading Level: 6.1; Accelerated Reader: 6.8
Girl in a Cage, by Jane Yolen
Philomel Books, 2002
As English armies invade Scotland in 1306, eleven-year-old Princess Marjorie,
daughter of the newly crowned Scottish king, Robert the Bruce, is captured
by England's King Edward Longshanks and held in a cage on public display.
Reading Level: 6.8; Accelerated Reader: 4.9
Growing Seasons, by Elsie Lee Splear
G.P. Putnam's Sons, 2000
Born into an Illinois farm family in 1906, Elsie Lee Splear describes
how she, her parents, and her sisters lived in the early years of the
twentieth century and how the changing seasons shaped their existence.
Reading Level: 4.6; Accelerated Reader: 5.1
Jason's gold, by Will Hobbs
Morrow Junior Books, 1999
Fifteen-year-old Jason embarks on a ten thousand-mile journey in 1897
in hopes of striking it rich after hearing the news that gold has been
discovered in Canada's Yukon Territory. Reading Level: 5.1; Accel. Reader:
5.5
Clarion, 2004
In 1911, Turner Buckminster hates his new home of Phippsburg, Maine, but things improve when he meets Lizzie Bright Griffin, a girl from a poor, nearby island community founded by former slaves that the town fathers--and Turner's--want to change into a tourist spot. Reading Level: 6.4; Accelerated Reader: 5.9
Lord of the Nutcracker Men, by Iain Lawrence|.
Delacorte Press, 2001
An English boy during World War I comes to believe that the battles he
enacts with his toy soldiers control the war his father is fighting on
the front.
Reading Level: 5.2; Accelerated Reader: 4.5
Midwife's Apprentice, by Karen Cushman
Clarion Books, 1995. 1996 Newbery Medal
Newbery Medal, 1996 In medieval England, a nameless, homeless girl is
taken in by a sharp-tempered midwife, and in spite of obstacles and hardship,
eventually gains the three things she most wants: a full belly, a contented
heart, and a place in this world.
Nory Ryan's Song, by Patricia Reilly Giff
Delacorte Press, 2000
When a terrible blight attacks Ireland's potato crop in 1845, twelve-year-old
Nory Ryan's courage and ingenuity helps her family and neighbors survive.
Reading Level: 5.5; Accelerated Reader: 4.3
Delacorte Press, 2001
In 1704, in the English settlement of Deerfield, Massachusetts, eleven-year-old Mercy and her family and neighbors are captured by Mohawk Indians and their French allies, and forced to march through bitter cold to French Canada, where some adapt to new lives and some still hope to be ransomed.
Reading Level: 5.1; Accelerated Reader: 5.7
Dial Books, 2003
During the early days of the Civil War, the Pruitt family takes in two mysterious young ladies who have fled New Orleans to come north to Illinois.
Accelerated Reader: 4.9
Sleeping Bear Press, 2004
In 1777 Philadelphia, young Maddy Rose spies for General Washington's army by using an unusual code to communicate with her soldier brother. Reading Level: 6.6; Accelerated Reader: 5.6
Dutton Children's Books, 1998
A young orphan boy is ordered by his master to infiltrate Shakespeare's acting troupe in order to steal the script of "Hamlet," but he discovers instead the meaning of friendship and loyalty.
Reading Level: 5.5; Accelerated Reader: 5.2
Shakespeare's Scribe, by Gary Blackwood
Dutton Children's Books, 2000
Sequel to: The Shakespeare stealer. In plague-ridden 1602 England, a fifteen-year-old
orphan boy, who has become an apprentice actor, goes on the road with
Shakespeare's troupe, and finds out more about his parents along the way.
Reading Level: 6.0; Accelerated Reader: 6.1
Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 2003
In the early years of the twentieth century, a Swedish family encounters separation and other hardships upon immigrating to New York City until the son is cast in a silent movie, in a picture book that evokes an actual silent movie. Reading Level: 3.3; Accelerated Reader: 1.9
Smugglers, by Iain Lawrence
Delacorte Press, 1999
In eighteenth-century England, after his father buys a schooner called
the Dragon, sixteen-year-old John sets out to sail it from Kent to London
and becomes involved in a dangerous smuggling scheme.
Reading Level: 4.2; Accelerated Reader: 4.7
Knopf, 2001
In 1895, after his mother's death, twelve-year-old Nathan moves with his father and grandfather to Pea Island off the coast of North Carolina, where he hopes to join the all-black crew at the nearby lifesaving station, despite his father's objections.
Reading Level: 6.5; Accelerated Reader: 5.5
Stowaway, by Karen Hesse
Margaret K. McElderry Books, 1999
A fictionalized journal relates the experiences of a young stowaway from
1768 to 1771 aboard the Endeavor which sailed around the world under Captain
James Cook.
Reading Level: 5.8; Accelerated Reader: 6.1
Stranded on Plimoth Plantation, 1626, by Gary Bowen
HarperCollins, 1994
Based on historical accounts and records, recreates the journal of a 13-year-old
orphan's experiences in the New England of 1626. Reading Level: 6.1; Accel.
Reader: 6.4
Virgie Goes to School with Us Boys, by Elizabeth Fitzgerald Howard
Siimon & Schuster, 2000
In the post-Civil War South, a young African American girl is determined
to prove that she can go to school just like her older brothers.
Reading Level: 3.0; Accelerated Reader: 2.5
Wreckers, by Iain Lawrence,
Delacorte Press, 1998
Shipwrecked after a vicious storm, fourteen-year-old John Spencer attempts
to save his father and himself while also dealing with an evil secret
about the Cornish coastal town where they are stranded. Reading Level:
4.2; Accelerated Reader: 4.2
Dragon's Gate, by Laurence Yep. 1994 Newbery Medal Honor
When he accidentally kills a Manchu, a fifteen-year-old
Chinese boy is sent to America to join his father, an uncle, and other
Chinese working to build a tunnel for the transcontinental railroad through
the Sierra Nevada mountains in 1867.
A Gathering of Days: A New England Girl's Journal, 1830-32,
by Joan W. Blos.
Newbery Medal Honor, 1980
The journal of a 14-year-old girl, kept the last year she
lived on the family farm, records daily events in her small
New Hampshire town, her father's remarriage, and the
death of her best friend.
My Brother Sam is Dead, by James Lincoln Collier
Four Winds Press, 1985 c1974
Newbery Medal Honor, 1975
Recounts the tragedy that strikes the Meeker family during the Revolution
when one son joins the rebel forces while the rest of the family tries
to stay neutral in a Tory town.
Sing Down the Moon, by Scott O'Dell
Houghton Mifflin, 1970
Newbery Medal Honor, 1971
A young Navajo girl recounts the events of 1864 when her tribe was forced
to march to Fort Sumner as prisoners of the white soldiers. Reading
Level: 5.3;
Accelerated Reader: 4.9
Slave Dancer, by Paula Fox
Newbery Medal Honor, 1974
Bradbury Press, 1973
Kidnapped by the crew of an Africa-bound ship, a thirteen-year-old boy
discovers to his horror that he is on a slaver and his job is to play
music for the exercise periods of the human cargo. Reading Level: YA
True North: ANovel of the Underground Railroad, by Kathryn Lasky
Blue Sky Press, 1996
Because of the strong influence which her grandfather, an abolitionist,
has in her life, fourteen-year-old Lucy assists a fugitive slave girl
in her escape. Reading Level: YA;
Accelerated Reader: 5.2
Wolf by the Ears, by Ann Rinaldi
Scholastic, 1991
Harriet Hemings, rumored to be the daughter of Thomas
Jefferson and Sally Hemings, one of his black slaves,
struggles with the problems facing her--to escape from the
velvet cage that is Monticello, or to stay, and thus remain a
slave. Reading Level: YA; Accelerated Reader: 4.3