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February Debut YA Novels

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Keeping track of this year’s debut YA novels? Here’s a look at what’s out this month. Like last month, we’ll come back and link up our reviews as we have them this year. If we’re missing any traditionally published debut YA novels, feel free to leave a note in the comments. 

All descriptions come from WorldCat. 

Crash and Burn by Michael Hassan: Steven “Crash” Crashinsky relates his sordid ten-year relationship with David “Burn” Burnett, the boy he stopped from taking their high school hostage at gunpoint. Reviewed here.

Blaze, or Love in the Time of Supervillans by Laurie Boyle Crompton: Treated badly by Mark, on whom she had a crush, seventeen-year-old Blaze posts a comic strip featuring him as a supervillain and Mark retaliates by spreading a “sext” of Blaze, but her little brother and his friends heroically come to her aid. 

Dance of Shadows by Yelena Black: Fifteen-year-old Vanessa follows her sister Margaret to an elite Manhattan ballet school, not only gaining admission but also earning the lead in a production of the Firebird, while trying to uncover why and how Margaret and other lead dancers have disappeared. (It’s possible this is not a debut because it’s a product of a packager, but I’m going to let it slide).

Dancing in the Dark by Robyn Bavati: Ditty was born to dance, but she was also born Jewish. When her strictly religious parents won’t let her take ballet lessons, Ditty starts to dance in secret. But for how long can she keep her two worlds apart? And at what cost? A dramatic and moving story about a girl who follows her dream, and finds herself questioning everything she believes in. 

City of a Thousand Dolls by Miriam Forster: Nisha lives in the City of a Thousand Dolls, a remote estate where orphan girls in the Empire become apprentices as musicians, healers, and courtesans, her closest companions the mysterious cats that trail her shadow. When girls begin to die, Nisha begins to uncover the secrets that surround the deathers–jeopardizing not only her own future within the City but her own life.

Dualed by Elsie Chapman: West Grayer lives in a world where every person has a twin, or Alt. Only one can survive to adulthood, and West has just received her notice to kill her Alt. 

The Reece Malcolm List by Amy Spalding: When her father dies suddenly, Devan is shipped off to Los Angeles to live with her estranged mother, Reece Malcolm, a bestselling novelist with little time for a daughter, and Devan navigates her way through her new performing arts school. Reviewed here. 

The Ruining by Anna Collomore: Still feeling guilty over the death of her little sister leaves eighteen-year-old Annie vulnerable when she takes a nanny job in beautiful Marin County, California, and meets her very controlling employer.

Pivot Point by Kasie West: A girl with the power to search alternate futures lives out six weeks of two different lives in alternating chapters. Both futures hold the potential for love and loss, and ultimately she is forced to choose which fate she is willing to live thorugh. 

The Whole Stupid Way We Are by N. Griffin: During a cold winter in Maine, fifteen-year-old Dinah sets off a heart-wrenching chain of events when she tries to help best friend and fellow misfit Skint deal with problems at home, including a father who is suffering from early onset dementia. Reviewed here.

Me, Him, Them, and It by Caela Carter: Playing the “bad girl” at school to get back at her feuding parents, sixteen-year-old Evelyn becomes pregnant and faces a difficult decision.

Pantomime by Laura Lam: R. H. Ragona’s Circus of Magic is the greatest circus of Ellada. Nestled among the glowing blue Penglass—remnants of a mysterious civilisation long gone—are wonders beyond the wildest imagination. It’s a place where anything seems possible, where if you close your eyes you can believe that the magic and knowledge of the vanished Chimaera is still there. It’s a place where anyone can hide. Iphigenia Laurus, or Gene, the daughter of a noble family, is uncomfortable in corsets and crinoline, and prefers climbing trees to debutante balls. Micah Grey, a runaway living on the streets, joins the circus as an aerialist’s apprentice and soon becomes the circus’s rising star. But Gene and Micah have balancing acts of their own to perform, and a secret in their blood that could unlock the mysteries of Ellada.

January YA Debut Novels

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Even though I’m no longer blogging over at YALSA’s blog, The Hub, I wanted to keep up with debut YA novels. As a reader and as a librarian, I want to know what’s coming out and who these new voices are. I’m going to try a roundup each month of that month’s debut novels. I’ll include covers and descriptions via WorldCat. 

If you can think of other traditionally published novels out by debuts in a given month, leave the title in the comments. I hope other people find this as helpful and as interesting as I do.

Over the course of the year, I’ll link up reviews Kimberly and I write on any of these titles for easy access and reference. 

Altered by Jennifer Rush: Seventeen-year-old Anna finds herself on the run from her father’s enigmatic Agency, along with the four teen boys the Agency had been experimenting on, as they try to make sense of erased memories, secret identities, and genetic alteration.

The Fire Horse Girl by Kay Honeyman: When Jade Moon, born in the unlucky year of the Fire Horse, and her father immigrate to America in 1923 and are detained at Angel Island Immigration Station, Jade Moon is determined to find a way through and prove that she is not cursed.

Propechy by Ellen Oh: A demon slayer, the only female warrior in the King’s army, must battle demon soldiers, an evil shaman, and the Demon Lord to find the lost ruby of the Dragon King’s prophecy and save her kingdom.  Kimberly’s review. 

Revolution 19 by Gregg Rosenblum: Twenty years after robots designed to fight wars abandoned the battlefields and turned their weapons against humans, siblings Nick, Kevin, and Cass must risk everything when the wilderness community where they have spent their lives in hiding is discovered by the bots.

The Tragedy Paper by Elizabeth LaBan: While preparing for the most dreaded assignment at the prestigious Irving School, the Tragedy Paper, Duncan gets wrapped up in the tragic tale of Tim Macbeth, a former student who had a clandestine relationship with the wrong girl, and his own ill-fated romance with Daisy.

Level 2 by Lenore Appelhans: Seventeen-year-old Felicia Ward is dead and spending her time in the hive reliving her happy memories–but when Julian, a dark memory from her past, breaks into the hive and demands that she come with him, she discovers that even the afterlife is more complicated and dangerous then she dreamed.

The Cadet of Tildor by Alex Lidell: At the Academy of Tildor, the training ground for elite soldiers, Cadet Renee de Winter struggles to keep up with her male peers, but when her mentor is kidnapped to fight in illegal gladiator games, Renee and best friend Alec struggle to do what is right in a world of crime of political intrigue.

Slated by Teri Terry: Kyla’s memory has been erased, her personality wiped blank, her memories lost for ever. She’s been Slated. The government claims she was a terrorist, and that they are giving her a second chance – as long as she plays by their rules. But echoes of the past whisper in Kyla’s mind. Someone is lying to her, and nothing is as it seems. Who can she trust in her search for the truth?

The Madman’s Daughter by Megan Shepard: Dr. Moreau’s daughter, Juliet, travels to her estranged father’s island, only to encounter murder, medical horrors, and a love triangle.

Nobody But Us by Kristin Halbrook: Told in their separate voices, eighteen-year-old Will who has aged out of foster care, and fifteen-year-old Zoe whose father beats her, set out for Las Vegas together, but their escape may prove more dangerous than what they left behind. Reviewed here. 

Uses for Boys by Erica Lorraine Scheidt (note this description comes from Goodreads): Anna remembers a time before boys, when she was little and everything made sense. When she and her mom were a family, just the two of them against the world. But now her mom is gone most of the time, chasing the next marriage, bringing home the next stepfather. Anna is left on her own—until she discovers that she can make boys her family. From Desmond to Joey, Todd to Sam, Anna learns that if you give boys what they want, you can get what you need. But the price is high—the other kids make fun of her; the girls call her a slut. Anna’s new friend, Toy, seems to have found a way around the loneliness, but Toy has her own secrets that even Anna can’t know. Then comes Sam. When Anna actually meets a boy who is more than just useful, whose family eats dinner together, laughs, and tells stories, the truth about love becomes clear. And she finally learns how it feels to have something to lose—and something to offer. Review here. 

Brianna on the Brink by Nicole McInnes: A one-night stand has life-altering consequences for popular, sixteen-year-old Brianna, who must then accept help from the one person closest to her mistake.

Hooked by Liz Fichera (Goodreads description): When Native American Fredericka ‘Fred’ Oday is invited to become the only girl on the school’s golf team, she can’t say no. This is an opportunity to shine, win a scholarship and go to university, something no one in her family has done. But Fred’s presence on the team isn’t exactly welcome — especially not to rich golden boy Ryan Berenger, whose best friend was kicked off the team to make a spot for Fred. But there’s no denying that things are happening between the girl with the killer swing and the boy with the killer smile.

A pair of debut reviews: Fingerprints of You and Emily’s Dress and Other Missing Things

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I’ve had a few books with outstanding reviews to post, and since two of them happen to be debut novels, I thought I’d go ahead and post these shorter reviews all together. “Shorter” is a very subjective description, as you should know by now if you’ve been reading STACKED. 

Lemon’s life has never been stable. Stella, her mother, uproots them often as she herself cycles through men. But one decision to sleep with the tattoo artist lands Lemon with a pregnancy she’s not sure she’s ready for. Mostly because she’s not sure who she is or what it is she wants. 

Except she knows she wants an adventure for her own to figure it out.

She and friend Emmy purchase bus tickets from their town in West Virginia to go to San Francisco. Lemon knows her dad’s there and even though she tells Emmy it’s part of the adventure they’ll take together during Christmas break, Lemon’s true intention is to find her dad. And when she tells her mom of her plans, rather than say no, her mom tells her where her dad last worked.

Lemon finds her dad and much, much more when she gets to San Francisco. Even when Emmy cuts her trip short because of a family emergency, Lemon sticks it out. She wants to know more about who she is, who her father is, who Stella is, and what life is like when you’ve lost the thing you didn’t know you wanted so badly.

Madonia’s book is a slow starter, and Lemon is a tough character to connect with. But the story and writing are compelling. Lemon’s got it rough, but she doesn’t moan about it. That’s probably what makes her hard to relate to — anyone else in this situation with an unstable life with mom and an absent father and an accidental pregnancy would wallow in pity. But she doesn’t. Instead, she takes control of her future by seeking out the pieces of her past.

Kristen-Page Madonia’s Fingerprints of You is about family and about how family doesn’t always take the nuclear shape we want it to. That family isn’t always the same to everyone within it. Stella, despite her shortcomings, is an excellent mother; but it’s not until Lemon gets to meet her father, who is also a fantastic, caring human being with a wife who, too, cares deeply about Lemon that she realizes how lucky she is. Even if it took 17 years to get, this is the family she needs. 

Where it would be easy to be frustrated by the miscarriage and the convenience of Emmy having to leave San Francisco, I thought they worked for the story. They allowed Lemon to experience real, hard loss with the baby and that allowed her to cherish what she had while she could. Emmy’s needing to return home forced Lemon to learn to lead for herself and forced Lemon to examine the value of friendship. It is ultimately Emmy who leads Lemon to the right choice — for the immediate future, at least.

Along with featuring a non-traditional family, this story features an interracial couple and does so without it ever becoming a point of the story. It’s a true urban relationship between Cassie and Ryan. Though it sounds like this is a story of being broken, it’s not at all an angst-laden, sad story. It’s quite easy to really want the best for Lemon and Stella because they do the best with what they have while they can. Sometimes the best stories don’t feature those in the bleakest of circumstances; rather, those stories you appreciate earn it because of the fight and determination the characters have for themselves. 

The romance between Aiden and Lemon is sweet, and I didn’t think it overshadowed the story. It was what it was to both of them, and it felt very much like a true teen relationship. I read Fingerprints of You a couple of months ago — about the same time I read Carrie Arcos’s Out of Reach, which I wasn’t crazy about — and while they don’t tread the same territory, Madonia’s contemporary is much more literary, fully-developed, and engaging that Arcos’s in a way that made me sort of wish this book had seen more attention. 

Fingerprints of You is available now. I purchased a copy of this book. 

Claire and her father just moves to Amherst, where Emily Dickinson lived. She’s become obsessed with Dickinson, to the point she’s breaking into the home (which operates as a museum) and she’s seeking comfort in there. It’s not really obsession with Dickinson so much as it’s a way to work through the grief in her life. In the last year, her mother died (she killed herself — and it wasn’t her first attempt, but it was the first time Claire couldn’t save her) and her best friend Richy went missing. Claire was a prime suspect in his disappearance since she was the last one to see him, but the case hasn’t been closed and no body has ever been found.

Through Kathryn Burak’s Emily’s Dress and Other Missing Things, we see snatches of what happened in the last year and we watch as Claire works through the grief via the writing she turns into her teacher (and her student teacher Tate, to whom she takes a real shine, despite giving him a bit of a hard tongue). One night, Claire steals a dress from Emily’s home, since she’d been wearing it. It shrouded her in comfort. Tate catches her, and now he’s in on not only the fact she stole this historical artifact, but also that she’s dealing with something so large and heavy on her own.

I found this book dragged, pace-wise. Claire is hard to read, and it’s because this grief consumes her. But the thing is, Claire has something else going on psychologically and it’s never quite clear what. Her illogical thought patterns and erratic behavior make her difficult to follow and I found her hard to care about because, well, I never knew up from down with her. And worse, I didn’t care. Periodically, something in her would stir, and Claire would have a sudden memory that cut through the grief to help her through it — I think this is fairly realistic, especially as everyone grieves differently. More than that though and more problematic is that when she has these break throughs at one point, suddenly everything that happened to Richy that night comes clear to her. If you don’t wan to be spoiled, skip down a paragraph. Claire has a sudden break through with the name of who he was meeting and it was a mix up in her understanding of the word “Dentist” from “Dennis.” This made no sense to me as a reader. But when she figures that out, she suddenly finds this Dennis and remembers his voice and voila, mystery of Richy’s disappearance is solved.  It seemed like there were a lot of conveniences in the plot, and the mystery never quite wove into the grief well at all. A lot of loose ends, with a not-all-there character made the connections a little sloppy.

I’d categorize this as literary only in the sense that it weaves in a lot of American Lit history within it, especially with Emily Dickinson. Though it could have been pushed a lot more and made a lot more interesting with that literary story line, I think. The writing in this is okay, though I found a lot of the transitions between Claire’s writing and Claire’s thinking jarring. It’s part of who she is, but from the reader’s perspective, it could have been smoother and still had the same effect. I particularly found the first few chapters of this book difficult to get through, to the point I almost gave up more than once. The hook wasn’t strong enough and Claire’s inconsistency weren’t holding me. 

Likewise — and this is also spoiler — the entire subplot with Tate and her and their maybe-maybe not romance was boring. I think because I never cared about Claire. She was so wishy washy, so all over the place. Something in her emotions and the emotions in the book never quite rang true nor felt poignant to me. Maybe it’s fair in just saying I did not like her. It’s not that she’s an unlikeable character, though. It was just personal.  

I certainly think there’s a readership for Emily’s Dress and Other Missing Things, but I also think other books do grief much better. Readers who like literary allusions and who are fans of Dickinson will dig this. Maybe if I were more of a Dickinson fan, I’d have picked up on more — it’s possible I missed a lot because it’s been quite a while. I’m more of a Whitman myself (as if that weren’t clear from blogging alone). 


Also, this is worth mentioning because it annoyed me a lot: four times in this book someone’s appearance or expression was negatively compared to a librarian’s. That got old real quick and it’s a description that says nothing. Why four times? Also, really? A “librarian sneer?” I don’t even know what that means. Teens aren’t that fixated on librarian appearances to continually refer to it when describing someone. I’m reviewing from the ARC, so this could have changed in the meantime, but it bothered me nonetheless. 


Emily’s Dress and Other Missing Things is available now. Review copy received from the publisher.