Verse Novels

If you think you hate poetry, these books might make you change your mind.

Love, Ghosts and Nose Hair  Steven Herrick

I’m a normal guy.
An average sixteen year old.
I think about sex, sport, and nose hair.
Sex mostly.

Jack and Annabel are in love. Jack is a poet and haunted by his mothers death seven years ago. Annabel Browning is beautiful and smart and she gets him. Suddenly the future seems hopeful.

One Night  Margaret Wild

In the morning, Gabe tramped
through the garden,
ripping bedraggled party streamers,
crushing empty beer cans,
knocking over abandoned wine glasses.
His chest hurting.

One Night centers on the stories of Gabe and Helen. Gabe is heart throb beautiful. Helen was born with a disfigured face. In one night their lives will be linked forever.

The Realm of Possibility  David Levithan

She tells me he is sweet because he wants
to stop all of the little children from running off
a cliff. And I say can you possibly think of a situation
where a group of children would be running towards
a cliff? 

A boy whose girlfriend is in love with Holden Caulfield. A girl who writes love songs for the one she can’t have. A couple edging towards their first anniversary and everyone in between. A combination of poetry and prose tells the stories of twenty students.

Love that Dog  Sharon Creech

September 13

I don’t want to
Because boys
don’t write poetry.

Girls do.

Jack is forced to write poetry by his teacher Ms Stretchberry, he hates it and he can’t do it. As his teacher continues to show him new and different poetry he begins to love it. And through it finds a way to express something he has been trying to say.

Make Lemonade Virginia Euwer Wolff

I called this babysitting number
and her voice answered
like we could be friends,
right away.

LaVaughn is determined to get out of the projects and go to college. All she needs is the money. She baby sits for seventeen year old Jolly, single mother of two. At first is it just a job, but it gradually turns into much more.

Things Left Unsaid Stephanie Hemphill

...I often choose to be the plastic doll on bended knee,
throwing other people's words out my mouth.
Why do I surrender my voice like that?

Robin is tired of her predictable life, she meets Robin who smokes and vandalises and wears nothing but black and is instantly attracted to her rebellion. They become best friends but a shock event has Sarah questioning her judgement.

What My Mother Doesn’t Know Sonya Sones

My name is Sophie.
This book is about me.
It tells
the heart-stoppingly riveting story
of my first love.
And also of my second
And, okay, my third love, too.

An honest and compelling account of life as a teenage girl, it captures Sophie’s freshman year of high school and her first real romance and the one after that, and the one after that.