By D'Lacey, Chris  Book I of the Firestar Trilogy, a fun series of books about a college student who rents a room in a house full of small clay dragon sculptures--that turn out to be real live fire-breathing dragons when no one is looking! And they lead Chris to discover the writer he never knew he could be, as well as to discover a witch and some magical bears, and more.

By McKinley, Robin  When Jake Mendoza, who lives in the Smokehill National Park where his father runs the Makepeace Institute of Integrated Dragon Studies, goes on his first solo overnight in the park, he finds an infant dragon whose mother has been killed by a poacher. And his life will never be the same!

By Jean, Mark and Christopher C. Carlson  Ernie is a troubled thirteen-year-old juvenile delinquent. Abandoned on the doorstep of an orphange when he was three years old, his only proof that he once belonged to somebody is a vintage Ernie Banks baseball card, a crystal acorn he wears on a string around his neck, and a strange spiral birthmark on the bottom of his foot. As a last reprieve before being sent to a juvenile detention facility, Ernie is allowed to spend three weeks on a working farm. When Ernie learns that the farmer's baby was kidnapped years before, he is determined to solve the case. Teaming up with Joey, a local tomboy, they investigate clues that lead them on a dangerous journey into a forbidden world of dark secrets, magic puddles, and the cavernous undergroun kingdom of the Puddlejumpers--eleven-inch-tall water creatures with whom Ernie has a mysterious connection.

By Duey, Kathleen 

In alternate chapters, Sadima travels from her farm home to the city and becomes assistant to a heartless man who is trying to restore knowledge of magic to the world, and a group of boys fights to survive in the academy that has resulted from his efforts.

Book I of A Resurrection of Magic series.

By Horowitz, Anthony 

Sent to live in a foster home in a remote Yorkshire village, Matt, a troubled fourteen-year-old English boy, uncovers an evil plot involving witchcraft and the site of an ancient stone circle. Matt discovers he is one of the Five, children who hold the power to save the world from a terrible ancient evil that is coming back. Fast-paced action and suspense along with lots of magic.

 Book I of the Gatekeepers series.

By Le Guin, Ursula K. 

When a young man in the Uplands blinds himself rather than use his gift of "unmaking"--a violent talent shared by members of his family--he upsets the precarious balance of power among rival, feuding families, each of which has a strange and deadly talent of its own.

See also: Book 2: Voices and Book 3: Powers

By Carman, Patrick 

The world of Atherton consists of three distinct, interconnected lands stacked atop each other like a layer cake, At the top are the Highlands, home to Atherton's rich and oppressive ruling class; the middle layer is the Flatlands, populated by Atherton's subservient working class; the bottom layer is The Wastelands, where none dare venture, for the few that have done so have never been heard from again. Edgar, an eleven-year-old orphan, finds a book that reveals significant secrets about Atherton, the strictly divided world on which he lives, even as geological changes threaten to shift the power structure that allows an elite few to live off the labor of others.

See also Book 2: Rivers of Fire

By Stroud, Jonathan 

In this version of England, the upper class are magicians who get their power by enslaving djinni (genies) and other magical creatures. Nathaniel, a magician's apprentice, summons up the djinni Bartimaeus and instructs him to steal the Amulet of Samarkand from the powerful magician Simon Lovelace.

Book I of the Bartimaeus Trilogy. See also Book 2: The Golem's Eye, and Book 3: Ptolemy's Gate

By Wrede, Patricia C.  With the aid of King Mandanbar, Princess Cimorene rescues the dragon Kazul and saves the Enchanted Forest from a band of wicked wizards. A spoof of conventional fairy tales. Book I in a series.

By Pratchett, Terry  A talking cat, intelligent rats, and a strange boy cooperate in a Pied Piper scam until they try to con the wrong town and are confronted by a deadly evil rat king. Set in the Discworld universe.