YA BOOK GIVEAWAYS THIS WEEK
The Hunt
by Stacey Kade
Hardcover Giveaway
plus Paperback Giveaway of The Rules
Disney-Hyperion
Released 4/22/2014
Ariane Tucker has finally escaped GTX, the research facility that created her. While on the run, Zane Bradshaw is the only person she can trust. He knows who-and what-she is and still wants to be part of her life.
But accepting Zane’s help means putting him in danger.
Dr. Jacobs, head of GTX, is not the only one hunting for Ariane. Two rival corporations have their sights set on taking down their competition. Permanently.
To protect Zane and herself, Ariane needs allies. She needs the other hybrids. The hybrids who are way more alien and a lot less human. Can Ariane win them over before they turn on her? Or will she be forced to choose sides, to decide who lives and who dies?
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about The Hunt?
Oh, gosh, I had so much fun writing this book, it’s hard to choose! It was a blast getting Ariane and Zane out of their normal (school) environment, and I loved seeing Ariane use her skills and training as alien/human “weapon.”
But my favorite has to be the scene between Ariane and Zane in the van, known on Twitter as “the sex and elbows” conversation. We all worry about someone wanting us, about someone caring enough that we can risk being vulnerable, and I love that they talked about it. In a very awkward, sweet and funny way!
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Meridian
by Josin L McQuein
Hardcover Giveaway
Greenwillow Books
Released 4/22/2014
Marina thought that she had solved all of the Arclight’s mysteries. She had found her own history—that she was one of the Fade, that she never should have been human. She knows that the Fade who surround the Arclight don’t want to be the humans’ enemies at all. She knows that the leader of those inside the Arc, Honoria Whit, never told the whole truth.
But there is so much more that Marina is just discovering. There are more survivors out there. Only Marina—and her friends, all of whom have connections to the Fade they’d never known about—can lead her people to them. But there are also darker dangers, things that even the Fade fear. And Marina slowly realizes she may never have been “cured,” after all.
The sequel to Arclight, Meridian is an intense, action-packed page-turner about the lines we draw between right and wrong, light and dark . . . and the way nothing is ever that black and white.
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about Meridian?
My favorite thing about writing Meridian was breaking the boundaries the characters used to define their world. The defining feature of the Arclight and what lies beyond is that there are strictly defined barriers, and strict assumptions about what lies beyond them. In Meridian, those beliefs are challenged when the characters learn that not only are they possibly not the last humans, but there are scarier things out there than the creatures they call the Fade. Leaving the relative safety of the Arclight facility itself, and traveling into what’s always been a forbidden place gives the characters an idea of the true scope of the disaster that led to humanity’s fall. They’ve seen the houses used by the Fade, and they’ve got books to show them the world-that-was, but it’s far less academic an experience when they’re standing at the base of crumbling buildings that used to be cities, and walking through the accidental shrine of abandoned cars left behind when people tried to flee for their lives. For these teens, it’s their first real taste of how big the world used to be compared to what it’s become, and that’s a humbling thing in the context of realizing just how little is left to them.
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The Last Best Kiss
by Claire LeZebnik
Paperback Giveaway
HarperTeen
Released 4/22/2014
Anna Eliot is tired of worrying about what other people think. After all, that was how she lost the only guy she ever really liked, Finn Westbrook.
Now, three years after she broke his heart, the one who got away is back in her life.
All Anna wants is a chance to relive their last kiss again (and again and again). But Finn obviously hasn’t forgotten how she treated him, and he’s made it clear he has no interest in having anything to do with her.
Anna keeps trying to persuade herself that she doesn’t care about Finn either, but even though they’ve both changed since they first met, deep down she knows he’s the guy for her. Now if only she can get him to believe that, too….
With her signature wit and expertly authentic teen voice, Claire LaZebnik (the author of fan favorites Epic Fail and The Trouble with Flirting) once again breathes new life into a perennially popular love story. Fans of Polly Shulman, Maureen Johnson, and, of course, Jane Austen will love this irresistibly funny and romantic tale of first loves and second chances.
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about The Last Best Kiss?
My favorite thing about The Last Best Kiss is that even though it’s a lighthearted romantic novel—a quick read for a lazy afternoon–there’s an undercurrent of something more serious under the surface. Deep down, it’s really about trust, redemption and forgiveness. I feel like there’s something wistful and thoughtful about it that I hope will linger with the reader long after she puts it down.
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Deception’s Princess
by Esther Friesner
Hardcover Giveaway
Random House Books for Young Readers
Released 4/22/2014
Some lies lead to true adventure. . . .
Maeve, princess of Connacht, was born with her fists clenched. And it’s her spirit and courage that make Maeve her father’s favorite daughter. But once he becomes the High King, powerful men begin to circle–it’s easy to love the girl who brings her husband a kingdom.
Yet Maeve is more than a prize to be won, and she’s determined to win the right to decide her own fate. In the court’s deadly game of intrigue, she uses her wits to keep her father’s friends and enemies close–but not too close. When she strikes up an unlikely friendship with the son of a visiting druid, Maeve faces a brutal decision between her loyalty to her family and to her own heart.
Award-winning author Esther Friesner has a remarkable gift for combining exciting myth and richly researched history. This fiery heroine’s fight for independence in first-century Ireland is truly worthy of a bard’s tale. Hand Deception’s Princess to fans of Tamora Pierce, Shannon Hale, and Malinda Lo.
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Victories (Shadow Grail)
by Mercedes Lackey and Rosemary Edghill
Hardcover Giveaway
Tor Teen
Released 4/22/2014
The fourth and final book in the Shadow Grail series by the “New York Times “and “USA Today “bestselling authors Mercedes Lackey and Rosemary Edghill
Spirit White and her friends Burke, Loch, and Addie have escaped from Oakhurst Academy. But their freedom has come at a terrible cost–a dear friend sacrificed her own life to save theirs. In the wake of Muirin’s death, they are also forced to deal with the terrifying truth behind the facade of Oakhurst Academy: all of the legends are true.
Queen Guinevere, King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table really had existed. With the magic of Merlin, they were able to imprison their greatest foe, Mordred, before he could plunge the world back into the Dark Ages. But Mordred is now free, in charge of Oakhurst Academy, and determined to finish what he started so long ago.
Pursued by Shadow Knights, the reincarnated remnants of Mordred’s original army, Spirit’s small band undertakes a quest to recover the Four Hallows, objects of immeasurable power. Memories of a past life have begun to surface, one in which Spirit wields a legendary sword. She comes to realize that these memories are the true key to Mordred’s defeat. Can Spirit and her friends manage to recapture the magic of Camelot in time to save their fellow students and prevent the end of the world?
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YA BOOK GIVEAWAYS LAST WEEK: WINNERS
Open Road Summer
by Emery Lord
Hardcover
Walker Childrens
Released 4/15/2014
Winner – Tammy George
After breaking up with her bad-news boyfriend, Reagan O’Neill is ready to leave her rebellious ways behind. . . and her best friend, country superstar Lilah Montgomery, is nursing a broken heart of her own. Fortunately, Lilah’s 24-city tour is about to kick off, offering a perfect opportunity for a girls-only summer of break-up ballads and healing hearts. But when Matt Finch joins the tour as its opening act, his boy-next-door charm proves difficult for Reagan to resist, despite her vow to live a drama-free existence. This summer, Reagan and Lilah will navigate the ups and downs of fame and friendship as they come to see that giving your heart to the right person is always a risk worth taking. A fresh new voice in contemporary romance, Emery Lord’s gorgeous writing hits all the right notes.
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about Open Road Summer?
My favorite thing about OPEN ROAD SUMMER is the experience of writing a (hopefully) uplifting story while exploring heavy topics that matter to me.
Okay, that’s a wordy sentence 🙂 What I mean is: I really wanted to write a fun, summer book because that’s where my mind needed to live for a while. But I also wanted to open up conversations about issues that matter to me: the cyclical nature of body and slut-shaming, what it means to be a “strong” as a girl, the iron-heartedness it takes to live out someone’s last days with them, the reality of committed (not necessarily always convenient or easy) friendship, issues of privacy and the invasion of it, the many forms that grief takes, domestic violence and how long it might take to process/react to the experience, what is fair to expect of parental figures, personal evolution while staying true to who you are, and a lot of others. It’s a weird dichotomy: read my sunny summer book! It’s about grief and redemption and trust and setting who you are against who you want to be! But that’s my favorite part: that I got to have fun writing it *while* digging into issues I think deserve to be talked about.
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There Will Come A Time
by Carrie Arcos
Paperback
Simon Pulse
Released 4/15/2014
Winner – Samantha Weldon
Mark knows grief. Ever since the accident that killed his twin sister, Grace, the only time he feels at peace is when he visits the bridge on which she died. Comfort is fleeting, but it’s almost within reach when he’s standing on the wrong side of the suicide bars. Almost.
Grace’s best friend, Hanna, says she understands what he’s going through. But she doesn’t. She can’t. It’s not just the enormity of his loss. As her twin, Mark should have known Grace as well as he knows himself. Yet when he reads her journal, it’s as if he didn’t know her at all.
As a way to remember Grace, Hanna convinces Mark to complete Grace’s bucket list from her journal. Mark’s sadness, anger, and his growing feelings for Hannah threaten to overwhelm him. But Mark can’t back out. He made a promise to honor Grace—and it’s his one chance to set things right.
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about There Will Come A Time?
I love how real Mark, the main character, feels. He’s raw and honest and in obvious pain. When you experience that kind of pain for the first time, the pain of losing someone you love, it overwhelms everything. You can’t possibly see any way through it. But those of us who have lived through a death or a huge loss know the only way is through. It’s ugly and beyond hard, but there’s beauty to be found again. There’s hope, and I think it’s important for those struggling with grief to know, with love there always hope.
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MORE YOUNG ADULT NOVELS NEW IN STORES NEXT WEEK WITH INTERVIEWS
Prisoner of Night and Fog
by Anne Blankman
Hardcover
Balzer + Bray
Released 4/22/2014
In 1930s Munich, danger lurks behind dark corners, and secrets are buried deep within the city. But Gretchen Müller, who grew up in the National Socialist Party under the wing of her “uncle” Dolf, has been shielded from that side of society ever since her father traded his life for Dolf’s, and Gretchen is his favorite, his pet.
Uncle Dolf is none other than Adolf Hitler.
And Gretchen follows his every command.
Until she meets a fearless and handsome young Jewish reporter named Daniel Cohen. Gretchen should despise Daniel, yet she can’t stop herself from listening to his story: that her father, the adored Nazi martyr, was actually murdered by an unknown comrade. She also can’t help the fierce attraction brewing between them, despite everything she’s been taught to believe about Jews.
As Gretchen investigates the very people she’s always considered friends, she must decide where her loyalties lie. Will she choose the safety of her former life as a Nazi darling, or will she dare to dig up the truth—even if it could get her and Daniel killed?
From debut author Anne Blankman comes this harrowing and evocative story about an ordinary girl faced with the extraordinary decision to give up everything she’s ever believed . . . and to trust her own heart instead.
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about Prisoner of Night and Fog?
I love that PRISONER OF NIGHT AND FOG is a mash-up. It’s historical fiction, of course, but it’s also a murder mystery, romance, and coming of age story.
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Don’t Call Me Baby
by Gwendolyn Heasley
Paperback
HarperTeen
Released 4/22/2014
All her life, Imogene has been known as the girl on THAT blog.
Imogene’s mother has been writing an incredibly embarrassing, and incredibly popular, blog about her since before she was born. Hundreds of thousands of perfect strangers knew when Imogene had her first period. Imogene’s crush saw her “before and after” orthodontia photos. But Imogene is fifteen now, and her mother is still blogging about her, in gruesome detail, against her will.
When a mandatory school project compels Imogene to start her own blog, Imogene is reluctant to expose even more of her life online…until she realizes that the project is the opportunity she’s been waiting for to tell the truth about her life under the virtual microscope and to define herself for the first time.
Don’t Call Me Baby is a sharply observed and irrepressibly charming story about mothers and daughters, best friends and first crushes, and the surface-level identities we show the world online and the truth you can see only in real life.
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about Don’t Call Me Baby?
My favorite thing about Don’t Call Me Baby is that it invites discussion…and even controversy.
When I grew up, I was rarely online aside from a few dial-up experiences on AOL and my parents definitely weren’t online. But now it’s 2014 and it’s a whole brave new world. I think this novel explores what it’s like to grow up today when both teens and parents are constantly online 🙂 I think this novel is going to get people talking and perhaps arguing about online boundaries 🙂
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MORE YOUNG ADULT NOVELS NEW IN STORES NEXT WEEK
Lair of Dreams
by Libba Bray
Hardcover
Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Released 4/22/2014
After a supernatural showdown with a serial killer, Evie O’Neill has outed herself as a Diviner. Now that the world knows of her ability to “read” objects, and therefore, read the past, she has become a media darling, earning the title, “America’s Sweetheart Seer.” But not everyone is so accepting of the Diviners’ abilities…
Meanwhile, mysterious deaths have been turning up in the city, victims of an unknown sleeping sickness. Can the Diviners descend into the dreamworld and catch a killer?
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She Is Not Invisible
by Marcus Sedgwick
Hardcover
Roaring Brook Press
Released 4/22/2014
Laureth Peak’s father has taught her to look for recurring events, patterns, and numbers–a skill at which she’s remarkably talented. Her secret: She is blind. But when her father goes missing, Laureth and her 7-year-old brother Benjamin are thrust into a mystery that takes them to New York City where surviving will take all her skill at spotting the amazing, shocking, and sometimes dangerous connections in a world full of darkness. She Is Not Invisible is an intricate puzzle of a novel that sheds a light on the delicate ties that bind people to each other.
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Summer State of Mind
by Jenny Calonita
Paperback
Poppy
Released 4/22/2014
Fifteen-year-old Harper McAllister thinks her summer plans are ruined when her parents receive her latest heart-stopping credit card bill and ship her off to camp at Whispering Pines. Suddenly Harper is at the bottom of a social ladder she can’t climb while wearing wedge sandals and expensive clothes. Slowly but surely, she starts to find her place, though, even winning over supercute camp “lifer” Ethan. But when she ruins the camp’s chance to have a pop star film a music video on campus, Harper becomes an outcast once again. With the help of a few good friends, she tries to make things right-and manages to find a whole new summer state of mind along the way.
A fresh and funny summer-camp companion novel to Jen Calonita’s hit Sleepaway Girls.
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Talker 25
by Joshua McCune
Hardcover
Greenwillow Books
Released 4/22/2014
Debut author Joshua McCune’s gritty and heart-pounding novel is a masterful reimagining of popular dragon fantasy lore, set in a militant future reminiscent of Paolo Bacigalupi’s Ship Breaker and Ann Aguirre’s Outpost.
It’s a high school prank gone horribly wrong-sneaking onto the rez to pose next to a sleeping dragon-and now senior Melissa Callahan has become an unsuspecting pawn in a war between Man and Monster, between family and friends and the dragons she has despised her whole life. Chilling, epic, and wholly original, this debut novel imagines a North America where dragons are kept on reservations, where strict blackout rules are obeyed no matter the cost, where the highly weaponized military operates in chilling secret, and where a gruesome television show called Kissing Dragons unites the population. Joshua McCune’s debut novel offers action, adventure, fantasy, and a reimagining of popular dragon lore.
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The Chance You Won’t Return
by Annie Cardi
Hardcover
Candlewick
Released 4/22/2014
When your mom thinks she’s Amelia Earhart, navigating high school, first love, and family secrets is like flying solo without a map.
Driver’s ed and a first crush should be what Alex Winchester is stressed out about in high school – and she is. But what’s really on her mind is her mother. Why is she dressing in Dad’s baggy khaki pants with a silk scarf around her neck? What is she planning when she pores over maps in the middle of the night? When did she stop being Mom and start being Amelia Earhart? Alex tries to keep her budding love life apart from the growing disaster at home as her mother sinks further into her delusions. But there are those nights, when everyone else is asleep, when it’s easier to confide in Amelia than it ever was to Mom. Now, as Amelia’s flight plans become more intense, Alex is increasingly worried that Amelia is planning her final flight – the flight from which she never returns. What could possibly be driving Mom’s delusions, and how far will they take her?
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The Inventor’s Secret
by Andrea Cremer
Hardcover
Philomel
Released 4/22/2014
New from Andrea Cremer, the New York Times bestselling author of the Nightshade novels, comes an action-packed alternate-history steampunk adventure.
In this world, sixteen-year-old Charlotte and her fellow refugees have scraped out an existence on the edge of Britain’s industrial empire. Though they live by the skin of their teeth, they have their health (at least when they can find enough food and avoid the Imperial Labor Gatherers) and each other. When a new exile with no memory of his escape or even his own name seeks shelter in their camp he brings new dangers with him and secrets about the terrible future that awaits all those who have struggled has to live free of the bonds of the empire’s Machineworks.
The Inventor’s Secret is the first book of a YA steampunk series set in an alternate nineteenth-century North America where the Revolutionary War never took place and the British Empire has expanded into a global juggernaut propelled by marvelous and horrible machinery. Perfect for fans of Libba Bray’s The Diviners, Cassandra Clare’s Clockwork Angel, ScottWesterfeld’s Leviathan and Phillip Reeve’s Mortal Instruments.
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To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before
by Jenny Han
Hardcover
Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
Released 4/22/2014
Lara Jean’s love life goes from imaginary to out of control in this heartfelt novel from the New York Times bestselling author of The Summer I Turned Pretty series.
What if all the crushes you ever had found out how you felt about them…all at once?
Lara Jean Song keeps her love letters in a hatbox her mother gave her. They aren’t love letters that anyone else wrote for her; these are ones she’s written. One for every boy she’s ever loved—five in all. When she writes, she pours out her heart and soul and says all the things she would never say in real life, because her letters are for her eyes only. Until the day her secret letters are mailed, and suddenly, Lara Jean’s love life goes from imaginary to out of control.
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