I see what you’re thinking, internets. You are sitting at your computer, wondering, “Why is Renay asking for recommendations for books without same sex make-outs or sexy times? Is she ILL?” Oh, internets, I am ill. I am.

I have a friend who we will call Horace. Horace and I have become good pals through our love of reading. I have loaned them several great books, one of which was My Most Excellent Year. I loved that story. I ran into a snag with Horace, though. See, Horace has this…thing. They can’t read books with the following traits:

• Main character death—if the character has a big-to-mid-sized role, it’s a no go.
• Hardcore SF/F—can’t handle it! Doesn’t work.
• Gay People—if you’re gay, Horace will be friends with you (Hi, Horace!) but fuck if they’ll read about those evil gay people who are definitely going to hell for having weird and gross sex.

I might be hanging on to a little residual anger. You know, perhaps.

I will be honest! I may live in the reddest state, in the reddest county in the country, where “Democrat” means “Rethuglican in disguise” and there are four anti-choice billboards on my route to work, but I do a pretty good job of insulating myself and keeping my circle of friends tightly controlled. I was shocked, and hurt, and disappointed in Horace when they told me they couldn’t read this book because of one gay character, one storyline that contained at most, chaste first-love antics. I did not know this about Horace, this aversion to gay people: the Othering, the erasing of, the “if I don’t see it they don’t exist” decisions they made. It has thrown me!

Because, and if you’ve read this blog for awhile you will know this about me: boys kissing is my forte. I read it, I write it, I promote it, I am a big fan. I could handle the no-death stuff, and yeah, no serious SF/F would be hard but doable, but by adding in this new rule, no icky gays, I’m stumped. I went from having tons of recs for romances to having almost none I could share with Horace. I feel adrift! I am, honestly, a little heartbroken, not just because Horace will miss out on books I think are amazing, but because I feel like a friend has rejected part of who I am. Like just because I am a girl, and think girls are totally hot, I am less worthy. YET, I do not want to give up my friendship with Horace, however masochistic that will be for me in the future.

Thus, people who read! I have come to the intertubes seeking your help. I have with me a list of books and series Horace has loved and I ask of you to read them and think about what other books Horace might like based on the titles listed. Feel free to help and, to cheer me up, feel free to add My Most Excellent Year to your reading list. It’s worth it, icky gays and all.

Books I have recommended that Horace has liked:

• All titles by Sarah Dessen
• All titles by Elizabeth Scott (excepting Living Dead Girl and Love You Hate You Miss You which break a rule)
• The Twilight Saga
• Graceling
• The Hunger Games (I do not know how this survived the character death rule, but it did)
• Suite Scarlett (and I’ve recced Johnson’s other books that don’t break the rules)
• The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks
• The Adoration of Jenna Fox

If you have titles you think would be appropriate and don’t violate the rules, please share them! I would really appreciate it. :)

Internet! Did you know that YALSA came up with a list called ULTIMATE TEEN BOOKSHELF which contains 50 books, five magazines and five audiobooks? Yes? TOO BAD, no new information for you. No? Well, let me share the news with you, and then proceed to embarrass myself thoroughly by showing how out of the loop I am. “Renay,” you say, “are you about to do one of those posts where you post a list and then get fancy with your formatting?” to which the answer is an excited, overjoyed HELLS YEAH. That isn’t related to the content of the novels, but more the content of the magazines. What’s so exciting? SHONEN JUMP is on that list! Why yes, I am going to manga dork out on you, please excuse me for a moment!

[Insert some major dorking out right here. Capslock and squeeing required, glitter optional.]

I’ve really got to start reviewing One Piece again.

Now it is time for me to look at the list of books and add some formatting, because that is my shtick: having unnecessary but bold opinions about everything I’ve read! Read the rest of this entry »

I wouldn’t have known the 2008 rec list from Locus if Scalzi hadn’t posted about it, but he did so now I am informed. I was happy to see a YA section on the list. That’s right, bitches, Zoe’s Tale better be on the list. I would have glared at them sternly had it not been. Although the kidlitosphere doesn’t go in much for science fiction of that type, which makes me sad in my pants.

• City of Ashes, Cassandra Clare
• The Hunger Games, Suzanne Collins
• Monster Blood Tattoo, Book Two: Lamplighter, D. M. Cornish
• Little Brother, Cory Doctorow
• The Graveyard Book, Neil Gaiman
• Eon: Dragoneye Reborn, Alison Goodman (Viking); as The Two Pearls of Wisdom
• Tender Morsels, Margo Lanagan
• How to Ditch Your Fairy, Justine Larbalestier
• Ink Exchange, Melissa Marr
• Chalice, Robin McKinley
• The Knife of Never Letting Go, Patrick Ness
• The Adoration of Jenna Fox, Mary E. Pearson
• Nation, Terry Pratchett
• Zoe’s Tale, John Scalzi
• Flora’s Dare, Ysabeau S. Wilce

My thoughts: I say I will, but I probably won’t ever read any of Cassandra Clare’s work. You plagiarize once like she did, you will probably plagiarize again. I would never be able to trust her work. I have no idea how people who read her trust it. Maybe they just don’t know.

The big players are there and no surprise; Graceling is on another list. I’m meh about The Hunger Games but perhaps just because I read Battle Royale right before it and it’s impossible to not draw lines between the two. A Curse Dark as Gold picks up another honor, and I am surprised by the inclusion of How to Ditch Your Fairy. I read this book but didn’t post any thoughts about it because I couldn’t find much to say, except I enjoyed it until the end, were it went from SWEET to STEAMING PILE in about one chapter. It fulfilled the Bow Principle of Story Resolutions; the shinier the pretty bow wrapping ever loose end up, the worse the ending will be. The Adoration of Jenna Fox takes part in the Bow Principle, as well.

The Graveyard Book absolutely deserves to be here, I have The Knife of Never Letting Go coming up on my reading list and I’ve never heard of Flora’s Dare, but it looks interesting.

Oh, to be read list. You are never getting smaller.

I rounded up my yearly reading here, but decided I should go back and pretend not to be lazy and collect my favorite YA books read in 2008. These weren’t all published in 2008; unfortunately, I scrounge to eat and buy a few books rather than just buying books and starving (ilu broken economy), so there’s a good mix. They’re all special to me and I will hug them close in a metaphorical squeeze forever and ever. If only I could have written the previous sentence with glitter pens and finished it off with a sparkly unicorn sticker. Read the rest of this entry »

I love best-of lists; I develop huge, massive reading lists at the end of the year when everyone starts collecting their top book choices to grace their own top-books list for the last 365 days. I start looking forward to it in September; why yes, I’m a huge nerd.

Amazon has released their choices and for the first time ever, I’ve been on the right track.

1. The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume II: The Kingdom on the Waves by M.T. Anderson

I’ve read The Pox Party, but it was very early in the year. I bought a copy for myself, but I haven’t re-read it yet, which means Kingdom on the Waves is sitting at my library, waiting patiently for me to get the lead out. It’s safe to say I was moved enough by The Pox Party to be hesitant to read it again and nervous enough about what horrors I’m going to discover inside the second volume. It will be worth it, of course, but it doesn’t make it hurt any less while reading it.

2. Paper Towns by John Green

I’ve read it twice since I bought it and I ran a contest for it which I really need to get on, someone remind me next year not to do a contest in the middle of super busy retail season, otherwise known as any time after September. I am co-reviewing this title with KJ, provided she doesn’t strangle me first for not finishing the fic we’re co-authoring together. I have blocked out the fact I wrote John a really creepy fan letter over his work in general? I remember sometimes, go through several levels of mortification and then forget again. It’ll be worth facing my letter writing demons to do this co-review, though. Such a great book.

3. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

I own this but haven’t read it. I bought it paired with Battle Royale, to explore the idea that Collins stole her entire premise from the story of Royale. The reviews have been pretty positive; I can’t count how many times I’ve read that people finish dying for the next book. It’s so hyped at this point! I hope it can survive my evil, critical eye.

4. Graceling by Kristin Cashore

I bought this without realizing the narrator has special eyes? I hope the eyes aren’t a big deal. I would hate to dislike this book on a technicality. Sometimes I wonder if fandom hasn’t made me too picky.

5. Pretty Monsters: Stories by Kelly Link

I did not even know this was a YA title until three days ago. *facepalm*

6. The Patron Saint of Butterflies by Cecilia Galante

I need to revisit this book for this blog, although I have a feeling I’m going to be even more critical of it than I was the last time. I liked the book, I just think it could have been done in less of a hey-look-it’s-a-Lifetime-movie-event way. I am tired of cardboard villains in these religious novels. Over it, guys.

7. The Knife of Never Letting Go: Chaos Walking: Book One by Patrick Ness

Oh, Patrick Ness. Remember how we met? How’s it feel, being part of the Ghetto of YA Lit? Pretty good right about now? My brick and mortars have told me straight up they won’t even carry this book. It’s not one they would order without a customer asking for it, thereby ruining my plans to walk in with no intention of buying it, but still snatch it up at the last second. This psychology doesn’t work when I actually have to order the book. Sigh.

8. Bog Child by Siobhan Dowd

I am so annoyed; I picked this up and looked at it yesterday in my library. More notable is that my library actually has it and they didn’t spend the money buying more Christian nonfiction books (because we don’t have enough at this point). Win! It’s now on my list for my next trip.

9. The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman

I am not a Gaiman fan, per se. American Gods? Meh. Neverwhere? Whatever. Coraline? Cute! but too short. I have Absolute Sandman I on my shelf, but I’m terrified I’ll read it and hate it. Terrified. I thought this book was kid lit, though, not YA, although I don’t know. I’ve read reviews that said Gaiman maintained that the chapters of this book could stand alone and readers who called shenanigans on that talk, so I’m not quite sure what I should expect. I’m on the very long waiting list at the library. Maybe by March it will be my turn.

10. Little Brother by Cory Doctorow

Doctorow gives this title away free, but I am not fond of the formatting in the .pdf so it doesn’t work for me; too distracting. There are too many columns and those were a big reason I never read newspapers without blocking out everything around the bits I was interested in. This was probably purposeful so people like me who don’t prefer to read in columns will go buy the book. It hasn’t worked yet but I’m afraid soon I will have to give in. Although my YA librarian swore we would be getting this title, I haven’t seen it anywhere. Cue disappointed sigh.

I’ve read two out of ten with five in my immediate path. Not too shabby!