Jill Ratzan

Seth drowns in a furious ocean, his body battered by freezing waves and sharp rocks. But as his consciousness gradually returns, he finds himself in a world that’s both foreign and eerily familiar. It appears to be a long-abandoned version of his childhood hometown, the British village full of painful memories that his family left eight years ago to start a new life far away. Strangest of all, this alternate, desolate world seems to respond directly to Seth’s thoughts, putting everything from supplies to companions in front of him just as he needs them.

As Seth and two other mismatched teens band together to avoid a terrifying menace, all three are haunted by frighteningly realistic dreams of their previous lives. Issues of forbidden love, unwavering friendship, complex family dynamics, the difference between childhood and adulthood, violent abuse and teen suicide dovetail as the three survivors gradually figure out where they really are . . . and what they might be able to do about it.

Artsy, creepy and full of psychological suspense, More Than This from Carnegie Medal-winning author Patrick Ness combines the science-fiction/thriller aspects of Robison Wells’ Variant with the surreal, trauma-induced alternate realities of Andrew Smith’s The Marbury Lens. As readers familiar with the Chaos Walking trilogy know, Ness specializes in writing post-apocalyptic worlds where things are rarely as they seem. When the truth—or what might be the truth—is finally revealed, the answers are both fitting and surprising. The dizzying ending brings the characters to the narrow edge between inevitable outcomes and hope for second chances—and challenges readers to form their own conclusions.

Five hundred years ago, Terra’s ancestors left a dying Earth for life aboard the Asherah, a spaceship bound for the distant planet Zehava. Over time, their well-intended plan to preserve their society—and their secular Jewish heritage—has hardened into a set of authoritarian rules: Everyone must marry and raise a family, and occupations and corresponding class structures are determined by an elite Council. Obedience is a mitzvah—part good deed, part commandment—and deviances are not tolerated.

As the Asherah approaches Zehava, Terra is almost 16—the age at which she must choose a mate or risk being assigned one. Her father has never recovered from her mother’s unusual early death; her older brother is distant; and her longtime best friend has concerns of her own. Terra’s passion is drawing, but her new career placement seems not to involve art at all. And at night, Terra dreams of an unseen lover—her bashert, Hebrew for “heart’s twin.”

When Terra accidentally stumbles on an underground anti-Council resistance movement, the certainties in her world begin to disappear. Readers familiar with the structure of YA dystopias may think they know what to expect next, but author Phoebe North demonstrates that a futuristic tale of love, rebellion and the search for identity can still offer some surprises. Life on the spaceship is meticulously described, and journal entries from an original passenger—a lesbian grieving her own lost lover—add context from the early days of the voyage. Hebrew and Yiddish phrases sprinkled throughout the text are clearly defined in context, but subtly altered definitions hint at the intriguing ways that words can change over time. In the end, many questions are answered . . . but many new ones take their place, to be pursued in a follow-up novel, Starbreak, in 2014.

Many YA books tackle the topic of teens with eating disorders and body image issues. Some, like Skinny by Donna Cooner, include insistent internal voices that whisper damaging thoughts to their hosts. Others, like Nothing by Robin Friedman and Purge by Sarah Darer Littman, portray teen boys struggling with anorexia and bulimia. But none combine these elements in quite the same way as Lois Metzger’s A Trick of the Light.

Who is this oddly persuasive voice that’s telling Mike to ignore his best friend and hang out with a strange, too-thin girl instead? Why does the voice encourage Mike to set aside his interest in stop-motion animation and focus entirely on the size and shape of his body? And who could ignore a voice that promises a more exciting life than one spent picking up the pieces left by a depressed mother and an absent father?

Speaking in a simple, hypnotic style, this unnamed voice distorts logic and warps perceptions, offering Mike the illusion of strength and discipline while pulling him further and further into the depths of anorexia. Will Mike eventually succumb to the voice’s unattainable goals? Or will he somehow find a way to silence the very speaker who’s been telling—and controlling—the story all along?

The unusual point of view is reminiscent of the otherworldly and disembodied narrators of The Book Thief by Markus Zusak and Every Day by David Levithan. However, unlike those more reliable narrators, the voice in A Trick of the Light is manipulative and deceitful, drawing readers into Mike’s head and forcing them to decide for themselves what’s true and what’s twisted. Don’t be misled by the book’s small size: This slim volume packs a big emotional punch.

When 17-year-old Michael and his 5-year-old brother run away from their abusive stepfather and into the West Virginia forest on Halloween eve, they know their world is about to change. But they don’t expect the rise of the undead.

To prevent the anxiety-prone Patrick from panicking, Michael convinces his brother that their flight is all a “Game,” just like the videogames they love. A Game Master gives them new instructions each night, the rules are always clear and no cheating is allowed. But when a zealous, enigmatic military captain brings the runaways to a Safe Zone that’s anything but safe, the structure of the Game begins to deteriorate. Without the stability and sense of meaning that the Game provides, how will Michael keep Patrick from a meltdown . . . or decide who deserves his trust in a world that’s been reset to a completely new level of play?

Like Carrie Ryan in The Forest of Hands and Teeth series, T. Michael Martin rarely refers to his walking dead as “zombies.” Instead, they're “Bellows,” “Zeds” or just “the Infected.” Whatever they’re called, Martin’s monsters are just as grotesque, scary and unpredictable as the best undead creatures from classic horror movies. At times the authorial voice is inconsistent, and readers may get frustrated with Michael’s unreliability as a narrator. But the clever blending of the perpetually popular zombie apocalypse motif with the lingo of an emerging video game culture remains a winning combination, making The End Games a post-apocalyptic tale full of spooky action and twisty surprises.

If you had three wishes, what would you wish for? What if the genie granting your wishes was a sophomore at your high school, a photographer for the yearbook . . .  and really cute?

When Margo first picks up a magic ring during rehearsal for the school musical, her thoughts are mostly of clichés: It’s Lord of the Rings meets Disney’s Aladdin, she figures. But the genie, Oliver, turns out to be something else entirely. His drab gray hoodie conceals his fantastical magical powers—including the ability to grant whoever possesses his ring the three wishes of traditional genie lore. As Margo quickly learns, though, Oliver’s magic is limited. He immediately rejects her wish for world peace (“If I had a dollar for every time I heard that one!”), forcing Margo to shift her focus to wishes that impact her everyday life in small but significant ways.

Oliver may have centuries of experience in granting wishes, but Margo only has a few days to choose hers: A rival genie is hunting Oliver, using ruthless tactics to achieve his ends, and Oliver is running out of time to elude his pursuer. But unlike the cartoon Aladdin, Margo can't use one of her wishes to set Oliver free—his magic, his ring and his history are so deeply entwined that breaking the connection between them would cost him his life.

Full of pop-culture references and teenage neologisms, Lindsay Ribar's debut novel combines a fun, peppy tone with reflections on deeper issues about the nature of love . . . and what people (and genies) will do in its name. The first in a planned trilogy, The Art of Wishing is a thoroughly modern—and thoroughly enjoyable—take on ancient legends of wish-granting genies.

Three years ago, Vanessa Adler's sister Margaret disappeared from the prestigious New York Ballet Academy. Her family was told that Margaret cracked under the high pressure of life as a prima ballerina. But Vanessa, now a freshman at NYBE, doesn't believe that. Although she's the most talented dancer in her class—with a strange ability to fall into a trance-like state when her steps are completely perfect—Vanessa hasn't enrolled at the elite boarding school to study ballet. Instead, she intends to track down the truth about how her sister vanished . . . and where Margaret might be now.

Vanessa immediately makes friends and almost as quickly finds herself drawn to two upperclass boys: the sensual but mysterious Zep and the disturbingly astute Justin. But events take a sinister turn when freshman orientation includes a creepy nighttime ritual, and when Vanessa discovers something distinctly disquieting about a subterranean practice room. When Vanessa is cast in the same lead role her sister was scheduled for just before Margaret's disappearance, she and her friends fear that their time to discover the ballet academy's secrets may be running out. But as they learn more about the school in general—and one unnerving, arrhythmic dance in particular—they find themselves embroiled in a plot beyond anything they could have suspected.

Inspired by the traditions of Gothic horror, Yelena Black's debut novel crackles with spooky imagery and thrilling suspense. Her detailed descriptions of ballet technique, set against the backdrop of autumn in New York City, transport the reader into Vanessa's world. Fans of classical ballet, dark romances and mysteries set at boarding schools won't want to miss Dance of Shadows . . . or its two upcoming sequels.