Image Credit: Pottermore/Warner Brothers HARRY POTTER AND

Hey, friends! Tori here. I just wanted to gloat about this awesome haul I got at work this week, a glorious blend of paperbacks I've been lusting after and some advance reader's copies that I can't wait to dive into! Definitely top of the stack is gonna be The Land of 10,000 Madonnas by former bookseller and general awesome person Kate Hattemer. Here's what I get from the back of the cover: Prior to his death from a rare congenital heart condition, Jesse prepared a once-in-a-lifetime trip across Europe for his cousins, best friend, and girlfriend. We as readers get to join them on this excursion, as well as in their search for the answer to the question Jesse poses for them: Would you rather live a long, quiet life or a short, heroic one? This isn't my usual shtick; but I cracked it open just to get a feel for it, and before I knew it I'd read the prologue and the first two chapters. I'm definitely hooked, and can't wait to let you guys know about it and my other new treasures. Happy reading!

YAAAAAASSSS! Well Read Black Girl is awesome. Check out this great interview and get with it. <3 Also Follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

The Biggest Problem in Publishing? The Invisibility of Black Women Writers

And how #WellReadBlackGirl is changing the game.

MC: What do you hope people will get from following WRBG?

GE: Whenever I read a book that speaks to me, I immediately want to tell the world about it. Every post [on Instagram] is about a writer I admire, a book I’ve read, or a title I’m adding to my “To Be Read” pile. When people use the hashtag #WellReadBlackGirl, it suddenly transforms the solitary experience of reading into a social activity.  

People are constantly looking for diverse reading recommendations. I spend a lot of time finding compelling content produced by Black women: new book releases, essays, poetry, culture writing, etc. I want WRBG to give these extraordinary writers a voice and introduce them to new audiences. Publishers need to fully acknowledge the role Black women play in literary culture. We’re creators, as well as consumers. We deserve that recognition.

Claire here!

Okay, so I have recently finished the lovely Kate Hattemer’s new YA novel The Land of 10,000 Madonnas.

It is about a group of 5 teenagers sent on a quest to Europe as a dying wish from their friend and cousin, Jesse, who died of a heart defect nearly a year previously. It is beautiful, sad, funny, bittersweet, and sometimes slightly gross. The gross factor is mostly due to Ben’s penchant for smoothies for every meal which sometimes include unusual choices for a liquefied meal.)

Kate’s sophomore novel reminded me a little bit of Maureen Johnson’s 13 Little Blue Envelopes. But I suppose that is more for the similarities between their teenaged characters going on trips across Europe after losing a loved one. I find Kate’s characters more real and relatable than Johnson’s. Cal, Trevor, Ben, Lillian, and Matt aren’t meant to discover some great and magical cure for their grief and then fall in love. They are and have been grieving. They deal with their grief on a daily basis and in myriad ways. And they are only beginning to come to terms with Jesse’s death. As teenagers, they are often prickly in their mourning, and don’t always agree. And like many teenagers I know, they do not say what they mean and feel immediately or clearly to each other. Hattemer’s portrayal and the perspectives she offers from her characters is one of her strengths in this book. They aren’t special in any extra way, they are normal, and they have been dealt a tragedy. And they react and exist accordingly. 

The book did take me a little while to get through, but that is in part because I tend to be a distracted reader and also this is a book that will make you think and reflect.  This is a novel that will be a good cathartic read. Hattemer made me tear up more than once while I was reading, but she brought me out on the brighter side at the end. I will be recommending this to fans of David Levithan, Maureen Johnson, Ava Dellaira, Emery Lord, and even John Green readers. I think that Kate Hattemer is going to be an author to keep an eye on and a voice to be heard in YA in the coming years.

Release date is April 19th 2016. I highly recommend it. And if you can, get it from a bricks and mortar bookstore or the library!

Okay y’all, Melissa here and we have something extremely important to discuss today.  I just finished reading the third book in the Winner’s Curse trilogy, so let me give you the spoiler-free lowdown on...

The Winner’s Kiss

First off, I’ll just say that I hate the title.  Like, YES there is considerably more kissing in this book than in Crime (LOLLLLL ‘cause there was none in Crime), but kissing wasn’t the point of this finale??? I personally think that The Winner’s CROWN would have been a much better title (also would have kept the “C” trend.  It’s actually perfect. ugh no one consults me.)

BUT I will TOTALLY take a dumb title over the AWFUL NEW COVERS they were proposing! For those of you who somehow missed that whole debacle, Macmillan announced back in November that they were going to do a complete overhaul of the covers.  Before the series was even finished.  After releasing the original cover for the new book (as seen above).  COMPLETE MAYHEM ENSUED.

UGH. I physically cannot look at them.  The best part, though, is that... Don’t these covers look familiar? Hmmmm... Like, super familiar.

WAIT. I KNOW.

Look at that.  It’s uncanny.  And so unfortunate.  ‘Cause unlike Celaena of Throne of Glass, Kestral is not an assassin. IN FACT she can barely throw a knife. No, Kestral uses her wit and smarts to tear you down.  As soon as you show any weakness, she will destroy you with her words and war tactics.  She’s very Sherlockian at times.  So these new covers make no sense.

But this rant has a happy ending!  Macmillan heard our cries! They listened!  Over Christmas they announced that they were throwing out the new covers and going back to the originals.  Which is HUGE.  I have been lamenting various cover changes since the dawn of time and no one has ever listened. It is so heart-warming.

Anyway, the point of all of that is that I would take a title like The Winner’s Poop Bucket if it meant I didn’t have to look at those covers on my book shelf.  REJOICE.

So let me get back to my thoughts on the actual content of the final book, haha.

The Winner’s Kiss (foreal this time)

Ugh, guys, it was SO. GOOD.  You will not be disappointed in this last installment.  I will admit that I had been extremely hesitant about starting this book because I just couldn’t see how everything would be resolved in a way that I wanted.

First, the ending of Crime was BRUTAL. Like tear my heart out, throw it on the ground, and jump on it repeatedly brutal.  Let’s just recap the ending real quick (if you don’t want to be spoiled because FOR WHATEVER REASON you haven’t read Crime, don’t read):

Kestral gets shipped off to a prison camp in the north

Arin sails away for his home in Heran

They both said some pretty gross things to each other beforehand

My babies, come back! Love each other! 

So how was Kiss going to fix everything?!  Even if Arin and Kestral somehow made their way back to one another, how could they reconcile all the things that were said??? Needless to say, I was emotionally distraught before I even started this book.

BUT WORRY NOT. Marie is badass, and she throws some completely unexpected twists at you from the very beginning. And, between you and me, she COMPLETELY makes up for the lack of kissing in Crime.  And then some. (I’m wiggling my eyebrows right now).  Girlfriend totally got my back.

And, some might say more importantly, she wraps up the major conflict with the emperor of Valoria in a way that I greatly enjoyed, but didn’t guess at all.  You go, Marie.  Like, I had a couple guesses for how everything would end, but even when I only had 50 pages left to read, I still had no idea.  So HOLLER.

The Winner’s Kiss is definitely worth the wait and all of the drama over covers.  Honestly, I’m going to go back and read it again ‘cause I sort of inhaled it this time around lolllll

The book doesn’t actually come out for another month (March 29), but GUYS IT’S SO WORTH IT. Just hold out a bit longer!  And then come back here and discuss it with me, obvs.

Peace, Melissa

A Diverse Reading List For The Holidays: Because representation matters. We’ve gathered some of our favorite authors and characters from 2015 who speak from just a few of the myriad perspectives humanity has to offer. (Don’t see what you’re looking for here? Send us a chat!)

Taking Flight by Michaela DePrince

Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehesi Coates

Negroland by Margo Jefferson

City of Clowns by Daniel Alarcón & Sheila Alvarado

Half-Resurrection Blues by Daniel José Older (@danieljose)

The Book of Phoenix by @nnedi Okorafor

Speak Now: Marriage Equality on Trial by Kenji Yoshino

Everything, Everything by @nicolayoon

The Wrath and the Dawn by Renee Ahdieh (@rahdieh)

The Architect’s Apprentice by Elif Shafak

The Girl at the Center of the World by Austin Aslan

Becoming Nicole by Amy Ellis Nutt

Beyond Magenta by Susan Kuklin

A Strangeness in My Mind by Orhan Pamuk

All Our Names by Dinaw Mengestu

The Moor’s Account by Laila Lalami

Peruse all of our holiday lists here!

5 Exciting YA Book Trends to Look for in 2016

Are you ready to discover the newest YA titles coming to a bookstore (or e-reader) near you in 2016? As a YA book blogger and book curator, I've scoured the Internet for forthcoming releases and f...

Hurrah for Cincinnati authors! Emily Henry and Kate Hattemer are both on the list!

On a Chris Haughton kick today. Cannot wait for his new book, Goodnight Everyone,  in the fall. <3

Chris Haughton’s beautiful storybook Shh! We Have A Plan was recently transformed into a live theatre production by Cahoots NI. We were lucky enough to make the backdrop animations, including these little fellows.

Books as Gifts

Hi all, JoAnn here.

Since January is what we retail folks call The Season of Returns, and Valentine’s Day is closing in quick, I figured it might be time for a quick and dirty “Books as Gifts Guide.”

First things first, I will pretty much always advocate that there is a book for just about everyone. 

Narrowing down what is the appropriate book for a given person is the more difficult part.

Did the person you are buying your gift for request a specific title?

Yes: easy peasy.

Your local bookseller should be able to help you lay your hands on that which you seek.

No: less easy but no less peasy.

Did they not give you a title because they couldn’t remember it or because your plan was to go to your local bookstore and see what spoke to you?

If they couldn’t remember the title, booksellers will gladly attempt to Sherlock Holmes their way to what you are looking for. If you don’t have a title or author, being able to tell a bookseller a few basic things about the book you are looking for (what it’s about, name of a character if you are looking for a novel or a series, where the person heard about the book, etc) can make things so much easier. Many times the Google on the Internet Machine has helped me put a name to broken pieces of information and allowed me to put the proper title in the hands of a customer.

And now, for the person that didn’t ask for a book but is on your list to be given one.

The difficulty with this bit is that if someone does not consider themselves a reader and/or doesn’t like books (gasp), there really isn’t anything you can do to force the change upon them. The book you give them will, most likely, sit on a case and gather dust.

Story time: I have a friend named Jon. Jon is an electrician by trade and a mechanic by hobby. He does not like to read novels. He flat out says he is not a reader. He will buy huge, densely written technical manuals and read them for fun. I shit you not, these books are written in such a way that if I try to read them I feel like I’m having a stroke. He will devour these while loudly ranting about how he doesn’t like to read. He does not recognize the contradiction.

For Jon, the best thing to get him book-wise is, you guessed it, a technical manual for something in his wheelhouse. Or a highly inappropriate humor book with lots of pictures. But that is just because I know what makes Jon laugh.

The following questions are a few tools that booksellers will typically use to help you figure out what direction to point you in if you are looking for a book but aren’t sure what book is right for your situation:

1) What is the last book you/insert person here read and loved? 2) What type of books do you/insert person here like to read? 3) What movie was the last movie that you/insert person here really enjoyed?

Question number three I’ve started tossing in my bag of tricks since a bunch of books that have done well in book format have been getting turned into movies. While many of the more literary snobs may pooh-pooh such things, I love it because the books start to fly off the shelves around the time the movie gets closer to hitting theaters and then I can suggest other titles that might tickle someone’s fancy.

At the end of the day, trust your judgment. You know the person that you are buying for. You know their personality and what they like. You can do this, I believe in you.

A look at recent YA books by Latino authors, providing “much-needed windows for all readers.” @schoollibraryjournal

Wolf by Wolf by Ryan Graudin

Man oh man oh man oh man OH MAN OH MAN.  This book was ammmmaaazzzziinnnngggggg. So good. Wow. Five stars. Fiver.

Let me break it down for you.  So let’s pretend that Hitler and the Axis powers never actually lost WWII.  IN FACT, they won and slowly began taking over the world, filling it with death camps and just lots more death.  Enter Yael. She and her mother were taken to a camp, and Yael became the subject of some extremely nasty German experiments. Unfortunately for the Germans, the experiments that were just supposed to change the pigment of Yael’s skin to that trademark Aryan White actually gave her the ability to skinshift, i.e. the ability to change all aspects of her appearance.

Fast forward ten years, and Yael has found the perfect opportunity for revenge. Every year the Third Reich hosts a cross-continental motorcycle race to commemorate their great victory, and the prize is an audience with Mr. Adolf Hitler himself.  Yael only has to enter the race as Adele Wolf, the only racer and person Hitler has ever let close to him, win it, and then kill Hitler.  Easy Peasy!

Unfortunately killing Hitler is not as easy as that, especially when Adele’s older, overly-protective brother Felix enters the race, along with past love interest Luka–two people who know Adele PRETTY well.  WOWWWW.

Let me further break this down for you:

Alternate history!

Sci-fi skinshifting!

Super attractive love interest with murky past!

Hunger Games-like competition that pits teens against one another at the expense of their safety and lives!

Knife fights, and fist fights, and gun fights, oh my!

Death

Basically everything you could ever want from a YA.

ALSO let me just say that Yael is the most badass girl I have ever encountered.  She puts Katniss Everdeen TO SHAME.  She’s super complex, cares a lot about people, and has trained to KILL HITLER. idk what else you could really want.

I am also going to add that I have an extremely awful habit of reading the ends of books before actually finishing them (I am fully aware that this is shameful bye). I did that while reading this book. I WAS STILL COMPLETELY BLINDSIDED BY THE ENDING.  Don’t ask me how that happens, idk.  And predicting endings is kind of my job (editor over here y’all). Surprise endings don’t really happen for me anymore.  But this IS an alternate history with skinshifting and motorcycle races, so what really could I have predicted lol

Read this book. It’s amazing.

~Melissa, Book Wench