Beyond the Boring Textbooks in September...

The theme for this month is hotly anticipated books. Even though these are getting buzz, if you’re new to reading YA books, you may not be familiar with these authors. They’re great proof that YA books aren’t just for kids.

The Ex Games is Jennifer Echols’ third romantic comedy for Simon Pulse, and don’t let the cartoony covers fool you. They’re genuinely funny, and the characters are sassy and real, with worries about family and college and the future. Plus all that first love stuff. I love her snappy dialogue and her romantic scenes; Echols describes something as deceptively innocent as hand-holding with detail that evokes the heart-pounding rush of discovery you felt the first time you realized the opposite sex was built so differently for a reason.

I asked her a couple of rapid fire questions about The Ex Games, and she gave me rapid fire answers:

RCM: What’s your “Twitter pitch” for the Ex Games? (140 characters or less)?

JENNIFER ECHOLS: Fear of heights keeps Hayden from a snowboarding career. The evil Nick, her hot ex-boyfriend, challenges her to a snowboarding battle of the sexes--including a jump.

RCM: Tell me your favorite thing about The Ex-Games.

ECHOLS: Hayden is an ebullient redhead who quips before she thinks.

RCM: Yay for ebullient redheads. I suspect, however, that I wasn’t the inspiration. What DID inspire you to write it?

ECHOLS: My editor wanted a snowboarding book. At first I squinted at him and said, “You know I’m from Alabama, right?” But once I thought of the title, the plot followed, and the book wrote itself.

RCM: You're very sporty. What extreme sport would you own, were you so inclined?

ECHOLS: Learning to surf is on my bucket list.

Check out The Ex Games (Simon Pulse, 9/8) and Echol’s first novel, Major Crush. For something a little more dramatic (an older YA, different, but with Echols’ great characterization) check out Going Too Far (MTV Books).

Bewitching Season, Marissa Doyle’s first book, is about twin (magical!) debutantes in the not-so-overdone period of the very early Victorian age. Historical, paranormal and YA is a trifecta of awesome for me. I’ll let Marissa tell you about the new, companion book, Betraying Season:

MARISSA DOYLE: Young witch Penelope Leland has gone to Ireland to study magic with her former governess's family, because she feels she's neglected her studies after her twin sister has to save the young Princess Victoria from a magical plot (Bewitching Season). She falls in love with Niall Keating, not realizing that Niall's mother is bent on using her magic for her own murderous ends and is using Niall as bait. Just who can Pen trust?

Queen Victoria herself is what drew me to this time period...I mean, how often does a barely 18-year-old girl become queen of the most powerful country on earth, and do it so well? She galvanized the country, which was thrilled to have a young, strong, and virtuous girl on the throne after decades of corrupt and decrepit old men being king. Awesome background material for a YA book!

I agree! These compare with the light Regencies that I grew up reading. Bewitching Season comes out in paperback Sept. 1, and Betraying Season comes out at the end of the month. (Henry Holt)

Other books everyone is talking about:

Libba Bray’s Gemma Doyle series is (rightfully) a favorite with readers of both popular and literary fiction. They’re historical fantasy novels, with a gothic sensibility and a witty humor about them, so you know I’m all over that. When she decides to write something completely different--I mean, totally, love it or hate it different--it causes a lot of stir.

Going Bovine concerns Cam, a self-absorbed 16 year old boy who doesn’t care about much. (The mall near me is full of Cams.) Then he learns he has Mad Cow Disease and goes on a cross-country journey (or possibly just on an extended hallucination) with a pink-haired angel, a video game playing Little Person, and a Norse God that looks like a garden gnome. Big doses of humor and magical realism in a book that should be ridiculous, but ultimately turns into something wonderful and sublime. (Delacorte Press, 9/22)

Suzanne Collins’ first YA book, Hunger Games, caused a kerfuffle in the YA writer circle when Stephen King raved about it in a way that implied the book was too gritty and exciting to be called a YA novel. Or something.

But then, this series is about a futuristic world with a tournament to the death fought by teenagers, so if you’ve never read a YA novel, this will surprise you. If you want a thrilling, action-packed, overthrow the evil empire novel, pick up Hunger Games. And then go get its sequel, Catching Fire, which carries the torch, so to speak. You won’t be sorry. (Scholastic, 9/1)

Speaking of books that let young adults act like young adults, check out Richelle Mead’s Vampire Academy novels. The latest, Blood Promise, picks up where the last one left off, with the protagonist, Rose (great name, by the way), going to do her duty and kill her beloved Dimitri. Not your same old prep school, not your same old vampires. These are great reads for any age. The first is titled, simply enough, Vampire Academy. (Razorbill, 8/25)

Rampant by Diana Peterfreund has gotten an insane amount of buzz based just on the premise: Killer Unicorns. These creatures are blood-thirsty killers, and Astrid Llewelyn is one of those destined to hunt them. The first chapter is a grabber, and reviewers are loving the characters and the unusual setting (Rome) and that it explores gender issues (only virgins can hunt unicorns, of course) and the ethics of slaying medieval beasts in the modern age. But I suspect everyone is thinking what I am: Killer Unicorns! (HarperTeen, 8/25)

End of Summer, first of Fall means a HUGE number of books.

I want to tell you about them all, but here are a few more that caught my eye:

Intertwined by Gena Showalter. Gena continues to get hot guys on the cover, even when she writes for Harlequin’s new Teen line. Awesome. (HarlequinTeen, 9/1)

Devil’s Kiss by Sarwat Chadda. Girl Knight Templar must fight the Unholy, and juggle complicated love life. Buffy with a unique, multi-cultural, multi-religious twist. (Hyperion, 9/1)

The Miles Between by Mary E. Pearson. Pearson writes with incredible emotional immediacy. I loved her book The Adoration of Jenna Fox, a near-future science fiction novel, which comes out in paperback the same day. (Henry Holt, 9/1)

Food, Girls, and Other Things I Can’t Have by Allen Zadoff. The title grabbed me on this one, too. But it’s got a boy protagonist dealing with very real life issues. He’s overweight, he likes a girl, and has to make changes. “How far should you go to be the person you really want to be?” (EdgemontUSA, 9/8)

Forest Born by Shannon Hale. Hale tells beautiful stories, a little ‘younger’ feeling, but with a fairy-tale quality that makes them universally enjoyable. Her Princess Academy was a Newberry Honor book. (Bloomsbury, 9/15)

Candor by Pam Bachorz. The kids in Candor, FL are all too perfect, thanks to subliminal messages. Boy rebels against a dystopian system. Spare, fast moving prose. Give this to a guy who thinks he doesn’t like to read anything but sports. (EdgemontUSA, 9/22)

What else am I personally looking forward to this month? Oh yeah. The Splendor Falls by Rosemary Clement-Moore sounds awesome. Just saying.

Until next time...

Rosemary Clement-Moore

Rosemary Clement-Moore writes Young Adult books because she loves to read them. Visit her webpage or blog to find out more about her award winning Maggie Quinn: Girl vs. Evil series, and upcoming gothic romance, The Splendor Falls.