Good Monday, YA Readers!
What’s Up in YA? is sponsored this week by Earth Hates Me: True Confessions from a Teenage Girl by Ruby Karp.
Earth Hates Me presents a look inside the mind of the modern teenager–from a modern teenager’s perspective. The Sixteen-year-old author addresses issues facing every highschooler, from grades to peer pressure to Snapchat stories, and their complicated effects on the teen psyche.
Ruby advises her peers on the importance of feminism (“not just the Spice Girls version”), dealing with jealousy and friend break-ups, family life, and much more. The book takes an in-depth look at the effect of social media on modern teens and the growing pressures of choosing the right college and career.
I’ve been collecting a boatload of YA news over the last month, and there’s no time like the present to share it. Be prepared for a lot of adaptation news and updates (among other things, of course!).
- Here’s this year’s short list for the National Book Awards in Young People’s Literature. Read any of them? I’m about 3/4 of the way through Far From The Tree and y’all, it’s the real deal (as is Mexican Daughter — haven’t yet read the other titles but getting there!).
- Malinda Lo offers up her annual look at LGBTQ in YA. These numbers offer some optimism, but also remind us that no, cis boys aren’t missing in YA lit. They’re still the largest population of characters.
- A great piece about why teens should be reading about police brutality and racism (with a book list, natch).
- First glimpses from the set of The Hate U Give. Hi, ready for this now!
- Read Lockwood & Co? You might soon see it on the small screen.
- City of Saints and Thieves is ready for its big screen treatment. I haven’t read this one but it’s sitting near the top of my to-read.
- Adam Silvera and Becky Albertalli are teaming up to write a YA book.
- On the most recent episode of Hey YA, Eric Smith and I talked about celebrity YA books. One of the things we mentioned was the lack of press for Cara Delevingne’s debut, Mirror Mirror. Here’s a nice pice about the book and about Delevingne’s experiences with depression and how that informed her book.
- I didn’t realize that the Beinecke had a big children’s archive collection, but now I’m glad I know, thanks to the fact they’re getting Judy Blume’s papers. (True story: I interviewed for an internship there in graduate school and it was the most intense and disastrous interview I’ve ever done).
- An excellent look at 12 women of color and why they write about mental health in their YA books.
- One Of Us Is Lying is getting the small screen treatment. Not surprised, since this one has “TV show” written all over it and has been a NYT bestseller for a while now.
- A spin-off of Pretty Little Liars is in the works, based on the spin-off YA series The Perfectionists.
- I did not know there were plans for either a Monster adaptation nor an Ophelia adaptation (by Walter Dean Myers and Lisa Klein respectively). Now I do.
- Freeform has ordered more episodes of Shadowhunters.
- Trailer and release date for the final film in the Maze Runner trilogy.
- I have never heard of the book Air, but it’ll be a movie. I am definitely curious since it’s social justice based.
- Dolly Parton is writing original songs for the adaptation of Julie Murphy’s Dumplin and tbh, this is the best news.
- Here’s another adaptation announcement I’m excited about. No link: I got this one straight from Reed herself — Amy Reed’s THE NOWHERE GIRLS, about three girls who come together to avenge the rape of a fellow classmate and in the process trigger a change in the misogynist culture at their high school transforming the lives of everyone around them, to Management 360 (GAME OF THRONES, STEVE JOBS).
- BuzzFeed asks you to answer some random questions and gives you a YA recommendation. Mine wasn’t too bad.
- Here’s the trailer for Marvel’s upcoming The Runaways, a YA-aimed comic that’s definitely worth picking up if you haven’t.
- I’d be remiss in not at least linking out to The Worst Bestseller podcast, wherein I was a guest on the show discussing the legendary 23-hour New York Times Bestseller brought down by CSIYATwitter, Handbook for Mortals. Sorry and you’re welcome!
And finally, though this was a publishing-wide event, so many YA authors coordinated and participated that it is worth sharing. Look at how much money was raised for Puerto Rico relief efforts:
Snap up some cheap YA reads…
Conveniently, all of these particular titles are the first in a series. So try ’em out while they’re inexpensive before making the full commitment.
Snag National Book Award short list author Robin Benway’s Also Known As for $2.
If you’re itching for some fantasy, Julie Kagawa’s The Iron King is a mere $2.
And Kimberly McCreight’s The Outliers — for the thriller fans — is also only $2.
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Thanks for hanging out and we’ll see you back here next week!
— Kelly Jensen, @veronikellymars