Librarians reading from the Young Adult collection

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Best picks, reader advisory, book recommendations, what’s hot, whatever you like to call it, sometimes the best reads come from someone else’s sharing.

Luckily there are librarians with a passion for the Young Adult (YA) collections in our libraries. We spend our spare time engrossed in books that we love to share with our rangatahi and teenagers to encourage a lifelong love of reading. “Young Adult” in library speak defines collections aimed at around 13-19, BUT, I challenge you NOT to let that dissuade you from venturing forth.

Anyone who loves a great read and is open to alternatives, a change, and a specialised writing style should have a browse and see how often you go WOW!  I say ‘specialised’ because I would suggest that good YA writers have nailed the need to hook our young adults in with powerful writing skills, great story lines and immediate attention grabbing techniques.

Therefore, with all this in mind, at a recent meeting with colleagues who have this passion and carry some responsibility in their libraries around the YA collection, we all shared what we had been reading recently. This is a very diverse list and we hope you find something that will encourage you to give a YA title a go or will provide some help when you are being your teenager’s personal librarian.

The following titles are found in our Young Adults’ collections in your library; some are available as free downloadable e-books and audio-books as well.

• The Archived and The Unbound - Victoria Schwab
• The 100 – Kass Morgan
• Beauty Queens – Libba Bray
• We Were Liars – Emily Lockhart
• Only Ever Yours – Louise O’Neill
• Mortal Fire – Elizabeth Knox – as seen in this blog post about the WORD festival
• The Knife of Never Letting Go – Patrick Ness
• The Tricksters – Margaret Mahy
• Everybody Sees the Ants – A. S. King
• Razorhurst – Justine Larbalestier
• The Boy’s Own Manual to Being a Proper Jew – Eli Glasman
• The 10 p.m. Question – Kate de Goldi – the recent Community Read title
• Popular: Vintage Wisdom for a Modern Geek (non-fiction!) – Maya van Wagenen

As with life, books are difficult to put in specific boxes: these titles are from the ‘adult’ collections, but may well appeal to older teenagers.

• The Child Thief and Red Winter – Dan Smith
• The Reason I Jump – Naoki Higashida (Biography, written when the author was only 13)
• The Facades – Eric Lundgren

So, whether you are up for a challenge or are tearing your hair out to get your offspring to read, there is something for everyone in the Young Adult collections in our libraries.

Let us know how many times you went WOW!