35 Going on 13: The Year's Best Teen Fiction for Adults

Angelina Benedetti, King Cty. Lib. Syst., WA -- Library Journal, 11/14/2008 12:06:00 PM

It is the most wonderful time of the year: November, when the best-of lists come fast and furious—Amazon.com, the review journals, the National Book Awards.

For those of us who live and love books, these lists are newfound joys that both affirm our own feelings and give us something to debate. In some cases, they also offer that rarest gift—a surprise; something new to read. When I began this column last month (see "Books That Go Bump in the Night"), I knew I would have fun creating my own best-of list. Reviewed below are my favorite 2008 teen fiction titles for adults. But before you skip ahead, please take the following points into account:

—This list is inherently different from the list of teen books I would have picked for teen readers. In some cases, these books would be more at home among adult readers. That is not to say that teens would not find and enjoy them; they just may be found only by what we used to call "the special reader."

—I made my selections with an eye for both literary quality (as judged by myself and a bevy of other reviewers) and potential adult appeal (as judged by the book’s characters, plot, setting, mood, or themes).

—The books being published for this market stand toe to toe with this year’s best adult reads—David Wroblewski’s The Story of Edgar Sawtelle or Marilynne Robinson’s Home being but two. The only difference is that books for teens generally feature teens and themes that resonate with them.

All said, it was an exceptional year for teen fiction, which is why every self-respecting, well-read grown-up in our ranks should pick out a few.

Anderson, M.T. The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation: Vol. 2: The Kingdom on the Waves. Candlewick. 561p. ISBN 978-0-7636-2950-2. $22.99.
Anderson continues the Revolutionary War saga begun in the National Book Award–winning first volume, The Pox Party. This volume opens with the slave Octavian on the run with his former tutor, Dr. Trefusis. The two land in Boston and later flee the besieged city for Virginia, where Octavian joins Lord Dunmore’s Ethiopian Regiment in the hopes of winning his freedom. In the regiment, a scourge of smallpox and lack of military readiness decimate the ranks.
Why It Is a Best: Six starred reviews are not wrong; the author makes good on the promise of the first book. Octavian’s chilling account of the death and deprivation around him and the pure injustice of his situation call into question the values on which our nation was founded. The ending, in particular, relies heavily on the reader’s having read and remembered the first volume of the series, but more happens here.
Why It Is for Us: Anderson’s command of period language and mannerisms brings this time to life through the eyes of a completely unique yet almost archetypal character. Octavian began his journey as an intelligent young man and ends it as an enlightened and empowered (if no better off) one, writing his own story and place in history. The title says it all: astonishing.

Blundell, Judy. What I Saw and How I Lied. Scholastic. 2008. 284p. ISBN 978-0-439-90346-2. $16.99.
Blundell, the pseudonymous author of a number of "Star Wars" series books for children, completely surprised me with this story of a girl’s loss of innocence. Evie’s stepdad is home from World War II and eager to be back with her movie star–gorgeous mother. The family travels to Palm Beach, FL, ostensibly for a little vacation, but Joe’s past follows in the form of Peter Coleridge, a handsome young charmer who served with him. Then Peter turns up dead, and Evie’s parents are the prime suspects. Now Evie must find her own path between the truth and the lies she learns everyone has been telling.
Why It Is a Best: Straightforward language belies the masterly storytelling in this 2008 National Book Award winner for Young People’s Literature. Here, our narrator is both unreliable and unflappable. Evie starts out more than a little naïve, and her maturity comes with hard-won experience.
Why It Is for Us: At its core, this is a mother-daughter book in which the daughter learns how to make her way in a world where she can no longer trust in the adults around her. Blundell does not shy away from the uglier aspects of the time—anti-Semitism and the tension between men returning home and the women who held down the fort while they were gone.

Collins, Suzanne. Hunger Games. Scholastic. 2008. 374p. ISBN 978-0-439-02348-1. $17.99.
In a far-future United States, a cruel Capitol keeps order by demanding an annual tribute for its Hunger Games, in which two contestants, a boy and a girl, are chosen by lottery from each of 12 districts to fight to the death in an event televised from an arena. Katniss Everdeen lives in what used to be Appalachia and is now called the Seam—a dirt-poor district without much hope of success in the games. Katniss volunteers in her sister’s place and may just have the smarts to win. Then Peeta, the soft baker’s son chosen from her same district, does something surprising. He declares his undying affection for Katniss just before they enter the arena. Is there room for friendship, loyalty, or even love when survival is on the line?
Why It Is a Best: Collins’s prose is merely serviceable, but she writes compelling characters and spins one terrific yarn. The premise is good to begin with, and the surprises keep coming.
Why It Is for Us: In this fight to the death, the book’s violence is cringe-worthy by even the most jaded standards. The exploitation of the desperate and impoverished for the entertainment of the wealthy and powerful is a theme reminiscent of Stephen King’s The Long Walk or The Running Man. King himself makes the comparison in his Entertainment Weekly review of the book, saying "I couldn’t stop reading."

Dowd, Siobhan. Bog Child. David Fickling: Random. 328p. ISBN 978-0-385-75169-8. $16.99.
The year is 1981, and the Troubles are close to home for 18-year-old Fergus, whose brother, an IRA member, has chosen to participate in the Long Kesh prison hunger strike. While digging peat with his Uncle Tally, Fergus discovers the body of a girl who might have been there for a long, long time. This discovery is complicated by two things: the peat they were digging is on the wrong side of the Irish border, and the girl has a noose around her neck.
Why It Is a Best: Fergus’s tender relationship with his brother and friendship with a border soldier bring to life a complicated political situation. Interspersed scenes from the life of the girl in the bog parallel the sacrificial choices made by Fergus and his family in these difficult times.
Why It Is for Us: This is the last book we get from Dowd, who died shortly after the publication of A Swift Pure Cry (2007). Here, as there, Dowd’s lyricism never gets in the way of the story.

Gaiman, Neil (text) & Dave McKean (illus.). The Graveyard Book. Harper: HarperCollins. 2008. 312p. ISBN 978-0-06-053092-1. $17.99.
A baby survives the killing of his family by a mysterious assassin. He crawls to a nearby graveyard and is adopted by the assortment of spooks who occupy the place, soon to include his own recently murdered parents. There he is christened with a new name: Nobody, or Bod for short. Under the watchful tutelage of the dead, Bod learns reading, writing, history, and a few other useful skills—haunting and "disapparating" [disappearing from a location and reappearing in another].
Why It Is a Best: An elegant combination of Gaiman’s masterly storytelling and McKean’s lovely drawings, this book also works as a series of independent but connected short stories set two years apart, following Bod from age two to 16.
Why It Is for Us: In interviews, Gaiman has said that this book took him years to write, and it was worth the wait. Imagine Kipling’s The Jungle Book set among a forest of graves. A complete recording of Gaiman reading the book is available on his web site; see also LJ’s video with the author from BEA 2008.

Goodman, Alison. Eon: Dragoneye Reborn. Viking Children’s. 544p. ISBN 978-0-670-06227-0. $19.99.
In Goodman’s fantasy kingdom, power struggles both worldly and magical combine in a zodiac of dragon energies. Each year, one apprentice is chosen to bond with a dragon. Crippled and frail, Eon has little hope of being that one apprentice until a mysterious dragon appears and makes its choice. Now Eon must survive his enemy’s ambitions while harboring a deadly secret: 12-year-old Eon is really 16-year-old Eona, a girl hiding in a man’s world.
Why It Is a Best: Because the publication of this book has been delayed (it appears this December), it may not earn its rightful place on 2008 best-of lists; that is a shame. The combination of complex world building—the result is a setting reminiscent of ancient China and Japan—and an edge-of-your-seat plot rank it among the top fantasy reads in this or any other year.
Why It Is for Us: Eon is also a sophisticated examination of the relationship between sex and politics. Fighting alongside Eon/Eona are the transgendered beauty who tutors her in palace politics and a very manly eunuch. In a genre so often peopled with brave ladies and valiant men, it is a pleasant surprise to meet characters for whom gender is a matter of choice.

Lanagan, Margo. Tender Morsels. Knopf Books for Young Readers. 436p. ISBN 978-0-375-84811-7. $16.99.
This book opens with a teenage girl miscarrying a child. Liga lives with her sexually abusive father in a small cabin set apart from their poor village. When he dies, she is left alone to care for their newborn baby. A group of boys takes advantage of her isolation, and, pregnant again, Liga attempts to kill herself and the baby. Instead, magic takes her to a place where she can safely raise her daughters, Branza and Urdda, apart from the cruelty of the world. Safety comes with a cost, and sometimes the skin protecting Liga’s realm is thin enough to let people through—first a greedy dwarf and then one magical man-bear followed by another. When the girls return from their self-imposed isolation, they must learn to love and understand the people of their village, with all of their flaws.
Why It Is a Best: The author’s two short story collections, Black Juice (2005) and Red Spikes (2007), focused on the beauty and cruelty of human nature. Here, she takes the same theme and reinterprets the Brothers Grimm story "Snow-White and Rose-Red" with stunning linguistic precision.
Why It Is for Us: The book’s chilling scenes of sexual violence contrast with the healing power of womanly sisterhood—familiar stuff for fans of Margaret Atwood and Toni Morrison—whereas its magical realism is reminiscent of Isabel Allende. Employing multiple viewpoints, Lanagan’s writing withstands these comparisons and more.

Marchetta, Melina. Jellicoe Road. Harper Teen: HarperCollins. 419p. ISBN 978-0-06-143183-8. $17.99.
When she was 11, Taylor Markham was abandoned by her mother at a convenience store. At 17, she resides in a boarding school on Jellicoe Road. The closest person to her is Hannah, a nearby resident and would-be foster mom to the school’s misfits. Now Hannah has disappeared when Taylor needs her most. She has been chosen to lead the school in its war with the local "Townies" and visiting "Cadets"—the cadets being led by a smoldering Jonah Briggs, with whom Taylor has a past. Looking for a clue to Hannah's whereabouts, Taylor reads a manuscript she left that tells the story of five friends united by a fatal accident on Jellicoe Road 22 years earlier.
Why It is a Best: Set in rural Australia, the story of Taylor and of the five friends is permeated by a sense of place and time. Readers will smell the trees and taste the dust.
Why It Is for Us: This is rich and layered domestic fiction that requires patience and careful attention as it spins a story of parents, children, and the legacy of tragedy. Readers of Anita Shreve and Wally Lamb will find much to enjoy here.

Pratchett, Terry. Nation. Harper: HarperCollins. 367p. ISBN 978-0-06-143301-6. $16.99.
When Mau returns home from his coming-of-age quest, he finds that a tsunami has wiped out his entire people. Also on the island is a shipwreck survivor, Ermintrude, an English miss now calling herself Daphne. Daphne does not know that she, too, is one of the last of her line. At home, in an alternate 19th-century Britain, a plague has all but destroyed the royal succession. Now her father is king and desperate to find her. Together Mau and Daphne work to rebuild some form of civilization, leading a ragtag group of other survivors who make their way to their island "nation."
Why It Is a Best: The author’s mix of absurd humor and rollicking adventure sugarcoats his larger theme: how do you build again when everything you know—your security, your idols, and your culture—is stripped away?
Why It Is for Us: At times, Pratchett stops the action to ruminate on the relationship between humans and the gods, familiar stuff for fans of his Good Omens (1990). Readers of a certain age will wonder whether he went to the Monty Python school of comedy—Gentlemen of Last Resort, cannibals from the Land of Many Fires, and regurgitating Grandfather birds abound.

Next month: books for the bleak midwinter.