For some reason, I’ve had a significant slow down with YA novels this year. I’ve just not been able to settle down and focus on reading, no matter how intriguing various books sound. Most of the time I’ve resorted to audiobooks for which I tend to pick non-fiction books. Thanks to a long haul flight though, I had no distractions to keep me from Mirage. I was happily entertained.
LOST FOR WORDS by Stephanie Butland
Lost for Words is the sort of book that requires time and patience from the reader. During the first 100 pages, I considered abandoning the book a few times. I was bored with the writing style and didn’t enjoy jumping around three points in the protagonist’s life — 2016, 2013 and 1999. Two alternating timelines are already more than I tend to like. Three was pushing it.
THE POET X by Elizabeth Acevedo
Usually, when I find out a book is a novel in verse, I will skip it. The Poet X, however, sounded so relatable, that I stepped out of my reading comfort zone. Let me tell you, it was absolutely worth it!
THE MEMORY OF LIGHT by Francisco X. Stork
The Memory of Light is such an excellent book. It’s not excitingly adrenaline-pumping, although there are some intense moments. On the contrary, it’s an exceedingly introspective book dealing with the realities of mental illness. It portrays the complexities of mental health and the difficulties of diagnosing and treating those who are mentally ill.
GRAFFITI MOON by Cath Crowley
My favourite undergrad project was graffiti. I spent an entire semester studying the subculture of graffiti, which was a more than colourful endeavour. What I noticed then was the lack of representation of graffiti in YA literature. Perhaps it’s the deviant nature of it that precludes it from being written about so freely? Or maybe it’s also the difficulty of access, which could be limiting authors’ understanding of graffiti.
