Earlier this year, YA author Jennifer Echols and I, as the only two YA authors in attendance at a reader event, sat next to each other during the signing. She bought my book, and I bought hers. I just recently got around to reading Going Too Far, and am I glad I did. I read so much paranormal YA that it had been awhile since I'd read a straight contemporary YA. In Going Too Far, Meg is a smart but rebellious teen who wants nothing more than to graduate and get out of her small Alabama town. She dyes her hair crazy colors, dates questionable guys but doesn't get attached, and gets into enough trouble that her parents are about to wash their hands of her. One night on a secluded railroad bridge changes her life. She's arrested and ends up having to spend her spring break riding the midnight shift with Officer John After, an entirely too straight-laced (but attractive) cop barely older than she is. As the week progresses, Meg and John learn a lot about each other -- including why she wants to leave their hometown and why he chose to stay. Lately, I've had one book that I read by my treadmill and another on the nightstand to read when I go to bed. I became so engrossed with Going Too Far that I started toting it back and forth. I might have even walked longer than normal to read more chapters. Maybe I have Jennifer to thank for not only a great story but the loss of a pound or two. :)Author Web site: http://www.jennifer-echols.com/
The cover on Heather Davis' Never Cry Werewolf is another of those that is very eye-catching, which is a good thing in the ever-more-crowded YA marketplace. I remember when Heather sold this book, and it's taken a while to hit store shelves. But I'm thinking it's good timing. After all, those thousands of Jacob Black-crazy girls are probably looking for more werewolf books about right now. In Never Cry Werewolf, Shelby's post-curfew kiss with a hot boy is the last straw that has her father and stepmother sending her off to a summer brat camp for spoiled rich kids. She doesn't really feel like she fits in. After all, she grew up in a normal family in the Midwest until her mother died, her scientist father remarried and he made a zillion dollars developing a cosmetic drug. She's not the kid of a famous rock star like the really cute Austin Bridges III, who shows up at the same camp. Shelby tells herself all she has to do to survive the camp and not get sent to a worse boot camp in the desert is just stay away from boys for the duration of her stay at Camp Crescent. But when she finds out that Austin isn't only a hottie but also a werewolf who is going to go hairy and howley if he doesn't get the medicine the camp counselors confiscated, keeping a low profile goes right out the window.Though Heather says on her site that a young Heath Ledger was her vision of Austin, I kept picturing Nick Simmons, Gene Simmons' son. Maybe because Nick and Austin are both sons of crazy rockers.
Author Web site: http://www.heatherdavisbooks.com/
YA News
Anyone who has had access to a news outlet the past couple of weeks knows that New Moon has been raking in the dough big time. I didn't get to go on opening day but did make it two days later and really enjoyed the film. The release date for the next movie, Eclipse, is set to release June 30, 2010.
Speaking of all things Twilight, Taylor Lautner is hosting Saturday Night Live this week. Click here to see a short promo.
While at New Moon, I saw the trailer for Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief, set to hit theaters on Presidents' Day. I've not read the Rick Riordan book series on which this is based, but I'm adding them to my list. Take a look at the trailer.
Anxious to read the last installment of Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games trilogy? Me too! The still untitled book will be released Aug. 24, 2010, so mark your calendars.
