Teens
In Darkness by Nick Lake
Shorty is lying in the rubble of the great Haitian earthquake of 2010. If he's not rescued soon, he will die. Shorty is from Site Soley, the sprawling slum of Port-au-Prince. After the murder of his father and abduction of his twin sister, Shorty has allowed himself to fall further and further into the slum's gang culture. But Route 9 isn't all about drug-dealing and gun-running - it's also about feeding the poor and educating the children. And Shorty has a great deal to teach his readers, as he recounts his life while waiting to die. Full review...
Trapped by Michael Northrop
When school closes early because of the snow coming down, Scott and his friends decide to take advantage of the extra time to work on a go-kart they've been building in shop class. But with nearly everyone else having left the school, and the snow coming down faster and faster, they realise they may have made a terrible mistake. So begins a chilling (sorry!) tale, which sees seven students struggle to hold on as the weather gets ever worse. Full review...
Street of Tall People by Alan Gibbons
It's the East End of London, and it's 1936, and it's a time of fighting. Jewish lad Benny, and Jimmy, who's rather more C-of-E, are going to become firm friends through having a boxing bout against each other. Benny is fighting against the more extreme anti-Goyim sentiments of his neighbour Yaro. Jimmy has to fight, it seems, against life, what with his father dieing and his mother having found a new boyfriend, putting a sense of social outcast on the lad. And all through this is the fight to come, around the corner, against Oswald Mosley's Blackshirts. Full review...
Smoulder by Brenna Yovanoff
Daphne is a quiet teenage girl who is half-demon and half-fallen angel. She's the daughter of Lucifer and Lilith and her sisters are seductive soul-sucking succubi (sibilance!). However, Daphne is more like her brother, Obie, whose gentle nature and genuine kindness make him an oddity in Pandemonium. When her brother leaves to make a life for himself on Earth, Daphne finds herself alone, confused and unsure of her future; but when she learns that her brother has been kidnapped by a psychopathic archangel she realises that she will stop at nothing to save him, even if that means going to Earth alone and facing the risk of being hunted and destroyed by Azrael. Full review...
Bullet Boys by Ally Kennen
Alex is a crack shot. His gamekeeper father trained him well.
Levi would rather pull a girl than a trigger.
Max is a bomb about to go off.
These are three unlikely friends. Alex doesn't really want to do his A levels. He'd rather join his father in estate management. But his father feels he needs to connect with the world more, especially since his mother died, and so Alex goes along with his wishes with as glad a heart as he can manage. Max doesn't have much choice either. Expelled from his posh private school and a severe disappointment to his military family, Hammerton is his last chance to salvage some chance of a future. Levi provides the link between these two wildly different boys. He's an easygoing, happy-go-lucky lad whose dreams are much more about being a lover than a fighter. Full review...
The Unforgotten Coat by Frank Cottrell Boyce
Julie lives in Bootle and is in her last year of primary school. She's like every little girl, hoping to be invited to her friends' houses for tea and just beginning to think about boys. She's never thought much about the world outside Bootle but the arrival of Chingis and his younger brother Nergui is about to change all that. The two boys are nomads from Mongolia and they arrive at school on a hot summer's day, wearing traditional Mongolian furry coats and hats. Taking a shine to Julie, Chingis appoints her his Good Guide to the UK. And in return he tells her stories of horsemen and eagles and shows her Polaroid photos of a land far away. Full review...
After Obsession by Carrie Jones and Steven E Wedel
Aimee Avery isn't a normal teenage girl. She has supernatural abilities – Aimee is a healer. But something evil is calling to her to the River, like her mother who drowned in the River. Aimee's mum had supernatural abilities too, and was branded insane by those around her. But was she? Or is there something really out there killing people in the river? Was Aimee's mum's suicide a suicide at all? Full review...
Heart of Stone by Melanie Welsh
We're back in the coastal town of Wellow to catch up with Verity Gallant and her pals. Verity has had a marvellous summer spent sailing with Henry but we all know peaceful times are unlikely to last... Full review...
A Witch in Winter by Ruth Warburton
Anna and her father have just moved to the coastal town of Winter - they needed to downsize. So Anna finds herself at a new school trying to make new friends. So when she finds a book of spells and Prue, Liz and June suggest trying the one which will enchant a boy to love you, Anna goes along with it - despite not believing in magic - and thinks of the gorgeous Seth Waters when she closes her eyes. And it's the worst thing she could have done...
... because Anna is a witch. Full review...
Deep Deep Down by Garrett Carr
Ewan can see monsters, wherever he is. That's not because he has any special abilities - unlike his friend May, who can telepathically talk to the animals, or Andrew, who starts this book a sub-human, with a Hellboy-type mutated and very mighty arm, and demons writhing inside him sending him berserk. No, Ewan can see monsters everywhere he looks because life is like that - especially adults. So when May decides a fabled pool of magical water is what can cure Andrew, they go and find an idyllic place of long life, peace and Utopia. And still Ewan can see monsters. But which side is of more danger to the other? Full review...
Midnight Blue by Pauline Fisk
Bonnie has finally got away from Grandbag and Aunt Doreen and gone to live with her - very young - mother, Maybelle. Maybelle may be nervous and insecure but she brims over with love. And love is something Grandbag doesn't understand too well at all. For Grandbag, it's all about control and possession. But for Maybelle, it's about sharing, bright colours, pretty plants and pancakes for breakfast. Finally, there's some optimism in Bonnie's life.
But it doesn't last long. Full review...
Torn by Cat Clarke
A week in the Scottish Wilderness doesn't exactly sound fun, not to Alice King, but that's what she's about to embark on. Her and her classmates are off on an activity holiday together – walking, climbing, caving. Alice is fortunately put in a cabin with her best friend Cass, so things can't be too bad. But, then Tara Chambers, the popular girl, gets put in their cabin too - things definitely just got worse. Tara, though beautiful is powerful, mean and likes nothing more than putting people down. Full review...
Dark Warning by Marie Louise Fitzpatrick
Taney Tyrell lives in a room in Missus Kenny's boarding house in Dublin. She shares it with her father, her step-mother Mary Kate and her little brother Jon Jon. Life is hard but both Da and Mary Kate are working and they get by. But Taney is lonely. Ever since she was a tiny thing she has known she can see things before they happen. She has the gift of second sight. But Da and Mary Kate don't see it as a gift. They see it as a curse and worse, the curse that killed Taney's mother. But whatever they say, Taney's gift won't be denied. It's as much a part of her as her beautiful red hair. Full review...
The Ingo Chronicles: Stormswept by Helen Dunmore
Morveren and her twin sister Jenna live with their parents in an isolated community on an island off the coast of Cornwall. A causeway leads to the mainland at low tide but at high tide they are cut off. Music is intrinsic to the islanders and Morveren's little brother Digory has a special talent for playing the violin. One day, he will play the special violin of island legend, but for now, Conan's fiddle sits high on a shelf waiting for him. Full review...
Lia's Guide to Winning the Lottery by Keren David
Lia is obsessed with a guy called Raf who barely seems to know she exists. She has a sister who's got some problems at school, a mother who never seems to stop nagging... and an £8 million lottery ticket in her pocket. Suddenly, she's a lot more popular with her family and friends - but is winning the riches on offer all that it's cracked up to be? Full review...
The Cry of the Wolf by Melvin Burgess
hought to have been extinct in Britain for centuries, there are actually 70 English wolves left when Ben meets the Hunter. Burning with mortification at being mocked for poor shooting skills, Ben lets the carefully-guarded secret slip to this awful, vile man. And over the next three years, the Hunter makes it his business to find and kill these beautiful, rare creatures. Eventually, there is only one family left and Silver and Conna will do anything to protect their cub, the last of his kind... Full review...
Young Sherlock Holmes: Fire Storm by Andrew Lane
The estate of Arthur Conan Doyle has authorised Andrew Lane to write a series of books about the early years of Sherlock Holmes, and if this book is typical then they made an excellent choice. Through these stories we see the development of the complex and sometimes contradictory aspects of Sherlock's personality, set in the context of the most thrilling adventures and courageous acts of derring-do a young person could desire. Full review...
Sweetly by Jackson Pearce
This book is the second in a series of fairy tale retellings (the first being Sisters Red) which, without being closely connected, share common elements. They both deal with the paranormal, including the Fenris, which are about as far from the glamorous and sexy werewolves of recent books and films as you can get. They stalk. They kill. They eat. End of story. The two books also look at the aftermath of an attack, and how it changes the lives of those who survive. Full review...
Shelter by Harlan Coben
Mickey Bolitar's girlfriend Ashley has disappeared, the latest in a long list of things to go wrong in his life. First his father died, then his junkie mother went into rehab, forcing him to move in with his uncle Myron, and now shy, beautiful Ashley has vanished. Full review...
Runelight by Joanne Harris
Runelight continues several years after Runemarks left off. The rescue of the gods has left a rift between the Worlds which allows demons and assorted ephemera to escape from Chaos into Malbry and spread towards World's End, a lawless city now it has no Order to maintain it. With Odin dead and the surviving gods power-stripped and forced to inhabit bodies of Folk, there is little chance of re-establishing Order. And with the End of the Worlds prophesied in just twelve days, the task of rebuilding Asgard and preventing it is Herculean. Full review...
The Complete Philosophy Files by Stephen Law
The Philosophy Files and The Philosophy Files 2 were first published in 2000 and 2003 respectively. Now we have them combined and reissued with illustrations by the wonderful Daniel Postgate. Full review...
Ashes by Ilsa Bick
Alex is hiking in the wilderness when it all kicks off. Suffering from a brain tumour and with only Aunt Hannah to care about, she has a mission to complete before it's too late. She is enjoying - as much as she could enjoy anything - the solitude and her memories, cruelly truncated by the cancer, which come in tiny, sparkling, precious moments. And then comes the zap. A catastrophic electromagnetic pulse sweeps across the globe and destroys almost everything. There are few survivors and most of those who do make it through have become psychotic, flesh-eating monsters. Those who haven't changed are in terrible trouble. Society is in ruins, all communication has broken down, and the flesh-eaters are hunting. Full review...
Beautiful Chaos by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl
Those of you who've been hooked on this series already will remember where we left off. A choice was made. Everything seems to have been changed. And now, we find, the End of Days is near… Dark characters lurk. Some who we thought (or hoped) were gone, have returned. Other things we’ve not seen before are starting to tear the small town of Gatlin apart. The shorthand way of summing up how terrible things are is to note that Mrs Lincoln may be one of the good guys now… Full review...
Between by Jessica Warman
Elisabeth Valcher, a spoilt, vain but popular girl, wakes up after a party to celebrate her 18th birthday on her father's yacht to discover herself dead, lying face down in the water. Luckily for Liz, who has trouble remembering exactly who she is and what happened in the run up to her death, she is soon joined by another ghost, Alex, one of the unpopular boys from her high school, who was killed a year earlier in a hit and run accident. Full review...
Fly by Night by Frances Hardinge
The Fractured Realm is a country existing in an uneasy peace. Each province is ruled by the craftsmen guilds which hold ultimate control, an ineffective Duke, and citizens who honour a multitude of demi-gods, 'The Beloved', who haunt them their entire life. This is the world Mosca Mye inhabits. An orphan, Mosca is fostered by her aunt and uncle, who think little of her and use her as a bookkeeper due to her unique, and quite illegal, ability to read and write. She runs away the night she burns their mill to the ground. Full review...
Playground by 50 Cent
When Butterball fills a sock with batteries and attacks geeky Maurice in the playground, his school sends him off to twice-weekly meetings with a therapist. Butterball is not impressed. It's a waste of his time and he will never, never, tell anyone the truth about that day. Besides, any problem could be easily fixed if his mother just gave up on this idea of nursing school and moved them out of the stifling suburbs and back to New York City.
But Liz has other ideas... Full review...
Virtuosity by Jessica Martinez
Carmen Bianchi plays the violin; in fact she might well be the best young violinist in the world. She plays a Stradivarius worth $1.2 million, provided by the grandparents who otherwise have little to do with her and she's managed by her mother, whose word is law. Schooling is provided by a home tutor – and she doesn't even get to knock on doors because of the possible damage to her hands: she kicks instead. So far she hasn't really minded that she doesn't have a life outside of violin, but then she meets Jeremy King – a fellow competitor in the world's most prestigious violin competition – and she has to think about her priorities. Full review...
Darkness Falls by Mia James
April's not had the best time of it lately. First her family up and moved her clear across the country and sent her to an exclusive college full of the smartest (and apparently most beautiful) kids in the country. Then, while April was struggling to fit in, she discovered Ravenwood school's terrible secret - it's run by vampires. Full review...
Ten Things We Shouldn't Have Done by Sarah Mlynowski
April doesn't want to move to Cleveland with her dad and his new wife. She doesn't want to move to Paris with her mum either. So April decides the best thing to do is to move in with her best friend Vi, and Vi's mum. But, Vi's mum has recently landed herself the role as Mary Poppins in a travelling theatre, so she's not going to be home. That's not going to stop April from staying in Westport, armed with a couple of fake emails addresses the plan is set. Full review...
CRYPT: The Gallows Curse by Andrew Hammond
A warning: do not begin to read this book while eating your lunch, as this unfortunate reviewer did. There's nothing quite like the description of people in an underground train being ripped apart, then having their faces chewed off by bugs, to put you off your egg and cress. In fact, you may develop a strong aversion to the whole of London Transport by the time you've finished this book, which will definitely not please Uncle Boris. Full review...
Prized (Birthmarked) by Caragh M O'Brien
The Cool Age - our age - is long gone. Few people made it and those that did now live in isolated communities. Gaia Stone, a young midwife, has just escaped from the Enclave, where genetic manipulation has both saved and condemned the select few. The rest live in poverty. Lost in the wasteland, Gaia and her baby sister Maya are rescued by Peter, an outranger from another settlement, Sylum. Full review...
Naked by Kevin Brooks
Lili is a quiet student, not hip or trendy or in demand, and she spends most of her time playing the piano. She's an unlikely candidate for the nascent punk scene but Curtis Ray, the school's charismatic bad boy, doesn't agree. He recruits Lili to his band Naked, and it's not long before Lili gets naked with Curtis in more ways than one. As the band begins to make a name for itself on the burgeoning punk scene, fame-obsessed Curtis gets drawn further and further in and his drug-fuelled behaviour becomes more and more erratic. Full review...
Ruby Rocksparkle: Her Wildly Incredible Adventure by Jean Clemens Loftus
Ruby Rocksparkle and her thirteen - yes! thirteen! - siblings are all named after gemstones. Ruby's father is a peasant farmer in the happy little kingdom of Felicitania. Felicitania is ruled by the kingly King Flavian and his beautiful second wife, Queen Morgana. His son, Prince Alano, is busily preparing for the day when he must rule, and the time for him to find a wife is fast approaching. Ruby, a vivid, read-headed beauty, dreams of marrying Prince Alano. If only he could ever marry a commoner - but even Ruby knows that could never be. Full review...
Mister Creecher by Chris Priestley
Ooh, ooh - two Frankenstein-related books one after the other! More of that in the further reading at the end. Mr Creecher isn't a retelling, a sequel or a prequel; it's an interlude, set midway through the events of Mary Shelley's novel.
It's Regency London, the Industrial Revolution is beginning to crank up, and Billy is an orphan and pickpocket trying to survive in the grimy streets. About to rob what he thinks is a corpse, Billy is set upon by some acquaintances to whom he owes money. Before Fletcher's knife prises out Billy's eye, the corpse - not a corpse at all, in case you didn't guess - comes to his rescue. This huge, shambling man is not a pretty sight. But he has a job for Billy. Mr Creecher has come to London on the trail of Victor Frankenstein, with whom he has a bargain. And he needs Billy to follow Frankenstein to make sure he doesn't renege on the deal. Full review...
Verity Fibbs by Cathy Brett
Verity Fibbs is the daughter of fashion designer Saffron Fibbs. Saffron's brought her up on her own and made a pretty good job of it without a lot of input from Verity's 'bio-dad'. Verity's used to the celebrity lifestyle although Saffron does her best to keep her feet firmly on the ground, with or without coffee suede boots. The latest buzz is that Saff and Eden Greenfield are dating – it's even trending on Twitter – and Verity is getting texts asking if the fashion magnate is going to be her new Dad. When Vee wants to retreat from all this she plays an online game called Demon Streets, although she's obviously not addicted. Before long she's going to find that she's playing the game against a real, live villain. Full review...
Number the Stars by Lois Lowry
Copenhagen, 1943, and everyone from schoolgirls like Annemarie up are suffering from shortages, fear and loathing - all caused by Nazi occupiers. But it's always been an open country, has Denmark, and no less than the King takes a daily horse ride, protected in plain view by every single loyal subject. But when, on the Jewish New Year, word gets out that Jews will have to be hidden more discretely, things kick into action. Annemarie and her family take her best friend, Ellen, to the country for safety. But it seems death will even follow them there... Full review...
This Dark Endeavour by Kenneth Oppel
Victor and Konrad Frankenstein are twins, born just two minutes apart. They look alike but their personalities couldn't be more different. Konrad is calm, assured and capable. People like him. Victor is intense and arrogant with a burning ambition. He rubs people up the wrong way more often than not. The twins live with their beautiful, sometimes wayward, cousin Elizabeth and the three are educated alongside great friend and wordsmith Henry. It's a charmed life in the Frankenstein chateau in the Genevese republic. Full review...
The Goddess Test by Aimee Carter
When Kate's mother makes a dying wish to return to her home town, Eden, Kate drops what's left of her life and goes with her. She doesn't want to make friends – she's here for her mum and nothing else – so she's not very interested when popular girl Ava, with her jock boyfriend Dylan, invites her to a party. Full review...
Wave Hunter: The Book of Water by Beth Webb
As the Iron Age comes to a close, Romans are sweeping across the British countryside destroying anyone who stands in their way. The druids are a particular target - the Romans understand all too well that the society they seek to subdue revolves around its religion and its sacred places. Tegen is determined to stop them. As the Star Dancer, the young druid girl's destiny is to avert a great evil, and she believes that evil is the Roman invasion. Full review...
Far Rockaway by Charlie Fletcher
Cat Manno and her grandfather Victor have a long-held ambition: to one day take the subway and ride it right the way to the very end, to Far Rockaway. Just for the sheer hell of it. But when the day comes, Cat's brother doesn't show. This is more than a disappointment to Cat - it's an utter betrayal. She needed Joe on the trip because she has a guilty secret. She hasn't read the latest book Victor gave her - he sends her a classic adventure every year on her birthday - and she knows he'll want to discuss as it they ride the train. Without Joe, Cat has no chance of concealing her sin. Full review...
Velvet by Mary Hooper
The opening chapter of this book is a roller-coaster of a read. Velvet has fainted while doing back-breaking, gruelling work in a laundry, and risks being sent to the workhouse. Quick thinking saves her job, and the reader relaxes, only to learn a shocking and shameful secret about the heroine we have already begun to like. Her fortunes soon change, in true Dickensian style, but her troubles are not over: this same secret will come back to haunt her (please excuse the pun) and put her in the power of one of the other characters. Full review...
Dust & Decay by Jonathan Maberry
Dust & Decay picks up the action six months after Rot & Ruin's climactic battle with Charlie Pink-eye and the Motor City Hammer. Benny and his friends have spent the time honing their self-defence and zombie-killing skills through some very intense training by Tom. And now, the time is finally right. They're about to head back out into the Ruin in search of the jet plane they saw in the sky after the battle at Gameland. There might, just might, be a real civilisation surviving somewhere on the continent. Full review...
D4rk Inside by Jeyn Roberts
4. Earthquakes shudder across the world.
3. SOMETHING is released.
2. Trust no one - not even yourself.
1. The killing game has begun...
Full review...
Maphead by Lesley Howarth
MapHead and his father Ran are of the Subtle World. Ran can travel through time, make things disappear and erase human memories. MapHead can flash the map of any place across his face and bald scalp. MapHead is a halfling and now he is almost 12, Ran has brought him to meet his human mother. As they need to pass for humans, they've taken new names - Boothe and Powers, from a random movie - practised their English, and enrolled MapHead at the same school as his half-brother. Full review...
The Alien in the Garage and Other Stories by Rob Keeley
Would aliens like custard creams? Can fake tan hide a big lie? Are TV remotes sinister objects? Do secrets make you popular?
Rob Keeley explores all these questions and more in a super collection of slightly spooky, blackly comic short stories. They're beautifully observed and you can see that Rob knows children well. He has the emotional landscape exactly right and is equally accurate when describing - and sometimes gently mocking - peer relationships. Full review...
Haunted by Susan Cooper, Joseph Delaney, Berlie Doherty, Jamila Gavin, Matt Haig, Robin Jarvis, Derek Landy, Sam Llewellyn, Mal Peet, Philip Reeve and Eleanor Updale
I've always enjoyed a good ghost story – whether at a sleepover when I was a teenager, or even now reading horror stories in bed in the middle of the night. As soon as I saw this book I knew I wanted to read it, and it did not disappoint; a group of excellent authors from all genres have come together and the result is a collection of brilliant stories not to be missed by any ghost hunters out there. Full review...
A Long, Long Sleep by Anna Sheehan
This is a book set in the future, with hover-cars and eye-scans and travel to other planets. But make no mistake – that's not what this book is about. Sixteen-year-old Rose has been asleep for far longer than she intended; in the meantime the world has almost come to an end in a terrible plague, and her stasis tube has been abandoned in a basement. If Brendan had not come exploring, she might never have been found at all. But how is that possible? How could the daughter and heiress of the most powerful couple in the galaxy have been forgotten? This book is about her awakening, and the slow, painful unfurling of the real facts of her early life. Full review...