Books shelved under “Young Adult”

Disclaimer: I won this in a Goodreads First Reads Giveaway. Loves me the free books.

There is really no question about it: adolescents and superpowers just go well together. After all, teenagers just want to be normal, and superheroes often just want to be normal. Can you guess what a teenager with superpowers wants?

Kelly Oram does not break any new ground with Being Jamie Baker, which hews very closely to all of…

I am ambivalent about how Specials concludes the original Uglies trilogy (yes, I know there's a fourth book, and I shall even read it one day). On one hand, it was much better than Pretties. On the other hand, it is still not as good as Uglies.

Specials just didn't grip me. It fell flat, in a quiet, unassuming sort of way. I persevered, poked and prodded at it, begged it to impress…

With Uglies, Scott Westerfeld creates a creepy adolescent dystopia where "pretty" is decided by committee, and everyone at sixteen receives an operation to become pretty. Until then, one exists as an "ugly," good only for learning and playing pranks, banned from the parties and glitz of New Pretty Town. Of course, being a dystopia, there's more sinister workings afoot. Being pretty isn't all it's cracked up to be.

In many ways, Uglies reminds me…

The perverse, contrary part of me enjoys panning books that receive wide acclaim. It's a calling (in the same way that being a creepy funeral home director is a calling). Giving a wildly popular book a bad review is almost as fun as giving a bad book a bad review. I'll be honest: it's an ego thing, a sense of smugness that comes from not succumbing to the hype.

So when I like a book,…

This is a birthday present for a coworker, who as far as I know reads only that other vampire series. I wanted something similar to give her, so I bought Night World No. 1 upon the recommendation of a friend. Now I've read it for myself, so I know what it is I'll be giving away.

The first rule of Night World: Do not talk about Night World.

The second rule of Night World: Do…

After not enjoying Elsewhere, I was hesitant to read this book, but decided to go through with it anyway. I'm not sure that was the right decision. While Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac isn't a terrible book, I finished it with a profound feeling of "So what?"

The premise is interesting: Naomi Porter is a teenage yearbook editor who hits her head when she falls down the steps at her school, causing her to…

Is it just me, or are books about dead characters living in an afterlife increasingly common? There must be something innately fascinating about making one's protagonist already dead. Fortunately, the eponymous afterlife known as "Elsewhere" is a pleasant, non-threatening environment where dead people age backward and then are born again as babies.

If I had a choice, reincarnation would not be my first choice of afterlife. The concept hinges on the idea that everyone has,…

Neil Gaiman is one of the world's leading storytellers, and The Graveyard Book great story--several stories, in fact, all bound up into one nice narrative.

I have great respect for Gaiman because he does not patronize children. The Graveyard Book is, in many ways, a children's book (although adults will enjoy it as well). Unlike much of the mass culture drivel produced for children these days, Gaiman does not treat children like they are idiots…

I finished this book in three hours. From page one, Larry Doyle creates an eerily familiar depiction of high school, specifically that moment when you look back during your graduation and realize you're finally free and have your whole life ahead of you--and it's scary.

Doyle's wit sets us off on a one-night odyssey that originates from the single question, "What if, instead of delivering an average graduation speech, the valedictorian head of the…