Eleven-year-old Jonas lives in an ideal world. There is no crime, no hate, and no fear. But it is not until Jonas turns 12 and begins working with the Giver that he learns there are things like love, color, sunshine, and music that are also missing from this “ideal” world. As the new Receiver of Memory, Jonas begins to receive all the secret memories of the less-than-perfect past world that the Giver has to give him. With each new memory, both good and bad, Jonas begins to question the world he has been brought up in. There is no suffering, but there is also no joy, no choice, no individuality, and no privacy. Can Jonas continue living in this “ideal” world when he knows the truth about what he’s missing? Can he keep his secret memories locked away inside himself until he grows old and it’s finally his turn to be The Giver?
Set in a future world, The Giver examines the high cost of living in a conflict-free world of perfect order and sameness, where every step in life from birth to death is carefully controlled. A powerful story that combines science fiction and fantasy with history and real life, this book is recommended for young adults of all ages in public and school libraries.
Read more about Lois Lowry on her website or her blog. The Giver is currently being made into a movie, which is scheduled to release in 2013, so be sure to watch out for that.
Watch a short interview with Lowry below:
A quote from the book:
“The worst part of holding the memories is not the pain. It's the loneliness of it. Memories need to be shared.”
― Lois Lowry, The Giver
Read the sequels to The Giver to find out what happens Jonas, his family, friends, and the world they live in.
What could a 300-year-old vampire and a 16-year-old girl possibly have in common? When Zoe meets Simon one night in the park, she is drawn to him in a way that she doesn’t understand or trust. But everything changes when she learns that they share the same sadness—the deaths of their mothers. Zoe’s mother is dying of cancer, and Simon’s mother was brutally murdered. As the two grow closer over their shared grief, Zoe learns that Simon has been hunting his mother’s killer for the past 300 years trying to avenge her death. Will Zoe risk her life to help Simon seek his revenge? Is their bond strong enough to defeat such a deadly, dangerous killer?
This book combines fantasy with realistic themes of death, grief, revenge, romance, and friendship as Zoe and Simon deal with the deaths of their mothers and attempt to bring a murderer to justice. Recommended for young adults of all ages in a public or school library setting.
Read an interview with Annette Curtis Klause to find out more about her and her inspiration for writing The Silver Kiss as well as her other books.
Watch a book trailer for The Silver Kiss below:
If you liked The Silver Kiss, you might also like Klause's third book, Blood and Chocolate, about a werewolf woman who falls in love with a human man and must choose between her pack and her love. It was made into a movie in 2007. You can watch the trailer here.
Klause, Annette Curtis. The Silver Kiss. New York: Delacorte Press, 1990. Print.
978-0375857829; Paperback; $9.00; 198 pages
Also available in hardback, ebook, and audiobook formats.
Sage was perfect—she was everything Logan ever wanted in a girlfriend. But when Logan finds out the secret she’s been keeping from him he realizes that she’s not perfect, but she’s Almost Perfect.
When Logan’s girlfriend cheats on him Senior year, he thinks he’ll never get over the heartbreak. Then one day he meets Sage, the new girl in town, who is unlike anyone he’s ever known. Smart, confident, funny, and beautiful, Sage helps Logan move on from his ex and enjoy life again. As they grow closer, Logan begins to challenge Sage’s “just friends” rule until one night they finally kiss and Sage reveals the secret she’s been keeping from him: she’s a girl trapped in a boy’s body. Enraged and disgusted, Logan lashes out at Sage, but over time he begins to realize that she’s still his best friend and the girl that he’s grown to love. As Sage struggles to find her place in the world and with Logan, Logan struggles to understand his feelings for Sage and to accept her for being Almost Perfect.
Set in small town America, this story provides a closer look at what it’s like living as a transgender person in today’s society and the impact on families and friends. It also explores the societal norms and prejudices that can make it a difficult, even dangerous place for transgender people to live. Almost Perfect is a powerful, moving story about acceptance, love, and having the courage to be exactly who you are. Due to some sexual content and violence, this book is recommended for older young adults in a public or school library setting.
Find out more about Brian Katcher, Almost Perfect, and his other books on his website, or friend him on Facebook. You can also read an interview with Brian Katcher to find out what got him started writing, his inspiration for Almost Perfect, and other projects he's working on.
Katcher is also the author of the award-winning book, Playing With Matches. Watch a book trailer for Playing With Matches below:
To learn more about what it's like growing up as a transgender child, watch the Dateline interview below where Josie and her parents tell their story:
What would you do if something you wrote caused people to
die? When Valerie’s boyfriend, Nick, begins shooting fellow classmates
at their high school cafeteria, Valerie jumps into the line of fire to
try to stop him. She wakes up in the hospital to learn that not only is
Nick dead, but he used her Hate List to choose his victims. Valerie
wrote the Hate List after years of being bullied and humiliated at
school, never imagining that Nick would one day seek revenge on their
bullies. Now, with seven people dead and countless others wounded,
Valerie must face her role in the shooting and try to begin her life
again. As she struggles for acceptance and forgiveness, Valerie learns
that the road to recovery is never easy. Can Valerie learn to forgive
herself and her bullies? Will people ever see her as anything but the
author of the Hate List?
Set in modern America, this book examines the impacts of bullying on the lives of students, teachers, parents, and the community as everyone struggles to understand how and why this tragedy happened. Told from the point-of-view of the shooter’s girlfriend, we begin to see how years of bullying take their toll, how no one is completely innocent or guilty, and how forgiveness is the only way to finally heal. This book is highly recommended for young adults in a school or public library setting.
Learn more about Jennifer Brown and her other books on her website.
Watch the book trailer for Hate List below:
A quote from the book:
“I don’t know if it’s possible to take hate away from people. Not even
people like us, who’ve seen firsthand what hate can do. We’re all
hurting. We’re all going to be hurting for a long time. And we, probably
more than anyone else out there, will be searching for a new reality
every day. A better one.”
―Jennifer Brown,
Hate List
Brown, Jennifer. Hate List. New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2009. Print.
9780316041447; Hardback; $17.00; 408 pages
Fun Home is the autobiography of
Alison Bechdel, from birth to young adulthood, in the 1960’s and ‘70’s. Told in a graphic novel format, Bechdel
examines her relationship with her parents and the events that shaped herself
and her family. Her father, a high
school English teacher and funeral home director, is a cold, often angry man
who is obsessed with perfectly restoring the family’s Victorian mansion home. Her mother, a talented pianist and local actress,
closes herself off from her family in order to cope with her unhappy
marriage. When Bechdel realizes in
college that she is a lesbian, she comes out to her parents and they begin to
tell her some difficult facts about her father. She learns that
her father is a closeted gay man who has had affairs with men throughout
his marriage. She also learns that he has had affairs with some of the teenage boys he teaches at the high school. While Bechdel is still dealing with the emotional impact of her own coming out and her father's painful secrets, her father is
killed in an apparent suicide. Bechdel is left to cope with the emotional fallout of her father’s life and
death, and to try to understand her father, her family, and herself with these new truths.
This book is recommended for older,
mature young adults in a public or school library. The book contains some very dark subject
matter and a few sexually-explicit images that are not appropriate for younger,
more immature young adults. This book is
well-written and entertaining, and the graphic novel format helps to further
engage the reader in the story. The author
expertly weaves her story with some of the great classics of literature, encouraging
a new generation of readers to discover these books for themselves. At times funny and sad, the book navigates
the issues of family, childhood, coming of age, and self-discovery with
honesty, humor, and insight.
Learn more about Alison Bechdel on her website or by following her blog. If you liked Fun Home, you might also like her comic strip, Dykes to Watch Out For.
Watch Bechdel discuss the process of writing and illustrating Fun Home:
Bechdel, Alison. Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2006. Print. 978-0618477944; Hardback; $20.00; 232 pages
Tessa Gray is a 16-year-old girl living a normal life with her aunt in
New York City. When her aunt dies suddenly, she sails to Victorian
London to live with her brother. However, upon arriving in England her
brother is nowhere to be found and she is instead met by the Dark
sisters. The sisters kidnap Tessa and force her to learn to use a
magical power she never knew she possessed—the ability to shape-shift.
Upon learning that she is being groomed by the sisters to marry a
mysterious stranger called the Magister, Tessa runs away from the Dark
sisters with the help of a handsome Shadowhunter named Will. Will takes
Tessa to the sanctuary of the Shadowhunters, where she meets other
Shadowhunters and begins to learn about the Downworld of vampires,
demons, and warlocks, and the half-angel Shadowhunters who fight them.
In exchange for helping her find her missing brother, Tessa agrees to
use her ability to help the Shadowhunters find the Magister and solve
the mystery of the clockwork automatons that are being built with
murdered human parts. As Tessa struggles to understand her unique power
and her place in this new world, she also struggles with her feelings
for the charming, volatile Will and his best friend, the tender, quiet
James.
This book is highly recommended for young adults in a
public or school library. As the first book in the Infernal Devices
series (and a prequel to the wildly popular Mortal Instruments series), readers will be drawn into the dark, deadly Downworld of the
Shadowhunters and will be eager for the next series installments. Clare
blends science fiction, fantasy, mystery, steampunk, and romance to create a story
that appeals to fans of multiple genres. The rich history and
characters of this new world, and the continuing mysteries at the end of
the book, will entice readers to the second book, Clockwork Prince, and
keep them waiting for the third book, Clockwork Princess (scheduled to
release in March 2013).
Learn More
Watch the official book trailer for Clockwork Angel:
You can learn more about the world of the Shadowhunters on Cassandra Clare's website, blog, or Flickr page. You can also connect with Cassandra on Facebook or follow her on Twitter.
Book 2: Clockwork Prince
Clockwork Prince, the second book of the Infernal Devices series, was released in December 2011. Watch the official book trailer below to learn more about this book:
Book 3: Clockwork Princess
Clockwork Princess, the third book of the Infernal Devices series, is scheduled to release in March 2013. View the countdown to its release below:
Clare, Cassandra. Clockwork Angel. New York: Margaret K. McElderry Books, 2010. Print.
978-1416975861; Hardback; $12.00; 479 pages
Also available in paperback, audiobook, and ebook formats.
Weetzie Bat is an eccentric high schooler with a bleached blonde
flattop and punk style living in Los Angeles in the 1980's. She
befriends a fellow eccentric named Dirk, a high schooler with James
Dean-style good looks, and together the two of them search for true
love. Dirk finds his true love in Duck, a blonde surfer boy, while
Weetzie Bat finds her true love in My Secret Agent Lover Man, a movie
producer who casts her in his movies. The four friends move in together
and soon raise a family together when they have their daughters Cherokee
and Witch Baby. The family supports each other as they deal with
death, divorce, infidelity, AIDS, and everything else that comes with
living in modern American society. Though unconventional, the
characters create a family bond that carries them through good times and
bad and teaches them about true happiness.
Part fantasy,
part drama, and part comedy, this book is recommended for young adults
and adults alike and is appropriate for a public or school library
collection. Block's unique writing style creates a vivid picture of
L.A. in the 1980's and tells a compelling story with minimal use of
words. Her characters struggle to find "happily ever after" while
dealing with the darker issues that come as they transition out of high
school and into adulthood. As a reader, you are drawn into Weetzie
Bat's eccentric world and come to see the beauty in a family that
accepts differences, values uniqueness, and is willing to create their
own version of happily ever after.
