Fiction

PIECES OF GEORGIA
by Jen Bryant
In journal entries to her mother, a gifted artist who died suddenly, thirteen-year-old Georgia McCoy reveals how her life changes after she receives an anonymous gift membership to a nearby art museum.

FEELS LIKE HOME
by e. E. Charlton-Trujillo
Following the death of their father, seventeen-year-old Michelle's older brother — who had disappeared six years earlier — returns to their small Texas town where, with the help of S.E. Hinton's The Outsiders, the two siblings try to find a way to move beyond a past tragedy.

ALICIA AFTERIMAGE
by Lulu Delacre
Explores the life of Alicia, a popular sixteen-year-old, in the aftermath of a fatal car crash, as her friends, family members and others recall key episodes that show her impact on their lives. Includes author's note about the real Alicia and how she inspired the book, as well as resources on teen grief.

FAR AND BEYON’
by Unity Dow
A Tswana mother, grieving the loss of two sons to AIDS, embraces traditional magic, while her remaining son and daughter increasingly reject her beliefs.

FRANNIE IN PIECES
by Delia Ephron
When fifteen-year-old Frannie's father dies, only a mysterious jigsaw puzzle that he leaves behind can help her come to terms with his death.

WRECKED
by E.R. Frank
After a car accident seriously injures her best friend and kills her brother's girlfriend, sixteen-year-old Anna tries to cope with her guilt and grief, while learning some truths about her family and herself.

CHOICES
by Deborah Lynn Jacobs
Overcome with guilt over her brother's death, a teenaged girl shifts between multiple universes in an attempt to find one in which he is alive.

LOOKING FOR RED
by Angela Johnson
A thirteen-year-old girl struggles to cope with the loss of her beloved older brother, who disappeared four months earlier off the coast of Cape Cod.

DEADVILLE
by Ron Koertge
While visiting an injured classmate in the hospital, sixteen-year-old Ryan, who is trying to come to terms with his sister's death from cancer, meets a young patient who claims to be able to see into the world where the dead live.

ALL RIVERS FLOW TO THE SEA
by Alison McGhee
After a car accident in the Adirondacks leaves her older sister Ivy brain-dead, seventeen-year-old Rose struggles with her grief and guilt as she slowly learns to let her sister go.

MY TIKI GIRL
by Jennifer McMahon
Fifteen-year-old Maggie, still grieving the loss of her mother in an accident that also gave her a limp, has turned her back on old friends but connects with a new student, Dahlia, who makes Maggie part of her unconventional family and plans their future together as roving musicians and lovers.

ALL WE KNOW OF HEAVEN
by Jacquelyn Mitchard
When Maureen and Bridget, two sixteen-year-old best friends who look like sisters, are in a terrible car accident and one of them dies, they are at first incorrectly identified at the hospital, and then, as Maureen achieves a remarkable recovery, she must deal with the repercussions of the accident, the mix-up, and some choices she made while she was getting better.

SAVING ZOË
by Alyson Nöel
Instead of a fresh start, high school provides more grief and isolation to Echo, whose older sister died a year earlier, but insights gained from Zoë's diary — a fifteenth birthday gift from Zoë's boyfriend — about her sister's life and death change Echo in ways she could have never expected.

AFTER THE WRECK, I PICKED MYSELF UP, SPREAD MY WINGS, AND FLEW AWAY
by Joyce Carol Oates
Blaming herself for the car accident on the Tappan Zee Bridge that killed her mother, fifteen-year-old Jenna undergoes a difficult physical and emotional recovery.

FAR FROM XANADU
by Julie Anne Peters
In a small Kansas town, sixteen-year-old Mary-Elizabeth "Mike" Szabo tries to come to terms with her father's suicide and her own homosexuality.

BULLYVILLE
by Francine Prose
After the death of his estranged father in the World Trade Center on 9/11, thirteen-year-old Bart, still struggling with his feelings of guilt, sorrow and loss, wins a scholarship to the local preparatory school and there encounters a vicious bully whose cruelty compounds the aftermath of the tragedy.

SAMMY & JULIANA IN HOLLYWOOD
by Benjamin Alire Sáenz
As a Chicano boy living in the unglamorous town of Hollywood, New Mexico, and a member of the graduating class of 1969, Sammy Santos faces the challenges of "gringo" racism, unpopular dress codes, the Vietnam War, barrio violence, and poverty.

I HEART YOU, YOU HAUNT ME
by Lisa Schroeder
Ava can't see or touch him, unless she's dreaming. She can't hear his voice, except for the faint whispers in her mind. Most would think she's crazy, but she knows he's here. Jackson. The boy Ava thought she'd spend the rest of her life with. He's back from the dead, as proof that love truly knows no bounds.

THE COMEBACK SEASON
by Jennifer E. Smith
High school freshman Ryan Walsh, a Chicago Cubs fan, meets Nick when they both skip school on opening day, and their blossoming relationship becomes difficult for Ryan when she discovers that Nick is seriously ill and she again feels the pain of losing her father five years earlier.

THE SHAPE OF WATER
by Anne Spollen
A year after her artistic mother's death, fifteen-year-old Maggie puts aside her desire to set fires and hopes for more solidity in life, as her down-to-earth father prepares to marry a like-minded woman and sell their home on the Staten Island shore.

A SEA SO FAR
by Jean Thesman
After surviving the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fires, two teenage girls, a wealthy semi-invalid and her hired companion, travel together to Ireland and discover they share much in common, from a love of romance novels to grief over the loss of their mothers.

NO RIGHT TURN
by Terry Trueman
After three years of wanting only to be invisible, sixteen-year-old Jordan begins to recover from his father's suicide and start living again when a neighbor's vintage Corvette Stingray opens up new possibilities for him.

HARD HIT
by Ann Turner
A rising high school baseball star faces his most difficult challenge when his father is diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.

BEHIND YOU
by Jacqueline Woodson
After fifteen-year-old Jeremiah is mistakenly shot by police, the people who love him struggle to cope with their loss as they recall his life and death, unaware that 'Miah is watching over them.

Nonfiction

WHEN NOTHING MATTERS ANYMORE: A SURVIVAL GUIDE FOR DEPRESSED TEENS
by Bev Cobain
A guide to understanding and coping with depression, discussing the different types, how and why the condition begins, how it may be linked to substance abuse or suicide, and how to get help.

OUT OF THE DARKNESS: TEENS AND SUICIDE
by Marion Crook
Based on interviews with teen suicide survivors, parents and professionals, Marion Crook sensitively explores all aspects of teen suicide, in particular the reasons why certain young people are driven to it.

I WILL REMEMBER YOU: WHAT TO DO WHEN SOMEONE YOU LOVE DIES, A GUIDEBOOK THROUGH GRIEF FOR TEENS
by Laura Dower
An accessible guide for teens to coping with the loss of a loved one, this book features personal stories of life and death by teens, advice from renowned grief counselor Lister, and hands-on creative exercises to help teens heal from grief.

STOPPING FOR DEATH: POEMS OF DEATH AND LOSS
edited by Carol Ann Duffy
A collection of poems about death, loss, and mourning written by poets from all over the world including Janet Frame, Alice Walker and Seamus Heaney.

THE COLOR OF ABSENCE: 12 STORIES ABOUT LOSS AND HOPE
edited by James Howe
A collection of stories dealing with different kinds of loss experienced by young people.

THE GRIEVING TEEN: A GUIDE FOR TEENAGERS AND THEIR FRIENDS
by Helen Fitzgerald
In this wise, compassionate, pragmatic book, the author turns her attention to the special needs and concerns adolescents face during the grieving process.

WHEN WILL I STOP HURTING?: TEENS, LOSS, AND GRIEF
by Edward Myers
A self-help guide for teenagers who are struggling with bereavement and the emotional difficulties it presents.

GRIEF GIRL: MY TRUE STORY
by Erin Vincent
Imagine that you're going through one of the hardest parts of your life — being a teenager — when your parents are killed in a horrific car crash. Now you, your seventeen-year-old sister, and your three-year-old brother are on your own. Imagine what that would be like. Then read this book and find out.

HEALING A TEEN'S HEART: 100 PRACTICAL IDEAS FOR FAMILIES, FRIENDS, AND CAREGIVERS
by Alan D. Wolfelt
A compassionate resource for friends, parents, relatives, teachers, volunteers and caregivers, this series offers suggestions to help the grieving cope with the loss of a loved one.