Teens Review Books for Teens

You Review:

Welcome to the place where teens review books just for teens. Email teenunderground@ccpl.org if you want to review, too! Click on any title to put the book on hold at your favorite CCPL branch, and be sure to comment at the end.

Windblowne

Windblowne
By Stephen Messer

You Reviewed by Javari

This book has a really original story line. The main world is all based around kites. Oliver, the central character, is a boy who lives in a land where people are obsessed with flying kites. But when Oliver tries to fly them, they crash in horrible ways.

Every year, the town of Windblowne has a festival of kites. Oliver really wants to fly a kite with success, but his parents are not helpful. So, when he finds out that his great-uncle Gilbert was once a champion kite flier, Oliver gets his hopes up that he will now be able to fly a kite without being laughed at. But Oliver’s hopes are dashed when Gilbert refuses to help.

YALLFest Read-Alikes

Y'all Loved YALLFest!

Judging by the crowds and lines of book-wielding fans, YALLFest was a huge success. Now that you've met the authors you love, try these read-alikes -- and don't forget to click on the titles to reserve them!

If you like this YALLFest book:                                                                                                  Then try:

Every You, Every Me
By David Levithan

Evan is haunted by the loss of his best friend, so when mysterious photos appear, he begins to fall apart.


As Simple As Snow
By Gregory Galloway

The narrator is left with unanswered questions after goth girl Anastasia disappears.

Everybody Loves A Smackdown

YA SMACKDOWN!!!

One more reason to hit YALLFest on Saturday (drum roll): the YA Smackdown!!! Featuring zombies, vampires, witches, evil unicorns, werewolves and bullies (not really...just the people who create them, yikes!).

Which authors will be crowned the inaugural YALLFest Kudzu Queens and Kings?

Just who has the guts, the talent, the sheer hilarity or freakishness to win this unparalleled competition?

Kaleb Nation

The YALLFest authors will be divided into viciously competitive teams: Team Supernatural, Team Dystopia, Team Reality and so on. Then, we here at CCPL and you, the pumped up audience and fans, will attempt to stump, dismay and otherwise rattle these superstars of the YA writing world.

Just who are the most clever, most creative, most deserving storytellers? You and our specially chosen judge will bestow the prestigious KUDZU CROWNS of 2011!!

Kaleb Nation will moderate -- yes, he of You Tube fame, author of YA books and launcher of a new reality TV show that will be filming during YALLFest. The show, Kaleb's Nation, will follow him as he concocts the parodies and pop culture commentaries that have lured 28 million views to his YouTube channel. So, wipe that barbecue off your face after dinner and keep an eye out for the cameras as you race down King Street for the YA Smackdown.

Who knows what calamities might ensue with Kaleb at the mic and 30 or so of the nation's top YA writers on one stage...and, of course with you in the audience cheering for your all-time favorites!!

Hilarity will ensue. Tickets cost $5. Be there.

PS: This event comes to you from the young adult department of the Charleston County Public Library because we love these authors, and we love that you love them, too!

Join us at 6 p.m. Saturday at the American Theater for this YALLFest grand finale.

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Author Interview: Melissa de la Cruz!

Author Interview: Melissa de la Cruz

Melissa de la Cruz writes the bestselling teen vampire series, the Blue Bloods, as well as The Ashleys and The Au Pairs series. On top of all that, she has worked as a fashion and beauty editor and has appeared on TV shows as a trend expert. Whew! She even writes great adult fiction, including the Witches of East End.

Melissa grew up in Manila, capital of the Phillipines, and moved to San Francisco, where she graduated salutatorian of The Convent of the Sacred Heart. Then, she majored in art history and English at Columbia University (and says she minored in nightclubs and shopping!).

Read our interview with her below and then come meet her at YALLFest:

Author Interview: Victoria Schwab

Author Interview: Victoria Schwab

Victoria Schwab is the product of a British mother and a Beverly Hills father. She grew up on the west coast but went to high school in the South at a girls' prep school, complete with plaid skirts that she used to doodle on during math. Talk about contrasts!

Today, she loves fairy tales, folklore and books that make her wonder if the world is really as it seems. Which might be why her debut novel, The Near Witch, is so creepily beautiful. It's about Lexi, a girl who lives on an enchanted moor and gets stuck solving a big mystery when, the day after an intriguing boy appears in town, children start disappearing. Ooohhh!

Read our interview with Victoria below before meeting her at YALLFest!



We’re all excited that you’ll be at YALLFest! What made you decide to come?

How could I resist? I’m a transplant in the South (originally from California), but I’ve lived here long enough for it to feel like home. Also, being a new author, I’m still adjusting to the idea that I get to see some of my favorite writers, not only as a fan, but as a colleague! That blows my mind.

Author Interview: Sarah Rees Brennan

Author Interview: Sarah Rees Brennan

Sarah Rees Brennan grew up in Ireland by the sea where her teachers valiantly tried to make her fluent in Irish. She chose to read books under her desk instead -- mostly Jane Austen, Margaret Mahy, Anthony Trollope, Robin McKinley and Diana Wynne Jones. (She still loves them all!).

Sarah began work on The Demon’s Lexicon while doing a creative writing master's and library work in England. She has returned to Ireland to write but is traveling all the way to Charleston for YALLFest! Read our interview with this hilarious writer:


We’re all excited that you're coming to Charleston for YALLFest! What made you decide to come?

I'm excited too! I love to travel, and I've never been to Charleston before...so I was like, 'Cool, people who like books? Rhett Butler's hometown (I know, I know, such a book nerd)? I'M IN!' I was honored to be invited.

Author Interview: Diana Peterfreund

Author Interview: Diana Peterfreund

Diana Peterfreund has been a costume designer, cover model, and food critic. She's traveled from the cloud forests of Costa Rica to the caverns of New Zealand (and she’s just getting started!).

She graduated from Yale University with degrees in literature and geology, which her family claimed would only come in handy if she wrote books about rocks. Instead, she writes books that rock!

Her first teen novels, Rampant and sequel Ascendant, are adventure fantasies about killer unicorns and the virgin descendants of Alexander the Great who hunt them. Check them out before meeting her at YALLFest! First read our interview here:


We’re all excited that you're coming to Charleston for YALLFest! What made you decide to come?

I was promised pie. ;-)

Seriously, though, I'm so excited to be a part of this festival. It's the first one I've been to away from home since my baby was born, and I can't think of a better way to start meeting up with readers again. A lot of my writer friends are going to be there, and I'm looking forward to meeting some of my favorite writers who I only know online (like Saundra Mitchell).

Author Interview: Andrea Cremer

Author Interview: Andrea Cremer

Andrea Cremer has always loved writing. But she only recently plunged into the deep end of the pool that is professional novel writing. And how well she's done!

When she’s not writing, Andrea is a professor of history at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota. We want to know if she's as awesomely strong-willed as her main character, the werewolf leader Calla.

Check out her new release, Wolfsbane, and read our interview below before meeting her at YALLFest!


What inspired you to write Nightshade, your debut novel?

Nightshade was inspired by Calla's character -- who I knew was a girl and a wolf, but I don't like traditional werewolf mythology because I find wolves to be beautiful, graceful, and intelligent. Most werewolf stories feature lycanthropy as a disease or curse. I wanted to create a new mythology where shifting was a gift and something the characters reveled in, not wanted to be rid of. I also drew on my interest in the history of witchcraft -- an area that I teach in my work as a historian.

Author Interview: Ellen Hopkins!!!!!

Author Interview: Ellen Hopkins

Imagine that you're adopted, love your adoptive parents, and then meet your birth mother -- only to find that she's written poetry her whole life. Just like you! That really happened to Ellen Hopkins, an amazingly gifted poet writing for teens (and adults) today.

Ellen has written five New York Times bestsellers, all in verse. Her poetry, written as full-length novels, tackles such real-life struggles as addiction and abuse. Suffice it say that here at CCPL, her books are HUGELY popular. Check out a few (click on the titles) and meet this amazing writer at YALLFest! But first, read our interview with her:


We’re all so excited that you're coming to Charleston for YALLFest! What made you decide to come?

I love Charleston! Was just there a couple of weeks ago, in fact, so am looking forward to a return visit. Your food rocks! And so do my Charleston readers.

Author Interview: Michelle Hodkin

Author Interview: Michelle Hodkin

At 16, Michelle Hodkin sadly lost the rights to her soul in a poker game with pirates just south of Natchez. Shortly thereafter, she joined an acting troupe and traveled the world performing feats of wonder and mischief. (She also grew up in Florida, went to college in New York, and studied law in Michigan.)

She just released her debut novel to the applause of YA author superstar Cassandra Clare, among others who loved the book. Read it yourself and then come meet Michelle at YALLFest!


What inspired you to write The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer, your debut novel?

The short answer is that it was inspired by true events, and on May 15, 2009, I had the idea to turn them into a book. The long answer will be posted on http://www.maradyer.com/.

Author Interview: Adele Griffin

Author Interview: Adele Griffin

Adele Griffin, two-time National Book Award finalist, likes writing YA stories set during summer vacation, a time (as she recalls it) of bad jobs, new friends, and sometimes an intriguing stranger. But as a kid, nothing tempted her more than ghost stories and mysteries. She also loved books about new girls — probably because her own family moved around a lot. What's that advice about writing what you know?!?

These days, Adele only writes at a certain desk! Must be a pretty charmed place because she's written many great books for teens and younger children. Check out our interview with her below and then come meet her at YALLFest!


We’re all excited that you're coming to Charleston for YALLFest! What made you decide to come?

I'm really excited, too! I'm looking forward to seeing my Picture the Dead partner in collaboration crime, Lisa Brown. And there are so many cool authors there, people I know from Goodreads or twitter or joint-promotion stuff. I'm excited to for-real meet them.
                                                                  Picture The Dead

Okay, and I'm also excited for Southern desserts. Brown-sugar walnut ice-cream! Coconut cake! Pecan pie! Bring it!


What got you into writing books for teens?

I landed my first job out of college working as an editorial assistant for Macmillan Children's Books. It was two blocks away from my first NYC mouse-infested apartment. Which I loved. And I was deathly afraid of the subway — I wanted to walk to work. Luckily I loved the job. So that was how I came into it.

Author Interview: Beth Revis

Author Inverview: Beth Revis

Beth Revis' debut novel about a girl cryogenically frozen aboard a spaceship, Across the Universe has become a bestseller. Beth loves to blog about writing, grammar, and publishing at Writing it Out. She also founded the dystopian blog the League of Extraordinary Writers. And, yes, she does believe that space is the final frontier. Learn all about her before YALLFest!


We’re all excited that you’ll be at YALLFest! What made you decide to come?

I was invited! I LOVE Charleston, and I didn't have to think twice about coming. In fact, I took my honeymoon there, so I'm even more excited about coming back!

Meet Author Kimberly Derting!

Author Interview: Kimberly Derting

Kimberly Derting lives in the Pacific Northwest, an ideal place to be writing anything dark or creepy—just what you'll find aplenty in her books (hint: morbid abilities, dead people, haunting interpersonal connections, etc.).

Her writing gig started when she chose journalism as a 7th-grade elective. It was supposed to be an easy A. Instead, she fell in love with writing. The rest is...well, you know.

Get to know Kimberly through our interview with her below. Then, check out her books before meeting her at YALLFest on Nov. 11 and 12! (Click on any book title to place a library hold on it.)


We’re all excited that you’ll be at YALLFest! What made you decide to come?

I'm SO excited to be coming to YALLFest, it’s such an amazing opportunity to connect with readers! And to be perfectly honest, I may or may not have highlighted a few of my own favorite authors to stalk while I'm there. If you’re curious as to who they are, just be on the lookout for the authors giving me very awkward half-hugs. :)

Author Interview: Saundra Mitchell

Author Interview: Saundra Mitchell

This Carolina neighbor writes haunting books and short stories. But did you know she's also a longtime screenwriter? For all you aspiring writers, Saundra is especially passionate about helping teens tap their own creative writing talents.

Check out her books: Shadowed Summer, The Vespertine, and The Springsweet (due out in 2012). Then, come meet Saundra at YALLFest in November! We have a sneak introduction because she kindly agreed to answer a few questions for us:


We’re all excited that you’ll be at YALLFest! What made you decide to come?

A book festival in an incredibly historic U.S. city, packed to the gills with my favorite YA writers and pie? When Kami and Margie (authors of Beautiful Creatures) invited me, I couldn't say no. And if they hadn't invited me, I can't say that I wouldn't have crashed the party. It's just too much awesome in one place!

YALLFest brings top YA authors to town

Updated with YALLFest schedule and YA Smackdown info! 

YA Superstars Descend on Charleston

Here at the library, our hearts are beating super fast. Why? We've learned which bestselling YA authors are coming to Charleston in November for YALLFest 2011! Thanks to Beautiful Creatures authors Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl, the list includes such megastars as Ellen Hopkins, David Levithan, Heather Brewer, and Melissa de la Cruz.

Major thanks to Jonathan Sanchez of Blue Bicycle Books, who is hosting the event!

CCPL is thrilled to be a partner...check out the FULL SCHEDULE HERE!