List: 2023 Teen Reading Challenge: Unreliable Narrators
Dark Room Etiquette
Sixteen-year-old Sayers Wayte has everything: popularity, good looks, perfect grades--there's nothing Sayers' family money can't buy. Until he's kidnapped by a man who tells him the privileged life he's been living is based on a lie. Trapped in a windowless room, without knowing why he's been taken or how long the man plans to keep him shut away, Sayers faces a terrifying new reality. To survive, he must forget the world he once knew, and play the part his abductor has created for him. But as time passes, the line between fact and fiction starts to blur, and Sayers begins to wonder if he can escape... before he loses himself.
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The Initial Insult
Tress Montor's parents disappeared seven years ago while driving her best friend home. The entire town shuns her now that she lives with her drunken, one-eyed grandfather at what locals refer to as the 'White Trash Zoo,' a wild animal attraction featuring a zebra, a chimpanzee, and a panther, among other things. Felicity Turnado has worked hard to make everyone forget that she was with the Montors the night they disappeared. She buried what she knows so deeply that she can't even remember what it is-- only that she can't look at Tress without having a panic attack. At a Halloween costume party at an abandoned house, Tress wants either the truth-- or revenge. She tries to pry the truth from Felicity by slowly sealing her former best friend into a coal chute... with a drunken party above them, and a loose panther on the prowl. --
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The Perks of Being a Wallflower
Charlie is a freshman. And while he's not the biggest geek in the school, he is by no means popular. He's a wallflower-- shy and introspective, and intelligent beyond his years, if not very savvy in the social arts. We learn about Charlie through the letters he writes: trying to make friends, family tensions, exploring sexuality, experimenting with drugs-- and dealing with his best friend's recent suicide.
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Dreaming Darkly
Myra Bloodgood was a confusing mix of protective and abusive, a manipulative personality who never told the truth about Ivy's father was, or why they were living their lives on the run. After her death, Ivy is sent to Darkhaven, an island off the New England coast, to live with a rich uncle she didn't know existed. Forced to reckon with her mother's past, and long-held family secrets, she wakes up from one of her nightmares covered in someone else's blood. Darkhaven has a sordid history -- and what Ivy doesn't know might kill her. --
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Creep: A Love Story
Laney Villanueva and Nico Fiore are the perfect couple: beautiful, popular, talented, and hopelessly in love. Everyone looks up to them at Holy Family High School. But Rafi doesn't just admire them. She watches them. She's drawn to them. Intent on becoming their closest friend, Rafi weaves her way into their lives. She starts small: taking photos of the senior class for the yearbook, joining Laney's club, and babysitting Nico's little sister. And it works--soon they invite her to parties, take her on joyrides, and ask her for favors. Rafi's actions quickly turn invasive, delving deeper and deeper until she's consumed by their most intimate secrets.
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In the Hall with the Knife
When a storm strikes at Blackbrook Academy, an elite prep school nestled in the woods of Maine, a motley crew of students--including Beth 'Peacock' Picach, Orchid McKee, Vaughn Green, Sam 'Mustard' Maestor, Finn Plum, and Scarlet Mistry--are left stranded on campus with their headmaster. Hours later, her body is found hanging in the conservatory and it's very clear her death was no suicide. With this group of students who are all hiding something, nothing is as it seems, and everyone has a motive for murder.
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We Were Liars
Spending the summers on her family's private island off the coast of Massachusetts with her cousins and a special boy named Gat, teenaged Cadence struggles to remember what happened during her fifteenth summer.
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The Good Girls
Targeted as suspects in the shocking murder of a high school senior, three teens--including a notorious party girl, a head cheerleader and a would-be valedictorian--race to expose long-buried secrets and identify the real killer.
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Allegedly
Mary B. Addison killed a baby. Allegedly. She didn't say much in that first interview with detectives, and the media filled in the only blanks that mattered: A white baby had died while under the care of a church-going black woman and her nine-year-old daughter. The public convicted Mary and the jury made it official. But did she do it? She wouldn't say. Mary survived six years in baby jail before being dumped in a group home. The house isn't really "home" -- no place where you fear for your life can be considered a home. Home is Ted, who she meets on assignment at a nursing home. There wasn't a point to setting the record straight before, but now she's got Ted -- and their unborn child -- to think about. When the state threatens to take her baby, Mary must find the voice to fight her past. And her fate lies in the hands of the one person she distrusts the most: her Momma. No one knows the real Momma. But who really knows the real Mary?
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The Walls Around Us
Orianna and Violet are ballet dancers and best friends, but when the ballerinas who have been harassing Violet are murdered, Orianna is accused of the crime and sent to a juvenile detention center where she meets Amber and they experience supernatural events linking the girls together.
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Bone Gap
Eighteen-year-old Finn, an outsider in his quiet Midwestern town, is the only witness to the abduction of town favorite Roza, but his inability to distinguish between faces makes it difficult for him to help with the investigation, and subjects him to even more ridicule and bullying.
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With Malice
Eighteen-year-old Jill Charron wakes up in a hospital, unable to remember the past six weeks, including the accident that killed her best friend, if it was, in fact, an accident.
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Code Name Verity
In 1943, a British fighter plane crashes in Nazi-occupied France and the survivor tells a tale of friendship, war, espionage, and great courage as she relates what she must to survive while keeping secret all that she can.
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Sadie
Sadie's been raising her sister Mattie in an isolated Colorado town, trying her best to provide a normal life and keep their heads above water. When Mattie is found dead, and the police investigation is botched, Sadie is determined to bring her sister's killer to justice. She hits the road following a few meager clues. When West McCray, a radio personality working on a segment about small, forgotten towns in America, hears Sadie's story, he becomes obsessed with finding the missing girl. He starts his own podcast as he tracks Sadie's journey, trying to figure out what happened, hoping to find her before it's too late--
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Dead Girls Can't Tell Secrets
Piper Sullivan was in a strange hiking accident last month and has been in a coma ever since. Her older sister, Savannah, can't pretend to be optimistic about it--things look bad. Piper will likely never wake up, and Savannah will never get any answers about what exactly happened. But then Savannah finds a note in Piper's locker inviting Piper to a meeting of their school's wilderness club...at the very place and on the very day she fell. Which means there was a chance that Piper wasn't alone. Someone might have seen something. Worse, someone might have done something. But who would have wanted to hurt the perfect Piper Sullivan--and why? To discover the truth, Savannah joins the club on their weekend-long camping trip on the same mountain where her sister fell. But she'd better be careful. Everyone in the club is a suspect, and everyone seems to be keeping secrets about that tragic day. And Savannah? She's been keeping secrets too...
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Rules for Vanishing
Once a year, a road appears in the forest. And at the end of it, the ghost of Lucy Gallows beckons. Lucy's game isn't for the faint of heart. If you win, you escape with your life. But if you lose.... Sara's sister disappeared one year ago--and only Sara knows where she is. Becca went to find the ghost of Lucy Gallows and is trapped on the road that leads to her. In the sleepy town of Briar Glen, Lucy's road is nothing more than local lore. But Sara knows it's real, and she's going to find it. When Sara and her skeptical friends meet in the forest to search for Becca, the mysterious road unfurls before them. All they have to do is walk down it. But the path to Lucy is not of this world, and it has its own rules. Every mistake summons new horrors. Vengeful spirits and broken, angry creatures are waiting for them to slip, and no one is guaranteed safe passage. The only certainty is this: the road has a toll and it will be paid. Sara knows that if she steps onto the road, she might not come back. But Becca needs her. And Lucy is waiting.
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You Owe Me a Murder
On a school trip to London that includes her ex-boyfriend and his new girlfriend, Kim meets risk-taker Nicki, who proposes a diabolical deal.
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What We Buried
Siblings Liv and Jory Brewer have grown up resenting each another. Liv--former pageant queen and reality TV star--was groomed for a life in the spotlight, while her older brother, Jory, born with a partial facial paralysis, was left in the shadows. The only thing they have in common is contempt for their parents. Now Liv is suing her mom and dad for emancipation, and Jory views the whole thing as yet another attention-getting spectacle. But on the day of the hearing, their parents mysteriously vanish, and the siblings are forced to work together. Liv feels certain she knows where they are and suspects that Jory knows more than he's telling...which is true. What starts as a simple overnight road trip soon takes a turn for the dangerous and surreal. And as the duo speeds through the deserts of Nevada, brother and sister will unearth deep family secrets that force them to relive their pasts as they try to retain a grip on the present.
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We Are Inevitable
Aaron Stein's friends have gone to college and moved on with their lives, while he has been left behind in the Cascade Mountains of Washington State, running a failing bookshop with his dad, Ira. When an opportunity to sell the store arises, Aaron thinks it's his only way out. He doesn't account for Chad, a wheelchair bound optimist. Or the town's out-of-work lumberjacks taking on the failing shop as their pet project. Or Hannah, a musician who might be the kind of inevitable he's been waiting for.
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My Flawless Life
At the most elite private school in Washington, DC., whenever anyone has a problem that they need to go away, they hire Hana Yang Lerner. Hana is a fixer. She knows who to call, what to say, and how to make sure secrets stay where they belong--buried. She can fix anything. Except her own life, which was destroyed when her father, senator Skip Lerner, was arrested for an accident that left one woman nearly dead. Now Hana's reputation is ruined and her friends are gone. So when she gets a job from an anonymous client called 'Three' to follow her former best friend, Luce Herrera, Hana realizes this might be her way of getting back her old life. But the dangerous thing about digging is that you never know what you'll unearth. As Hana uncovers a dark truth about her supposedly flawless classmates, she's forced to face a secret of her own.
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A Lesson in Vengeance
A dark, twisty thriller about a centuries-old, ivy-covered boarding school haunted by its history of witchcraft and two girls dangerously close to digging up the past. The dangerous romance and atmospheric setting makes it a perfect read for fans of dark academia. The history of Dalloway School lives in the bones it was built on. Five violent deaths in the first ten years of its existence. Sometimes you can still smell the blood on the air. It wasn't until Felicity enrolled that she fell in love with the dark. And now she's back to finish her senior year after the tragic death of her girlfriend. She even has her old room in Godwin House, the exclusive dormitory rumored to be haunted by the spirits of the five Dalloway students who died there--girls some say were witches. It's Ellis Haley's first year at Dalloway. A prodigy novelist at seventeen, Ellis is eccentric and brilliant, and Felicity can't shake the pull she feels to her. So when Ellis asks for help researching the Dalloway Five for her second book, Felicity can't say no. Dalloway's occult lore is everywhere, and the new girl won't let Felicity forget it. But when the past begins to invade on the present, Felicity needs to decide where she stands. The soil under her feet is bloody with Dalloway's history. But so is the present. Is it Dalloway--or is it her?
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Friends Like These
Fun-loving Jake tells his girlfriend, Jessica, that they have to go to Tegan's end-of-summer party in their tiny California beach town. Jessica doesn't like parties, and she doesn't like Tegan, who has an obvious, obsessive crush on Jake. But she agrees to go, to make Jake happy...mistake number one. Something awful happens at the party. Something so embarrassing that Jessica doesn't know if she can ever get over it -- and Jake will do whatever it takes to earn her forgiveness. But now a girl is missing. Everyone is a suspect. And Jake seems to have a lot to hide...mistake number two. When a body is discovered at the beach, friends start turning on friends, and lies start piling upon lies. What happened could destroy their lives. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer? Mistake number three... --
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We Made It All Up
Celeste Bergstein moves to a small town in Montana to escape her past, only to become embroiled in her new home town's twisted secrets when the school's star athlete--who is also the subject of Celeste's writings--is found dead at the mouth of a cave.
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Summer's Edge
When five estranged friends return to a summer lake house on the anniversary of their friend's death, unexplainable events begin happening, old betrayals rise to the surface, and the group suspects a killer among them is intent on revenge.
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All Eyes on Her
Perfect for fans of One of Us is Lying and We Were Liars, All Eyes on Her by L.E. Flynn is a gripping young adult thriller told from the perspective of everyone except the alleged killer-- a seventeen-year-old girl. You heard the story on the news. A girl and a boy went into the woods. The girl carried a picnic basket. The boy wore bright yellow running shoes. The girl found her way out, but the boy never did.... Everyone thinks they know what happened. Some say Tabby pushed him off that cliff-- she didn't even like hiking. She was jealous. She had more than her share of demons. Others think he fell accidentally--she loved Mark. She would never hurt him...even if he hurt her. But what's the real story? All Eyes On Her is told from everyone but Tabby herself as the people in her life string together the events that led Tabby to that cliff. Her best friend. Her sister. Her enemy. Her ex-boyfriend. Because everybody thinks they know a girl better than she knows herself. What do you think is the truth? An Imprint Book Praise for Last Girl Lied To I can't lie: Last Girl Lied To is my favorite thriller of 2019. Twisted and delicious. -- Kim Savage, author of In Her Skin A twisty, piercing thriller with an end you won't see coming. --Mindy McGinnis, author of Female of the Species Fans of E. Lockhart, Karen M. McManus, and Flynn's other work will revel in this mystery/thriller and the authenticity with which its characters are rendered. --
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I Killed Zoe Spanos
Anna Cicconi's summer gig in the Hamptons village of Herron Mills as a nanny is supposed to be a fresh start. But the community has been on edge since Zoe Spanos, a local girl, disappeared New Year's Eve. Anna's resemblance to Zoe causes her to delve into Zoe's life. She becomes increasingly convinced that she and Zoe are connected-- and that she knows what happened to her. When Zoe's body is found in a nearby lake, Anna is charged with manslaughter. But Martina Green, teen host of the Missing Zoe podcast, isn't satisfied. Can her podcast uncover the truth? --
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The Last Witness
Heather agrees to a group camping holiday with Dougie and his friends because she's desperate to get closer to him. But when the two of them disturb a pagan burial site above the beach, she becomes certain that they have awoken a malevolent spirit. Something is alive out there in the pitch-black dark, and it is seeking revenge. One year later, Heather knows she was very lucky to escape Black Cairn Point. She is still waiting for Dougie to wake up from his coma. If he doesn't, how will she prove her sanity-- and her innocence? --
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The Thief
When Eugenides' bragging lands him in prison, Gen's only hope for freedom lies in joining a quest to steal a legendary object.
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