Archives

ONCE UPON A QUINCEANERA, any magic leftover? by Monica Gomez-Hira (book review)

Jan25
book cover of Once Upon a Quinceanera, by Monica Gomez-Hira. Published by HarperTeen | recommended on BooksYALove.com

Weird summer internship,
dancing Disney party princess –
but no prince will rescue her!

Carmen must complete this internship to fill the final required credit for graduation, so she’s spending her summer dancing in a ballgown… at kids’ birthday parties… in Florida heat and humidity.

Of course, Mami made sure that she knew how to dance, even though Carmen didn’t get to have a quinceanera to celebrate turning 15 – not her fault, not at all! (Mami’s own quince plus papa equaled Carmen, and it’s just been the two of them for the longest time).

Strange that Mauro is back in Miami when his famous photographer dad has moved away; awkward that he and Carmen are dancing together after he dumped her before leaving for college.

Oh no, her snooty cousin Ariana’s parents have hired the party dance company as the ceremonial corte for her quinceanera! Extra coaching for Ariana’s special dance, too, with Carmen’s boyfriend as her escort… this summer may never end!

Performing for parties while practicing endlessly for Ariana’s quince puts Carmen and Mauro together a lot… time to talk through old times and college scenarios and…

Could Carmen really make a future with her video editing?
Does Mauro like her or is he falling for Ariana?
Can they both dance through the summer without a meltdown?

Family rivalry and fancy dresses, waltzing and wondering, cafe con leche and considering the future – Carmen searches for her own Happily Ever After.

Meet Carmen and crew as you read the first two chapters excerpt here free, courtesy of the publisher.

What big drama in your family has turned out okay in the end?
**kmm

Book Info: Once Upon a Quinceanera / Monica Gomez-Hira. HarperTeen, 2021. (author site) (publisher site) Personal collection; cover image courtesy of the publisher.

SERENDIPITY romance short stories, edited by Marissa Meyer (YA book review)

Jan18
book cover of Serendipity: Ten Romantic Tropes, Transformed, ed. by Marissa Meyer. Published by Feiwel & Friends | recommended on BooksYALove.com

That grand romantic gesture!
Stranded together – oh my!
The Matchmaker’s magic!

Whether it’s a character suddenly realizing they’re In Love with their Best Friend or the Makeover that opens the eyes of an admirer, classic tropes (story patterns) lead readers of romance writing to a satisfying HEA – Happily Ever After.

These ten stories about teens (including a graphic novel chapter) give familiar patterns a fresh look in every color of the rainbow, from the social Class Warfare to Just One Bed on a school trip to Trapped Together in a small space to the Fake Relationship that becomes oh-so real.

Technology plays a part in some stories, while school dance jitters loom large in others. Trying to fit in is a common theme, but fear not – being true to oneself triumphs in the end.

And just look at the stellar crew of YALit contributors to this collection!
Elise Bryant,
Elizabeth Eulberg (Revenge of the Girl With the Great Personality! ),
Leah Johnson,
Anna-Marie McLemore ( in Hungry Hearts anthology),
Sandhya Menon (remember When Dimple Met Rishi ),
Marissa Meyer (gotta love Cinder )
Julie Murphy (Dumplin’ forever),
Caleb Roehrig,
Sarah Winifred Searle,
and Abigail Hing Wen.

Enjoy this January 2022 release, then see how many romantic tropes you can identify in the books you read in the future.

Which story pattern leads to your favorite HEA?
**kmm

Book Info: Serendipity: Ten Romantic Tropes, Transformed / Marissa Meyer, editor. Fiewel & Friends, 2022. (editor site) (publisher site) Review copy & cover image courtesy of the publisher, via NetGalley

BLOOD LIKE MAGIC, by Liselle Sambury – her witch test will destroy love or family! (YA book review)

Jan17
book cover of Blood Like Magic, by Liselle Sambury. Published by Margaret K. McElderry Books | recommended on BooksYALove.com

Safety is staying in her family home,
facing the forces outside is her fate…
how can she balance the magic required?

Oh yes, her extended family is exasperating on a day-to-day basis, but 16-year-old Voya knows they love her and that she’d do anything to keep them safe in mid-21st century Toronto.

Now the Trinidadian-Canadian teen pleads for a second chance to claim her Calling as a witch, through a task to be set by her ancestor.

But this task is brutal, far beyond what anyone in her extended family experienced in their Calling – ‘destroy her first love.’

Time is of the essence as Voya must fall in love with someone and then eliminate them…or her little sister will die, and her entire family will lose its long-held magic!

Love match via genetic blood test?
Cozying up to a rival magic family?
Surely there must be another way…

Find this great YA debut at your local library or independent bookstore now. The series continues with Blood Like Fate in August 2022.

What would you sacrifice to keep your family safe?
**kmm

Book Info: Blood Like Magic (Blood Like Magic, book 1) / Liselle Sambury. Margaret K. McElderry Books (S&S), 2021. (author site) (publisher site) Review copy & cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Bad news AIN’T BURNED ALL THE BRIGHT, by Jason Reynolds & Jason Griffin (YA book review)

Jan11
book cover of Ain't Burned All the Bright, by Jason Reynolds; artwork by Jason Griffin. Published by Atheneum | recommended on BooksYALove.com

Three long sentences,
Two Jasons collaborating again,
One vibrant book, willing us to breathe…

His father coughing and coughing in the bedroom, his mother glued to the all-bad-news television. Brother won’t stop playing his video game, sister chatting about what to bring for a protest during a pandemic.

Stuck at home together – will it ever be safe to leave?
After George Floyd’s murder – who wants to be away from home?
TV locked on the same channel – is there better news anywhere?

A Black young man feels like he’s the only family member who realizes how bad things really are, how “worry is worn like a knit sweater in summer” suffocating them all, yet maybe hope can get them through all this.

Jason Reynolds (I’ve recommended his books Boy in the Black Suit; Ghost; Look Both Ways) wrote the story of a young man and his family during that first year of pandemic and protests as three very, very long sentences.

His former roommate Jason Griffin journaled his impressions of 2020 via paint, colored pencil, and collage in his moleskin notebook, then cut out and taped Reynolds’ words onto his artwork whose textures leap off the satin-surfaced pages of this book.

Happy book birthday to this stunning reflection on events of 2020 when so many of us wished we could change the TV channel from its harsh realities to something brighter.

What do you remember most about 2020?
**kmm

Book info: Ain’t Burned All the Bright / Jason Reynolds; artwork by Jason Griffin. Caitlyn Dlouhy Books/ Atheneum, 2022. [author site] [artist site] [publisher site] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Staying friends LONG DISTANCE is hard, #MGLit graphic novel by Whitney Gardner – book review

Dec8
book cover of Long Distance, by Whitney Gardner. Published by Simon Schuster Books for Young Readers | recommended on BooksYALove.com

Moving to Seattle?
Leaving her best friend?
(leaving her only friend…)

Middle-schooler Vega doesn’t care that she’ll have a great window for her star-gazing telescope – leaving Portland is terrible!

Her dads try to help by sending her to Camp Very Best Friend. Their new neighbor guy Qwerty is going too, also with great reluctance. And best friend Halley doesn’t even text back as Vega endures the counselor’s off-key singing on the long ride to camp…

Tent-mate Gemma and twin Isaac both collect rocks (especially thundereggs), Qwerty is a computer whiz (talks non-stop), and George (the kid in all the camp brochure photos) seems to change personality every day.

Where are the squirrels and birds and insects?
Why won’t Qwerty’s satellite phone work at camp?
Why are the counselors are super-happy every single moment?

The multicultural campers find a pine cone with a speaker inside and a secret tunnel to the big telescope promised in the brochure.

Then weird things start happening… truly weird.

Great graphic novel in hardcover, paperback or ebook – worth your gift card!

How do you cope with friends moving away?
**kmm

Long Distance / words and art by Whitney Gardner. Simon Schuster Books for Young Readers, 2021. (author site) (publisher site) Review copy & cover image courtesy of the publisher.

YOU CAN’T SAY THAT! yes, authors can! #BannedBooksWeek (nonfiction book review)

Sep30
book cover of You Can't Say That! Writers for Young People Talk About Censorship, Free Expression, and the Stories They Have to Tell, edited by Leonard S. Marcus. Published by Candlewick Books | recommended on BooksYALove.com

Too rude! too scary!
Not in our school, our town,
we don’t talk about such things…

Name a ‘controversial topic’ and you can find a list of books for kids and teens that someone, somewhere in the US has tried to censor or ban from class or remove from library shelves.

That’s why this is Banned Books Week and why noted children’s books expert Leonard Marcus decided to talk with authors whose books have challenged by people who think their viewpoint is the only one.

Marcus sets the stage in each chapter by noting the author’s books, the censorship they faced, and how he knows them, so the interviews are conversations between friends as well as explorations of how their depictions of real life often clash with adults trying to protect kids from unpleasant things.

Authors interviewed include: Matt de la Peña, Robie H. Harris, Susan Kuklin, David Levithan, Meg Medina, Lesléa Newman, Katherine Paterson, Dav Pilkey, Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell, Sonya Sones, R. L. Stine, and Angie Thomas.

You’ll recognize challenged titles from Captain Underpants to the Goosebumps series to Heather Has Two Mommies that have been stolen, challenged, and even publicly burned, but might not have heard about authors being ‘disinvited’ from speaking at schools because their books include gay characters or children in families with alcoholism.

Meg Medina expresses the balance between would-be censors and the author’s right to tell their stories freely: “When it comes to formal challenges to books, the problem is not that parents don’t have the right to be involved in deciding what their children read. The problem is that they don’t have the right to make that determination for other people’s children.” (p. 96)

What are your experiences with book banning or censorship at your school?
**kmm

Book Info: You Can’t Say That! Writers for Young People Talk About Censorship, Free Expression, and the Stories They Have to Tell / Leonard S. Marcus, editor. Candlewick Books, 2021. [editor site] [publisher site] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

She stays BRUISED to mask her bone-deep anguish, by Tanya Boteju (YA book review)

Sep28
book cover of Bruised, by Tanya Boteju. Published by Simon Schuster BFYR | recommended on BooksYALove.com

Block the mental pain
with physical pain,
repeat, repeat, repeat…

Daya bruises herself to keep from feeling the guilt and sorrow of surviving the car crash that killed her parents. Keeps her distance from everyone at school, from the well-meaning artsy aunt and uncle she lives with now, from the therapist trying to coax out feelings that must stay boxed in.

But the Sri Lankan-Canadian teen finds a better escape when skateboarding pal Fee introduces her to roller derby. Strong women, sweating and pushing and falling and getting up to skate and hit some more!

Can Daya up her skating skills enough to get onto the rink where the bashing starts?
Was Fee right when they said she could really do this?
Is Daya willing to let veteran skaters help her improve?

When she starts falling for Shanti, the derby team captain says Daya’s interest in her sister shows weakness, threatens to bench the former youth boxing champ for not being tough enough…

Stellar complex story from the author of Kings, Queens, and In-Betweens (recommended here).

Ever try the right thing for the wrong reasons?
**kmm

Book Info: Bruised / Tanya Boteju. Simon Schuster Books for Young Readers, 2021. (author site) (publisher site) Review copy & cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Gothic intrigue in DIRE DAYS OF WILLOWEEP MANOR graphic novel! by Shaenon K. Garrity & Christopher Baldwin – YA book review

Sep21
book cover of The Dire Days of Willoweep Manor, by Shaenon K. Garrity (story) & Christopher Baldwin (art). Published by Margaret K. McElderry Books | recommended on BooksYALove.com

A daring rescue,
a ghost in the manor,
a brooding hero with a dark secret…

Haley’s teacher insists that she must write a book report on anything but a gothic romance if the African American teen wants to pass English class… sigh.

When Haley rescues a man from drowning under the river bridge, they emerge from the water into a different world! But what world and when??

The manor house is “three centuries and four European architectural traditions smushed together” on the eerie moors, brooding older brother Laurence says they’re in “the year of our Lord none of your business,” and there’s a ghost that only Haley can see or hear – are they actually inside a book?

Perhaps so, because Haley is now “the Maiden” attired in a long dress, the sinister housekeeper lets a few secrets out, and youngest brother Cuthbert acts more zany by the hour.

But maybe not, because Montague (the brother that she rescued) insists that he was seeking help from her world because a devouring Penultimate Evil was encroaching on Willoweep Manor, a pocket universe that’s the final defense…and there are cracks in the barrier!

As the Bile seeps out, it infects every creature to join in its attack against all things good!

Will the three brothers finally band together instead of bickering?
Can Haley become the Gothic Heroine that Willoweep needs?
Is she trapped in this pocket universe forever?

This clever graphic novel uses every trope, tradition, and cliche of gothic romances to great effect as our intrepid heroine and the desperate caretakers of Willoweep fight to save… everything!

What what you learned from reading fiction that can help in real time?
**kmm

Book info: The Dire Days of Willoweep Manor / Shaenon K. Garrity (story) & Christopher Baldwin (art). Margaret K. McElderry Books, 2021. (author site) (artist site) (publisher site) Book cover image and review copy courtesy of the publisher.

One night only! It’s the BATTLE OF THE BANDS anthology, ed. by Lauren Gibaldi & Eric Smith (YA book review)

Sep14
book cover of Battle of the Bands, edited by Lauren Gibaldi & Eric Smith. Published by Candlewick Press | recommended on BooksYALove.com

On stage, behind the scenes, in the audience,
taking tickets, selling merchandise –
all connected by local teen musicians!

Sixteen authors bring us interlinking stories that center around the annual Battle of the Bands at a suburban New Jersey high school from many points of view.

Solo acts and long-standing bands, breakups and first kisses, new friends and old grudges, family ties that bend and stretch (but will they break?).

Most stories begin before The Big Night with characters appearing in more than one narrative, just like the overlapping circles of acquaintance at the high school… or the first-time interactions at the Battle itself.

Get this book now at your local library or independent bookstore – just published last week!

I rarely read books twice, but I honestly can’t wait to reread this one, now that I’ve met so many characters as they gather for the music, the friendship, and the best Battle of the Bands ever!

What’s your favorite concert story?
**kmm

Book Info: Battle of the Bands / Lauren Gilbaldi & Eric Smith, editors. Candlewick Press, 2021. ISBN 9781536214338 (Lauren’s site) (Eric’s site) (publisher site)

Stories by Brittany Cavallaro, Preeti Chhibber, Jay Coles, Katie Cotugno, Lauren Gibaldi, Shaun David Hutchinson, Ashley Poston, Jenny Torres Sanchez, Sarah Nicole Smetana, Eric Smith, Jenn Marie Thorne, Sarvenaz Taghavian, Jasmine Warga, Ashley Woodfolk, and Jeff Zentner, and featuring Motion City Soundtrack’s Justin Courtney Pierre.

Romance & relationships – listen in with free audiobooks!

Jul8

Time to download this week’s love-filled free audiobooks from SYNC so you can read with your ears!

Save these complete audiobooks to your Sora shelf (FAQs here) free! from Thursday through Wednesday, then listen to them at your leisure – the loan period is 99 years!

The Henna Wars (free Sora download 8-13 July 2021)
By Adiba Jaigirdar
Read by Priya Ayyar
Published by Listening Library

When Flavia comes back into Nishat’s life, the Irish-Bangladeshi teen is smitten with her.
But for their high school business competition, both young women decide to showcase their henna skills.
Can they get past the competition to see if their relationship will bloom? Will Nishat hide her feelings for Flavia to keep her family happy?

Saints and Misfits (free Sora download 8-13 July 2021)
By S.K. Ali
Read by Ariana Delawari
Published by Listening Library

Janna can cope with being considered a nerd because she studies or different because she wears the hijab at public school, which her remarried dad says is “too religious”.
But when the guy who assaulted her keeps her in sight at every mosque activity and is welcomed at friends’ homes, her fear grows – and she doesn’t want to be afraid anymore!

(Recommended on BooksYALove: https://booksyalove.com/?p=8819 as well as the sequel, Misfit in Love, just published in May! https://booksyalove.com/?p=12109)

More love stories, please?
**kmm