The Young Adult book thread.

[AdamYJ]

I've recently been taking a Literature for Young Adults class and have come to an important discovery: not all teen literature is vapid paranormal romance. I know. Big shocker, right? So, I set up this thread for people to recommend Young Adult books that are actually good and people might want to read.

I would like to suggest:

Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi
The Book Thief by Marcus Zusak
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian by Sherman Alexie
Trash by Andy Mulligan
Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green and David Levithan
Au Revoir, Crazy European Chick by Joe Schreiber

Anyone else have suggestions?

[berk]

I like a lot of children's literature but not sure what would qualify as young adult. When I was a teenager I enjoyed the S. E. Hinton books, The Outsiders and That Was Then, This Is Now is that the kind of thing you mean?

[AdamYJ]

I like a lot of children's literature but not sure what would qualify as young adult. When I was a teenager I enjoyed the S. E. Hinton books, The Outsiders and That Was Then, This Is Now is that the kind of thing you mean?

Nowadays, a lot of what would be called Young Adult literature would also be called Teen literature. A lot of teen literature is very big right now, though it often stems from popularity rather than quality. Twilight is teen lit, though not very good. The Hunger Games is also teen lit, and is supposedly rather good.

Also, both your examples do count though they're both a bit on the older side. In fact, The Outsiders was on the reading list for my course. I agree that it's very good.

[jesse_custer]

Rite of Passage by Richard Wright is worth a read.

[hugglebunny]

Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi, mentioned above, is great.

Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld and illustrated by Keith Thompson, this is a WWI alt. history with mechs.

[Puma]

almost anything by Chris Crutcher (Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes, Whale Talk, The Sledding Hill) and Joan Bauer (Rules of the Road, Hope was Here).

[Inkthinker]

Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld and illustrated by Keith Thompson, this is a WWI alt. history with mechs.

Seconded. Brilliant illustrations, very entertaining story.

And while it doesn't come out until middle of next year, I'll shout out Brandon Sanderson's The Rithmatist. Not nearly as silly as his "Alcatraz" books, but much less heavy than his mainstream fantasy novels.

[AdamYJ]

Thanks for all the recommendations. I was afraid this thread wouldn't take off.

I'm a big folk and fairy tale nut, so I'm doing my end of the semester book talks on books based on folk and fairy tales.

Two of the ones I picked that I liked a lot were:
An Earthly Knight by Janet McNaughton
and
A Kiss in Time by Alex Flinn

The first one is a traditional fantasy story based on two old ballads "Lady Isabel and the Elfen Knight" and "The Ballad of Tam Lin". The second one is a cute romantic comedy about the princess from sleeping beauty being awoken in modern times by an average American teenager who ditched his European tour group. Neither is really Prinz Award material, but I found them both to be very entertaining.

[Kizmet]

Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld and illustrated by Keith Thompson, this is a WWI alt. history with mechs.

I haven't read "Leviathan", but I'm very fond of most things Westerfeld writes there's his Uglies trilogy about a distopian future where plastic surgery is a right of passage. "Peeps" for a vary weird take on vampires (intercut with stomach-turning descriptions of parasites). "The Midnight Hour" trilogy had a fun super-powered teens theme.

Tamora Pierce's books are fun female-protagonist, coming of age, sword and sorcery stories. Robin McKinley's "The Hero and the Crown" is similar.

Hilari Bell's "Knight and Rogue" series is an odd couple fantasy with chapters told in first person which alternate between the idealistic would-be knight Micheal and his much more cynical squire Fisk. They've got a bit of a Don Quixote and Sancho vibe to them, set in a fantasy world that's slightly past the age of knights, regardless of Micheal's ambitions.

[DebkoX]

13 reasons why, had me feeling a strange mixture of....sadness ;(

[Subotai]

Cynthia Voigt's Tillerman series.

[kattygomes]

I agree!! Many people think that young adult books are all about love stories and all that. But some young adult books like Brave Boys of Derry and The Future are really excellent books to read that are based on different theme.

[The Green Condom]

Well, love stories are indeed an important part when it comes to young adult literature but the big thing right now in YA is dystopia.

Divergent for example or The Mortal Instruments, Legend or again of course the very famous Hunger Games trilogy.

(all of them having a love story angle by the way)

[Wild_Child]

I read a young adult novel called Dark Dude: Oscar Hijuelos.It's about a runaway teen who got tired of the stuff at his home town.He ran away to a farm with his friend.He likes comic books and he talks about The Flash and Superman.He wanted to be a comic book writer and I found that interesting.

[DebkoX]

And i'm sure Rick Riordans stuff can sneak in?