Author: Kelly Jensen

May’s parents put a lot of pressure on her, and she’s still not the Chinese Taiwanese American daughter they want her to be. Her beloved brother Danny is, so his acceptance into Princeton pleases their mom and dad. But Danny’s secretly struggled with depression and when he dies by suicide, the family experiences grief they could never imagine. The only thing making it worse is how the community responds with racism and hatred. May works through these challenges with her writing–the thing her parents didn’t see as valuable–and she’s taking back her and her family’s story.

This book explores mental health, racism, and the challenges of finding your voice and sounds outstanding.

It’s the 17th century and Kiki and Ana are best friends and proper ladies. That is…until night falls. Then the two girls venture out into the crime-ridden streets to fight, gamble, and allow themselves to fall deeply in love with one another.

But when Kiki’s engagement to the Viceroy’s son is announced, her brother murdered. Her brother, heir to the family fortune. Now the girls will don their night personas to find out who is responsible.

This historical Latine novel sounds like so much fun. Teen girl vigilantes in the 17th century? I’m in.

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If you are looking for a K-Pop inspired rom-com, look no further. Lulu is ready for her final summer before going off to college, but plans are changed when her childhood best friend Kite–who has built a career as a K-Pop artists–is taking a break and heading back home. Now they’ve got the chance to reconnect as friends . . . and maybe more.

(Can we talk about the cats on this cover?)

This book has been on my radar for a while and is pitched as The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina meets The Craft.

Dan and Liss are witches, and after a spell gone wrong, they find their friendship in a precarious place when Liss’s boyfriend disappears. Liss assumes he is dead but months later, after the disappearance of another girl, she realizes both of them are being held underground by an evil demon.

To end the predicament, Liss and Dan need to rekindle their friendship. But it won’t be easy to do that OR to harness their power and undo the spell gone wrong.

Something about summer makes a big, sweeping story just what you crave. Tian’s book is just this: it’s a story about two sisters, the racist incident their family is victim of in their small Midwestern town, and the summer in which both girls process their experiences very differently.

Kristina Forest is writing some of the most fun YA romances right now, and this one sounds like no exception. Zyla and Kai could not be any different, and they’ve broken up, as many anticipated they would. Or HAVE they broken up? On a school trip to the Poconos, they run away together, and the story which unravels travels past and present, exploring what went wrong–and what went right–in their unlikely love story.

Miliani, Inez, Natalie, and Jasmine are best friends who love their town of Providence, Rhode Island. To them, it is all things magic. But when Jasmine is killed by a drunk driver, the friends are shattered. In an effort to work through their grief, they decide to resurrect Jasmine’s spirit using their combined magic. The problem is it does not go anything as they’d planned. If you love friendship stories and stories about magic (with a little Filipine magic), this debut will be up your alley.

Serene and Lian are two very different teens: Serene is popular, with a hot boyfriend, and she’s the daughter of a famous fashion designer. Lian is a newcomer and his parents push him to take advantage of every studying opportunity possible to ensure he gets top test scores and gets into the best school possible.

So when tragedy strikes Serene’s life and she meets Lian in a very unexpected way, the two of them form a bond that will push both of them to become who they are truly meant to be. This is a tougher read, but it’s one that has a rewarding payoff–content note here for cancer, but this is where I add that no one will die and the very end of the book is feel good.

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Looking for a space adventure? Look no further.

Pendt has a genetic mutation that her family–who owns an intersteller freighter–sees as an insurmountable issue for her. She’s taking up important space and food. But on a layover at a space station, Pendt meets the twins who are heir to the station and together, they plan to overthrow the station and remake the lives that have been slated for them.

This one is pitched as Frankly in Love meets Shark Tank and I somehow missed this one in hardcover but will not be missing it now.

Valerie runs a successful beauty business in her high school with her cousin. She loves making money and has big plans for a trip to Paris. But when Wes, the new kid, shows up to school and begins selling K-pop branded products, he, too, sees that he can make the money he needs to attend music school after graduation.

Now Valerie and Wes are rival businesses in the same school…and mayyyyy be falling for each other, despite being competition for the limited market.

Even though she’s always been curious about her Korean heritage, Melody was not prepared to be uprooted from her NYC home following a small school transgression. She and her mom are moving to Seoul to join her father and Melody doesn’t get the chance to say her goodbyes.

The good news is once she arrives in Seoul, it’s amazing. That is…until it isn’t. Now Melody has to figure out how to make the best of her situation, how to understand the challenges her family is dealing with, and what she wants from that relationship with a cute boy she’s met.

Atta’s debut The Black Flamingo was such a great read so I’m eager to see what his sophomore effort brings.

15-year-old Mack is a romantic and he’s had a crush on the gorgeous Karim for forever. Now Karim is into him, too . . . just in time for Mack’s father to announce he has a job in Scotland so they’ll be moving. The long distance thing is hard, and it’s made even harder both because Karim is hard to read and because of the cute guy Mack has met at his father’s job.

This is a book in verse about first love, about the challenges of long-distance romance, and what happens when the perfect person comes along when you aren’t looking.

In this standalone fantasy, a Rovan–who is pansexual and a bloodmage–is forced to team up with an undead spirit in an alliance that will cause a huge rebellion between the living and the dead. This is a dark read, but as one reviewer put it, “This book is not here to play when it comes to The Gay Agenda.”

Though they exist, it can be tricky to find books that are tailor-made for younger teen readers. This is one of them. Fourteen-year-old Parvin is an Iranian-American set on capturing the attention of the cute guy named Matty. Too bad her last relationship was an utter disaster and she herself is far too nerdy for him. Her plan? Mirror the kinds of leads in the rom-coms she loves.

Yamilet Flores isn’t thrilled about standing out as a new kid in a mostly white Catholic school. But it’s a fresh start after being outed by her former best friend and crush. Here, she can at least keep her sexuality quiet and just get through the day. She wants to make her mother proud and avoid falling in love. Too bad the only openly queer girl at the school is annoying(ly) easy for Yamilet to fall for.

This sounds like an awesome next read for fans of Erika L. Sánchez’s I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter.

Twin sisters separated at birth? Check.

Witches? Check.

A plan for kidnapping and avenging parental death? Check.

This fun, high-stakes fantasy read follows one sister who was raised outside the palace with a goal of kidnapping and revenge and one who was raised to be the next royal, preparing for marriage into a brutal kingdom. But what happens when everything in both of their worlds is turned upside down? It’s the first in a series.

Packed with a star-studded list of authors, this anthology is a collection of short stories about what it is to grow up Mexican American. This would be an excellent read alongside the Black Enough anthology.

Looking for pirate YA? Look no further. This story follows an orphan-turned-pirate who falls in love with Lady Evelyn Hasegawa, a high-born imperial daughter, aboard the Dove. The problem, besides their differing classes? Evelyn is being sent to the Floating Islands in an arranged marriage . . . at least, she was until the ship’s captain decides to take all of the wealthy passengers captive. If you love magic, the high seas, and characters who refuse to live by the rules of their social class, this one’s for you.

Safiya Mirza is a budding journalist and she’s committed to following the path of being truthful without being biased. But when she finds a boy who has been murdered–one who had been labeled a a threat before–she’s set on finding out what happened and that may mean putting the idea of being objective behind.

I’ve not yet read this one, but it’s comped to Sadie and Dear Martin, and Ahmed is an excellent storyteller.

Somehow, despite how much I loved this book, I missed highlighting it in last week’s mega roundup. So know this book came out last week but I’m including it here because it’s still a new release.

This is a very queer and at times very funny book about a girl named Chloe who attends an elite, religious private school in the south. She and Shara Wheeler have been competitive since the beginning of high school but then Shara disappears on prom night. She leaves behind several clues about her whereabouts to a handful of people at the school . . . all of whom had shared a kiss with her.

McQuiston explores all of the YA tropes you know and either love or hate. It is extremely clever.