New YA Books Out This Week, October 9, 2024

The year is 2460 and 18-year-old Liv wants out of her lower class life in the Metro. She’s making money as a Proxy. The work involves using a neurochip in her brain to sell wealthy clients memories. She may do some of it illegally, but money is money, especially when you’re desperate. When a client offers Liv a huge sum of money to take her work into a dangerous area, she jumps at the chance, even if it is going to require legit survival.

Adrian is a Forceman and is a big believer in Law and Order. When he catches wind of a Proxy messing with the brain chemistry of citizens, he’s going to take care of the problem. But when he encounters Liv, there’s a huge problem: all of her memories are gone.

Now Adrian has a dilemma. Does he go after her for crimes she has no recollection of? And more, what if he’s starting to catch some feelings?

This is the first in a new duology and one for fans of political fantasy. It follows dutiful Raisa, who lives on Upper Earth. She’s been forever privileged and she’s fine with the arranged married her father is coordinating. Lein is the Crown Prince of Lower Earth, and though he’s from a different sphere than her, their unification, she believes, will benefit both the Upper and Lower Earth.

Nada of Lower Earth disagrees. She’s Raisa’s cousin and she is fiercely in opposition to the marriage. Nada thinks that the worlds will open up in violent ways, and so she puts plans into place to end the marriage.

Then Raisa goes missing a week before the wedding. All fingers point to Nada’s twin brother. But Lein isn’t going to let his bride-to-be go quietly. He wants his prize and the future he was promised through the marriage.

Readers who loved Wintergirls or who want a story about mental health will do well picking up Seal’s debut novel in verse. The book follows Evie, who has just admitted to having an eating disorder. She’s sent to an inpatient facility where she has to not only learn how to practice healthy habits but where she has to face her demons head-on.

Lucy is ready for college since she’ll finally be able to introduce herself as Lucy without the transphobic comments rife at her high school. She’ll get to be roommates with her best friend Callie and be close enough to a prestigious theater program to follow her dreams.

But when she goes for a campus tour and runs into two high school classmates who continue to hurl insults at Lucy, she begins to wonder if she needs to go elsewhere. She can’t relive her small-town life at what she thought was her dream college.

Lucy finds a new school on the list of most LGBTQ+-friendly colleges and realizes this is her chance. THIS might be the dream school. The problem? It’s so far from home…and it’s a woman’s college that, as far as she can tell, has never admitted a trans student.

Readers looking for a bloody Western need look no further. Faolan Kelly’s grandfather has died and she’s rendered homeless. The local authorities don’t think she’s mature enough at 16 to take over her grandfather’s homestead. Those authorities also think Falan is a guy, as her true identity has been a closely guarded secret by her grandfather. Were they to find out the truth, then she’d be married off ASAP.

The solution to Faolan and the town’s problem is proposed by the mayor: ship her off to the Settlement. That’s where social outcasts are shipped off to so they can be minded by His Benevolence Gideon Dillard.

Strange noises and Dillard himself are keeping Faolan from getting sleep or relaxing, and as she discovers the dead body of a fellow boarder, Faolan knows this is no “ordinary” murder. Something is out to get them all.

This, friends, may be one of my favorite books of 2024. It is everything you want and hope for in a new Jason Reynolds and then some.

Neon is locked in Aria’s bathroom because, in 24 seconds, they’re going to have sex. But, as much as this book is about the first time experience, it’s more than that. We follow Neon as he recounts the entire two-year relationship with Aria, from their first meeting to her relationship with Neon’s grandmother and so much more. This is a book about two fantastically drawn characters, as well as all of the little and big moments that make up the connections between two people.

You’ll read it in a sitting then want to reread it immediately.

More hardcover releases this week:

– Giddy Barber Explodes In 11 by Dina Havranek

– If You’re Not the One by Farah Naz Rishi

– Solis by Paola Mendoza and Abby Sher

– Wrong Answers Only by Tobias Madden

Eleanor’s acceptance into The Meadows is her ticket out of a community ravaged by climate change. Those who attend elite institutions like it are primed for great lives when they’re done.

But The Meadows is not what it seems. It is instead a reform institution, meant to erase the passions and urges of its students and groom them into a singular mindset and way of living. Eleanor is ready to believe the lessons of The Meadows, until she meets Rose.

As Eleanor and her friends embark on their post-Meadows life, though, everything she thought she knew about herself and her life unravels. Now she puts her life — and Rose’s — at stake.

Nikki is a budding photographer and is looking forward to spending five days with her father in Dubai to celebrate Diwali. However, she soon discovers that her neighbor and rival, Yash is also on the flight to Dubai.

Nikki’s family doesn’t know about the tension between the two and, with their sights on matchmaking, encourage Nikki to get cozy with Yash. But can they? Is their history too heavy?

Perhaps the celebration of light will change everything in this enemies-to-lovers rom-com.

A locked-door thriller set on an airplane? Let’s go!

Emily has grown up without much money and she takes the opportunity to join a competition abroad that would help cover college costs for her. But when Emily gets aboard the plane with 11 other contestants on the way to Europe, she knows immediately the competition is happening right there, right then.

As people begin to die on the flight, what lengths will Emily go to secure essential alliances that will ensure her survival?