Leftovers (Laura Wiess)A devastating novel of desperation and revenge from one of today's most compelling new voices in fiction.
Blair and Ardith are best friends who have committed an unforgivable act in the name of love and justice. But in order to understand what could drive two young women to such extreme measures, first you'll have to understand why. You'll have to listen as they describe parents who are alternately absent and smothering, classmates who mock and shun anyone different, and young men who are allowed to hurt and dominate without consequence. You will have to learn what it's like to be a teenage girl who locks her bedroom door at night, who has been written off by the adults around her as damaged goods. A girl who has no one to trust except the one person she's forbidden to see. You'll have to understand what it's really like to be forgotten and abandoned in America today.
Are you ready?
ttyl (Lauren Myracle)An epistolary novel for the 21st century, this sharp, funny, and true-to-life breakout hit about friendship is told entirely in instant messages. And Internet-savvy teens have fallen in love with flirty Angela (SnowAngel), moody Maddie (mad maddie), and good girl Zoe (zoegirl) and their frank perceptions about a tumultuous tenth-grade semester.
Me and the blondes (Teresa Toten)“How did your poor husband pass away?” Make it simple, Mama, I tried to bore into her, simple, simple… “His brains exploded.” I heard a gasp. It was me. “An aneurysm?” “Okay,” said Mama. “I’m sorry, hon,” said Mrs. Haver. “At least it was fast.” “It vas?” Mama looked puzzled. I nodded furiously at her. “Ya. It vas. Yours?” “Heart attack.” “Oooo, dat’s good too.” I could’ve killed her.
Sophie Kandinsky has spent the last six years trying to keep her crazy family life secret. The devil is in the details. The first detail is her larger-than-life, eccentric, Bulgarian mother. The slightly larger detail is the fact that her gentle, poet-father has been charged with murder. All Sophie wants is to be adored and invincible, which is really hard once people find out her father’s in prison.
But this time, after yet another move to another new school, and another opportunity to wipe the slate clean, Sophie has devised a plan. On her first day of school, she will locate The Blondes—that clique of perfect, confident girls who are beyond gossip and reproach—and she will make them her friends. This time, no one will find out the truth. This time, everything will be brilliant.
Born to Rock (Gordon Korman)Leo Caraway is about the most straight-laced guy you could ever find. Honor student, headed for Harvard, president of his school's Young Republicans club ... until he is accused of cheating on a test and blackmarked unfairly, and learns that his biological father is not the man who raised him, but about the most wild and famous singer punk rock has ever had.
Now Leo is working as a roadie on a summer tour with Purge, learning the punk scene from the inside out, and trying to get to know his father. Unfortunately, the punk scene isn't exactly Ozzie and Harriett, and Leo has got quite a learning curve ahead of him, as he tries to avoid the sex and drugs the punk scene is riddled with.
Unfortunately, there are a wide variety of unpleasant surprises waiting for Leo, and some rather unpleasant experiences, to boot. But if he can weather the storm, he just may make some worthwhile friends!
How to be a hero on Earth 5 (Rob Payne)Canadian John Fitzgerald is less than thrilled when his eccentric father sends him to England to spend his summer with relatives he's never met. Then on his way over his plane takes a wrong, and quite disturbing, turn over the Atlantic and drops into a parallel universe-Earth 5-where things are not quite the same: days have fifteen hours, distortion waves warp his brain, and a nefarious government agency decides that inter-dimensional visitors must be eliminated at all costs. Talk about your lousy vacation.
But John is no wimp. Together with an unlikely band of fellow non-dimensionals-including Delores the Texan goth, Gus the cane toad-licking Australian, and a truly embarrassing Earth 5 version of his father-he sets off to a remote island that holds the key to their escape home. Like most journeys involving public transportation, this trek will not be easy. Evil scientists, killer cutlery, and nerds with big plans threaten to really ruin John's summer. With time running out, the gang scrambles to save the day, the universe, and perhaps even their vacations...
Star Wars: Outbound Flight (Timothy Zahn)The Clone Wars have yet to erupt when Jedi Master Jorus C’baoth petitions the Senate for support of a singularly ambitious undertaking. Six Jedi Masters, twelve Jedi Knights, and fifty thousand men, women, and children will embark–aboard a gargantuan vessel, equipped for years of travel–on a mission to contact intelligent life and colonize undiscovered worlds beyond the known galaxy. The government bureaucracy threatens to scuttle the expedition before it can even start–until Master C’baoth foils a murderous conspiracy plot, winning him the political capital he needs to set in motion the dream of Outbound Flight.Or so it would seem. For unknown to the famed Jedi Master, the successful launch of the mission is secretly being orchestrated by an unlikely ally: the evil Sith Lord, Darth Sidious, who has his own reasons for wanting Outbound Flight to move forward . . . and, ultimately, to fail. Yet Darth Sidious is not the mission’s most dangerous challenge. Once underway, the starship crosses paths at the edge of Unknown Space with the forces of the alien Chiss Ascendancy and the brilliant mastermind best known as “Thrawn.” Even Jedi Knight Obi-Wan Kenobi, aboard Outbound Flight with his young Padawan student, Anakin Skywalker, cannot help avert disaster. Thus what begins as a peaceful Jedi mission is violently transformed into an all-out war for survival against staggering odds–and the most diabolical of adversaries.
