How Ya Like Me Now


Brendan Halpin - 2007
    When Eddie's mom goes into rehab and his aunt and uncle take him away to Boston, everything changes. His new school, which he attends with his cousin Alex, is experimental: there's a CEO instead of a principal, classes are held in an office building, and the students, all sporting business-casual looks, are the only urban kids Eddie has ever seen outside of a rap video. As for Alex, it's bad enough that he has to share his bedroom with Eddie, but his parents are on his case about including his quiet cousin in his social life as well. Alex wants to do the right thing, but between talking to girls, playing video games, thinking about girls, laughing with his friends, and looking at girls, when is he supposed to find time to help Eddie and "work up to his potential" in school?Two boys find that they have a lot to learn from each other in this touching, funny novel about finding your place and looking out for your friends.

Things I Should Have Known


Claire LaZebnik - 2017
    Ethan was a perfect match. Ethan’s brother, David, was an arrogant jerk.Things Chloe should have known: Setups are complicated. Ivy can make her own decisions. David may be the only person who really gets Chloe.Meet Chloe Mitchell, a popular Los Angeles girl who’s decided that her older sister, Ivy, who’s on the autism spectrum, could use a boyfriend. Chloe already has someone in mind: Ethan Fields, a sweet, movie-obsessed boy from Ivy’s special needs class.Chloe would like to ignore Ethan’s brother, David, but she can’t—Ivy and Ethan aren’t comfortable going out on their own, so Chloe and David have to tag along. Soon Chloe, Ivy, David, and Ethan form a quirky and wholly lovable circle. And as the group bonds over frozen-yogurt dates and movie nights, Chloe is forced to confront her own romantic choices—and the realization that it’s okay to be a different kind of normal.

Switch


A.S. King - 2021
    Tru lives in a house that has a switch at its center. No one knows what the switch controls, but her father continually builds larger and larger boxes around the switch (Tru lives in Box #7). Tru leaves the box through a Tru-shaped hole to go to school, where she pays no attention to the new “Solution Time” curriculum. In fact, the only interesting thing that’s ever happened to Tru at school is when she discovers (on her first try) that she can throw a javelin farther than any human has ever thrown anything before in human history.

We Can Be Heroes


Kyrie McCauley - 2021
    Perfect for fans of Laura Ruby and Mindy McGinnis.“Welcome to Bell, proud home of Bell Firearms for two hundred years, and where five months ago, the teen heir to the Bell fortune took his father’s guns to school and killed his ex-girlfriend, Cassandra Queen.” —WE CAN BE HEROES PODCASTBeck and Vivian never could stand each other, but they always tried their best for their mutual friend, Cassie. After the town moves on from Cassie’s murder too fast, Beck and Vivian finally find common ground: vengeance. They memorialize Cassie by secretly painting murals of her around town, a message to the world that Cassie won’t be forgotten. But Beck and Vivian are keeping secrets, like the third passenger riding in Beck’s VW bus with them—Cassie’s ghost.When their murals catch the attention of a podcaster covering Cassie’s case, they become the catalyst for a debate that Bell Firearms can no longer ignore. With law enforcement closing in on them, Beck and Vivian hurry to give Cassie the closure she needs—by delivering justice to those responsible for her death.

The Last Confession of Autumn Casterly


Meredith Tate - 2020
    Enigmatic, aloof, and tough as nails, Autumn hasn't had real friends--or trusted anyone--in years. Even Ivy.But Autumn might not be tough enough. After a drug deal gone wrong, Autumn is beaten, bound, and held hostage. Now, trapped between life and death, she leaves her body, seeking help. No one can sense her presence--except her sister.When Autumn doesn't come home, Ivy just knows she's in trouble. Unable to escape the chilling feeling that something isn't right, Ivy follows a string of clues that bring her closer to rescuing her sister... and closer to danger.Autumn needs Ivy to find her before time runs out. But soon, both sisters realize that finding her also means untangling the secrets that lead to the truth--about where they're hiding Autumn, and what Autumn has been hiding.

Five Ways to Fall Out of Love


Emily Martin - 2021
    Smith, Julie Buxbaum, and Sandhya Menon.How do I hate thee? Let me count the ways…Aubrey Cash learned the hard way not to rely on love. After all, Webster Casey, the new boy next door she’d been falling for all summer, stood her up at homecoming in front of everyone with no explanation. Proving her theory that love never lasts seems easy when she’s faced with parents whose marriage is falling apart and a best friend who thinks every boy she dates is “the one.” But when sparks fly with a boy who turns out to be Webster’s cousin, and then Webster himself becomes her lab partner for the rest of senior year, Aubrey finds her theory—and her commitment to stay single—put to the test.As she navigates the breakdown of her family, the consequences her cynicism has on her relationship with her best friend, and her own confusing but undeniable feelings for Webster, Aubrey has to ask herself: What really happened the night Webster stood her up? And if there are five ways to fall out of love…could there perhaps be even more ways to fall back in?

Neighborhood Girls


Jessie Ann Foley - 2017
    Her father gets a years-long jail sentence, her family falls on hard times, and the whispers around town are impossible to ignore. If that wasn’t bad enough, she gets jumped walking home from a party one night. Wendy quickly realizes that in order to survive her father’s reputation, she’ll have to make one for herself. Then Wendy meets Kenzie Quintana—a cigarette-smoking, Catholic-school-uniform-skirt-hiking alpha—and she knows that she’s met her savior. Kenzie can provide Wendy with the kind of armor a girl needs when she’s trying to outrun her father’s past. Add two more mean girls to the mix—Sapphire and Emily—and Wendy has found herself in Academy of the Sacred Heart’s most feared and revered clique. Makeover complete. But complete is far from what Wendy feels. Instead, she faces the highs and lows of a vapid, toxic friendship, the exhaustion that comes with keeping up appearances, and the only loss that could hurt more than losing herself.

On Luna Time


Amber Crawley - 2019
    When she receives a strange letter from her mother three weeks before her 18th birthday, Vanessa knows it’s the only shot she has at finding her real family. The letter instructs her to jump off the Swan Pier into the ocean at midnight under the next full moon. With the steadfast hope that her mother would be waiting for her, Vanessa jumps, only to find that she’s come up for air seventy years in the past. Journals written by women who took the same time-altering jump help Vanessa realize that the mystery of her mother’s life spans generations and is far more complex than she could have ever dreamed. While living in 1949, Vanessa develops feelings for a boy despite the warnings from previous travelers not to fall in love. As she begins to unravel her mother’s web of secrets, Vanessa discovers that the truth is anything but easy, and the answers are not influenced by past, but have the power to alter her future forever.

Teen Spirit


Francesca Lia Block - 2014
    It's perfect for fans of supernatural stories with a touch of romance like the Beautiful Creatures series by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl.After Julie's grandmother passes away, she is forced to move across town to the not-so-fancy end of Beverly Hills and start over at a new school. The only silver lining to the perpetual dark cloud that seems to be following her? Clark—a die-hard fan of Buffy and all things Joss Whedon, who is just as awkward and damaged as she is. Her kindred spirit.When the two try to contact Julie's grandmother with a Ouija board, they make contact with a different spirit altogether. The real kind. And this ghost will do whatever it takes to come back to the world of the living.Francesca Lia Block's latest young adult novel is a haunting work about family, loss, love, and redemption.

Battle of the Bands


Lauren GibaldiJenny Torres Sanchez - 2021
    A lonely ticket taker worries about his sister. An almost-famous songwriter nurses old wounds. A stage manager tires of being behind the scenes. A singer-songwriter struggles to untangle her feelings for her best friend and his girlfriend. In this live-out-loud anthology, the disparate protagonists of sixteen stories are thrown together for one unforgettable event: their high school’s battle of the bands. Told in a harmonic blend of first- and third-person narrative voices, roughly chronological short stories offer a kaleidoscopic view of the same transformative night. Featuring an entry from Justin Courtney Pierre, lead vocalist of Motion City Soundtrack, Battle of the Bands is a celebration of youth, music, and meeting the challenges of life head-on.

When the Curtain Falls


Carrie Hope Fletcher - 2018
    Their relationship is made up of clandestine meetings and stolen moments because there is someone who will make them suffer if he discovers she is no longer 'his'. But life in the theatre doesn't always go according to plan and tragedy and heartache are waiting in the wings for all the players . . .Almost seventy years later, a new production of When the Curtain Falls arrives at the theatre, bringing with it Oscar Bright and Olive Green and their budding romance. Very soon, though, strange things begin to happen and they learn about the ghost that's haunted the theatre since 1952, a ghost who can only be seen on one night of the year. Except the ghost is appearing more often and seems hell bent on sabotaging Oscar and Olive. The young couple realise they need to right that wrong from years gone by, but can they save themselves before history repeats itself and tragedy strikes once more?

The Cure for Second Lead Syndrome


Amanda Abram - 2021
    Symptoms may include wanting to throw objects at the TV and losing all faith in true love.Bria Copeland is addicted to K-dramas. She loves the romance. She loves the drama. And most importantly, she loves the second leads: the secondary male characters who are secretly in love with the female leads. They’re nice. Sweet. Caring.But they never get the girl.It doesn’t make any sense!So, when Bria realizes her brother’s friend, Caleb Nichols, is a real-life second lead, she just has to intervene. Caleb has been hopelessly in love with his best friend, Paige, for years now. And if he doesn’t act fast, he might lose her to the hot new surfer guy from California.Bria knows this plot well, and she knows exactly how the story will end.Unless she can rewrite it.When she proposes an idea to Caleb—to transform him into a male lead—he thinks she’s crazy. Maybe she is, but Bria is sure the plan will work. All they have to do is recreate some of the most clichéd scenes from K-dramas and Paige will be falling for him in no time!The only problem?If she's not careful, Bria may just end up falling for the second lead herself.

Starling


Isabel Strychacz - 2021
    Raised by an eccentric father always on the hunt for the spectacular, they're used to following weather patterns that twirl onto strange paths, a car that refuses to play any artist but one, and living in a sentient house with whims of its own. But when a mysterious boy falls from the stars into the woods behind the Wilding sisters' farmhouse, nothing can prepare them for the extraordinary turn their lives are about to take. Extraordinary, and dangerous. Starling Rust is not from this world and his presence in the Wilding home brings attention. As the terrified locals, Delta's ex-boyfriend, and the unscrupulous mayor descend onto the Wilding's home, both Delta and her sister go to incredible lengths to protect their mystical visitor--especially as Delta's growing feelings for Starling could prove the greatest risk of all. Filled with atmospheric prose and lush and vivid descriptions, Starling has the spectacular waiting with every flip of the page.

The Looking Glass


Janet McNally - 2018
    Now, Julia has disappeared—and no one knows if she’s in trouble.Sylvie is trying to carry on Julia’s impressive legacy at the prestigious National Ballet Theatre Academy, but Julia, ever the star of the show, can’t stay hidden forever. And when she sends Sylvie a copy of their old storybook with a mysterious list inside, Sylvie begins to see signs of her sister everywhere she goes. She may be losing her grip on reality, but Sylvie has to find out if the strange, almost magical things she’s been seeing have anything to do with Julia’s whereabouts.With the help of her best friend’s enigmatic brother and his beat-up car, Sylvie sets out to the beat of a Fleetwood Mac playlist, determined to return to New York with her sister in tow. But what Sylvie doesn’t expect to learn is that trouble comes in lots of forms—and that the damsel in distress is often the only one who can save herself.

You Were Never Here


Kathleen Peacock - 2020
    Since the summer she discovered she could do things that no normal twelve-year-old could do. Since she had her first kiss with Riley Fraser. Since she destroyed their friendship.Now, five years later, she’s back and Riley has disappeared.For the last three months no one has heard from or seen Riley. And while there are all sorts of conspiracy theories about where he went, neither the police nor his parents are any closer to finding him. When Noah, Riley’s brother, asks for help in discovering what happened, Cat is torn between wanting to learn the truth and protecting the secret that she’s been guarding ever since that summer she and Riley stopped speaking.But then a girl is discovered floating in the river, barely alive with no knowledge of who attacked her or why. With the possibility that someone out there is hunting teens, Cat must make a choice: Use her unusual ability to discover the truth and find Riley or keep running away from a power she can’t control. Only one choice will put her in a killer’s sights…