The Rad Librarian

The geektastic 80′s pop culture book of the summer!  Virtual gamers around the world try and find the Easter egg left in OASIS- a full immersive digital world to win billions in this near future tale.  Our teen hero must solve the puzzles by immersing himself in 80′s culture to look for clues to help him on his quest.  There was no name checking of my first computer the Commodore Vic-20, but remembering playing Joust as an arcade going boy was worth the whole great reading experience.  Good for YA and adult alike.

Just when I thought I was too tired for another talking animals YA book, this sweet and charming tale won me over.  Max the Wolf, who is not a wolf, and his animal friends are trying to understand why they don’t have any memories of their lives before they meet in a big forest.  They are being hunted by the Cutters who will change their personalities if they are caught.  Nice message about creativity and world building by the author of my favorite comic series going-  Fables.

This is a Semi-Hard-Boiled Noir parody placed in a high school to maximum effect.  Great puns, inventive use of language,  and social hierarchy commentary make this a fun and engaging read.  Even though it’s marketed as a YA novel, much of the humor is more accessible to middle aged readers- so I would recomend it to teens and adult fans of noir. 

A fresh take on the slacker coming of age story, “I’m learning I’m a very powerful Necromancer, but my friend’s severed head in the bowling bag is really hard to stomach”, yet it remains delightfully tongue in cheek.  And I dare you not to sing the title out loud over and over again.  Fun, fun, fun. For teens and grownups.

Beautiful coming of age novel taking place in Wales and England in the 70s where Morwenna finds refuge in SF and fantasy novels as she tries and recover from her mother’s magical attack that killed her twin sister and crippled her leg.  The fairies and magic portrayed are mysterious and subtle while the majority of the action takes place in a boarding school where she learns to rely on herself most of all.  A true delight for teens and adults.

Crivens! It’s with a heavy heart that Terry Pratchett’s Tiffany Aching YA series is finished.  This has a darker tone than the other three, but is still a masterclass in thoughtful engaging storytelling.  Tiffany was 9 when the series started and now at 15 can come into her own being the witch for her community that gets things done when there is no one else who can.  When his Discworld series is all over, I’m going to cry myself to sleep.  Super highly recommended.

One YA anthology cannot answer the age old question of which is better- Zombies or Unicorns, but these superstars of the YA world will die a horrible undead death if they didn’t give it their all fighting it out.  Alaya Dawn Johnson’s Love Will Tear Us Apart (Joy Division reference on purpose) is a particularly awesome short story. Run Teens for your lives!

Another fun read from the grandmaster.  Written as a series of letter, this a a wondrous tale filled with twins, werefox, and a grand old house.  Good for teens and adults.

It’s not a modern horror novel, but a well crafted historical Young Adult novel taking place in the time of Henry VIII.  Dell comes to London from the countryside where she has been told the city will eat her alive.  The atmosphere, with all the 16th century squalor portrayed, will give teens a view into that time period as well as a interesting coming of age story.

When I tell people that 9 out of the 20 largest economies in the world are virtual, they just don’t believe me.  “But it’s just fake gold/whuffies/tokens right?”  People buy and sell and speculate on these games with real money.  Put it this way.  World of Warcraft’s economy is worth more than  either Portugal’s or Poland’s.  Which leads to a great young adult novel about the workers who make their living in these games and their global effort to organize their labor.  Doctorow creates a believable, fast paced adventure novel across many countries with important economic lessons.  Just the relationship between the IWW and the IWWWW  is worth the price of the novel.  Teens and adults will like this in equal measures.