Too bad I didn’t discover this book sooner (its publication date was July 2020) so that I could have pushed it as a voter’s primer for YA readers and in particular for senior students voting for their first time. It… Read More ›
Death and Grieving
We Are Not From Here
Chico, Pulga and Pequena are three teenagers living in the small village of Puerto Barrios, Guatemala. They are not related but are close enough in friendship to be so. Chico lives with Pulga, having been orphaned when his mother died… Read More ›
Conjure Women
Rue and her mother May Belle are newly-freed residents of a southern plantation immediately following the Civil War. The big plantation home has been burned to the ground, their master shot himself, the northern armies have come rampaging through, and… Read More ›
The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes
So here’s the long-anticipated prequel to the Hunger Games trilogy. Coriolanus Snow is in his final year at the elitist Academy, training ground for future leaders of Panem. He is fortunate to be there because although he is charming, intelligent… Read More ›
This Is How I Lied
Eve is a 15-yr-old girl living with her mother Charlotte and 13-year-old sister Nola in small-town Grotto, Iowa. They don’t have much. Her mother works but doesn’t bring in a lot, and she is one cranky, self-centered mom. Like in… Read More ›
They Went Left
In August 1942 Zofia Lederman and her family, who are among the remaining Jews in the Polish town of Sosnowiec, report to the local soccer stadium, where they are sorted into two groups, one headed for death camps and the… Read More ›
What I Like About You
Halle Levitt is spending her senior year with her brother at her grandfather’s home in Middleton, Connecticut instead of traveling abroad with her documentary-producing parents, who, after six previous Academy Award nominations but no win, are still pursuing the prize…. Read More ›
The Twin
Ten years after their parents divorce and their mom moves away to another city, taking one identical twin (Iris) with her and leaving the other (Ivy) with her ex-husband, the twins find themselves living together again when their mother suddenly… Read More ›
Malamander
Young Herbert (Herbie) Lemon works as the Lost and Founder from his small, cluttered office in the Grand Nautilus Hotel in Eerie-on-Sea, a resort town shut down for the winter season. Having mysteriously washed up as a baby in a… Read More ›
we speak in storms
Three high school students who barely know each other are wrestling with problems: Joshua, who defines himself as queer, at home lives with a religious stepfather who won’t accept it and at school goes from being bullied by classmates to… Read More ›
Before You Buy YA 