Santa Womble - The Second Stocking Suggestion - Young Adult

Ho Ho Hoooooo

“Santa womble, slip a book under the tree for me

Been an awful good book tempter!

Santa Womble, and hurry down the TBR pile tonighhhhhht””

Thanks to @lazyhedwig for that inspirational song lyric you’ll be humming all day

So, if you want to let people know what is good as a gift for you someone else or perhaps just treating yourself too; then join me in my grotto and let’s talk some book ideas.  My favourites of the year come later this month but these listed are all worthy of your consideration.

Stocking Number 2 – Young Adult

I often feel some genre fans have extremely biased prejudices against YA. “Ooh it’s just romance and weak female characters!” to which I say absolute RUBBISH! Firstly, YA is just a targeted age group its like saying the adult fiction section of the library are all Edwardian period thrillers.  It contains vast ranges of genres within it. Secondly the adult genre is rather prone to romance to – let us not forget Aragorn4Arwen4EVA but it’s rare with adults that some forms of relationships aren’t getting explored; not all YAs are romance but as with life sometimes romance is a sub plot. I also think it’s a genre that adult genre fiction has a lot to learn from in terms of diversity and attitudes to people who are not straight white men doing manly things.  As part of 2019 I wanted to read outside my genres and find YA to be a thriving genre with tales I recommend for everyone.  Let’s break these down by genre

Horror

Yes, YA is a very interesting place for horror stories. Perhaps a metaphor for life and lets not forget in movies we have a whole selection of movies where teens try to survive and on TV we had Buffy saving the world a lot.  But as we all know books can be scarier.

Speaking of Buffy if you fancy a smart well designed spooky world full of mysteries to untangle lets start with the fascinating The Devouring Gray by Christine Lynne Herman with the next instalment coming in 2020. Start now because eventually this should be a TV show or movie in its own right.

Moving towards the gothic while inspired by Dracula’s Brides this origin story for the ladies who follow Dracula The Deathless Girls by Kiran Millwood Hargrave is haunting, powerful and reminds us humanity can be just as cruel (possibly worse) than any monster we can fear in the dark.

My first two choices are for teens but the next two can be aimed at middle grade audiences but are deliciously spooky enough I think anyone can enjoy them The Bone Garden by Heather Kassner is a creepy tale of a girl who is no longer alive searching a graveyard to find our her creator’s secret before it’s too late to save herself.

And Victoria Schwab returns to touring the haunted cities of the world with a trip to Paris that I really loved in Tunnel of Bones

Science Fiction

I was not exposed to many SF YA this year so any recommendations you have please add to the comments but The Record Keeper by Agnes Gomillion stuck in the mind for exploring how racism and slavery work within a future dystopian environment.

Fantasy

An excellent tale of growing up; magical entities and how love and crushes are not the same thing is Other Words for Smoke by Sarah Maria Griffin – a stunning writer everyone should read.

 I was really impressed with Sky in the Deep by Adrienne Young with an alternate Viking setting and a truly fascinating central lead character.

VE Schwab returns with the reissuing of two of their earlier YA works but for the first time published in the UK. The first The Dark Vault is a double bill covering the Archived duology which explores a world where the souls of the dead escape and people have to race into a hidden world adjacent to ours to capture them before they can hurt the rest of us.  Spooky, unsettling and eerie - I LOVED IT!! But in a different fairy-tale like tone The Near Witch is full of strange imagery and set in amore magical world than our own. Perfect for a stormy winter’s night.