Young Adult

Stupid Fast

2012, Books in Bed, Cybil Challenge, Fiction, Young Adult /

Here’s another book from the Cybils Shortlist that I didn’t think I would like. Stupid Fast – there’s a guy in a football uniform on the cover. Total turn off for me – but, it was good. Really heartbreaking but good.

I really liked the descriptions of Fenton’s growth spurt – I’m guessing there are a lot of teenage guys who can relate to this. And a lot of parents who might gain insight into how a kid feels when everything changes that way.

Moral of the story, for adults – DO NOT LIE TO YOUR CHILDREN.

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Everybody Sees the Ants

2012, Books in Bed, Cybil Challenge, Fiction, Young Adult /

I didn’t think I was going to like Everybody Sees the Ants. The whole Vietnam – POW/MIA – escapes to the Laos jungle thing just seemed… not my thing.

And at first, it wasn’t. The dreams were weird, through the whole book – but particularly at the beginning. Luckily, Lucky is a great character and the supporting cast – particularly the characters in Arizona, are excellent. (The Vagina Monologues pieces, hah. Totally amused. Not sure Lucky would really have reacted that way – but hey, it’s fiction. We can dream…)

A book I thought would take me a few days to read because I didn’t really love it – ended up causing me to stay up til midnight to finish it all one one sitting.

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Bunheads

2012, Books in Bed, Cybil Challenge, Favorites, Fiction, Young Adult /

I’m finally getting back into the swing of reading from my TBR list and my Challenge lists. Bunheads, a Cybils shortlister, was the last of the URGENT MUST READ NOW books that was due back to the library this week. Thankfully it was a short, easy, fun read. A very fun read actually. Except I probably will never be able to watch The Nutcracker again. TW thinks this is perfectly fine since she does not like The Nutcracker. I, however, don’t mind going to the ballet every 10 Christmases or so. In fact I had just been thinking it was time to see The Nutcracker again. Darn.

I also think Bunheads will make a really fun TV series.  

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Anna Dressed in Blood

2012, Books in Bed, Cybil Challenge, Favorites, Sci Fi and Fantasy, Young Adult /

I read almost NOTHING while I was in Hawaii. I had only a few non-fiction books with me and ebooks and none of the ebooks were holding my attention so I asked TW to bring me a book when she came – she did. She brought Anna Dressed in Blood and I was happy. However, I only read about 15 pages of it during that last week of our trip. I was just too tired to read at night and/or too focused on JMP to read.

But on the plane, I did read a bit and made it about 2/3 of the way through. I liked it but I wasn’t sure I loved it. We got home and I read a few more chapters and I really, really liked it a lot – but love? I wasn’t so sure. And then last night, I started reading and I COULD NOT PUT IT DOWN. I was exhausted and not feeling great but I had to find out what happened so it was after midnight before I turned off the lights – satisfied, very satisfied and in love with this story.

For anyone who loved ghost stories as a kid and loves horror fiction now – you must read this. Ignore the fact that it’s YA, if you’re not generally a YA reader. Fabulous, fabulous story.

Poor, poor Anna.

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Huntress

2012, Books in Bed, Favorites, Queer, Sci Fi and Fantasy, Young Adult /

I really liked Huntress. The only problem was that I kept wondering what the heck Ash was about. I mean I remembered that it had lesbians in it. And that it was a Cinderella story. But other than that – I couldn’t remember a darn thing. TW kept saying, “just forget it’s a prequel” and I tried but it wasn’t easy.

And when I got to the end of Huntress, I looked up Ash and remembered it all. I should have looked up Ash before I started Huntress and saved myself the annoyance. Because this book was better than Ash. Much better.  A whole lot happened at the end and that’s really the only thing I might have changed – I mean a visit to a unicorn really deserves its own book, or certainly more than just a few pages.

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Putting Makeup on the Fat Boy

2012, Books in Bed, Fiction, Queer, Young Adult /

Elly says Putting Makeup on the Fat Boy is a weird book. I think she’s a 13 year old girl who does not understand gay high school boys who like makeup.  I really enjoyed the book, even if it seemed like Carlos was really, really well-adjusted while his sister (who is straight) was not.  How many poor, Hispanic, gay, high school students in NYC are THAT well-adjusted ? He seemed almost too good to be true. His life too Cinderella perfect. (Except he doesn’t get the boy. Oops, spoiler.)

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I Hunt Killers

2012, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction, Young Adult /

Sassymonkey told me about I Hunt Killers and it sounded interesting so I added it to my TBR list. But just as I was about to close my list, I noticed the author’s name – Barry Lyga?  That changed things considerably. I took the book off of my TBR list and added it to my library hold list.

And then it sat on my library cart for awhile, ‘til TW read it.

She liked it. Like Dexter – but not – and also, YA.

So I expected to really like it – Dexterish YA written by Barry Lyga? What could go wrong?

It started slowly, that’s what. It started slowly and I was tired. Not a good mix. I almost put it down after 50 pages but –Barry Lyga. I couldn’t just give up on it. So I put it down for the night. And finally, last night, I barreled through it and I was very, very glad I hadn’t given up on it.

I started to really like Jazz (which was another small problem in the beginning, I just didn’t much care about him or not care about him.)  The murder of the waitress, that’s really when I started to settle into the story and the characters. By the time bad things happened at the apartment building, I was HOOKED.

And, I didn’t see that ending coming. I just didn’t. I thought about it briefly, a few chapters before the ending. But I really did not expect it.  Now all I need to know is – when is the sequel coming out?

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First #Readathon Book DONE! — Spell Bound

2012, Books in Bed, Dewey's Readathon, Favorites, Sci Fi and Fantasy, Young Adult /

One book down, 327 pages. And TW called when I had two pages left to read. Talk about bad timing, heh.

Spell Bound was excellent. I wasn’t sure how everything was going to be fixed at the end of the last book. In fact, I didn’t think it could be  fixed. But, Hawkins did it beautifully. All wrapped up in a nice little bow. Even the ending was perfect. Exactly right. How often does that happen?  Almost never.

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Graphic Novels Galore! (Three Cybils, Two Not.)

2012, Books in Bed, Children's Literature, Comics & Graphic Novels, Cybil Challenge, Young Adult /

I went on a graphic novel spree because the week was crazy and those were the easiest things to read when I was super tired and super busy. Some were really good, some not so much, some pretty darn weird.

Tiny Titans: Adventures in Awesomeness – it was more like a comic book than most graphic novels. Short panel stories, single panel posters, word searchy type games. Reminded me a lot of comics from my childhood. But – I don’t really love the Tiny Titans. I just can’t get into them. Then again, I’m not a middle grade graphic novel/comics person, am I? (This was not a Cybils shortlister – I reserved it after seeing it on the recently reviewed list on the library website)

I picked up The Hidden in a drive-by walkthrough of the new release books at the library. Really, it just jumped into my bag. Elly said it was creepy and weird – she was right. Frankenstein gone really really bad but in a good graphic novel sort of way. I loved it. Very creepy and not for little kids. This is an adult (or YA at the very least) graphic novel and not a Cybils shortlister.

Remember American Born Chinese? Well Level Up was written by the same dude – and I liked it. Not as much as American Born Chinese but I definitely liked it. The GI doctor story line was fabulous since we really appreciate good GI docs around here. The Cybils have this one as a YA graphic novel but I can see some middle schoolers getting into it, too.

Bad Island was another kind of creepy graphic novel. A whole lot of bad things can happen to a family that gets shipwrecked on a bad island – when the island isn’t so much an island as it is an alien with evil alien creatures living on it. The dead snake thing – lol – funny in a disgusting sort of way.  Another Cybils YA lister.

Page by Paige was my favorite of this bunch. A teenage girl moves to NYC and she’s dealing with figuring out who she is and what she wants and making friends and all sorts of nifty, frustrating things like that. And, she journals her way through. I loved the artwork. I think this was Elly’s favorite of the bunch, too.  And, yep, this one was on the YA Cybils list as well.

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