Best Middle Grade Fiction of 2023
Barely floating
Rivera, Lilliam, author.
2023
Twelve-year-old Natalia's dream of becoming a synchronized swimmer is in jeopardy when her parents decide they are against a sport that emphasizes looks, but Nat is determined to change their minds.
Eb & Flow
Baptist, Kelly J., author.
2023
"In this dual-POV novel in verse, Black seventh graders Ebony "Eb" Wilson and De'Kari "Flow" Flood contemplate the conflict that sees them both suspended from school. A ten-day suspension has tweens De'Kari and Ebony seeing the world with a fresh perspective. Don't miss this poignant novel in verse from the award-winning author of Isaiah Dunn Is My Hero. Two kids. One fight. No one thinks they're wrong."-- Publisher description.
Good different
Kuyatt, Meg Eden, author
2023
Seventh-grader Selah Godfrey knows that to be "normal" she has to keep her feelings tightly controlled when people are around, but after hitting a fellow student, she needs to figure out just what makes her different--and why that is ok.
The lost library
Stead, Rebecca, author
2023
When a mysterious Little Free Library guarded by a large orange cat appears overnight, eleven-year-old Evan plucks two weathered books from its shelves, never suspecting that his life is about to change.
Remember us
Woodson, Jacqueline, author
2023
"The summer before seventh grade, as the constant threat of housefires looms over her Brooklyn neighborhood, basketball-loving Sage is trying to figure out her place in her circle of friends, when a new kid named Freddy moves in"-- Provided by publisher.
Ruby lost and found
Li, Christina, author.
2023
"Thanks to her Ye-Ye's epic scavenger hunts, thirteen-year-old Ruby Chu knows San Francisco like the back of her hand. But after his death, she feels lost, and it seems like everyone--from her best friends to her older sister--is abandoning her. After Ruby gets in major trouble at school, her parents decide she has to spend the summer at a local senior center, with her grandmother, Nai-Nai, and Nai-Nai's friends for company. When a new boy from Ruby's grade, Liam Yeung, starts showing up too, Ruby's humiliation is complete. But Nai-Nai, her friends, and Liam all surprise Ruby. She finds herself working with Liam, who might not be as annoying as he seems, to help save a historic Chinatown bakery that's being priced out of the neighborhood. And alongside Nai-Nai, who is keeping a secret that threatens to change everything, Ruby retraces Ye-Ye's scavenger hunt maps in an attempt to find a way out of her grief--and maybe even find herself.
Simon sort of says
Bow, Erin, author
2023
Two years after a tragedy saddles him with viral fame, twelve-year-old Simon O'Keeffe and his family move to Grin And Bear It, Nebraska, where the internet and cell phones are banned so astrophysicists can scan the sky for signs of alien life, and where, with the help of two new friends, a puppy, and a giant radio telescope, Simon plans to restart the narrative of his life.
The storyteller
Hobson, Brandon, author.
2023
Ziggy's mother disappeared ten years ago, one of the many Native women who have mysteriously gone missing, and Ziggy believes a secret cave may hold the key--so with his sister, Moon, and friends Alice and Corso, he sets out to find the cave and solve the mystery of his family's origins.
Two tribes
Bowen Cohen, Emily, author, artist
2023
"Mia is still getting used to living with her mom and stepfather, and to the new role their Jewish identity plays in their home. Feeling out of place at home and at her Jewish day school, Mia finds herself thinking more and more about her Muscogee father, who lives with his new family in Oklahoma. Her mother doesn't want to talk about him, but Mia can't help but feel like she's missing a part of herself without him in her life. Soon, Mia makes a plan to use the gifts from her bat mitzvah to take a bus to Oklahoma--without telling her mom--to visit her dad and find the connection to her Muscogee side she knows is just as important as her Jewish side"-- Provided by publisher