Others: Positive When her mother is arrested for killing Brooke's abusive father, Brooke must confront the shadow of her family's violence and dysfunction. A twisted tragedy leaves Brooke and her siblings on their own in this provocative new novel from the New York Times bestselling author of The Way I Used To Be. How do you let go of something you’ve never had? Junior year for Brooke Winters is supposed to be about change. She’s transferring schools, starting fresh, and making plans for college so she can finally leave her hometown, her family, and her past behind. But all of her dreams are shattered one hot summer afternoon when her mother is arrested for killing Brooke’s abusive father. No one really knows what happened that day, if it was premeditated or self-defense, whether it was right or wrong. And now Brooke and her siblings are on their own. In a year of firsts—the first year without parents, first love, first heartbreak, and her first taste of freedom—Brooke must confront the shadow of her family’s violence and dysfunction, as she struggles to embrace her identity, finds her true place in the world, and learns how to let go.
Genres: young adult
Lists: …
Amber Smith
2016 · 384 pages · 1 review
Others: PositiveNew York Times bestseller! In the tradition of Speak, Amber Smith's extraordinary debut novel “is a heart-twisting, but ultimately hopeful, exploration of how pain can lead to strength” (The Boston Globe). Eden was always good at being good. Starting high school didn’t change who she was. But the night her brother’s best friend rapes her, Eden’s world capsizes. What was once simple, is now complex. What Eden once loved—who she once loved—she now hates. What she thought she knew to be true, is now lies. Nothing makes sense anymore, and she knows she’s supposed to tell someone what happened but she can’t. So she buries it instead. And she buries the way she used to be. Told in four parts—freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior year—this provocative debut reveals the deep cuts of trauma. But it also demonstrates one young woman’s strength as she navigates the disappointment and unbearable pains of adolescence, of first love and first heartbreak, of friendships broken and rebuilt, all while learning to embrace the power of survival she never knew she had hidden within her heart.
What made the match, strongest first
Robin Roe
2017 · 310 pages · 8 reviews
Others: Overwhelmingly positive"Adam, a high school senior, rescues Julian, a freshman, from an abusive situation"--
What made the match, strongest first
Elizabeth Acevedo
2020 · 432 pages · 19 reviews
Others: Overwhelmingly positiveIn a novel-in-verse that brims with grief and love, National Book Award-winning and New York Times bestselling author Elizabeth Acevedo writes about the devastation of loss, the difficulty of forgiveness, and the bittersweet bonds that shape our lives. Camino Rios lives for the summers when her father visits her in the Dominican Republic. But this time, on the day when his plane is supposed to land, Camino arrives at the airport to see crowds of crying people… In New York City, Yahaira Rios is called to the principal’s office, where her mother is waiting to tell her that her father, her hero, has died in a plane crash. Separated by distance—and Papi’s secrets—the two girls are forced to face a new reality in which their father is dead and their lives are forever altered. And then, when it seems like they’ve lost everything of their father, they learn of each other.
What made the match, strongest first
Brandy Colbert
2017 · 341 pages · 1 review
Others: PositiveWhen Suzette comes home to Los Angeles from her boarding school in New England, she isn't sure if she'll ever want to go back. LA is where her friends and family are (along with her crush, Emil). And her stepbrother, Lionel, who has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, needs her emotional support. But as she settles into her old life, Suzette finds herself falling for someone new; the same girl her brother is in love with. When Lionel's disorder spirals out of control, Suzette is forced to confront her past mistakes and find a way to help her brother before he hurts himself, or worse.
What made the match, strongest first
Paula Weston
2013 · 394 pages · 2 reviews
Others: PositiveStill grieving over the death of her twin brother, Gaby Winters dreams every night that she's fighting and killing hell-beasts, then meets Rafa, who not only looks exactly like the guy who's been appearing in her dreams, but tells her things about her brother and her life that surely can't be true.
What made the match, strongest first
Richelle Mead
2011 · 6 reviews
Others: Overwhelmingly positiveThis is another amazing series written by Richelle Mead. If you loved The Vampire Academy you need to read this one as well. When alchemist Sydney is ordered into hiding to protect the life of Moroi princess Jill Dragomir, the last place she expects to be sent is a human private school in Palm Springs, California. Populated with new faces as well as familiar ones, Bloodlines explores all the friendship, romance, battles, and betrayals that made the #1 New York Times bestselling Vampire Academy series so addictive--this time in a part-vampire, part-human setting where the stakes are even higher and everyone's out for blood.
What made the match, strongest first
Loved itit was just so freaking amazing among all of the turmoil in Brookes life along this story she is also coming to terms of the fact that she is a lesbian and begins dating this really cool edgy other lesbian at school and it is just the relationship is so wonderful I love them so much
