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August Debut YA Novels

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It’s time for another round-up of debut YA novels of the month.

Like always, this round-up includes debut novels, where “debut” is in its purest definition. These are first-time books by first-time authors. I’m not including books by authors who are using or have used a pseudonym in the past or those who have written in other categories (adult, middle grade, etc.) in the past.

All descriptions are from WorldCat, unless otherwise noted. If I’m missing any debuts out in August from traditional publishers, let me know in the comments. As always, not all noted titles included here are necessarily endorsements for those titles.

From Where I Watch You by Shannon Grogan: Sixteen-year-old Kara McKinley’s life imploded after the death of her mean-spirited older sister, but she finds solace in baking and the hope of winning a culinary school scholarship until a stalker targets her, leading her to piece together events from her past even as she fears for her future.

The Temple of Doubt by Anne Boles Levy: Fifteen-year-old Hadara loves to go beyond the city limits gathering herbs and throwing off the yoke of her religious schooling, but when a falling star crashes into the marshes beyond Port Sapphire, two powerful high priests arrive from the god Nihil’s home city to investigate, insisting it harbors an evil force, and choosing Hadara as a guide into the wilds, setting off a chain of events that will upend everything she has been taught about the sacred and the profane. 

Diary of a Haunting by M. Verano: After her parents’ high-profile divorce, sixteen-year-old Paige is forced to leave Los Angeles for a rambling Victorian mansion in small-town Idaho where she soon notices strange occurrences that seem to be building toward some unspeakable horror.

The Creeping by Alexandra Sirowy: Seventeen-year-old Stella has no recollection of the day her best friend disappeared while the two, then six, were picking strawberries, until the corpse of a similar girl turns up and Stella not only begins to remember, she learns that something dark has been at work in their little town for generations.

How To Say I Love You Out Loud by Karole Cozzo: When Jordyn’s autistic brother joins her at her elite school her junior year, she is determined not to let anyone know they are related, even if that means closing herself off to her closest friends Erin, Tanu, and Alex, the football captain she secretly loves.

Madly by Amy Alward: Samantha’s ability to mix potions is needed when her family is summoned to take part in an ancient quest to save Princess Evelyn from a potion gone awry, but will curing the princess doom Samantha’s chance at love?

Not After Everything by Michelle Levy: After his mom kills herself, Tyler shuts out the world–until falling in love with Jordyn helps him find his way toward a hopeful future. 

July Debut YA Novels

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It’s time for another round-up of debut YA novels of the month.

Like always, this round-up includes debut novels, where “debut” is in its purest definition. These are first-time books by first-time authors. I’m not including books by authors who are using or have used a pseudonym in the past or those who have written in other categories (adult, middle grade, etc.) in the past.

All descriptions are from WorldCat, unless otherwise noted. If I’m missing any debuts out in July from traditional publishers, let me know in the comments. As always, not all noted titles included here are necessarily endorsements for those titles.

 

Pretending to be Erica by Michelle Painchaud: Violet has been preparing her entire life to step into the shoes of the missing heiress Erica Silverman, in order to pull off the biggest inside job in Las Vegas history. She doesn’t count on having a conscience.

You and Me and Him by Kris Dinnison: Maggie Bowers thinks she knows what to expect her junior year of high school, but when she and her out-of-the-closet best friend Nash have feelings for the same boy she wonders if winning someone’s heart means losing her soulmate.

Jillian Cade: Fake Paranormal Investigator by Jen Klein: A seventeen-year-old girl runs a fake paranormal detection agency, but when she takes a case involving a non-paranormal missing person, things start to get strange and her feelings for partner Sky Ramsey start to grow.

Damage Done by Amanda Panitch: Julia Vann has a new identity after being forced to leave town because of her twin brother’s terrible crime. Julia is the only survivor but she can’t remember what happened–at least, that’s what she tells the police. 

Ruthless by Carolyn Lee Adams: When Ruth is kidnapped, she’s determined not to become this serial-killer’s next trophy. After she’s able to escape, her captor begins stalking her through the wilderness.

Stone Rider by David Hofmeyr: A young man who seeks revenge and redemption from his past joins a brutal race to win a chance to escape his dying world. 

Forever For A Year by B. T. Gottfred: Two young teens fall in love for the first time, and discover it might not last forever. 

June Debut YA Novels

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It’s time for another round-up of debut YA novels of the month.

Like always, this round-up includes debut novels, where “debut” is in its purest definition. These are first-time books by first-time authors. I’m not including books by authors who are using or have used a pseudonym in the past or those who have written in other categories (adult, middle grade, etc.) in the past.

All descriptions are from WorldCat, unless otherwise noted. If I’m missing any debuts out in June from traditional publishers, let me know in the comments. As always, not all noted titles included here are necessarily endorsements for those titles.

Because You’ll Never Meet Me by Leah Thomas: Ollie and Moritz are best friends, but they can never meet. Ollie is allergic to electricity. Contact with it causes debilitating seizures. Moritz’s weak heart is kept pumping by an electronic pacemaker. If they ever did meet, Ollie would seize. But Moritz would die without his pacemaker. Both hermits from society, the boys develop a fierce bond through letters that become a lifeline during dark times — as Ollie loses his only friend, Liz, to the normalcy of high school and Moritz deals with a bully set on destroying him. A story of impossible friendship and hope under strange circumstances, about two special boys who, like many teens, are just waiting for their moment to shine. 

Between The Notes by Sharon Huss Roat: When Ivy Emerson’s family loses their house—complete with her beloved piano—the fear of what’s to come seizes her like a bad case of stage fright. Only this isn’t one of her single, terrifying performances. It’s her life.

And it isn’t pretty.

Ivy is forced to move with her family out of their affluent neighborhood to Lakeside, also known as “the wrong side of the tracks.” Hiding the truth from her friends—and the cute new guy in school, who may have secrets of his own—seems like a good idea at first. But when a bad boy next door threatens to ruin everything, Ivy’s carefully crafted lies begin to unravel . . . and there is no way to stop them.

As things get to the breaking point, Ivy turns to her music, some unlikely new friends, and the trusting heart of her disabled little brother. She may be surprised that not everyone is who she thought they were, including herself. (via Goodreads).

Dancing with Molly by Lena Horowitz: High school junior Becca is just a “band geek” until when her friends introduce her to molly, a form of ecstasy, and she finds herself with new friends–even a boyfriend–but soon learns there is a price to her newfound popularity.

Deadly Design by Debra Dockter: Kyle McAdams races to find out what’s killing kids conceived at the Genesis Innovations Laboratory before he becomes yet another perfect, blue-eyed corpse.

Even When You Lie to Me by Jessica Alcott: Because she sees herself as ugly and a misfit, tolerated only because of her friendship with pretty and popular Lila, Charlie dreads her senior year, but a crush on the new charismatic English teacher, Mr. Drummond, makes school bearable until her eighteenth birthday, when boundaries are crossed.

Hello, I Love You by Katie M. Stout: Grace Wilde is hoping for a fresh start from her family, famous in the music industry, and escapes to the farthest place from home she can think of, a boarding school in Korea, but when her roommate Sophie’s twin brother Jason turns out to be the newest Korean pop music superstar, Grace is thrust back into the world of fame and love.

Last Year’s Mistake by Gina Ciocca: Although Kelsey has fallen in love with her best friend, David, she cuts ties with him before moving from Connecticut to Rhode Island, believing they need a fresh start, but David moves nearby at the start of senior year, threatening Kelsey’s relationship with Ryan.

Like It Never Happened by Emily Adrian: As one of The Essential Five theater students at her alternative high school, Rebecca Rivers is preparing to become an actress and enjoying junior year with the perfect boyfriend until life-changing rumors threaten everything.

Mindwalker by AJ Steiger: In a futuristic reality, one girl falls in love with the boy whose memories she tries to erase. 

More Happy Than Not by Adam Silvera: After enduring his father’s suicide, his own suicide attempt, broken friendships, and more in the Bronx projects, Aaron Soto, sixteen, is already considering the Leteo Institute’s memory-alteration procedure when his new friendship with Thomas turns to unrequited love.

Proof of Forever by Lexa Hillyer: Four former friends are transported back in time to a pivotal summer in all of their lives during a camp reunion. 

The Sacred Lies of Minnow Bly by Stephanie Oakes: A handless teen escapes from a cult, only to find herself in juvenile detention and suspected of knowing who murdered her cult leader. 

Skyscraping by Cordelia Jensen: In 1993 in New York City, high school senior Mira uncovers many secrets, including that her father has a male lover.

The Night We Said Yes by Lauren Gibraldi: Before Matt, Ella had a plan. Get over a no-good ex-boyfriend. Graduate from high school without any more distractions. Move away from Orlando, Florida, where she’s lived her entire life. 

But Matt—the cute, shy, bespectacled bass player who just moved to town—was never part of that plan.

And neither was attending a party that was crashed by the cops just minutes after they arrived. Or spending an entire night saying “yes” to every crazy, fun thing they could think of.

Then Matt abruptly left town, and he broke not only Ella’s heart but those of their best friends, too. So when he shows up a year later with a plan of his own—to relive the night that brought them together—Ella isn’t sure whether Matt’s worth a second chance. Or if re-creating the past can help them create a different future.  (via Goodreads).

Those Girls by Lauren Saft: Eleventh grade at Greencliff, an all-girl school near Philadelphia, is momentous for long-term best friends Alex, Mollie, and Veronica, as the secrets they are keeping from each other about boyfriends, eating disorders, and more begin to undermine their relationships.

Where You End by Anna Pellicioli: Overwrought when she sees her ex-boyfriend with another girl during a class field trip, seventeen-year-old Miriam Feldman races into the Hirshhorn Sculpture Garden and pushes over a priceless Picasso sculpture, then finds herself blackmailed by the mystery girl who saw what she did.
The Witch Hunter by Virginia Boecker: Set in an alternative 16th-century England, Elizabeth Grey is the only girl in the king’s elite group of witch hunters. When she’s framed for being a witch herself, Elizabeth finds freedom at the hands of the world’s most wanted wizard and her loyalties are tested. 

March Debut YA Novels

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I don’t know if it’s this way everywhere, but this March is already a welcomed weather relief. As I’m putting together, I have my windows open because it’s 60 degrees and there’s almost no snow left on the ground.

Like always, this round-up includes debut novels, where “debut” is in its purest definition. These are first-time books by first-time authors. I’m not including books by authors who are using or have used a pseudonym in the past or those who have written in other categories (adult, middle grade, etc.) in the past.

All descriptions are from WorldCat, unless otherwise noted. If I’m missing any debuts out in February from traditional publishers, let me know in the comments. As always, not all noted titles included here are necessarily endorsements for those titles. 

Duplicity by N. K. Traver: When seventeen-year-old Brandon, a tattooed bad boy skilled in computer hacking, is sucked into a digital hell and replaced with a preppy Stepford-esque clone, his life and sanity rest on the shoulders of a classy girl he never thought he would fall for.

Under A Painted Sky by Stacey Lee: In 1845, Sammy, a Chinese American girl, and Annamae, an African American slave girl, disguise themselves as boys and travel on the Oregon Trail to California from Missouri. 

The Wrong Side of Right by Jenn Marie Thorne: After her mother dies, sixteen-year-old Kate Quinn meets the father she did not know she had, joins his presidential campaign, falls for a rebellious boy, and when what she truly believes flies in the face of the campaign’s talking points, Kate must decide what is best.

Everything That Makes You by Moriah McStay: In alternating voices, Fiona “Fi” Doyle experiences her teen years in two ways, with and without a disfiguring accident that occurred at age six, dealing with its effects on her brother and parents, her friendships, her dating life, her involvement in sports and hobbies, her future plans, and especially her self-image.

Mosquitoland by David Arnold: After the sudden collapse of her family, Mim Malone is dragged from her home in northern Ohio to the “wastelands” of Mississippi, where she lives in a medicated milieu with her dad and new stepmom. Before the dust has a chance to settle, she learns her mother is sick back in Cleveland. So she ditches her new life and hops aboard a northbound Greyhound bus to her real home and her real mother, meeting a quirky cast of fellow travelers along the way. But when her thousand-mile journey takes a few turns she could never see coming, Mim must confront her own demons, redefining her notions of love, loyalty, and what it means to be sane.

The Storyspinner by Becky Wallace: The Keepers, a race of people with magical abilities, are seeking a supposedly-dead princess to place her on the throne and end political turmoil, but girls who look like the princess are being murdered and Johanna Von Arlo, forced to work for Lord Rafael DeSilva after her father’s suspicious death, is a dead-ringer.

Written in the Stars by Aisha Saeed: Naila’s vacation to visit relatives in Pakistan turns into a nightmare when she discovers her parents want to force her to marry a man she’s never met. 

Solitaire by Alice Oseman: In case you’re wondering, this is not a love story. My name is Tori Spring. I like to sleep and I like to blog. Last year – before all that stuff with Charlie and before I had to face the harsh realities of A-Levels and university applications and the fact that one day I really will have to start talking to people – I had friends. Things were very different, I guess, but that’s all over now. Now there’s Solitaire. And Michael Holden. I don’t know what Solitaire are trying to do, and I don’t care about Michael Holden. I really don’t.

Unlikely Hero of Room 13B by Teresa Toten: Adam not only is trying to understand his OCD, while trying to balance his relationship with his divorced parents, but he’s also trying to navigate through the issues that teenagers normally face, namely the perils of young love. 

My Best Everything by Sarah Tomp: When her father loses her college tuition money, Lulu works with Mason, a local boy, making and selling moonshine but their growing romance may mean giving up her dream of escaping her small Virginia hometown.

Dead to Me by Mary McCoy: In 1948 Hollywood, a treacherous world of tough-talking private eyes, psychopathic movie stars, and troubled starlets, sixteen-year-old Alice tries to find a young runaway who is the sole witness to a beating that put her sister, Annie, in a coma.

How to Win at High School by Owen Matthews: Partly for the sake of his brother Sam, who is paralyzed, Adam decides to go from high school loser to god by selling completed homework assignments, buying alcohol, and arranging for fake IDs, but before the end of junior year, he realizes his quest for popularity has gone way too far.

The Memory Key by Liana Liu: In the not-so-distant future, everyone is implanted with a memory key to stave off a virulent form of Alzeimer’s. Lora Mint fears her memories of her deceased mother are fading, but when her memory key is damaged she has perfect recall–of everything– which brings her mother’s memory vividly back–but may also drive Lora mad

Guest Post: On Writing Realistic, Flawed Parents in YA by Bryan Bliss (& giveaway of NO PARKING AT THE END TIMES)

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I’m really excited to share this guest post from debut author Bryan Bliss today. Bliss is the author of No Parking at the End Times, which I wrote about earlier this week. When I finished the book, I couldn’t stop thinking about the portrayal of the parents in this story, and I asked if he’d be interested in talking a bit more about parents in YA fiction. It’s a topic that comes up in terms of parents being bad pretty frequently, but rarely do we look at parental intentions in YA fiction — what if parents aren’t bad but don’t always come off in the best light, despite doing what they think is right?

Enjoy this thoughtful post and at the end, you have the chance to win a copy of Bliss’s novel.

Bryan Bliss is the author of No Parking at the End Times. He has worked with teenagers for more than ten years and holds an MFA from Seattle Pacific University. This is his first novel. You can find him on Twitter @brainbliss. 

When people read my debut novel, No Parking at the End Times, the first thing I hear is some combination of: Those awful parents! and Somebody call Child Protective Services! As they make mistake after mistake (most of which would be unforgivable on their own), and continue risking everything because of the misguided prophecy of a radio preacher… let’s just say that readers don’t exactly empathize with them.
And I get it, I really do. Facebook alone gives me enough reason to seek out blood pressure medication. Stories about parents who take their daughters – and its always the daughters – to purity balls are guaranteed to get my blood going. Yet, whenever somebody gets in a huff about the parents in my novel, I pause and immediately think: Yeah, but…
From the very beginning, I wanted No Parking to be a story about a girl losing faith in her parents. Granted, it would happen on a bigger scale than most of us will ever face. But that rush of understanding – when and how a teenager transitions to the reality that her parents are not perfect – is so real, so painful, it fueled every moment of the book. But it left me with a challenging quandary: what do you do with parents who – arguably – have ruined the lives of their children? How do you write about the people you’d usually mock on Facebook?
The problem, of course, is that many parents in young adult fiction are not flawed. Sure, they have cute issues – you know the type. Oh Dad, you’re so goofy! Mom! Stop trying to buy me all these clothes… I don’t want to wear a dress! These central-casting problems can easily be spun as authentic in the pages of a novel. They become subplots, little moments that challenge the main character in-between bigger plot points.
And that’s fine. I’m not going to talk badly about these characters. 
But I want more. A lot more. 
I want to see the perfect mom lose her shit at the school assembly. I want to see the dad who’s struggling to make rent accidentally – and regrettably – snap at his kids. I want parents who, in the pages of our novels, make real mistakes that actively and deeply affect the lives of their children. If we’re going to claim that young adult literature has depth – which it certainly does – we need to give our parents scars. We need real representations of the adults in most teenagers’ lives. We need them to be fallible. And we need to understand why they are that way.
A case could be made that there are already plenty of flawed parents in young adult literature. Richie, from Rainbow Rowell’s Eleanor and Park immediately comes to mind. Is there a more despised character in YA? For me, no. But is Richie flawed or is he a villain? For some, the line between the two is blurred – and not to our benefit. I struggle to find the moment when Richie is ever supportive, when he shows me that he is a loving adult for the children and teenagers in that story. 
And that’s why the vitriol for the parents in No Parking is so confounding. In their own confused way, they are trying to do the right thing for their kids. Their belief system tells them that – if they sell everything, if they really believe – they will be rewarded. So when the End doesn’t come – when a desperate family has its only answer taken away – what do they do? 
They stay. Of course they stay. This is their answer. What happens if they leave and then the Rapture happens? What then? No matter what anybody says, I will argue this point until I am out of breath. They stay.
Because they are good parents. They are confused parents. They are flawed parents. In my mind, these three things are inextricable and necessary. To use the parents in my novel simply as a way to mock their belief – without realizing how much pain they’re in, how worried they really are – is not only a mistake for the story, but also for the readers.
If we’re going to create believable adults in young adult literature, we need to be brave enough to not only write unlikable and flawed parents – but to write them with the same care and compassion we bring to Nuclear Mom and Dad.  If we don’t, we’re in danger of teaching teenagers that adulthood means finally having all of our shit worked out.

But I’m still not there. Are you?

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Want to win a copy of Bliss’s No Parking at the End Times? I’ll give away two finished copies sometime mid-March. As long as you can get books from the Book Depository, you can enter!