Hi Everyone,
THIS WEEK’S GIVEAWAY
Zenn Scarlett
by Christian Schoon
Signed Paperback Giveaway
Strange Chemistry
Released 5/7/2013
When you’re studying to be exoveterinarian specializing in exotic, alien life forms, school… is a different kind of animal.
Zenn Scarlett is a resourceful, determined 17-year-old girl working hard to make it through her novice year of exovet training. That means she’s learning to care for alien creatures that are mostly large, generally dangerous and profoundly fascinating. Zenn’s all-important end-of-term tests at the Ciscan Cloister Exovet Clinic on Mars are coming up, and, she’s feeling confident of acing the exams. But when a series of inexplicable animal escapes and other disturbing events hit the school, Zenn finds herself being blamed for the problems. As if this isn’t enough to deal with, her absent father has abruptly stopped communicating with her; Liam Tucker, a local towner boy, is acting unusually, annoyingly friendly; and, strangest of all: Zenn is worried she’s started sharing the thoughts of the creatures around her. Which is impossible, of course. Nonetheless, she can’t deny what she’s feeling.
Now, with the help of Liam and Hamish, an eight-foot sentient insectoid also training at the clinic, Zenn must learn what’s happened to her father, solve the mystery of who, if anyone, is sabotaging the cloister, and determine if she’s actually sensing the consciousness of her alien patients… or just losing her mind. All without failing her novice year….
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about Zenn Scarlett?
My favorite thing about Zenn Scarlett? Easy: May 7th.* Why get all swoony about my book’s release date? (Beyond the obvious “Hey, my book’s on a shelf. Cool.”) The thing is, I’ve sold scripts for animated and live-action teen and children’s TV shows, and I’ve had the serious fun of seeing my stuff produced and aired. But there’s this: the TV properties I wrote for were just that, properties. As in: someone else’s properties. Don’t get me wrong. I was glad to have the work and I learned plenty. But I was in somebody else’s yard, playing on their swing set, with their characters and story arcs.
The day that Zenn Scarlett is released, I get to invite readers into my very own yard. Well, Zenn’s yard. Then, I get to wave them on into Zenn’s house (cloister compound, actually), and her world (a dystopian Earther colony on Mars), and her universe (a place teeming with exotic races and cultures, crazy-fascinating animals, disturbing cross-species ESP and some problematic romance). So, instead of collaborating with a whole HR department-full of directors, animators, lighting directors, casting directors, best boys, gaffers and craft-services-elves (all perfectly wonderful people, mind ya), I was able to do all those jobs myself. Which was a blast. So, May 7; that’s when the curtain goes up on a sprawling, off-world stage that I was allowed to conjure up from nothing but neuronal sparks and using whatever starry bits I wanted to toss in. I don’t know how you’d feel about doing something like that, but I think it just might be my fave thing ever. Anyway, thanks for letting me rattle on here. And please feel free to wander into Zenn’s cloister compound any time. She can’t wait to introduce you to some of her favorite things.
*May 2nd in the UK. Lucky Brits.
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Coda
by Emma Trevayne
Paperback Giveaway
Running Press Kids
Released 5/7/2013
Ever since he was a young boy, music has coursed through the veins of eighteen-year-old Anthem-the Corp has certainly seen to that. By encoding music with addictive and mind-altering elements, the Corp holds control over all citizens, particularly conduits like Anthem, whose life energy feeds the main power in the Grid.
Anthem finds hope and comfort in the twin siblings he cares for, even as he watches the life drain slowly and painfully from his father. Escape is found in his underground rock band, where music sounds free, clear, and unencoded deep in an abandoned basement. But when a band member dies suspiciously from a tracking overdose, Anthem knows that his time has suddenly become limited. Revolution all but sings in the air, and Anthem cannot help but answer the call with the chords of choice and free will. But will the girl he loves help or hinder him?
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about Coda?
This is a really tough (and therefore awesome) question. Obviously there’s a lot I love about my book–it would be weird if there wasn’t. But, since I have to choose, I’m going to be a little mean (in that unique way authors have) and say my favorite part is the emotions it’s elicited from the people who have read it. Legend has it that when my first agent was reading it prior to offering me representation, she threw her kindle at one point. There’s another point about which my best friend still yells at me every day and she first read the scene in question exactly two years ago. I’ve had similar comments from people I don’t know, about certain points in the book. As a writer, the number one thing I want to do is tell stories that make people feel things, so my favorite thing about Coda is that it occasionally succeeds there.
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Criminal
by Terra Elan McVoy
Hardcover Giveaway
Simon Pulse
Released 5/7/2013
A searing and gripping read that explores the depths of desperation true love can inspire, from the author of Being Friends with Boys.
Nikki’s life is far from perfect, but at least she has Dee. Her friends tell her that Dee is no good, but Nikki can’t imagine herself without him. He’s hot, he’s dangerous, he has her initials tattooed over his heart, and she loves him more than anything. There’s nothing Nikki wouldn’t do for Dee. Absolutely nothing.
So when Dee pulls Nikki into a crime-a crime that ends in murder-Nikki tells herself that it’s all for true love. Nothing can break them apart. Not the police. Not the arrest that lands Nikki in jail. Not even the investigators who want her to testify against him.
But what if Dee had motives that Nikki knew nothing about? Nikki’s love for Dee is supposed to be unconditional, but even true love has a limit. And Nikki just might have reached hers.
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LAST WEEK’S GIVEAWAY WINNERS
Identity Theft
by Anna Davies
Paperback
Point
Released 5/1/2013
Winner: Tiffany Johnson
The third title in our exciting relaunch of Point Horror!
Hayley is going to have the best year ever. After years of careful planning, she’s ready to serve as student council president AND editor-in-chief of the newspaper. Ivy League, here she comes!
However, just before student council elections, someone creates a fake facebook profile for Hayley and starts posting inappropriate photos and incriminating updates. It must be the work of a highly skilled Photoshopper, but the attention to detail is scary. The embarrassing photos of “Hayley” in her bathing suit reveal a birthmark on her back–a birth mark Hayley has never shown in public. . . .
The situation escalates until Hayley’s mother reveals some shocking information. Hayley isn’t an only child: She has a twin sister who was adopted by a different family. And that’s not all. Soon, Hayley discovers that her long-lost sister isn’t just playing a prank–she’s plotting to take over Hayley’s life . . . by any means necessary.
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The Last Academy
by Anne Applegate
Hardcover
Point
Released 5/1/2013
Winner: The Magic Violinist
Curtis Sittenfeld’s PREP meets THE SIXTH SENSE in this spine-tingling, unforgettable debut.
Camden Fisher arrives at boarding school haunted by a falling-out with her best friend back home. But the manicured grounds of Lethe Academy are like nothing Cam has ever known. There are gorgeous, preppy boys wielding tennis rackets, and circles of girls with secrets to spare. Only . . . something is not quite right. One of Cam’s new friends mysteriously disappears, but the teachers don’t seem too concerned. Cam wakes up to strangers in her room, who then melt into the night. She is suddenly plagued by odd memories, and senses there might be something dark and terrible brewing. But what? The answer will leave Cam–and readers–stunned and breathless, in this thrilling debut novel.
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about The Last Academy?
My favorite thing about The Last Academy is how the relationship with Camden and Mark ends up. I don’t want to spoil anything, so I’ll just say I like what they learn from each other, and how those lessons play out for them. I also loved the setting of the school itself. When I was fourteen, I left home for boarding school. It was interesting to go back to those memories as an adult. Especially when there were weird overlaps between my reality and theirs — Camden and Mark meet up by a fateful old phone booth very much like one I used to frequent when I wanted to place a call and needed a little privacy.
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I”m With Stupid
by Geoff Herbach
Paperback
Sourcebooks Fire
Released 5/1/2013
Winner: Tiffany Drew
Felton Reinstein has never been good with stress. Which is why he’s seriously freaking out. Revealing his college choice on national TV? It’s a heart attack waiting to happen. Deciding on a major for the next four years of his life? Ridiculous. He barely even knows who he is outside of football. And so…he embarks on The Epic Quest to Be Meaningful.
Which leads to:
1. Mentoring a freshman called Pig Boy.
2. The state of Wisconsin hating him.
3. His track coach suspending him.
4. The funniest viral video the world has ever seen.
5. A whole new appreciation for his family, his friends, and what’s really important in life..
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How I Lost You
by Janet Gurtler
Paperback
Sourcebooks Fire
Released 5/1/2013
Winner: Alyssa Susanna
There are a few things Grace Anderson knows for sure. One is that nothing will ever come between her and her best friend, Kya Kessler. They have a pact. Buds Before Studs. Sisters Before Misters. But in the summer before senior year, life throws out challenges they never expected. And suddenly the person who’s always been there starts to need the favor returned. Grace and Kya are forced to question how much a best friend can forgive. And the answer is not what they expected.
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about How I Lost You?
I love that the main character, Grace, is a really strong female lead. She’s nurturing and very protective of her best friend which gives her blinders sometimes, but at her core, she’s pretty kick butt. Like most of us, she just needs to figure that out for herself. There are twists and there are boys, but to me, in the end it’s a girl power story. From within.
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The Boyfriend App
by Katie Sise
Hardcover
Balzer + Bray
Released 4/30/2013
Winner: Rabiah Rowther
In The Boyfriend App by Katie Sise, super-smart, somewhat geeky Audrey McCarthy can’t wait to get out of high school. Her father’s death and the transformation of her one-time BFF, Blake Dawkins, into her worst nightmare have her longing for the new start college will bring.
But college takes money. So Audrey decides she has to win the competition for the best app designed by a high schooler-and the $200,000 that comes with it. She develops something she calls the Boyfriend App, and suddenly she’s the talk of the school and getting kissed by the hottest boys around. But can the Boyfriend App bring Audrey true love?
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about The Boyfriend App?
I’m going to answer this one twice! 🙂 My favorite thing about The Boyfriend App as a book is that it features a whip-smart, loyal, and kind protagonist with a tight-knit group of similarly loyal and kind friends.
My favorite thing about The Boyfriend App as a whole is that my dad loves it. He hadn’t read any fiction that I wrote before this (not since I was a little kid, at least!) and he didn’t know what to expect. I waited until I had a galley to show him. Getting the phone call from him after he read the book for the first time is my absolute favorite part of the process! I even wrote down what he said and taped it next to my computer to look at any time I get stuck writing the follow-up book to The Boyfriend App. At the end of the day, not everyone is going to like what you write. But if the people you love do, and if you loved the moments you spent writing it, then that’s pretty awesome.
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Absent
by Katie Williams
Hardcover
Chronicle Books
Released 4/30/2013
Winner: Krystal Marquis
Forever is a long time to be stuck in high school.
Seventeen-year-old Paige is dead, the victim of a freak fall from the roof during Physics class. Now she’s a ghost, permanently bound to the grounds of her high school. It isn’t all bad, she can find out everyone’s secrets, which can be amusing-for a while. But then Paige hears something that isn’t amusing at all: the rumor spread by the most popular girl at school that her death
wasn’t an accident-that she supposedly jumped on purpose.
Paige is desperate to stop the gossip, but what can a ghost do?
Then Paige discovers something amazing. She can possess living people when they think of her, and she can make them do almost anything. Maybe, just maybe, she can get inside the girl who’s responsible for the stories. . . and have a little fun turning the tables while she’s at it.
Katie Williams’s second novel is a suspenseful page-turner full of eerie wit and a touch of the otherworldly
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about Absent?
This is going to sound small and silly, but I love the ghost frogs in my book. The high school in ABSENT has trapped the ghosts of things that have died within its boundaries, including the frogs chloroformed for dissection in biology class. So every once in a while, Paige and her friends will come across hopping, croaking ghost frogs. ABSENT isn’t a comedy; in fact, it deals with serious subject matter, which is maybe why I like the touch of grim humor the ghost frogs bring. At one point during the revision process, I thought we were going to have to cut them because my editor pointed out that frogs wouldn’t have the presence of mind to walk on constructed ground–this is something the ghosts in my book have to practice–but then we figured they’d just sink through to the dirt-floor basement, a fitting place for ghost frogs to be!
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Defriended
by Ruth Baron
Paperback
Scholastic Inc.
Released 5/1/2013
Winner: Cindy R. Wilson
A friend request from beyond the grave . . .
Jason has met the perfect girl. OK, so maybe he hasn’t actually MET Lacey yet, but they talk online all the time. Yet despite spending most nights chatting, Lacey refuses to meet up in person. Suspicious, Jason starts googling, and his cyberstalking leads to a shocking discovery: According to multiple newspapers, Lacey died a year earlier.
Soon, Jason finds himself enmeshed in a disturbing mystery. Has he found a way to iChat with the dead? Or is someone playing a dangerous trick? Either way, Jason has to discover the truth before it’s too late. You can’t put up away messages from beyond the grave. . . .
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IN STORES NEXT WEEK WITH AUTHOR INTERVIEWS
Chantress
by Amy Butler Greenfield
Hardcover
Margaret K. McElderry Books
Released 5/7/2013
Lucy’s Chantress magic will make her the most powerful-and most hunted-girl in England.
“Sing, and the darkness will find you.” This warning has haunted fifteen-year-old Lucy ever since she was eight and shipwrecked on a lonely island. Lucy’s guardian, Norrie, has lots of rules, but the most important is that Lucy must never sing. Not ever. Now it is 1667, Lucy is fifteen, and on All Hallows’ Eve, Lucy hears a tantalizing melody on the wind. She can’t help but sing-and she is swept into darkness.
When she awakes in England, Lucy hears powerful men discussing Chantresses-women who can sing magic into the world. They are hunting her, but she escapes and finds sanctuary with the Invisible College, an organization plotting to overthrow the nefarious Lord Protector. The only person powerful enough to bring about his downfall is a Chantress. And Lucy is the last one in England.
Lucy struggles to master the song-spells and harness her power, but the Lord Protector is moving quickly. And her feelings for Nat, an Invisible College apprentice and scientist who deeply distrusts her magic, only add to her confusion.
Time is running out, and the fate of England hangs in the balance in this entrancing novel that is atmospheric and lyrical, dangerous and romantic.
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about Chantress?
It took me five years to write Chantress, and part of what kept me going was that I had so much fun diving into its world – a wild and dark not-quite London of long ago, full of dangerous music and magic and devious doings. But a story-world needs people to bring it alive, so my very favorite thing about Chantress actually might be the part that came hardest to me: the romance between Lucy and Nat. They weren’t people to look for shortcuts, and as an author I didn’t give them an easy time of it. If they were meant for each other, I needed them to prove it. And in the end they did. While there’s plenty of adventure and intrigue in Chantress, it’s also a love story about two very different people who find their way to each other.
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Reboot
by Amy Tintera
Hardcover
HarperTeen
Released 5/7/2013
Five years ago, Wren Connolly was shot three times in the chest. After 178 minutes she came back as a Reboot: stronger, faster, able to heal, and less emotional. The longer Reboots are dead, the less human they are when they return. Wren 178 is the deadliest Reboot in the Republic of Texas. Now seventeen years old, she serves as a soldier for HARC (Human Advancement and Repopulation Corporation).
Wren’s favorite part of the job is training new Reboots, but her latest newbie is the worst she’s ever seen. As a 22, Callum Reyes is practically human. His reflexes are too slow, he’s always asking questions, and his ever-present smile is freaking her out. Yet there’s something about him she can’t ignore. When Callum refuses to follow an order, Wren is given one last chance to get him in line-or she’ll have to eliminate him. Wren has never disobeyed before and knows if she does, she’ll be eliminated, too. But she has also never felt as alive as she does around Callum.
The perfect soldier is done taking orders.
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about Reboot?
My favorite thing about REBOOT is writing about characters who are viewed as “evil.” In the book, Reboots are enslaved by humans because they think they’re soulless monsters. I thought it would interesting to tell a story from the point of the view of the monster, not the person running from them.
Creating my main character, Wren, in a world where everyone thinks she is the worst of the monsters was especially fun. I liked getting to explore a character who wasn’t sure if she was good or bad, and what would happen when someone came along who truly made her consider her own emotions and feelings.
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Riptide
by Lindsey Scheibe
Paperback
Flux
Released 5/8/2013
Grace has one summer to prove she’s good enough
For Grace Parker, surfing is all about the ride and the moment. Everything else disappears. She can forget that her best friend, Ford Watson, has a crush on her that she can’t reciprocate. She can forget how badly she wants to get a surf scholarship to UC San Diego. She can forget the pressure of her parents’ impossibly high expectations.
When Ford enters Grace into a surf competition-the only way she can impress the UCSD surfing scouts-she has one summer to train and prepare. Will she gain everything she’s ever wanted or lose the only things that ever mattered?
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about Riptide?
Hmmm. That’s a toughie. Besides hottie Ford?
I’d have to say I loved writing the surfing scenes. For me, it’s almost like the setting is it’s own character. The beach, the surfers, the sun, the spray of salt water crashing against surfboards. It’s magical.
The first time I road a surfboard, I was a goner. Head over heels in love with it. I surfed in Galveston, Texas growing up. So all the surfers in the US with better waves might be thinking how can you surf Galveston? Well, you can. The water might be a little browner and the waves choppier, but in the winter the waves get better. And tropical storms always help kick the waves up a notch, too. And yes, I can remember being on the beach before a tropical storm hit and hearing the local lifeguards going up and down the beach telling everyone to get out of the water because there was a tropical storm coming in.
I’ve surfed in Maui, Oahu, and Saladita, Mexico – all very beautiful places to surf. I’ve been landlocked for several years and for a while was pretty into rock climbing.
Writing Riptide and enjoying memories of what made surfing and the beach magical was a blast.
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Fifteenth Summer
by Michelle Dalton
Hardcover
Simon Pulse
Released 5/7/2013
Love blossoms by the lake in this sweet summer romance, in the tradition of Seventeeth Summer and Sixteenth Summer.
Chelsea isn’t looking forward to her summer at the lake. It’s the first time her family has been there since her grandmother died, and she can’t break out of her funk. But her summer takes a turn for the better when she meets a boy who works in the bookstore. Josh is cute, sweet, funny-and best of all, seems to like her as much as she likes him. As the days pass by in a blur of boat rides, picnics, and stolen kisses, she can’t believe how lucky she is. No one has ever made her feel so special, or so beautiful.
But Chelsea knows her days with Josh are numbered. She’ll be heading home at the end of the summer-and he’ll be staying behind. Will this be Chelsea’s summer of love? Or will it be the summer of her broken heart?
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about Fifteenth Summer?
When I write, my first inspiration is almost always the setting. Maybe that’s weird, I know many writers start with, you know, the characters. Anyway, in FIFTEENTH SUMMER, the season is really part of the setting. We’re different in the summertime. We give our brains a rest and we daydream and read and doze. And we get to be more physical, more sensual, with all that swimming and hiking and heat, watermelon and barbecue and ice pops. It’s the most luxurious time to fall in love. So many concerns of daily life are set aside and you can just be. I love how, because she’s away from home, living in a quirky town on a lake, and because it’s summer, Chelsea gets the space to just feel so intensely. She feels this cathartic grief for her grandmother and mad swooning for Josh are cathartic. We’re all so, so busy. You’ve got a summer job or internship, or you have your reading list for school or even just the constancy of your social life and online life–it can be exhausting. So I think the simplicity of this kind of summer, which in part makes Chelsea and Josh’s intense love possible, is appealing to everyone.
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The End Games
by T. Michael Martin
Hardcover
Balzer + Bray
Released 5/7/2013
It happened on Halloween.
The world ended.
And a dangerous Game brought it back to life.
Seventeen-year-old Michael and his five-year-old brother, Patrick, have been battling monsters in The Game for weeks.
In the rural mountains of West Virginia, armed with only their rifle and their love for each other, the brothers follow Instructions from the mysterious Game Master. They spend their days searching for survivors, their nights fighting endless hordes of “Bellows”-creatures that roam the dark, roaring for flesh. And at this Game, Michael and Patrick are very good.
But The Game is changing.
The Bellows are evolving.
The Game Master is leading Michael and Patrick to other survivors-survivors who don’t play by the rules.
And the brothers will never be the same.
T. Michael Martin’s debut novel is a transcendent thriller filled with electrifying action, searing emotional insight, and unexpected romance.
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about The End Games?
I’m proud of a lot of things in The End Games, including its action and sense of place, and the way it tries to grapple with the spiritual questions that arise from an apocalyptic event.
But my favorite thing is the relationship between the book’s main characters, two brothers named Michael and Patrick. Michael is seventeen and Patrick is five, and the book began, really, as a kind
of love letter to my own little brother. I named the characters after us, because even though the fictional Michael and Patrick are very different from us, I wanted to examine the particular kind of
protective love I’ve always felt for my brother. It was a relationship I’d never quite seen in YA, and I’ve been so thrilled that early reviews of the book have mentioned that they found the relationship a convincing and powerful one. For all its spooky action and terror and laughter, The End Games is fundamentally the story of a love shared between siblings at the end of the world, and I hope that
readers will find the relationship as fun to read as I found it to write.
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MORE RELEASES IN STORES NEXT WEEK
Mystic
by Alyson Noel
Hardcover
St. Martin”s Griffin
Released 5/7/2013
Since arriving in Enchantment, New Mexico, everything in Daire Santos life has changed. And not all for the better. While she’s come to accept and embrace her new powers as a Soul Seeker, Daire struggles with the responsibility she holds navigating between the worlds of the living and the dead. And with the fate of her boyfriend Dace in the balance, Daire must put aside her personal feelings and focus on defeating Cade, whose evil plans threaten everyone she loves and the world as she knows it.
MYSTIC is the third book in The Soul Seekers, a magnificent new series about a girl who can navigate between the worlds of the living and the dead, by #1 New York Times bestselling author Alyson Noel.
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If I Should Die
by Amy Plum
Hardcover
HarperTeen
Released 5/7/2013
I will not lose another person I love. I will not let history repeat itself.
Vincent waited lifetimes to find me, but in an instant our future together was shattered. He was betrayed by someone we both called a friend, and I lost him. Now our enemy is determined to rule over France’s immortals, and willing to wage a war to get what they want.
It shouldn’t be possible, none of it should be, but this is my reality. I know Vincent is somewhere out there, I know he’s not completely gone, and I will do anything to save him.
After what we’ve already fought to achieve, a life without Vincent is unimaginable. He once swore to avoid dying-to go against his nature and forsake sacrificing himself for others-so that we could be together. How can I not risk everything to bring my love back to me?
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Invisibility
by Andrea Cremer & David Levithan
Hardcover
Philomel
Released 5/7/2013
Stephen has been invisible for practically his whole life – because of a curse his grandfather, a powerful cursecaster, bestowed on Stephen’s mother before Stephen was born. So when Elizabeth moves to Stephen’s NYC apartment building from Minnesota, no one is more surprised than he is that she can see him. A budding romance ensues, and when Stephen confides in Elizabeth about his predicament, the two of them decide to dive headfirst into the secret world of cursecasters and spellseekers to figure out a way to break the curse. But things don’t go as planned, especially when Stephen’s grandfather arrives in town, taking his anger out on everyone he sees. In the end, Elizabeth and Stephen must decide how big of a sacrifice they’re willing to make for Stephen to become visible – because the answer could mean the difference between life and death. At least for Elizabeth.
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The Originals
by Cat Patrick
Hardcover
Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Released 5/7/2013
A riveting new story from Cat Patrick, author of Forgotten and Revived.
17-year-olds Lizzie, Ella, and Betsey Best grew up as identical triplets… until they discovered a shocking family secret. They’re actually closer than sisters, they’re clones. Hiding from a government agency that would expose them, the Best family appears to consist of a single mother with one daughter named Elizabeth. Lizzie, Ella, and Betsey take turns going to school, attending social engagements, and a group mindset has always been a de facto part of life…
Then Lizzie meets Sean Kelly, a guy who seems to see into her very soul. As their relationship develops, Lizzie realizes that she’s not a carbon copy of her sisters; she’s an individual with unique dreams and desires, and digging deeper into her background, Lizzie begins to dismantle the delicate balance of an unusual family that only science could have created.
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15 Days Without a Head
by Dave Cousins
Paperback
Flux
Released 5/8/2013
A compelling US debut about family, forgiveness, and hope
Despite having a depressed alcoholic mother and a little brother who’s convinced he’s a dog, fifteen year-old Laurence Roach is trying to live a normal life. But when his mom doesn’t come home after work one night, Laurence is terrified that child services will find out she’s gone and separate him from his brother.
For two weeks, Laurence does whatever he can to keep her disappearance a secret. Spinning a web of complicated lies for friends, neighbors, and the authorities, Laurence even dresses like his mother to convince everyone she’s still around. By following clues, the brothers are finally able to track down their mother’s whereabouts. And that’s when the real trouble begins in this powerful story about what it means to be a family.
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Reluctant Assassin
by Eoin Colfer
Hardcover
Hyperion Book CH
Released 5/7/2013
Riley, a teen orphan boy living in Victorian London, has had the misfortune of being apprenticed to Albert Garrick, an illusionist who has fallen on difficult times and now uses his unique conjuring skills to gain access to victims’ dwellings. On one such escapade, Garrick brings his reluctant apprentice along and urges him to commit his first killing. Riley is saved from having to commit the grisly act when the intended victim turns out to be a scientist from the future, part of the FBI’s Witness Anonymous Relocation Program (WARP) Riley is unwittingly transported via wormhole to modern day London, followed closely by Garrick.
In modern London, Riley is helped by Chevron Savano, a seventeen-year-old FBI agent sent to London as punishment after a disastrous undercover, anti-terrorist operation in Los Angeles. Together Riley and Chevie must evade Garrick, who has been fundamentally altered by his trip through the wormhole. Garrick is now not only evil, but he also possesses all of the scientist’s knowledge. He is determined to track Riley down and use the timekey in Chevie’s possession to make his way back to Victorian London where he can literally change the world.
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Game On
by James LaRosa & Monica Seles
Hardcover
Bloomsbury USA Childrens; 1 edition
Released 5/7/2013
The Academy is an International Sports Mecca for teen athletes of all sports. There are only two ways in. Deep pockets or enough talent to score a scholarship.
Young tennis star Maya’s dreams have finally come true when she earns a scholarship to The Academy. Plucked from her small town, Maya moves to the sports training facility/boarding school to (hopefully) start the beginning of her pro career. But Maya’s fantasy of The Academy doesn’t quite match the reality. Because where there are hot, talented teens, there’s a lot of drama. Meet the players:
Cleo: Maya’s rebel/punk roommate who is nearing the top of the golf world.
Renee: The gorgeous swimmer with enough money to buy her way into The Academy.
Nicole: A tennis star who feels threatened by Maya (but she’d never admit it).
Travis: The son of The Academy owner–perfectly groomed to be the next NFL star.
Jake: Travis’ younger brother–the bad boy to his brother’s good.
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Maid of Secrets
by Jennifer McGowan
Hardcover
Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
Released 5/7/2013
Seventeen-year-old Meg Fellowes is a wry, resourceful thief forced to join an elite group of female spies in Queen Elizabeth’s Court. There she must solve a murder, save the Crown, and resist the one thing that will become her greatest freedom-and her deadliest peril.
For Meg and her fellow spies are not alone in their pursuit of the murderer who stalks Windsor Castle.
A young, mysterious Spanish courtier, Count Rafe de Martine, appears at every turn in the dark and scandal-filled corridors of the Queen’s summer palace. And though secrets and danger are Meg’s stock-in-trade, she’s never bargained on falling in love.
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How My Summer Went Up in Flames
by Jennifer Salvato Doktorski
Hardcover
Simon Pulse
Released 5/7/2013
First she lost her heart. Then she lost her mind. And now she’s on a road trip to win back her ex. This debut novel’s packed with drama and romance!
Rosie’s always been impulsive. She didn’t intend to set her cheating ex-boyfriend’s car on fire. And she never thought her attempts to make amends could be considered stalking. So when she’s served with a temporary restraining order on the first day of summer vacation, she’s heartbroken-and furious.
To put distance between Rosie and her ex, Rosie’s parents send her on a cross-country road trip with responsible, reliable neighbor Matty and his two friends. Forget freedom of the road, Rosie wants to hitchhike home and win back her ex. But her determination starts to dwindle with each passing mile. Because Rosie’s spark of anger? It may have just ignited a romance with someone new.
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Nantucket Blue
by Leila Howland
Hardcover
Hyperion Book CH
Released 5/7/2013
For Cricket Thompson, a summer like this one will change everything. A summer spent on Nantucket with her best friend, Jules Clayton, and the indomitable Clayton family. A summer when she’ll make the almost unattainable Jay Logan hers. A summer to surpass all dreams.
Some of this turns out to be true. Some of it doesn’t.
When Jules and her family suffer a devastating tragedy that forces the girls apart, Jules becomes a stranger whom Cricket wonders whether she ever really knew. And instead of lying on the beach working on her caramel-colored tan, Cricket is making beds and cleaning bathrooms to support herself in paradise for the summer.
But it’s the things Cricket hadn’t counted on–most of all, falling hard for someone who should be completely off-limits–that turn her dreams into an exhilarating, bittersweet reality.
A beautiful future is within her grasp, and Cricket must find the grace to embrace it. If she does, her life could be the perfect shade of Nantucket blue.
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Icons
by Margaret Stohl
Hardcover
Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Released 5/7/2013
Your heart beats only with their permission.
Everything changed on The Day. The day the windows shattered. The day the power stopped. The day Dol’s family dropped dead. The day Earth lost a war it didn’t know it was fighting.
Since then, Dol has lived a simple life in the countryside — safe from the shadow of the Icon and its terrifying power. Hiding from the one truth she can’t avoid.
She’s different. She survived. Why?
When Dol and her best friend, Ro, are captured and taken to the Embassy, off the coast of the sprawling metropolis once known as the City of Angels, they find only more questions. While Ro and fellow hostage Tima rage against their captors, Dol finds herself drawn to Lucas, the Ambassador’s privileged son. But the four teens are more alike than they might think, and the timing of their meeting isn’t a coincidence. It’s a conspiracy.
Within the Icon’s reach, Dol, Ro, Tima, and Lucas discover that their uncontrollable emotions — which they’ve always thought to be their greatest weaknesses — may actually be their greatest strengths.
Bestselling author Margaret Stohl delivers the first book in a heart-pounding series set in a haunting new world where four teens must piece together the mysteries of their pasts — in order to save the future.
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Thorn Abbey
by Nancy Ohlin
Hardcover
Simon Pulse
Released 5/7/2013
Nothing is as it seems in this darkly romantic tale of infatuation and possession, inspired by Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca.Becca was the perfect girlfriend: smart, gorgeous, and loved by everyone at New England’s premier boarding school, Thorn Abbey. But Becca’s dead. And her boyfriend, Max, can’t get over his loss.
Then Tess transfers to Thorn Abbey. She’s shy, insecure, and ordinary-everything that Becca wasn’t. And despite her roommate’s warnings, she falls for brooding Max.
Now Max finally has a reason to move on. Except it won’t be easy. Because Becca may be gone, but she’s not quite ready to let him go.
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The 5th Wave
by Rick Yancey
Hardcover
Putnam Juvenile
Released 5/7/2013
The Passage meets Ender’s Game in an epic new series from award-winning author Rick Yancey.
After the 1st wave, only darkness remains. After the 2nd, only the lucky escape. And after the 3rd, only the unlucky survive. After the 4th wave, only one rule applies: trust no one.
Now, it’s the dawn of the 5th wave, and on a lonely stretch of highway, Cassie runs from Them. The beings who only look human, who roam the countryside killing anyone they see. Who have scattered Earth’s last survivors. To stay alone is to stay alive, Cassie believes, until she meets Evan Walker. Beguiling and mysterious, Evan Walker may be Cassie’s only hope for rescuing her brother-or even saving herself. But Cassie must choose: between trust and despair, between defiance and surrender, between life and death. To give up or to get up.
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Savage Blue
by Zoraida Cordova
Hardcover
Sourcebooks Fire
Released 5/7/2013
The ocean is a vicious place. Deeper and darker than Tristan could have imagined. Beneath its calm blue surface, an ancient battle is churning—and no one is safe.
In the quest for the Sea Throne, Tristan has already watched one good friend die. Now he must lead the rest on a dangerous voyage in search of the trident that will make him king. But while Tristan chases his destiny, the dark forces racing against him are getting stronger, and the sea witch of his nightmares is getting closer.
Battling sea dragons and savage creatures of the deep, Tristan needs his friends’ support. But they each have their secrets, and a betrayal will force Tristan to choose between his crown and his best friend Layla—the only girl he’s ever loved.
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