Last year I met Felton Reinstein in Stupid Fast and fell madly in love with his character. Then, of course, Herbach’s book went on to win the Cybils award in YA fiction. The combination of a great male lead who was able to tackle the tough issues of family, love, small town life, and friendship with humor and with depth stood out. So when I heard there was a continuation of the story, I was beyond excited. And Nothing Special lives up.

After we left Felton in Stupid Fast, he was making a name for himself, and now, he’s being recruited by some of the top colleges in the country for his athletic prowess. It’s stressing him out — as it would — because he wants to make sure he’s making the right choice. If the attention he garnered last year made him crazy, the attention he’s getting on the national level now is making him downright insane.

Things at home aren’t as bad as they were last year, but they’re also not exactly great. Especially when Andrew, his brother, goes missing. Turns out Andrew’s taken an impromptu trip to Florida and now Felton has to go rescue him and bring him back home. Without his mother finding out. He pulls off this wild road trip in a strikingly similar way his brother pulled it off: with a few little lies to his mother about where he was going for a week. Whereas Andrew said he was heading to a camp in northern Wisconsin, Felton tells his mom he’s heading to a recruitment camp in another state. And Jerri, their mother who has never quite had herself together, buys the story. It’s then Felton sets off to Florida with Gus. Gus who used to be his best friend. Gus who now Felton feels he has little or nothing in common with anymore.

Let me back up a second and explain how the book is set up. It’s a letter to Aleah, Felton’s girlfriend/not a girlfriend, and it’s written at the end of the summer between airport trips down to Florida. He’s explaining the road trip with Gus in the past, since it had already happened. By framing the story this way, Herbach not only leaves readers wondering where Felton is heading now, but he complicates it further by making us wonder what happened between the initial road trip and the flights because in both instances, we know Felton’s going to Florida. This works well not only because it pushes the story forward but also because it mirrors how the first story was set up. We know Felton’s the kind of guy who needs to work his problems out by paper. It would be inauthentic to his character for this to be a straightforward narrative.

Nothing Special is Felton’s story, but it’s just as much about Andrew, even though he doesn’t once have an opportunity to tell. We’re wondering right along with Felton why his brother skipped town and lied about it, and as he pieces together the story, we start to get a real image of who Andrew is and why he would make this decision.

If your brother were getting so much attention at home, you wouldn’t blame Andrew, either. If you were constantly living in the shadow of a guy being recruited by so many big name schools, you would look for a place where you could earn some attention. But Andrew’s reason for his trip to Florida are much more than about finding a place where he could stand out and be special. It’s about reconnecting with his family. With family who his mother has essentially divorced herself from and never told her boys about. If you’ll remember in the first book, Felton helps reconnect with a long long family member, this is what is going to happen through Andrew. Except — and maybe this is pretty bold — I think Andrew’s much more successful in his quest and helps both himself and Felton reconsider what it means to be family and to love one another.

The family relationships and family dynamics in this story ring true. Where I could see some readers suggesting that maybe there’s too much mess in Felton’s family, I buy every moment of this story. Families are tricky things. It’s not always clear where people stand with one another, despite being connected by genetics. I’m not sure in the end that things are resolved, either, and that’s a huge part of what figuring out family is all about. It constantly shifts and changes and it’s not always comfortable. At times, I found myself getting a little welled up because Felton’s experiences with family hit close to him.  Fortunately, Felton’s trademark humor brings levity to the situations he works through. They don’t become heavy issues nor do they become messages or lessons to learn. They just are.

Herbach’s writing is easy to read and he nails voice. Felton still remains one of the most authentic males I’ve read in YA. He had feelings and thoughts, but he doesn’t necessarily act upon them in the most logical manner nor in the way we would want him to. He makes mistakes and he does stupid things. But he has to in order to get to the heart of things. He’s selfish and self-absorbed, but it doesn’t make him the kind of character you dislike because of it. Instead, he’s able to gain the reader’s interest and sympathy because of these qualities. The thing is, you know deep down he is a great guy and he knows deep down he’s a great guy too.

As much as this is a story about family, Nothing Special is also a story about friendship and about love. Where Felton found himself lost without Gus the summer before, he’s learning that maybe he and Gus aren’t meant to be the kind of friends who stick together to the end. Relationships are dynamic, ever-shifting things, and Felton learns to deal with this head on while in the car with Gus. They’ve both changed and their lives are going separate ways. Part of it has to do with Felton’s character and his selfishness, but part of the blame lies squarely on Gus for the same reasons. Then there’s Aleah. We know this entire story is a letter to Aleah, but what makes it more powerful is knowing how much of himself Felton gives her through it. He’s raw and broken, and he is absolutely unafraid of being that way with her, even if he’s not entirely sure of what their future together is. That Felton has this sort of person in his life made me cheer because, even if she’s not right there with him in person, she’s there with him in the way he really needs her. She’s there to listen. 

As soon as I finished the book, I wrote down a quote that stuck with me and that I think nails Felton’s character and his story: “If you act out of love, whatever you do is both perfect and right. It doesn’t matter if you’re a deep thinker or a squirrel nut if you act out of love. Crap starts getting seriously screwed if something else gets in the way, something like fear or revenge or even victory or being famous or some other dumb thing. The only thing we need to do is figure out what we really love.” Even though things suck sometimes, even if things suck a lot of the time, and even if things make no sense whatsoever when they’re happening, all that matters is acting out of love. Felton, for all his faults, is ultimately a likable because as readers, we know this is precisely why he does the things he does. 

Nothing Special will appeal to the same readers who fell in love with the first book, and while it’s possible to read this one without having read Stupid Fast, I wouldn’t recommend it. To come to the conclusions Felton does, readers need to stick with him throughout. My only qualms with this story are that at times it feels it runs a little long and at times it takes on a lot of heavy issues at once. It’s not that they’re not relevant or important to the story, but it can feel a bit overwhelming to the reader. Herbach, though, has a gift for voice, and I am beyond excited to see what sort of story he offers next. If you like funny, thoughtful, and authentic male characters, this book and its predecessor are essential reads. 

Review copy received from the publisher. Nothing Special is available now.

I made it a goal to read 35 debut novels this year, and as of the time I’m writing this post, I’ve already finished 23. Rather than settle on reading my favorite genre, though, I’ve been pushing myself to read outside my comfort zone with debut novels. Here are three of the recent debuts I’ve read and I think you’ll see what I’m talking about. All three of these novels also share an element of government conspiracy to them.

Hemlock by Kathleen Peacock is a paranormal featuring werewolves — something way outside my usual fare. But this story is so much more than a paranormal werewolf novel; it’s a mystery full of heart, with a great main character who doesn’t fall into the trappings I find to be too-common in these sorts of stories.

Mac’s best friend Amy died, and it’s believed her death is related to the outbreak of the werewolf disease hitting the town of Hemlock. The town’s under surveillance, and even though Amy wasn’t the first to die, the circumstances relating to her death are suspicious enough that the government wants to get to the bottom of the disease. They want to protect their citizens and put an end to the fear once and for all.

Kyle and Jason are Mac’s other two friends — Kyle had always been her closest friend, the one everyone thought she should get together with romantically and Jason is the guy who had been dating Amy before she died. There is a love triangle developing, but the way Peacock handles this is fantastic. Never once is Mac the girl figuring out which guy she should be with. Instead, this is a story where the male leads are the vulnerable ones, where their feelings are the ones we have to sort out. Mac has great agency and a brain in her head; this allows her to pursue things as she wants to pursue them. All three of these characters are flawed, and when the mystery surrounding Amy’s death amps up, with Mac at the helm, these flaws become more apparent.

Maybe what I appreciated most about this, aside from the mystery woven through the werewolf lore, was that these characters have no super powers. These are your average teenagers, and because of that, they’re so limited in how they can behave and act. They aren’t going to solve the mystery easily and part of that is because the truth is there is a political conspiracy afoot.

The biggest weakness to Hemlock for me was that the secondary characters were challenging to keep apart and when one of them ended up playing a pretty significant role in the story, I kinda had forgotten who he was. Hand this one off to readers who like paranormal stories but are looking for something fresh, as well as those readers who are looking for a different kind of mystery. Obviously, this one will also go over well with your werewolf fans. I give Peacock some major props for sliding a great reference to Ginger Snaps into the book too. Hemlock is available now.

SD Crockett’s After the Snow hooked me with the dialog, which reminded me a lot of Moira Young’s Blood Red Road (which I really liked) but ultimately, this post-apocalyptic/dystopian novel left me somewhat unsatisfied.

Willo, a half-wild, nature-driven teen, comes home after a day of trapping to discover his father and his father’s wife have disappeared. They’ve resided deep in the wilderness, far away from the city where the government has strapped down control and power over the citizens. The entire world is very, very cold (figuratively and literally). Willo wants to find his family so bad, and so he takes off on a journey away from his home, in hopes of tracking them down. Along the way, he stops at another home, where he finds Mary, and together, they are going to survive and find their families.

Of course it’s not that easy, and they end up being transported right into the city where the government has taken control. They’re lucky to make it inside, since they don’t have papers to identify them. Once there, though, Willo ditches Mary in hopes of being able to seek out his father (he’s gotta look out for number one). People here are not nice, and they all want to steal the coat off his back because it’s a luxury none of them have seen in a long time. But he’s taken in by an older man and woman who put his creation skills to the test, and they’re able to sell apparel with his talent. The woman who has been buying his creations, though, knows where his father is and when she begins to tell him how he can get to safety, all hell breaks loose.

The problems with this story were two-fold: Willo as a character was very hard to follow. His dialect isn’t problematic because it gives us a great sense of his education, his class, and his wildness. He’s very much nature-driven and very much about the survivalist method employed by wild animals. Except his heart is driven in finding his father and that’s where it becomes challenging to connect with him or understand what he’s doing. We don’t get a sense of what’s going on in Willo’s mind, and when he makes choices, they aren’t logical to us as readers. This in and of itself wouldn’t be a challenge, except it is made that way because readers are not given a sense of what is at stake in the city. It’s never clear what the government is doing that’s so bad. We’re never clear why Willo or anyone should be fearful. We don’t know what it is they need to escape from. Part of this has to do with Willo’s lack of knowledge, since the story’s from his perspective, except since we don’t know much about Willo, the tactic falls flat. It leaves the reader confused and unable to emotionally connect with him.

The ending was also unsatisfying. It was too obvious from the beginning and made the journey — the long and frustration journey — even more a question of why? Why did we follow it?

That said, After the Snow has earned three starred reviews from readers who figured out the world much more than I did, but browsing non-professional journals, it appears many others had the same challenges I did. Hand this over to readers who are ready for a challenging read that’s more about style than about world-building. It’s at heart a survival story. After the Snow is available now.

Emmy Laybourne’s Monument 14 is another post-apocalyptic/dystopian novel and it hooked me from the premise alone: 14 kids, ranging in age from elementary school students all the way through high school students, are on their way to school when the sky opens up and starts destroying everything. They have to take refuge in the nearest safe place, which is the Greenway store (think big box, like Walmart). The employees from the store have died because they went outside and were crushed by the massive hail. Their bus driver — arguably the most interesting character in the story — goes out and never comes back. Now they’ve got to fend for themselves in a world that is falling apart before their own eyes.

All of these kids are trapped in what is probably the best place to be stuck during a catastrophe. They’ve got everything they could possibly need all in front of them. They have things they can sleep on. They have food they can eat. They have electricity (which they have to conserve). I guess it stunk they didn’t have water, but they did have it in bottles, and they figured out how to handle the bathroom situation (in far too much detail, I think). They can’t communicate with the outside world because the Network is down.

Apparently, there is some sort of government conspiracy going on in this story, too, but it is never explained. There are snatches of it — the knowledge that something being released into the system causes people to exhibit certain physical problems, based on their blood type — but it is so minimal. The story focuses much more on the minutia of life inside this store. That’s to say there’s no apparent external threat in this story. For a moment, there’s a crazy guy outside who wants to get in, and when the kids choose to allow two men come in from the outside, there are small moments of wondering what could go wrong. But otherwise, Monument 14 suffers from being boring because there’s not really anything worth worrying about. Likewise, this is also a future world, but never once did it feel like that was the case because that plot line was never explored.

More than that, though, what Laybourne’s story doesn’t offer us is any good character development. There are 14 characters, and most of them get little to no page time. The teen characters get a little more time, as they should, but they offer us no reason to worry about them. Two of the main female characters are depicted in very problematic ways, too: one is given the reputation and storyline of being a slut (and it’s done in a very disturbing manner, in a scene that made me very, very uncomfortable to read because it objectified her terribly) and then she’s raped later on in the story but the characters don’t necessarily buy this from her because of her reputation; the other girl, who we get to meet in a very intimate moment (one where she ends up hurting a boy pretty bad) we find out is expecting a baby. There is a third girl, but she’s given so little time it’s hard not to walk away wondering what the message about females and males was in this story.

Monument 14 is the first in a series, and I am pretty certain I won’t be picking up the next title. This one didn’t offer me any reason to because it didn’t offer me compelling characters or a world worth caring about. The ending is very much first-in-a-series in terms of being a cliffhanger, but it was more disappointing than hooking. If characters in the story aren’t going at this with their whole heart, I can’t either. I left this one feeling bored, disinterested, and deeply unsatisfied as a reader. Other books have taken this concept of teens trapped together and offered up not only strong characters, but also great external threats. Monument 14 will be available June 5.

Review copies provided by the publishers.

If you’ll remember last year, I reviewed Megan McCafferty’s Bumped, calling it insane and hilarious. The dystopian society built in the book was meant to be a satire of not only other books in the genre but of society more generally. It was a world where adults over a certain age couldn’t reproduce, so they purchased the bodies of teen girls to have their children. And at the end of the book, readers were left wondering what happened to twin sisters Harmony and Melody.

Thumped answers those questions and many, many more.

Harmony, the “godly” sister, has returned to Goodside, the community which protects its citizens from the greater world. It’s a bubble and it’s essentially cut off from modernity so the residents can practice their spiritual beliefs without fear. Harmony’s returned to this place pregnant, leaving her also-pregnant sister Melody behind. The girls, both pregnant with twins, will be giving birth at the same time, and the country is so excited about the spectacle that will be the Double Double Due Date. But after 35 weeks apart from one another, neither Harmony nor Melody can stand being apart from one another. It’s not just their sadness for each other though. Harmony is missing Jondoe, the guy who she’d developed real feelings for (who happened to, of course, be the guy who Melody’s body was sold to for reproductive purposes and who shot the sisters into the spotlight in the first place). Enter a series of events that break Harmony free of Goodplace and right in the midst of reuniting with her sister and the guy for whom she really cares.

Of course, everyone’s got their eyes on the girls and their expanding baby bumps. These are two extremely popular celebrity girls now, and they can’t let their fans down. Or can they? Are they even telling the truth about their due dates? About who the fathers of their respective babies are?

Where Bumped was a very plot-driven story, McCafferty flips the switch and makes Thumped a more character-driven story. The first third of the book is a little tough to get through. The writing is a little clunky and the events a little convenient, but they’re forgivable because they’re required to get to the meat of the story. I found the initial book in the series to focus heavily on Melody and her rise to the spotlight, but in this edition, it’s Harmony who has the chance to have a real voice. That’s part of why the weaker writing is forgivable in the beginning: we’re given the opportunity to hear and understand Harmony, why she’s desperate to leave Goodside, and how she plans on pursuing her love for Jondoe (and escaping her marriage to Ram). Where I’d never had feelings about her as a character, I’m given the opportunity to not only develop them, but I really rooted for her. She’d been dragged into the situation by being Melody’s sister and though she’s not bitter, she kind of got the raw end of the deal.

Thumped is an eerie read if for no other reason than the fact the world it describes is so close to our own. Despite being a dystopia, the social realities very much mirror not only what we’re living with now politically, but they also mirror the fears we have about what our world could become. Melody and Harmony’s government is obsessed with protecting its citizens, to the point that their own bodies are seen not as their bodies, but as bodies belonging to the government. This is evident not only through the way the pregnancies are treated, but also through the decisions the girls are not allowed to make. There’s a scene right after Harmony gives birth where the nurse informs her she cannot breastfeed her children because the government had decided it wasn’t the right method for taking care of children. Despite the babies being her own and despite her body’s functional ability to provide nutrients to her children, the government said it wasn’t okay to do. And she can’t fight it. It was during this particular scene that the story began to break my heart much more than it had from the start. Not only have the girls lost their rights to their own bodies, but it’s here where we learn the truth about Harmony and Melody’s mother.

It’s also in these moments post-birth where both girls declare themselves independent and whole beings. They’re no longer interested in being tools for the government and they’re no longer interested in being tools for societal entertainment. More than that, they both come to realize that the decisions other people have made for themselves are not the decisions they have to make and they’re not decisions that they can change or undo. They’re only able to think and act for themselves as individuals. This is a huge moment in the story, not only because of what it says about rebelling against a dystopian world, but also because of what it says for the future of these girls who’d become so enmeshed in a world who followed their every move. They’re no longer going to allow anyone to dictate who or what they are except themselves. Harmony and Melody are taking ownership of their own bodies here, too. McCafferty has a great scene between Melody and her long-time crush where it seems like they’re going to finally consummate their relationship. Except, the boy is unwilling to use a condom since it’s one of the only ones left around and he believes Melody should be fine anyway. That there’d be no worries about the consequences of sex on her body. It’s right here where Melody stands up for herself and where she realizes how important it is to take care of herself, even if it means sacrificing something she always thought she wanted. The fact this is illustrated via condoms — a tool used by a male in a sexual relationship — only further nails home the point. 

Thumped is still satirical like the initial story, but that satire begins to lessen as the book progresses. This is where the book excels. Where the girls had seen themselves as satire, as tools to make a point by their government in Bumped, now they’ve woken up and come to understand they’re full beings. They’re the ones who are in control of their future and their decisions and if they want to say no, they can do that. Their happiness and satisfaction with their own lives are not contingent upon anyone but themselves. If they do not want to live their lives under religious canopies, they don’t have to. If they don’t want their bodies to become tools for population growth, they don’t have to. If they don’t want to be in an unhappy marriage or relationship, they don’t have to. Bumped was the story the government wanted to tell — that’s why it’s so plot-driven — but Thumped is the girls’ story. That’s why it is so character driven. I didn’t think I’d find myself welling up reading this book, but I definitely did. The messages here are fantastic, feminist, powerful, and really damn pertinent and relevant to today’s world.

This isn’t an easy read and it is essential to read the first book before diving into Thumped, but this is the kind of book that should be read and discussed with teens. It’s smart without being pretentious and without hitting the reader over the head with messages. I think that’s part of why I did get a little teary. The emotional impact of the book is unexpected and a great payoff. Melody kind of sums it all up with these lines: “I’m the only one who will take credit for my successes. And I’m the only one who will take the blame for my mistakes. From now on, I live for me.” Hand this book off to those who have read and loved the first book and to those looking for a unique take on the dystopia trend (after, of course, making them read Bumped). McCafferty ranks high on my list of favorite authors and this book only further solidified it. 

I don’t usually talk about covers in my reviews, but I have to say: this cover, as well as the cover for the predecessor, are absolutely brilliant. If I had to describe these two stories via one image each, Bumped would be the whole and perfect egg while Thumped would be the one that’s cracked. So simple yet so meaningful. 

Review copy received from the author via the publisher. Thumped is available now.

Eighth grader Bounce — her nickname — comes from the right side of the tracks. Her parents work for a drug company, and aside from having an endless supply of oxycontin, she lives in a nice house, has little supervision, and has never had a real problem in her life. She’s confident. No actually, she’s cocky. Bounce believes she owns the world and everyone in it.

When she’s challenged by a poet in her English class, suddenly Bounce begins feeling like she’s losing her edge a bit. She’s beyond frustrated anyone would challenge her or call her out, suggest she’s not everything great and wonderful in the world. So Bounce does what she does best and decides to get revenge. Enter Wiggins and Orange, two seventh grade boys who are enamored by the idea of having the attention of such a powerful, older girl.

As a means of getting revenge on the poet, Bounce decides to kidnap a four-year-old girl who they’ve nicknamed Frog. They’ve chained the little girl in Orange’s basement and have given her a video game to keep her occupied. Bounce, Wiggins, and Orange plan on using Frog’s kidnapping as an opportunity to raise money — they’re telling people they plan on using that cash to fund supplies for creating posters and awareness campaigns of the girl’s disappearance. Of course, that money isn’t going to be used for that purpose. Bounce’s real plan is to use that money to purchase a weapon and seek her revenge on the poet.

The Children and the Wolves might be one of the riskiest books I’ve read in a while. It’s short, clocking in at only about 160 pages, but within those pages, there are so many broken characters, terrible situations, and so much to unpack. Rapp’s story is told through multiple narrators. We’re dropped immediately into Wiggins’s story, and his home life is anything but happy. His mother’s fairly useless, too preoccupied with men and other things to care about her son. He’s also from the wrong side of the tracks, and not only is this shown through his experiences at home, it’s shown through his lack of education. His chapters are not the easiest to read because Wiggins struggles with literacy issues. We’re forced to see the world through his eyes and his somewhat simplistic thinking. It’s essential to remember this when reading because at times, what Wiggins says or how he addresses certain people in the book is uncomfortable to read. There are racial slurs without consequence. While it’s jarring to readers, it’s who he is as a character. Although it seems like Wiggins might be the kind of character you’d hate, he has an immense heart and wants to do right by everyone. This is why he goes along with Bounce’s idea in the first place and why he continues to treat Frog as a pet to take care of, rather than as a human being he should help out. He likes the acceptance he received from Bounce. It’s something he’s not getting elsewhere. While Bounce’s payback scheme seems like it’s the crux of the story, I actually think this is much more Wiggin’s tale than hers.

Orange is part of the story because he’s also easily manipulated by Bounce but more importantly, he has a place they can house Frog. Orange’s father is disabled and unable to get around well at home, so his entire life is confined to the first floor of their home. Orange, like Wiggins, is from the poor side of town and sees the opportunity to serve as a tool in Bounce’s scheme as good for him. He, too, needs the acceptance. But maybe more frightening about Orange, as opposed to Wiggins, is that he’s much more inclined to violence.

The final player in the story is Frog, the kidnapped girl. She doesn’t have a lot of page time and really, she doesn’t need it. She’s much more a prop in the story than a real character, and the fact Rapp writes her that way is proof to how all of the other characters see her. She’s not a fighter at all — she doesn’t struggle to get free from Orange’s basement. Instead, she contents herself on playing a video game all day long. The video game follows a bunch of children who are in the trees trying to escape the wolves who live on the ground. It’s a game about sacrifice and power. As much as it’s a game, it’s a much larger metaphor for the entire plot of the story.

The Children and the Wolves successfully executes the multiple narrator, as well as successfully executes four distinct voices. This is a book that really does have a voice for everyone, and those voices are only heightened by the obstacles they’re trying to overcome. Rapp’s story is very mature; while all of these characters behave and speak like middle schoolers, never once did I feel like I was reading a younger YA book. It’s intended for older YA readers, and by successfully making readers forget how young these characters really are, Rapp is able to make these characters and their stories even more bleak. More than that, this story will leave you wondering who is in the right and who is in the wrong. As much as it seems like Bounce is entirely in the wrong here, her situations do leave you questioning whether or not this is an act of desperation — a plea for help — more than a nasty trick meant for payback. And as much as the boys feels like tools in her game, are they maybe more right than wrong in doing what they’re doing?

As soon as I finished The Children and the Wolves, I immediately flipped back to the beginning of the story to read it again. The story’s short length but deeply developed characters and complicated situations made me want to go back and see what other layers I could uncover. This book was recommended to me by Blythe Woolston, and I can’t help but see how similar it is to her own books. Rapp’s title will appeal to those who like their stories dark, unsettled, and with compelling and complicated characters. Do not give this to sensitive readers — it’s for your mature ones. I’ll make the bold statement now that I think this title will see some sort of award recognition at the end of the year. Despite being a relatively quiet release, it packs a punch.

I purchased my copy of the book. The Children and the Wolves is available now.