Hardcover to Paperback Makeovers: 7 YA Cover Changes to Consider

January 10, 2022 |

I love looking at the changes in cover designs between a hardcover YA book and its paperback edition. What compelled the publisher to make a change? Who does the book seek to reach now? I love to think about whether the book is now angled more (or less!) toward a teen readership. In some cases, the change is a real upgrade, while in others, it’s not. In yet other cases, the change in design leaves a big ole question mark.

For all that’s said about not judging a book by its cover, it’s actually a pretty powerful skill to have. You’re looking at so many elements to convey what a story is about, who it’s written for, and what books it might be similar to in order to have it reach potential readers. It’s art, after all, and considering the power of art to depict a story is not being superficial.

Authors have little to no say in their cover art, which makes the entire process more complex. How the story is marketed, its first impression to readers in stores and online, is pretty much out of their hands. And given how more and more marketing of books is online and less in-store, it’s no surprise design has taken into consideration how a cover will look when the size of a thumbnail.

Interestingly, there have been more cover redesigns in the last few months than in recent memory, and it’s hard not to wonder if slower mid-list sales of YA books because of the pandemic are causing panic for publishers, leading to trying to give a book a facelift in hopes of reaching audiences who may have literally missed it amidst a global upheaval.

Find below seven YA books that are getting new designs in paperback. Original hardcover designs are on the left, while the new paperback editions are on the right. I’d love to know which you prefer and why.

Descriptions of the books come from Amazon. Note that I have not indicated the cover designers or artists on any of these covers, as I’m not attempting to critique their work; often, they don’t have the final say, meaning that some of the choices I may highlight could have been out of their hands entirely.

New YA Paperback Book Cover Redesigns for Early 2022

A Taste for Love by Jennifer Yen

This cover redesign is one of my favorites because as much as I’m not really a fan of illustrated covers — they all sort of blend together for me — the change for A Taste for Love is far more accurate to what the book is about. The hardcover made me think about this being a cute dating-themed rom-com, but that’s not really the crux of the book. That’s there, but it’s a book about a teen baking contest, and the inevitable couple is in competition with one another. None of that is really present in the hardcover; it’s more apparent in the paperback, even though it, too, only conveys so much.

One of the things that I don’t like about the cover change, though, is that while we know the main characters are Asian, the use of a photo on the original cover featuring two Asian teens offers a clearer face for representation. There are so few Asian cover models, and that doesn’t translate as easily or neatly onto this paperback.

The font choice isn’t the same, but they are quite similar on both editions of the book. I love the use of multiple colors on the hardback, though the spacing between the title and the models left space that was filled with a tag line: “Can these star bakers win each other’s hearts.” That, I suppose, gets to the idea of a bake off, but it doesn’t connect with the image itself. The paperback ditches the tag line, and instead, fills the background space with an ombre color palate, along with images associated with baking.

I like both of these designs for different reasons, but I think the paperback gets the book a little better and sells it to readers in a more accurate way. The paperback for A Taste for Love hits shelves January 11.

Description:

To her friends, high school senior Liza Yang is nearly perfect. Smart, kind, and pretty, she dreams big and never shies away from a challenge. But to her mom, Liza is anything but. Compared to her older sister Jeannie, Liza is stubborn, rebellious, and worst of all, determined to push back against all of Mrs. Yang’s traditional values, especially when it comes to dating.

The one thing mother and daughter do agree on is their love of baking. Mrs. Yang is the owner of Houston’s popular Yin & Yang Bakery. With college just around the corner, Liza agrees to help out at the bakery’s annual junior competition to prove to her mom that she’s more than her rebellious tendencies once and for all. But when Liza arrives on the first day of the bake-off, she realizes there’s a catch: all of the contestants are young Asian American men her mother has handpicked for Liza to date.

The bachelorette situation Liza has found herself in is made even worse when she happens to be grudgingly attracted to one of the contestants:the stoic, impenetrable, annoyingly hot James Wong. As she battles against her feelings for James, and for her mother’s approval, Liza begins to realize there’s no tried and true recipe for love.

As Far As You’ll Take Me by Phil Stamper

Sometimes in looking at cover redesigns, your thoughts change. Initially, I was really confused by the change for As Far As You’ll Take Me, as the cover seemed to nail the idea of starting over, of having that fresh start, of being able to lean fully into who you are as a person. The character has an expression of hope, paired with a stance that seems like he’s eager to move onward.

But the paperback captures something that the hardcover doesn’t: the loneliness of starting over and the truth of what happens inside when everything on the outside might tell a different story. This is the crux of the book itself, and the singular boy in blue amid a crowd of similarly-colored characters on the paperback just gets that feeling.

What doesn’t work for me on the paperback, though, is the shoving of a blurb in an awkward space and in such a way that it actually crowds out the character at the center. The shadow is covered by the blurb-giver’s name, as are some of the words in the blurb itself. Maybe it’s a way of compensating for the light source being inconsistent? If you look, you’ll see the shadow falls behind the boy at the center, but other shadows of the characters around him fall in all different directions. If the blurb were gone, that might be more obvious, but also, if the blurb were gone, the feeling of this cover would be much stronger.

The font choices aren’t especially worth commenting on, as both are ones that have been used numerous times on YA book covers. The paperback font fits the feel, and the same goes for the choice on the hardcover. In both, the author’s name gets a little lost.

Both of these are decent covers, though I lean a little toward the paperback — with the caveat that the blurb placement is distracting and does a disservice to the art itself (yes, even with the shadow inconsistency).

As Far As You’ll Take Me hits shelves in paperback on March 29.

Description:

Marty arrives in London with nothing but his oboe and some savings from his summer job, but he’s excited to start his new life–where he’s no longer the closeted, shy kid who slips under the radar and is free to explore his sexuality without his parents’ disapproval.

From the outside, Marty’s life looks like a perfect fantasy: in the span of a few weeks, he’s made new friends, he’s getting closer with his first ever boyfriend, and he’s even traveling around Europe. But Marty knows he can’t keep up the facade. He hasn’t spoken to his parents since he arrived, he’s tearing through his meager savings, his homesickness and anxiety are getting worse and worse, and he hasn’t even come close to landing the job of his dreams. Will Marty be able to find a place that feels like home?

Blood Moon by Lucy Cuthew

I could not be sadder that Lucy Cuthew’s Blood Moon is getting a paperback makeover. The original cover is absolutely riveting and boundary pushing — this is a book about menstruation, and the design, which is a creek of menstrual blood and a hand gently opening the representation of a vagina, is incredible (as is that small string of a tampon). It’s a bold cover, too, with use of only white, red, and black, and that tiny trail of blue. The title placement is awesome, and even though I’m not a fan of a blurb, the placement doesn’t distract from the brilliant image on the cover.

The paperback is….really inoffensive. And that’s not necessarily a compliment so much as being surprised how toned down it is. The title bond is fine, but the multiple red hues of the moons don’t have the same sharpness that the red on the hardcover does. The shadow girls walking together hand-in-hand has real Moxie vibes, which isn’t necessarily bad but is also not really special.

And the thing that annoys me most on the paperback? The hashtag t-shirts that make no sense. Why are they broken up? A hashtag is a single line, but one meant to be separated out like they are here: #Its Only Blood and #No Shame. Ditch the hash tags and keep the slogans if that’s essential. The paperback ditches the blurb but adds a tagline, which reads “An unexpected period sent Frankie’s universe spinning, and then she took a stand.”

I get what the goal is of the paperback, but it’s a real downer after the hardcover and more, the hashtag thing is going to read as adults trying too hard to any teen.

This one’s all about the hardcover for me, but you can grab the paperback of Blood Moon on March 15.

Description:

After school one day, Frankie, a lover of physics and astronomy, has her first sexual experience with quiet and gorgeous Benjamin—and gets her period. It’s only blood, they agree. But soon a gruesome meme goes viral, turning an intimate, affectionate afternoon into something sordid, mortifying, and damaging. In the time it takes to swipe a screen, Frankie’s universe implodes. Who can she trust? Not Harriet, her suddenly cruel best friend, and certainly not Benjamin, the only one who knows about the incident. As the online shaming takes on a horrifying life of its own, Frankie begins to wonder: is her real life over?

Instructions for Dancing by Nicola Yoon

Off the bat, I want to say both of these covers are gorgeous and do a great job capturing the feel of the book. That said, I think my preference for the hardcover comes only because it’s a preference, not because of any design choices that don’t make sense or don’t feel like they offer insight into the book itself.

Both the hardcover and paperback have a gorgeous Black girl with tremendous hair, as well as a beautiful Black boy with stunning hair, and it’s clear on both dancing and love are at the heart of the story. The hardcover makes their facial expressions harder to read, but the shape of their bodies tells a story. The paperback turns closer to their facial expressions, which are serious, thoughtful, and also portray that they are digging each other.

The font choice for the book title on the hardcover is a little sweeter and more dance-y for me, where the one on the paperback feels understated.It doesn’t have the same flair or feel, and it doesn’t make use of script as part of the couple’s image (which I love on the hardcover). The color of the hardcover pops more, as does the use of pink flowers in the background. Both covers make use of a blurb, but in both cases, it’s pretty understated. Yoon’s name is much larger, as it should be, since she’s a well-established and beloved author.

The covers are both good, but I prefer the original. It just feels a lot swoonier than the paperback, which reads more intense (neither read is incorrect!). The paperback for Instructions for Dancing hits shelves May 3.

Description:

Evie Thomas doesn’t believe in love anymore. Especially after the strangest thing occurs one otherwise ordinary afternoon: She witnesses a couple kiss and is overcome with a vision of how their romance began . . . and how it will end. After all, even the greatest love stories end with a broken heart, eventually.

As Evie tries to understand why this is happening, she finds herself at La Brea Dance Studio, learning to waltz, fox-trot, and tango with a boy named X. X is everything that Evie is not: adventurous, passionate, daring. His philosophy is to say yes to everything–including entering a ballroom dance competition with a girl he’s only just met.

Falling for X is definitely not what Evie had in mind. If her visions of heartbreak have taught her anything, it’s that no one escapes love unscathed. But as she and X dance around and toward each other, Evie is forced to question all she thought she knew about life and love. In the end, is love worth the risk?

The Electric Kingdom by David Arnold

Aren’t both of these covers just stunning? They offer something really compelling visually, begging the reader to pause and take it all in. There’s a lot of layering and a thoughtful use of color on both. The hardcover gives us a disappearance of color through the hole at the center, while the paperback spotlights color in its use of font, as well as the image inside the helmet’s visual area. It’s clever, the way we go from color outside to color inside between the two.

It’s also clever that the girl with her blonde hair, red backpack, and black dog are on both covers.

But that paperback cover is a stunner. It definitely reads more adult to me than the hardcover does, likely because it’s reminiscent of a couple of other space-set books (The Martian and In The Quick come to mind). Though I’m a little distracted by the lack of consistency for the title font size — there’s no reason for the words Electric and Kingdom to be so disparate in size), it’s a much better font that the original, which does the same thing with size and also adds a strange element with the “o” in Kingdom, not seen in the O in Arnold’s name. The font size difference on the hardcover makes sense with the space needs but less so on the paperback.

That said, the color and composition of the paperback packs a punch. I wasn’t especially interested in the book with the original cover, but the new one makes me want to pick it up as soon as I can. I may need to wait, given it’s a book about a pandemic.

You can grab the paperback of The Electric Kingdom on February 1.

Description:

When a deadly Fly Flu sweeps the globe, it leaves a shell of the world that once was. Among the survivors are eighteen-year-old Nico and her dog, on a voyage devised by Nico’s father to find a mythical portal; a young artist named Kit, raised in an old abandoned cinema; and the enigmatic Deliverer, who lives Life after Life in an attempt to put the world back together. As swarms of infected Flies roam the earth, these few survivors navigate the woods of post-apocalyptic New England, meeting others along the way, each on their own quest to find life and love in a world gone dark. The Electric Kingdom is a sweeping exploration of art, storytelling, eternal life, and above all, a testament to the notion that even in an exterminated world, one person might find beauty in another.

The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

I’m not going to spend too long with this cover redesign, other than to say it’s not great. I don’t understand the Cruella Deville look going on with the paperback, nor its use of electric, disjointed color tones. This is a loose retelling of a number of Edgar Allan Poe’s short stories, meaning that the book is dark, creepy, suspenseful, and a little weird. The hardcover nails this, while also offering a design that is timeless: it’s font-driven, and we know the shadow animal on the cover has something to do with the story (it does — it represents a zoo). The paperback makes its nod to Poe with the bricks in the background, but those are a little challenging to figure out if you don’t read the description or immediately know this is a Poe-inspired book. It definitely doesn’t read well on screens.

Both covers have a blurb, but in the tradition of newer YA paperback styles, the blurb on the new cover is tucked beneath the cover itself on a separate page. The green on it mirrors the green on the cover, whereas the blurb is integrated on the cover itself in the original.

I don’t like the paperback at all and think it’s a tremendous turnoff. It might be the thing that captures some readers, especially intrigued by the weird image of the person on it and its disjointed nature, but for me, that disjointedness makes me want to pass. The hardcover made me eager to see how they would treat the book’s sequel. The paperback’s design aesthetic is what carried over into the upcoming sequel, though.

You can pick up the paperback of The Initial Insult now. It came out January 4.

Description:

Tress Montor’s family used to mean something—until she didn’t have a family anymore. When her parents disappeared seven years ago while driving her best friend home, Tress lost everything. The entire town shuns her now that she lives with her drunken, one-eyed grandfather at what locals refer to as the “White Trash Zoo.”

Felicity Turnado has it all: looks, money, and a secret. One misstep could send her tumbling from the top of the social ladder, and she’s worked hard to make everyone forget that she was with the Montors the night they disappeared. Felicity has buried what she knows so deeply that she can’t even remember what it is . . . only that she can’t look at Tress without feeling shame and guilt.

But Tress has a plan. A Halloween costume party at an abandoned house provides the ideal situation for Tress to pry the truth from Felicity—brick by brick—as she slowly seals her former best friend into a coal chute. Tress will have her answers—or settle for revenge.

Attucks! / Unbeatable by Phillip Hoose

I almost never get to showcase YA nonfiction in cover redesigns because too often, how a nonfiction title is marketed or sold isn’t given the same level of attention as a paperback. But in the case of Phillip Hoose’s last nonfiction title, this cover redesign has a lot of incredible thought behind it, while offering a lot of the same exact elements as the original cover — peep the author name color on the hardcover and how it becomes the background for the paperback.

What’s most striking is what’s most obvious and likely what inspired the decision to make the change: the book’s title. Attucks! and Unbeatable could not be any different, despite the fact they represent the same thing: the 1955 championship basketball team, the Crispus Attucks tigers, who went from their Indianapolis high school court to win a state championship basketball game during this highly racially segregated time. The team was unbeatable, marking the first time an all-Black team won a racially-open US basketball championship.

While Attucks! makes sense in the context of the book as a title, one is going to immediately make sense to anyone browsing. The original title, though, is a little more challenging. The subtitle change isn’t as huge a change, but it, too, is worth noting: we get the explanation of the book title with Attucks!, the subtitle for Unbeatable offers what’s inside the book (the how of the story).

Though the coach isn’t in the image on the paperback, the team member raising his arm up with the index finger pointing makes the exact same shape for the image as the original. Again, a really clever way to keep the original while giving it a stronger sense of teen appeal.

The paperback makeover is excellent, building from the strongest aspects of the original hardcover. The title change, while always challenging for marketing, cataloging, and reader advisory purposes, is a smart one, as it will make this book more clearly “for” the readers its intended to reach.

You can grab Unbeatable on February 22.

Description:

By winning the state high school basketball championship in 1955, ten teens from an Indianapolis school meant to be the centerpiece of racially segregated education in the state shattered the myth of their inferiority. Their brilliant coach had fashioned an unbeatable team from a group of boys born in the South and raised in poverty. Anchored by the astonishing Oscar Robertson, a future college and NBA star, the Crispus Attucks Tigers went down in history as the first state champions from Indianapolis and the first all-black team in U.S. history to win a racially open championship tournament―an integration they had forced with their on-court prowess.

From native Hoosier and award-winning author Phillip Hoose comes this true story of a team up against impossible odds, making a difference when it mattered most.

Cover Makeovers: 5 YA Book Covers With New Looks

July 19, 2021 |

Cover design is never not fascinating. For all that’s said about not judging a book by its cover, it’s actually a pretty powerful skill to have. You’re looking at so many elements to convey what a story is about, who it’s written for, and what books it might be similar to in order to have it reach potential readers. It’s art, after all, and considering the power of art to depict a story is not being superficial.

Find below five YA books that are getting new designs in paperback. I always love looking at the different choices made in the new iterations. What compelled the publisher to make a change? Who does the book seek to reach now? I love to think about whether the book is now angled more (or less!) toward a teen readership. In some cases, the change is a real upgrade, while in others, it’s not. In yet other cases, the change in design leaves a big ole question mark.

Original hardcover designs are on the left, while the new paperback editions are on the right. I’d love to know which you prefer and why. Descriptions of the books come from Amazon.

Five New YA Hardcover to Paperback Makeovers

The Companion by Kate Alender

I’ve been meaning to read this one, in part because it’s horror, in part because Kimberly raved about it, and in part because I’ve read Alender’s work before and enjoy her storytelling. The original hardcover image is so great: it’s unlike anything else out there right now, with its silver spoon collecting nails. It gives creepy and chilling vibes, and with the tagline “Lies pile up. And then they bury you” really offers a lot to the reader without saying too much. The use of pink for Alender’s name is clever, a small treat to prepare the reader for the book to come.

That said, the fact the cover is so different from what’s currently on shelves may be why the paperback has an entirely new look. It reminds me of a horror movie cover more than a book cover, and it’s a design I’ve seen many times with YA horror as well. It’s a creepy house with the silhouette of a girl and a moody sky and color palate. The lights on in the windows add to the spooky ambiance. Interestingly, the title font went from serif to san serif, which I think makes it a little more genre-friendly, and more, the tagline itself completely changed. “She thought she was finally safe. She was wrong” is a very different tell for the book than the first tagline, too. The first, perhaps, leans more thriller, while the second leans heavy into horror.

Both of the covers work, though I’m drawn more toward the original if for no reason other than its freshness. The paperback would look fabulous on a display of books featuring creepy houses, right along with Alender’s earlier The Dead Girls of Hysteria Hall.

The Companion hits shelves in paperback August 21.

The other orphans say Margot is lucky.

Lucky to survive the horrible accident that killed her family.

Lucky to have her own room because she wakes up screaming every night.

And finally, lucky to be chosen by a prestigious family to live at their remote country estate.

But it wasn’t luck that made the Suttons rescue Margot from her bleak existence at the group home. Margot was handpicked to be a companion to their silent, mysterious daughter, Agatha. At first, helping with Agatha–and getting to know her handsome younger brother–seems much better than the group home. But soon, the isolated house begins playing tricks on Margot’s mind, making her question everything she believes about the Suttons . . . and herself.

Margot’s bad dreams may have stopped when she came to live with Agatha – but the real nightmare has just begun.

Each of Us a Desert by Mark Oshiro

Having loved Oshiro’s first YA book Anger Is a Gift, I have to say the cover of Each of Us a Desert left me feeling uninterested. It didn’t tell me anything about the book any more than the title did (and it’s a great title). The tagline “Find where you belong” offers nothing, either. What is the book’s genre? What’s it about? Sure, there’s a profile in the triangle shape — is that supposed to be a sand hill or a pyramid? — but the lack of seeing an expression conveys nothing.

The paperback, on the other hand, nails it. There’s been this neat trend in YA covers, perhaps something to dig into soon, where a bigger scene plays out within the cover image. As you see with the two teens on the cover, there’s an actual desert along their backs. The tagline has been all together ditched in favor of the bigger focal point of title and image, and even though I’m still not sure what the book might be about, I’m far more compelled to pick it up. The teens have readable expressions on their faces, and the look the teen on the left is serving up makes me wonder what she has to say. I like how this copy notes Oshio is an “award winning author,” wherein on the hardcover, it simply read author.

Each of Us a Desert is more captivating in its paperback iteration. It hits shelves November 9.

From award-winning author Mark Oshiro comes a powerful coming-of-age fantasy novel about finding home and falling in love amidst the dangers of a desert where stories come to life

Xochitl is destined to wander the desert alone, speaking her troubled village’s stories into its arid winds. Her only companions are the blessed stars above and enigmatic lines of poetry magically strewn across dusty dunes.

Her one desire: to share her heart with a kindred spirit.

One night, Xo’s wish is granted―in the form of Emilia, the cold and beautiful daughter of the town’s murderous conqueror. But when the two set out on a magical journey across the desert, they find their hearts could be a match… if only they can survive the nightmare-like terrors that arise when the sun goes down.

Fresh off of Anger Is a Gift‘s smashing success, Oshiro branches out into a fantastical direction with their new YA novel, Each of Us a Desert.

How It All Blew Up by Arvin Ahmadi

The next couple of entries on this look at cover makeovers fall into the category of surely, there’s a reason for the small change but I have no idea what it might be.

Ahmadi’s How It All Blew Up begins as a red cover. The title treatment here is interesting, with “Blew Up” rendered with shadows behind each letter and at an increased size, compared to the rest of the words. We have a big blurb from Angie Thomas, as well as the words “A Novel” beneath the title. It’s a fine cover, and offers to the reader what to expect: a contemporary, coming of age story. The teen on the cover appears to be brown, further letting readers know who the lead in the story is.

The paperback, which hits shelves September 28, takes the same cover images and turns the background to yellow. The squiggles, presumably to indicate “blowing up”/stress/angst, pop a big more with the color change, and the boy has been resized to be a little bit smaller. Ahmadi’s name now lies at the bottom, in what appears to be the same font as the hardcover’s title, while the title itself changed fonts entirely. “Blew Up” is still larger than the other words, but now all of the letters have black outlines.

Perhaps most curious in the change is the disappearance of “A Novel” and the appearance of another blurb, this one from Adam Silvera. In many ways, this now feels like too much on the cover, especially as the squiggles take on more prominence and yellow itself is a bright, energetic color. There’s a lot of writing on the front cover of the book.

Neither is better nor worse, but I love thinking about the why here. What compelled design and marketing to go with yellow here? To add another blurb — one that doesn’t actually say anything about the book? To get rid of “a novel?”

Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda goes to Italy in Arvin Ahmadi’s newest incisive look at identity and what it means to find yourself by running away.

Eighteen-year-old Amir Azadi always knew coming out to his Muslim family would be messy–he just didn’t think it would end in an airport interrogation room. But when faced with a failed relationship, bullies, and blackmail, running away to Rome is his only option. Right?

Soon, late nights with new friends and dates in the Sistine Chapel start to feel like second nature… until his old life comes knocking on his door. Now, Amir has to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth to a US Customs officer, or risk losing his hard-won freedom.

At turns uplifting and devastating, How It All Blew Up is Arvin Ahmadi’s most powerful novel yet, a celebration of how life’s most painful moments can live alongside the riotous, life-changing joys of discovering who you are.

I’m Not Dying With You Tonight by Kimberly Jones and Gilly Segal

The hardcover design for I’m Not Dying With You Tonight is simple and straight forward: two girls, one Black and one white, are on opposite sides, facing in opposite directions. The title being smack in the middle draws your attention to their faces, and the mirrored title and author fonts reflect that back. It’s a nice use of patterns. The bold choices in colors works well, too. There is power in that cover, without ever once trying to say there’s power in it.

But I will say, I’m even more compelled by the paperback makeover. The elements that worked in the hardcover are made more urgent when the girls are face to face, their eyes staring right into each other, rather than into one another’s mouths. Your eye is drawn to the title, and the layering effect of the city scape behind them adds nice dimension. We know this book was a New York Times bestseller, and both Angie Thomas and Nic Stone blurbed it. I’m generally not a fan of blurbs, especially multiple ones on a cover, but in this case, those blurbs establish this title as a read alike, even if the single words (“Powerful” and “Vital”) are kind of meaningless. The lengthier blurbs on retail websites offer way more to the story itself.

The new cover reminds me of adult contemporary reads a little more than YA, but that’s a value-neutral statement. This has a wide appeal range.

My one criticism of the paperback is something that, to the untrained eye, probably isn’t noticeable: the size and spacing of each word in the title is different. It’s a small difference, meant to squeeze the title between the faces of the girls. It happens in the hardcover, too — look specifically at “Dying” — but it’s easier to see on the paperback.

Both covers are solid, but I prefer the paperback a little bit more.

I’m Not Dying With You Tonight hits shelves in paperback September 7.

Lena has her killer style, her awesome boyfriend, and a plan. She knows she’s going to make it big. Campbell, on the other hand, is just trying to keep her head down and get through the year at her new school.

When both girls attend the Friday-night football game, what neither expects is for everything to descend into sudden mass chaos. Chaos born from violence and hate. Chaos that unexpectedly throws them together.

They aren’t friends. They hardly understand the other’s point of view. But none of that matters when the city is up in flames, and they only have each other to rely on if they’re going to survive the night.

Wicked As You Wish by Rin Chupeco

One of the biggest pet peeves of readers and librarians is when a book in a series gets a new look before the series ends. This means an inconsistent look on shelves and a challenge for helping readers find a book they’re looking for and describing by color. Were a series to maintain two looks — one in hardcover and one in paperback — throughout, it might not be so irritating. But I can’t think of many cases where that’s happened.

All of that is to say the hardcover of the first book in Rin Chupeco’s “A Hundred Names for Magic” series is getting a new look in paperback. The hardcover is such a neat look: each of the letters offers some kind of insight into the story, tying it all together with the concept of magic. There’s a lot of images packed into the design, and yet, it doesn’t feel busy. I’m a huge fan of the series title and number being included, too, right below the title. The color palate here is itself magical.

And while many of these things carry over into the new paperback, particularly the colors and the series title, there’s something that feels less compelling for me. There is the teen looking over their shoulder, a universal offering to walk into the story with them, but the explosion of orange in front of the person is confusing. Perhaps because this is a digital cover and not in person, it’s hard to tell if that’s meant to be a dragon or a phoenix or other creature. At the bottom right, there’s what looks to be a ferris wheel or, perhaps, some kind of climbing plant structure. What was not busy in the hardcover turns into an overly busy visual in paperback.

I do like the font and title treatment on paperback, and I find it interesting the addition of the word “trilogy” to Chupeco’s accolade.

The paperback isn’t bad, but it’s a bit confusing and a little generic in comparison to the hardcover. I’m also curious about the change when the second book in the trilogy has yet to be announced. As of this writing, there’s no title, cover, or publication date.

Wicked As You Wish hits shelves October 1.

Once upon a time, the magical Kingdom of Avalon was left to wither and die after the Snow Queen encased it in ice. Its former citizens are now refugees. Which is why crown prince Alex and his protectors are stuck in… Arizona.

Tala Makiling has lived her life as an outsider. Her family curse, the one that’s doomed her to be a spellbreaker, someone who destroys magic, hasn’t won her too many friends. Except Alex, who trusts her and her family to keep his royal identity a secret.

And then one night, a famous creature of legend, the Firebird, appears in their tiny town, reigniting hope for their abandoned homeland. Alex and Tala team up with a ragtag group of new friends to journey back to Avalon. Their path is filled with danger―from deadly prophecies, to terrifying ice wolves, a traitor among them, and the Snow Queen herself. But if they succeed… their story would be legendary.

Note:

Because the nature of this post is to explore and discuss design, I’ve elected not to include the names of artists or designers. I went back and forth on this because crediting is important and something more people who write or talk about books need to do, especially related to covers, but ultimately, because the changes happen more often in marketing and sales than they do in design, I don’t want to draw attention to an individual who may or may not have had much say in what they produced.

YA Cover Updates: The Reissue/New Edition Looks For Favorite Reads

October 5, 2020 |

Packed into my list of cover changes to highlight in the coming months are a number of YA books which have been staples in the category for a while or are books that didn’t quite land with audiences when they were first published — as you’ll see, many of them are by and about characters of color — that are getting new looks. These reissue editions are meant to entice new readers or encourage long-time fans to step into the backlist of favorite long-time YA authors. Let’s take a look at some of these YA reissue/new editions and talk about the new looks they’re getting.

Original packaging is on the left, while the new looks are on the right.

Illegal by Bettina Restrepo’s reissue isn’t exactly brand new, but I wanted to begin with this one because the reissue hit shelves in August 2019, when culturally, discussions of immigration really ramped up. It was the perfect timing to bring this book to the attention of YA readers, as it was a debut in 2011. The new and updated look follows what we’ve seen in terms of YA cover trends — it’s illustrated, and we know immediately that the main character is a girl of color — but it doesn’t necessarily convey the same sense of longing that the original cover does. But for today’s YA readers, I suspect that paperback is extremely appealing and the tagline, “We are all immigrants,” nicely conveys the essential nature of Nora’s story.

When I was working as a teen librarian, Helen Frost was a go-to for YA verse novels. I’m not sure whether that’s still the case or not, but I do think the decision to repackage her classic Crossing Stones this August with a new, fresh cover is a smart way to introduce her writing to a new generation of readers. It’s a far more compelling and contemporary cover in paperback, with bright colors, but it’s also quite clear that it’s a historical verse novel given the ways that the characters are dressed. Since it’s set and about the women’s suffrage movement, the choice for putting a strong-looking girl at the center and holding a flag cues the reader to the main character in a way that the somewhat removed, wistful looking girl in the original cover does not. A new tagline was added as well, which reads “Maybe you won’t rock a cradle. Some women prefer to rock the boat.” A definite cover upgrade timed well with the 100th anniversary of (white) women’s suffrage.

I could not love the new look of Cynthia Leitich Smith’s debut YA novel any more. The original cover feels a tiny bit dated, in so much as her style of dress is very early-2000s and the images that are behind her are black and white photographs (and that boy in one of the photographs also does a great job showcasing just how great early 00s was for style). The new look, which will be part of Leitich Smith’s inaugural line for her imprint Heartdrum, hits shelves February 9 and is beautifully contemporary and timeless. It’s illustrated, with a much larger font choice for the title and author, and the style of the girl’s clothing and hair give less clues as to when the book was written and published. I love that it looks like it’s a perfect read for younger YA readers, too, as I think Leitich Smith writes such great work for that emerging YA reader without watering down the big issues she seeks to convey.

Marie Myung-Ok Lee’s Finding My Voice is believed to be the first Asian American #OwnVoices novel for YA readers, and the fact it’s being reissued with such a beautiful, modern cover in December is an utter treat. The original book, published in October of 1992, has a very of-the-time cover. That was a few years before I was reading YA books, but I remember that style of cover being popular for chapter books at the time. It’s not bad nor spectacular but very 1992. What’s interesting and most noteworthy, though, is that Marie’s full-name is not on the cover. Rather, she’s Marie G. Lee, a moniker that doesn’t make her heritage front and center. We really only know that the main character in the story is Asian by the illustration. The new cover, though, highlights Marie’s full name, and it features an incredible illustration of a modern Asian American girl. Like with Leitich Smith’s book above, I’m especially happy to see that her style doesn’t date her, meaning that this design will likely look fresh and modern years from now. The title font is big and central, and the colorful stripes in the background make the cover pop. I don’t know about you, but I am so eager to get my hands on this reissue.

Coming June 1 next year is the five-year anniversary edition of Nina LaCour and David Levithan’s You Know Me Well. What I love about this set of covers is how much they tell you about the ways cover design and the push to see diverse characters on YA book covers has changed in just a short period of time. The initial cover is fine, but it’s very 2016 — it’s font drive, with an illustration that doesn’t really tell you much. If you didn’t know the authors and what they tend to write, you might not pick up the cues that this is a queer YA book by two leading queer YA authors (and yes, there are a lot of YA readers who wouldn’t!). But the paperback reissue is queer as queer can be, without reinventing the entire cover. The bridge is still there, the font for the title is still big and bold, but now you see all kinds of teenagers showing their pride. It’s beautiful and inclusive and tells the reader everything they’d want to know (though if I could nitpick, I’d note that there’s not a physical disability represented, which feels a bit like a missed opportunity given everything else this cover nails). I’m not usually a big fan of taglines, but this one here is a nice addition: “Kate’s in love with Violet. Mark’s in love with Ryan. The hard part comes next.” That hardcover is very much for grownups who are fans of the authors. The paperback? For readers who want queer YA.

What do you think? Favorites in the bunch? Are there any older or classic YA books you’d love to see recovered and repackaged?

Cover Makeovers: Fall 2020 YA Edition

July 6, 2020 |

It’s makeover season!

Although it’s still summer here in the northern hemisphere and will be until September, publishers have been putting efforts behind promoting and sharing their fall 2020 YA books. There are so many great new books, as well as great previously-published books getting their paperback editions.

Many paperbacks look similar to the hardcover, but in a softer, cheaper, and more portable form. But as happens in YA quite a bit, a number of books get a new look in their paperback form. Be it for marketing purposes, for better highlighting the mood and tone of the book, or to get it on fresh reader radars who may have missed it before.

Let’s take a look at some of the YA books getting new looks in paperback in the coming season.

As always, the original hardcover is on the left, while the paperback is on the right.

Spontaneous by Aaron Starmer

I hadn’t realized Starmer’s book wasn’t in paperback yet, since the hardcover came out in 2016. Perhaps because the book is in development for adaptation. The new paperback will hit shelves September 8.

The original hardcover really pops. The yellow background with the orange title and clever burst of the “o” in the font. It’s not super surprising to see that the John Green blurb takes up more real estate than the title and author name, and in addition, there’s a tag line which reads “a novel about growing up . . . and blowing up.” The ice cream truck is central, and the girl in the image says so much with her body language. She’s over the truck, but she’s also tough.

In paperback, the ice cream truck is gone, as is whoever was standing beside the girl. Now she’s front and center, giving off the same vibe as in the hardcover. She’s tough and she’s over it, whatever “it” might be. The bubble is a clever little detail.

Missing from the paperback is the tag line, the standout color background, and clever font design for the title. The new color is more muted, as is the title. But the Green blurb is still present, though it blends into the background a bit more than before.

Either cover is fine. I’m not sure one is better than the other, nor does one draw me in more than the other as a reader. Perhaps the new cover is a hint at news of the adaptation coming soon?

Chicken Girl by Heather Smith

Chicken Girl! It reminds me a lot of Hot Dog Girl by Jennifer Dugan, of course, though rather than being a girl in a hot dog costume, it’s a girl in a chicken suit.

The hardcover doesn’t give any indication of that and, in fact, is kind of confusing all around. Is the girl actually a chicken? Does she raise chickens? The bright pink is fun, but the contrasting bright yellow feathers, as well as the black-on-yellow font for the book title and author name is a little challenging on the eyes (especially digitally).

In paperback, it’s a different story. We know exactly what the book is about: a girl who might be wearing a chicken costume, presumably for a job. The fact we don’t see a face of the girl is clever, especially paired with the tag line, which carried over from the hardcover: “Life can be a tough egg to crack.” The light pink with pastel yellow is much easier on the eyes. I love that the chicken head looks like it has an eye roll going on.

For me, this one is easy. The paperback is way more appealing and would make it pick it up. I suspect teens would feel similarly.

The paperback hits shelves September 8.

Everlost by Neal Shusterman (series)

Given the tremendous success in the last few years in Neal Shusterman’s career, it shouldn’t be any surprise one of his older series is getting a fresh look. It’s a good one, too!

Everlost looks perfectly creepy in hardcover, but it does feel like design that’s about a decade old. In no way is it bad, but it blends into so many other book covers of the time of its publication.

The paperback, on the other hand, feels fresh and contemporary. The cover also indicates it’s part of a trilogy, which is super helpful for readers and those who work with readers. Added to the paperback, in addition to a new — but still familiar — look, is that Shusterman is a New York Times bestseller. The title of the book gets a new font, with the second “e” getting a little special touch. Perhaps most noticeable is Shusterman’s name. What was once in the corner of the book is now front and center and takes up much more real estate.

I think both covers are effective and evocative, though the new paperback might edge out the original look a bit for me, if for no reason other than how fresh it feels.

You can grab Everlost in paperback September 8. All of the books in the trilogy will be getting the redesign, which is going to look so sharp on shelves.

Tithe by Holly Black (series)

Another series getting a whole new look is Holly Black’s “Modern Faerie Tale.” The originals, picked above, are dark and reminiscent of the YA fantasy which published around the same time (2004!). Think LJ Smith and the Vampire Diaries, among others. It’s really perfect for the series, and readers who are looking for dark fairy tales know what to pick up.

But the paperback design? It’s absolutely gorgeous. The books maintain the same feel, but they’ve been updated and modernized for today’s teen readers. The images pay homage to the classic covers, while also making clear these are still modern and relevant. Holly Black’s name is much larger now, and like with the Shusterman redesign, the series title is indicated on the front cover. The font is fresher, too.

For anyone with this series on your shelves at libraries or schools: this is your sign to update.

It’s not going to be surprising that I think the paperback redesign is a total win. The originals are great, but they’re of an era. The new looks are of this era.

The redesigned series will hit shelves October 20.

The Beauty of the Moment by Tanaz Bhathena

This cover redesign seems to be a classic of “what is the story about” variety. I love the hardcover. It’s eye-catching and unique. But what is it about? I love the brown model at the center, paired with the illustrated flora and fauna, as well as the swoopy script lettering of the title. There’s a tag line, too, which in digital rendering is super challenging to read: “Why fit in when you can stand out?” It’s a beautiful cover but it tells absolutely nothing of the story.

The paperback is a big change, though the illustrated girl definitely gives the same vibe about her as the model on the hardcover. It’s more clear that romance might be central to the story here, and even clearer is that the girl might not be entirely into it. It’s interesting that the background is of a skyline, which suggests an entirely different feel than the hardcover, featuring nature.

On paperback, the font is not noteworthy except for the thing that does make it noteworthy: it’s big! And rather than the author’s name being in all lower case letters, it’s now rendered in all uppercase. Both the title and author font stand out well on the muted-rainbow background.

The tag line has disappeared, but it’s been replaced with a blurb that explains the story so much better: “A titanium-strength love story.” In no way does the original suggest love story, but the paperback? Absolutely.

And interestingly, there’s a different cover for the Canadian edition of the book, which may be the inspiration for the new design in paperback:

This cover is a sheer delight. Look at the girl! Look at the boy who is trying so hard to be smooth with her! I love the elements of this one.

Both the paperback and hardcover are beautiful, but the paperback seems more true to the story itself. If only we had the choice of the Canadian edition because it’s especially good.

You can grab the paperback July 21.

What do you think? Which covers do you prefer? I’d love to hear your thoughts!

A Big Roundup of YA Book Cover Makeovers

April 20, 2020 |

I like to parse out the YA book cover makeovers I do in smaller posts. But I’ve been saving these up for months, meaning that even if I broke them up into a few smaller posts, there’d be so many of them and I’d still be pretty far behind when the next big batch of cover changes emerge.

Let’s take a look at a whole bunch of YA book cover changes for spring/summer/early fall 2020 releases. Some of these cover redesigns are better, some are not as good, and some make you wonder why the cover was redesigned at all. As always, authors don’t usually have any say on design changes, and they’re made with some sort of thought behind them — be it that the new look is to establish a new brand, to reach new readers, or to develop a whole new audience for an author’s work.

Because there are so many redesigns to share, the writing will be minimal here. I like to usually dig into the changes, but I think the redesigns speak for themselves here. I’ve pulled descriptions from Goodreads for you to consider what the book’s about in context to the new cover, and I’ve done my best to give the publication date of the redesign. Since publication dates have been shifting this year because of COVID-19, know some might not be entirely accurate. Original cover design is on the left, with the redesign on the right.

I’d love to hear what you think on social or in the comments. What redesigns are speaking to you? Which do you wish weren’t happening? Do you plan to weed old editions from your library or classroom collection in exchange for an updated look?

Spring/Summer 2020 YA Book Cover Redesigns

The Rest of the Story by Sarah Dessen

Paperback May 5

Emma Saylor doesn’t remember a lot about her mother, who died when Emma was twelve. But she does remember the stories her mom told her about the big lake that went on forever, with cold, clear water and mossy trees at the edges.

Now it’s just Emma and her dad, and life is good, if a little predictable…until Emma is unexpectedly sent to spend the summer with her mother’s family that she hasn’t seen since she was a little girl.

When Emma arrives at North Lake, she realizes there are actually two very different communities there. Her mother grew up in working class North Lake, while her dad spent summers in the wealthier Lake North resort. The more time Emma spends there, the more it starts to feel like she is also divided into two people. To her father, she is Emma. But to her new family, she is Saylor, the name her mother always called her.

Then there’s Roo, the boy who was her very best friend when she was little. Roo holds the key to her family’s history, and slowly, he helps her put the pieces together about her past. It’s hard not to get caught up in the magic of North Lake—and Saylor finds herself falling under Roo’s spell as well.

For Saylor, it’s like a whole new world is opening up to her. But when it’s time to go back home, which side of her—Emma or Saylor—will win out?

Love and Other Carnivorous Plants by Florence Gonsalves

Paperback April 14

Freshman year at Harvard was the most anticlimactic year of Danny’s life. She’s failing pre-med and drifting apart from her best friend. One by one, Danny is losing all the underpinnings of her identity. When she finds herself attracted to an older, edgy girl who she met in rehab for an eating disorder, she finally feels like she might be finding a new sense of self. But when tragedy strikes, her self-destructive tendencies come back to haunt her as she struggles to discover who that self really is.

I Know What You Did Last Summer by Lois Duncan

Paperback May 5

The cover on the left isn’t the original cover for this book, but one of the more recent redesigns. This would be a fascinating book to do a cover retrospective on, since there have been a few variations. The cover on the right is the one hitting shelves next month.

Last summer, four terrified friends made a desperate pact to conceal a shocking secret. But now, someone has learned the truth and is determined to get even.

The horror is starting again. There is an unknown avenger out there who is stalking them in a deadly game. Will he stop at terror-or is he out for revenge?

Killing Mr. Griffin by Lois Duncan

Paperback May 5

Like with the Duncan cover above, the left cover isn’t the original. It’s from the 2010 redesign. The right is the forthcoming edition.

Mr. Griffin is the strictest teacher at Del Norte High, with a penchant for endless projects and humiliating students. Even straight-A student Susan can’t believe how mean he is to her crush, Dave, and to the charismatic Mark Kinney. So when Dave asks Susan to help a group of students teach Mr. Griffin a lesson of their own, she goes along with them. After all, it’s a harmless prank, right?

But things don’t go according to plan. When one “accident” leads to another and people begin to die, Susan and her friends must face the awful truth: one of them is a killer.

The Price Guide to the Occult by Leslye Walton

Paperback June 2

When Rona Blackburn landed on Anathema Island more than a century ago, her otherworldly skills might have benefited friendlier neighbors. Guilt and fear instead led the island’s original eight settlers to burn “the witch” out of her home. So Rona cursed them. Fast-forward one hundred–some years: All Nor Blackburn wants is to live an unremarkable teenage life. She has reason to hope: First, her supernatural powers, if they can be called that, are unexceptional. Second, her love life is nonexistent, which means she might escape the other perverse side effect of the matriarch’s backfiring curse, too. But then a mysterious book comes out, promising to cast any spell for the right price. Nor senses a storm coming and is pretty sure she’ll be smack in the eye of it. In her second novel, Leslye Walton spins a dark, mesmerizing tale of a girl stumbling along the path toward self-acceptance and first love, even as the Price Guide’s malevolent author — Nor’s own mother — looms and threatens to strangle any hope for happiness.

Jackpot by Nic Stone

Paperback September 29

From the author of the New York Times best seller Dear Martin – which Angie Thomas, the best-selling author of The Hate U Give, called “a must read” – comes a pitch-perfect romance that examines class, privilege, and how a stroke of good luck can change an entire life.

Meet Rico: high school senior and afternoon-shift cashier at the Gas ‘n’ Go, who after school and work races home to take care of her younger brother. Every. Single. Day. When Rico sells a jackpot-winning lotto ticket, she thinks maybe her luck will finally change, but only if she – with some assistance from her popular and wildly rich classmate, Zan – can find the ticket holder who hasn’t claimed the prize. But what happens when have and have-nots collide? Will this investigative duo unite…or divide?

Nic Stone, the New York Times best-selling author of Dear Martin and Odd One Out, creates two unforgettable characters in one hard-hitting story about class, money – both too little and too much – and how you make your own luck in the world.

Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor

Series paperback release December 1

Laini Taylor’s series is getting a whole new paperback look. It reminds me a bit of the redesign of the Marissa Meyer “Lunar Chronicles” series.

Around the world, black hand prints are appearing on doorways, scorched there by winged strangers who have crept through a slit in the sky.

In a dark and dusty shop, a devil’s supply of human teeth grows dangerously low.

And in the tangled lanes of Prague, a young art student is about to be caught up in a brutal otherworldly war.

Meet Karou. She fills her sketchbooks with monsters that may or may not be real, she’s prone to disappearing on mysterious “errands”, she speaks many languages – not all of them human – and her bright blue hair actually grows out of her head that color. Who is she? That is the question that haunts her, and she’s about to find out.

When beautiful, haunted Akiva fixes fiery eyes on her in an alley in Marrakesh, the result is blood and starlight, secrets unveiled, and a star-crossed love whose roots drink deep of a violent past. But will Karou live to regret learning the truth about herself?

Serious Moonlight by Jenn Bennett

Paperback January 5, 2021

After an awkward first encounter, Birdie and Daniel are forced to work together in a Seattle hotel where a famous author leads a mysterious and secluded life in this romantic contemporary novel from the author of Alex, Approximately.

Mystery-book aficionado Birdie Lindberg has an overactive imagination. Raised in isolation and homeschooled by strict grandparents, she’s cultivated a whimsical fantasy life in which she plays the heroic detective and every stranger is a suspect. But her solitary world expands when she takes a job the summer before college, working the graveyard shift at a historic Seattle hotel.

In her new job, Birdie hopes to blossom from introverted dreamer to brave pioneer, and gregarious Daniel Aoki volunteers to be her guide. The hotel’s charismatic young van driver shares the same nocturnal shift and patronizes the waterfront Moonlight Diner where Birdie waits for the early morning ferry after work. Daniel also shares her appetite for intrigue, and he’s stumbled upon a real-life mystery: a famous reclusive writer—never before seen in public—might be secretly meeting someone at the hotel.

To uncover the writer’s puzzling identity, Birdie must come out of her shell…discovering that the most confounding mystery of all may be her growing feelings for the elusive riddle that is Daniel.

Campfire by Shawn Sarles

Paperback July 14

Be careful what stories you tell around the campfire . . . they just might come true.

While camping in a remote location, Maddie Davenport gathers around the fire with her friends and family to tell scary stories. Caleb, the handsome young guide, shares the local legend of the ferocious Mountain Men who hunt unsuspecting campers and leave their mark by carving grisly antlers into their victims’ foreheads.

The next day, the story comes true. Now Maddie and her family are lost in the deep woods — with no way out — being stalked by their worst nightmares. Because there were other, more horrifying stories told that night — and Maddie’s about to find out just how they end . . .

Hungry Hearts edited by Elise Chapman and Caroline Tung Richmond

Paperback June 16

A stunning collection of short stories about the intersection of family, culture, and food in the lives in teens, from bestselling and critically acclaimed authors, including Sandhya Menon, Anna-Marie McLemore, and Rin Chupeco.

A shy teenager attempts to express how she really feels through the pastries she makes at her family’s pasteleria. A tourist from Montenegro desperately seeks a magic soup dumpling that can cure his fear of death. An aspiring chef realizes that butter and soul are the key ingredients to win a cooking competition that could win him the money to save his mother’s life.

Welcome to Hungry Hearts Row, where the answers to most of life’s hard questions are kneaded, rolled, baked. Where a typical greeting is, “Have you had anything to eat?” Where magic and food and love are sometimes one in the same.

Told in interconnected short stories, Hungry Hearts explores the many meanings food can take on beyond mere nourishment. It can symbolize love and despair, family and culture, belonging and home.

We Walked The Sky by Lisa Fielder

Paperback July 7

In 1965 seventeen-year-old Victoria, having just escaped an unstable home, flees to the ultimate place for dreamers and runaways–the circus. Specifically, the VanDrexel Family Circus where, among the lion tamers, roustabouts, and trapeze artists, Victoria hopes to start a better life.

Fifty years later, Victoria’s sixteen-year-old granddaughter Callie is thriving. A gifted and focused tightrope walker with dreams of being a VanDrexel high wire legend just like her grandmother, Callie can’t imagine herself anywhere but the circus. But when Callie’s mother accepts her dream job at an animal sanctuary in Florida just months after Victoria’s death, Callie is forced to leave her lifelong home behind.

Feeling unmoored and out of her element, Callie pores over memorabilia from her family’s days on the road, including a box that belonged to Victoria when she was Callie’s age. In the box, Callie finds notes that Victoria wrote to herself with tips and tricks for navigating her new world. Inspired by this piece of her grandmother’s life, Callie decides to use Victoria’s circus prowess to navigate the uncharted waters of public high school.

Across generations, Victoria and Callie embrace the challenges of starting over, letting go, and finding new families in unexpected places.

The Virtue of Sin by Shannon Schuren

Paperback June 23

Miriam lives in New Jerusalem, a haven in the desert far away from the sins and depravity of the outside world. Within the gates of New Jerusalem, and under the eye of its founder and leader, Daniel, Miriam knows she is safe. Cared for. Even if she’s forced, as a girl, to quiet her tongue when she has thoughts she wants to share, Miriam knows that New Jerusalem is a far better life than any alternative. So when God calls for a Matrimony, she’s thrilled; she knows that Caleb, the boy she loves, will choose her to be his wife and they can finally start their life together.

But when the ceremony goes wrong and Miriam winds up with someone else, she can no longer keep quiet. For the first time, Miriam begins to question not only the rules that Daniel has set in place, but also what it is she believes in, and where she truly belongs.

Alongside unexpected allies, Miriam fights to learn–and challenge–the truth behind the only way of life she’s ever known, even if it means straying from the path of Righteousness.

Mirage by Somaiya Daud

Paperback July 7

In a star system dominated by the brutal Vathek empire, eighteen-year-old Amani is a dreamer. She dreams of what life was like before the occupation; she dreams of writing poetry like the old-world poems she adores; she dreams of receiving a sign from Dihya that one day, she, too, will have adventure, and travel beyond her isolated moon.

But when adventure comes for Amani, it is not what she expects: she is kidnapped by the regime and taken in secret to the royal palace, where she discovers that she is nearly identical to the cruel half-Vathek Princess Maram. The princess is so hated by her conquered people that she requires a body double, someone to appear in public as Maram, ready to die in her place.

As Amani is forced into her new role, she can’t help but enjoy the palace’s beauty—and her time with the princess’ fiancé, Idris. But the glitter of the royal court belies a world of violence and fear. If Amani ever wishes to see her family again, she must play the princess to perfection…because one wrong move could lead to her death.

This Savage Song by Victoria Schwab

Paperback May 12

Both books in this duology are getting a fresh look in paperback!

There’s no such thing as safe in a city at war, a city overrun with monsters. In this dark urban fantasy from author Victoria Schwab, a young woman and a young man must choose whether to become heroes or villains—and friends or enemies—with the future of their home at stake. The first of two books.

Kate Harker and August Flynn are the heirs to a divided city—a city where the violence has begun to breed actual monsters. All Kate wants is to be as ruthless as her father, who lets the monsters roam free and makes the humans pay for his protection. All August wants is to be human, as good-hearted as his own father, to play a bigger role in protecting the innocent—but he’s one of the monsters. One who can steal a soul with a simple strain of music. When the chance arises to keep an eye on Kate, who’s just been kicked out of her sixth boarding school and returned home, August jumps at it. But Kate discovers August’s secret, and after a failed assassination attempt the pair must flee for their lives.

Brief Chronicle of Another Stupid Heartbreak by Adi Alsaid

Paperback August 4

A story about being in love with love.

Dumped by her boyfriend the summer after senior year, popular love-and-dating columnist Lu Charles can’t seem to write another word. Devastated, she spends her time wondering if everything she used to believe about love was a lie. But when Lu overhears another college-bound couple breaking up—before deciding to stay together for one final summer—she is inspired. Could Cal and Iris be the key to solving her writers block?

Lu starts chronicling the couple’s final weeks around New York City, ignoring her friends, her family, even her looming column deadlines as she becomes Cal and Iris’s unofficial third wheel. With her NYU scholarship hanging in the balance, will Lu be able to discover the truth about love that she’s been looking for? Or will she learn a much greater lesson?

Jack of Hearts and Other Parts by LC Rosen

Paperback May 26

Jack has a lot of sex — and he’s not ashamed of it. While he’s sometimes ostracized, and gossip constantly rages about his sex life, Jack always believes that “it could be worse.”

But then, the worse unexpectedly strikes: when Jack starts writing a teen sex advice column for his friend’s blog, he begins to receive creepy and threatening love letters that attempt to force Jack to curb his sexuality and personality. Now it’s up to Jack and his best friends to uncover the stalker — before their love becomes dangerous.

Groundbreaking and page-turning, Jack of Hearts (and other parts) celebrates the freedom to be oneself, especially in the face of adversity.

Don’t Date Rosa Santos by Nina Moreno

Paperback April 14

Rosa Santos is cursed by the sea-at least, that’s what they say. Dating her is bad news, especially if you’re a boy with a boat.

But Rosa feels more caught than cursed. Caught between cultures and choices. Between her abuela, a beloved healer and pillar of their community, and her mother, an artist who crashes in and out of her life like a hurricane. Between Port Coral, the quirky South Florida town they call home, and Cuba, the island her abuela refuses to talk about.

As her college decision looms, Rosa collides-literally-with Alex Aquino, the mysterious boy with tattoos of the ocean whose family owns the marina. With her heart, her family, and her future on the line, can Rosa break a curse and find her place beyond the horizon?

Invisible Ghosts by Robyn Schneider

Paperback May 5

When one girl’s best friend is her dead brother’s ghost, romance can be tricky. Perfect for fans of John Green and Nicola Yoon.

Rose Asher believes in ghosts. She should, since she has one for a best friend: Logan, her annoying, Netflix-addicted brother, who is forever stuck at fifteen. But Rose is growing up, and when an old friend moves back to Laguna Canyon and appears in her drama class, things get complicated.

Jamie Aldridge is charming, confident, and a painful reminder of the life Rose has been missing out on since her brother’s death. She watches as Jamie easily rejoins their former friends—a group of magnificently silly theater nerds—while avoiding her so intensely that it must be deliberate.

Yet when the two of them unexpectedly cross paths, Rose learns that Jamie has a secret of his own, one that changes everything. Rose finds herself drawn back into her old life—and to Jamie. But she quickly starts to suspect that he isn’t telling her the whole truth.

All Rose knows is that it’s becoming harder to choose between the boy who makes her feel alive and the brother she isn’t ready to lose

Bloodleaf by Crystal Smith

Paperback May 5

Aurelia is a princess, but they call her a witch.

Surrounded by spirits and burdened with forbidden magic, she lives in constant fear of discovery by the witch-hunting Tribunal and their bloodthirsty mobs. When a devastating assassination attempt reveals her magical abilities, Aurelia is forced to flee her country with nothing but her life.

Alone and adrift in an enemy kingdom, Aurelia plans her revenge against the Tribunal, desperate to bring down the dark organization that has wrought terror upon her people for hundreds of years. But there’s something deeply amiss in her new home, too, and soon she finds herself swept into a deadly new mystery with a secretive prince, the ghost of an ancient queen, and a poison vine called Bloodleaf.

Aurelia is entangled in a centuries-long game of love, power, and war, and if she can’t break free before the Tribunal makes its last move, she may lose far more than her crown.

You’d Be Mine by Erin Hahn

Paperback July 21

Annie Mathers is America’s sweetheart and heir to a country music legacy full of all the things her Gran warned her about. Superstar Clay Coolidge is most definitely going to end up one of those things.

But unfortunately for Clay, if he can’t convince Annie to join his summer tour, his music label is going to drop him. That’s what happens when your bad boy image turns into bad boy reality. Annie has been avoiding the spotlight after her parents’ tragic death, except on her skyrocketing YouTube channel. Clay’s label wants to land Annie, and Clay has to make it happen.

Swayed by Clay’s undeniable charm and good looks, Annie and her band agree to join the tour. From the start fans want them to be more than just tour mates, and Annie and Clay can’t help but wonder if the fans are right. But if there’s one part of fame Annie wants nothing to do with, it’s a high-profile relationship. She had a front row seat to her parents’ volatile marriage and isn’t interested in repeating history. If only she could convince her heart that Clay, with his painful past and head over heels inducing tenor, isn’t worth the risk.

Night Music by Jenn Marie Thorne

Paperback May 12

Ruby has always been Ruby Chertok: future classical pianist and daughter of renowned composer Martin Chertok. But after her horrendous audition for the prestigious music school where her father is on faculty, it’s clear that music has publicly dumped her. Now Ruby is suddenly just . . . Ruby. And who is that again? All she knows is that she wants away from the world of classical music for good.

Oscar is a wunderkind, a musical genius. Just ask any of the 1.8 million people who’ve watched him conduct on YouTube–or hey, just ask Oscar. But while he might be the type who’d name himself when asked about his favorite composer and somehow make you love him more for it, Oscar is not the type to jeopardize his chance to study under the great Martin Chertok–not for a crush. He’s all too aware of how the ultra-privileged world of classical music might interpret a black guy like him falling for his benefactor’s white daughter.

But as the New York City summer heats up, so does the spark between Ruby and Oscar. Soon their connection crackles with the same alive, uncontainable energy as the city itself. Can two people still figuring themselves out figure out how to be together? Or will the world make the choice for them?

Neverworld Wake by Marisa Pessl

Paperback May 26

Once upon a time, back at Darrow-Harker School, Beatrice Hartley and her five best friends were the cool kids, the beautiful ones. Then the shocking death of Jim – their creative genius and Beatrice’s boyfriend – changed everything.

One year after graduation, Beatrice is returning to Wincroft – the seaside estate where they spent so many nights sharing secrets, crushes, plans to change the world – hoping she’ll get to the bottom of the dark questions gnawing at her about Jim’s death.

But as the night plays out in a haze of stilted jokes and unfathomable silence, Beatrice senses she’s never going to know what really happened.

Then a mysterious man knocks on the door. Blithely, he announces the impossible: time for them has become stuck, snagged on a splinter that can only be removed if the former friends make the harshest of decisions.

Now Beatrice has one last shot at answers… and at life.

And so begins the Neverworld Wake.

How to Make Friends With The Dark by Kathleen Glasgow

Paperback May 12

Tiger’s life changed with a simple phone call. Her mother has died. That’s when darkness descended on her otherwise average life.

Tiger’s mother never talked about her father, and with no grandparents or aunts or uncles, her world is packed into a suitcase and moved to a foster home. And another. And another. Until hope surfaces in the shape of . . . a sister?

Sometimes family comes in forms you don’t recognize. But can Tiger learn to make friends with the darkness before it swallows her whole?

Love From A to Z by SK Ali

Paperback May 12

A marvel: something you find amazing. Even ordinary-amazing. Like potatoes—because they make French fries happen. Like the perfect fries Adam and his mom used to make together.

An oddity: whatever gives you pause. Like the fact that there are hateful people in the world. Like Zayneb’s teacher, who won’t stop reminding the class how “bad” Muslims are.

But Zayneb, the only Muslim in class, isn’t bad. She’s angry.

When she gets suspended for confronting her teacher, and he begins investigating her activist friends, Zayneb heads to her aunt’s house in Doha, Qatar, for an early start to spring break.

Fueled by the guilt of getting her friends in trouble, she resolves to try out a newer, “nicer” version of herself in a place where no one knows her.

Then her path crosses with Adam’s.

Since he got diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in November, Adam’s stopped going to classes, intent, instead, on perfecting the making of things. Intent on keeping the memory of his mom alive for his little sister.

Adam’s also intent on keeping his diagnosis a secret from his grieving father.

Alone, Adam and Zayneb are playing roles for others, keeping their real thoughts locked away in their journals.

Until a marvel and an oddity occurs…

Marvel: Adam and Zayneb meeting.

Oddity: Adam and Zayneb meeting.

Catching Jordan by Miranda Kenneally

Paperback reissue July 7

What girl doesn’t want to be surrounded by gorgeous jocks day in and day out? Jordan Woods isn’t just surrounded by hot guys, though–she leads them as the captain and quarterback of her high school football team. They all see her as one of the guys and that’s just fine. As long as she gets her athletic scholarship to a powerhouse university.

But everything she’s ever worked for is threatened when Ty Green moves to her school. Not only is he an amazing QB, but he’s also amazingly hot. And for the first time, Jordan’s feeling vulnerable. Can she keep her head in the game while her heart’s on the line?

Kens by Raziel Reid

Paperback June 2

Every high school has the archetypical Queen B and her minions. In Kens, the high school hierarchy has been reimagined. Willows High is led by Ken Hilton, and he makes Regina George from Mean Girls look like a saint. Ken Hilton rules Willows High with his carbon-copies, Ken Roberts and Ken Carson, standing next to his throne. It can be hard to tell the Kens apart. There are minor differences in each edition, but all Kens are created from the same mold, straight out of Satan’s doll factory. Soul sold separately.

Tommy Rawlins can’t help but compare himself to these shimmering images of perfection that glide through the halls. He’s desperate to fit in, but in a school where the Kens are queens who are treated like Queens, Tommy is the uncool gay kid. A once-in-a-lifetime chance at becoming a Ken changes everything for Tommy, just as his eye is caught by the tall, dark, handsome new boy, Blaine. Has Blaine arrived in time to save him from the Kens? Tommy has high hopes for their future together, but when their shared desire to overthrow Ken Hilton takes a shocking turn, Tommy must decide how willing he is to reinvent himself — inside and out. Is this new version of Tommy everything he’s always wanted to be, or has he become an unknowing and submissive puppet in a sadistic plan?