Teens
Library Closed for Independence Day
NPL will be closed Thursday, July 4 for the Independence Day holiday. Our Fell Avenue lot bookdrop and off-site bookdrops will remain available. We will reopen at 9 am on July 5.
Normal Public Library provides many enriching events and resources for teens. Find items from our teen collections and helpful online resources.
Activities
We have lots of activities going on every month for teens to enjoy. Whether you are into technology, poetry, crafts, anime, or more, there is something for you at NPL!
Learn more about current activities here.
NPL Teens Discord
If you are a teen and would like an invite to join our NPL Teens Discord, just fill out this form.
We use the Discord for a variety of our teen activities, including Dungeons & Dragons, Writers' Workshop, and game nights.
Teen Spaces
The library is a great place to meet up with friends or spend some time studying.
We hope you will check out our Teen Department next time you are at the library.
Teen Mobile Maker Space
Our Teen Mobile Makerspace is an area that encourages participation in hands-on collaborative learning, sharing, and creating through the use of technology and do-it-yourself materials. Teens, take a look at the makerspace during your next visit.
Thanks to our Giving Tuesday campaign in 2015, we are pleased to offer our Teen Mobile Makerspace.
Collection
The library has a fantastic collection of the latest books for teens and we work hard to maintain a great selection of graphic novels.
You will also find tons of music and movies to check out and a huge selection of media to download & stream.
New Books for Teens
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The Misdirection of Fault Lines
Alice is on her own for the first time. She has no coach. No friends. Not even clothes that meet the Bastille Invitational’s strict dress code. There’s only the steady drumbeat of guilt inside—pressure to make the tournament’s costly expense “worth it” in the wake of Ba’s unexpected passing. But will a win on court justify the price she paid to get here?
Violetta is Bastille’s darling: social media influencer, coach’s pet, and daughter of a former tennis star who fell from grace. Bastille is her chance to reclaim the future her mother gave up to raise her. But is that what she wants for herself?
Leylah hasn’t competed in two years, thanks to a back-stabbing ex-friend. Bastille is her last chance to prove she’s ready for a life of professional tennis. But will her fixation on past wrongs keep her from reclaiming her rightful place at the top?
.
One week at the elite Bastille Invitational tennis tournament will decide their futures. If only the competition between them stayed on the court.
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The Kill Factor
Fifty contestants. Five mental and physical challenges. One winner.
In a near-future where a virtual currency of digital content fuels a fame-hungry society, a brand-new experiment that combines social media and reality TV has been greenlit. Fifty contestants. Five mental and physical challenges. One winner.
Contestants are sent to a maximum-security reform camp on an island where they can have no contact with the outside world. To lose means prison. But to win is to be free. The most popular young offender with the most upvotes by the end is given both a second chance in society and a cash prize.
This kind of money could mean everything to Emerson and her family who live in the Burrows, one of the subterranean villages where the government have buried affordable housing. It's more than freedom. It could mean the chance to change her family's circumstance and finally find a place in the society they've never been allowed into.
But what Emerson doesn't know, what the viewers don't know, is that the prison on the island is empty. Those who lose, those who are voted off aren't incarcerated. Each challenge will leave more and more contestants to die. And the only choice they have is to win over viewers before it's too late.
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Trajectory
Seventeen-year-old Eleanor is nothing like her hero Eleanor Roosevelt. She is timid and all together uncertain that she has much to offer the world. And as World War II rages overseas, Eleanor is consumed with worry for her Jewish relatives in Europe. When a chance encounter proves her to be a one-in-a-generation math whiz--a fact she has worked hard all her life to hide--Eleanor gets recruited by the US Army and entrusted with the ultimate challenge: to fine-tune a top-secret weapon that will help America defeat its enemies in World War II and secure the world's freedom. This could be her chance to help save her family in Poland.
Soon, she's swept from the basement of an Ivy League engineering school, to the desert of California, to an Army Air Corps base at Pearl Harbor, and finally she takes to the skies above the South Pacific.
But before she can solve this complicated problem, she must learn to unlock a bigger mystery: herself.
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Meet Me in the Fourth Dimension
NASA has assured everyone the passage of rogue planet Malachite will be safe, but Crosby's been getting other messages—from a fortune teller and Malachite truther message boards. And now she believes that Malachite will kill everyone who doesn’t ascend to the fourth dimension—a higher plane that transcends physicality.
She tries to prepare her friends and family to leave their bodies behind and raise their frequency by changing their diets, wearing the right crystals, and moving into her friend’s bunker before it’s too late. But no one is listening.
The more time she spends trying to talk her roommate and her quirky friends into her apocalypse plans, the more Crosby is forced to face the cracks in everything she believes to be true.
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We Are Mayhem
When Birdie’s parents move the family from their gated New Jersey community to the Catskills, Birdie thinks life as she knows it is once again—just like it was when she quit gymnastics—completely over. But when Birdie’s friends ditch her during a dare gone wrong, she finds herself staring down the barrel of a shotgun wielded by Mad Mabel the Mother of Mayhem, and Birdie strikes a deal with Mabel to work off her crime.
Abigail Rose, Mabel’s granddaughter, is convinced that Birdie—whose big, strong arms have always felt like the bane of her existence — is destined to help pull her family’s male-dominated indie wrestling promotion in a more feminist direction.
With no way to return to or escape her past and no clear course into her future, Birdie has to find a way to somehow make her new town a home. But if Birdie is going to be the future of Mayhem, she first has to find a way to embrace who she is - no matter the cost. -
Pretty Furious
In the small town of Eganston, Ontario, five good girls have had enough. They’ve experienced the best of what their community has to offer, but they’ve seen the darker side too. Together, they’ve decided that it’s time for a reckoning and that justice is their privilege to give.
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Dark Parts of the Universe
In Calico Springs, Willie's life has been defined by two powerful forces: God and the river. The "miracle boy" died for five minutes as a young child, and ever since, Willie is certain he survived for a reason, but that purpose didn't become clear until he found the Game.
The Game is called Manifest Atlas, and the concept is simple: enter an intention and the Game provides a target--a blinking blue dot on the map. Willie's second time playing Manifest Atlas, his intention takes him to an ominous target: three empty graves. Willie is sure the Game is telling him he's going to die.
Willie's older brother, Bones, doesn't believe him, but their friends are intrigued. Sarai, a girl from across the river, sets the next intention: something bloody. The group follows the Game's coordinates and they discover something even more unsettling than the graves: a dead body. Sarai's stepfather's body. The Game is suddenly personal.
Willie is dedicated to proving the Game works while Sarai is set on finding out what happened to her stepdad. Bones just wants to enjoy his last summer before real life begins. As the group digs deeper into Manifest Atlas, stranger and wilder things begin to appear, unlocking a much deeper mystery running like an undercurrent through the small town.
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One Last Breath
Mount Orange, Florida, is famous for two things: cerulean freshwater springs, ideal for free divers who aren't afraid of lurking gators. And the gruesome cold case murder of best friends, Bailey and Celeste, twenty years ago.
Bailey and Celeste's murders cast a permanent darkness over sunny Mount Orange. Tru has always lived in that shadow. Now she's supposed to head to FSU in the fall with her boyfriend, but those unsolved murders—and the death of her own sister—invade her every thought. It’s only in the shadowy deep of Hidden Glen Springs that she can breathe.
When a strange girl named Rio rolls into town, hell-bent on figuring out who killed Bailey and Celeste, Tru can't resist entangling herself in the thrill of solving the decades old mystery any more than she can resist her familiar, aching attraction to Rio.
As the summer heat ignites, so does the spark between Tru and Rio…along with their otherworldy connection to Bailey and Celeste. But when someone begins stalking them, the girls become convinced the killer is back in town. And if they keep digging into the past, Tru and Rio know this time, it could be their blood that makes the springs run red. -
I Will Follow
The first time Nora saw one of Shea's videos on TikTok, something just clicked. You know how you can see someone and know you're supposed to be in each other's lives? Well, that's how Nora felt. She knows Shea is a big star, with nearly a million followers, and Nora isn't. But, really, all Nora needs is her own viral moment. And who better to help her with that than Shea
If life isn't going to give Nora entry into Shea's world, Nora's going to have to take matters into her own hands.
Meeting Shea.
Kidnapping her.
Holding her hostage until Shea finally understands...
They are meant to be best, best friends.
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Book, Beast, and Crow
Anna Kellogg has always felt different. Growing up in Hartwood, New Jersey--where frequent disappearances are attributed to an urban-legend-like beast that dwells in the walled-in swamp at the center of town--can have that effect on people. But for Anna, it's more than that. Since she was a child, she's been plagued by episodes where she sees things others can't see. Feeling different is one thing, but actually being different is another. If it weren't for her best friend, Olivia, Anna's not sure where she'd fit in.
But any hopes of having a normal senior year come to a halt when Olivia is attacked in the woods, bitten, and left for dead by a whirling cyclone of claws, fur, and teeth. Though Olivia survives, a sinister entity makes it clear that the mark had been set on Anna...and the miss has set in motion a catastrophic shift that will change Anna and her friends' lives forever.
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Why We Play With Fire
Desperate to escape encroaching darkness, Thea is propelled through a mystical well by her mother and grandmother, left only with a cryptic mission to "retrieve the keys." However, her destination defies all expectations as she arrives at an extraordinary haven—a house known as Malachite. Within the hallowed halls of Malachite, Thea unveils a world far beyond her wildest imagination. Amidst an intricate tapestry of training and elusive artifacts, she discovers a mysterious box safeguarded by the students' within the home.
But when the three keys that allow access to the box disappear, Thea's mixed-race ancestry and connection to two gods launch her on an all-consuming quest that awakens her to her divine lineage and an awe-inspiring destiny. Thea becomes determined to reclaim the keys before the approaching Winter Solstice, navigating treacherous rivalries and evading the clutches of the morally ambiguous Arcana—a competing school with nefarious intentions.
When her comrades fall into captivity, and two keys remain lost, Thea must gain confidence in her new abilities and leadership role to see this through. Amidst the crumbling facade of deceit and the allure of Zero, the enigmatic Arcana prodigy, she must maintain focus, for time is dwindling, and the shadow creatures draw ever closer. -
Stay with My Heart
Liana Sarkar lives and breathes music, hoping to follow in the footsteps of her A&R coordinator father. Maybe if she succeeds, he'll finally give her the time of day instead of drowning himself in work to distract from the grief of her mother's passing.
When Liana accidentally sabotages an up-and-coming local band, Third Eye, she makes it her mission to steer them towards success--without them discovering her role in their setback. But as she gets closer to Third Eye, especially their enigmatic leader Skyler Moon, it becomes harder to hide the truth.
With both her heart and their futures on the line, will Liana be able to undo the damage she's caused?
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Something Kindred
Jericka Walker had planned to spend the summer before senior year soaking up the sun with her best friend on the Jersey Shore. Instead she finds herself in Coldwater, Maryland, a small town with a dark and complicated past where her estranged grandmother lives—someone she knows only two things about: her name and the fact that she left Jericka’s mother and uncle when they were children. But now Jericka's grandmother is dying, and her mother has dragged Jericka along to say goodbye.
As Jericka attempts to form a connection with a woman she's never known, and adjusts to life in a town where everything closes before dinner, she meets “ghost girl” Kat, a girl eager to leave Coldwater and more exciting than a person has any right to be. But Coldwater has a few unsettling secrets of its own. The more you try to leave, the stronger the town’s hold. As Jericka feels the chilling pull of her family’s past, she begins to question everything she thought she knew about her mother, her childhood, and the lines between the living and the dead. -
These Bodies Between Us
For seventeen-year-old Callie and her best friends Talia and Cleo, every summer in their small North Carolina beach town is as steady as the tides. But this year, Cleo has invited enigmatic new girl Polly to join them, creating waves in their familiar friendship. And Cleo has an idea, gleaned from private YouTube videos and hidden message boards: they’re going to learn how to make themselves invisible.
Callie thinks it’s a ridiculous, impossible plan. But the other girls are intoxicated by the thought of disappearing, even temporarily—from bad boyfriends, from overbearing families, from the confusing, uncomfortable reality of having a body altogether. And, miraculously, it works.
Yet as the girls revel in their reckless new freedom, they realize it’s getting harder to come back to themselves… and do they even want to? -
Hearts Still Beating
Seventeen-year-old Mara is dead—mostly. Infected with a virus that brought the dead back to life and the world to its knees, she wakes up in a facility to learn a treatment for the disease has been found. No longer a Tick, Mara is placed in an experimental resettlement program. But her recovery is complicated by her destination: she’s sent to live with the best friend she hasn’t seen since the world ended—and since their first and only kiss.
Seventeen-year-old Rory is alive—barely. With impaired mobility from an injury and a dead sister, Rory’s nightmares are just as monstrous as the Ticks that turned her former best friend. Even after the Island—one of a handful of surviving communities—rebuilds itself, Rory is prepared for the Ticks to return at any time. She never expected them to come in the form of the only girl she’s ever loved.
As the girls struggle with their pasts and the people they’ve become, and with the Island’s fragile peace in the balance, Rory and Mara must lean on each other to survive—or risk losing the girl they love all over again.
Outreach
Our Teen Librarian regularly visits McLean County's Juvenile Detention Center to introduce teens there to books that they might enjoy. She also visits schools in Normal during the students' lunch breaks to introduce them to great books through our Books & Bites program.
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