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Some time ago, I asked around if we had a YA thread here in TBB. Since one doesn’t presently exist, I thought I’d put this together for discussion of the genre! Let’s please try and keep the posting about newer books and those that might not be widely known – no Harry Potter or Twilight, please! Shouldn’t you be reading books targeted at your age group? Absolutely not! Don’t feel ashamed if you enjoy YA books – hell, currently one of the most popular book series in the USA is a YA series! And no, I certainly don’t mean Twilight. Why YA? Because it’s a fun way to read between longer and more ‘serious’ works! Reading nothing but War and Peace gets tedious after a while, and more often than not the Young Adult section of a bookstore will at least have a few decently written, well-thought out stories! Well ok, but can you recommend some books? Of course! That’s the purpose of this thread, after all! In the case of multiple books in a series, I’ll only touch on the first one.    The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins The Hunger Games - Catching Fire - Mockingjay ( Amazon – Goodreads ) The first of a trilogy, The Hunger Games is set in a dystopian world where the United States has fallen and the great nation of Panem has risen to control on the North American continent. The Capitol has a forced-participation death match, called ‘The Hunger Games’ every year, in which they force each district (numbered, and scattered all about the continent) to have a random lottery for one boy and one girl to enter into the games and fight to the death, for the amusement of the Capitol citizens. The Hunger Games has it’s own thread in TBB, located here!    Chaos Walking by Patrick Ness The Knife of Never Letting Go – The Ask and the Answer – Monsters of Men ( Amazon – Goodreads ) Settlers have ventured out to a new planet, far away from the Earth that we know. They left in search of religious freedoms, and upon finally reaching this new planet everything seemed to be going well… until every male began projecting ‘Noise’, their every thought broadcast to the world. The entire planet is infected, and many of the inhabitants have evolved to use this Noise as their means of communication. The book stars Todd Hewitt, a young man that is just coming of age. He finds himself thrown in the middle of a civil war – and in the end a war for the control of the entire planet – when he discovers that the leader of the town he lives in is hiding a very dark secret.  Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs ( Amazon – Goodreads ) Now, before I tell you about this one, I do have to note that the author has some very badly photoshopped ‘vintage’ photos to accompany a lot of the story. They’re cheesy as hell, but I suppose they do add a little to the story to help you imagine what’s going on. Jacob’s grandfather always entertained him with stories of bizarre and often seemingly ludicrous tales from his own childhood – stories of invisible children, those that could levitate and many other strange things. When the old man dies quite unexpectedly, Jacob begins to think again of the stories his grandfather told him of growing up in the Welsh countryside – and he begins to search to see if there might have been any truth to what his grandfather told him. He begins digging – and perhaps begins to dig too deep as some strange creature begins stalking him, trying to stop him from learning the truth at all costs.    Maze Runner by James Dashner The Maze Runner – The Scorch Trials – The Death Cure ( Amazon – Goodreads ) Thomas has no memory of ‘before’. He awakens to darkness, and quickly finds that he’s on a lift that takes him to a strange place – a town populated by other young boys just like himself. This place is called ‘The Glade’, and it is enclosed in a sort-of maze, with walls 15 feet tall and strange doors that close every night at sundown only to re-open in the morning to the maze outside. The small community has a job for every person, and of those some are assigned to go out into the maze every morning to map it, as its walls shift and change every single night. However, after only a day of living in The Glade, Thomas’s life changes forever. The elevator begins to open, and it brings with it a girl – the only one that has ever come to The Glade in memory. With her, she brings a strange secret, and may even hold the key to remembering what happened to the boys before they were sent to The Maze.   Unwind by Neal Shusterman Unwind - UnWholly ( Amazon – Goodreads ) In this dystopian novel, the Second Civil War was fought over reproductive rights. The resolution: Life is inviolable from the moment of conception until age thirteen. Between the ages of thirteen and eighteen, however, parents can have their child "unwound," whereby all of the child's organs are transplanted into different donors, so life doesn't technically end. Connor is too difficult for his parents to control. Risa, a ward of the state is not worth enough to be kept alive. And Lev is a tithe, a child conceived and raised as a religious sacrifice be unwound. Together, they may have a chance to escape and to survive. The second book, UnWholly is due to be released on August 28th, 2012, however a third book in this series has already been confirmed.  Railsea by China Mievelle ( Amazon – Goodreads ) A highly anticipated release by Mievelle, only a little has been released about this book that's to be released May 15th 2012. I can't give my own summary of it, but here's what the publisher has released about it: On board the moletrain Medes, Sham Yes ap Soorap watches in awe as he witnesses his first moldywarpe hunt: the giant mole bursting from the earth, the harpoonists targeting their prey, the battle resulting in one’s death and the other’s glory. But no matter how spectacular it is, Sham can't shake the sense that there is more to life than traveling the endless rails of the railsea–even if his captain can think only of the hunt for the ivory-coloured mole she’s been chasing since it took her arm all those years ago. When they come across a wrecked train, at first it's a welcome distraction. But what Sham finds in the derelict—a series of pictures hinting at something, somewhere, that should be impossible—leads to considerably more than he'd bargained for. Soon he's hunted on all sides, by pirates, trainsfolk, monsters and salvage-scrabblers. And it might not be just Sham's life that's about to change. It could be the whole of the railsea. From China Miéville comes a novel for readers of all ages, a gripping and brilliantly imagined take on Herman Melville's Moby-Dick that confirms his status as "the most original and talented voice to appear in several years." We do have a general China Mievelle thread which is located here, but mind that most of his work is not YA.  Ready Player One by Ernest Cline ( Amazon – Goodreads If you are a child of the 80's, this book is almost overwhelming in the sheer amount of pop-culture that's crammed into it. I can't imagine that the target audience gets even a fourth of the references, but even without that it's a pretty decent book. Set in the year of 2044, the world has been trashed by pollution, over-population and war. Like most of humanity, Wade Watts spends nearly all of his waking hours logged into the OASIS, a sprawling virtual utopia that lets you be anything you want to be, a place where you can live and play and fall in love on any of ten thousand planets modeled individually after different themes. The creator of this virtual reality system, James Halliday, has hidden a series of fiendish puzzles that will yield massive fortune—and remarkable power—to whoever can unlock them. Upon his death, this bizarre 'contest' was released to the world. The problem, however, is that Halliday only left a short rhyme as a clue to where the first key is hidden. For years, millions have struggled fruitlessly to attain this prize, knowing only that Halliday’s riddles are based in the pop culture he loved — that of the late twentieth century. And for years, millions have found in this quest another means of escape, retreating into happy, obsessive study of Halliday’s icons. Like many of his contemporaries, Wade is as comfortable debating the finer points of John Hughes’s oeuvre, playing Pac-Man, or reciting Devo lyrics as he is scrounging power to run his OASIS rig. And then Wade stumbles upon the first puzzle. Suddenly the whole world is watching, and thousands of competitors join the hunt — among them certain powerful players who are willing to commit very real murder to beat Wade to this prize. Now the only way for Wade to survive and preserve everything he knows is to win. But to do so, he may have to leave behind his oh-so-perfect virtual existence and face up to life—and love—in the real world he’s always been so desperate to escape. That’s all I have for now, but I welcome any other suggestions/contributions! Have you read a good YA book that should have more attention? Then please share it with us! That Damn Satyr fucked around with this message at 05:56 on May 7, 2012 |
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May 7, 2012 05:32
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May 7, 2012 05:33
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I only started reading YA about a year and a half ago, starting with The Hunger Games trilogy, and I have to say I still tend to pick out the dystopian novels rather than more general YA fiction. That said, I recently read The Fault in Our Stars by John Green and loved it to pieces, so I'll be checking out more of his books. I also joined a YA book club (through Forever Young Adult, an informative if exceptionally annoying YA website), which is fun, but I continually find myself reading these books with my 'adult' eyes.
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May 7, 2012 13:06
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I've also within the past couple years started looking at YA fiction more seriously, and The Hunger Games were definitely a part of that. It's nice to have something a little lighter to enjoy between larger works. The nice thing about YA is that you're able to get a complete narrative in a relatively small amount of time, so even if it's bad it doesn't take long to get through. There is an awful lot of bad out there too, but maybe I'm just overly critical. I've read a few things that came highly recommended but I just didn't enjoy. I'm not going to give full write-ups for the stuff I didn't like, but here's a short list of some popular books/series and why I didn't care for them: The Alchemyst series: Couldn't even get through the first book, dumb kids making dumb decisions, and it reads like fan-fiction. I believe there was a part in the beginning where the girl is listening to Pink on her iPod, and it just seemed to set the theme for the rest of the book. It was like the author was an old dad trying to seem hip and relevant while cashing in on the Harry Potter craze. The Warrior Heir: I at least finished this. It wasn't horrible but it wasn't amazing either, it didn't grab me enough to want to read the other books in the series. Incarceron: My feelings here are similar to Warrior Heir. The premise of a "living prison" is neat but they didn't really do much with it, just ended up like a typical fantasy romp in a slightly different setting. Boneshaker: I'm not sure if this is technically YA or not but it's certainly appropriate for teens so I've included it. I read this and while some of the characters were interesting I kind of really didn't care for the protagonists, and didn't find myself interested in their plight. And towards the end of the book everything kind of just goes to hell (in the story) and it felt like the narrative did the same thing, just a lot of random stuff that magically fits together perfectly to make everything work out. I know a lot of people enjoyed this but, again, I wasn't excited enough to get the other books by the author. I'm also not a big fan of steampunk so that might have had something to do with it. With that out of the way, here are some books I did enjoy and highly recommend:    Graceling by Kristin Cashore Graceling - Fire - Bitterblue If there's one YA fantasy book I could get you to read, it would be Graceling. Graceling is the story of Katsa, who is a Graceling. Gracelings are people with extreme talents, it could be dancing or cooking or anything really, but Katsa's Grace is killing. So she works as an enforcer for the King, her uncle. She ends up meeting another graceling and they uncover a terrifying secret that could change the shape of the lands they live in. Seriously, the "villain" of this book is terrifying and it's a great story. Kristin Cashore is incredibly imaginative and her writing is very descriptive and vivid. Fire is actually a prequel to Graceling that takes place in another section of the world. Some people didn't like it (they wanted a sequel), but I thoroughly enjoyed it, again, Cashore is just so imaginative. Her world is unlike any other I've read. I just started Bitterblue so don't have much to comment on yet.  The Amulet of Samarkand by Jonathan Stroud The Amulet of Samarkand - The Golem's Eye - Ptolemy's Gate - The Ring of Solomon The Bartimaeus Trilogy books (+The Ring of Solomon) take place (mostly) in London in an alternate history. The premise is that there are magicians who are the ruling class who govern the non-magicians. It's not like Harry Potter though where only magicians know about magic, everyone knows about magic. However, almost all magic is actually performed by demons that are bound to requests by magicians that summon them. The books follow a particular demon, Bartimaeus, and the magicians who summon him. Bartimaeus himself is hilarious, he's a respectably powerful demon but his real strength is his cleverness. The books are told like a story from Bartimaeus's perspective most of the time, in a very conversational tone, which just makes you like the character more as he peppers in mentions of his greatness and ability (frequently with footnotes for further clarification on why he is so amazing). I've read all 4 books in the sequence and enjoyed them immensely.  Delirium by Lauren Oliver Delirium is another dystopian setting where Love is considered a disease. It takes the idea that love itself, desire for love, and lack of love are some of the biggest causes of suffering in the world and takes it to an extreme. The technology is pretty much our same level, except they have figured out a way to make people no longer feel love, in a procedure that is performed when people get to their late teens. Until that time, the genders are almost constantly segregated. Delirium is about a girl, Lena, who is almost at the age where she is going to have her procedure done. And of course, she ends up meeting a boy and has to struggle with her emotions. Because in this world, the children are actually raised to fear love because of how "dangerous" it is. So there's a lot of Lena being scared about meeting this guy because she doesn't want love to "get her", but she's also drawn to him because of feelings she doesn't understand. At its heart this is a love story with a Big Brother spin on it, and though the writing isn't incredible (though not bad for YA) and the climax is kind of a stretch, I liked the premise and how it was explored so I would say it is worth a read. Apparently this is planned as a trilogy and the 2nd book, Pandemonium, is out now, but I haven't read it yet. I will most likely be giving it a shot though.  The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly This is a little older I think but I really enjoyed it. It's about a boy, David, struggling with his father's marriage to another woman after his mother dies. The book takes place during WWII, and David escapes from the struggles of reality into another world that mirrors his fairy tale books, and gets trapped there. This is another take on the "fairy tales retold as darker versions" idea, the characters he meets are familiar to us but changed. And David has to figure out how to get home from this strange fantasy world while aspects of the real world start to meld into it. All the while, David starts to view his life back in the real world in a different light. Here are some books I haven't read yet but would be interested in people's opinions on. Basically these are on my radar but I haven't made up my mind on if I'm going to read them yet: The Book Thief by Markus Zusak The Iron Fey series by Julie Kagawa The Boy in the Striped Pajamas by John Boyne sighnoceros fucked around with this message at 18:17 on May 7, 2012 |
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May 7, 2012 17:32
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sighnoceros posted:The Mortal Instruments series and The Infernal Devices series by Cassandra Clare Oh, you had to get me started. Cassandra Clare is an ex-Harry Potter fanfic writer (who started the "Draco in leather pants" thing) best known for plagiarizing another YA novel in her fanfics, and later plagiarizing her own fanfics in her "original" writing. Most of the funny, witty parts of her fics were the result of her cribbing lines from Buffy or various British comedies. She's apparently VERY well connected in the publishing world though, which is why she has a major deal and gets drooled over by various YA authors. I actually interacted with her a bit back in 2001 when we both posted on the same Harry Potter ezboard (the predecessor to Fiction Alley, I believe). She praised some essay I had written, saying that I'd said "everything I've ever thought but better", which became fairly amusing in light of the plagiarism thing.
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May 7, 2012 18:15
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I'd heard they were derivative but not to that extent. I will steer clear, thanks!
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May 7, 2012 18:18
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sighnoceros posted:
This sounds exactly like the kind of things I love! Also, thank you so much for sharing all of those! I haven't ever heard of most of them, so now I have tons of new stuff to put on my to-read list! =)
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May 7, 2012 19:30
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No problem, thanks for making the thread! I was looking at The Maze Runner at the same time as Incarceron and chose Incarceron, I may have to go back and pick that up. And Unwind sounds awesome too. The others I hadn't heard of so those are going on my list now. Another interesting series is Gregor the Overlander by Suzanne Collins. Before Hunger Games she started a set of children's books and someone at B&N recommended them to me. They are about a boy named Gregor who goes underground to this world where bugs and bats and rats etc. are all larger than man-sized, and there are people down there as well as a prophecy about a coming war that seems to refer to him. The books are not incredibly complex or anything but I still enjoyed the story she was telling. In the same vein is The City of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau. A children's series about a city of people living in a huge cave underground after some huge calamity on the surface generations ago. They have electricity powered by a huge generator, but the generator is starting to break down and nobody knows enough about it to fix it, and it's up to two kids to convince everyone else how real the danger is and hopefully find a way to survive. Both of the above series are about 300 pages a book, and while they are probably aimed at younger teens they're still good. They kind of reminded me of the His Dark Materials series in their level of maturity. So it's mostly tweens trying to deal with grown-up problems written in a way that is accessible to children of any age that can read it. sighnoceros fucked around with this message at 20:06 on May 7, 2012 |
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May 7, 2012 19:44
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Ooh, great thread. Another great one is How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff. It's getting made into a movie starring Saoirse Ronan so there's that motivation, if you need it. It's a YA standout, in my opinion, on par with Hunger Games. Daisy, the narrator, is a fifteen year old anorexic American poor little rich girl type who gets stuck in England with her cousins (one of whom is ~dreamy~) when a mysterious war breaks out and England gets invaded by the Enemy. Daisy's voice is incredible and there's a palpable sense of doom throughout and though it won't take you more than a couple of hours to get through it, it'll stay with you long after you finish it. And speaking of Cassie Clare, I'd steer clear of YA paranormal/UF in general unless you really know the subgenre. I've yet to read one that I actually liked. That's a sweeping generalization but really, all the clunkers/repeat offenders seem to be YA paranormals. (Which is not a chicken-egg situation. It's because of the egg named Twilight. Pre-Twilight you have some great ones, like Companions of the Night and Blood and Chocolate. Post, it's all downhill with Bella 2.0s and Edward-lites all over the place.) Fantasy and contemporary, on the other hand, seem to represent the best of YA. You really can't go wrong with a Juliet Marillier, Jessica Day George, Dianne Wynne Jones, Courtney Summers, Laini Taylor, or Laurie Halse Anderson book and they're the cream of the crop in those subgenres.
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May 7, 2012 20:13
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I love YA so much--mostly fantasy stuff. YA got me hooked on magic and I've never looked back. Although the first three books of Diane Duane's Young Wizards series are better than the rest (excepting maybe Wizard's Dilemma), they're all good reads and the series is still in progress. I particularly love Deep Wizardry. The premise isn't as HP-like as the title may sound: protagonists Nita and Kit have experience and books as their only school, and they face things more terrible and more redeemable than Voldemort. I haven't read Blood and Chocolate yet, but I tried Silver Kiss by the same author (Annette Curtis Klause) a couple of years ago and it's a lovely alternative to other YA vampire contenders. I don't remember these as well as I would like, and they're probably hard to find, but Suzy McKee Charnas wrote the Sorcery Hall trilogy: Bronze King, Silver Glove, and Golden Thread. I don't think I ever did find the second one. The first and the last made me cry, though. (Disclaimer: I was a twelve-year-old girl at the time.) What I recall is that they're set in New York City and are rather like the Duane books in that there are grim and weighty things for the protagonist to overcome, but it's not all dark and despair. Erin Bow's first novel, Plain Kate, is beautiful. It has some Slavic mythology touches I enjoyed very much. Madeleine L'Engle wrote A Wrinkle In Time, A Wind In the Door, Many Waters, and A Swiftly Tilting Planet (among many other things I haven't read yet)--they have the same good vs. evil/creation vs. entropy struggle as the Duane, but Planet, at least, feels like it was written for a slightly older audience. Many Waters has a heavy Biblical theme (the 'waters' being the Flood). Wind increased my interest in biology as a kid. I was thrilled when we got to mitochondria in high school and I already knew what they were. Speaking of the Cassie Cla(i)re affair, the books she ripped off are pretty good: Pamela Dean's Secret Country, Hidden Land, and Whim of the Dragon. They were re-released just a few years back. More fantasy, with children stumbling onto a magical world a la Narnia, but with less religious allegory, fewer talking animals, and more murder. Anne McCaffrey's Dragonsong, Dragonsinger, and Dragondrums are YA set in the otherwise adult Dragonriders of Pern universe. There's some serious wish-fulfillment going on with Dragonsinger. It's my favorite, even so. Music is a much bigger feature than dragons. On a mystery note, I still enjoy Ellen Raskin's Westing Game, in which an apartment building's residents have to solve the murder of a mysterious tycoon. Gene Stratton Porter's Girl of the Limberlost has some magnificent natural beauty and an old-fashioned flavor, if you like that sort of thing; it was published in 1909. Kaishai fucked around with this message at 09:56 on May 8, 2012 |
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May 8, 2012 02:50
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I remembered one I left out of the OP, but it was mentioned above! Here's a bit of a review! The Book Thief by Markus Zusak Narrated by Death himself, and set during World War II in Germany, this is the story of Liesel Meminger, a foster girl living outside of Munich. Liesel has very little in her life that she loves, until she encounters something she finds she can't resist - books. her accordion-playing stepfather teaches her to read and she finally finds joy in the pages of the books she steals and takes home to read. This book touched me in a way very few ever have. It's beautifully written, and deeply emotional. I dare you to read it and come out with dry eyes. That Damn Satyr fucked around with this message at 22:23 on May 13, 2012 |
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May 8, 2012 02:56
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Kaishai posted:Gene Stratton Porter's Girl of the Limberlost has some magnificent natural beauty and an old-fashioned flavor, if you like that sort of thing; it was published in 1909. I only read that for the first time a few months ago since it was free for Kindle, and it's another one of those I'd wished I'd read when I was 12 or 13, because Elnora is a way better protagonist than those in most of the crap I was reading back then.
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May 8, 2012 03:10
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I thought Ready Player One was complete poo poo. I only got a couple of chapters in, just more pointless references haphazardly stapled together into an abomination. The 80's, so loving what? I'm glad I didn't buy it.
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May 8, 2012 04:04
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Some things to check out... i teach 7th and 8th grade so I have TONS to suggest. Trenton Lee Stewart's "The Mysterious Benedict Society" Series. A bunch of young talented children have been recruited to be secret agents to go on adventures and save the world. But this is lighthearted and fun stuff that doesn't take itself too seriously. I picked up the first one on a whim. The 4th book just came out recently. James Howe - The Misfits, Totally Joe, Addie on the Inside. After writing Bunnicula books for a couple years with his wife, James Howe decided to come out as Gay and totally changed his approach to writing. Not the best for Adult-Crossover readers, but these are intersting stories that hit perspectives that you don't see every often. Carl Deuker - RUNNER. This freaking book is MAGIC! Last year my 8th graders were proud to never have finished a book. After a week with this one, most of them had already finished it. A poor kid with a messed up life gets a job. He picks up a package on the beach and delivers it. Eventually he starts to wonder what is inside the package and things get crazy. I think RICK RIORDAN really put together something quite fun with his Percy Jackson series of books. The movie was completely awful, but the novels are a perfect blend of adventure and mythology. The second series is just as good. Also... I really got a kick out of The 39 Clues series. A bunch of authors teamed up to write a series of books. It's basically like "Its a Mad Mad Mad World" meets "Indiana Jones". The second series of this has been coming out, I've not had a chance to pick them up (for budget reasons). There is an internet game component. For those who like codes and puzzles, you can easily get a little more mileage out of it. Laurie Halse Anderson writes some okay stuff. Everybody gets all spazzed about "SPEAK" but TWISTED and PROM are both better books. Some of Eion Colfer's stuff is pretty decent. Specfically I really like Halfmoon Investigations... the Artemis Fowl stuff is alright but not as impressive. Also.. read CLIVE BARKER's ABARAT books. Beautifully illustrated, and it's a good call back to Barker's early epic fantasy stuff. That is a good place to start
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May 8, 2012 04:41
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I review books with out reading them from cover to cover posted:I thought Ready Player One was complete poo poo. I only got a couple of chapters in, just more pointless references haphazardly stapled together into an abomination. The 80's, so loving what? I'm glad I didn't buy it. I actually loved Ready Player One. The 80's is what I grew up with and reading the book was an extremely nostalgic experience for me. The story itself might have lacked somewhat overall (certainly it wasn't a 5 star novel), but it was well written, and didn't ramble through out. If you're a child or fan of the 80's I'd definitely give it a read.
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May 8, 2012 05:21
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Waffle Ho posted:Oh, you had to get me started. I actually like the Mortal Instruments series, to be honest. I found them to be a ton of campy, teen angsty fun when I read them back in high school, with monster slayers, a Jewish vampire, emo kids, magical powers and lots of fighting. I also liked her positive, non-stereotypical portrayal of gay characters. In light of the plagiarism thing (which I never really heard of until now), maybe the fact that Buffy and HP were two of my favorite series in HS skewed my enjoyment of them, I don't know. Let me put it this way. If you're the kind of person who prefers weird/quirky 90s-ish characters in your juvenile fiction, you'll probably like Mortal Instruments. I could see them appealing to people with a sarcastic sense of humor, as well. Anyway, to contribute: The Monstrumologist by Rick Yancey: Probably my favorite YA of all time, no lie, and one of the very few true horror novels in the genre. Someone described it as a cross between HP Lovecraft, Mary Shelley, and Harry Potter, and that person was dead on. It is essentially the story of a boy in Victorian London who is assistant to a mad scientist of sorts who studies Lovecraftian horrors. There's a ton of blood, guts, and gore, and no romance! The Perks of Being a Wallflower: This one's famous by now, and people either love it or hate it. I noticed this is almost 80% due to whether or not somebody read it when they were in high school. Since I did read it in high school (like Mortal Instruments), I am firmly in the former category. It's basically about a "slow" boy who befriends a group of deeply troubled outcasts, which sounds boring, but the beauty of it is in Charlie's narrative voice. it's like reading about an 8 year old who suddenly got transported to a school setting. I recommend it to everyone who still has a kid stuck inside of them somewhere. Incarceron: Couldn't put this one down. Switches POVs between a girl stuck in a dystopian world that is eternally set in the Renaissance period and a boy trapped in a large, living prison. Their stories intertwine and there's a lot of twists and turns in there, as well. Highly recommended to all sci-fi fans. Anna Dressed in Blood: Another YA horror, about a teen boy who travels around the country getting rid of troublesome ghosts. He thinks he's seen it all, until he encounters one particularly evil & murderous spirit named Anna. It's sort of a perverse love story. Both of the characters are ruthless and totally meant for one another. It's like "Ghostbusters" meets "True Blood", I guess you could say. Captain Mog fucked around with this message at 20:21 on Aug 28, 2012 |
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May 8, 2012 05:35
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Roydrowsy posted:I think RICK RIORDAN really put together something quite fun with his Percy Jackson series of books. The movie was completely awful, but the novels are a perfect blend of adventure and mythology. The second series is just as good. I enjoyed the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series. I appreciate the renewed attention to mythology and I like the modern demigod ideas he put forth, but honestly, he's not the most sophisticated writer. I know his target audience is much younger (I'm thinking 6th grade, perhaps?), but the writing style and characterizations were so childish, it was sometimes difficult to get through. That being said, I still really enjoyed the Percy Jackson books and his Kane Chronicles series as well. I still haven't read the Heroes of Olympus yet. I lost track of Eion Colfer's Artemis Fowl books after middle school. Is it worth going back to? Yes, Cassandra Clare is known to be a big Harry Potter fanfic writer and plagiarist, but her books do seem to sell quite well. Are they any good on their own merit or is it just another strange Twilight-like phenomenon? Also, does anyone know anything about the Divergent trilogy by Veronica Roth?
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May 8, 2012 16:38
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Roydrowsy mentioned it, but I can't recommend the the Books of Abarat by Clive Barker highly enough. Just a really fantastic setting with interesting characters.
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May 8, 2012 18:21
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Panda So Panda posted:Yes, Cassandra Clare is known to be a big Harry Potter fanfic writer and plagiarist, but her books do seem to sell quite well. Are they any good on their own merit or is it just another strange Twilight-like phenomenon? Divergent had a good premise, but I couldn't finish as soon as she found twu wuv with a guy who treats her like poo poo and embarrasses her in public. It annoys the crap out of me when YA books do that. It was a decent story otherwise. Also, as I stated above, I like the Mortal Instruments series. I wouldn't compare them to Harry Potter, but her books do have a consistent, colorful lore to them that draws from mythological and Biblical inspirations. They center around a society of "Shadowhunters" who are basically the police force of a supernatural underworld that lies beneath New York City- fae, vampires, werewolves, witches/wizards, ect. The characters are really likeable and it's not at all Twilighty because the first three books were over by the time Twilight became popular. I don't get the apparent hate for them. They're very run-of-the-mill fun books.
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May 8, 2012 18:23
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Dark Lord of Derkholm by Dianna Wynne Jones is a great humorous fantasy YA. I don't know if anyone has mentioned how great Dianna Wynne Jones is yet. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diana_Wynne_Jones_bibliography Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi is a great dystopian YA novel set after a hard fall from a pre-peak oil industrialized society. The main character is a ship breaker who works cutting up old oil tankers for scrap steal, copper, and oil. It's a pretty fast paced book with scary action. Very well paced and written.
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May 8, 2012 18:35
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SlenderWhore posted:I don't get the apparent hate for them. They're very run-of-the-mill fun books. She's just not a very good writer—I thought her fanfic was better written than her original stuff, and that's because so much of it wasn't her writing at all.
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May 8, 2012 18:56
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Waffle Ho posted:She's just not a very good writer—I thought her fanfic was better written than her original stuff, and that's because so much of it wasn't her writing at all. This may be true. Perhaps I was young enough that I didn't mind or notice crappy writing when I saw it. Oh, well.
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May 8, 2012 19:16
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Kasan posted:If you're a child or fan of the 80's I'd definitely give it a read. How the hell is it YA if it's targeted for people who grew up in the 80's? I enjoyed it most likely only because I got the audiobook - Wil Wheaton was just the perfect smug oval office to voice the smug oval office that was the protagonist. Also because I grew up in the 80's and could relate to it. Not a 5 star book in any case, but a nice one to listen to. The writing wasn't stellar, or even particularly good, but I still don't think it's an YA novel. It's just a poorly written novel which attracts 80's manbabies (like me and my sister). edit: Also might want to mention Alastair Reynolds' Terminal World, since it's the YAest book not marketed as YA as it gets. Also steampunk, which someone might like.
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May 8, 2012 21:09
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Don't get me wrong, I think the rise of YA novels is awesome. When I grew up I had nothing to read except Carolyn Keene and the Three Investigators novels. Easy to say I wasn't particularly into the authors spamming three-four books about horses every year. It's awesome that kids these days have tons more variety in what they read.
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May 8, 2012 21:18
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Panda So Panda posted:Yes, Cassandra Clare is known to be a big Harry Potter fanfic writer and plagiarist, but her books do seem to sell quite well. Are they any good on their own merit or is it just another strange Twilight-like phenomenon? I tried the first one--only the first one, so I may have missed good things later for all I know--and I just couldn't get through it or even very far. Valentine too closely resembled Voldemort. Jace was her fanfic Draco. And Clary... if Rowling had crossbred Harry with Buffy and named the result 'Rowls' the effect might be similar. I didn't spot any actual plagiarism, but it felt derivative as all hell. Which doesn't necessarily mean a person wouldn't like it. I retain a childhood fondness for Sword of Shannara even after re-skimming it a couple of days ago, and it matches LotR almost beat for beat.
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May 8, 2012 21:37
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HUMAN FISH posted:How the hell is it YA if it's targeted for people who grew up in the 80's? YA has more to do with writing style than subject matter. I think the target audience of the novel is young males age 8 to 18 since the entire premise of the novel takes place inside an MMORPG/SH, which the predominate age bracket playing is quickly shifting from late 20's early 30's to preadolescence to late teens. Us old folks aren't the majority of online gamers anymore 
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May 8, 2012 22:14
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Roydrowsy posted:Some of Eion Colfer's stuff is pretty decent. Specfically I really like Halfmoon Investigations... the Artemis Fowl stuff is alright but not as impressive. Never liked Halfmoon Investigations much, but I've been a fan of the Fowl series since I was a teen. The first three are excellent and very funny. The rest, not so much. Personally I think his best work is the Supernaturalist. Apparently he has a sequel in the works, but it won't be the same without Stefan  .I'd like to recommend Garth Nix's The Old Kingdom series: Sabriel, Lirael, and Abhorsen.  An interesting fantasy world with a great cast of characters. Sabriel in particular is a fantastic protagonist. Lirael isn't as interesting, but her supporting cast is better - Sam is lovely and the antagonists are pretty compelling. Also, the series features Mogget, the best fictional cat.  Abhorsen's ending is one of the most satisfying things I've read. Sabriel is a decent stand-alone too, no dodgy cliffhangers or forced sequels (Hunger Games, I'm looking at you). It feels very natural. Plus, look at how pretty they are!Nix's other big series, Keys to the Kingdom (he likes his kingdoms) is longer, but with a slightly simpler writing style.  I like them a lot too. I own them all except Wednesday and it makes me irrationally annoyed whenever I look at my bookshelf  It's not a complex series, but it's a lot of fun, and the titular characters are all brilliant. Arthur is a decent enough protagonist, but it's the bad guys that stand out for me. Monday and Thursday are my favourites. I need to reread them all some time soon.e: Saturday has a horrible cliffhanger. I was reading them as they came out. There was like two years between Saturday and Sunday
eating only apples fucked around with this message at 23:00 on May 8, 2012 |
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May 8, 2012 22:23
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SlenderWhore posted:Divergent had a good premise, but I couldn't finish as soon as she found twu wuv with a guy who treats her like poo poo and embarrasses her in public. It annoys the crap out of me when YA books do that. It was a decent story otherwise. I couldn't agree more with this, and I also found her to be ridiculously naive. My biggest problem with the book is what a blatant rip off it was of THG. Young girl lives in a dystopian society where the population is split up and uninformed, does something that is required of all young people but then finds the unique snow flake inside her and rebels along with her love interest. But if you like THG and you want to read more like it, Divergent is a good place to start. Not sure if I'll finish the trilogy, though. That's also a pet peeve of mine about YA: EVERYTHING is a trilogy nowadays. Not even a series, always a trilogy 
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May 8, 2012 22:53
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Panda So Panda posted:I enjoyed the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series. I appreciate the renewed attention to mythology and I like the modern demigod ideas he put forth, but honestly, he's not the most sophisticated writer. I know his target audience is much younger (I'm thinking 6th grade, perhaps?), but the writing style and characterizations were so childish, it was sometimes difficult to get through. That being said, I still really enjoyed the Percy Jackson books and his Kane Chronicles series as well. I still haven't read the Heroes of Olympus yet. I really want him to try Norse Mythology though.
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May 9, 2012 12:32
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I love YA, and I work in children's book publishing, so I'll be sure to have a list of stuff to post here, but first...Roydrowsy posted:James Howe - The Misfits, Totally Joe, Addie on the Inside. After writing Bunnicula books for a couple years with his wife, James Howe decided to come out as Gay and totally changed his approach to writing. Not the best for Adult-Crossover readers, but these are intersting stories that hit perspectives that you don't see every often. These books are great, and, not kidding you, I'm on the cover of both Totally Joe and Addie on the Inside. As in, I modeled for both. In book publishing, we often pull people from the office to do cover shoots. It's cheap (aka free), the person's there whenever you need them, and it's pretty fun. I was picked for Addie because I pretty much look like a middle-grader. The designer picked me for my hair, but he unfortunately had to photoshop it shorter at the author's request. Totally Joe required me to lie on my back with my feet up in the air fot a good hour or so to make it appear to be a headstand. Fun fact for this one: the two legs are from two different photographs, which were then photoshopped together.
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May 9, 2012 15:05
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Some of these are a bit older but still good. Jane Yolen's trilogy Dragon's Blood Heart's Blood A Sending of Dragons Nice coming of age story and good world-building The Witch of Blackbird Pond--Elizabeth Speare, which was on my shelf right along with Nancy Drew and Trixie Belden. Midnight is a Place--Joan Aiken. I'm not sure if that's technically YA but I picked up a copy because it was one of my favorites when I was 12 or so, and it was just as good as I remembered. My husband read it and loved it as well. Very Dickensian. More recent, and perhaps not strictly YA but very well done is Fledgling and Saltation by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller.
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May 9, 2012 23:04
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I'd like to recommend Across the Universe by Beth Revis. Amazon says:quote:Seventeen-year-old Amy joins her parents as frozen cargo aboard the vast spaceship Godspeed and expects to awaken on a new planet, three hundred years in the future. Never could she have known that her frozen slumber would come to an end fifty years too soon and that she would be thrust into the brave new world of a spaceship that lives by its own rules. The romance part is actually well done and moves slowly. (No twu wuv here) It's facinating to read about the generational ship and the differences between our culture and theirs. Of course, trying to find out the mystery is awesome too. It's going to be a trilogy. The second book is out ("A Million Suns"), and the final book is coming (hopefully) January 2013.
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May 9, 2012 23:56
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Seconding the love for Ship Breaker, it's brilliantly constructed and would make a terrific movie/miniseries. The most impressive YA novel I've read recently is Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver, who also wrote Delirium which was mentioned above. Before I Fall is a high school semi-fantasy (the premise is fantastic, but the plot is very grounded) and it's the best YA book I've read since Robert Cormier's stuff. Speaking of which - Robert Cormier is pretty old-school at this stage (I think he was writing in the 70s and 80s) but The Chocolate War for me is the one book that accurately gets how loving bleak being a teenager can be.
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May 10, 2012 06:02
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I recently finished the Chaos Walking series and can't stop recommending it. I'm trying to convince all my friends who drooled over Hunger Games to read it. Lionsgate is producing the films, which will be adapted by Charlie Kaufman.
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May 10, 2012 18:26
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HUMAN FISH posted:How the hell is it YA if it's targeted for people who grew up in the 80's? I read somewhere (not sure where so not sure if this is true or not) that what predominantly identifies a book as 'Young Adult' to publishers is that the protagonist must be under 18, regardless of subject matter. Therefore a book targeted for 80's or a book about zombies could still be young adult just by virtue of having a young protagonist. I find this interesting because you can have a book that has a very adult subject matter and even a very adult-seeming protagonist such as The Reapers Are the Angels by Alden Bell that gets shoehorned as 'YA' when I really don't think it fits that category and I could see much more adults liking the book than teenagers. Speaking of very adult-seeming YA books I'd say one of my faves is The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier. I remember reading it as a teen and being really impressed by the amount of sex, violence and anarchy in this book.
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May 10, 2012 19:04
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futurememory posted:I love YA, and I work in children's book publishing, so I'll be sure to have a list of stuff to post here, but first... that is so cool.
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May 11, 2012 03:01
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sighnoceros posted:No problem, thanks for making the thread! I was looking at The Maze Runner at the same time as Incarceron and chose Incarceron, I may have to go back and pick that up. And Unwind sounds awesome too. The others I hadn't heard of so those are going on my list now. I literally just finished Unwind, and It was such a killer book, I had to crawl out of bed and remark about it. I've never been much for most YA books. I like hard fantasy, comedic fantasy (think Discworld), alternate history (Guns of the South) and some science fiction assuming it wasn't written by Heinland. Unwind is perhaps one of the best novels I've read this year, and I've read some pretty good books thus far. I highly recommend it to anybody looking for a good book they can't put down.
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May 11, 2012 10:06
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Unwind is incredible. Certainly, one of the more intriguing books I've read this year. I'm so bummed I haven't been able to loan it to any kids I know yet!
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May 11, 2012 15:53
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Unwind really seems like one of those books that you give to really problem kids, and then tell their parents that things will be better, just wait... I can't wait for the sequel! =D ...or the supposed movie, but I really can not imagine how they can make this work as a PG-13 movie and not traumatize every child in America and half of the adults.
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May 11, 2012 16:04
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My favorite Young Adult Novel is Young Adult Novel by Daniel Pinkwater. It's set in a high school, is narrated by a person who calls himself Charles the Cat, and involves fan fiction, Dada, popularity contests, cereal attacks, politics and toilet bowl art (among other things). Like most of Pinkwater's oeuvre, it's extremely insightful, and completely insane. I also thoroughly recommend The Snarkout Boys And The Avocado Of Death, which begins as a trip to the late night movie theater, and turns into a mystery involving orangutans, professional wrestlers, disappearing uncles, amazing stereo systems, delicious baked potatoes and the greatest detective in the world. I believe both are out of print, but they can be found in the Pinkwater collection "5 Novels." Beware, though- Pinkwater's goofiness is contagious. One Amazon reviewer noted that there is a whole subculture of people whom Pinkwater has corrupted, and I'm proud to count myself among them.
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May 12, 2012 23:56
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