Kay Donovan & her friends are the most popular students at an elite private school. They run the place, they control the social atmosphere that is more important to most than grades. One evening, after a party, they find a dead girl floating in a lake by the school. None of them claim to know her, she was a student at their school but she wasn't high up enough on the pecking order to be important to them. However when Kay receives a coded scavenger hunt from the dead girl, her life becomes very complicated. She's plunged headfirst into a dangerous game where she must stab her friends in the back otherwise be framed for the murder. As the noose tightens, and the police begin to close in, Kay begins to unravel, and what is real and what is not becomes blurred. I really enjoyed People Like Us, Kay is a great character, she has several flaws and can be very unlikeable but I never stopped rooting for her. She has a melancholic yet determined nature that keeps her chugging along in the face of obstacle after obstacle. At the Library that I manage, students can't get enough of school-based mysteries so I know this novel will be extremely popular. I recommend it for ages 14 and up!
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Being the daughter of Zeus should result in having an awesome life. However for Helen Thomas, it's anything but. Her dad wants her entire family to keep the whole Greek God thing on the down low, which means no altering people's minds, no lightning bolts or anything that will bring unwanted attention to themselves. For Helen, being a half-mortal, it doesn't really matter because she's more obsessed with keeping her half sister Aphrodite from driving her insane. Aphrodite has a hit YouTube channel, a gazillion Instagram followers & has the complexion of the greatest super model of all time. Also, her half brother Eros can play a mean guitar, somewhat too mean when he uses his skills to get himself on television. Things go from bad to worse when the Council discovers that Aphrodite and Eros are abusing their God-like powers in the presence of mortals. They are ordered back to Mount Olympus for a day of judgement. If found guilty, it means Helen will have to live away from Earth for the remainder of her days, no more friends, no more hanging out, just sitting in Mount Olympus until the day she dies. It's a problem that most teens don't have to deal with! I really enjoyed Oh My Gods, I felt the pacing was quick and it had a lot of humour in it. Having Helen write to her deceased mother to relay her troubles was both sweet and sad. Super Awkward by Beth Garrod is a very popular book at Glenthorne High School and I know Oh My Gods will be too as they both share some great qualities that make it engaging and fun to read. One to look out for in 2019! Paris is on the cusp of a Revolution, but all Camille cares about is putting food on the table so her and her sister Sophie don't starve to death. Her parents deceased, Camille must try to survive famine, disease and her brother's drunken squandering of the little money they own. However, Camille has a secret. She can turn worthless metal into coins, for a short period at least. This magic skill buys her and Sophie some time while she figures out a plan. After delving into much darker magic, magic that her mother warned her about, Camille is able to disguise herself as nobility and enter the famed halls of Versailles, where she partakes in expensive and dangerous card games where the rewards are great. It doesn't take long for Camille to discover that she might not be the only one at Versailles with a dark secret. Throw in the fact that she's fallen hopelessly in love with a daring young balloonist, Camille doesn't know if she can keep up her double life much longer. As the stakes become higher and the suspicions out of control, Camille finds herself in great danger, it doesn't help that Paris has turned completely upside down with violent anger at those who enter Versailles. Enchantée is a great novel containing magic realism and historical facts about Paris, Versailles and the French Revolution. Camille's brother is a great villain, as are the other characters at Versailles although I don't want to spoil this as it's not clear who the real villain is right away. I felt like the novel moved a long at an excellent pace and was really interesting from start to finish. I was genuinely concerned for Camille and Sophie and the sections of the novel where they were starving were really effective. I don't think anyone who loves YA will want to miss Enchantée at all when it's released in 2019! Two high school students take the same bus everyday but they've never actually met. Then one day, one of the teens, Richard, takes it upon himself to act recklessly and lights the other students' skirt on fire. Sasha suffers 3rd degree burns and has their life forever altered. Richard is charged with hate crimes & faces a life behind bars. Both teens are forced to be in the spotlight as the press descends on them and their families. The strangest part? It's all true. The 57 Bus is a fascinating look at two people who are brought together because of a horrible event. I could not put this book down, I needed to know what was going to happen to Richard & reading about Sasha's recovery was painful and heart breaking. It's an important book about tolerance, violence and recovery. I have organised it so that all of our Year 9 students (over 250 of them) will be reading The 57 Bus in the new year as I know it will generate a lot of discussion. Do not miss out on this amazing story. Recommended for ages 13 and up! |
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