Wayland YA Booklists: Survival Stories

What do you fear? Dying. Are you likely to die in this situation? Yes. Nora's birthday marks the one-year anniversary of the worst day of her life. To distract them both from the memories of the horrible shooting that killed Nora's mom, her dad surprises her with a trip to explore a slot canyon deep in the Arizona desert. Nora hopes they'll find some remnant of the happiness they felt when her mother was still alive. But in the twisting, winding depths,...

Perfect for fans of Hatchet and the I Survived series, this harrowing middle grade debut novel-in-verse from a Pushcart Prize-nominated poet tells the story of a young girl who wakes up one day to find herself utterly alone in her small Colorado town. When twelve-year-old Maddie hatches a scheme for a secret sleepover with her two best friends, she ends up waking up to a nightmare. She's alone--left behind in a town that has been mysteriously evacuated...

Josef is a Jewish boy living in 1930s Nazi Germany. With the threat of concentration camps looming, he and his family board a ship bound for the other side of the world. Isabel is a Cuban girl in 1994. With riots and unrest plaguing her country, she and her family set out on a raft, hoping to find safety in America. Mahmoud is a Syrian boy in 2015. With his homeland torn apart by violence and destruction, he and his family begin a long trek toward...

This thrilling adventure begins after a sea kayaking trip takes a dangerous turn and Tom Parker is stranded on the remote, outer coast of the unpopulated Bear Island in the rough terrains of the Alaskan wilderness. With only a small survival kit in his pocket, Tom finds himself soaked and freezing, and worst of all--alone. Desperate to find his father, Tom doesn't know how long he can survive and he must put his skills to the test as he fights to...

Leira is starting her initiation as a priestess when her world is turned upside down. A violent earthquake leaves her home in pieces. And the goddess hasn't finished with the island yet. With her family, Leira flees across the sea to Crete, expecting sanctuary. But a volcanic eruption and tsunami throw the entire world into darkness. In the resulting chaos, Leira finds her noble-born privilege reduced to nothing; alone with her injured mother and...

After a plane crash, thirteen-year-old Brian spends fifty-four days in the Canadian wilderness, learning to survive with only the aid of a hatchet given him by his mother, and learning also to survive his parents' divorce. Includes an introduction and sidebar commentary by the author.

Instead of being rescued from a plane crash, as in the author's book Hatchet, this story portrays what would have happened to Brian had he been forced to survive a winter in the wilderness with only his survival pack and hatchet.

Bronx middle-grader Addy, who struggles with a family tragedy by drawing maps and studying mazes, joins other city youngsters on a wilderness adventure in California that turns deadly when wildfires erupt.

"After a monster apocalypse hits town, average thirteen-year-old Jack Sullivan builds a team of friends to help slay the eerily intelligent monster known as Blarg"--

A young boy relates his adventures during the year he spends living alone in the Catskill Mountains including his struggle for survival, his dependence on nature, his animal friends, and his ultimate realization that he needs human companionship.