When you go into the Young Adult section of your public or school library, does it seem like all the books are for girls? Are The Clique and Gossip Girls threatening to overwhelm you with their glossy, lip-sticky covers? Well, never fear, Best Boy Reads are here! Believe it or not, there are some great books out there for the teen-aged males of the world who like a little more testosterone in their paperbacks.
Boy Meets Book
Zeus: King of the Gods by George O’Connor
2010
03.10
03.10
Ever wonder how we got here? How the Earth was formed, how we human beans popped into existence? There are several versions of the creation myth–you can take your pick when it comes to explaining how we emerged from the Great Black Void: Christian, Hindu, Egyptian, Norse, the list could go on and on. But my favorite has got to be that wacky Greek version, so recently made popular by former middle school teacher Rick Riordan. But forget Percy Jackson, he’s just some johnny-come-lately compared to the dude who made the lightning in the first place, the very first international playboy and rebellious teenager, Zeus. Artist and author George O’Connor provides readers with a crash course in the Greek creation myth, which basically consists of Mother Earth and Father Sky giving birth to some big nasty gods, including Kronos, who wants to keep all the temporal goodies for himself. So every time his wife has a baby, he swallows it so it can’t grow up to challenge him. Eventually his wife gets sick of giving up her babies for dinner, so she hides one. Zeus is raised in secret by hot nymphs (which will explain his later lady-killer ways) and tricks his father into swallowing a poison plant which makes him vomit up all Zeus’s sibs, now fully grown and totally pissed off! What happens next is the story of how Zeus claims his father’s throne with the help of his super sibs (more about them later) and gets the lightning that Percy’s gotta find in couple thousand years. O’Connor’s hyper-kinetic art is old school comic book illustration, full of action, energy and bursts of color. For those of you also interested in more than just a good celestial butt-kicking, there’s also a helpful Greek god family tree in the front and some fun extras in the back, including minor god and goddess profiles and some cool websites you might want to visit. For more Greek superhero action, pair this GN with the new and improved Clash of the Titans.
Purple Heart by Patricia McCormick
2010
02.25
02.25
Private Matt Duffy wakes up one morning in a hospital ward in Baghdad’s Green Zone with scrambled brains and scrambled memories. He’s awarded a Purple Heart before he can even remember exactly what he did to earn it. Matt just knows there was an alley he wasn’t supposed to be in, an Iraqi boy who wasn’t supposed to be there, and a rocket propelled grenade that was supposed to hit him—but didn’t, though it knocked him around pretty bad. Now Matt has to piece together the broken bits of his memory to try and establish what happened in the alley that day. But the higher ups don’t seem to be looking into his story too closely and Matt starts to wonder if they want to learn the truth—or bury it. Soon Matt rejoins his unit, happy to be back with his friends but troubled by the fact that he still doesn’t know exactly what went down the day his world exploded. What did he do? Did he run? Did he hide? Did he cover his buddies? Did he…kill someone? With a minimum of words and a maximum of heart, Patricia McCormick tells one young soldier’s story that could be every young soldier’s story. “It wasn’t about fighting the enemy. It wasn’t about politics or oil or even about terrorists. It was about your buddies; it was about fighting for the guy next to you. And knowing he was fighting for you.” Matt’s feelings and observations are sincere and very real, based on McCormick’s extensive research and interviews. With only a few words, she quietly captures small moments that bring the war right up out of the pages. Like when Matt sees orderlies coming down the hall pushing a gurney with a body bag. “Still, he kept his head erect, his back stiff, his mouth set in a straight line as the gurney got closer. Then, just as it passed by, he flinched.” When Matt finally does learn the truth about what happened that day, he begins to realize that the black and white war he believed he was fighting is much grayer than he could have ever imagined. This sobering psychological mystery pulls no punches. Want to learn more about what it’s like on the ground in Iraq? An excellent nonfiction follow-up is The Good Soldiers
Calamity Jack by Shannon and Dean Hale, illustrated by Nathan Hale
2010
02.15
02.15
The crackerjack team of Hale, Hale & Hale are back with another rootin’ tootin’ graphic adventure of that wild girl Rapunzel and her trouble-making friends. This volume covers the back-story of ‘Punzie’s scheming sidekick, Jack. Before he met Rapunzel out west, Jack made his living swindling chumps in the big city with his partner Prudence, a stylish pixie with a serious attitude and an addiction to fancy hats. He was forced to skip town after a problematic beanstalk, a golden-egg laying goose and an angry giant named Blunderboar made it unsafe to return home to his hand-wringing, bakery-owning mama. After hightailing it west and meeting Rapunzel, Jack knows it’s time to head back home and make things right. Except in his absence, the fearsome giant Blunderboar has set up a corrupt shadow government and taken Jack’s mother prisoner in order to force her to bake his human-bone meal bread. Now Jack and Rapunzel must team up with Prudence and verbose muckraking journalist Frederick Sparksmith III to uncover Blunderboar’s citywide scheme and prove to the people once and for all what a, well, BOAR Blunderboar really is! All the while, Jack is trying to work up the courage to tell Rapunzel how he really feels about her. But will silver-tongued Frederick sway her heart instead? This action-packed sequel is every bit as entertaining as its predecessor, and then some. Jack’s big city, in contrast to Rapunzel’s Wild West, is a bustling technological marvel, which adds a little steam punk to the whole whimsical affair. The imaginative team of Hale to the 3rd power envisions their fantastical teeming urbanity as a magnet for diverse immigrants of every color and creed; from Native and African Americans to fairies and porcine half-men. Thanks to Nathan Hale’s meticulous attention to detail, each full color panel is a little work of art. This GN was so much fun that just writing this review makes me want to read it again! Batten down the hatches and tie up the dirigibles–this is one wild ride.
Happyface by Stephen Emond
2010
01.25
01.25
He’s just a regular dude. Sure, his parents fight sometimes, and his older brother is a pain in the ass. And yes, occasionally he’s lonely and his best friend and secret crush Chloe seems to have no idea how he really feels about her. But for the most part, his life is just fine. After all, he’s “got my art and my journal to write in, and I’ve got Ol’ Trusty, the Internet to keep me company. If the apocalypse strikes tomorrow, that’s still a pretty good survival kit.” Then life comes to a screeching halt (for reasons our narrator slowly reveals that I won’t be spoiler-y and tell here) and our dude finds himself starting over at a new school, with a new crush and a new crowd to navigate. What happened to Chloe? What’s up with his parents? And where has his big bro gone? Our hero isn’t telling—yet. All we know is that he’s in so much pain he’s turned himself into Happyface—an alter-ego that always smiles and has sworn to never be hurt again. But how long can Happyface hold that grin before his past comes crashing down on him?
Some of you will find Happyface a little TOO typical. He’s not fighting vampires or turning into a werewolf, he’s not wasting away from a terminal disease or being secretly abused by his parents. He’s just living and recording the story of his (somewhat) normal life in words, drawings and comic strips the year after something terrible happens. Something terrible enough to make him want to start his life over as someone else. Someone who’s happy. Someone who’s popular. Someone who knows all the answers. For some of you, this story will be too close to your own experiences, and you’d rather go to a different head space when you read. But for those of you who read to know you’re not alone, or who always hang around the art room after school and put all your most secret thoughts in your sketchpads, this personal and incredibly honest story is YOURS.
Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green & David Levithan
2010
01.15
01.15
Meet Will Grayson. He’s the guy at school who tries to blend in with the scenery. He doesn’t like to rock the boat and he doesn’t like to get too emotional. “I don’t really understand the point of crying. Also, I feel that crying is almost…totally avoidable if you follow two very simple rules: 1. Don’t care too much. 2. Shut up.” Unfortunately, Will’s best friend Tiny Cooper is his exact opposite: big, loud and flamboyantly gay. And Tiny keeps making Will care—about him, about the musical he’s writing based on his life called “Tiny Dancer,” and about Jane, the uber-smart girl in the Gay-Straight Alliance who likes the band Neutral Milk Hotel as much as Will does and drives an orange Volvo. Will could probably care about Jane if he tried. In fact, he could probably fall in love with her—if he wasn’t so terrified by the idea that she might find out the truth about him: “Not that smart. Not that hot. Not that nice. Not that funny. That’s me: I’m not that.”
Now, meet will grayson. He’s the guy at school who hates everything. “i am constantly torn between killing myself and killing everyone around me.” He feels one emotion—rage, and makes sure everyone knows it. Unfortunately for will, despite his obvious dissing of her, this girl Maura seems to like him although he can’t understand why. “it’s like those people who become friends in prison even though they would never really talk to each other if they weren’t in prison. that’s what maura and i are like, i think.” will’s only solace is chatting online with isaac, a guy he’s never met face to face but who feels like his soulmate. He could probably fall in love with isaac if he let himself. And that’s exactly what he intends to do when makes plans to meet up with isaac in Chicago in, of all ironic places, a porn shop.
…the same porn shop Will Grayson finds himself wandering around after his fake i.d. gets him thrown out of the club he tried to get into with Tiny and Jane. Will Grayson, meet will grayson. Two very different dudes with the same name and the same problems when it comes to matters of the heart. But now that they’ve actually met? Their lives will never be the same…
This epic and utterly unforgettable book brings together two of the biggest and brightest names in YA lit: John Green and David Levithan, both writing as, well, will Grayson. As a result, the levels of smart and funny are off the charts. My advance review copy is chock full of scribbles, giggles, highlights and underlines. And stealing every scene is the irrepressible Tiny, whose sheer exuberance at being alive and being in love helps both Will graysons get their acts together. (The amazing thing about Tiny is that he’s written by both Green and Levithan, who manage to keep him consistently fabulous through the whole book.) Who’s writing who? Well, you’ll just have to read it to find out. Coming to a library or bookstore near you April 2010.
You Don’t Even Know Me: Stories and poems about BOYS by Sharon G. Flake
2009
11.27
11.27
Though I am grateful for many things this Thanksgiving weekend, one item that tops my list is Sharon G. Flake’s new collection of short stories and poems featuring teenage boys and their angst. She is one of the hippest authors for teens around, and a new title from her is ALWAYS cause for celebration. This book is a companion piece to one of her earlier works, Who Am I Without Him? Short stories about girls and the boys in their lives (a title I have successfully shopped to so many teens I’ve lost count), and provides the adolescent 411 from the dudes’ POV. Navigating issues from teen marriage and suicide, to neighborhood politics and hot moms who attract unwanted attention, these guys struggle to make sense of the world around them while trying to solve that most maddening of mysteries—what makes girls tick? Flake also dishes up some hot poetry in this collection, including this excerpt from the title poem, “You Don’t Even Know Me”: You tell me to quit fronting,/ You ask who I think I am,/Pretending/That I’m better than you know I really am./…You know/I’ve been wondering lately,/Trying to figure out just how it could be/That we call each other brother,/And you still don’t know a thing about me/ There’s some surprises here, too. I like all the stories, but my favorite just might be “Fakin’ It,” about a last-chance boy who’s been kicked out of every one of his relatives’ homes and is now about to be kicked out of his aunt’s house, a six million dollar lottery winner. Despite her new money and resources, she still has old-school rules and he still can’t seem to follow them no matter how many chances she gives him. Unusual and unsettling because we like to think money solves everything, I just can’t get that story out of my head. So if you want to be moved to tears, laugh out loud, or be lit up with surprise, then this is YOUR book.
The Monstrumologist by Rick Yancy
2009
10.25
10.25
In 1888 New England, young orphan Will Henry serves as an apprentice to Dr. Pellinore Warthrop, a scientist who performs the secret practice of monstrumology, or “the study of life forms generally malevolent to humans and not recognized by science as actual organisms, specifically those considered products of myth and folklore.” In this series opener, Will and his master are on the trail of a hidden pod of Anthropophagi, a race of muscular albino headless monsters who wear their over-sized obsidian eyes on their shoulders, their shark-tooth filled mouths on their stomachs, and their tiny brains in their crotch. Though they originated in Africa, somehow these horrific beasts have managed to cross the pond into the New England states, and are now running amok in the countryside, tearing off heads and sucking down the entrails of their human victims while they still draw breath. Will and Dr. Warthrop don’t only have to find a way to stop them, they must also solve the mystery of how and why they got there in the first place to prevent others from coming—and breeding—and EVOLVING. Friends, I can barely contain my morbid delight at having discovered this delightfully gruesome book! Yancy’s bloody tale, written in a delicious Victorian gothic style, is just gory and disturbing as the early Stephen King I devoured as a teen while still being a cracking good yarn between explicit scenes of dismemberment and disembowelment that leave nothing (and I mean NOTHING) to the imagination. When not running for his life from headless freaks trying to open one of his major arteries, soulful Will Henry contemplates the meaning of life, death, and his complicated feelings about his single-minded caretaker, making this a much deeper read than your average run of the mill horror pulp. But violent and bloodthirsty it is, and if Goosebumps and Coraline are more your speed, then this graphic gore-fest is not for you. I can’t even give you an excerpt here, just in case you come back and blame me for your nightmares. (And even though I haven’t slept very well the past couple of nights, I just CAN’T WAIT to read the next one!) This is YA horror at it’s stomach-churning finest, heading further down the dark path that Lauren Myracle paved with the creepy Bliss. Go ahead and read it—if you dare!
