Monstrumologist by Rick Yancey

Around the turn of the 19th century, Will Henry is an orphan, apprenticed to the doctor with a very unusual specialty:  he hunts monsters. This isn't really what Will Henry signed up for, but it is better than being at the orphanage.  Of course, most of the work happens at night, when the monsters are out and about.  The story begins with a strange man showing up at the back door with a "specimen" that he happened to find in the graveyard at NIGHT (he was grave-robbing).  It is indeed a monster, so the doctor gets very excited and piles everyone into a horse-driven cart to go check out the graveyard AT NIGHT.  Very spooky story with monsters galore, guaranteed to make it hard to go to sleep.  Beginning of a series...

Amazing Life of Birds by Gary Paulsen

As twelve year-old Duane endures the confusing and humiliating aspects of puberty, he watches a newborn bird in a nest outside his window. The bird and Duane have a lot in common, as they both grow awkwardly and navigate the world.  At least the bird has a couple of parents to help him---Duane seems to be unable to ask either parent for help, especially about the weird things his body is doing.  Paulsen has handled this topic with humor, which really is the only way to handle puberty.  Funny read, appealing to both sexes.

Beauty Queens by Libba Bray

This book begins with a plane crash. But the author says "we do not want you to worry about this."  The plane is filled with beauty queen contestants and after it crashes on a desert island, they have to figure out how to survive and keep their nails neat.  The characters are comical at first, but as the survival aspect starts to peel away their veneer, their humanity is revealed.


 This story could have easily  become  Lord of the Flies, but Bray cleverly steers it, resulting in an enjoyable read with a deeper thread of how far women have advanced since the 50s, but have they really...

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

Arthur Dent wakes up with a hangover and looks out to see several bulldozers posed to demolish his house.  He lays down in front of the bulldozers to stop them, when his friend, Ford Prefect, comes to take him to the pub.  Unknown to Arthur, Ford is an alien, an author who has been writing The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.  He has been on Earth for several years to include a chapter in his book, but it now is unnecessary because the Earth is going to be demolished in a few minutes.   Ford saves Arthur, and together they go across the galaxy in Ford's spaceship. This hilarious, classic book also contains the answer to the question "What is the meaning of life?"  

The Schwa was Here by Neal Shusterman

A Brooklyn eighth grader nicknamed Antsy makes friends with the Schwa, a boy who is so good at blending in with his surroundings that he is, for all intents and purposes, invisible. Antsy takes advantage of the Schwa's skills of invisibility by charging students for tasks that only he could accomplish.  When he tries to steal a dog bowl from an old man and gets caught, Antsy and the Schwa are enlisted to escort the old man's blind granddaughter.  This is the beginning of a friendship, with some twists and turns.  The Schwa struggles with the fear of disappearing (like his mother), but Antsy's friendship helps him come to terms with that.

Reformed Vampire Support Group by Catherine Jinks

Being a vampire is like being stuck indoors with the flu watching daytime television forever and ever.  Nina is a fifteen-year-old vampire and she has been 15 for 51 years!  She is stuck in a support group for vampires who don't want to kill people.  Nothing exciting ever happens and she hates her life with the angst of a 15-year old.  When one of the vampires of the group is killed, finally something exciting has happened!    It's left to the other members to solve the crime.  This book is a funny read, no sparkly vampires here!

In The After by Demetria Lunetta

Amy has to survive and she is very good at it. She is a quiet as a ninja, slipping in and out of houses to scavenge for supplies. She has to be quiet, because aliens with super sensitive hearing have taken over the Earth. On her excursions, she finds Baby, a child who has miraculously survived the invasion. Since they can't speak, Amy teaches Baby to communicate with sign language. When their home is taken over by other humans on the run, Amy and Baby have to stay on their toes to avoid being captured. This book is action-packed, full of aliens we love to hate. First of a trilogy, this book will get you prepping for disaster!

Earth Abides by George R. Stewart

Isherwood has been in the woods, literally, for months without seeing another human being.  After surviving a deadly rattlesnake bite, he decides to rejoin civilization.  However, when he gets to town, he finds everyone dead from a plague.  Somehow he has escaped this plague, but now his task is to survive the infrastructure failure.  Although this book was written in 1949, it is an excellent story about a post-apocalyptic world.  Once we survive the initial collapse of civilization, how do we rebuild?  I love the strategies for "prepping" and the challenge of rebuilding a moral civilization.

Eleanor and Park by Rainbow Rowell

Park is popular, Eleanor is not.  Park is athletic and sociable, Eleanor is withdrawn and clumsy.  Almost against his will, Park is drawn to Eleanor's strangeness and he begins to share his playlists with her.  Their love of music draws them into a friendship that could be more.  But Eleanor needs help, there's a good reason why she is so strange.  Park steps outside his comfort zone to be a good friend to Eleanor and finds strengths he didn't know he had. Although there is some strong language, this book was hard to put down.

Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein

In 1943, a British fighter plane crashes in Nazi-occupied France and the survivor tells a story of friendship, war, espionage and great courage as she relates what she must while keeping secret all she can.  After Verity is captured by the Gestapo, she has to write her confession.  This story will bend your mind!  

If I Stay by Gail Forman

Mia is a gifted cellist with an awesome family.  Her future is looking good that morning as they all get in the car.  Then the unthinkable happens----car accident.  Her family is killed and Mia is left in a coma.  She is aware that she needs to decide to go with her family to the unknown and leave behind her life, or wake up and live a life without her family.  Which would you choose?  This book is being made into a movie soon.  As things can change so quickly, this book made me stop and smell the roses.

Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver

What if you had only one day to live?  What would you do?  Who would you talk to?  In the first chapter, teen Samantha dies in a car crash.  Then she wakes up again to relive the same day.  She gets seven chances to make it right.  It reminded me of Groundhog Day with Bill Murray.  The most intriguing part for me is how the little choices I make all day long impact the outcome of my day.  

52 Reasons to Hate My Father by Jessica Brody

It's tough to be a spoiled heiress, and this book starts with one named Lexington crashing her new car into a drugstore.  She is just waiting for her 18th birthday, when she will inherit the trust fund that will allow her to live in luxury with her equally shallow friends. After the car crash, however, her father decides that she will have to work at 52 different low-wage jobs, a new one every week, in order to inherit her trust fund.  Her first one is working as a maid, but she also works at a taco stand, a flower shop, a catering service, and a mortuary to name a few.  As I read this book, I was hoping this girl would get what she deserved, but perhaps my judgment was hasty...

The False Prince by Jennifer Nielsen

This book is a fun read, full of action and sword-fights, alliances and betrayals. An orphan named Sage, who is quite skilled at "procuring" things that don't belong to him, is adopted (basically, purchased) by a strange man who takes him to his mansion to train him to be a prince.  The king and queen have been murdered, but no one knows about it yet except his strange benefactor.  Their only son, Prince Jaron, has been missing for years and presumed dead.  Sage and two other boys have been chosen to try and impersonate Prince Jaron so that they could become King.  Of course, only one boy is needed, so the competition is fierce.  Sage doesn't know who to trust or which fork to use to eat his salad. This is the first book of a trilogy (the second one is The Runaway King) and it promises to be a great adventure!

Unwind by Neal Shusterman

This novel joins The Giver, Declaration and any other novel that illuminates the topic of what a life is worth.  In an effort to placate both sides of the political/ethical debate about pro-choice vs. pro-life, the not-too-future society of this book has come up with a technological solution called "unwinding."  From the age of 13-18, a child's parents can choose to offer them up for "unwinding."  It doesn't really kill the person and it gives the parents the choice about keeping their children or offering them up for unwinding.  It's a chilling alternative, and very quickly the novel points out the difficulties involved.  Thought-provoking and exciting, Unwind is an absolute must-read!  Two big thumbs up (and they are my own thumbs...)

Matched by Ally Condie    

This book opens with a very happy Cassia heading for her Matching ball.  She is wearing a formal dress, everyone is wearing their finest and the ceremony is full of splendor.  Right away, I suspected something foul in a scene that was perfect.  The society that Cassia lives in controls EVERYTHING, even who they can marry.  They aren't allowed to own any items (that wouldn't be fair) and everyone dies at age 80.  It is an authoritarian regime to the utmost degree, reminding me of Fahrenheit 451. In fact, her dad is in charge of burning books at the library!  As the book unravels, so does the utopian picture of Cassia's life.  She likes the wrong guy, she starts to feel stifled by her lack of choices, and her grandfather shares a *gasp* poem that is outlawed.  Only 100 poems are chosen from the myriad of poetry written and none other can exist.   Only 100 songs are allowed, no other music. This is society gone terribly wrong, and Cassia is stuck right in the middle of it. Great read, hard to put down.  It reminded me of how revolutionary reading can be!

The Order of Odd-Fish by James Kennedy

This book is ODD right out of the gate.  The characters are bizarre (one of them is a nappy dressing cockroach) and the situations are even more weird.  The main character, Jo, lives with her aunt in the desert, which is the most normal thing in the whole book.  Jo is not who she thinks she is and neither is anyone else in her strange family.  Her journey is never boring and often whimsical, with boxes that fall from the sky, cockroaches with impeccable manners that talk, and strange lands that don't seem to exist here on Earth.  One of my favorite characters is the evil Ken Kiang who is so bored with being rich and good at everything, that he decides to try to be the best at being evil.  Good read, rich and imaginative.

Emily the Strange: the Lost Days by Rob Reger and Jessica Gruner

I must confess, I LOVE EMILY! I love her sarcasm, her attitude, her unflagging pessimism, her love of cats. This is not the graphic novel about Emily, but there are drawings and highlights in the story.

In this story, she becomes conscious in a strange town, on a park bench. She doesn't know who she is, why she is on the bench or where the bench is located. Practical girl, she starts making a list of things she's doesn't know and things she does. So begins the adventure of the girl who always wears black and likes the number 13.

A book for all of us who secretly wish we could wear black all the time...

The Patron Saint of Butterflies by Cecilia Galante

COULDN'T PUT THIS ONE DOWN! Ever have a book grab you, making you think about it even when you can't be reading it? This is one of those books. I don't want to spoil it, so I'll be brief about the plot: the story follows two girls that have been raised in a religious commune. They are now teens, and their carefully constructed existence is teetering on the brink.

After reading the whole book and pondering that mystery of why I couldn't put it down, I read the notes at the end. The author was actually raised in a similar commune, which explains the painful clarity of the story. Highly recommend this one.

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman

If you like dark books, this is one for you. It begins with a hand holding a knife in the darkness, literally bloody murder, and a baby boy getting adopted by ghosts that live in the graveyard. I really didn't expect to like this book, but it grabbed me. The ghosts name the boy Nobody Owens, Bod for short, and raise him as their own child. Bod grows to be a pre-teen in this strange place he calls home until the man who murdered his parents finds out he's still around and comes looking for him.

The scary man and the murder plot really play second-fiddle to the boy and his graveyard family. Although not raised by wolves, Bod has a lot in more in common with Mowgli from Jungle Book than with Oliver Twist. His caretakers adore him, he is able to make real-live friends and make sense of his strange graveyard world.

Even without the comic book style illustrations, this book is a keeper.