I haven't really been able to keep up with the book blogosphere recently - but this is something I want to take part in:
The Best YA Books I Haven't Read - a project started by
Kelly at YAnnabe together with a few other book bloggers who enjoy reading YA lit. The aim of the
Unsung Heroes of YA Blog Blitz is for each blogger to list a few of their favourite YA books, with an emphasis on books who aren't so very well-known but very much deserving of attention from YA readers.
I learned about this project yesterday while going through
Nymeth's posts, and was particularly impressed by this statement of hers:
One thing that the books I’m about to highlight have in common is the fact that they all illustrate an often overlooked fact about YA: YA (and children’s lit) is not a dumbed-down, simplified version of adult fiction. It’s also not a genre, but a marketing category. Not only does it cover every genre, but there are books that are published as adult fiction in some markets and as YA in others. If this doesn’t tell you that it’s not the content, tone or level of complexity of a book that determines where it gets placed in the bookshop, I don’t know what will.
As for me, I love books with teenage protagonists: coming-of-age stories, first-love stories, high-school-sucks stories, and so on. I read a lot of them - some really touch my mind and my heart, others I sort of flip through. Some are extremely good, others - well - not so much.
You want to know what's funny? When I actually *was* a teen, I mostly read classics or what was (and still is) labelled as "adult, serious" fiction. Now that I'm an adult, I read as much YA as possible. Of course, this might be because I'm still a seventeen-year-old at heart, but that's not the point. Also, as a teen I had no real access to the Internet or to bookshops selling books in foreign languages (read: English), so I was stuck with the local library.
So, here's a list of some not-so-well-known favourites of mine with young adults as the main characters (in no particular order - they're all great).
Description: When her little brother seems to become possessed by an evil spirit, fourteen-year-old Laura seeks the help of the strangely compelling older boy at school who she is convinced has supernatural power.
This is a coming of age story which is exhilarating and heart-tugging at the same time. It's set in New Zealand, and the paranormal twist feels so very real. When I first picked it up (from the local library in the Italian translation), I was maybe 14, the same age as Laura, the heroine. In spite of this, I didn't get the book at all - it made me extremely uncomfortable. I picked it up again at 18 and loved it - the romance between Laura and Sorensen felt so very real and tangible to me then. Last year I bought a used copy in the original English, and the story felt different again - the whole metaphor of going through a change-over from teen to adult was finally clear to me.
Description: Owen is seventeen and smart. He knows what he wants to do with his life. But then he meets Natalie and he realizes he doesn't know anything much at all.
Another coming-of-age story, but the narrating voice here is a 17-year-old boy. I discovered this book in the Italian translation at the library when I was 14, and felt... understood. Those feelings I had back then of being an outcast and never able to fit in - of being book smart, and yet incredibly stupid - it was my own experience, all right. Never mind that the book was more than 20 years old already when I discovered it - it spoke to me like no other.
Two years ago I bought myself a used copy of the book in the original English from Amazon. I was surprised, because the book is a lot slimmer in the original, less than 100 pages. Re-reading it as an adult was strange - it felt still powerful, but also sort of detached, almost "prudish", in a way - meant in the best possible way, of course.
Description: Shortly after graduating from high school and being dumped for the 19th time by a girl named Catherine, Colin Singleton embarks on a roadtrip with his best friend.
I could squeal and rave about this for a while, but I'll just skip it. How can you not love Colin, Hassan, and Lindsay? So weird, and yet so incredibly endearing. My favourite John Green book.
No description here, because the less you know about this book before you read it, the better it is :) Let's just say it's set "on a remote island, in a post-apocalyptic, plague-ridden world".
I read this book last year, in the Italian translation. Wow. It blew me away. Possibly the best book I read in 2009. Full of questions such as, What is consciousness? What makes us human? If artificial intelligence were developed to a high enough capability, what special status could humanity still claim?
Description: They promised Meredith nine years of safety, but only gave her three. Her father was supposed to be locked up until Meredith turned eighteen. She thought she had time to grow up, get out, and start a new life. But Meredith is only fifteen, and today her father is coming home from prison.
This is a very powerful novel on child abuse. While the subject matter is not pleasant, the writing and characters are so beautifully done. I keep this book on my bedside table and re-read it from time to time.
I'm going to stop at five, but I could go on...
affiliate programs to help pay for my next giveaway. So far I've referred: