Hold me like a breath, Tiffany Schmidt

Penelope Landlow has grown up with the knowledge that almost anything can be bought or sold—including body parts. She’s the daughter of one of the three crime families that control the black market for organ transplants. Penelope’s surrounded by all the suffocating privilege and protection her family can provide, but they can’t protect her from the autoimmune disorder that causes her to bruise so easily. And in her family’s line of work no one can be safe forever. All Penelope has ever wanted is freedom and independence. But when she’s caught in the crossfire as rival families scramble for prominence, she learns that her wishes come with casualties, that betrayal hurts worse than bruises, that love is a risk worth taking . . . and maybe she’s not as fragile as everyone thinks. (Goodreads)

First lines: One upon a time – nine years ago, to be exact- I didn’t know anything about the Family Business. My parents wanted it this way, and since my father was head of the Family, his wishes were obeyed without question. My childhood was spend being loved and coddled by members of my family and members of the Family – I was taken for walks by my Father’s second-in-command, flew kites with his enforcers, and played board games with my older brother, Carter. I was constantly told I was the most fragile person on the estate…and the most fragile.

Everything, everything, Nicola Yoon

My disease is as rare as it is famous. Basically, I’m allergic to the world. I don’t leave my house, have not left my house in seventeen years. The only people I ever see are my mom and my nurse, Carla. But then one day, a moving truck arrives next door. I look out my window, and I see him. He’s tall, lean and wearing all black—black T-shirt, black jeans, black sneakers, and a black knit cap that covers his hair completely. He catches me looking and stares at me. I stare right back. His name is Olly. Maybe we can’t predict the future, but we can predict some things. For example, I am certainly going to fall in love with Olly. It’s almost certainly going to be a disaster. (Goodreads)

First lines: I’ve read many more books than you. It doesn’t matter how many you’ve read. I’ve read more. Believe me, I have time. In my white room, against my white walls, on my glistening white bookshelves, book spines provide the only colour. The books are all brand-new hardcovers- no germy secondhand softcovers for me.

Six impossible things, Fiona Wood

Fourteen-year-old nerd-boy Dan Cereill is not quite coping with a reversal of family fortune, moving house, new school hell, a mother with a failing wedding cake business, a just-out gay dad, and an impossible crush on the girl next door. His life is a mess, but for now he’s narrowed it down to just six impossible things…(Goodreads)

First lines: There’s this girl I know. I know her by heart. I know her in every way but one: actuality. Her name is Estelle. I yearn for her. She walks in beauty – yes, like the night of cloudless climes and starry skies – with one iPod earbud in at all times- the soundtrack of her life.

Even when you lie to me, Jessica Alcott

Charlie, a senior, isn’t looking forward to her last year of high school. Another year of living in the shadow of her best friend, Lila. Another year of hiding behind the covers of her favorite novels. Another year of navigating her tense relationship with her perfectionist mom. But everything changes when she meets her new English teacher. Mr. Drummond is smart. Irreverent. Funny. Hot. Everyone loves him. And Charlie thinks he’s the only one who gets her.She also thinks she might not be the only one with a crush.(Goodreads)

First lines: The day I turned eighteen was the day Mr. Drummond left for good. I was never a pretty girl. I knew it more from other people’s silences than from anything they said. They didn’t call me beautiful. They didn’t say I was winsome or sexy or gorgeous. They told me I was smart.

The escape, Hannah Jayne

When two boys walk into the woods, and one comes out covered in blood, what would you believe? Fletcher and Adam venture into the woods for an afternoon hike, but when day turns into night and neither boy returns, their town is thrown into turmoil. Avery, the detective’s daughter, is the one to find Fletcher—dishelved, disoriented, and covered in blood. He has no memory of what happened, but Avery can’t shake the feeling that something’s off. When Adam’s body is finally found, Avery is determined to uncover the truth. But if she stands by her gut, and Fletcher, is she standing by a friend, or a murderer? The answer might cost her life.(Goodreads)

First lines: “Come on, loser!” Adam yelled over his shoulder.
Fletcher could hear Adam’s laughter echoing back at him as he pumped his legs, intent on keeping the deep green of Adam’s jacket in sight as he dodged through the forest. There was no way Fletcher could catch Adam unless Adam stopped or dropped dead.

Cheating for the chicken man, Priscilla Cummings

Thirteen-year-old Kate Tyler must ask herself how far she will go to protect her older brother, J.T., when he returns home after nearly a year in a juvenile detention facility, only to find himself ostracized and bullied as he attempts to make a fresh start. Kate compromises her own values and risks getting herself into serious trouble as she launches a secret campaign to protect her brother long enough for him to find his place in the family – and in the world – again.(Goodreads)

First lines: The funeral was on a warm October day with a high blue sky and a single wispy white cloud that drifted, waiting like an angel, Kate though. Her mother said they had been to Arlington National Cemetery before, when Kate’s grandfather was buried, but that was ten years ago, when Kate was only two, and she didn’t remember.

One, Sarah Crossan

Grace and Tippi. Tippi and Grace. Two sisters. Two hearts. Two dreams. Two lives. But one body. Grace and Tippi are conjoined twins, joined at the waist, defying the odds of survival for sixteen years. They share everything, and they are everything to each other. They would never imagine being apart. For them, that would be the real tragedy. But something is happening to them. Something they hoped would never happen. And Grace doesn’t want to admit it. Not even to Tippi. How long can they hide from the truth—how long before they must face the most impossible choice of their lives? (Goodreads)

First lines: Here
We Are.
And we are living.
Isn’t that amazing?
How we manage
to be
at all.

Cut both ways, Carrie Mesrobian

Will Caynes never has been good with girls. At seventeen, he’s still waiting for his first kiss. He’s certainly not expecting it to happen in a drunken make-out session with his best friend, Angus. But it does and now Will’s conflicted—he knows he likes girls, but he didn’t exactly hate kissing a guy. Then Will meets Brandy, a cute and easy-to-talk-to sophomore. He’s totally into her too—which proves, for sure, that he’s not gay. So why does he keep hooking up with Angus on the sly? Will knows he can’t keep seeing both of them, but besides his new job in a diner, being with Brandy and Angus are the best parts of his whole messed-up life. His divorced parents just complicate everything. His father, after many half-baked business ventures and endless house renovations, has started drinking again. And his mom is no help—unless loading him up with a bunch of stuff he doesn’t need plus sticking him with his twin half-sisters counts as parenting. He’s been bouncing between both of them for years, and neither one feels like home. Deciding who to love, who to choose, where to live. Whichever way Will goes, someone will get hurt. Himself, probably the most. (Goodreads).

First lines: You get used to it, divorce. Since fourth grade, I’ve lived in two different houses and while that sounds kind of crazy, especially for a little kid, you get used to it. Used to your parents not being together, to scenery changing every other week.

It’s about love, by Steven Camden

Real life is messier than the movies. A bold, thought-provoking novel from the exceptionally talented, Steven Camden. He’s Luke. She’s Leia. Just like in Star Wars. Just like they’re made for each other. Same film studies course, different backgrounds, different ends of town. Only this isn’t a film. This is real life. This is where monsters from the past come back to take revenge. This is where you are sometimes the monster. But real life? Sometimes, only sometimes, it turns out just like in the movies…… maybe. (Goodreads)

First lines: Black.
Hum of a strip light and radio static as a dial tries to find a station. Fade up to a face. Young man. Wheat-coloured skin. Dark hair cropped close. Radio static settles on ‘Fly me to the moon’.

The letter for the king, Tonke Dragt

On the night of his final vigil before being knighted, Tiuri answers a request to deliver an urgent letter to a distant kingdom across the Great Mountains–a journey that will threaten his life and teach him the true meaning of what it is to be a knight. (Publisher’s summary).

First lines: This is a tale of long ago, when knights still roamed the land. It takes place in two kingdoms: the land of King Dagonaut, to the east of the Great Mountains, and the land King Unauwen, to the west of the Great Mountains. The capital cities of these two realms also bear the name of their kings: the City of Dagonaut and the City of Unauwen. A third land also plays an important part in this tale, but now is not the the time for stories of this place.

A thousand nights, E.K Johnston

Lo-Melkhiin killed three hundred girls before he came to her village, looking for a wife. When she sees the dust cloud on the horizon, she knows he has arrived. She knows he will want the loveliest girl: her sister. She vows she will not let her be next. And so she is taken in her sister’s place, and she believes death will soon follow. Lo-Melkhiin’s court is a dangerous palace filled with pretty things: intricate statues with wretched eyes, exquisite threads to weave the most beautiful garments. She sees everything as if for the last time. But the first sun rises and sets, and she is not dead. Night after night, Lo-Melkhiin comes to her and listens to the stories she tells, and day after day she is awoken by the sunrise. Exploring the palace, she begins to unlock years of fear that have tormented and silenced a kingdom. Lo-Melkhiin was not always a cruel ruler. Something went wrong. Far away, in their village, her sister is mourning. Through her pain, she calls upon the desert winds, conjuring a subtle unseen magic, and something besides death stirs the air. Back at the palace, the words she speaks to Lo-Melkhiin every night are given a strange life of their own. Little things, at first: a dress from home, a vision of her sister. With each tale she spins, her power grows. Soon she dreams of bigger, more terrible magic: power enough to save a king, if she can put an end to the rule of a monster.(Goodreads)

First lines: Lo-Melkhiin killed three hundred girls before he came to my village looking for a wife. She that he chose of us would be a hero. She would give the others life. Lo-Melkhiin would not return to the same village until he had married a girl from every camp, from every town and from every district inside the city walls – for that was the law, struck in desperation though it was.

The big lie, Julie Mayhew

Jessika Keller is a good girl: she obeys her father, does her best to impress Herr Fisher at the Bund Deutscher Mädel meetings and is set to be a world champion ice skater. Her neighbour Clementine is not so submissive. Outspoken and radical, Clem is delectably dangerous and rebellious. And the regime has noticed. Jess cannot keep both her perfect life and her dearest friend. But which can she live without?(Goodreads)

First lines: I am a good girl. It is my most defining feature. And that’s the truth. If you’d asked anyone on Lincoln Drive or at the elite school, they’d have told you. Jessika Keller? Oh, she is a superior girl, upstanding, immaculate.

Baba Yaga’s assistant, Marika McCoola and Emily Carroll

Most children think twice before braving a haunted wood filled with terrifying beasties to match wits with a witch, but not Masha. Her beloved grandma taught her many things: that stories are useful, that magic is fickle, and that nothing is too difficult or too dirty to clean. The fearsome witch of folklore needs an assistant, and Masha needs an adventure. She may be clever enough to enter Baba Yaga’s house on chicken legs, but within its walls, deceit is the rule. To earn her place, Masha must pass a series of tests, outfox a territorial bear, and make dinner for her host. No easy task, with children on the menu! (Goodreads)

The rules, Nancy Holder and Debbie Viguie

Junior Robin Brisset has no idea what she’s in for when she accepts an invitation to one of Callabrese High’s most exclusive parties. And when the trademark scavenger hunt begins, Robin must go against every rule she’s lived by to survive.(Goodreads)

First lines: Flames raged along the cliff. Pine trees and manzaita bushes ignited with a whirlwind whoosh, the steam rising off Robin’s sopping-wet jeans as she zigzagged toward the beach like a desperate rabbit inches ahead of the fire. Salt and embers clogged the air.