Some of the best new young adult fiction is
piled on my
desk. Here are some
highlights - check these out!
Sometimes true stories are more interesting
than anything
an author could invent. One
example of
this is the new book by Katherine Paterson, Stories
of My Life. Ms.
Paterson is a writer
I’ve recommended for years. She has received many awards, and each
one is
richly deserved. Her life
has gone from
being the child of missionary parents in China, interrupted by the
Second World
War, to being a missionary in Japan by herself.
Her writing is not preachy or didactic, but her faith
infuses her books. I am
inspired by what she says about faith
and writing:
“Self-consciously
Christian
(or Jewish or Muslim) writing will be sectarian and tend to
propaganda and therefore have very little to say to persons
outside that
particular faith community. The challenge for those
of us who
care about our faith and about a hurting world is to tell
stories which will
carry the words of grace and hope in their bones and sinews and
not wear them
like fancy dress.” (From
Ms. Paterson’s
website, www.terebithia.com)
James
Patterson continues
his “Confessions” series with Confessions:
The Paris Mysteries. This
series centers
on a wealthy family whose parents have been murdered. The only
suspects are the
four orphaned children. The
other books
in the series are Confessions
of a Murder
Suspect and Confessions:
The Private School
Murders.
Sara Shepard
has begun a
new series, The
Perfectionists. We
meet four girls who are all driven to be
perfect, no matter what. When their common enemy turns up dead, they have a
mystery to solve
because they are definitely murder suspects. Reviews compare
this book to Ms.
Shepard’s “Pretty Little Liars” series, which has been hugely
popular.
The third book in the “BZRK”
series, BZRK Apocalpyse,
has just come
out. Michael Grant wrote
the very
popular “Gone” series, but “BZRK” is something else. Like other popular series,
the story is about a
group of teenagers facing
impossible odds to survive, fighting against mind control both
in the real
world and in the nano world. Reviews
are
very positive for this somewhat dark series.
Blackbird
begins a new series by Anna Carey.
Her
heroine wakes up on subway tracks with no idea of who she is,
what she is doing
there, or why someone wants to kill her.
Much of the book is written in the second person,an
unusual choice of
point of view. Reviews
are mixed for this
one.
These are all
found in the
Young Adult section, but many adult readers enjoy young adult
novels. Stop by the
library and check out a book!
(Pun intended.)
