As the school year begins, so does Café Book, the partnership between area middle schools and Central Rappahannock Regional Library. Students in 7th and 8th grade will read from a list of selected titles then discuss those books with each other at school during lunch. This year’s Café Book list has fourteen titles for students to choose from, with everything from dystopian to adventure, fantasy, mystery, and realistic fiction. Find the complete list of Café Book titles for 2026-2027 at librarypoint.org/cafe-book/.
Anna-Jane and the Endless Summer by Paige Classey
Every year Anna-Jane looks forward to summer camp, where she meets her best friend, Amaya, for weeks of swimming, paddling, arts and crafts, and bonfires. But when campers hear rumors of a new pandemic, then lose internet, phone, and mail service, camp leaders put them on lockdown. Families of campers who live close come to get their children but after those kids have left, the remaining staff and campers realize they are on their own, too afraid to venture past the camp boundaries. Campers and staff work together to keep everything going as normally as possible, but as the weeks wear on, supplies dwindle, temperatures drop, emotions start to run high, and trust breaks down. When their first true threat comes from inside the camp, Anna-Jane and the other campers are forced to tap into their deepest reserves of bravery to find a path forward.
At the Edge of Lost by Martha Brockenbrough
A family emergency separates teenage Caleb from his canine best friend, Ronan. Both end up in places they don’t want to be, and neither understands why they can’t be together. Ronan, a giant Irish Wolfhound, escapes and winds up injured in the wilderness while searching for his boy. When Caleb learns Ronan has gone missing, he runs away to find him. With a coyote threatening Ronan and a severe storm impacting Caleb’s search, it isn’t certain both will survive this ordeal, much less find each other.
Blood in the Water by Tiffany D. Jackson
Kaylani is not excited to be leaving her home in Brooklyn to spend the summer with her father's friends on Martha's Vineyard. Everyone is snooty and Kaylani does not feel comfortable, no matter how kind Mr. and Mrs. Watson are. She feels judged for being a "charity case" and because her father is in prison. But when a local teenager turns up dead after an altercation that Kaylani witnessed, her sleuthing leads her to connect with some other young people on the island also interested in finding out the truth. As Kaylani's digging turns up things the locals have tried to hide, her time on the island gets much more complicated.
Confessions From the Group Chat by Jodi Meadows
Fed up with the mean treatment and comments of her friends, Virginia stands up to them and calls them out. Those girls retaliate online, using Virginia’s own words as ammunition and setting the whole school against her, including her budding crush, Grayson. Though Virginia knows what her friends are doing to her is wrong, it also makes her examine her own behavior and think about how she wants to be different. With support from her family, Virginia sets out to defend herself from the mean kids and mend fences with friends she values.
The House Saphir by Marissa Meyer
With only each other for support, teen sisters Mallory and Anaïs are living tenuously by using the reputation of their deceased mother to sell counterfeit spells and potions, and Mallory’s ability to see and communicate with ghosts to give unauthorized spooky tours. Constantly dodging law enforcement, the sisters accept a job from a young nobleman who wants to rid his estate of the ghosts of several murder victims. The sisters lie and assure the heir to the Saphir estate they can indeed perform these exorcisms, planning to retreat to the estate and ride the con as long as they can. But as the paranormal danger increases, the sisters fear they are in over their heads.
The Right Call by Tommy Greenwald
Cal is a high school baseball phenom, planning his current life and future around the sport, while managing the growing spotlight. When Cal suffers a shoulder injury and then witnesses a scary incident between his dad and an umpire, he begins to reconsider the sport he loves and his place in it. Relationships in his life shift, along with his emotions. Supportive adults, including an unexpected new friend, help Cal as he figures out how to work through the aftermath of these events.
Darcie Caswell is Director of Youth Services at CRRL. This column originally appeared in The Free Lance-Star newspaper.
