Dread Nation
by Justina Ireland
Balzer + Bray
Nominated by: Katy Kramp
In the 1880s, the world has been infested with shamblers — or zombies as we’d call them. Jane McKee is a young black woman attending school to become an Attendant, protecting rich white women from shamblers. A series of events and betrayals lands her in the unregulated and unprotected West. Full of action, suspense and humor, but with an underlying critique of racism, sexism, and zealotry, Dread Nation gives us an #ownvoices re-imagined history that no one will want to put down.
Mirage: A Novel
by Somaiya Daud
Flatiron Books
Nominated by: kdh
When Amani is kidnapped by the Vathek, the cruel conquerors of her moon, she learns that she is to serve as the body double for the hated half-Vathek princess Maram, perhaps to be assassinated in her place. Daud builds a fascinating Moroccan-inspired futuristic world around this irresistible hook, one where old-world poetry and glittering palaces exist alongside robots and space travel. Danger haunts Amani’s every step as she becomes caught up in a plan to overthrow the Vathek rulers, even as her relationship with Maram, once purely antagonistic, gradually deepens. Mirage tackles the real-world issue of the evils of colonization and combines it with a high-stakes plot, rich character relationships, and stellar world-building to create a story that teens won’t soon forget.
Not Even Bones (Market of Monsters)
by Rebecca Schaeffer
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Nominated by: Shannon
Not Even Bones lives up to its hyped pitch as a cross between “Dexter” and “The Savage Song.” In a world where humans traffic in fresh body parts of unnatural species, Nita’s job is to dissect the bodies her mother brings her. When her mother brings home a live boy in a cage, however, Nita knows she has to save him. Nita has the most villainous mother in YA lit: when crossed, her punishment is worse than death. Nita fights for her freedom, but a surprise twist at the end blows up the entire book, setting the stage for book two. With page turning action and ghastly description, Not Even Bones is a YA masterpiece of horror! Kudos to Rebecca Schaeffer for the BAM! Epic twist that will leave teen readers reeling.
Pitch Dark
by Courtney Alameda
Feiwel & Friends
Nominated by: Pixie
The premise of Pitch Dark is simple: a hacker terrorist takes control of the Conquistador, crashing the ship into the USS John Muir, a starship that has been lost in space for over four hundred years. The John Muir’s inhabitants had woken up from a 400 year stasis about twenty-two months before that. Laura is blamed for the crash because unfortunately she had been hacking the system at the same time as an ecoterrorist, making her the perfect scapegoat for the Smithson family, who are trying to sabotage Laura’s family’s leadership (her mother is the captain). It’s a fight for survival against the clock and monstrous creatures that kill with sound in the dark. We loved the big ideas, the world-building, the excitement and creep-factor Alameda presented in this #ownvoices science fiction/horror novel. Her protagonist Laura is Latina and will connect with teen readers as they read about her and Tuck trying to save the John Muir and everyone aboard ship.
Summer of Salt
by Katrina Leno
HarperTeen
Nominated by: Stormy
This is one for readers who love magic in the real world. It’s a family story, with two very different twin sisters figuring out how they fit
together as they get ready to leave the island where they’ve lived all their lives to go to different colleges. It is a story of women with
magical talents. It is a murder mystery, with a most unusual victim. It is a very sweet teen lesbian love story. It is also a sensitive story about rape and mass hysteria. These threads all combine to make a gripping page turner, that despite everything bad that happens, is very sweet and very magical.
Tess of the Road
by Rachel Hartman
Random House Books for Young Readers
Nominated by: Caitlin
Set in the same world as the author’s earlier Seraphina, Tess of the Road follows seventeen-year-old Tess as she casts off her hyper-critical family and heads out on the road with only a small dragon companion, intent on finding the self she lost three years before. The novel moves between the past, slowly revealing the events that traumatized a fourteen-year-old Tess, and the present, as she confronts her memories, rediscovers her own strength, and slowly transforms from an angry, unhappy girl to one at peace with her past and looking forward to her future.
This Mortal Coil
by Emily Suvada
Simon Pulse
Nominated by: Dan P.
With a plot more twisty than a strand of DNA, and a terrifying apocalyptic world decimated by plague, This Mortal Coil keeps readers on the edge of their seats following Catarina Agatta, master gene hacker, as she races to code a cure with a soldier she doesn’t trust. What if you could hack your own DNA? What if you could hack everyone’s? Emily Suvada explores identity and free will in the best sci fi tradition in this fast-paced, mind-blowing adventure.