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Booklist: Synesthesia in Middle Grade and YA

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Synesthesia is one of those interesting phenomena that crops up every now and again in fiction for kids and teens. In medical terms, synesthesia is “a condition in which one type of stimulation evokes the sensation of another, as when the hearing of a sound produces the visualization of a color.” It’s the word for when someone says they can feel sounds or taste colors. The most common form is colored hearing: perceiving sounds as colors.

The first encounter I had with it was in R. J. Anderson’s Ultraviolet, which I read a few years ago. I was fascinated by it. I think it’s a difficult condition to understand for those of us who don’t have it, since it deals with the way we perceive the world around us. According to this article from the American Psychological Association, most people who have synesthesia wouldn’t choose to give it up, even though it may cause them some strife. I expect it’s equally strange for synesthetes to consider perceiving the world like I do as it is for me to consider perceiving the world as they do.

For many kids and teens, the path to understanding lies in fiction, so here are a few middle grade and YA titles featuring people with synesthesia. Descriptions are from Worldcat and links go to Goodreads. Do you know of any others? Let me know in the comments.

Ultraviolet by R. J. Anderson
Almost seventeen-year-old Alison, who has synesthesia, finds herself in a
psychiatric facility accused of killing a classmate whose body cannot
be found.

One + One = Blue by M. J. Auch
Branded the class loser, twelve-year-old Basil reluctantly becomes
friends with a bossy new girl who, like Basil, has synesthesia and comes
to Basil’s aid when his estranged mother returns and turns his life
upside down.

The Name of This Book is Secret by Pseudonymous Bosch
Two eleven-year-old misfits try to solve the mystery of a dead magician
and stop the evil Dr. L and Ms. Mauvais, who are searching for the
secret of immortality.

Starseeker by Tim Bowler
Still troubled by the death of his father two years before, Luke, a
virtuoso pianist, falls in with a local gang who persuade him to burgle
the house of a rich widow–an act that draws him into a mystery that
changes his life forever.

A Mango-Shaped Space by Wendy Mass
Afraid that she is crazy, thirteen-year-old Mia, who sees a special
color with every letter, number, and sound, keeps this a secret until
she becomes overwhelmed by school, changing relationships, and the loss
of something important to her.

Mondays are Red by Nicola Morgan
When he wakes up from a coma after having meningitis, fourteen-year-old
Luke finds that he has lost control of his senses and his thoughts and
he must fight an inner demon in order to return to his former life.

Realistic YA Review Round-Up: This Side of Home by Renee Watson, I’ll Meet You There by Heather Demetrios, and Read Between the Lines by Jo Knowles

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I’ve been reading a lot lately and I’ve been really enjoying what I’ve been reading lately. It’s been interesting though, as the more I’ve enjoyed books, the less I’ve wanted to sit down and write lengthy reviews of them. Instead, I’m eager to pick up the next book and cross my fingers it’ll be as good as the one before. Which isn’t to say I don’t want to review anymore nor do I want to quit talking loudly about really great books. Instead, it’s easier to talk about a pile of recent reads at once and make sure I talk about something relating to them before forgetting to mention them at all. More about this later in the week.  

Here’s a look at 3 recent contemporary/realistic YA titles I’ve read and what makes them solid and worthwhile.

Renee Watson’s This Side of Home is about twins Maya and Nikki — both named after the poets — and what it’s like to be living in their Portland neighborhood which has seen significant gentrification over the last few years. The story picks up when Maya’s best friend, who had lived across the street from her, moves to the other side of Portland, and in move a family that’s much different than she’s used to. They represent the changes going on in her community, and she doesn’t want anything to do with it. 

Maya is very reluctant to embrace her community’s changes, where her sister Nikki is more willing to try out new places to eat and shop, and she’s much more accommodating about educational and relationship changes going on around her. There isn’t a message here about whether gentrification is good or bad, and neither Maya nor Nikki are made out to be correct in their attitudes. Instead, this is a story about degrees of change and about sociopolitical and economic changes and how the impact individuals so differently. 

But it’s not all heavy. There’s also a story here about Maya, Nikki, and best friend Essences’s changing dreams. Maya, as readers won’t be surprised to discover, is frustrated when the dreams she and her best friend had to attend the same historically black college together aren’t shared forever. Where she thinks she knows the right thing for everyone, Maya learns that she can only ever control her own future and destiny, and that understanding she can’t push her dreams and expectations on those around her is how she grows her relationships even stronger. 

Maya is stubborn, hard headed, and it’s those things that drive her to be ambitious. This is an outstanding — and fairly quick — read about embracing one’s heritage while being open to change and new experiences. Readers who are seeking stories about race and class issues, especially in an urban setting, will want to pick This Side of Home up.

One side note: while I LOVE the cover, it’s not representative of either Maya nor Nikki. Watson is fairly explicit in how the girls wear their hair on numerous occasions in the story, and neither of them fit the image above. It’s a great cover, but this isn’t either girl in the story. 

This Side of Home is available now. Review copy received from the publisher.

I like a good military-themed YA book, in part because I don’t think there are a whole lot of them out there. Heather Demetrios offers up a fresh story in I’ll Meet You There, which follows Skylar Evans as she begins a relationship with a veteran named Josh who comes back from the Marines. 

This is a romance, which usually isn’t a thing I care about in a story, but it works really well here. Set in a lower class town in California, Skylar works to help keep a roof over the head of her and her mother. When Sky’s mom loses her job, the responsibility put upon her gets even heavier. It’s so heavy, in fact, that Skylar’s wondering if her dreams of getting out of town and going to college will be squashed. 

While working at Paradise, a local motel, Sky “meets” Josh — she knew him before, but it wasn’t until he was working at the same motel where she got to know more of who he is and why it is he’s back in town. His injuries from Afghanistan put him on leave, but as readers learn through the diary entries included in between Sky’s chapters, there’s much more going on with Josh internally. He’s suffering from PTSD and being back home is making him rethink what his future might look like on numerous levels. This isn’t romanticized at all, despite the fact there’s respect for his service. 

Sky isn’t exceptionally defined in this book, but that isn’t a huge mark against this book because there’s so much else going on that is really well fleshed out. The look at class and status here is rarely seen in YA — and interestingly, I read this book immediately after reading My Best Everything by Sarah Tomp which also features a lower socioeconomic class girl who might have to skip her college dreams because of a parent’s job loss — but more, the writing is smooth, breezy, and enjoyable. It could have done without some of the too-modern references, as it might date the book quickly, but readers who enjoyed Trish Doller’s Something Like Normal will enjoy this. 

Bonus points in this one for a very forthright consent scene between Josh and Skylar. What made it stand out wasn’t just that it was Josh seeking consent from Skylar. She seeks consent from him as well. This was a well-drawn look at trust, sexual exploration, and healthy conversation. 

I’ll Meet You There is available now. Review copy received from the publisher.

What is the significance of the middle finger? What does it mean when it’s thrown at you? What did you do to deserve that gesture? 

Jo Knowles explores the lives of ten characters in Read Between the Lines, tying them all together with the flipping of a middle finger. It begins when Nate, who is an unpopular kid at school, gets hurt in gym class. From there, we see that he lives in a not-so-friendly home environment with a father who is disappointed in him. He’s broken his middle finger and dad’s annoyed he has to take his son to the hospital to get it healed. 

Knowles then offers up nine more stories of people who attend this relatively small high school, ranging from the girl who feels like a complete outsider in her tight-knit group of friends, the girl who thinks she’s too fat to be a cheerleader (and experiences the small slights people toss at those who are overweight), to a gay couple who has to keep their relationship a secret from those around them, to a recent graduate of the high school who is counting down the days until he can pursue his dreams, to a teacher who encounters these students and what her experience is as a “replacement” teacher for one who killed himself. While it sounds complicated, it’s relatively straightforward; we get a snapshot into each of their lives at that moment, and in each of the stories — which are short — the character experiences a middle finger at some point, for some transgression they’ve committed. 

Like Siobhan Vivian does in The List, we’re forced to see a community from multiple sides of the story. We meet and re-meet these characters throughout the short glimpses, and because we’re given both their perspective, as well as the biased perspectives of their friends and peers, we are the ones left to make a decision on whether their actions were justified or out of line. 

All of the characters have distinct voices, though not all of their stories have the same resonance. That’s not a flaw of the book, but a feature. Different readers will connect in different ways, 
seeing bits of themselves in some places more than others. But ultimately, Read Between the Lines is about empathy and understanding the complex internal and external lives people are living beyond the setting they’re in currently. This is about how complexity itself is a complex idea. 

Readers who love connected short stories will love this, as will fans of Siobhan Vivian and Laurie Halse Anderson. Knowles sits in a sweet spot between those two voices. 

Read Between the Lines is available tomorrow, March 10. Review copy received from the publisher. 

Get Genrefied: Alternate/Alternative Formats

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Every month, Kimberly and I talk about genres and formats in YA in our “Get Genrefied” series. We’ve tackled everything from high fantasy to thrillers, contemporary/realistic to the graphic novel format. Each month, we love talking back and forth about what topic we want to approach, and we’ve built a nice list of what we haven’t talked about yet.

But this month, I thought I would go back and talk more about a format that I have talked about before. Not because we’re out of ideas, but instead, because it’s a format that got a lot of talk at ALA Midwinter in January from various publishers as being something they’re acquiring and publishing more and more of. That is the alternative format — books that aren’t a traditional narrative structure. Because this isn’t a traditional genre in the same way that urban fantasy or cyberpunk may be, this guide will be a little bit less traditional as well. Alternate format novels take on every genre, and there’s not necessarily an easy, straightforward way to define them. You know what it is when you see it.

Definition

There’s not a singular, solid definition of what a novel in an alternate — or alternative — format is. It’s hard to even say which is the right terminology, alternate or alternative, so for the purposes of this guide, the terms are used interchangeably but mean the same thing.
We’re used to a traditional narrative format when it comes to novels. That doesn’t mean that we expect the same structure with each book, but we expect the story to be composed of lines and paragraphs which flow into chapters of some sort. There’s a linear structure keeping the story together. Alternative formats do away with this linear format we’re used to and instead, they use different methods of story telling. This could be through letters, which make them epistolary novels, through diary entries, through e-mails or instant messages, through Twitter or other social media, through lists, or through mixed media, including novels that are partially traditional narrative and partially graphic novels. 
It could be easily argued that verse novels and novels told through multiple points of view fall under the alternate format umbrella. For me, I don’t know anymore if I agree with that argument. Not because they’re not different, but because there’s a specific term for verse novels (and it’s acknowledged as a format in and of itself) and because the use of multiple points of view isn’t that surprising or different anymore. Multiple points of view still tend to follow the traditional narrative structure, unless they are themselves in an alternate format (say one of the characters tells his or her side of the story through lists or illustrations). This is splitting hairs, of course, and considering either or both as alternate is perfectly reasonable. 
Another kink in defining alternate formats is that it can be tricky to figure out what an end point to the category is. Would alternate format novels also include the sorts of books that feature a digital component to them? Do transmedia works count as alternative formats? It would make sense to say yes to this, though for the purposes of defining alternate formats, as well as keeping this guide tight, I think it’s fair to leave those sorts of books out of the definition because many transmedia works or novels which feature digital components are not entirely dependent on those pieces to tell the story. Often, though not always, that’s bonus content for readers who want to continue digging deeper into the worlds they’re reading. 
So what’s an alternate format then? It’s a book in which non-traditional methods are used to tell the story and those methods are crucial to the understanding of that story. 

Resources

Because alternative formats aren’t a genre in and of themselves, these books are eligible for awards in their appropriate categories. Fiction titles — including graphic hybrids — are as eligible for the Printz, as well as the Morris awards through YALSA, and they’re eligible for the National Book Award in Young People’s Literature. Books in alternate formats are eligible for other respective awards and selection lists through YALSA, including the Best Fiction for Young Adults list and the Excellence in Non-Fiction Award, if the work in question is non-fiction (an example of an alternate format in non-fiction may include something like a graphic hybrid memoir). Depending on the genre of the book in an alternate formate, it may also be eligible for various awards, including the Edgar, the Norton Award, and so forth. 
Of course, because these books are eligible across awards and honor lists, it’s not always easy to pull out which titles are written in alternative formats. This is where reading annotations, as well as writing strong annotations, becomes useful. Making note of books featuring something different in structure makes finding them much easier. 
We’ve put together lists and resources in the past: 
  • As part of the 2012 Contemporary YA week, we put together a list of contemporary/realistic YA in alternate formats. This included novels in verse, as well as books told through multiple points of view. As proof of how much we grow as readers and thinkers, I’m not entirely sure I agree anymore that novels told through verse or in multiple points of view are necessarily alternate formats; however, I think they do offer something different, so they’re worth noting here. 
  • Verse novels as rounded up last year and in previous years. 
Around the book world, a few more resources worth having on hand to make finding alternate format YA novels easier:
  • Jennie wrote about a handful of epistolary YA novels at YA Reading List. 

Reading List 

Because this could be lengthy, this reading list is limited to books published in the last 4 to 5 years. It’s especially heavy on upcoming titles, as this is a format that’s going to be growing in the next year. Links above will lead you to many excellent backlist titles that fit the alternate format category in YA. I’ve also included forthcoming titles I’m aware of, but if there are any missing, lay them on me in the comments. Likewise, this is a contemporary/realistic heavy list, so genre novels fitting the alternate format definition are ones I’d love to know more about as well. 

These books range from being told as graphic hybrids to play scripts, from art class assignments in narrative non-fiction format (fictionalized) to more traditional diary/epistolary formats. As usual, all descriptions are from WorldCat unless otherwise noted. 

Me Being Me Is Exactly As Insane As You Being You by Todd Hasak-Lowy (March 24): Through a series of lists, a narrator reveals how fifteen-year old Darren’s world was rocked by his parents’ divorce just as his brother, Nate, was leaving for college, and a year later when his father comes out as gay, then how he begins to deal with it all after a stolen weekend with Nate and his crush, Zoey.

The Truth Commission by Susan Juby (April 14): As a project for her “creative non-fiction module” at a school for the arts, Normandy Pale chronicles the work of the Truth Commission, through which she and her two best friends ask classmates and faculty about various open secrets, while Norm’s famous sister reveals some very unsettling truths of her own.

The Five Stages of Andrew Brawley by Shaun David Hutchinson: Convinced he should have died in the accident that killed his parents and sister, sixteen-year-old Drew lives in a hospital, hiding from employees and his past, until Rusty, set on fire for being gay, turns his life around. Includes excerpts from the superhero comic Drew creates.



Hold Me Closer: The Tiny Cooper Story by David Levithan (March 17): Larger-than-life Tiny Cooper finally gets to tell his story, from his fabulous birth and childhood to his quest for true love and his infamous parade of ex-boyfriends, in the form of a musical he wrote.

The Bunker Diary by Kevin Brooks: I can’t believe I fell for it. It was still dark when I woke up this morning. As soon as my eyes opened I knew where I was. A low-ceilinged rectangular building made entirely of whitewashed concrete. There are six little rooms along the main corridor. There are no windows. No doors. The lift is the only way in or out. What’s he going to do to me?

Gabi, A Girl in Pieces by Isabel Quintero: Sixteen-year-old Gabi Hernandez chronicles her senior year in high school as she copes with her friend Cindy’s pregnancy, friend Sebastian’s coming out, her father’s meth habit, her own cravings for food and cute boys, and especially, the poetry that helps forge her identity.

Why We Broke Up by Daniel Handler and Maira Kalman: Sixteen-year-old Min Green writes a letter to Ed Slaterton in which she breaks up with him, documenting their relationship and how items in the accompanying box, from bottle caps to a cookbook, foretell the end.

Roomies by Tara Altebrando and Sara Zarr: While living very different lives on opposite coasts, seventeen-year-old Elizabeth and eighteen-year-old Lauren become acquainted by email the summer before they begin rooming together as freshmen at UC-Berkeley.

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl by Jesse Andrews: Seventeen-year-old Greg has managed to become part of every social group at his Pittsburgh high school without having any friends, but his life changes when his mother forces him to befriend Rachel, a girl he once knew in Hebrew school who has leukemia.

Love Letters to the Dead by Ava Dellaria: When Laurel starts writing letters to dead people for a school assignment, she begins to spill about her sister’s mysterious death, her mother’s departure from the family, her new friends, and her first love.

Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock by Matthew Quick: A day in the life of a suicidal teen boy saying good-bye to the four people who matter most to him.

Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs (series): A horrific family tragedy sets sixteen-year-old Jacob journeying to a remote island off the coast of Wales, where he discovers the crumbling ruins of Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children. As Jacob explores its abandoned bedrooms and hallways, it becomes clear that the children who once lived here were more than just peculiar.

 

Asylum by Madeleine Roux (series): Three teens at a summer program for gifted students uncover shocking secrets in the sanatorium-turned-dorm where they’re staying–secrets that link them all to the asylum’s dark past.

Chasing Shadows by Swati Avasthi, illustrated by Craig Phillips: Chasing Shadows is a searing look at the impact of one random act of violence. Before: Corey, Holly, and Savitri are one unit– fast, strong, inseparable. Together they turn Chicago concrete and asphalt into a freerunner’s jungle gym, ricocheting off walls, scaling buildings, leaping from rooftop to rooftop. But acting like a superhero doesn’t make you bulletproof. After: Holly and Savitri are coming unglued. Holly says she’s chasing Corey’s killer, chasing revenge. Savitri fears Holly’s just running wild– and leaving her behind. Friends should stand by each other in times of crisis. But can you hold on too tight? Too long? In this intense novel, told in two voices, and incorporating comic-style art sections, Swati Avasthi creates a gripping portrait of two girls teetering on the edge of grief and insanity. Two girls who will find out just how many ways there are to lose a friend– and how many ways to be lost.

Because You’ll Never Meet Me by Leah Thomas (July 2): Ollie, who has seizures when near electricity, lives in a backwoods cabin with his mother and rarely sees other people, and Moritz, born with no eyes and a heart defect that requires a pacemaker, is bullied at his high school, but when a physician who knows both suggests they begin corresponding, they form a strong bond that may get them through dark times.

  

Bright Lights, Dark Nights by Stephen Emond (August 11): Walter Wilcox’s first love, Naomi, happens to be African American, so when Walter’s policeman father is caught in a racial profiling scandal, the teens’ bond and mutual love of the Foo Fighters may not be enough to keep them together through the pressures they face at school, at home, and online.

Everything, Everything by Nicola Yoon (September 1): My disease is as rare as it is famous. Basically, I’m allergic to the world.I don’t leave my house, have not left my house in seventeen years. The only people I ever see are my mom and my nurse, Carla.

But then one day, a moving truck arrives next door. I look out my window, and I see him. He’s tall, lean and wearing all black–black T-shirt, black jeans, black sneakers, and a black knit cap that covers his hair completely. He catches me looking and stares at me. I stare right back. His name is Olly.

Maybe we can’t predict the future, but we can predict some things. For example, I am certainly going to fall in love with Olly. It’s almost certainly going to be a disaster. (Description via Goodreads). 

Chopsticks by Jessica Anthony and Rodrigo Corral: In a love story told in photographs and drawings, Glory, a brilliant piano prodigy, is drawn to Frank, an artistic new boy, and the farther she falls, the deeper she spirals into madness until the only song she is able to play is “Chopsticks.”

On The Radar: 13 Books for March

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One of the most popular posts I do over at Book Riot is the round-up of upcoming YA fiction titles, and one of the most popular questions I seem to get on Twitter and in my inboxes is “what should I be looking out for in YA?” For a lot of readers, especially those who work with teens either in classrooms or in libraries, knowing what’s coming out ahead of time is valuable to get those books into readers’ hands before they even ask.

Each month, I’ll call out between 8 and 12 books coming out that should be on your radar. These include books by high-demand, well-known authors, as well as some up-and-coming and debut authors. They’ll be across a variety of genres, including diverse titles and writers. Not all of the books will be ones that Kimberly or I have read, nor will all of them be titles that we’re going to read and review. Rather, these are books that readers will be looking for and that have popped up regularly on social media, in advertising, in book mail, and so forth. It’s part science and part arbitrary and a way to keep the answer to “what should I know about for this month?” quick, easy, and under $300 (doable for smaller library budgets especially).

I’m cheating a little bit this month because there are so many releases worth knowing about. Rather than keep to the strict 12 title limit…I’m including 13. So, here are 13 titles to have on your March 2015 radar. All descriptions are from WorldCat, and I’ve included short notes as to why the title was included. 

Bone Gap by Laura Ruby (March 3): Everyone knows Bone Gap is full of gaps—gaps to trip you up, gaps to slide through so you can disappear forever. So when young, beautiful Roza went missing, the people of Bone Gap weren’t surprised. After all, it wasn’t the first time that someone had slipped away and left Finn and Sean O’Sullivan on their own. Just a few years before, their mother had high-tailed it to Oregon for a brand new guy, a brand new life. That’s just how things go, the people said. Who are you going to blame?

Finn knows that’s not what happened with Roza. He knows she was kidnapped, ripped from the cornfields by a dangerous man whose face he cannot remember. But the searches turned up nothing, and no one believes him anymore. Not even Sean, who has more reason to find Roza than anyone, and every reason to blame Finn for letting her go.

As we follow the stories of Finn, Roza, and the people of Bone Gap—their melancholy pasts, their terrifying presents, their uncertain futures—acclaimed author Laura Ruby weaves a heartbreaking tale of love and loss, magic and mystery, regret and forgiveness—a story about how the face the world sees is never the sum of who we are.  (via Goodreads)

Why: This literary tale has garnered a ton of buzz (sorry, sorry) and it’s earned a number of stars. I have no doubt we’ll be seeing a lot of Printz-related talk about this one as the year goes on. 

The Walls Around Us by Nova Ren Suma (March 24): Orianna and Violet are ballet dancers and best friends, but when the ballerinas who have been harassing Violet are murdered, Orianna is accused of the crime and sent to a juvenile detention center where she meets Amber and they experience supernatural events linking the girls together.

Why: I think Suma’s books should all be on everyone’s radars since they’re so outstanding, but this one might be her best. It’s received a ton of buzz, as well as three starred reviews, and all of it is well-deserved. This is a literary novel with huge appeal for readers, especially those who like their stories with a side of horror. The “Orange is the New Black Swan” tag line it’s had is pretty on point. 

The Bunker Diary by Kevin Brooks (March 1): I can’t believe I fell for it. It was still dark when I woke up this morning. As soon as my eyes opened I knew where I was. A low-ceilinged rectangular building made entirely of whitewashed concrete. There are six little rooms along the main corridor. There are no windows. No doors. The lift is the only way in or out. What’s he going to do to me?

Why: Brooks won the UK’s Carnegie medal in literature for this book when it published over there in 2013. It then went on to get some media attention, primarily about how this isn’t “really” a book “for teens.” With the discussion it generated there, I think this is a book to keep an eye on when it comes out in the US this month.

Shadow Scale by Rachel Hartman (March 10): Seraphina, half-dragon and half-human, searches for others like her who can make the difference in the war between dragons and humans in the kingdom of Goredd.

Why: This is the sequel to the 2013 Morris Award winning Seraphina. 

Death Marked by Leah Cypess (March 3): After killing the leader of a clan of assassins and falling in love with his heir, a young sorceress discovers she is the one person to bring down the evil Empire that has been oppressing her people for centuries, and now, in the heart of the Empire, Ileni herself is the deadliest weapon the assassins have ever had.

Why: This is the sequel to Cypess’s Death Sworn. This is a high fantasy series featuring magical powers. Kimberly quite enjoyed the first entry in this series. 

The Winner’s Crime by Marie Rutkoski (March 3): The engagement of Lady Kestrel to Valoria’s crown prince is the event of a lifetime, but to Kestrel it means living in a cage of her own making, so as she aches to tell the truth about her engagement, she becomes a skilled practitioner of deceit and as a spy passes information and gets close to uncovering a shocking secret.

Why: This is the sequel to the popular The Winner’s Curse book, which came out last year. This is a historical fantasy series worth knowing about. 

The Orphan Queen by Jodi Meadows (March 10): Orphaned as a child, Princess Wilhelmina together with her best friend Melanie return to the Indigo Kingdom to fight back and reclaim Wil’s throne. But Wil has a secret — one that could change everything.

Why: This is the launch of a new fantasy series. Meadows’s first series, “Newsoul,” was — and is — pretty popular and well reviewed by readers. 

The Wicked Will Rise by Danielle Paige (March 31): My name is Amy Gumm–and I’m the other girl from Kansas. After a tornado swept through my trailer park, I ended up in Oz. But it wasn’t like the Oz I knew from books and movies. Dorothy had returned, but she was now a ruthless dictator. Glinda could no longer be called the Good Witch. And the Wicked Witches who were left? They’d joined forces as the Revolutionary Order of the Wicked, and they wanted to recruit me. My mission? Kill Dorothy. Except my job as assassin didn’t work out as planned. Dorothy is still alive. The Order has vanished. And the home I couldn’t wait to leave behind might be in danger. Somehow, across a twisted and divided land, I have to find the Order, protect the true ruler of Oz, take Dorothy and her henchmen down–and try to figure out what I’m really doing here. 

Why: Paige’s first novel, Dorothy Must Die, was a New York Times Bestseller. This is the sequel/companion to that title. (Not a why, but worth noting that this series is from Full Fathom Five, so do with that what you will).

The Alex Crow by Andrew Smith (March 3): The story of Ariel, a Middle Eastern refugee who lives with an adoptive family in Sunday, West Virginia, is juxtaposed against those of a schizophrenic bomber, the diaries of a failed arctic expedition from the late nineteenth century, and a depressed, bionic reincarnated crow.

Why: It’s a new Andrew Smith title, and the first of two he’ll publish this year. This one is more along the lines of Grasshopper Jungle than Winger on the weird/strange scale. 

Hold Me Closer: The Tiny Cooper Story by David Levithan (March 17): Larger-than-life Tiny Cooper finally gets to tell his story, from his fabulous birth and childhood to his quest for true love and his infamous parade of ex-boyfriends, in the form of a musical he wrote.

Why: This is the companion to Will Grayson, will grayson, but it’s Tiny Cooper’s story. This is told in an alternate format, as well. 

The Cemetery Boys by Heather Brewer (March 30): When Stephen moves to the small, midwestern town where his father grew up, he quickly falls in with punk girl Cara and her charismatic twin brother, Devon. But the town has a dark secret, and the twins are caught in the middle of it.

Why: Heather Brewer is perennially popular, and this is a brand new stand-alone paranormal story from her. 



Vanishing Girls by Lauren Oliver (March 10): Two sisters inexorably altered by a terrible accident, a missing nine-year-old girl, and the shocking connection between them.

Why: Despite the fact I haven’t seen too many rave reviews of this one — not have I seen a lot of talk about it more broadly — it’s a brand new Lauren Oliver book, and she’s always popular. 

Black Dove, White Raven by Elizabeth Wein (March 31): Having moved to Ethiopia to avoid the prejudices of 1930s America, Emilia Menotti, her black adoptive brother Teo, and their mother Rhoda, a stunt pilot, are devoted to their new country even after war with Italy looms, drawing the teens into the conflict.

Why: New Elizabeth Wein is why enough. 

The Girl in the Book: Two Snappy Reviews

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Girl on a Wire by Gwenda Bond
Jules is a wire-walker, trained by her father (the best in the business) and passionate about her craft. When her family is invited to join a prominent, up and coming circus, Jules persuades them to agree, even though it means performing with their long-established enemies. Many years ago, mysterious deaths occurred, and Jules’ grandmother – suspected to be able to administer curses – was blamed. Now, strange accidents are happening again, and Jules teams up with the teenage boy from the other family to try and unravel what really happened all those years ago – whether it really was magic, whether her grandmother really was responsible, and how it all ties into to what’s going on now.

This book could be called magical realism. It’s never established 100% whether the curses are really magic, though Jules comes to believe they are by the end of the book (and I believed it as well). This aspect is the weakest part of the book. The performers are a superstitious lot and the curses all come down to an exploitation of those superstitions (an unlucky color sneaked onto a costume, for instance). Where the novel shines is in Jules’ performances on the wire, which are exciting and full of tension. She’s even better than her father, but the psychological effect of the curses is such that she wobbles. While balancing on a wire strung between buildings. With nothing to catch her below. Yikes. Off the wire, Jules wanders around playing detective, trying to solve the mystery of the past, and it’s not terribly interesting. It makes the book seem pretty episodic: a wire walk (fascinating!), then a clue-gathering mission (snooze), then another performance (nail-biting), and more sleuthing (zzzzzz). While I wouldn’t recommend the book to someone wanting a magical fantasy or a scintillating mystery, it should appeal to readers interested in the circus or high-risk professions.

Finished copy provided by the publisher.

The Girl From the Well by Rin Chupeco
This is solid horror with some creative storytelling choices. It’s told from the point of view of Okiku, the subject of the well-known Japanese ghost story The Ring, but her perspective is fragmented, and her story is really a frame for the story of a modern-day boy named Tark. Tark himself is haunted, not only by Okiku, but also by something much more malevolent. Okiku is initially passive in Tark’s story, but she’s drawn further into his life as she observes more of it – as she learns that Tark can sense her, too, and that she has a reason for being there with him. This ghost story is more unsettling than it is scary. It should appeal to fans of Japanese horror, though I thought it dragged a bit. It’s a debut, and I find that pacing is often a weakness in first novels. Still, it’s got a great (creepy!) ending and I appreciated the fresh perspective.

Book borrowed from my library.