I’m so glad to be participating in the #MustRead challenge again in 2021 (sadly, I skipped 2020 🥺). My thanks to Cheriee of Library Matters and Leigh Anne at A Day in the Life for hosting this community (previously created and hosted by Carrie at There’s a Book for That). If you want to link up, join the 2021 round-up before the end of January, HERE. 

I tend to stress over what to add to my yearly list, usually attempting to balance between age-level, nonfiction vs. fiction, and older titles vs. soon-to-be published. But this year I simply looked at what is already available on my shelves, what recent award-winners I missed in 2020, and what books I’ve wanted to read for ages. So today I’m simply going to let loose and publish this baby before I overthink it. HA! I’ll plan to publish updates on my “must read” progress in April, September and December.

Here’s my list in graphic form (in no particular order), followed by the list form (I *think* I got the age-levels correct):

Middle Grade

All Thirteen: The Incredible Cave Rescue of the Thai Boys’ Soccer Team by Christina Soontornvat
Displacement by Kiku Hughes
Root Magic by Eden RoyceStealing Mt. Rushmore
Astrophysics for Young People in a Hurry by Neil deGrasse Tyson and Gregory Mone
Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You by Jason Reynolds, Ibram X. Kendi
Under the Broken Sky by Mariko Nagai
Dragon Hoops by Gene Luen Yang
King and the Dragonflies by Kacen Callender
Everything Sad Is Untrue: (a true story) by Daniel Nayeri
The Sea in Winter by Christine Day
Sia Martinez and the Moonlit Beginning of Everything by Raquel Vasquez Gilliland
One for the Murphys by Lynda Mullaly Hunt
The Talk: Conversations about Race, Love & Truth by Wade Hudso and Cheryl Willis Hudson
Pashmina by Nidhi Chanani
The Train of Lost Things by Ammi-Joan Paquette
In the Shadow of the Sun by Anne Sibley O’Brien
Normal: One Kid’s Extraordinary Journey by Magdalena Newman, Nathaniel Newman
A Wish in the Dark by Christina Soontornvat
Echo Mountain by Lauren Wolk
Show Me a Sign by Ann Clare LeZotte
All of Me by Chris Baron
The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin
The Jumbies by Tracey Baptiste
From the Desk of Zoe Washington by Janae Marks
Fighting Words by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley
When You Trap a Tiger by Tae Keller
The Magic Fish by Trung Le Nguyen
How We Got to the Moon: The People, Technology, and Daring Feats of Science Behind Humanity’s Greatest Adventure by John Rocco
Operatic by Kyo Maclear and illustrated by Byron Eggenschwiler
Class Act by Jerry Craft

Young Adult

Return of the Thief by Megan Whalen Turner
Elatsoe by Darcie Little Badger and Rovina Cai
Legendborn by Tracy Deonn
Tigers, Not Daughters by Samantha Mabry
We Are Not Free by Traci Chee
Apple: Skin to the Core by Eric Gansworth
Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell
A Song Below Waterby Bethany C. Morrow
This Is My America by Kim Johnson
How the King of Elfhame Learned to Hate Stories by Holly Black
Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo

Adult

Sisters of the War: Two Remarkable True Stories of Survival and Hope in Syria by Rania Abouzeid
Fortune’s Pawn by Rachel Bach
The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America’s Shining Women by Kate Moore
Anxious People by Fredrik Backman, Neil Smith, translator
Who Wrote the Bible? by Richard Elliott Friedman
A Promised Land by Barack Obama

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