Survival / Adventure Fiction (Middle School Appropriate)

*Anderson, Laurie Halse. Fever, 1793. (2000)—In 1793 Philadelphia, sixteen-year-old Matilda Cook, separated from her sick mother, learns about perseverance and self-reliance when she is forced to cope with the horrors of a yellow fever epidemic.

*Avi. The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle. (1990)—As the only passenger, and the only female, on a transatlantic voyage in 1832, thirteen-year-old Charlotte finds herself caught between a murderous captain and a mutinous crew.

*Bauer, Joan. Backwater. (1999)—While compiling a genealogy of her family of successful attorneys, sixteen-year-old history buff Ivy Breedlove treks into the mountain wilderness to interview a reclusive aunt with whom she identifies and who in turn helps her to truly know herself and her family.

Carter, Alden R. Between a rock and a hard place. (1995)—Although neither fifteen-year-old Mark Severson nor his diabetic cousin Randy are looking forward to the canoe trip that is a family rite of passage, they begin to enjoy themselves as they make their way through Minnesota's lake country, until the trip becomes a fight for survival.

*Halam, Ann. Siberia: a novel. (2005)—After spending two years at a prison school, thirteen-year-old Sloe sets off on a trek across frozen wastelands, tending to the secret “seeds” of wild animals her mother left in her care, trying to reach a new life for all of them.

*Hill David. Take it Easy. (1997)—Sent by his father on a five-day wilderness hike in the rugged New Zealand mountains, Rob and five other less-experienced teenagers must go it alone when their leader suddenly dies.

*Hobbs, Will. Wild Man Island. (2002)—After fourteen-year-old Andy slips away from his kayaking group to visit the wilderness site of his archaeologist father's death, a storm strands him on Admiralty Island, Alaska, where he manages to survive, encounters unexpected animal and human inhabitants, and looks for traces of the earliest prehistoric immigrants to America.

*Hobbs, Will. Crossing the Wire. (2006)—Fifteen-year-old Victor Flores journeys north in a desperate attempt to cross the Arizona border and find work in the United States to support his family in central Mexico.

Hokenson, Terry. The Winter Road. (2006)—Seventeen-year-old Willa, still grieving over the death of her older brother and the neglect of her father, decides to fly a small plane to fetch her mother from Northern Ontario, but when the plane crashes she is all alone in the snowy wilderness.

*Goodman, Joan Elizabeth. Paradise: Based on a True Story. (2002)—In 1542, eager to escape the French Huguenot household of her harsh father, sixteen-year-old Marguerite de la Rocque sails with her equally stern uncle, the Sieur de Roberval, to the New World, where she is left alone on an island with only her young Catholic lover and her chaperone to help her survive.

*Jaramillo, Ann. La Linea. (2006)—When fifteen-year-old Miguel’s time finally comes to leave his poor Mexican village, cross the border illegally, and join his parents in California, his younger sister's determination to join him soon imperils them both.

Lawlor, Laurie. Dead Reckoning: a Pirate Voyage with Captain Drake. (2005)— Emmet, a fifteen-year-old orphan, learns hard lessons about survival when he sails from England in 1577 as a servant aboard the Golden Hind—the ship of his cousin, the explorer and pirate Francis Drake—on its three-year circumnavigation of the world.

*Lewis, Richard. The Killing Sea. (2007)—In the aftermath of the 2004 tsunami in Sumatra, two teenagers, American Sarah and Acehnese Ruslan, meet and continue together their arduous climb inland, where Ruslan hopes to find his father and Sarah seeks a doctor for her brother.

*Marsden, John. Tomorrow, When the War Began. (1993)—Seven Australian teenagers return from a camping trip in the bush to discover that their country has been invaded and they must hide to stay alive.

*Mazer. Harry. Snow Bound. (1973)—Two teenagers caught in a snowstorm in a desolate area face a fight for survival.

*McKernan, Victoria. Shackleton’s Stowaway. (2005)— A fictionalized account of the adventures of eighteen-year-old Perce Blackborow, who stowed away for the 1914 Shackleton Antarctic expedition and, after their ship Endurance was crushed by ice, endured many hardships, including the loss of the toes of his left foot to frostbite, during the nearly two-year return journey across sea and ice.

*Mikaelsen. Ben. Rescue Josh McGuire. (1991)—When thirteen-year-old Josh runs away to the mountains of Montana with an orphaned bear cub destined for laboratory testing, they both must fight for their lives in a sudden snowstorm.

*Mikaelsen, Ben. Stranded. (1995)—Twelve-year-old Koby, who has lost a foot in an accident, sees a chance to prove her self-reliance to her parents when she tries to rescue two stranded pilot whales near her home in the Florida Keys.

*Myers, Edward. Climb or Die. (1994)—After a car accident in a snowy Colorado pass seriously injures their parents, athletic fourteen-year-old Danielle and her brainy younger brother, Jake, must scale a mountain to find help

Paulson, Gary. Tucket’s Ride. (1997)—When fifteen-year-old Francis and two younger children lose their way in the wilderness of the Southwest, they face capture at the hands of dangerous men.

*Rosoff, Meg. How I Live Now. (2004)—To get away from her pregnant stepmother in New York City, fifteen-year-old Daisy goes to England to stay with her aunt and cousins, with whom she instantly bonds, but soon war breaks out and rips apart the family while devastating the land.

*Spooner, Michael. Last Child. (2005)—Caught between the worlds of the her Scottish father and her Mandan mother in what is now North Dakota, Rosalie fights to survive both the 1837 smallpox epidemic and the actions of a vengeful trader.

*Stevens, J.B. The Big Empty. (2004)—After half of the world’s population is killed by a plague, seven teenagers seek a better life in a nightmarish future by deciphering coded messages and trying to avoid the Slashers.

Taylor, Theodore. Sweet Friday Island. (1994)—Vacationing on what they think is an uninhabited island, fifteen-year-old Peg and her father find their adventure turned into a fight for survival.

*Thomas, Jane Resh. Blind Mountain. (2006)—Unsure of himself and annoyed at having to spend a day climbing a Montana mountain with his bossy father, twelve-year-old Sam must become the guide on their perilous journey down when his carelessness temporarily blinds his father.

*Van Draanen, Wendelin. Runaway. (2006)—After running away from her fifth foster home, Holly, a twelve-year-old orphan, travels across the country, keeping a journal of her experiences and struggle to survive.

*Weaver, Will. Memory boy: a novel. (2001)—Sixteen-year-old Miles and his family must flee their Minneapolis home and begin a new life in the wilderness after a chain of cataclysmic volcanic explosions creates dangerous conditions in their city.

*Included in Belmont Collection