Books with author Todd Strasser

Everyone had been drinking that snowy night when Chris's car plunged into the ravine. Luckily, Matt hadn't gone with the group. Now four of his friends are dead. Only Jason survives.Everyone blames Chris for the tragedy, and Matt doesn't like the way people talk about him and harass his family. Matt suspects there's something fishy about the investigation that followed the accident. Was it another case of drunk driving? Or was something more at stake? Matt is determined to uncover the truth, but no one is talking. What really happened that night?

All it takes is one second. One stupid move. One click of a cell phone. When Callie discovers Katherine sprawled on the ground, she bends down to help her. It's only natural―the party's been a bit wild. And it's only natural for her to pull out the fake knife, irritated at one more example of Katherine's callous disregard of other people's feelings. But the knife is real . . . and bloody. And then Callie hears the click of one cell phone, followed by another, and another. In minutes, images of her holding the bloody knife have gone viral. Now wanted for murder, Callie is on the run from the police. All the evidence points to her guilt, but she's determined to prove her innocence, which means . . . the real killer is still out there.

“A powerful and disturbing look at the downward spiral of despair that remains too common for too many teens (School Library Journal).”Her street name is Maybe. She lives with a tribe of homeless teens—runaways and throwaways, kids who have no place to go other than the cold city streets, and no family except for one another. Abused, abandoned, and forgotten, they struggle against weather, hunger, and constant danger.With the frigid winds of January comes a new girl: Tears, a twelve-year-old whose mother doesn’t believe her husband is abusive. As the other kids start to disappear—victims of violence, addiction, and exposure—Maybe tries to help Tears get off the streets…if it’s not already too late.

Jake Liddell is a war hero. The military is considering awarding him a Silver Star, a huge honor for any soldier -- especially for the son of a military family. Only Jake's questioning everything his family brought him up to believe.Now at home, recovering from his physical wounds, the memories of what he experienced "over there" haunt him. Meanwhile, he feels pressure from all sides. Some people want him to speak out against the military system he was brought up to honor and respect. Others, like his famous grandfather (a general himself), are urging him to return to the battlefield to fight again.Jake was raised to believe that fighting for one's country was a moral obligation. But now that he's seen firsthand the human cost of war, he is no longer sure. Bestselling YA author Todd Strasser delivers an engrossing and timely novel about very real issues faced by the young people caught in today's "forever war," and the price they pay.

When Barry Dunn starts beating kids up off school property, Principal Blanco says school rules prevent him from doing anything about it. But Jake has a plan. If he can get his friend Josh to switch bodies with Principal Blanco, the rules won't apply. Josh in Blanco's body can expel Barry and get rid of him for good. But things don't go quite the way Jake expected. In fact, if Josh is going to expel anyone, it could be Jake!

In the middle of the night Garrett is taken from his home to Harmony Lake, a boot camp for troubled teens. Maybe some kids deserve to be sent there, but Garrett knows he doesn't. Subjected to brutal physical and psychological abuse, he tries to fight back, but the battle is futile. He won't be allowed to leave until he's admitted his "mistakes" and conformed to Harmony Lake's standards of behavior. And there's no way to fake it. Beaten, humiliated, and stripped of his pride, Garrett's spirit is slowly ebbing away. Then he hears whispers of an escape plot. It's incredibly risky -- if he's caught, the consequences will be unthinkable -- but it may be his only way out. In this tense, riveting novel, award-winning YA author Todd Strasser reveals what really goes on in highly secretive -- and notoriously dangerous -- boot camps, a stealth prison system where any teenager under the age of eighteen can be imprisoned at his parents' whim.

Nicole Maris has it all: looks, popularity, and Brad Selden, the hottest guy in school, at her fingertips. But then Brad decides to take someone else to the prom! Now Nicole's got a project on her hands: find an even better prom date. Enter Chase Hammond. He's not exactly Mr. Popular, but with a makeover and some help form Nicole, he just might be prom king material.

I'll begin with Lucy. She is definitely first on the list. You can't believe how it feels to be in the cafeteria and turn around and there she is staring at me like I'm some disgusting bug or vermin. Does she really think I WANT to be this way? I hate you, Lucy. I really hate you. You are my #1 pick. I wish you were dead. The day after anonymous blogger Str-S-d wishes the popular girl would die, Lucy vanishes. The students of Soundview High are scared and worried. Especially frightened and wracked with guilt is Madison Archer, Lucy's friend and the last person to see her the night she disappeared. As days pass with no sign of the missing girl, even the attention of Tyler, an attractive new student, is not enough to distract Madison from her growing sense of foreboding. When two more popular students disappear after their names are mentioned on Str-S-d's blog, the residents of Soundview panic. Meanwhile, Madison receives anonymous notes warning that she could be next. Desperate to solve the mystery before anyone else disappears, Madison turns to Tyler, but can she trust him when it becomes clear that he knows more than he's sharing? The clock is ticking. Madison must uncover the truth behind the mysterious disappearances . . . before her name appears in Str-S-d's blog. In the spirit of stories like I Know What You Did Last Summer, Todd Strasser updates the teen thriller for the techno age with Wish You Were Dead.

Drawing from his teenage years, Todd Strasser’s novel revisits a tumultuous era and takes readers on a psychedelically tinged trip of a lifetime.With his girlfriend, Robin, away in Canada, eighteen-year-old Lucas Baker’s only plans for the summer are to mellow out with his friends, smoke weed, drop a tab or two, and head out in his microbus for a three-day happening called the Woodstock Music and Art Fair. But life veers dramatically off track when he suddenly finds himself in danger of being drafted and sent to fight in Vietnam. If that isn’t heavy enough, there’s also the free-loving (and undeniably alluring) Tinsley, who seems determined to test Lucas’s resolve to stay faithful to Robin; a frighteningly bad trip at a Led Zeppelin concert; a run-in with an angry motorcycle gang; parents who appear headed for a divorce; and a friend on the front lines in ’Nam who’s in mortal danger of not making it back. As the pressures grow, it’s not long before Lucas finds himself knocked so far down, it’s starting to look like up to him. When tuning in, turning on, and dropping out is no longer enough, what else is there?