For 17-year-old Tess, growing up in a medieval English village has always meant keeping her power of fire-sight—and her trips to the forbidden Dragonswood sanctuary—a secret, especially from her abusive blacksmith father. But when a witch hunter funded by the absent prince's regent comes to her village, Tess finds that her clandestine actions have been noticed after all. Accused of witchcraft, she escapes her violent trial and flees into the nearby forest with two childhood friends. The group of runaways are soon taken in by a mysterious woodward named Garth, who harbors secrets of his own.

As Tess attempts to rebuild her friends' shattered lives, she finds herself developing startling and unfamiliar feelings of affection for their host. At the same time, fairy voices begin to call to her in her ruined left ear. The voices draw her northward toward the fey kingdom of DunGarrow, nestled deep in Dragonswood. Once in DunGarrow, Tess becomes entangled in a complex political plot designed to help the fairies and dragons protect their sanctuary from the regent's destructive campaign. This plot, prophesized in a troubadour's song, involves marrying a fairy maiden to a member of the part-dragon, part-human royal family, combining the three races into a powerful alliance.

But how will this be accomplished—especially when the regent has other plans? And what role will Tess, with her fire-inspired visions, play in the fairies' scheme? In Dragonswood, author Janet Lee Carey blends fantasy, mystery and romance into a carefully researched medieval tale that will entrance readers and draw them fully into Tess' world.

Shorty, a young teenage boy, is trapped under the rubble of a hospital during the aftermath of the 2010 Haitian earthquake. Desperate for water and unsure of his survival, Shorty keeps himself alert by narrating his harrowing childhood growing up in the violent Haitian slums. Born a twin, he and his sister Marguerite live in dire poverty and witness unspeakable crimes that affect not just their neighborhood, but their own family. Then a bullet lands him in the hospital, which is where he is when the earthquake hits.

Overlapping Shorty’s story is that of Toussaint L’Ouverture, the slave who, centuries ago, ignited a rebellion that freed the Haitians from the French. Their lives are linked by violence and bondage; even Shorty’s liberty is restricted by the UN guards who patrol the slums. As Toussaint hoped for a free Haiti, Shorty hopes that his life won’t end in darkness beneath the rubble.

In Darkness is a harrowing and compelling read because, as mentioned in the author’s note, much of it is true. While Shorty’s tale is fictional, the political violence and poverty surrounding his upbringing is based on fact, and Toussaint was a real man who witnessed unspeakable inhumanity and who rose up against it, only to die tragically. Readers will be affected by Nick Lake’s skillful juxtaposition of Haiti’s tragic history with its beautiful culture and strong people who continue to survive despite insurmountable odds. Let this incredible novel initiate a call for action.

Colby is about to embark on a year he’s been dreaming of forever: Once he graduates, he’s both driver and roadie for his best friend Bev’s band as they tour the Pacific Northwest, after which he and Bev will take off and spend a year exploring Europe. So it’s a major surprise when, before the rubber has even hit the road, Bev tells Colby she’s bailing on him as soon as the tour is done. That squall of feedback you heard wasn’t just Colby’s life screeching to a halt; meet The Disenchantments.

There are many reasons this book should be on your radar. Author Nina LaCour (Hold Still) has created a road trip so realistic you’ll end up with leg cramps from sitting in the van so long. Each stop along the way has its own side trips, cruddy motel rooms and wonderfully odd local characters. Also tattoos, impromptu dance parties, nude hot tubbing and epic graffiti. The excitement of live shows comes through, along with the boredom of hours on the road and time spent simply waiting.

While they travel, Colby presses Bev for an explanation. She does ultimately reveal an event from her past that shaped her decision to plan the trip, and also to abandon it . . . but did she really understand what she was seeing? With his plans in chaos, will Colby be able to regroup and reconsider his future without Bev in it? And when she told him, “You have to find something to love,” did she mean “besides me”?

While navigating these hard questions, Colby, Bev and their fellow travelers have lots of conversations about art and music; they’re a pleasure to eavesdrop on, and it’s inspiring to observe the way they each take details from their environment and turn them into a work of art, a sculpture, drawing or song, that captures a better moment than the one that really was. It’s not giving anything away to say the story resolves on an inspiring note, too—when life gives you so much raw material, sometimes it’s possible to make inspired, and brave, decisions. The Disenchantments’ music may make your ears bleed, but their story is beautiful and full of heart. Don’t miss it.

Sometimes being God has its benefits. The whole “creating and naming everything on earth” gig was kind of a blast, and so is engineering the occasional cosmic miracle. And, of course, being able to seduce any woman on the planet is not a bad perk. Just ask Bob. Since being appointed God, he’s had his share of beautiful girls—and he’s also created his share of natural disasters, when (like any teenage boy in the throes of lust and heartbreak) he reacts badly if things don’t quite turn out according to plan.

Bob may have met his match in the form of Lucy, a voluptuous young zoo employee who’s eager to settle down, although maybe not with the Creator of the Universe. Bob’s petulance during his courtship of Lucy wreaks some serious havoc worldwide (is it global warming or a pouting God?). Meanwhile, Bob’s provocative mother has gambled away the only creature who loves Bob more than he loves himself, and Bob’s sidekick, Mr. B., is plugging away at the less glamorous godly work of answering prayers and making sure the world doesn’t fall apart entirely.

The idea of gods behaving badly is at least as old as Greek and Roman myth; envisioning a hormone-addled modern-day Judeo-Christian God, however, is a provocative premise, and one that Meg Rosoff is more than capable of handling. In the past, she’s been known for dark, evocative, apocalyptic work, like the Printz Award-winning How I Live Now; in this, her first foray into satire, she also reveals herself to be irreverent, insightful and very, very funny.

RELATED CONTENT
Read our interview with Meg Rosoff for There Is No Dog.

Seventeen-year-old Aria is a Dweller, a girl of privilege who lives in a sheltered city with no disease, conflict or threat of starvation. She spends most of her time in Realms, multidimensional virtual environments that surpass the imagination, whose motto is “Better than real.” Aria explains, “If you go to a party, you feel the people dancing around you, and you can smell them and hear the music. And you can change things, like choose more comfortable shoes to dance in. You can do anything you want.” Thus, Aria has never needed to rely on (or even develop) survival skills until she’s banished and thrown out into the wild.

Eighteen-year-old Perry is an Outsider. He is a hunter and second in line to lead his tribe, but he too is unwanted by his people. When Perry’s young nephew is kidnapped by the same people who betray Aria, the two become allies and embark on a treacherous journey in search of answers. As they fight off cannibals and dodge deadly electrical storms, they begin a desperate romance. But the answers they seek lead to larger questions, particularly involving Aria’s mother, that thrust them apart.

The first in a trilogy, Under the Never Sky is a captivating and atmospheric read. Debut author Veronica Rossi has created compelling, multifaceted characters—from Aria’s ambitious mother to Perry’s audacious best friend to the heart-wrenching Cinder, an orphan who holds more power in his body than the swirling skies above them—whose relationships to each other are complex and dynamic. Comparisons to The Hunger Games are inevitable; like Suzanne Collins’ groundbreaking novel, this well-written and well-plotted story is intense, dark and hopeful. Set to be published in more than 20 countries, Under the Never Sky will capture fans and hold them until the next installment is released.

When 15-year-old Phillip hurts his foot on a cross-country run, he hides to avoid sadistic Coach Farragut, aka “Ferret,” and meets the most amazing girl. Rebekah seems to like him back, and so he ends up at her church youth group, an activity he hides from his atheist dad. Not that Dad would notice, having finally decided to clean out a basement full of emergency supplies laid in by Phillip's mother, who has since died. The entire family has raised not talking about that to an art form. Lucas Klauss titled his first novel Everything You Need to Survive the Apocalypse; the way things pile up on Phillip, it seems like it might come at any time.

As Phillip gets more involved in Rebekah's church, his relationships with everyone around him change. His best friends are beginning to branch out, one into new friendships with a couple of Grade-A jerks. The other is into girls . . . possibly including Rebekah. Things get ugly. Punches are thrown. And some things are damaged that can never be repaired.

Phillip is a likable guy, smart and funny, and it's easy to root for him to do the right thing. Much harder is figuring out exactly what that is. Does he really believe the things in the pamphlets he's been handing out, which would alienate almost everyone in his life? Is he truly seeking God, or just trying to win over a hot girl? And what does she think about all this? Everything You Need to Survive the Apocalypse is wise about the misunderstandings we hang onto and the ways we fail to understand one another in both friendship and love.

When he loses his best friend to a drive-by shooting, Anthony “Ant” Jones realizes he needs to get away from his dangerous school in East Cleveland. He decides to take advantage of the offer of a scholarship to attend elite prep school Belton Academy, in Maine. There he discovers a world he doesn’t really understand, where he feels completely misunderstood and alone.

As Ant struggles to find a place in the new school, where the kids assume he’s from Brooklyn and automatically call him “Tony,” he learns a lot about himself—and how to be true to himself even as he is faced with all new surroundings and people. Ant must come to terms with the fact that he is now a part of a world that he does not fully understand, and he has to find a way to survive there. How much is he willing to adapt? His home is now a place where he does not feel he belongs, but it is, nonetheless, home.

Debut author Brian F. Walker’s background as a tough kid running the streets of East Cleveland, only to move to an elite boarding school at the age of 14, is clearly the inspiration for this highly autobiographical novel. His prose rings true and the story is engrossing. Ant is a very realistic character whom readers will love, in spite of his idiosyncrasies. Black Boy White School poses compelling questions: How far should anyone go to “fit in,” and how can that be done while remaining true to oneself?

It should not shock you to learn that Why We Broke Up doesn’t have a happy ending. It’s the story of a breakup, told through the items Minerva Green collected while dating Ed Slaterton, which she has boxed up to return to him. The novel is Min’s letter to Ed, with each chapter centered on one item in the box and a story about how it came to be there. Daniel Handler provides the words, and Maira Kalman’s paintings of each item introduce the chapters; the two fit together to create a perfect mood, both magical and heartbreaking.

Min is a classic film-obsessed café denizen who shops at vintage stores that are only open for an hour and a half one day a week, but hates being pigeonholed as “arty” or “different.” Ed is co-captain of the basketball team and about as far from “different” as it gets, with his jocky earnest ways and string of exes. Can these two star-crossed lovers overcome their pasts and their separate groups of friends to throw an epic birthday bash for an 88-year-old stranger who may or may not be a film star from days of yore? Yeah, probably not.

Handler’s prose gets inside Min’s head and jumbled hormones; when she’s ultimately betrayed we’re ready to throw the box of stuff right in Ed’s stupid face (despite still kind of liking him). And Kalman’s paintings give us not just the thing-ness of the things left behind, but some of the magic that made them worth saving. Anyone who has had a broken heart and sifted through the detritus left behind will find Min’s collection extremely relatable. If that’s not you yet, just wait; Why We Broke Up is a beautiful story, but also soul food for dark times. Don’t miss it.

RELATED CONTENT
Read our interview with Daniel Handler for Why We Broke Up.

Just when you think that every possible approach to fairy-tale retellings has been heavily trod, along comes Marissa Meyer, who boldly sends her retelling of Cinderella into a futuristic new realm.

Meyer’s Cinder is a cyborg, only 64 percent human, her other 36 percent reconstructed from robotic parts after a horrible childhood accident. She was adopted soon after, but her beloved stepfather has died from the plague that is ravaging New Beijing, and her stepmother is nowhere near as sympathetic. Now, on the eve of the ball sponsored by Prince Kai, Cinder’s beloved stepsister Peony has succumbed to the deadly disease, and Cinder herself has been conscripted as one of the cyborg guinea pigs for the scientists trying to find a cure. But Cinder’s artificial parts might be hiding a secret from her past—and perhaps also the key to her future.

Meyer cleverly includes enough elements of the original Cinderella story to keep fans of fairy tales happy, but she simultaneously makes the story entirely her own, constructing a futuristic, dystopian world that is complex enough to stand on its own. The good news is that Cinder is just the first in a projected Lunar Chronicles quartet, with futuristic takes on the tales of Little Red Riding Hood, Rapunzel and Snow White still to come.

Evan and Lucy have been best friends since childhood. After Lucy’s parents split up, she moved away, and now her winter break visits are the highlights of Evan’s year. Until this year. Lucy comes home draped in Goth gear, with a new attitude that falls somewhere between angry and totally absent. Evan is determined to figure out where his old friend is in the midst of this transformation; Lucy is just as focused on keeping her secrets under lock and key. This emotional tug-of-war is just one of the stories threading through Winter Town.

Author Stephen Emond (Happyface) has created an intricate world for Evan and Lucy to navigate, and shifts in perspective allow each to tell part of the story. Evan is an artist, or might be, if he can shake off his family’s Ivy League game plan; comic strips that he has drawn, sometimes in collaboration with Lucy, appear in the book, giving yet another view of what’s going on with him. Emond strikes a nice balance with the artwork. It never overwhelms the story, but gets us closer to the characters, and it’s lovely to look at, sometimes clean and literal, then cartoonish and fantastic.

Another neat trick Winter Town pulls off is blending some seriously heavy subject matter—parental pressure, dangerous relationships, drug use—into what is frequently hilarious writing. There’s an early scene, in which Evan’s entire family openly speculates about his sexuality as if he weren’t right there, that belongs on screen. Add in pop culture riffs and chapters titled with Beatles and Beach Boys songs, and Winter Town is a rare treat: a book about art and love, friendship and independence, that’s a real pleasure to read. Don’t miss it.

Day is wanted for assault, arson, theft, destruction of military property and hindering the war effort against the Colonies. The real problem is that no one in the dystopian Republic of America even knows what the 15-year-old looks like. According to military records, he died five years ago in a labor camp after failing the Trial and losing a secure spot in society. As Day now holes up in an abandoned and crumbling Los Angeles building, the annual plague has hit hard again, this time striking what’s left of his family.

On the other side of the city, wealthy June, the Republic’s favorite prodigy and the only participant to receive a perfect score on the Trial, has just been fast-tracked to become a detective in training. Her first tracking mission: Day. Going undercover, she blends in with the gritty life on the streets until she meets a boy who just may be her suspect. June and Day’s mutual suspicions turn into an adventurous cat-and-mouse game that will keep readers guessing.

As both teens discover more secrets about their corrupt, militaristic government, including the real cause of the plague, they suddenly find themselves on the same side—against the Republic. It’s life or death to the very end as Day and June work to save themselves, each other and civilians from a brutal fate.

Even though dystopias have become common fare in young adult literature, an intriguing premise, strong characterizations and fully realized world-building make the action-packed Legend a standout. Unanswered questions and final scenes set the stage for more excitement in a sequel.

Juliette has not seen, spoken to or touched another human being for 264 days. Locked away in an asylum as punishment for an accidental crime, her solitude is interrupted when she is assigned a cellmate. The fact that the cellmate is a boy both frightens and excites her. She is as frightened for him as for herself, because her powers, the same powers that caused her to commit the accidental crime, could be the end of this new cellmate, Adam.

She can inflict great pain—or worse—by simply touching or being touched. Her parents, who regard her as a monster, are relieved to be rid of her. Time in the asylum has not alleviated her insanity, but has actually caused it. Her lack of lucidity is represented throughout the book by insane thoughts struck through and then replaced with more appropriate remarks. Juliette is a work in progress, and her curse evolves into a power as the story progresses. As she is empowered, her need to strike through her thoughts wanes.

Author Tahereh Mafi, at only 23 years of age, has created a fascinating dystopian society where birds don’t fly, clouds are the wrong color, disease is rampant and the weather alternates between snow and blazing heat without seasons or any measurable pattern. A group known as The Reestablishment has taken over, and they rule with cruelty and psychopathic measures of torture. When the extremely good-looking but horribly evil Warner plans to turn Juliette into his secret weapon for torturing troublemakers, she has to choose her own path and fight for what she believes is right.

Although Shatter Me is the first of a forthcoming trilogy, it stands alone as a poetically written and absolutely riveting novel that rivals The Hunger Games in intensity and page-turning excitement.