All American Boys -- Jason Reynolds

A 2016 Coretta Scott King Author Honor book, and recipient of the Walter Dean Myers Award for Outstanding Children's Literature.

In this Coretta Scott King Honor Award-winning novel, two teens--one black, one white--grapple with the repercussions of a single violent act that leaves their school, their community, and, ultimately, the country bitterly divided by racial tension.

A bag of chips. That's all sixteen-year-old Rashad is looking for at the corner bodega. What he finds instead is a fist-happy cop, Paul Galluzzo, who mistakes Rashad for a shoplifter, mistakes Rashad's pleadings that he's stolen nothing for belligerence, mistakes Rashad's resistance to leave the bodega as resisting arrest, mistakes Rashad's every flinch at every punch the cop throws as further resistance and refusal to STAY STILL as ordered. But how can you stay still when someone is pounding your face into the concrete pavement?

There were witnesses: Quinn Collins--a varsity basketball player and Rashad's classmate who has been raised by Paul since his own father died in Afghanistan--and a video camera. Soon the beating is all over the news and Paul is getting threatened with accusations of prejudice and racial brutality. Quinn refuses to believe that the man who has basically been his savior could possibly be guilty. But then Rashad is absent. And absent again. And again. And the basketball team--half of whom are Rashad's best friends--start to take sides. As does the school. And the town. Simmering tensions threaten to explode as Rashad and Quinn are forced to face decisions and consequences they had never considered before.

Written in tandem by two award-winning authors, this four-starred reviews tour de force shares the alternating perspectives of Rashad and Quinn as the complications from that single violent moment, the type taken from the headlines, unfold and reverberate to highlight an unwelcome truth.

Author: Jason Reynolds, Brendan Kiely
Publisher: Atheneum Books
Published: 09/29/2015
Pages: 320
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 0.90lbs
Size: 8.50h x 5.80w x 1.10d
ISBN: 9781481463331
Age Range: 13-17

Accelerated Reader:
Reading Level: 4.9
Point Value: 10
Interest Level: Upper Grade
Quiz #/Name: 176653 / All American Boys

Award: Coretta Scott King Award - Honor Book

Review Citation(s):
Publishers Weekly 08/31/2015
School Library Journal 09/01/2015 pg. 172
Kirkus Reviews 08/15/2015 pg. 168
Booklist 09/15/2015 pg. 62
Horn Book Magazine 11/01/2015 pg. 89
PW Best Children's Books 11/02/2015 pg. 53
PW Children's Starred Reviews 12/02/2015 pg. 88
New York Times Book Review 12/20/2015 pg. 15
New York Times Book Review 12/27/2015 pg. 22
Hornbook Guide to Children 01/01/2016 - Outstanding, Noteworthy In Style

About the Author
Jason Reynolds is a #1 New York Times bestselling author, a Newbery Award Honoree, a Printz Award Honoree, a two-time National Book Award finalist, a Kirkus Award winner, a Carnegie Medal winner, a two-time Walter Dean Myers Award winner, an NAACP Image Award Winner, and the recipient of multiple Coretta Scott King honors. He's also the 2020-2021 National Ambassador for Young People's Literature. His many books include All American Boys (cowritten with Brendan Kiely), When I Was the Greatest, The Boy in the Black Suit, Stamped, As Brave as You, For Every One, the Track series (Ghost, Patina, Sunny, and Lu), Look Both Ways, and Long Way Down, which received a Newbery Honor, a Printz Honor, and a Coretta Scott King Honor. He lives in Washington, DC. You can find his ramblings at JasonWritesBooks.com.

Brendan Kiely is the New York Times bestselling author of All American Boys (with Jason Reynolds), The Last True Love Story, The Gospel of Winter, Tradition, and The Other Talk. His work has been published in ten languages; received a Coretta Scott King Author Honor Award, the Walter Dean Myers Award, and the Amelia Elizabeth Walden Award; has twice been awarded Best Fiction for Young Adults by the American Library Association; and has been a Kirkus Reviews Best Book. Originally from the Boston area, he now lives in New York City.