Hey, YA Readers!
Make this your most bookish summer yet with personalized reading recommendations from Tailored Book Recommendations! Our bibliologists (aka professional book nerds) are standing by to help you find your next favorite read. Get your recommendations via email, or opt to receive hardcovers or paperbacks delivered right to your door. And with quarterly or annual plans available, TBR has something for every budget. Get started today from just $18!
No intro this time around. Let’s get right into the meat and potatoes—paperback releases and YA book news.
Bookish Goods
’70s Pride Bookmark by MagicandMeaning
This bookmark popped up when I was working on a post for next month about Pride goods…and whether you see it as explicitly Pride themed or not, this retro rainbow bookmark is so fun. I might end up buying one for myself. $5, with choices on how you want your corners and tassels.
New Releases
There are a lot of paperback releases this week. May’s been a busy month. Don’t miss the rest of this week’s new YA paperbacks over in the mega roundup. As always, you might need to toggle your view when you click the link to get to the paperback edition.
Funeral Songs for Dying Girls by Cherie Dimaline
Winifred lives in an apartment above the cemetery office with her father, who works at the crematorium. Her mother died when she was young and is buried in the graveyard. It’s not weird for Winifred, and on the precipice of her 16th birthday, she’s found a routine for a good, lazy summer. One of the things she does is visit the neglected graves with her dog. It’s not weird except it does begin rumors around town that the cemetery is haunted.
This, Winifred thinks, is an opportunity to help bolster business for her dad. If there are ghost tours, that’s good money. The problem is, of course, keeping the ruse up and, well, ensuring her father doesn’t actually believe that Winifred’s mother is alive and well in ghost form.
And then it’s possible an actual real ghost is haunting the place.
I’ll Take Everything You Have by James Klise
Joe comes to Chicago in 1934 in order to make enough money to save the family farm. He’s been set up at a hotel job, and he decides to take part in a con coordinated by his cousin in order to make a lot of money really fast. As he’s in on the scheme, Joe befriends two guys who expose him to things he’s never seen: a rich queer life in the city.
But Joe soon finds himself in big trouble. Between the con and being caught up in danger with the cops and gangsters, he knows he’s gotta get out of town. Leaving, though, means deciding who he truly wants to be.
For a more comprehensive list of new releases, check out our New Books newsletter.
YA Book News
Where we’ve seen an acceleration in YA books being published this month, the opposite seems to be true in YA news. It’s a quieter week in stories!
- Here’s all of the new YA science fiction and fantasy hitting shelves this month.
- Season 3 of The Summer I Turned Pretty has been pushed to 2025.
- Peep the finalists in the young adult category for the Locus Awards.
- There’s a new comics imprint for young adults called Holler, whose focus is “trends-driven” stories. I’m…curious about that.
- The Outsiders adaptation hits Broadway.
As always, thanks for hanging out. We’ll see you on Saturday with some stellar deals.
Until then, happy reading!
–Kelly Jensen, currently reading Time and Time Again by Chatham Greenfield