Written in free verse, explores how three teenagers try to cope with the consequences of their mother's addiction to crystal meth and its effects on their lives.

A delinquent sixteen-year-old girl is sent to live with her uncle for the summer, only to learn that he is a Grim Reaper who wants to teach her the family business.

"Jack, 12, tells the gripping story of Joseph, 14, who joins his family as a foster child. Damaged in prison, Joseph wants nothing more than to find his baby daughter, Jupiter, whom he has never seen. When Joseph has begun to believe he'll have a future, he is confronted by demons from his past that force a tragic sacrifice"-- Provided by publisher.

Thirteen-year-old Martin Boyle struggles to break a family curse after discovering that he has only twelve weeks to live.

Teenage America, a part-black, part-white, part-anything boy who has spent many years in institutions for disturbed, antisocial behavior, tries to piece his life together.

Seventeen-year-old Bianca Piper starts sleeping with Wesley Rush, a notorious womanizer who disgusts her, in order to distract herself from her personal problems, but to her surprise, the two of them find they have a lot in common and are able to help each other find more productive ways to deal with their difficulties.

J, who feels like a boy mistakenly born as a girl, runs away from his best friend who has rejected him and the parents he thinks do not understand him when he finally decides that it is time to be who he really is.

Sixteen-year-old Valerie, whose boyfriend Nick committed a school shooting at the end of their junior year, struggles to cope with integrating herself back into high school life, unsure herself whether she was a hero or a villain.

Time is a funny thing in the hospital. In the mental ward. You lose track of it easily. After six months in the Maryland Mental Health Unit, Kyra Sellers, a.k.a. Goth Girl, is going home. Unfortunately, she’s about to find out that while she was away, she lost track of more than time.
Kyra is back in black, feeling good, and ready to make up with the only person who’s ever appreciated her for who she really is.

But

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Written in the form of interviews, reports, and journal entries, the story of three troubled teenagers ends in a tragic school shooting. Cameron: "Deep inside, you know that whoever gets up in your face gets there because he knows you're nothing, and he knows that you know it too." Carla: "What I'm trying to do is to get by -- not even get over, just get by." Leonard: "I have bought a gaw-juss weapon. It lies beneath my bed like a secret lover, quiet,...