Illinois Authors

Penguin Audio, New York : ℗2009.

Eager to escape her sleepless nights and demanding mother, Auden travels to a quaint beach town to spend her summer break with her newly remarried father. Once there, Auden acquires a job at a local clothes boutique and befriends a group of girls. When she meets Eli, a fellow insomniac, Auden finds a companion for her restless evenings. As their friendship blossoms, Auden looks to experience a classic teenager's summer, while Eli looks to get over the guilt he feels regarding a friend's death.

Viking, New York : 2009

When Auden impulsively goes to stay with her father, stepmother, and new baby sister the summer before she starts college, all the trauma of her parents' divorce is revived, even as she is making new friends and having new experiences such as learning to ride a bike and dating.

Viking, New York : 2000.

After her older sister runs away, sixteen-year-old Caitlin decides that she needs to make a major change in her own life and begins an abusive relationship with a boy who is mysterious, brilliant, and dangerous.

Viking Children's Books, New York : ©2006

Isolated from friends who believe the worst because she has not been truthful with them, sixteen-year-old Annabel finds an ally in classmate Owen, whose honesty and passion for music help her to face and share what really happened at the end-of-the-year party that changed her life.

Speak, New York : [2009]

Presents three novels that deal with the trials, humor, and complexities in the lives of their teenage heroines.

Perfection Learning Prebound 2008.

Fifteen-year-old Colie, a former fat girl, spends the summer working as a waitress in a beachside restaurant, staying with her overweight and eccentric Aunt Mira, and trying to explore her sense of self.

Viking, New York, N.Y. : 2008

When she is abandoned by her alcoholic mother, high school senior Ruby winds up living with Cora, the sister she has not seen for ten years, and learns about Cora's new life, what makes a family, how to allow people to help her when she needs it, and that she too has something to offer others.

Louna's years working at her mother's wedding planning business--as well as the tragic end of her first love--have shaped her cynical views on romance, but the arrival of serial-dater Ambrose may start to change Louna's mind and give her a second chance at love.

Sydney's charismatic older brother, Peyton, has always been the center of attention in the family but when he is sent to jail, Sydney struggles to find her place at home and the world until she meets the Chathams, including gentle, protective Mac, who makes her feel seen for the first time.

Speak, New York, N.Y. : [2010]

Lock and key. When she is abandoned by her alcoholic mother, high school senior Ruby winds up living with Cora, the sister she has not seen for ten years, and learns about Cora's new life, what makes a family, how to allow people to help her when she needs it, and that she too has something to offer others.

Halley's junior year of high school includes the death of her best friend Scarlett's boyfriend, the discovery that Scarlett is pregnant, and Halley's own first serious relationship.

Orchard Books, New York : ©1996.

During the summer of her divorced father's remarriage and her sister's wedding, fifteen-year-old Haven comes into her own by letting go of the myths of the past.

Viking, New York : 2013.

During her last summer at home before leaving for college, Emaline begins a whirlwind romance with Theo, an assistant documentary filmmaker who is in town to make a movie.--

Viking, New York : 2004

The summer following her father's death, Macy plans to work at the library and wait for her brainy boyfriend to return from camp, but instead she goes to work at a catering business where she makes new friends and finally faces her grief.

Raised by a mother who has had five husbands, eighteen-year-old Remy believes in short-term, no-commitment relationships until she meets Dexter, a rock band musician.

Viking, New York : 2011

Following her parents' bitter divorce as she and her father move from town to town, seventeen-year-old Mclean reinvents herself at each school she attends until she is no longer sure she knows who she is or where she belongs.