King, A.S. Glory O'Brien's History of the Future. New York: Little, Brown, 2014. Print. ISBN 978-0-316-22272-3; Hardcover; $18.00. Annotation: Glory O'Brien can see the future and the past but she isn't sure if she wants to stick around long enough to see if it comes true. Book Talk: After one night of doing something really stupid and gross, Glory and her best friend Ellie acquire the uncanny ability to see both the past and the future of everyone around them, except for themselves. As Glory tries to unravel what her visions of war, female oppression, and unexpected love reveal, her best friend must confront her own demons of sexual promiscuity and betrayal. Read A.S. King's brave and powerful new novel to find out what Glory O'Brien knows about the History of the Future and whether or not she can save it. Available in hardcover, eBook, and audio CD.
King, A S. Everybody Sees the Ants. New York: Little, Brown, 2012. Print. ISBN 978-0-316-12927-5; Paperback; $9.99. Annotation: Lucky Linderman escapes from Nader, the Squid and the Turtle by visiting his grandfather in his dreams and imagining ants seek revenge on his behalf. Book Talk: Lucky Linderman doesn't feel so lucky. He has no real friends and no girlfriend. He has been bullied by Nader McMillan for as long as he can remember, and it is getting worse. But no one seems to care. His granddad never came home from the Vietnam War and no one in his family has recovered. His mother hides from her problems at the local public pool and his dad works too much. After Nader's last attack leaves him disfigured, depressed and vengeful, Lucky begins hallucinating tiny ants to enact his revenge. In order to escape oppressive reality Lucky travels into his dreams where he tries to rescue his grandfather from the jungle and rescue himself from Nader McMillan. Read A.S. King's engaging and haunting novel to discover how Lucky, and everyone else who is suffering, sees the ants. Available in paperback, hardcover, eBook and audio CD. Awards:2011 Cybils Award finalist 2011 Andre Norton Award finalist Teen quote: "I really like this book because it talked about how your (sic) the one who builds your own prisons so your (sic) the only one who can tear them down. I also liked that whenever he woke up from a dream he had an object from the dream. That was COOL." ~Jill, 15.
Young, Suzanne. The Program. New York: Simon Pulse, 2013. Print. ISBN 978-1-4424-4580-2; Hardcover; $16.99. Annotation: Sloane can't reveal any emotions or she risks being taken away to have her memory erased and never being able to kiss her boyfriend James again, or remember him. Book Talk: What would you do if you weren't allowed to show any emotions? Not even to your own family? Sloane and James are a normal high school couple, except it's the near future and an epidemic of teen suicide becomes a nation-wide crisis and the government implements a terrifying program where at-risk teens are whisked away by handlers to have their memories erased and their senses dulled. Who would you trust? Would you choose death too? Available in eBook, paperback, hardcover, and digital audio book.
Cliff, Tony. Delilah Dirk and the Turkish Lieutenant. New York: First Second, 2013. Print. 978-1-59643-813-2; Paperback; $15.99. Annotation: Watch Delilah Dirk plunder, kick and fly her way through various exploits while dragging along her mild, tea-drinking new friend Selim. Book Talk: Delilah Dirk is a feisty, sword-wielding, globetrotting adventure-seeker who refuses to be tied down to any man or place for too long. When she is detained by and later rescues Selim, a Turkish soldier with a penchant for tea and relaxation, he tags along on her latest escapade. It doesn't take long for Selim to discover he isn't cut out for explosions, murder, stealing treasure or flying ships. Read Delilah Dirk and the Turkish Lieutenant to witness Selim's amazing reaction when Delilah gives him a compass and tells him to follow it. Available in paperback.
Alexie, Sherman, and Ellen Forney. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian. New York: Little, Brown and Co, 2009. Print. ISBN 978-0-316-01368-0; Hardcover; $20.00. Annotation: Junior leaves the reservation to attend the all-white high school 20 miles down the road. Will he survive tragedy and illness to get the girl and graduate? Book Talk: Junior is a nerdy, sickly, reading and drawing obsessed Spokane Native who leaves his friends and family behind on the reservation to attend a racist all-white high school in the next town. Despite meeting the girl of his dreams, Penelope, and making new friends, like Gordy, tragedy strikes and one horrible thing after another happens, until Junior isn't sure if he can go on. Does being Native destine him to a life of drunken poverty, unhappiness and early death? He says, "I used to think the world was broken down by tribes...By black and white. By Indian and white. But I know that isn't true. The world is only broken into two tribes: The people who are assholes and the people who are not." Read The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian to discover if Junior is willing to change everything in order to change his life. When given the choice, which tribe will he choose? Available in paperback, hardcover, eBook and audio CD. Awards: 2007 National Book Award for Young People's Literature 2008Boston Globe-Horn Book Award, Fiction and Poetry 2009Odyssey Awardas the year's "bestaudiobookfor children or young adults" 2010California Young Reader Medal, Young Adult Book
Murakami, Haruki. Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage. Trans. Philip Gabriel. Toronto: Bond Street Books, 2014. Print. ISBN 978-0-385-68183-4; Hardcover; $29.95. Annotation: Tsukuru's friends are all named after colors, but he is bland and colorless. When his friends dump him unexpectedly with no explanation, Tsukuru sets out on a journey to discover why. Book Talk: Where does the line blur between dreams and reality? Can we revisit the past and change our interpretation of events in order to create a new future? Or does fate have us locked into a destiny that will find us no matter which choices we make? Haruki Murakami forces us to ask all these questions and more in his new novel that follows the travels of Tsukuru Tazaki as he tries to solve a mystery from his past. In high school Tsukuru was part of a close-knit group of friends who all had colorful nicknames based on their surnames: Mr. Blue, Mr. Red, Ms. White, and Ms. Black. The only one who didn't get a special name was Tsukuru, whose last name simply means "one who builds". He felt this was fitting since he had always seen himself as rather colorless, quiet and bland, and was just happy to be an empty vessel the group could rest their vibrancy within. So one day, in his sophomore year of college he is thrown into the depths of despondency and depression after having the following phone conversation with one of his best friends, Ao: "I'm sorry, but I have to ask you not to call any of us anymore," Ao said abruptly and without preface. No "Hey!" or "How've you been?" or "It's been a while." I'm sorry was his only concession to social niceties. Tsukuru took a breath, and silently repeated Ao's words, quickly assessing them. He tried to read the emotions behind them, but the words were like the formal recitation of an announcement. There had been no room for feelings... ..."But if possible, I do want to know the reason for this," Tsukuru said. "That's not something I can tell you," Ao replied. "Then who can?" A thick stone wall rose. There was silence on the other end. Tsukuru could faintly hear Ao breathing through his nostrils. He pictured Ao's flat, fleshy nose. "Think about it, and you'll figure it out," Ao said, finally. Join Tsukuru on his adventure to chase down the answer to why his best friends abandoned him all those years ago, and whether or not the fault lines of memory can be mended.
Available in paperback, hardcover, ebook, digital audio book, and audio CD.
Myers, Walter D, and Christopher A. Myers. Monster. New York: HarperCollins, 1999. Print. ISBN 9780060280789; Hardcover; $15.89. Annotation: Steve is in prison awaiting trail for murder and his own lawyer isn't sure if he's innocent. Book Talk: 16 year old Steve Harmon has landed in prison and is awaiting trial for felony murder in a robbery gone wrong. In order to deal with life behind bars and what awaits him before a State Prosecutor who refers to him as a "monster" Steven writes in a journal and creates a screenplay of his experience. Check out this notebook entry: "They take away your shoelaces and your belt so you can't kill yourself no matter how bad it is. I guess making you live is part of the punishment." Read Walter Dean Myers award-winning book tofind out whether Steve is destined to spend the rest of his life behind bars, whether his lawyer truly believes he is innocent, and whether he can figure out for himself whether or not he's a monster.
Available in paperback, hardcover and on audio CD. Awards: Winner of the Michael L. Printz Award 2000 Nominated for the National Book Award 1999 Coretta Scott King Award Honor Book 2000 Nominated for the Edgar Award 2000
Moyes, Jojo. Me Before You. New York, N.Y: Pamela Dorman Books/Viking, 2012. Print. 978-0-14-312454-2; Paperback; $16.00. Annotation: Louisa Clark loses her job and is forced to confront her small town life and small time ambitions when she begins looking after a gorgeous young man with a paralyzed body and a terrible secret.
Book Talk:
Louisa Clark
was a spunky, adventuresome adolescent until the unspeakable happened seven
years ago and now she lives a quiet life in a tiny town shuffling to and from
work, seeing her boyfriend Patrick and squabbling with her sister under her
parents’ roof. When she is laid off from
her coffee girl job and faced with the big unknown she discovers a surprising
ally in her cantankerous, bullying, and devastatingly gorgeous new boss, Will. Will Traynor has also come up against his own
unspeakable tragedy, an accident which has left him wheelchair-bound and mostly
paralyzed.
Here’s an
example of their dialogue when Will and Louisa attend a fancy marriage of Will’s
former girlfriend. She’s been feeding
him and helping him at the reception:
“You know, you would never have let those breasts
so close to me if I weren’t in a wheelchair,’ he murmured. I looked back at
him steadily. ‘You would never have looked at my breasts if you hadn’t been in
a wheelchair.’ ‘What? Of course I
would.’ ‘Nope. You would
have been far too busy looking at the tall blonde girls with the endless legs
and the big hair, the ones who can smell an expense account at forty paces. And
anyway, I wouldn’t have been here. I would have been serving the drinks over there.
One of the invisibles.’ He blinked. ‘Well? I’m right,
aren’t I?’ Will glanced over
at the bar, then back at me. ‘Yes. But in my defense, Clark, I was an arse.”
As Louisa
begins to uncover the sensitive, endearing personality Will is trying so hard
to mask, she also learns of a Will’s plan to take control back over his own
life – at any cost. Read this intriguing
tale to find out if Louisa and Will can learn to live with their own personal
tragedies and help each other along the way.
Available in ebook, hardcover, paperback, audio CD, and audio download. It is also being made into a movie!
Hartman, Rachel. Seraphina. New York: Random House, 2012. Print. ISBN 978-0-385-66839-2; Hardcover; $21.00. Annotation: Seraphina is half-dragon, half-human in a world where that is forbidden and a handsome young prince is about to find out. Book Talk:
Would you tell the truth for love? Seraphina is a young woman with a terrible
secret: she’s a half-breed, with a dragon mother and human father, a musical
gift and the ability to locate and communicate with other half-breeds in her
mind. Phina lives in a kingdom with an
unstable peace treaty between the emotional, impulsive humans and the calculating,
rational dragons who assume human form to become scholars and noblemen. Even though everyone is supposed to get
along, dragons and humans rarely trust each other and interspecies marriage is
strictly forbidden. After a member of
the royal family is murdered shy, introverted Seraphina gets swept up into an
investigation that leads her to falling in love with the princess’s finance,
the handsome and perceptive Lucian Kiggs.
In order to save the Royal family and her beloved uncle, Seraphina has
to reveal her special talents and the scales she hides under layers of
clothing, but will Lucian ever see her the same way? Would you tell the truth for love?
Here's a great video of Rachel Hartman talking about how her dragons have sensory processing issues, like her son:
Seraphina is available in ebook, hardcover, paperback, and audio CD.
Awards:
Winner of the 2013 YALSA Morris Award for Best YA Debut Novel Finalist for the 2012 Governor General’s Literary Award (Canada) Short-listed for the Kitschies’ Golden Tentacle Award (UK) Long-listed for the Carnegie Medal (UK)
