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Tom Appleby, Convict Boy

Jackie French · back to the book

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24 books with the same feel

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The Convicts

Iain Lawrence · 198 pages

After seeing his father hauled off to debtor's prison, Tom Tin sets out to take revenge on Mr. Goodfellow, the man responsible for his family's misfortunes. But the fog-filled London streets are teeming with sinister characters. Tom encounters a blind man who scavenges the riverbed for treasure--and wants what Tom digs up; Worms, a body snatcher who reveals a shocking surprise; and a nasty gang of

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionPrisonMale Lead
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The King's Fifth

Scott O'Dell · 264 pages

The King's Fifth (1966) is a children's historical novel by Scott O'Dell that was the inspiration for the cartoon TV series The Mysterious Cities of Gold. It describes, from the point of view of a teenage Spanish Conquistador, how the European search for gold in the New World of the Americas affected people's lives and minds. The title refers to the one fifth share of spoils expected by the Spanis

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionPrisonMale Lead
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Daniel's Story

Carol Matas · 136 pages

Daniel, whose family suffers as the Nazis rise to power in Germany, describes his imprisonment in a concentration camp and his eventual liberation.

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionPrisonMale Lead
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Curiosity

Gary L. Blackwood · 313 pages

In 1835, when his father is put in a Philadelphia debtor's prison, twelve-year-old chess prodigy Rufus Goodspeed is relieved to be recruited to secretly operate a chess-playing automaton named The Turk, but soon questions the fate of his predecessors and his own safety.

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionPrisonMale Lead
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The Prisoner

Robert Muchamore

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionPrisonMale Lead
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Just Henry

Michelle Magorian · 711 pages

It's 1949 and life is bleak for Henry. He misses his father who died a war hero, and he escapes from his annoying stepfather and stepsister whenever he can by going to the movies. One day he meets Mr. Beaumont, a man who also loves films and agrees to lend Henry a camera for his school project. Henry is disgusted to learn that he's been put in a group with Jeffries, the son of a man who went AWOL,

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionMale LeadMiddle Grade
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Brooklyn Bridge

Karen Hesse · 229 pages

In 1903 Brooklyn, fourteen-year-old Joseph Michtom's life changes for the worse when his parents, Russian immigrants, invent the teddy bear and turn their apartment into a factory, while nearby the glitter of Coney Island contrasts with the dismal lives of children dwelling under the Brooklyn Bridge.

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionMale LeadMiddle Grade
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Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionMale LeadMiddle Grade
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The Ides of April

Mary Ray · 168 pages

In Rome in 62 A.D., seventeen-year-old Hylas must find a way to save himself, his mother, and the other household slaves from imprisonment and imminent death when their master, a prominent senator, is found murdered.

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionMale LeadMiddle Grade
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Prisoner 88

Leah Pileggi · 143 pages

In 1885, ten-year-old James in sent to prison for killing a man who threatened his father, and struggles to survive the harsh realities of prison life in the Idaho Territory.

Historical FictionTeen ProtagonistMale LeadPrison
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Trail of Fate

Michael P. Spradlin · 240 pages

In the Middle Ages, young squire Tristan of the Knights Templar, King's Archer Robard, and Muslim assassin Maryam work together to protect the Holy Grail as they travel across France toward England, a journey that takes them to the Cathar fortress of Montségur.

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionMale LeadMiddle Grade
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The Fire Eaters

David Almond · 228 pages

In 1962 England, despite observing his father's illness and the suffering of the fire-eating Mr. McNulty, as well as enduring abuse at school and the stress of the Cuban Missile Crisis, Bobby Burns and his family and friends still find reasons to rejoice in their lives and to have hope for the future.

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionMale LeadMiddle Grade
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Run, Boy, Run

Uri Orlev · 192 pages

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionMale LeadMiddle Grade
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A Beautiful Lie

Irfan Master · 293 pages

In the days leading up to the partition of India in 1947, thirteen-year-old Bilal devises an elaborate scheme to keep his dying father from hearing the news about the country's division.

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionMale LeadMiddle Grade
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No Promises in the Wind

Irene Hunt · 223 pages

"No Promises in the Wind", by Irene Hunt, is about a 15-year-old boy and his little brother that run away from their home. It takes place in the Great Depression, 1932. After a long journey, the boys go back home and make things better.

Historical FictionTeen ProtagonistMale LeadMiddle Grade
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Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionMale LeadMiddle Grade
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The Dragon Turn

Shane Peacock · 242 pages

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionMale LeadMiddle Grade
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Ghost Canoe

Will Hobbs · 195 pages

After a sailing ship breaks up on the rocks off Washington's storm-tossed Cape Flattery, Nathan McAllister, the fourteen-year-old son of the lighthouse keeper, refuses to believe the authorities, who say there were no survivors. Unexplained footprints on a desolate beach, a theft at the trading post, and glimpses of a wild "hairy man" convince Nathan that someone is hiding in the remote sea caves

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionMale LeadMiddle Grade
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Outcast

Rosemary Sutcliff · 229 pages

Fifteen-year-old Beric feels increasingly bitter isolation when, because of his Roman birth, he is cast out by the Celtic tribe that raised him and, after reaching a Roman settlement, he is sold into slavery and sentenced to serve in a galley for the rest of his life.

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionMale LeadMiddle Grade
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The King of Mulberry Street

Donna Jo Napoli · 245 pages

In 1892, Dom, a nine-year old stowaway from Naples, Italy, arrives in New York and must learn to survive the perils of street life in the big city.

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionMale LeadMiddle Grade
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Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionMale LeadMiddle Grade
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Soldier's Heart: Being the Story of the Enlistment and Due Service of the Boy Charley Goddard in the First Minnesota Volunteers

Gary Paulsen · 106 pages

Eager to enlist, fifteen-year-old Charley has a change of heart after experiencing both the physical horrors and mental anguish of Civil War combat.

Historical FictionTeen ProtagonistMiddle GradeMale Lead
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In the Reign of Terror: The Adventures of a Westminster Boy

G.A. Henty · 256 pages

Harry Sandwith, a Westminster boy, becomes a resident at the chateau of a French marquis, and after various adventures accompanies the family to Paris at the crisis of the Revolution.

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionMale LeadMiddle Grade
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Shadow on the Mountain

Margi Preus · 320 pages

In Nazi-occupied Norway, fourteen-year-old Espen joins the resistance movement, graduating from deliverer of illegal newspapers to courier and spy.

Teen ProtagonistHistorical FictionMale LeadMiddle Grade

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