Daughter of Smoke and Bone centers around Karou, blue haired, lanky, artist and wickedly awesome errand runner.  In her sketchbook Karou draws monstrous characters like Brimstone, Kishmish, Issa and their adventures and her friends and classmates think these stories and characters are brilliant except what they don't know, because no one really knows anything about Karou is that all those character are real.  Brimstone, the Wishmonger, raised her, trained her and now she runs errands for him around the world collecting teeth to exchange for wishes. While Karou is running her errands frustrated that Brimstone never completely fills her in about why teeth are exchanged for wishes, there's danger mounting as black hand prints are found burned into doors all over the world. The same doors Karou uses as a portal to complete her errands.  Whose hand prints are on the doors? Some claim they've seen shadows with wings, others claim they felt a feather grace their skin.  In the middle of Morocco on an errand Karou finds herself face to face with exactly who's been leaving those hand prints and who's out to exact revenge on Brimstone, and once they've met neither of their worlds will ever be quite the same. 

-Renee (the Loft)

A teen’s coming-of-age story is told in a series of humorous and painful letters to a “friend.”  Growing up in the suburbs of Pittsburgh, 15-year old Charlie’s only social life is his family—until he meets the half-siblings, Sam (a girl) and Patrick.  Sam and Patrick, who are seniors at Charlie’s high school, take him under their wings and introduce him, in turn, to a wider circle of friends, a tight-knit group living on the fringe of the high-school social scene.  Mostly Charlie observes—hence the title "wallflower"—and, under the watchful eyes of his friends, he discovers the great bands (The Smiths, Nirvana, U2, etc.), experiments with dating, sexuality, and drugs. Meanwhile, as Charlie pines for the beautiful Sam, his darkest afflictions lurk just below the surface. The winner of three YA book awards, Chbosky’s The Perks of Being a Wallflower is an exceptionally moving and haunting work.

Read the book before the film release in September 2012. Click HERE to see the trailer! (Russ K., Ref.)

If you're a fan of Cassandra Clare's Mortal Instruments series, get excited because Entertainment Weekly has posted the book trailer for the latest book in the series: City of Lost Souls!   Click HERE to see the trailer.

-Renee (the Loft)

Doug Swieteck is a character you may have first come across in Gary Schmidt’s The Wednesday Wars. He wasn’t exactly lovable in that story, but you are left wondering what happened to him. Okay For Now focuses on just that – what happened to Doug and what’s his deal? The story starts off with Doug’s family having to move to a “dump” in “stupid” Marysville after his father loses his job. Doug’s father has “fast hands” that lash out at his family and a fast mouth that runs his mostly negative opinions about everything. Doug has two brothers - Chris, who has reputation for trouble and Lucas, who is fighting in Vietnam.
But, back to Doug - Doug’s first encounter with someone in Marysville is Lil, whose dad owns Spicer’s Deli. Their relationship doesn’t get off to the best start, but then Lil offers Doug a job delivering ice cream and groceries around the neighborhood for her dad. After that, they’re inseparable.

Now there’s one place Doug can escape from his dysfunctional family, school troubles and an unearned bad reputation around town - the library. At the library he encounters John Audubon’s Birds of America. You wouldn’t think a bird book could change someone’s life, but in this case a bird book changes Doug’s. It’s not just the book, but also all the people and relationships that are created because of it. Whether it’s with Mr. Powell the librarian who teaches Doug how to draw using the illustrations in Audubon’s book or the president of the company that Doug’s dad works at, who happened to purchase one of the bird drawings from the book or the eccentric playwright Mrs. Windermere, the bird book pulls the story together. It’s all of these people and more from “stupid” Marysville who start to chip away at Doug’s hard outside shell and begin to see everything that Doug’s been covering up inside. With the help of fiery spirited Lil and many other endearing characters, Doug might just decide that things are more than just Okay For Now. (Renee, The Loft)

Alex finally won a disagreement with his mom - he got to stay in Cedar Falls, Iowa for the weekend instead of being stuffed in the car with his family for a trip to Warren, IL to see relatives. Alex was enjoying having the house to himself when, “There was a low rumble, almost too low to hear, and the house shook a little. An earthquake maybe, but we never have earthquakes in Iowa. The power went out. I stood to open the curtains. I thought there might be enough light to read by at least for awhile. Then it happened […] The floor tilted, and I fell across the suddenly angled room, arms and legs flailing. I screamed but couldn’t hear myself over the noise: a boom and then a whistling sound – incoming artillery from a war movie but played in reverse.” What was going on? The super volcano that sat dormant for millions of years under Yellowstone National Park erupted; sending ash and debris across the United States. 

Alex makes up his mind and decides try to get to Warren, IL to find his family. Along the way he encounters frighteningly cruel blood-thirsty people who want nothing more than to kill him and take his supplies - but Alex also meets kindhearted people who are willing to share their sparse food (everything is covered in ash and there's still no power) and homes with him. Two of these are Darla and her mother who save Alex from the brink of death after he encounters one of those not so nice people. After Alex meets Darla their lives are connected and they're put through a series of trials and adventures as they try to survive what the volcanic explosion has done to their world. Full of action, adventure, and a bit of romance – Ashfall is an epic survival story sure to impress any reader. (Renee, the Loft)

YALSA has announced this year's nominees for the Teens' Top Ten! What does that mean? Well, this is an opportunity for teens to vote for the nominees they think were the best of the bunch. Check out the list of nominated books and see if some of your favorites are there (or get the scoop on interesting books you maybe haven't heard about). Voting won't start until August, so that gives you plenty of time to read the nominees and make your picks! Keep your eye out for posts later this summer with information on how to cast your votes.