Archives de catégorie : Young Adult

ONE LAST BREATH de Ginny Myers Sain

The New York Times bestselling author of Dark & Shallow Lies  delivers another chilling supernatural thriller filled with murder, romance, and a decades long mystery that haunts a small Florida town.

ONE LAST BREATH
by Ginny Myers Sain
Razorbill/Penguin Random House, March 2024
(viaPark & Fine Literary and Media)

True love never dies. It just stays buried.

Mount Orange, Florida, is famous for two things: Cerulean freshwater springs, perfect for free divers who aren’t afraid of lurking gator, and the gruesome cold case murder of best friends, Bailey and Celeste, twenty years ago.

The spectre of Bailey and Celeste’s murders cast a permanent darkness over sunny Mount Orange. Tru has always lived in that shadow. Sometimes, it seems like she knows the long-dead Bailey, feels the dead girl in her bones. Now she’s supposed to head to FSU in the fall with her boyfriend, but those unsolved murders — and the death of her own sister — invade her every thought. It’s only in the shadowy deep, 100 feet below the surface of Hidden Glen Springs, that she can breathe.

When Rio, a strange girl, rolls into town, hell-bent on figuring out who killed Bailey and Celeste, Tru can’t resist entangling herself in the thrill of solving the decades old mystery any more than she can resist her familiar, aching attraction to Rio.

As the summer heat ignites, so does the spark between Tru and Rio…along with their other-worldy connection to Bailey and Celeste. But when someone begins stalking them, the girls become convinced the killer is back in town. And if they keep digging into the past, Tru and Rio know this time, it could be their blood that makes the springs run red.

Ginny Myers Sain lives in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and has spent the past twenty years working closely with teens as a director and acting instructor in a program designed for high school students seriously intent on pursuing a career in the professional theatre. Having grown up in deeply rural America, she is interested in telling stories about resilient kids who come of age in remote settings.

A BRIGHT HEART de Kate Chenli

What if you could avenge your own murder? A brilliant young woman gets a second chance at life in this debut YA tale of vengeance, court intrigue, and romance inspired by clasic Chinese tropes.

A BRIGHT HEART
by Kate Chenli
Union Square Press, October 2023
(via Context Literary)

Mingshin is murdered by the prince she loved, the man she helped become king. But as she is dying, she prays for time to turn back so she can have a chance to make things right. Her prayer is granted.

When Mingshin wakes up two years earlier, she swears two things: She will do whatever it takes to prevent Ren from becoming king and she will never fall in love. But it isn’t easy to stop a man who is willing to lie, steal, kill, and even give his soul to the most evil form of magic. And it isn’t easy to prevent falling in love with a good man. Even if that man is Ren’s brother, who is also in competition for the throne.

Book 2: A FIERY SPIRIT – June 2025:

Kate Chenli returns to a world of magic and courtly intrigue in this heart-stopping conclusion to A Bright Heart.

Blessed with a second chance at life, Mingshin has defeated Prince Ren and found love in the handsome, Prince Jieh. Though Ren’s plot has been foiled, Mingshin and her friends have not escaped the dangers of this new timeline.

The Night Dragon, Xiangyu, has been revealed as the sorcerer behind the dark machinations at court—and he’s after the Divine Stone.

As dark forces move in to destroy Dazhou, Mingshin must learn to harness the power of the Divine Stone or risk losing those she loves forever.

Kate Chenli has a Master’s degree in Computer Engineering, but has always enjoyed creating elaborate worlds and characters more than designing complex software. Besides reading and writing, her passion is world travel (four continents down and counting.)

NO ONE LEFT BUT YOU de Tash McAdam

Own voices for trans identity and struggles with anxiety and depression, NO ONE LEFT BUT YOU will appeal to fans of Malinda Lo’s A Line in the Dark, Angelline Boulley’s Firekeeper’s Daughter, and the TV show Euphoria.

NO ONE LEFT BUT YOU
by Tash McAdam
Soho Teen, November 2023
(via The Rights Factory)

Newly out trans guy Max is having a hard time in school. Things have been tough since his summer romance turned on him. This year, his plan is to keep his head down and make sure he graduates. All that changes when new It-girl Gloss moves to town.

No one understands why perfect, polished Gloss is so interested in an introverted skater kid, but Max blooms in the hothouse of her attention. Swept along in the riptide of burgeoning popularity, it doesn’t matter to Max that Gloss is making all the decisions, choosing his clothes, what he does and who he hangs out with. Caught somewhere between romance and obsession, he’ll do whatever it takes to keep her on his side.

Haircut, makeovers, drugs, parties. It’s all fun and games until someone gets stabbed in the throat. When Gloss confesses to murdering his ex, Max refuses to believe that she did it. If she did, he’ll have lost the two most important people in his life in one night. Trying to collect evidence that will exonerate his only friend, Max veers dangerously close to being implicated—and his own memories of that awful night are fuzzy. He has to figure out who’s lying, even if it turns out to be himself.

Tash McAdam is a Welsh-Canadian author, activist, and high school educator. Their publications include The Psionics (Nine Star Press), and the Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selections Blood Sport and Sink Or Swim (Orca Books). They are also featured in multiple anthologies. Tash is a recipient of the Shoot for the Moon fund for trans writers, and a founding mentor with the Gender Generations Project. When they’re not writing or reading you can probably find Tash in a lake, lying on the carpet thinking about monsters, or getting a new tattoo. They enjoy regular cups of tea, existential philosophy, and sharp objects.

MY NAME IS MAGIC de Xan van Rooyen

For fans of witchcraft and wizardry looking for a new, inclusive story, MY NAME IS MAGIC, is a story about finding strength from within and potential where you least expected it.

MY NAME IS MAGIC
by Xan van Rooyen
Tiny Ghost Press, September 2022
(via The Rights Factory)

Despite coming from a long line of powerful Finnish mages, and their name literally meaning magic, Taika can’t perform the simplest of spells.

Forced to attend Myrskyjärvi International School for the Magically Gifted on account of their mom being principal, Taika has a hard time fitting in. Sometimes, they wonder if not having magic has something to do with the fact they’re neither a girl nor a boy and if they’re fated to be Taika the Talentless forever.

Life goes from bad to worse when Taika sees a liekkiö and recognizes the spirit’s voice begging for help as that of their former BFF and major crush, Natalie Khumalo, whose recent absence from class hadn’t gone unnoticed. When more students go missing, Taika must take the lead in a race against time to save friends old and new before a powerful group of chaos mages can unleash the legendary Sampo, an artifact capable of either renewing the world’s waning magic or destroying everything Taika holds dear.

To rescue Natalie, Taika will have to journey to the liminal space between worlds where they’ll be forced to battle mythical monsters and their own flagging self-esteem. In doing so, Taika might just discover that magic—and love—comes in many different forms.

Xan van Rooyen is a genderqueer, tattooed storyteller from South Africa. They currently live in Finland where they find the heavy metal soothing and the cold, dark forests inspiring. Although they have a Master’s degree in music, Xan prefers conjuring strange worlds and creating quirky characters. When they grow up, they want to be an elf—until then, they spend their time (when not writing) climbing, buying far too many books, and entertaining their shiba inu, Lego.

THE VANISHING STATION d’Ana Ellickson

A lyrical and bold YA debut about an underground magic system in San Francisco—and the lengths one girl is willing to go to protect the ones she loves.

THE VANISHING STATION
by Ana Ellickson
Amulet/Abrams, April 2024

Eighteen–year–old Filipino American Ruby Santos has been unmoored since her mother’s death. She can’t apply to art school like she’s always dreamed, and she and her father have had to move into the basement of their home and rent out the top floor while they work to pay back her mother’s hospital bills.

Then Ruby finds out her father has been living a secret life as a delivery person for a magical underworld—he “jumps” train lines to help deliver packages for a powerful family. Recently, he’s fallen behind on deliveries (and deeper into alcoholism), and if his debts aren’t satisfied, they’re going to take her mother’s house. In an effort to protect her father and save all that remains of her mother, Ruby volunteers to take over her dad’s station and start jumping train lines.

But this is no ordinary job. Ruby soon realizes that the trains are much more than doors to romance and adventure: they’re also doors to trafficking illicit goods and fierce rivalries. As she becomes more entangled with the magical underworld and the mysterious boy who’s helped her to learn magic, she realizes too late that she may be in over her head. Can she free her father and save her mother’s house? Or has she only managed to get herself pulled into the dangerous web her father was trapped in?

Ana Ellickson writes about fierce girls, family curses, and everyday magic. THE VANISHING STATION is her debut novel, inspired by daydreams about jumping portals in the San Francisco subway. Roman the Renegade–her graphic novel script about street art and Filipino monsters–was awarded the 2021 New Visions Honor by Lee & Low Books. She lives in sunny Santa Barbara.