Oh, goodness, where to start? Is there any “good” day for voodoo revenge on a mean teacher who failed you just because he doesn’t like you? Or any good day to travel through the slums and get car jacked trying to undo a too-effective revenge spell? Over the top, hilarious and more than a little […]
Category: YA books
Enclave by Ann Aguirre
August 28, 2013Enclave starts on the naming day of Deuce, a young woman who has been training her whole life to be a Huntress, a protector and food gatherer for her clan which lives in an underground enclave. The tunnels mean a hard life, snaring what food can be caught, scavenging what remainders of society can be […]
Fallout by Ellen Hopkins
August 26, 2013In Fallout, the third book in the series that started with Crank, centered on meth addict Kristina Snow, Hopkins moves on to show the effect Kristina’s selfish ways still have on her children, and covers a wide spectrum of emotional and psychological problems. Fallout is told through three narrators: Hunter, Kristina’s first child, born of […]
Glass by Ellen Hopkins
August 21, 2013Glass is the direct follow up to Crank. Glass continues the story of Kristina Snow after she’s had her baby, and kicked meth and nicotine, shortly before her eighteenth birthday. It follows her relapse in her struggle with the meth monster and goes farther than Crank imagined. Sharp and painful, Glass is hard to read. […]
My So-Called Death by Stacey Jay
August 19, 2013Karen tragically died from a major fall from the top of the cheerleading pyramid. Even more tragically, she has discovered that she is a genetic zombie and now has to live out the rest of her days slurping down animal brains and fearing maggot infestations. She’s even transferred to DEAD high, where supposedly she’ll learn […]
The Blue Mirror by Kathe Koja
August 14, 2013Maggie flees to The Blue Mirror, a café that serves as her sacred space, nightly to escape her drunk, depressed mother. There she nurses a drink and spends most of her time drawing the things and people around her, translating them into her own world, which shares a name with her café hide out. It’s […]
Beautiful Dead: Jonas by Eden Maguire
August 12, 2013Darina thinks she’s going crazy. She’s seeing her dead boyfriend everywhere and having visions of beating wings and death’s head masks. If she’s off, though, the whole town is too. Four teens have died suspiciously in the past year, and the most recent was her boyfriend, Phoenix, who was stabbed during a fight. While the […]
I Was a Teenage Fairy by Francesca Lia Block
August 5, 2013Block is one of my favorites for off beat but surprisingly soulful tales. I had a pretty good idea what I was getting into in this one before I even noticed the handwritten notes about the book someone so kindly left on the inside cover. Barbie is the daughter of a former beauty queen who […]
Crank by Ellen Hopkins
August 2, 2013Crank is Ellen Hopkins’ controversial, and sorely needed, verse novel. Kristina Snow’s life changes forever when her father and the boy she’s crushing introduce her to meth. Unlike Impulse, which is raw and shredding in its emotion, Crank is almost cold at times, brutally showing a girl on the edge of being a woman, who […]
Review: Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson
July 13, 2013Many times in Wintergirls, the main character mentions feeling like a puppet whose strings are being pulled, which in turn is a fitting description for the feel of this book. Wintergirls is the story of Lia, who suffers from anorexia, depression, and a family who sees her as nothing but a burden. Her best friend […]