Myers, Walter Dean

A teenage basketball player from Harlem is befriended by a former professional player who, after being forced to quit because of a point shaving scandal, hopes to prevent other young athletes from repeating his mistake.

Ten stories portray life on a block in Harlem.

Relates events in Martin Luther King, Jr.'s, childhood which sowed the seeds for his activism for equal rights for people, regardless of their color.

Seeing no way out of his difficult life in Harlem, seventeen-year-old Jeremy "Lil J" Dance flees into a house after a drug deal goes awry and meets a strange man who reveals different turning points in Lil J's life when he could have made better choices.

Author Walter Dean Myers describes his childhood in Harlem in the 1940s and 1950s, discussing his loving stepmother, his problems in school, his reasons for leaving home, and his beginnings as a writer.

Fifteen interrelated stories explore different aspects of love, including a dying father's determination to help start a family business--a beauty salon--and the relationship of two teens who plan to remain celibate until they marry.

Examines the histories of the two American Navy ships called "USS Constellation," the first launched in 1797 and the second in 1854, discussing the role of the vessel in suppressing the illegal slave trade and in the Civil War, looking at what life was like for a sailor on the ship, and discussing its restoration in the 1990s.

Written in the form of interviews, reports, and journal entries, the story of three troubled teenagers ends in a tragic school shooting.

Sixteen-year-old "Slam" Harris is counting on his noteworthy basketball talents to get him out of the inner city and give him a chance to succeed in life, but his coach sees things differently.

Motown and Didi, two teenage loners in Harlem, become allies in a fight against Touchy, the drug dealer whose dope is destroying Didi's brother, and find themselves falling in love with each other.