Category Archives: Young Adult

Review: Echo by Alicia Wright Brewster

25 April, 2013 8:30 am , 7 Comments ,

Echo
By: Alicia Wright Brewster
Publisher: Dragonfairy Press
Published: April 25, 2013
Genre: YA Sci-Fi
Rating:
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The countdown clock reads ten days until the end of the world. The citizens are organized. Everyone’s been notified and assigned a duty. The problem is . . . no one knows for sure how it will end.

Energy-hungry Mages are the most likely culprit. They travel toward a single location from every corner of the continent. Fueled by the two suns, each Mage holds the power of an element: air, earth, fire, metal, water, or ether. They harness their powers to draw energy from the most readily available resource: humans.

Ashara has been assigned to the Ethereal task force, made up of human ether manipulators and directed by Loken, a young man with whom she has a complicated past. Loken and Ashara bond over a common goal: to stop the Mages from occupying their home and gaining more energy than they can contain. But soon, they begin to suspect that the future of the world may depend on Ashara’s death.

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Posted in: YA Sci-fi

Review: Warm Bodies by Isaac Marion

24 April, 2013 7:00 pm , 1 Comment ,

Warm Bodies
(Warm Bodies, #1)
By: Isaac Marion
Publisher: Atria
Published: April 26, 2010
Genre: Young Adult
Rating:
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R is a young man with an existential crisis–he is a zombie. He shuffles through an America destroyed by war, social collapse, and the mindless hunger of his undead comrades, but he craves something more than blood and brains. He can speak just a few grunted syllables, but his inner life is deep, full of wonder and longing. He has no memories, no identity, and no pulse. Just dreams.

After experiencing a teenage boy’s memories while consuming his brain, R makes an unexpected choice that begins a tense, awkward, and strangely sweet relationship with the victim’s human girlfriend. Julie is a burst of vibrant color in the otherwise dreary and gray landscape that R lives in. His decision to protect her will transform not only R, but his fellow Dead, and perhaps their whole lifeless world.

Scary, funny, and surprisingly poignant, Warm Bodies is about being alive, being dead and the blurry line in between.

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Posted in: YA Sci-fi

Review: Nevermore by Kelly Creagh

5 April, 2013 10:00 am , 2 Comments ,

Nevermore
(Nevermore, #1)
By: Kelly Creagh
Publisher: Atheneum Books
Published: Aug. 31, 2010
Genre: YA
Rating:
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Cheerleader Isobel Lanley is horrified when she is paired with Varen Nethers for an English project, which is due—so unfair—on the day of the rival game. Cold and aloof, sardonic and sharp-tongued, Varen makes it clear he’d rather not have anything to do with her either. But when Isobel discovers strange writing in his journal, she can’t help but give this enigmatic boy with the piercing eyes another look.

Soon, Isobel finds herself making excuses to be with Varen. Steadily pulled away from her friends and her possessive boyfriend, Isobel ventures deeper and deeper into the dream world Varen has created through the pages of his notebook, a realm where the terrifying stories of Edgar Allan Poe come to life.

As her world begins to unravel around her, Isobel discovers that dreams, like words, hold more power than she ever imagined, and that the most frightening realities are those of the mind. Now she must find a way to reach Varen before he is consumed by the shadows of his own nightmares.

His life depends on it.

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Posted in: YA Fantasy

Review: Sea of Tranquility by Katja Millay

3 April, 2013 10:00 am , 2 Comments ,

Sea of Tranquility
By: Katja Millay
Publisher: Atria Books
Published: Nov. 13, 2012
Genre: YA
Rating:
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Former piano prodigy Nastya Kashnikov wants two things: to get through high school without anyone learning about her past and to make the boy who took everything from her—her identity, her spirit, her will to live—pay.

Josh Bennett’s story is no secret: every person he loves has been taken from his life until, at seventeen years old, there is no one left. Now all he wants is be left alone and people allow it because when your name is synonymous with death, everyone tends to give you your space.

Everyone except Nastya, the mysterious new girl at school who starts showing up and won’t go away until she’s insinuated herself into every aspect of his life. But the more he gets to know her, the more of an enigma she becomes. As their relationship intensifies and the unanswered questions begin to pile up, he starts to wonder if he will ever learn the secrets she’s been hiding—or if he even wants to.

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Posted in: YA Contemporary

Review: Stung by Bethany Wiggins

29 March, 2013 10:00 am , 4 Comments ,

Stung
By: Bethany Wiggins
Publisher: Walker Childrens
Release Date: April 2, 2013
Genre: Distopian YA
Rating:
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There is no cure for being stung.

Fiona doesn’t remember going to sleep. But when she opens her eyes, she discovers her entire world has been altered—her house is abandoned and broken, and the entire neighborhood is barren and dead. Even stranger is the tattoo on her right hand—a black oval with five marks on either side—that she doesn’t remember getting but somehow knows she must cover at any cost. She’s right.

Those bearing the tattoo have turned into mindless, violent beasts that roam the streets and sewers, preying upon the unbranded while a select few live protected inside a fortress-like wall, their lives devoted to rebuilding society and killing all who bear the mark.

Now Fiona has awakened branded, alone—and on the wrong side of the wall.

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Posted in: YA Sci-fi

Review: Half-Blood by Jennifer L. Armentrout

11 March, 2013 8:24 pm , 1 Comment ,

Half-Blood
(Covenant, #1)
By: Jennifer L. Armentrout
Publisher: Spencerhill Press
Published: Oct. 20, 2011
Genre: YA
Rating:
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The Hematoi descend from the unions of gods and mortals, and the children of two Hematoi-pure-bloods-have godlike powers. Children of Hematoi and mortals-well, not so much. Half-bloods only have two options: become trained Sentinels who hunt and kill daimons or become servants in the homes of the pures. Seventeen-year-old Alexandria would rather risk her life fighting than waste it scrubbing toilets, but she may end up slumming it anyway. There are several rules that students at the Covenant must follow. Alex has problems with them all, but especially rule #1:Relationships between pures and halfs are forbidden. Unfortunately, she’s crushing hard on the totally hot pure-blood Aiden. But falling for Aiden isn’t her biggest problem–staying alive long enough to graduate the Covenant and become a Sentinel is. If she fails in her duty, she faces a future worse than death or slavery: being turned into a daimon, and being hunted by Aiden. And that would kind of suck.

 

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Posted in: YA Fantasy

Review: Me, Him, Them, and It by Caela Carter

5 March, 2013 3:51 pm , 2 Comments ,

Me, Him, Them, and It
By: Caela Carter
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Published: Feb. 26, 2013
Genre: YA
Rating:
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ME is Evelyn Jones, 16, a valedictorian hopeful who’s been playing bad girl to piss off THEM, her cold, distant parents. HIM is Todd, Evelyn’s secret un-boyfriend, who she thought she was just using for sex – until she accidentally fell in love with him. But before Evelyn gets a chance to tell Todd how she feels, something much more important comes up. IT. IT is a fetus. Evelyn is pregnant – and when Todd turns his back on her, Evelyn has no idea who to turn to. Can a cheating father, a stiff, cold mother, a pissed-off BFF, and a (thankfully!) loving aunt with adopted girls of her own help Evelyn make the heart-wrenching decisions that follow?

 

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Posted in: YA Contemporary

Review: Pushing the Limits by Katie McGarry

28 February, 2013 9:24 pm , Leave a Comment ,

Pushing the Limits
(Pushing the Limits, #1)
By: Katie McGarry
Publisher: Harlequin Teen
Published: July 31, 2012
Genre: YA
Rating:
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No one knows what happened the night Echo Emerson went from popular girl with jock boyfriend to gossiped-about outsider with “freaky” scars on her arms. Even Echo can’t remember the whole truth of that horrible night. All she knows is that she wants everything to go back to normal.But when Noah Hutchins, the smoking-hot, girl-using loner in the black leather jacket, explodes into her life with his tough attitude and surprising understanding, Echo’s world shifts in ways she could never have imagined. They should have nothing in common. And with the secrets they both keep, being together is pretty much impossible.

Yet the crazy attraction between them refuses to go away. And Echo has to ask herself just how far they can push the limits and what she’ll risk for the one guy who might teach her how to love again.

 

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Posted in: YA Contemporary

Review: Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins

27 February, 2013 8:11 pm , 1 Comment ,

Anna and the French Kiss
By: Stephanie Perkins
Publisher: Dutton
Published: Dec. 2, 2010
Genre: YA
Rating:
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Anna is looking forward to her senior year in Atlanta, where she has a great job, a loyal best friend, and a crush on the verge of becoming more. Which is why she is less than thrilled about being shipped off to boarding school in Paris–until she meets Étienne St. Clair. Smart, charming, beautiful, Étienne has it all…including a serious girlfriend.

But in the City of Light, wishes have a way of coming true. Will a year of romantic near-misses end with their long-awaited French kiss?

 

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Posted in: YA Contemporary

Review: Pieces by Michelle Davidson Argyle

20 February, 2013 10:30 am , 2 Comments ,

Pieces
(The Breakaway, #2)
By: Michelle Davidson Argyle
Publisher: Rehmalda Publishing
Published: Feb. 14, 2013
Genre: New Adult
Rating:
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Staying in love can mean running away…

Two years after watching her kidnappers go to prison, Naomi Jensen is still in love with one of them. Jesse will be released in a few years, and Naomi knows college is the perfect distraction while she waits. But when her new friend Finn makes her question what is right and what is wrong, she begins to wonder if Jesse is the one for her…until she discovers he’s out on parole. Naomi must sort through her confusion to figure out where love and freedom truly lie-in Finn, who has no connections to her past, or Jesse, who has just asked her to run away with him.

 

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Posted in: YA Contemporary