Written by Mike Lupica in 2008, The Batboy tells the story of 14-year-old Brian, who becomes a batboy for the Detroit Tigers and tries to bond with his hero, Hank Bishop. Lupica is a well-known author of sports novels for younger readers and a member of the Sports Media Hall of Fame. He writes for The New York Daily News and regularly appeared on the ESPN show The Sports Reporters (1988-2017). He has also published... Read The Batboy Summary

The Beach Club, Elin Hilderbrand’s debut novel, was published by St. Martin’s Press in 2000. It is the first of her 30 novels set on Nantucket Island, located off the coast of Massachusetts. The novel takes place in the late 1990s at the fictional Nantucket Beach Club and Hotel. As in many Hilderbrand novels, several characters make their way in and out of the location as their story arcs interweave. The Beach Club’s main plotline... Read The Beach Club Summary

The Bean Trees (first published in 1988) is the first novel by Barbara Kingsolver. Kingsolver is an American novelist, essayist, and poet who holds degrees in ecology and evolutionary biology, and her work often addresses biodiversity, social justice, communities, and people’s interactions with their environment. The Bean Trees is a work of realistic adult fiction that follows Taylor Greer as she leaves her rural upbringing in Kentucky, drives across the country to Tucson, Arizona, and... Read The Bean Trees Summary

The Bear and the Nightingale (2017) is a historical fantasy novel by Katherine Arden. The story is set in medieval Russia and was heavily inspired by the country’s folklore and history. It follows Vasilisa “Vasya” Petrovna, a girl who lives in an isolated village at the edge of a forest and can communicate with household spirits and other supernatural beings that others cannot see. Her life is upended when her father marries a pious woman... Read The Bear and the Nightingale Summary

The Bears on Hemlock Mountain is a 1952 children’s chapter book by British American author Alice Dalgleish. Based on a Pennsylvania folk tale, The Bears on Hemlock Mountain won the Newbery Honor award in 1953. In the story, eight-year-old Jonathan must venture over Hemlock Mountain, a hill behind his farmhouse, to fetch an iron pot from his aunt’s house. Jonathan is filled with trepidation about the trip since he believes that there could be bears... Read The Bears on Hemlock Mountain Summary

Ta-Nehisi Coates’s The Beautiful Struggle, published in 2009, is the writer’s memoir of his childhood and early teenage years. It is a true bildungsroman, or coming-of-age story, but it also is a character study of Coates’s father, and secondarily, of his brother Big Bill. The book profiles Coates’s experiences growing up in various Baltimore neighborhoods with a family always somewhat in flux, attending different schools as he matures into early adulthood. Coates’s first two chapters... Read The Beautiful Struggle Summary

The Beekeeper’s Apprentice (1994) is a historical mystery novel by American author Laurie R. King and the first installment in the best-selling Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes series. King, who won an Edgar Award for her debut novel, A Grave Talent, creates a literary pastiche that re-engages with Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes canon. Set against the backdrop of World War I, the novel introduces Mary Russell, a brilliant and independent 15-year-old orphan who becomes... Read The Beekeeper's Apprentice Summary

The Bee Sting by Paul Murray is a piece of contemporary literary fiction—a family tragicomedy set around 2008 in Ireland and published in 2023. Paul Murray is the bestselling author of An Evening of Long Goodbyes (2003), Skippy Dies (2010), The Mark and the Void (2015), and The Bee Sting. The Bee Sting was nominated for the An Post Award (2023) and shortlisted for the 2023 Booker Prize.This guide is based on the 2023 Farrar... Read The Bee Sting Summary

Louise Erdrich’s The Beet Queen, published in 1986, is a sequel to her award-winning debut novel, Love Medicine. The Beet Queen was followed by two other novels in the series, Tracks and The Bingo Palace. Though most of The Beet Queen’s characters are non-Indigenous, the series as a whole is concerned with issues facing Indigenous Americans, particularly those living on tribal lands in Minnesota and North Dakota. Characters and storylines are woven throughout the four... Read The Beet Queen Summary

The Bell Bandit by Jacqueline Davies is a 2012 novel for young adult readers and the third book in The Lemonade War Series, which explores the adventures of siblings Evan and Jessie Treski. This installment takes place during a New Year’s visit to their grandmother’s house when they discover that the beloved town bell, a symbol of community, joy, and tradition, has gone missing. As the siblings set out to solve the mystery of the... Read The Bell Bandit Summary

The Benefits of Being an Octopus (2018) is a middle-grade coming-of-age novel by Ann Braden. The novel has won many awards, including the National Public Radio (NPR) Best Book of 2018. The protagonist, Zoey Albro, is an observant, somewhat snarky seventh grader who lives with her family in a trailer park in a small Vermont town. Told from Zoey’s first-person, present-tense point of view and set in the present day, the narrative begins in January... Read The Benefits of Being an Octopus Summary

The Berry Pickers (2023) is the debut novel of Canadian author Amanda Peters. Peters, who is of both Mi’kmaq and white-settler ancestry, explores the history and experiences of First Nations communities in the Nova Scotia, Canada environs. Peters holds an MFA from the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and a certificate in creative writing from the University of Toronto. The Berry Pickers was a finalist for the Carnegie Medal for... Read The Berry Pickers Summary

The Best at It is a 2019 middle grade coming-of-age book by debut author Maulik Pancholy. Pancholy drew on his personal experiences with sexuality, cultural identity, and mental health to create protagonist Rahul Kapoor, a gay Indian American boy managing obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD).The Best at It is a bildungsroman that follows 12-year-old Rahul through seventh grade in Indiana’s Greenville Middle School. Rahul is bullied about his sexuality and Indian heritage and decides that becoming the... Read The Best at It Summary

The Best of Iggy is a middle grade novel written by Annie Barrows and illustrated by Sam Ricks, published in 2020. The story follows the adventures of Iggy Frangi, a mischievous fourth grader who constantly finds himself in trouble. Through a series of humorous and sometimes regrettable escapades, Iggy learns valuable lessons about friendship, responsibility, and the consequences of his actions.The Best of Iggy is the first in a series of five books about Iggy’s... Read The Best of Iggy Summary

The artist and writer Thi Bui published her autobiographical graphic memoir, The Best We Could Do, in 2017. Alternating her narrative between her present-day experiences as a new mother in New York City with her parents’ past growing up in and then escaping from Vietnam, Bui builds a complex web of intergenerational trauma and love. This is Bui’s first venture into comic book illustration. The artwork that accompanies her narrative is based on the black... Read The Best We Could Do Summary

The Better Sister (2019) by Alafair Burke is a psychological thriller that blends domestic noir with legal drama. The novel opens with the murder of attorney Adam Macintosh in his East Hampton vacation house, and the investigation identifies his son Ethan as the prime suspect. To defend him, Ethan’s stepmother, high-powered magazine editor Chloe Taylor, must join forces with her estranged older sister, who is both Ethan’s birth mother and Adam’s ex-wife. The story explores... Read The Better Sister Summary

The Bewitching (2025) is a supernatural horror novel by Mexican Canadian author Silvia Moreno-Garcia. Moreno-Garcia is known for works that are suspenseful and genre-bending by fusing elements of horror, fantasy, and mystery. Her novels showcase Mexico’s rich culture and history, paying particular attention to women’s lives and experiences. Like many of her other books, The Bewitching features layered, female protagonists and explores the complex relationship between gender and identity. Moreno-Garcia’s most widely read work is... Read The Bewitching Summary

Mike Lupica, the author of The Big Field (2008), is a sports journalist and the author of many books for adults and young readers. Though he writes about a variety of sports, Lupica concedes that baseball is his favorite. The Big Field focuses on two teen baseball players—Hutch and Darryl—as they try to lead their team to a finals victory in Florida. This novel for young readers addresses the themes of The Hopes and Pressures... Read The Big Field Summary

The Bird Hotel is a literary novel by Joyce Maynard, an American journalist and New York Times bestselling author of over a dozen novels and works of nonfiction. Her books include literary fiction, true crime, memoirs, and novels for young adults, including The Usual Rules (2004). She frequently probes personal conflicts around love, secrets, parenthood, and reconciliation. Her novel Count the Ways, published in 2021, won the French Grand Prize in American Literature.After a traffic... Read The Bird Hotel Summary

Drawing on the poet’s experiences growing up during the Depression in Bronzeville, the name given to the predominantly Black neighborhoods of Chicago’s South Side, Gwendolyn Brooks’s “the birth in a narrow room” recounts the earliest years of a young Black girl amid the disenfranchisement and limited expectations she faces in post-war segregationist, patriarchal America. Despite the reality of growing up in the narrow rooms of an inner-city home, however, the girl thrives, her tender imagination... Read The birth in a narrow room Summary