Hi, All.

A friend asked me to compile a list of contemporary YA fiction for a fourteen year old girl. Below is what I ended up with and I’m going to leave it up here, and add updates to it occasionally. Feel free to add titles to the comment section. This will be followed by my Fave Fifteen for 2006.

* I have marked a few books with an asterisk to indicate where I think content is probably for 14 years or older. However, if you were my kid, I’d let you read whatever you felt up to reading. That’s what my mum did and I believe it’s the right approach. However, some parents who check out this site have asked me to do that and I don’t mind complying. Again, it’s all just my opinion.

 

Humor, Fluff and Fun (this is sometimes pretty light reading, but I’ve chosen the BEST of the best)

• Rat Boys – A Dating Experiment by Thom Eberhardt
• I’d Tell You I Love You, But Then I’d Have to Kill You by Ally Carter
• Cross My Heart and Hope to Spy by Ally Carter
• All of Louise Rennison’s Georgia books – They start with Angus, Thongs, and Full Frontal Snogging
• Leap Day by Wendy Mass
• All of Phyllis Reynold Naylor’s Alice books (they start when she’s very young though, so MG and YA readers may just want the older ones)
• My Road Trip to the Pretty Girl Capitol of the World by Brian Yansky
• My Cup Runneth Over – The life of Angelica Cookson Potts by Cherry Whytock (there’s also a sequel)
• Alice I Think by Susan Juby (and the two sequels)
• The Teacher’s Funeral by Richard Peck
• Absolutely Positively Not by David La Rochelle
• All of Meg Cabot’s books (the Mediator series, The Princess Diaries, and the All American series) – They’re what everyone else is trying to copy in this genre.
• A Fate Totally Worse Than Death by Paul Fleischman (a satire on the teen horror genre)
• Oy! Joy! By Lucy Frank
• I Was a Non-Blonde Cheerleader by Kieren Scott

Historical Fiction/Foreign Settings/Other Time Periods

• Gentle’s Holler by Kerry Madden
• The Minister’s Daughter by Julie Hearn
• Gilbert and Sullivan Set Me Free by Kathleen Karr
• The Legacy of Gloria Russell by Sheri Gilbert
• The Legend of Buddy Bush by Sheila P. Moss
• Catherine Called Birdy by Karen Cushman
• Here Today by Ann M. Martin
• Shadow Spinner by Susan Fletcher
• Daughter of Venice by Donna Jo Napoli

Anything by these authors:

• Joan Bauer
• Cathy Cassidy
• Janette Rallison (falls into fluffy)
• Linda Crew
• Jerry Spinelli
• Rachel Vail
• John Rowe Townsend
• Jill Paton Walsh
• Arthur Slade

Contemporary – sometimes edgy

• Walking Naked by Alyssa Brugman*
• Parent Swap by Terence Blacker
• The Geography of Girlhood by Kirsten Smith
• The True Meaning of Cleavage* by Mariah Fredricks
• The First Part Last by Angela Johnson
• Define Normal by Julie Anne Peters
• Love and Other Four Letter Words by Carolyn Mackler
• The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things by Carolyn Mackler
• Honey, Baby, Sweetheart by Deb Caletti
• So B. It – A novel by Sarah Weeks
• Speak* by Laurie Halse Anderson
• Money Hungry by Sharon G. Flake
• Begging For Change by Sharon G. Flake
• Hang on in there Shelley by Kate Saksena
• Finding Miracles by Julia Alvarez
• The Canning Season by Polly Horvath
• Each Little Bird That Sings by Deborah Wiles
• Elsewhere by Gabrielle Zevin
• Dizzy by Cathy Cassidy
• Children of the River by Linda Crew

Fantasy/Sci Fi

• Hannah’s Garden by Midori Snyder
• All the Artemis Fowl books by Eoin Colfer
• Alia Waking by Laura Williams McCaffrey
• Treasure in the Heart of Tanglewood by Meredith Ann Pierce
• The House of Scorpion* by Nancy Farmer (won lots of awards but is a little icky)
• The Wish List by Eoin Colfer
• Catch Me Once, Catch Me Twice by Janet McNaughton
• An Earthly Knight by Janet McNaughton

MUST READS!

• Al Capone Does My Shirts by Gennifer Choldenko
• Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli

Series That I Love

• Betsy-Tacy by Maud Hart Lovelace
• The Melendy Quartet by Elizabeth Enright
• The Borrowers by Mary Norton
• Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling

Thrillers/Mystery/Suspense

• Deep* by Susanna Vance (Oregon author!)
• Colibri by Ann Cameron
• Say Yes by Audrey Coulombis

Fave Fifteen of 2006

GILBERT AND SULLIVAN SET ME FREE by Kathleen Karr
ABSOLUTELY POSITIVELY NOT… by David La Rochelle
TRIBES by Arthur Slade
PROM by Laurie Halse Anderson
TOTALLY JOE by James Howe
STUMPTOWN KID by Carol Gorman and Ron J. Findley
INDIGO BLUE by Cathy Cassidy
THE BIG NOTHING by Adrian Fogelin
DO-OVER by Rachel Vail
SUMMER OF THE SKUNKS by Wilmoth Foreman
FAT KID RULES THE WORLD by k.l. Going
THE XANADU MANUSCRIPT by John Rowe Townsend
NOT AS CRAZY AS I SEEM by George Harrar
WELCOME TO WAHOO by Dennis & Elise Carr
LOOKING FOR ALASKA by John Green