Dystopias Have Caught Fire

UPDATED WITH NEW TITLES (AT THE TOP)!! ALSO, CHECK OUT THE NEW SEQUELS TO MATCHED AND THE MAZE RUNNER.


Hungry for Dystopias?

If the The Hunger Games left you hungry for more thrilling, world-gone-bad tales, we've got great news! Suzanne Collins' trilogy has become so incredibly popular that authors and publishers are cranking out tons of great dystopian and post-apocalyptic books for teens. Here's a bunch we think you should check out next.

(Click on titles to reserve them at a CCPL branch near you.)

Say Yes to the Mess

Maxine Banks is Getting Married

by Lori Aurelia Williams

Maxine Banks is the kind of girl who knows what she wants and isn’t afraid to make it happen, and what she wants right now is to get married. Well, what she REALLY wants is to get out of her mother’s house, and a wedding seems like the best way to do that and be treated like a queen for a day.  She's seventeen, and has seen enough of her mother’s bad boyfriends to know that her man Brian is a keeper. She convinces him that they should get married but their parents object – they’re still in high school, after all – but Maxine knows how to get her way...and tells everyone that she’s pregnant. She’s not. But it works. Maxine Banks gets married.

Teens Vote "Wings" Next Twilight Series

Wings

By Aprilynne Pike

Not that we'd ever dump Edward or Jacob. But with so many supernatural romances seducing us, which one will be the next Twilight? Teens voting on JSYK narrowly chose Wings by Aprilynne Pike as the series most likely to fill the blood-thirsty shoes. (Stephenie Meyer endorsed the book, too.)

In Wings, you'll meet home-schooled Laurel who must start public high school when her parents move to L.A. Long story short: Laurel grows a flower with foot-long petals on her back. Throw in a sweet love triangle and an ending that promises lots of sequels...and maybe Laurel will be the next Bella.

However, the race was tight -- down to the last Tweets. Out of 27,000 votes cast, Wings pulled out just 49 more votes than second-place Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl, a gothic fantasy romance set right outside our awesome home city of Charleston. In this book, Ethan discovers the new girl in his small town is part of a family of Casters.

Check out its sequel, Beautiful Darkness, to see which books you like best.

These other fantasy favs were in the running, too:

It's a Bird, It's a Plane, It's...a Graphic Novel!

Superheroes Battle Over Pages

and the Big Screen

Calling All Hero Fans! 

It's going to be a Marvel-ous year at the box office with movies like Thor (May 6) and Captain America: The First Avenger (July 22) hitting the big screen. While you wait, read up on a few heroes (and sheroes!) -- some familiar, some new -- in these graphic novels: 

Contest: Win an ARC of Demonglass

Demonglass, the sequel to Hex Hall by Rachel Hawkins, won't be released until March 1, 2011. 

But if you just can't wait to find out what happens next with Sophie, Archer and the rest of the Prodigium, here's your chance to win an Advance Reading Copy.

Just leave a comment on this blog post, telling us either:

a) your favorite book of all time 
(or)
b) the best book you've read recently.

Contest ends Sunday, Feb 13 2011, 11:59pm EST

A winner will be selected at random, and notified on Monday, Feb 7. 

And if you haven't read Hex Hall yet....what are you waiting for?  It's about a girl who gets sent to a reform school for delinquent Prodigium (a.k.a. witches, shapeshifters and fairies) and discovers ancient secrets about herself, her family, and the true nature of her powers.