Justina Ireland caught my attention with a duology set in an alternate history where the Civil War ended early… due to the dead rising from their graves after Gettysburg. It shouldn’t have worked. Hell, I’ve been tired of zombies (and their myriad knockoffs) for years and I went in with a jaundiced eye. But Ireland …
From Shelf Awareness February 14, 2022: YA author Lani Forbes died on February 3 after a nine-month battle with neuroendocrine cancer. She was 35. Forbes’s YA book series, the Age of the Seventh Sun, made its debut in 2020 with the release of The Seventh Sun, followed by The Jade Bones in 2021. The Seventh Sun was a finalist …
The cathartic power of righteous anger is usually overlooked, but not this book! This book is all about righteous anger. One young woman is born with a coveted power, and with that power she works to avenge not only her sister, but also all young women who are being sacrificed in the dystopia she lives …
Iron Widow is a book born from female rage. I often pitch it as “Pacific Rim” meets The Handmaid’s Tale because those are two properties familiar to Western audiences, but in truth, I was more inspired by Japanese mecha anime and Chinese harem dramas. The gilded palaces of Imperial China, where thousands of women must …
Whenever your local librarian highly recommends a book that TJ Klune (author of The House in the Cerulean Sea) calls a transformative marvel, you should probably read that book. I immediately did, and as someone who has access to whatever she wants to read, this will be a book I come back to over and …
Local author Tara Goedjen slips onto the shelves with No Beauties or Monsters, which is an eerily rendered novel about friendship and memory loss and top secret government ops. On returning to her old stomping grounds in Twentynine Palms, Rylie Caruso discovers that one of her besties has been missing for a year. When she investigates …
This addition to the fairy tale re-tellings did not disappoint! Meyer gives her characters such fullness and a rich world in which to grow that I couldn’t help but be invested in the plot. Unlike her Lunar Chronicles, this retelling happens in a medieval world, full of magic and curses, and I especially enjoyed …
Every now and then, a book comes along that stirs the excitement of the entire bookshop. This is that book. In the debut novel from Amanda Foody and Christine Lynn Herman, The Hunger Games meets magical realism. Every generation, seven families must send a tribute to fight to the death in a secret battle for …
I read it all in one go! This book had my heart racing from start to finish. It features alternating perspectives between resourceful and genuine young women. A timely narrative on race and protest, both in broader society and between/within individuals –AND a guaranteed read to raise your blood pressure! –Ellen, Queen Anne Book Company, …
Shaun David Hutchinson’s A Complicated Love Story Set in Space follows three teens who wrestle with the comedic set-up of the title while escaping from a bathroom, fixing a leaking coolant conduit, and rebooting a recalcitrant computer. All of which leads to a lot of space folding, awkward conversations, and constantly thrilling set pieces that …
