Vega is a girl with stars on her skin. Her mother created the tattoos when Vega was small, knowing that one day she would take up the mantle of the last Astronomer. Vega has never left their valley and knows only the safety of her mother’s cottage. But her mother is dying from a sickness that has claimed much of the world’s population, and twin stars have appeared in the sky, signifying that Vega must fulfill her duty: to find the Architect and go to the sea.

Vega is unprepared for the dusty, desperate world outside the valley, where branded men called Theorists hunt her mercilessly, believing she holds the key to a cure for the sickness. She is rescued by a girl named Cricket, who leads her to Noah, a mysterious, secretive boy with green eyes. Together, the three of them set off across the desert, guided by ancient stories and starlight. But as the twin stars move along their orbital path, Vega knows that time is running low.

A Wilderness of Stars is an atmospheric adventure romance that pulls from a constellation of genres as author Shea Ernshaw crafts a world that seems both familiar and alien. Full of ghost towns and outlaws, much of the setting feels straight out of a Western, but without the identifiable geography of the American West. Ernshaw employs a similar tactic with the novel’s temporal scope, giving enough clues to place the story in a far-off future where our current technologies are considered ancient myths, but no real specifics about when the story takes place. 

Ernshaw’s narrative relies on intentional ambiguity and the slow unspooling of secrets, which is sometimes effective and other times frustrating. Many characters hold their cards close to their chests, and as a consequence, Ernshaw often writes around plot points rather than through them. Although her writing can be dense, readers who appreciate a focus on romance will enjoy the time she spends lavishing Vega and Noah’s love story with florid prose. 

Overall, A Wilderness of Stars will delight readers who love soft science fiction, measured reveals and romances that are written in the stars.

Two years after his mother dies of breast cancer, high school junior and amateur photographer Jamison Deever decides to channel his grief into a photography project. At a street corner he could see from his mother’s hospital window, Jamison photographs whoever happens to show up at 9:09 p.m., the exact time at which his mother died. 

Initially, Jamison simply wants to honor his mother’s memory, but when he creates a website and begins uploading his work online, the photos garner attention, both local and national. A popular girl named Kennedy exploits Jamison’s talent in the hope of kickstarting a modeling career, while another girl named Assi, who is dealing with her own loss, butts heads with Jamison in English class. Friendship—and then something more—grows between them. As Jamison’s photography inspires others to embark on their own 9:09 projects, he begins to understand the transformational power of expressing his grief. 

As author Mark H. Parsons was drafting The 9:09 Project, his mother was diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer, and she died before the book was published. Through Jamison, Parsons offers a strikingly honest and moving depiction of loss, grief and healing. As the novel opens, Jamison is adrift, struggling with the reality that life after the death of a loved one doesn’t come with a road map. Instead, he must find his own path, apart from but alongside his supportive sister, father and friends. 

Parsons’ first-person narration is spare and never weighed down by heavy descriptions, focusing instead on Jamison’s thoughts from moment to moment. This strong internality adds to the novel’s appeal as Jamison undertakes a journey through grief, which, sooner or later, every reader must also experience. Not every teen who has suffered a loss will be ready for the raw emotions Parsons captures here, but when they are, the novel’s honesty will likely be a comfort.

It’s four days before Christmas, and Atlanta is in the middle of an unprecedented blizzard. Highway traffic has slowed to a halt; flights are grounded; malls are closing. The abundant chaos as a surprise snowstorm hits a wholly unprepared Southern city serves as the perfect setting for a race against time in the delightful, suspenseful Whiteout. Can a couple reunite and reconcile before it’s too late?

Stevie and Sola’s middle school friendship transformed into high school love. Together, they’ve plotted out their future: Howard University, marriage, kids, in that order. But after a truly disastrous weekend, that future is in serious jeopardy. First, Sola was deeply hurt by the hypothesis of Stevie’s science experiment, which posited that love is nothing more than “a biological response built into human brains to ensure the survival of the population.” Then, in a spectacular explosion of arrogance and humiliation, Stevie ruined their meticulously planned coming-out dinner with Sola’s extended family. And so Sola has issued Stevie an ultimatum: provide a satisfactory explanation and apology by midnight, or they’re over—for good.

Heartsick Stevie leaps into action, asking several friends to join her elaborate plan to win back Sola. When the blizzard arrives, she cancels those requests, but in an encouraging display of loyalty, the other teens pitch in nonetheless. It’s not easy; they get stuck in locations all around their snow-besieged city while also unraveling their own entanglements. As the clock ticks down to midnight, readers will root for multiple couples to take their own leaps of faith as they assist Stevie with hers.

This unabashedly romantic effort by acclaimed and bestselling YA authors Dhonielle Clayton, Tiffany D. Jackson, Nic Stone, Angie Thomas, Ashley Woodfolk and Nicola Yoon will captivate readers who adored the group’s first novel, 2021’s Blackout. While both books celebrate Black and queer love, the writers took a different approach for Whiteout, blending their contributions rather than crafting alternating chapters. (For extra fun, be sure to check out their authors’ note, which offers tantalizing hints about who wrote which characters.) The result is a charming and captivating second-chance romance that pays homage to friendship, honesty and the power of swoonworthy grand gestures.

The four Singh sisters help their twice-widowed father run the Songbird Inn, a quaint but charming vacation spot on Orcas Island, Washington. In the year after the Songbird wins an award for most romantic inn in the country, each member of the family finds themselves on the edge of romance. As they navigate relationships old and new, the Singh sisters discover that love is bigger, bolder and more omnipresent than any of them could have dreamed.

Drizzle, Dreams, and Lovestruck Things is divided into four sections, each of which focuses on one of the Singh sisters and her story. The sisters couldn’t be more different: Nidhi, the eldest, is disciplined and organized, with big plans for her future. Avani is her opposite, restlessly hopping from one hobby to the next. Shy Sirsha, the youngest, prefers expressing herself through photography rather than conversation. And Rani, Avani’s twin, is a true idealist and self-proclaimed love guru. With each passing season, a different sister finds herself in the middle of a romantic intrigue, creating a fun, cohesive set of interconnected stories with recurring characters and settings. 

But romance is just one part of this novel. Debut author Maya Prasad dives deep into the Singh sisters’ inner worlds to show how broadly love can be defined and experienced. When their extended family in India reaches out to reconnect after years of distant silence, the girls wrestle with what it means to be Indian American. They grieve the loss of their mother and stepfather years after their deaths. And as they consider their plans for life after high school, they contemplate a future in which they may no longer live together under one roof.

Self-love becomes a central theme as each sister faces her own challenges. Nidhi wrestles with an unexpected new connection. Avani confronts unaddressed grief and resentment. Sirsha struggles to speak up for herself. And deep down, Rani is unsure what love really is. As the sisters work through their biggest insecurities and flaws, Prasad illustrates how difficult relationships can be, but she never loses sight of how love can be as simple as a meal enjoyed together, a promise to be present, a shared silence or a second chance. 

Drizzle, Dreams, and Lovestruck Things doesn’t sacrifice authenticity for romance. Instead, it features well-rounded characters experiencing different types of love and portrays serious subjects with a light, refreshing and relatable touch. Realistic and entertaining, this novel is perfect for readers who crave love in all its many forms.

Author Marina Budhos has previously explored the experiences of immigrants, particularly Muslim teens after 9/11, in two acclaimed YA novels, Ask Me No Questions and Watched. We Are All We Have is set in 2019, after the U.S. Department of Justice implemented a zero-tolerance policy toward illegal immigration. The novel follows 17-year-old Rania, whose late father was a political journalist in Pakistan. Rania lives in Brooklyn, New York, with her mother and younger brother, Kamal, who was born in the U.S. As the novel opens, Rania is looking forward to spending the summer with friends before attending Hunter College on a scholarship she received for “literary promise.”

But Rania’s world is shattered in a single night when her mother is arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and sent to a detention facility in Pennsylvania. Rania and Kamal’s legal situation becomes even more complicated when the neighbor who agreed to serve as their guardian changes her mind, afraid of being deported herself. Before Rania can track down an estranged uncle who may be able to help, a neighbor reports her and Kamal for living without a guardian and they are taken to an understaffed shelter in Manhattan.

At the shelter, Rania meets Carlos, a young artist from Mexico. Carlos hatches a plan that will allow him, Rania and Kamal to escape the shelter and attend Rania’s graduation—and then keep on running. During her summer on the road, Rania uncovers secrets about her mother and the circumstances of her own birth. On Cape Cod, Carlos and Rania take on temporary jobs until they realize the only way to redeem their futures is to face the present.

We Are All We Have is compelling and vivid, filled with drama, family secrets and romance. Budhos conducted extensive research for the novel, which included visiting courtrooms and meeting with experts on immigration law. Her conversations revealed that “though we consider ourselves an immigrant nation, our bedrock ideal rests on a capricious and ever-changing set of laws and policies.” Budhos’ fully realized characters and urgent prose bring these laws into sharp focus for teen readers.

When the sun sets in the forests of Hemlock Falls, a heavy mist rises, bringing with it a host of horrifying creatures. From banshees to were-beasts, these living nightmares exist to wreak terror and destruction and must be killed or contained within the boundaries of the forest. If they were to escape, they would destroy the world.

Winnie Wednesday desperately wants to become a Hunter for the Luminaries, the international order whose seven clans keep humanity safe. Each clan is named for a day of the week, and each has its own motto. The Wednesday clan’s motto is “loyalty through and through,” which Winnie’s family happily embodied until her dad was revealed to be a traitor and disappeared from their lives. Winnie and her family have been shunned and scorned by the other Luminaries in the four years since.

But as her 16th birthday approaches, Winnie is ready to restore her family to its rightful place by passing the grueling Hunter trials. It won’t be easy, since she hasn’t spent the past four years training with the other Wednesdays. She reluctantly realizes that there is one person she could ask for help: her ex-best friend, Jay Friday, who is now one of the best—and most handsome—Hunters in Hemlock Falls.

In The Luminaries, bestselling author Susan Dennard kicks off a darkly magical, action-packed new series and introduces a mysterious world filled with monsters. Readers will urge Winnie on as she gains confidence, strength and lots of bruises while training with the capable yet secretive Jay. Dennard builds tension as what seemed impossible comes tantalizingly within Winnie’s reach. But Winnie’s doubts grow, too. Does she really want to become part of a group that shunned her and her family?

Plenty of gasp-inducing thrills, monstrous gore and empathetic soul-searching—plus a little tentative flirting—bring The Luminaries to a satisfying conclusion. Dennard resolves important questions and tees up some well-placed cliffhangers for the next installment. In the meantime, readers should check out the author’s acknowledgments, in which she thanks the fans who helped get the book started via a wonderful 2019 choose-your-own-story Twitter thread that still lives online. LumiNerds, arise!

Quinta has spent the seven years since her mother died searching for a curiosity shop called the Vermilion Emporium. With her last breath, Quinta’s mother gave her a vial of moonshadow and told Quinta that she would find its purpose there. When she finally finds the magical shop, it’s down an alley and around a corner where no shop had been just a few days before.

Twain has also found his way to the emporium’s door, hoping to sell enough razorbill feathers to book passage on a ship sailing out of Severon. While collecting the feathers, he stumbled onto something even more valuable: a rare strand of starlight, a substance that was once crafted into magical lace that granted power and prestige to those rich enough to afford it. 

The pair meet on the emporium’s doorstep, and after a chance encounter with the Casorina, the ruler of Severon, Twain and Quinta agree to make her a dress of starlight in time for the upcoming Scholar’s Ball. This puts the teens in a Rumpelstiltskin-esque quandary: They have just the one strand of starlight, and the secrets of harvesting and crafting with it have been lost for generations.

The day of the ball occurs at the halfway point of The Vermilion Emporium, the first fantasy novel from author Jamie Pacton (The Life and Medieval Times of Kit Sweetly). From there, Pacton pulls together threads from earlier in the story to weave a tale of grief and healing, enchanted rooms and family history, politics and ambition, and how far someone will go for the sake of love.

In her author’s note, Pacton reveals she wrote The Vermilion Emporium in tribute to the Radium Girls, a group of young female factory workers from the early 20th century whose real-world situation mirrors Quinta’s fantastical one. The Vermilion Emporium will be enjoyed by readers who appreciated Laini Taylor’s exploration of who benefits from magic and who pays its costs in her Daughter of Smoke and Bone trilogy, and by those entranced by the world of Elizabeth C. Bunce’s A Curse Dark as Gold, set in a society on the verge of exchanging magic for science. Come for the steampunk vibes and Pacton’s lavish imagery, but stay for her thoughtful commentary on social class, technology and power.

Kit Sutherland is a new codebreaker, hired by the United States government to decipher Japanese codes during the height of World War II. Unbeknownst to her colleagues, Kit is also an imposter. She had been working as a lady’s maid to a fragile student at Arlington Hall, a prestigious Virginia boarding school. Just before her employer died, she made Kit promise to assume her identity: “Say you’ll live, even when I can’t.” 

Contributing to the war effort at Arlington Hall, which has been purchased by the U.S. Department of War, gives Kit a chance to make a difference. For the first time in her life, she makes friends, saves lives and controls her own destiny—until she and her friends stumble upon a gruesome crime scene. Another girl who works at Arlington Hall has been viciously murdered, and she isn’t the perpetrator’s first victim. The police ignore obvious clues and connections, so Kit and her friends set out to solve the crimes using their codebreaking skills, even though doing so means putting themselves directly in the murderer’s path. 

Australian author Ellie Marney’s The Killing Code is an engaging historical mystery with a vibrant cast of characters, including Moya, Kit’s glamorous supervisor and romantic interest; Dottie, Kit’s loyal roommate; and Violet, a Black codebreaker from the segregated unit whose friend was one of the killer’s first victims. Together they form a fearsome team as they utilize their codebreaking expertise to develop a profile of the murderer. Scenes that depict how Kit and her fellow codebreakers intercept and decipher Japanese ciphers are as fascinating as the investigation itself and are likely to send readers to the resources mentioned in Marney’s author’s note, which also includes two codes for such readers to try their hand at cracking. 

Marney (None Shall Sleep) knows how to pen suspense. Although seasoned mystery fans will likely guess the perpetrator long before the reveal, Marney ratchets up the tension by focusing on how Kit and her friends systematically take down the murderer, ending with a nail-biting showdown. Teens are sure to recommend this book to their friends; they might even do so in code.

Toma hasn’t seen another living person in years, but her life in the sparsely populated outskirts of the Kosa Empire is not entirely lonely. Adopted by a family of upyri—human corpses reanimated by naturally occurring magic—she’s carved out a measure of happiness in the company of her undead sister, Galina, and their parents. But when Kosa’s young dethroned tsar, Mikhail, crash-lands near their homestead while fleeing proletarian revolutionaries, Galina is captured by his pursuers. 

Toma will do anything to rescue Galina, even if it means diving into the dangerous center of Kosa’s bloody political upheaval by helping Mikhail. The pair are soon joined by a charismatic boy named Vanya, who has been accused of witchcraft. Vanya is Strannik, one of Kosa’s persecuted minority groups, and he’s witnessed the atrocities committed by the empire firsthand. Together, Toma, Mikhail and Vanya must save Galina, reclaim the imperial throne and show the world who the true monsters are.

In Bone Weaver, author Aden Polydoros (The City Beautiful) draws inspiration from imperial Russian history, Slavic folklore and Jewish culture to craft a detailed setting that feels fully alive, even as it’s constantly shadowed by death. The human politics at the center of the novel are grounded, while the monsters lurking around the edges provide an otherworldly contrast. Polydoros frequently draws on the effect of such contrasts, depicting, for example, realistic horrors like battlefields and public executions alongside surreal forest spirits whose ribcages spill over with butterflies. Loneliness and family, life and death, divinity and heresy, the personal and the political—Polydoros interweaves them all as his trio of characters experiences more of one another’s worlds. 

Polydoros also powerfully evokes absence throughout the novel, with the ruins, remnants and suffocating silences of the story’s settings mirroring his characters’ emotional journeys. The gaps in Toma’s childhood memories, Mikhail’s missing magical abilities and Vanya’s unknown mother shape each character’s sense of self. Even as Toma learns more about her past, she is often confronted by a wider sense of what she’s lost, what she will never know and the lives she never had a chance to live. Yet what the characters are missing only motivates them to move forward, to survive and to protect the bonds they form with one another. Bone Weaver is a bloody and unflinching fantasy that balances its darkness with an unwavering cascade of love.