1) "The Innocents" by Lili Peloquin
It’s dangerous when a novel references The Great Gatsby; it only begs unfortunate comparisons.
Sensible Alice and rebellious Charlie have just arrived at the Connecticut shore after a whirlwind romance between their just-divorced mother, Maggie, and a filthy rich architect, Richard. It takes no time for them to be caught up in the dreary intrigues and festering secrets of the 1 percent. Charlie hurls herself into the country-club world of their new stepfather, connecting almost instantly with a creepy-yet-charismatic pair of cousins, the dissolute Jude and bitchy Cybill. Alice, though more resistant to the allure of luxury, is drawn to the ruggedly handsome Tommy, whose most recent girlfriend just happens to have been Camilla, Richard’s late daughter, who committed suicide the year before and who bore an uncanny resemblance to—gasp—Alice. Charlie drinks and acts out; Alice alternately moons over Tommy, obsesses over Camilla and questions Maggie and Richard’s past. While Peloquin isn’t a bad writer—her control over a shifting third-person voice that captures both Alice’s reserve and Charlie’s attitude is particularly effective—Fitzgerald she ain’t. Readers will particularly wonder at the unfulfilled role of green-eyed waiter and scholarship student Stan in Charlie’s love quadrangle—until they get to the end and realize that the entire book has been an elongated setup for a series.
2) "A Discovery of Witches" by Deborah Harkness
Harry Potter meets Lestat de Lioncourt. Throw in a time machine, and you’ve got just about everything you need for a full-kit fantasy.
The protagonist is a witch. Her beau is a vampire. If you accept the argument that we’ve seen entirely too many of both kinds of characters in contemporary fiction, then you’re not alone. Yet, though Harkness seems to be arriving very late to a party that one hopes will soon break up, her debut novel has its merits; she writes well, for one thing, and, as a historian at the University of Southern California, she has a scholarly bent that plays out effectively here. Indeed, her tale opens in a library—and not just any library, but the Bodleian at Oxford, pride of England and the world. Diana Bishop is both tenured scholar and witch, and when her book-fetcher hauls up a medieval treatise on alchemy with “a faint, iridescent shimmer that seemed to be escaping from between the pages,” she knows what to do with it. Unfortunately, the library is crammed with other witches, some of malevolent intent, and Diana soon finds that books can be dangerous propositions. She’s a bit of a geek, and not shy of bragging, either, as when she trumpets the fact that she has “a prodigious, photographic memory” and could read and write before any of the other children of the coven could. Yet she blossoms, as befits a bodice-ripper no matter how learned, once neckbiter and renowned geneticist Matthew Clairmont enters the scene. He’s a smoothy, that one, “used to being the only active participant in a conversation,” smart and goal-oriented, and a valuable ally in the great mantomachy that follows—and besides, he’s a pretty good kisser, too. “It’s a vampire thing,” he modestly avers.
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3) "Sapphique" by Catherine Fisher
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4) "Die for Me" by Amy Plum
Boy meets Girl. Boy turns out to have a deep—nay, otherworldly—connection to Girl despite being the loneliest member of a family of immortal, sexy, good-hearted monsters.
Newly-orphaned Brooklynite Kate Mercier is now living in Paris with her grandparents and sister. She's grateful for anything that breaks the constant tyranny of her depression, even the weird obsession she's developing with Vincent, a hot Parisian she's seen in her favorite café. Vincent is equally obsessed with Kate, but after a few dates his secret is revealed: Vincent is a revenant, driven by some mystical force to give his life to save others again and again, constantly reborn as an 18 year old with rippling "rock-hard abdominal muscles." Along with his revenant family (one father figure, several extremely sexy pseudo-brothers and a teenage girl to be Kate's friend), he rescues at-risk Parisians while fighting off the revenant's evil counterparts among the undead. Kate and Vincent are, of course, drawn to each other, miserable with despair when apart. When they are together, it takes all Vincent's willpower not to molest his beloved; readers of Twilight and its ilk know the drill. But wait! Evil is afoot, and perhaps it will spice up their love life!
Those obsessed with paranormals won't dislike anything here, but everyone else should give it a miss. (Paranormal romance. 12-14)
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Mackie's nauseated by the scent of blood, is burned by cold iron and would die if he entered a church. None of this helps him avoid notice in his hometown, where close-mouthed neighbors hang horseshoes and leave milk in the garden. No quaint old-world superstitions, these; in the town of Gentry, a child dies mysteriously every seven years. Mackie's been raised to avoid notice, so nobody will recognize him for the changeling his parents and adoring sister know him to be. But with another baby apparently dead and blood and iron all over town, Mackie's having a hard enough time staying upright, let alone under the radar. Soon the sickly boy meets the Morrigan and her court: a mishmash of Celtic mythology with British folklore, elfpunk music and adorable Tim Burton–esque horrors. There's romance and rescue (though mercifully no Edward Cullen types to replace the tale's endearing original couple). Some of the urban-fantasy elements get dropped in the crowd partway through, but enough grotesque goodies remain to keep this a fast-paced, dark delicacy. (Urban fantasy. 12-14)
5) "The Replacement" by Brenna Yovanoff
6) "Fallen" by Lauren Kate
There’s no better place to encounter your centuries-old true love than reform school, right? Luce, newly enrolled at Sword & Cross School after a fire kills her sort-of boyfriend, is instantly attracted to two majorly gorgeous bad boys, elusive Daniel and popular Cam. She can also see clouds of dark shadows, but she doesn’t know why or where they come from. With the help of a friend, Luce discovers that Daniel has a storied supernatural history. The Southern Gothic atmosphere, the best part of the book, is so well crafted that readers can easily picture Luce walking among the marshes and crumbling buildings. Daniel’s angelic identity is one that will be obvious to any reader with knowledge of the Bible. By the time Luce figures it out, however, the evil school librarian has Luce in her clutches, threatening to end Luce and Daniel’s One True Love. This would be no great loss, as Luce lacks personality, and it is never clear to readers why the two hottest guys in school would compete for her attention. This angel story fails to rise above. (Supernatural. YA)
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Haven Moore can’t wait to graduate and escape her small Tennessee hometown—and her repressive grandmother. But she is plagued by strange seizures that confuse her with images of clandestine embraces with a mysteriously familiar man named Ethan. When the fits prompt her grandmother to cancel Haven’s first semester at fashion school, the rebellious and inquisitive girl heads for New York, where she encounters both Iain Morrow, the sexy celebrity in whose body Ethan’s soul now resides, and the Ouroboros Society, a shadowy organization dedicated to the study of reincarnation. As Haven tries to understand her visions, she finds herself mired in a battle between good and evil, but she can’t be sure of the real villain. The questions surrounding Iain/Ethan’s motives—is he a liar, cheater and/or murderer?—nearly undermine the romantic tension, and the slightly-too-long story sags in the middle. But Miller is adept at humorous description (Haven’s grandmother has “the pinched nose and the perfect posture of a meerkat”), and her keen eye for detail and Haven’s bold maneuvers keep the tale humming along. (Paranormal romance. 12 & up)
7) "The Eternal Ones" by Kirsten Miller
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8) "Wither" by Lauren DeStefano
In this thought-provoking debut, reminiscent of The Handmaid’s Tale with a touch of Big Love, a generation of “perfectly engineered” embryos, known as the First Generation, has been watching its children die off from a virus that claims females at age 20 and males at age 25. Since her geneticist parents’ death, 16-year-old narrator Rhine and her twin brother spend endless nights warding off homeless orphans from their Manhattan basement until she is kidnapped by Gatherers, who make a living collecting potential brides and selling them off to wealthy families to breed new children. Rhine arrives at a Florida compound, where she is locked away with two other “sister wives,” and the three teens are forced to marry (and presumably procreate with) 21-year-old Linden. Through her similar appearance to Linden’s first (and now dead) love, intriguing heterochromia (two different colored eyes) and acting abilities, Rhine achieves “First Wife” status as she plots an escape. Her situation becomes more urgent when she discovers an underground laboratory where her diabolical father-in-law performs gruesome experiments in the name of finding a cure. A taut present-tense narration ratchets up the suspense. Despite some holes in the plot, particularly in the rushed ending, Rhine’s fight for freedom against the clock—and the dissecting table—will leave readers eager for the sequel. Give this one to fans of The Hunger Games trilogy or Ally Condie’s Matched (2010). (Dystopia. YA)
