Fall 2020 edition
Simon & Schuster’s Education & Library team is very proud to bring you The Book Pantry—your indispensable guide to book discovery. We strive to bring educators relevant book recommendations and valuable resources for their classrooms and libraries.
With significant contributions in K–12 literature, Simon & Schuster offers a wide range of engaging and important titles for children of all ages. Navigate the Literature By Category tab above to preview titles for the upcoming publishing season.
We encourage you to explore The Book Pantry and let us know what you think! Learn all about what new titles we are publishing each season, and be sure to sign up for our monthly e-newsletter so that you can stay informed.
We hope you find The Book Pantry to be a useful program for readers’ advisory and collection development. Let us know at Education.Library@SimonandSchuster.com. And if you’re also an adult librarian, be sure to check out The Book Drop for recommendations on new adult titles for your library!
—Rachel, Amy, Amanda, Sarah, Michelle, and Ana
Simon & Schuster’s Education & Library Team
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In another perfectly-toned middle grade novel from Barbara Dee, Zinnia must question what’s more important—talking about the hard things going on in her family, or keeping “private” like her mom asked. Dee handles stressful situations and mental illness in a comprehensible and appropriate way, all while managing to capture the twelve-year-old voice of a girl struggling to understand her older brother and the friendships that change as she does. My Life in the Fish Tank is perfect for fans of The Science of Breakable Things and Nest.
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A retelling of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, set in lush and evocative 1920s Shanghai. Juliette Cai and Roma Montagov are both poised to become the leaders of their families’ warring gangs, and the relationship they once had is long in the past. But, when a mysterious contagion takes over their city and causes madness and death, Roma and Juliette are forced to work together to uncover the truth. I really loved this romantic and thrilling debut novel, and hope it makes your TBR.
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Double the Danger and Zero Zucchini
I don’t even know where to begin to convey how much I love this novel. Alex Harmon is the kind of immersive character who drags you along on adventures with quirky friends and an annoying little brother in a way that makes you forget you’re sitting still, reading a book—which, being a self-termed “reluctant reader,” I think Alex would appreciate. After all, Alex is revealing the secret to the writer behind a bestselling children’s series, and how he and his friends—and a fun-loving crew from a local nursing home—string together creative ideas for his aunt, who needs real kids to point out the “boring parts” in her developing middle grade novel.
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Christina Hammonds Reed’s debut novel is told from the perspective of Ashley Bennett, a black teenager growing up in a wealthy part of Los Angeles in the 1990s. Set during the LA riots, Ashley finds herself thinking more and more about her identity—her blackness, her role in her family, and how she relates to her friends, classmates, and the rest of the world. My favorite part of this book is the narration—Ashley is clever and funny, and the intersection of her worldview and her race helps readers experience and learn from her perspective as well as helps them consider parallels in the world today. This book is an incredibly important read and not to be missed.
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