STACKED

books

Taking Contemporary YA to Book Riot, too

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I’m over at Book Riot today with the second post in my “Beyond the Bestsellers” monthly series. This month, I decided it was time to talk about Sarah Dessen. Who should you read or recommend to readers who love Dessen’s books? I’ve got three authors to suggest, along reasons why they make for great fits for Dessen fans.

I may have also talked a bit about how much I think Dessen is underappreciated as a force in YA. But just a little bit. It seemed only natural to tie this back to contemporary week.

Go. Read. Enjoy!

“Beyond the Bestsellers” at Book Riot

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I get annoyed when big sites do posts about YA Lit — particularly as it pertains to getting adults into reading it — and I’ve talked regularly about how often, the suggestions given don’t try too hard. They’re usually titles pulled from the bestsellers list or from any number of “best of” and awards lists.  Good for those who haven’t stepped foot in a bookstore or opened anything that features advertising, but probably less useful for those who actually want to read more widely within YA lit. And, of course, then the question that comes up is “what next?” Often, those sources don’t offer an answer to that, and if they do, it’s not based on what it is a reader really dug in the books they read.

So rather than continue to complain about this, I decided I’m going to try to do something about it. Every month, I’m going to write a piece over at Book Riot called “Beyond the Bestsellers,” and it’ll feature a book, a series, or an author, an explanation for why readers like it, and then offer up three next reads and why those books may appeal to fans of the given work.

You can check out the inaugural piece today, which is about what to read about polishing off Veronica Roth’s Divergent series (or what to read while waiting for Allegiant).

Banned Books at Book Riot

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I’ve got a post over at Book Riot today and wanted to link it over here and add a little bit more commentary. I’m talking about all of the challenges and book bannings that have happened over the last month.

I wanted to talk about this for a couple of reasons. First, I hate the idea that we celebrate banned books. I think it’s terrible we celebrate the banned books aspect, rather than celebrate the other angle to it, which is intellectual freedom. We need to celebrate the freedom to choose, rather than the items that become representative of what happens when that right is taken from us.

Second, I think it is important to consider how much attention the recent invitation-revoking and removal of Eleanor & Park from Anoka County has received — and where it’s come from. The impassioned pleas people have written in defense of the book and the author’s visit aren’t coming from within the book community. They aren’t coming from the library world or the publishing world. They’re coming from the main stream, including NPR and The Toast. I think this is incredibly important and it leaves me wondering what would happen if this sort of widespread attention could be given to the other books challenged or banned this month alone.

Note the range of books I’ve talked about, too: they all feature “outsiders.” Chew it over. Imagine what would happen if we got angry about all of this and were able to better shine light to it outside our own world, where we are well aware of this sort of thing happening. How do we keep grabbing wider attention?

All over the place at Book Riot

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It feels like cheating not to have actual content here at Stacked for a day, but it’s for good reason. I have two — yes, two — posts going up at Book Riot today. I’ll update this post as each goes up, but I promise they’re good. Maybe two of my favorite posts I’ve written in a while.

First up: some thoughts on gendering reading — in other words, calling things “books for boys” and “books for girls” and the problems of those designations.

Then, you can check out the awesome foreign covers for The Hunger Games, as tomorrow is the 5th anniversary of the book’s publication. Some of these special editions are spectacular.

Over at Book Riot

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I’ve got two posts over at Book Riot from this week and wanted to share them both here before the link roundup next week.

First . . .

I rounded up some of the coolest libraries and book stores in LEGO form. Doing the research for this one was a blast.

My other post at Book Riot was for the regular 5 Books to Watch for feature, and I got to talk about 5 books to keep an eye out for in September. And . . . maybe I mentioned more than 5. September is a busy month.

Also, in the event you want to see your to-read piles grow even higher (of course you do), make sure you read this month’s Riot Roundup of everyone’s favorite reads from August. It’s a really fabulous mix of books of all shapes and styles.