Dr. William Alexander, a noted curriculum authority and a central founder of the middle school movement, shared in a presentation in 1963 that teachers must have a goal of stimulating a "love for learning, an attitude of inquiry, a passion for truth and beauty, a questioning of mind." He asserted, "Learning the right answers is not enough, beyond answers alone, we must help children ask the right questions, and discover their answers through creative thinking, reasoning, judging, and understanding." Alexander's ideals have been influential in the development of the Association for Middle Level Education (AMLE) position paper, "This We Believe." This article responds to "This We Believe" by describing one attempt to develop a challenging and integrated curriculum. It also responds to the Common Core State Standards by describing how authentic literature can be used with instructional strategies to support learning across the curriculum. A brief review of related literature is shared. Next, instructional strategies to use with authentic literature are presented. The article concludes with final thoughts about using authentic literature to develop challenging and integrated curriculum. The hope is that this article will help teachers and students create new passions for authentic literature because when students have passion to read, they have passion to learn. Figure 1 provides examplars of authentic literature.