Elliot McHugh is a young woman just starting out in college. This novel is about her freshman year, and the struggles she has, both academically and with her personal relationships. This book is fast paced, often funny, written in colloquial and informal language. Elliot is a bisexual girl, living with a diagnosis of ADHD, and her college life is rather chaotic and eventful.
Meet Laila Piedra, a straight-laced student with a love for reading, watching and more particularly writing sci-fi. When her favourite teacher and number one writing fan, Mr. Madison, is hurt in a car accident, Laila starts to look at her writing differently. She has a new-found feeling of lived experience that affects what goes into her stories.
Parks’s latest title is a romantic comedy that delves into the complexities of human emotions and the feat that navigating through life can be. If family, friends and school life is not enough, there is always the etiquette of the dating world to consider. From first kisses, to new crushes, and childhood sweethearts, this novel exposes the complications that can arise with matters of the heart.
Brian is a Canadian middle schooler, he is almost thirteen, and he enjoys hanging out with his family. He shoots hoops at lunchtime with the boys from his basketball team, but he finds it hard to fit in. He calls it Super Awkward Weirdo Syndrome and it often leaves him tongue- tied, so much so that he becomes the target of class bully and popular kid Victor, who calls him ‘the ghost’.
Ivy Campbell prides herself on being kind. Her life focus is caring for others, but her resolve to make everyone feel better comes at a cost. This novel explores the concept of kindness, prompting readers to question what it truly means. Through Ivy’s experiences it becomes apparent that, while being nice is admirable, it is not without its complications.
I could not put this book down. Ray Stoeve’s début novel is a gripping and emotionally compelling read. Dean Foster’s coming-of-age narrative, and the characters he shares it with, works to guide the reader through the complexities of teenage love, relationships and identity formation in an informative and honest way. As each of these themes develops, the story offers an intimate insight into Dean’s experience of gender self-realisation.
This beautiful, unsettling Korean graphic novel combines text and art in an almost seamless way. Suee is a courageous but cynical twelve-year-old. Her parents have divorced. She lives with her recently demoted, depressed father. She is forced to move both home and school, from Bustle Elementary to Outskirts Elementary, and to a tiny house. She treats school bullies with sharp wit and cool dismissiveness. Her unusual gothic dress style and sharp hairstyle empower her. Hers is a fascinating moral journey, from being purely interested in survival to finding sympathy with others.
The first thing that struck me about this book is author Marianna Baer’s impeccable instinct for teen dialogue. From page one, the reader is transported convincingly into sixteen-year-old Quinn Cutler’s life, and the author manages to hold us there until its unusual, ethereal ending.
Science educator and TV personality Bill Nye (The Science Guy) has teamed up with author Gregory Mone for this scientific adventure series. The first instalment introduces twelve year-old Jack and his genius foster siblings, Ava and Matt. Resourceful emancipated minors, they soon become assistants to an eccentric inventor and set off to Antarctica for a prestigious science competition. Upon arrival, they learn that a scientist has gone missing and set out to solve the mystery.
This science fiction graphic novel is about an alien invasion of a future Earth, an invasion in which the aliens initially suck up and consume electrical devices. Consequently, humans are divided into those who have reverted to a pre-electrical civilisation, some becoming bandits, and those who continue to try and preserve such equipment, especially anything containing data, from films to instruction manuals. This means keeping on the move to avoid the aliens.
