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YA/Coming of Age |
Sammy’s last year of high school, living in the Hollywood barrio of Las Cruces, NM sees him face tragedy after tragedy at the end of the tumultuous 1960s. The first tragedy and one that forever shapes him is when his first love, Juliana is killed by her father. Hanging out with other guys in the neighborhood, Sammy finds himself in a fight when a couple of gay friends are attacked, he sees one friend drafted and another die of a heroin overdose.
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YA/ Science Fiction/ Alternate Worlds |
Two lands, side by side, one rich with technology, the other devoutly religious are engaged in a devastating war. While the Altimans have aeroplanes and other technology analogous to that of the early 20th century in our world, the Bartokhrin have the lands rich in natural resources and provide the labor that keeps the residents of Altima in relative luxury. In the battle between the two, the Altimans use bombs and the Bartokhrin us a magical religious ritual to create “mortiphas” martyrs who appear in the midst of Altiman gatherings and detonate with psychic energy. Teenaged Chamus Aranson of Altima wants to be a flyer, following in the footsteps of his father and grandfather. Riadni Mocranen of Bartokhrin, a teenage girl doesn’t like the restrictions placed on her by her gender and wants to play a role in defending her country. When Chamus crash lands deep in the Fringelands he is rescued by Riadni and they become reluctant allies trying to stop a conflagration that could devour both lands. A timely and thought provoking read not only for the teens it is marketed to but also for adult fans of science fiction.
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YA/ Suspense |
Charlie’s father is very strict. When Charlie doesn’t behave as Father wants, Charlie is punished. For a very long time this has meant that Charlie must live in the basement stealing upstairs after Mother and Father have gone to bed to forage for any food that is not locked up and to drink from the faucet. It is also the time that he goes outdoors, carefully placing his towel, the only blanket he has, in the door to keep it open while he goes to the bathroom under the big pine tree in the yard. One night the door slams and Charlie, who doesn’t know his own last name, is locked outside. When he is found, suffering from a high fever he is taken to a hospital where his life starts over again and he is placed in foster care. A gritty story of the resiliency of this twelve-year-old who has suffered abuse his entire life.
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YA / Suspense
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Already published in Canada by Groundwood Press, Edgar award winner Wynne-Jones latest suspense novel will keep readers on the edge of their seats with this thoughtful, atmospheric tale. When Dec was ten-years-old his mother disappeared. Along with his father, little sister, and his father’s girl friend, the family has moved out of the ancestral mansion into a more ordinary house that isn’t filled with the memories of Lindy. Now at age sixteen, Dec spends more and more time up at Steeple Hall and now his sister Sunny likes to go there too but one day they find a massive bookcase tipped over on top of the body of a man who had picked up Dec hitch hiking. As family secrets slowly unfold, Dec’s life and family are illuminated.
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Women’s Fiction / Chick Lit |
Kate, a twenty-five year old Human Resources Representative has just broken up with her musician boyfriend of ten years and is couch surfing at her best-friend and co-worker Jen’s house. Unable to find an affordable New York apartment she is thinking her life can’t get much worse when her boss aka the Tyrannical Office Despot forces her to fire Ida, the very popular older woman who provides deserts in the New York Journal’s senior staff dining room, because she had refused to serve key lime pie to Stuart Hertzog, an odious lawyer. With Dale, her ex, constantly harassing her to move back in with him, and a law suit filed against her for wrongful termination by Ida’s union Kate begins to despair. The attorney defending the paper from the charges is Mitch, Stuie’s unconventional brother. Told in the form of journal entries, instant messages, e-mail, and notes on receipts and menus both Kate and Mitch with their hilariously complicated lives spring vividly to life.
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Science Fiction/ Satire |
This satire set in the near future sees the state of Washington being invaded by aliens. No, they aren’t trying to take over, after losing a war the Minervans are being returned to their ancient homeland -- Kenniwick, Washington. The government politicos decide to make a stand against the invasion and in a move to make the Minervans look really bad they require all Kenniwickians to return home no matter where they are living or what they are doing. As religious fanatics start training children to attack the Minervans and be martyrs an intergalactic news reporter tries to slew the angle of the news to make the Minervans look like the villains instead of the victims.
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Crime / Mystery / Amateur Sleuth |
The sixth mystery in Raphael’s Nick Hoffman series is a little short on detection but the gay mystery-writing professor from the imaginary State University of Michigan in Michiganopolis is an enticing and endearing character. With all the politics in academia, he is glad to go on an unexpected tropical vacation to the Serenity resort with his partner Stefan where trouble is sure to appear. Raphael’s writing is witty and graceful with plenty of literary references.
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YA / Contemporary |
Sandro’s dad, supposedly some italian duke who impregnated his teenage mom when she was on a skiing trip disappeared before he was born. His mom doesn't’t even know what Sandro’s dad’s last name was. For seventeen years they’ve lived a hand to mouth existence in a Colorado ski resort while his mother has waited for Alessandro, her true love to return. Sandro, a spectacular slalom skier, dozen’t have the time or money to join the ski team but everything changes when one day his mother comes into the ski rental shop where he is working and a customer sees and recognizes her. It is her Alessandro who had looked for her but been unable to find her. Sandro’s life is turned upside down by the arrival of this long lost dad who buys him new skis and works out things so he can be on the ski team but of course, disaster must strike. Rottman is a good storyteller.
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YA / chic lit
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Six-foot-tall, Octavia, the daughter of a sit com actress and a gay director attends a London school for the offspring of the rich and famous. Her curmudgeonly gay-bashing grandfather is a lord. When india, the petite blond princess-like daughter of a famous old rock star invites her to her sweet sixteen party to wrangle an invitation to meet the studly young actor working on Olivia’s dad’s new film Olivia meets Alex, India’s older brother and starts going out with him. She thinks there is more to him than appears but appearances can be deceiving. Fans of The A List and Gossip Girl will love it.
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Fantasy/ Our World / Mythic Reality World of Faerie
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GiGi Gellman, young looking for her age, has ended her career with the Providence, RI police department under a cloud, blamed for a blood bath in a sting that went wrong. Now as a private investigator she is called on to find a missing teenager which sends her back to the seamy underside of the city and to Underhill, a “gentlemen’s club” that caters to pedophiles. When the owner of Underhill gives her a file on a missing heir he wants her to investigate she passes it on to her retired mentor who ends up dead. Delving into both cases she makes discoveries that lead right back to her own mysterious past.
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Mystery / Cozy
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Just before Beatrix Potter arrives in Near Sawry Mrs. Tolliver, who she was to stay with is found dead. Miss Potter discovers that Miss Tolliver’s Constable painting, a valuable miniature, is missing. Her young friend Jeremy is accused by Miss Crabbe of stealing the money for the roof repair fund and the animals of the community are the ones who ultimately solve the mysteries. A delightful gentle read that makes one want to visit the Lake country and dig out those old Potter books out of storage. Charming characters and a very pleasant village setting make one want to visit the world so beautifully evoked by Albert.
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YA/ Paranormal/ Psionic Powers / Mystery and Suspense
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Sabine Rose’s psychic gifts had gotten her kicked out of her former high school. Now she is living with her grandmother and fitting in pretty well at her new high school. She has a gorgeous boy friend, a best friend who is a cheerleader, and a job with the school paper but when she sees a vision of a bloody dragonfly she knows something terrible will happen if she doesn’t act. Even though she has tried to reject her powers and be ordinary she can’t turn her back on a situation that is threatening to the girlfriend of her boyfriend’s odious best friend. Meanwhile someone is trying to frame her for a crime at the school and destroy her hard won good reputation. On top of it all her grandmother seems to have believed her when Sabine claimed to have grown out of her powers and has brought in Dominic, who can communicate with animals, as her apprentice. Singleton, the author of the Regeneration series (named to the American Library Association’s Quick Picks list) is a master at pacing and creating believable teen characters. Readers will be waiting impatiently for further entries in this enticing new series.
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YA/ Alternate Formats/ Epistolary / Contemporary/ Romance
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When Sara submits some poetry to a web site she receives some vicious criticism but also a nice email from a guy calling himself robcruise99. As they continue to email back and forth the reader begins to know the Army brat whose best friend has cancer and the poor little rich boy who is in a boarding school for troublesome kids. Not quite the power of Marsden’s Letters from the Inside, but close, and the romance adds another dimension while the ending is more than satisfying.
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YA/ Historical / Multiple time periods/ Multicultural
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Jerry, electively mute since her hippie mother disappeared, is finally, after years of going through various homes and institutions, sent to New Mexico to live with her great-grand-aunt Constanza, a ninety-four-year-old baker. Going through a trunk in the cellar, Jerry, finds objects that give her visions of the lives of her ancestors starting in 1391 in Spain, to Mexico, to New Mexico. Lasky is a great storyteller and the New Mexico Spanish descendents and Jewish connection is a fascinating and little known corner of history.
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YA / Mystery and Suspense |
When thirteen-year-old Emma sees on the television news that her former best friend Abby is missing and was last seen Saturday morning she knows that she must have been the last person to have seen her as they talked on a bus Saturday afternoon. Amidst the official investigation she starts her own. A page-turning story with a sub-text of the changes that happen in friendships in adolescence and the angst of figuring out where one fits in.
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YA/ Contemporary/ Humorous |
Vince Luca is off to film school in LA and Kendra is nearby. Unfortunately his roommate turns out to be the criminally minded son of a congressman and Kendra is starring in his arch-rivals movie. Things heat up when his brother Tommy shows up followed by several of the “uncles.” A kidnapped union boss and a sexy upperclassman add to the excitement as Vince discovers all is not as it may first appear in this hilarious chronicle of his first semester in college. Will the path of life ever run smoothly for the son of the mob and his one true love, the daughter of an FBI agent?
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YA/ Mystery and Suspense/ Psychological |
Are siblings Emmet and Niki shapeshifters? Did they kill the famous horror novelist who lives in the woods near by? Has their long missing father returned or is he dead? Johnson poses many questions to her readers in a suspenseful and truly weird tale.