I recently published a YA novel, Fingerprints. As a result, I was asked to write an article about my all time, top 10 favorite YA books for a parenting website.
Sounds like an easy task at first, but once I started thinking about it, I realized that weeding out thousands of books to identify my top 10 would be no easy task. I mean, how can I compare a blockbuster award winner like Looking for Alaska to a lesser known and seriously gritty favorite like Amy Reed's Beautiful?
How can I include the beach read fun of Gossip Girl (You know you love her.) on the same list as a haunting classic like Judy Blume's Tiger Eyes?
Then I thought, "Whatever. It's my list."
So, what book or books would you put on an all time favorite list and why?
xoxo,
Suzanne
PS - Yes, that is one of my bookshelves. And yes, I may be the biggest Sarah Dessen fan alive.
My favorite all time YA Novel is "Alan Mendelsohn, the Boy from Mars" by Daniel Pinkwater. It's a hysterical outcast-nerd-boy-in-a-school-full-of-yuppies-and-jocks book, complete with mind control, clueless child psychologists, and parallel dimensions.
ReplyDeleteAnother classic from Pinkwater is his aptly named "Young Adult Novel." It's about a group of high school students who have a dadaist writing club, "The Wild Dada Ducks." They write short fiction all based on a fictional character named Kevin Shapiro. Then one day, an actual boy named Kevin Shapiro moves to their school. They start worshiping him, but he isn't impressed...
And of course, "Ender's Game" by Orson Scott Card is an all time science-fiction classic. It's about a young boy who is put in intense training from kindergarten through his teenage years to learn how to fight off an alien invasion. Great Twilight Zone twist at the end.
Oh Dear, What ever happened to Black Beauty, Nancy Drew, etc. I'm out of my league here,
ReplyDeletebut I do remember all the Judy Blume books strewn aroung your room !!!!
I would have to include Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone.
ReplyDeleteOh, and HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY
ReplyDeleteMany, many children's books would be on my list, including the Little House ones. I loved those so much growing up.
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