New Books for April 2016 (part 8)

The Steep and Thorny Way by Cat Winters

Historical Fiction 

1920s Oregon is not a welcoming place for Hanalee Denney, the daughter of a white woman and an African-American man. She has almost no rights by law, and the Ku Klux Klan breeds fear and hatred in even Hanalee's oldest friendships. Plus, her father, Hank Denney, died a year ago, hit by a drunk-driving teenager. Now her father's killer is out of jail and back in town, and he claims that Hanalee's father wasn't killed by the accident at all but, instead, was poisoned by the doctor who looked after him--who happens to be Hanalee's new stepfather. The only way for Hanalee to get the answers she needs is to ask Hank himself, a "haint" wandering the roads at night.

A Study in Charlotte by Brittany Cavallaro

Mystery 

Jamie Watson has always been intrigued by Charlotte Holmes; after all, their great-great-great-grandfathers are one of the most infamous pairs in history. But the Holmes family has always been odd, and Charlotte is no exception. She's inherited Sherlock's volatility and some of his vices--and when Jamie and Charlotte end up at the same Connecticut boarding school, Charlotte makes it clear she's not looking for friends. But when a student they both have a history with dies under suspicious circumstances, ripped straight from the most terrifying of the Sherlock Holmes stories, Jamie can no longer afford to keep his distance. Danger is mounting and nowhere is safe--and the only people they can trust are each other.

Sure Signs of Crazy by Karen Harrington

Contemporary Fiction 

Love can be a trouble word for some people. Crazy is also a trouble word. I should know. You've never met anyone exactly like twelve-year-old Sarah Nelson. While most of her friends obsess over Harry Potter, she spends her time writing letters to Atticus Finch. She collects trouble words in her diary. Her best friend is a plant. And she's never known her mother, who left when Sarah was two. Since then, Sarah and her dad have moved from one small Texas town to another, and not one has felt like home. Everything changes when Sarah launches an investigation into her family's Big Secret. She makes unexpected new friends and has her first real crush, and instead of a "typical boring Sarah Nelson summer," this one might just turn out to be extraordinary.

Sword and Verse by Kathy McMillan

Fantasy 

Raisa was just a child when she was sold into slavery in the kingdom of Qilara. Before she was taken away, her father had been adamant that she learn to read and write. But where she now lives, literacy is a capital offense for all but the nobility. The written language is closely protected, and only the King, Prince, Tutor, and Tutor-in-training are allowed to learn its very highest form. So when she is plucked from her menial labor and selected to replace the last Tutor-in-training, who was executed, Raisa knows that betraying any hint of her past could mean death. Keeping her secret guarded is hard enough, but the romance that's been blossoming between her and Prince Mati isn't helping matters. Then Raisa is approached by the Resistance--an underground rebel army--to help liberate the city's slaves. She wants to free her people, but that would mean aiding a war against Mati. As Raisa struggles with what to do, she discovers a secret that the Qilarites have been hiding for centuries--one that, if uncovered, could bring the kingdom to its knees.

Thanks for the Trouble by Tommy Wallach

Paranormal 

"Was this story written about me?" I shrugged. "Yes or no?" I shrugged again, finally earning a little scowl, which somehow made the girl even more pretty. "It's very rude not to answer simple questions," she said. I gestured for my journal, but she still wouldn't give it to me. So I took out my pen and wrote on my palm. I can't , I wrote. Then, in tiny letters below it: Now don't you feel like a jerk? Parker Santé hasn't spoken a word in five years. While his classmates plan for bright futures, he skips school to hang out in hotels, killing time by watching the guests. But when he meets a silver-haired girl named Zelda Toth, a girl who claims to be quite a bit older than she looks, he'll discover there just might be a few things left worth living for.

April Books bring May...more books! (April new books part 4)

Glass Arrow by Kristen Simmons

Science Fiction

Living in hiding with other ragtag girls in a world where women are hunted and sold for breeding, Aya is caught by a group of businessmen who test her survival skills.

Gone Too Far by Natalie Richards

Mystery

When high school senior Piper Woods finds a notebook with mutilated photographs and a list of student sins, she is sure the book is too gruesome to be true, but when a student from the list dies, and although everyone thinks it is a suicide, she suspects something much worse, and her fears are confirmed when she receives an anonymous text daring her to make things right.

Half Wild by Sally Green

Paranormal

In a modern-day England where two warring factions of witches live amongst humans, seventeen-year-old Nathan has come into his own unique magical Gift, but he is on the run with the Hunters close behind, and they will stop at nothing until they have captured Nathan and destroyed his father.

I Was Here by Gayle Forman

Contemporary Fiction

In an attempt to understand why her best friend committed suicide, eighteen-year-old Cody Reynolds retraces her dead friend's footsteps and makes some startling discoveries.

Liars, Inc. by Paula Stokes

Mystery

Max Cantrell has never been a big fan of the truth, so when the opportunity arises to sell forged permission slips and cover stories to his classmates, it sounds like a good way to make a little money and liven up a boring senior year. With the help of his friends Preston and Parvati, Max starts Liars, Inc. Suddenly everybody needs something and the cash starts pouring in. Who knew lying could be so lucrative?

When Preston wants his own cover story to go visit a girl he met online, Max doesn’t think twice about hooking him up. Until Preston never comes home. Then the evidence starts to pile up—terrifying clues that lead the cops to Preston’s body. Terrifying clues that point to Max as the murderer.

Can Max find the real killer before he goes to prison for a crime he didn’t commit?

New year, new books ~ Happy 2015! (part 7)

Signed Skye Harper by Carol Lynch Williams

In 1972, while her idol, Mark Spitz, is in Germany competing in the Olympics, fifteen-year-old Winston, her Nanny, and her crush, Steve, head to Las Vegas in Steve's parents' motorhome to reconnect with Winston's mother, who left ten years before to become a star.

Stranger by Rachel Manija Brown & Sherwood Smith

Many generations ago, a mysterious cataclysm struck the world. Governments collapsed and people scattered to rebuild where they could. A mutation called the Change arose, granting some people unique powers. Though the area once known as Los Angeles retains its cultural diversity, its technological marvels have faded into legend. "Las Anclas" now resembles a Wild West frontier town--where the Sheriff possesses superhuman strength, the doctor can warp time to heal his patients, and the distant ruins of an ancient city bristle with deadly crystalline trees that take their jewellike colors from the clothes of the people they killed. Teenage prospector Ross Juarez's best find ever--an ancient book he doesn't know how to read--nearly costs him his life when a bounty hunter is sent to kill him and steal the book. Ross barely makes it to Las Anclas, bringing with him a precious artifact, a power no one has ever had before, and a whole lot of trouble.

Storm Siren by Mary Weber

Seventeen-year-old slave girl, Nym, should not exist. In a world where Elementals are only born male, and always killed at birth, she is an anomaly at best. At worst, people around her die. When a court emissary identifies her weather-manipulating ability as a weapon, Nym is purchased and put to work honing her skills. With time running out for the kingdom of Faelen, Nym might be all that stands between it and the technologically-advanced horror racing down upon them--not to mention the rumored reemergence of the monstrous shapeshifter, Draewulf. But some elements even she can't control. Nym must decide whom to trust as she's unleashed into a world of assassins and political betrayal surrounding a young king fighting for his throne, a tired nation that has forgotten its calling, and her handsome tutor whose dark secrets could destroy both her people and her heart.

Swagger by Carl Deuker

High school senior point guard Jonas Dolan is on the fast track to a basketball career until an unthinkable choice puts his future on the line.

The Terminals by Royce Scott Buckingham

Nineteen-year-old Cam Cody takes the opportunity to join a covert unit of young spies who, like him, are terminally ill but have extraordinary abilities due to an experimental super-steroid, but he soon learns the program is not what it seems--and they may not even be ill.

New year, new books ~ Happy 2015! (part 4)

Gracefully Grayson by Ami Polonsky

Grayson, a transgender twelve-year-old, learns to accept her true identity and share it with the world.

Halley by Faye Gibbons

Times are hard in Depression era Georgia mountain country. Even so, fourteen-year-old Halley Owenby, her younger brother, Robbie, and their parents, Jim and Kate manage to get by until Jim dies suddenly in an accident, and Kate decides she and her children have no choice but to move in with her parents.

How it Went Down by Kekla Magoon

When sixteen-year-old Tariq Johnson is shot to death, his community is thrown into an uproar because Tariq was black and the shooter, Jack Franklin, is white, and in the aftermath everyone has something to say, but no two accounts of the events agree.

Isla and the Happily Ever After by Stephanie Perkins

Isla has had a crush on classmate Josh since their freshman year at the School of America in Paris, but after a chance encounter over the summer in Manhattan they return to France for their senior year where they are forced to confront challenges every young couple in love must face.

The Jewel by Amy Ewing

Violet, a poor girl from the outer city, finds forbidden romance and uncovers brutal secrets when, after three years of training, she is purchased by a royal family as a surrogate mother for royal children.

Thanks for the New Books! ~ November New Books Part 9

Sanctum by Madeleine Roux

Plagued by nightmares from their summer in the Brookline asylum, Dan, Abby, and Jordan return to New Hampshire College for a prosective students weekend, only to find themselves caught in a dark and dangerous mystery.  

The Scandalous Sisterhood of Prickwillow Place by Julie Berry

There's a murderer on the loose--but that doesn't stop the girls of St. Etheldreda's from attempting to hide the death of their headmistress in this rollicking farce. The students of St. Etheldreda's School for Girls face a bothersome dilemma. Their irascible headmistress, Mrs. Plackett, and her surly brother, Mr. Godding, have been most inconveniently poisoned at Sunday dinner. Now the school will almost certainly be closed and the girls sent home--unless these seven very proper young ladies can hide the murders and convince their neighbors that nothing is wrong. Julie Berry's The Scandalous Sisterhood of Prickwillow Place is a smart, hilarious Victorian romp, full of outrageous plot twists, mistaken identities, and mysterious happenings.

Screaming Divas by Suzanne Kamata

At sixteen, Trudy Baxter is tired of her debutante mom, her deadbeat dad, and her standing reservation at the juvenile detention center. Changing her name to Trudy Sin, she cranks up her major chops as a singer and starts a band, gathering around other girls ill at ease in their own lives. Cassie Haywood, would-have-been beauty queen, was scarred in an accident in which her alcoholic mom was killed. But she can still sing and play her guitar, even though she seeks way too much relief from the pain in her body and her heart through drugs, and way too much relief from loneliness through casual sex. Still, it's Cassie who hears former child prodigy Harumi Yokoyama playing in a punk band at a party, and enlists her, outraging Harumi's overbearing first-generation Japanese parents. The fourth member is Esther Shealy, who joins as a drummer in order to be close to Cassie--the long-time object of her unrequited love--and Harumi, her estranged childhood friend. Together, they are Screaming Divas, and they're quickly swept up as a local sensation. Then, just as they are about to achieve their rock-girl dreams, a tragedy strikes.

Siege & Storm by Leigh Bardugo

Hunted across the True Sea and haunted by the lives she took on the Fold, Alina must try to make a life with Mal in an unfamiliar land, all while keeping her identity as the Sun Summoner a secret.

Snow Like Ashes by Sara Raasch

Orphaned Meira, a fierce chakram-wielding warrior from the Kingdom of Winter, must struggle to free her people from the tyranny of an opposing kingdom while also protecting her own destiny.

July's New Books are (finally) Here! (part 2)

Breaking Free: True Stories of Girls Who Escaped Modern Slavery by Abby Sher

Somaly Mam was born in the forests of Cambodia in the early 1970s and sold into sexual slavery by her “grandfather” before she was even twelve years old.

Maria Suarez came to America from Mexico when she was fifteen with her family. She went on a job interview to be a maid. When she got inside, her “interviewer” locked the door and told her he owned her body from that moment on.

Minh Dang was born in San Jose, California. Her house was always neat and there were bright rose bushes in her front yard. Nobody knew that behind closed doors her parents were raping and abusing her from the time she was three years old. Soon they started selling her body to neighbors as well.

These three women could easily have been voiceless victims, lost to the horrors of their own histories. Instead, they not only fought their way out of sexual slavery, they have each become leading advocates and activists in the anti-trafficking movement.

No Summit Out of Sight: The True Story of the Youngest Person to Climb the Seven Summits by Jordan Romero

The story of Jordan Romero, who at the age of 13 became the youngest person ever to reach the summit of Mount Everest. At age 15, he reached the summits of the world's 7 highest mountains.

Dancing Through It: My Journey in the Ballet by Jenifer Ringer

Jenifer Ringer, as a principal dancer with the New York City Ballet, knows what it''s really like to make it to the top in the rarefied world of classical ballet. In her charming and honest memoir, Ringer goes behind the scenes at one of the most renowned ballet companies in the world and shares the story of her own journey from student to star, a path that included losing her job during her struggle with an eating disorder and handling a media storm after her weight was commented on by a New York Times critic. Witty, insightful, and modest, Ringer is the perfect guide to the world behind the curtain.

September 17 by Amanda West Lewis

Presents a fictionalized account of the sinking of the City of Benares, which was torpedoed by a German U-boat during World War II as it secretly transported ninety British children to Canada.

The Mirk and Midnight Hour by Jane Nickerson

Seventeen-year-old Violet Dancey is spending the Civil War with a new stepmother and stepsister and her young cousin when she comes upon a wounded Yankee soldier, Thomas, who is being kept alive by mysterious voodoo practitioners.

New books for the new year part 5

Tankborn by Karen Sandler

Check the Catalog

Kayla and Mishalla, two genetically engineered non-human slaves (GENs), fall in love with higher-status boys, discover deep secrets about the creation of GENs, and find out what it means to be human.

 Glow by Amy Kathleen Ryan

Check the Catalog

The Empyrean is the only home 15-year-old Waverly has ever known. Part of the first generation to be successfully conceived in deep space, she and her boyfriend Kieran will be pioneers of New Earth. Waverly knows she must marry young in order to have children who can carry on the mission, and Kieran, the handsome captain-to-be, has everything Waverly could want in a husband. Still, there's a part of Waverly that wants more from life than marriage, and she is secretly intrigued by the shy, darkly brilliant Seth. Suddenly, Waverly's dreams are interrupted by the inconceivable - a violent betrayal by the Empyrean's sister ship, the New Horizon. The New Horizon's leaders are desperate to populate the new planet first, and will do anything to get what they need: young girls. 

and the book that Miss G is most excited for...

  Cinder by Marissa Meyer

Check the Catalog

As plague ravages the overcrowded Earth, observed by a ruthless lunar people, Cinder, a gifted mechanic and cyborg, becomes involved with handsome Prince Kai and must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect the world in this futuristic take on the Cinderella story. (Jan 3rd)