Somewhere, Junior High Me Is Smiling

I don't know if it's growing up in a house with teachers, or just something intrinsic, but have always loved to read.  But of all the books I read, the ones I read in my pre-teen and teen years tend to bring back the most memories.  I've been batting around this post for a while, and then I read this article on my new favorite site, HelloGiggles.

The book series that I fell in love with was Ann M. Martin's The Babysitters Club books.  I had a whole book shelf of them.  The ones I read looked like this:

 I always wanted to be Stacey, but I was totally Mary Ann.  Apparently, now you can read these "classics" in a graphic novel form that looks like this:

Next, it was the ultimate instructor in how to survive being a teenage girl, Judy Blume.  I have read her books over and over, and still do on occasion.  Those books shaped the lives of so many girls my age.  Several years ago, one of the boys in my class picked up Are You There God?  It's Me, Margaret. and was half way through before he realized what it was about.  He asked, "Ms. M, did you know this was a girl book?" and I informed him that no, it was THE girl book.

I read a million others.  I recently cracked one of my classes up by reading an extensive list of Lurlene McDaniel books.  I could never really get past the titles, but I know a lot of other girls read them.

In my literature class right now, we are reading The Lightning Thief (Book 1 of the Percy Jackson series), and I have never seen a group of kids love a book so much!  They beg me to read it, and it kills me to limit them to just one chapter a day!  Rick Riordan knows how to capture a wonderful tale, mixing Greek myths with a current and funny teen tale. 

So, on this Friday, share with the class.  What were your favorite young adult books?  Or your kids' favorites?  I would love to hear about them in the comments!