Thematic Reading List: Fall Trends in YA Publishing

Our Fall 2018 YA list includes books that follow this year’s trends of empowering females and recognizing the plight of all people, regardless of race or origin. Each book reflects timely issues that are being played out in our society, regardless of the book’s setting or time-period. Books included are both fiction and nonfiction for ages 12 and up, and each entry includes publication month. Be sure to use the links provided to find similar books to those shown.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

	Here to Stay  By: Sara Farizan  When a cyberbully sends the entire high school a picture of basketball hero Bijan Majidi, photo-shopped to look like a terrorist, the school administration promises to find and punish the culprit, but Bijan just wants to pretend the incident never happened and move on. Deals with issues of bullying and Islamophobia. (September)
	Sadie By: Courtney Summers When Sadie’s sister, Mattie, is found dead in a field, it’s the last straw. Sadie’s life has been hard she lives in a dead-end town, her drug-addicted mother abandoned her and her sister, she’s constantly mocked for her stutter, and her childhood was plagued with a string of abusive men but she can’t stand to watch her sister’s case slip through the cracks of a disinterested police force. With nothing left to lose, she takes matters into her own hands, packing light and tracing a scanty trail of breadcrumbs toward the man she knows is responsible for Mattie’s death. But Sadie’s disappearance doesn’t go unnoticed. Soon a true-crime podcast is on the case, and its host, New York journalist West McCray, interviews Sadie’s friends and neighbors in an attempt to both tell Sadie’s story and trace her whereabouts before there’s another dead girl. (September)
	Mary Shelley: The Strange True Tale of Frankenstein’s Creator By: Catherine Reef  On the 200th anniversary of the publication of Frankenstein, comes a riveting biography of its author, Mary Shelley, whose life reads like a dark gothic novel, filled with scandal, death, drama, and one of the strangest love stories in literary history. (September)
	The Dark Descent of Elizabeth Frankenstein  By: Kiersten White   The events of Mary Shelley’s classic Frankenstein unfold from the perspective of Elizabeth Lavenza, who is adopted as a child by the Frankensteins as a companion for their volatile son Victor. (September)
	Steal This Country: A Handbook for Resistance, Persistence, and Fixing Almost Everything By: Alexandra Styron  Inspired by Abbie Hoffman’s Steal This Book, Styron offers a resource for activist kids who refuse to accept things as they are. Includes how to organize, march, rally, and petition, and calls young people to vote, volunteer, and talk to others about their opinions. (September)
	Attack of the 50 Foot Wallflower By: Christian McKay Heidicker  Phoebe, fifteen, the daughter of a famous mother and unearthly father, suddenly begins experiencing radical changes as she enters one scene after another from 1950s and 60s science fiction movies. She will run from flesh-eating plants, radioactive ants, and other monsters, and must fend for herself once her mother vanishes.(September)
	A Heart in a Body in the World  By: Deb Caletti  Followed by Grandpa Ed in his RV and backed by her brother and friends, Annabelle, eighteen, runs from Seattle to Washington, D.C., to escape the tragedy and trauma of the past year. Along the way she is becoming a reluctant activist as people connect her journey to her recent trauma.(September)
	Ignite the Stars  By: Maura Milan  When the notorious I.A. Cocha is captured by the Olympus Commonwealth and revealed to be a sixteen-year-old girl, she is sentenced to correctional rehabilitation at a training ground for the elite Star Force where she forms unlikely alliances and tries to find a way to escape. (September)
	Dry By: Neal Shusterman and Jarrod Shusterman  A lengthy California drought escalates to catastrophic proportions, turning Alyssa’s quiet suburban street into a warzone, and she is forced to make impossible choices if she and her brother are to survive. (October)
	The Boneless Mercies  By: April Genevieve Tucholke This re-imagining of Beowulf centers around four female mercenaries known as Boneless Mercies, weary of roaming Vorseland, ignored and forgotten until they are needed for mercy killings, decide to seek glory by going after a legendary monster. (October)
	History vs. Women: The Defiant Lives That They Don’t Want You to Know By: Anita Sarkeesian and Ebony Adams Illustrated by: T.S. Abe  Profiles 25 extraordinary women from around the world who changed the world around them, such as female Mongolian wrestlers, Chinese pirates, Egyptian scientists, and British Prime Ministers. (October)
	Anything but Okay  By: Sarah Littman  Life has suddenly turned chaotic for high school student Stella since her brother, Rob, got home from his second tour of duty in Afghanistan: her school is on edge with ethnic tensions and her brother seems to be suffering from post-traumatic stress but will not talk about it. But when Rob’s anger finally spirals out of control, Stella realizes she has to find the courage to take a stand against the forces of hate in her hometown.(October)
	Come November  By: Katrin van Dam Senior year at high school is going to be hard enough for Rooney Harris, desperate to get into a good college and away from her small town, but things get tougher when she ends up as the sole support for herself and her younger brother because of their mother’s obsession with the Next World Society, a cult that believes they will be whisked away to a new world paradise on November 17. (October)
	Just Wreck It All  By: N. Griffin  Crippled with guilt after causing a horrific accident two years earlier, sixteen-year-old Bett’s life is a series of pluses and minuses. But when the pluses become too much to outweigh the minuses, Bett is forced to confront her self-harming behavior. (October)
	What They Don’t Know  By: Nicole Maggi  Alternating journal entries chronical the powerful fight for Mellie’s right to choose after she becomes pregnant by rape. (October)
	Fire and Heist  By: Sarah Beth Durst   As Sky Hawkins, a were-dragon, faces her first heist she discovers secrets about her missing mother, the true reason her boyfriend broke up with her, and the valuable jewel that could restore her family’s wealth and rank. (December)