Tag: Young Adult

Cool For The Summer by Dahlia Adler

On the one hand, this is a thoroughly lived-in YA romance with two bisexual leads, at least one of whom is struggling with her identity as someone who isn’t strictly heterosexual. Lara Bogdan was your typical mousy high schooler, with a clique of awesome friends and a raging crush on handsome, sweet Chase Harding, football …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/05/14/cool-for-the-summer-by-dahlia-adler/

Slingshot by Mercedes Helnwein

I found this book shockingly, uncomfortably relatable, and would fight anyone to defend its heroine, the precocious 15 year-old Gracie Welles. I, too, was sent to a “prestigious” boarding school at that age by a well-meaning dad who didn’t really understand the realities of what I needed to survive it, and I too spent countless …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/04/27/slingshot-by-mercedes-helnwein/

Down World by Rebecca Phelps

And here I thought I’d broken my streak of being grumpy with the science in speculative fiction novels! Granted, my last read, Oliver K Langmead’s terrific Birds Of Paradise, never pretended at being scientific, to its credit. But here I am reviewing another novel with half-baked scientific ideas that could have just been hand-waved entirely …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/03/31/down-world-by-rebecca-phelps/

Deathless Divide (Dread Nation #2) by Justina Ireland

Thank God for Katherine! I was pretty fond of her in the first novel of the series too, and am so, so glad she gets entire viewpoint chapters in this novel, alternating with Jane’s. Deathless Divide begins with the girls fleeing Summerland and trying to figure out, with their small band of survivors, where to …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/03/25/deathless-divide-dread-nation-2-by-justina-ireland/

Namesake (Fable #2) by Adrienne Young

Deeeeeep sigh. So I was sent this book without having read the first one, and when I went to read Fable to get myself up to speed, I was Not Impressed. That was a book that romanticized immature people making irrational choices. This sequel has the dubious virtue of being utterly consistent with its predecessor. …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/03/22/namesake-fable-2-by-adrienne-young/

Perfect on Paper by Sophie Gonzales

This might be one of my favorite romance novels ever, never mind a YA romance. And that’s even with hating the guy around the beginning: he gets (a lot) better, and I’m really hoping the devil’s advocate nonsense is something he grows out of because, you know, he’s a teenager and it’s understandable, if certainly …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/03/09/perfect-on-paper-by-sophie-gonzales/

Down Comes the Night by Allison Saft

To give you an idea of how much I hated the heroine, the first time she’s in mortal peril, I was hoping she wouldn’t survive. When she unfortunately does escape the potentially fatal consequences of the (self-inflicted) accident only to be later gravely wounded by a villain, I literally shouted with laughter because I was …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/03/04/down-comes-the-night-by-allison-saft/

Amelia Unabridged by Ashley Schumacher

Honestly, this reads like J. D. Salinger fanfic. But, y’know, I didn’t think I’d like Joanna Rakoff’s My Salinger Year either, especially with its dreadful prologue, and I’ve since taken to evangelizing that excellent memoir and hoping the upcoming movie does it justice. Ashley Schumacher’s Amelia Unabridged shares a tendency towards gorgeous writing with Ms …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/02/15/amelia-unabridged-by-ashley-schumacher/

You Have A Match by Emma Lord

Whereas Emma Lord’s debut novel Tweet Cute updated You’ve Got Mail for the 21st century, her follow-up You Have A Match is a smart, modern take on The Parent Trap. Sixteen year-old Abby Day only takes one of those Ancestry-DNA-type tests out of solidarity with her best friend Leo, on whom she also happens to …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/01/12/you-have-a-match-by-emma-lord/

Lore by Alexandra Bracken

Siiiigh. In the year 2021, is describing a book as being like The Hunger Games even a good reference any longer? Especially since, if you’re really looking for an on-the-nose comparison, Highlander would be much more appropriate? I suppose I’m focusing on the petty business of book marketing because I don’t want to address how …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/01/08/lore-by-alexandra-bracken/