YA Reads for 2016

A Big Dose of Lucky by Marthe Jocelyn 

Malou is a sixteen-year-old mixed race girl who has no family and has been living in an orphanage all her life. She has the desire to search for her family and find her roots. After her orphanage burns down, Malou receives some hints that she may have been born in Ontario’s cottage country and goes on a mission to find out where she comes from. This novel is set around the time of John F. Kennedy's assassination, continuous racial tension, social and sexual inequalities. A Big Dose of Lucky is part of a seven book series, but the series can be read in any order.

Juba! A Novel by Walter Dean Myers 

William Henry Labe, also known and Master Jubba, was a free slave and a dancer who danced in America and England in the 1840s. In his final novel, Walter Dean Myers captures the light of a person who helped influenced today’s tap, jazz, and step dancing.  

Not If I See You First by Eric Lindstrom 

Parker Grant does not allow her vision disability to define her while balancing her life as a normal teen. In her short life, Parker already dealt with a lot of tragedy. She lost her mother and sight at an early age and her father died when she started her junior year of high school. To add to all the problems weighing on Parker’s shoulders, her ex boyfriend, Scott Kilpatrick, resurfaced after breaking her heart when she was thirteen. Parker is a strong individual who has set a ground rule for no one to treat her any differently just because she's blind, and never take advantage. There will be no second chances. But when her ex tries to reach out to her, she tries hard to stick to her rules, which makes her second guess them.

Yo, Miss A Graphic Look at High School by Lisa Wilde 

This graphic memoir is told from the point of view of the author, who is also a teacher at John V. Lindsay Wildcat Academy. Wildcat Academy is a school in New York City to give teens who have been suspended, had issues with the law, and even teen parents, a second chance at an education.Wilde's graphic novel was inspired by portraits she created during her lunch break as well as poetry created by some of her students.  

New YA that goes all the way: review by Kathryn

An Ember In The Ashes by Sabaa Tahir

Reviewed by our resident teen blogger, Kathryn Barnes-Mealy

An Ember in The Ashes was a welcome change from the traditional formula authors use in other YA novels. Often YA novels can have a considerable amount of dark aspects in their story, but few go all the way. An Ember in The Ashes was very dark and captivating, and it certainly kept my attention throughout the duration of the book. The fact that it is told in dual perspectives is genius, as it allows the reader to alternate from Laia and Elias’s point of view. The world building was fantastic, allowing the reader to get a glimpse of the world that the characters live in, but not too much as that information is most likely left for the books to come.

The characters in this novel weren’t exactly lovable, but they were believable and honest to the extent that you have to admire the author for taking the time to really focus and develop them. An Ember In The Ashes has it all; action, drama, romance, and even a bit of added mystery to keep the reader guessing.  I would wholeheartedly recommend this to any reader who is looking for something different, or any reader who enjoys reading young adult fiction.

13 Books I loved as a teenager

We hear a lot about YA, or young adult, literature these days, and it is constantly on my mind as of late with the frenzy of Summer Reading upon us. I have been asked for a lot of recommendations for teen readers over the past couple of weeks which has caused me to reflect on what books I immersed myself in as a teenager, way back before the recent  explosion in literature published with teenagers in mind. It is probably not too surprising to find out that your librarian was a library-loving teenager, always tucked into a corner somewhere with their nose shoved in a book.  It didn't take much to get me to sit still and read, in fact it probably required force to get me to do much of anything else.  I usually sought out stories with a rebellious spirit and a dark side.  If asked my favorite genre, I probably would have answered "horror" or just glared (teenagers!) but if asked for a list of my favorite books, this would have been it.

Yep, The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath.  I remember reading this moody American classic for the first time immediately after I bought it at Goodwill for a quarter and feeling like I had discovered some great secret.  The Bell Jar follows the unraveling of the brilliant and talented Esther Greenwood into insanity.  This haunting novel is especially perfect for teen girls and budding artists.

I had to read The Great Gatsby in a high school English class.  I didn't love everything we had to read in school--I'm not that kind of book lover.  In fact, I still hate The Scarlet Letter.  There, I said it.  Sorry, Hawthorne.  The Great Gatsby is a fantastic read for teens, especially for anyone fascinated by the roaring 20s.

With my up-all-night reading of The Joy Luck Club began my lifelong love of multi-generational family sagas.  I remember having many discussions with my mom over this novel we shared at an age when that didn't always come easy.  This book could be great for a teen who is having trouble seeing eye to eye with their parents, not that there are very many of those around...*ahem*.

I still list The Women's Room as one of my all time favorites.  Checked out from my high school's library, this is another novel that made me feel like I had discovered a secret world of really cool, super adult literature, and it probably influenced my adult taste in literary fiction more than anything else I've read. Young feminists will find a lot to love about this story of a woman's journey of self-discovery through marriage and children, divorce, and later-in-life college study and academia set in tumultuous mid-20th century America.

My mom gave me her much loved paperback copy of The Good Earth when I was about 12 or 13 and I read it twice.  I remember many tears.  Good for a teen who likes to have a good cry over a book now and then, The Good Earth is the story of a Chinese farmer, Wang Lung, and his family in agrarian China. 

20 years after this book's publication, ebola is back in the news in a really horrible way so it may or may not be a good time to recommend The Hot Zone but I'm all about honesty and this book was one of my most favorite favorite reads as a teenager.  I bought it at a drugstore on a family summer vacation to the mountains in 1994 because I was "really interested in viruses" at the time. The Hot Zone is the terrifying true story of a virus which is currently wreaking havoc in west Africa. 

Ending up in Richmond was extra cool for me as a hardcore teenage E. A. Poe fanatic.  I had memorized a good deal of "The Raven" and would quote it often, and I carried around the complete works in my backpack.  Poe is excellent for lovers of horror and tragic romance, and the short story is great for teens who don't take easily to hefty novels.

What began as an act of rebellion (because my mom wouldn't let me see the movie so I checked out the book at the library and made a point to read it in front of her) ended up as another book that will remain a favorite of mine forever.  A Clockwork Orange works a pretty cool message about redemption that teens will respond to into a story of a violent future taken over by criminals, and the Slavic slang used by the gangs made me want to study Russian, which I later did in college.

Gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson's novel Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas was another rebellious read from the Davenport (Iowa) Public Library.  At least, it felt like rebellion.  Depictions of alcohol and drug use abound in this raucous classic about a reporter on a long weekend road trip. 

It really doesn't get better than this dark short story by Franz Kafka about a man who awakens to find himself transformed into a giant beetle. Considering all the changes one goes through at that age, it isn't surprising that The Metamorphosis strikes a chord with many a teen.

Siddhartha, first published in 1922, tells the spiritual journey of a boy from the Indian subcontinent during the time of the Buddha. This novel is peaceful, elegant, and spiritual--great for contemplative teens. I read it between shifts at the restaurant where I worked for some much needed respite from the diners.

Written in 1962 by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich is a powerful story of one day in life of a man imprisoned in a gulag (prison labor camp) in Soviet Russia. It's hard to be a teenager, which I suppose is why stories of terrible struggle are so popular with them.

The novel that defined the beat generation, On the Road was written by Jack Kerouac in 1957 and has been carried around by teenagers as a badge of cool ever since.  It usually needs little introduction and has inspired many a road trip across America. 

We would like to know, what sort of books did you discover as a teenager? Why did they speak to you?  

Happy Summer Reading!

FIZZ, BOOM, READ! and Spark a Reaction! Summer Reading recommendations for children and young adults

Summer Reading 2014 kicks off this weekend at the Richmond Public Library so a few of us got together to bring you a list of librarian-approved must reads for kids, teens, and the young at heart for the summer. Need something fun to do with the whole family this weekend?  Check with your neighborhood branch to see what festivities are planned, then swing by with the family pick up some books and get registered for Summer Reading!  You could win prizes!  

Children

The Bell Award is given annually to 5 picture books, one from each of the categories Read, Write, Sing, Talk, and Play, which represent the five practices to develop early literacy skills.  The following list are the shortlist nominees and winners for 2014.

Bell Award Winner, Read category: 

Open This Little Book by Jesse Klausmeier

Other notable "read" books:
Again by Emily Gravett
I’m Not Reading by Jonathan  Allen

Open Very Carefully: A Book With A Bite by Nick Bromley

The Story of Fish and Snail by Deborah Freedman

Bell Award Winner, Write category:

The Things I Can Do by Jeff Mack

Other notable "write" books:
Henri’s Scissors by Jeanette Winter

Monsters Love Colors by Mike Austin

My First Touch and Trace: First ABC by Tiger Tales

The Line by Paula Bossio

Bell Award Winner, Sing category:

Nighty-Night, Cooper by Laura Numeroff

Other notable "sing" books:
Lullaby by Langston Hughes

Marc Brown’s Playtime Rhymes by Marc Brown

Maria Had A Little Llama by Angela Dominquez  (English and Spanish)

Sing by Joe Raposo

Bell Award Winner, Talk category:

Moo! by David LaRochelle

Other notable "talk" books:
Diggers Go by Steve Light

I Like Berries, Do You? by Marjorie Pitzer

Rain by Linda Ashman

Which is Round? Which is Bigger? by  Mineko Mamada

Bell Award Winner, Play category-

Nino Wrestles the World by Yuri Morales

Other notable "play" books:
Hooray Parade by Barbara Joose

Wiggle by Taro Gomi

The World is Waiting for You by Barbara Kerley

Windblown by Edouard Manceau

For more information about the Bell Awards, visit: http://clel.org/content/bell-awards  

Young Adults

Here are some excellent reads for teens to help them decided what to read for the start of the summer reading program. More great YA titles that was picked by the Young Adult Library Association for 2014 can be found at: http://www.ala.org/yalsa/2014-best-fiction-young-adults

September Girls
Bennett Madison  

Zero Fade
Chris L. Terry 

Crossover
Kwame Alexander

 Fault In Our Stars
John Green

Drama
RainaTelgemeier

FanGirl
Rainbow Rowell

 Texting the Underworld
Ellen Booraem

Fake ID
Lamar Giles

Twenty Boy Summer
Sarah Ockler

  

Fat Angie
e.E Charlton-Trujillo