What are your favorite young adult books? Share them with us.

MAPark adds:
"Rashi's Daughter: Secret Scholar" by Maggie Anton. Published by JPS, this is a great book for Jewish girls - especially those studying for their Bat Mitzvah.

Linda's additions:
These are great lists! Missing from them (in my opinion of course) are:
Wee Free Men by Terry Pratchett and the following two in the trilogy: A Hat Full of Sky and The Wintersmith. This series is so funny yet also very smart. The 7th graders I work with through the school library where I work just love Terry Pratchett!
The other series that is fantastic is Sabriel, Lirael, and Abhorsen by Garth Nix.

Mugwumps says: Our book club's YA readers go crazy for Janet Tasjian's books, especially those about Larry. We had one of our best discussions around the anti-consumerism message of The Gospel According to Larry. If you had to pare down your existence to a certain number of items (as Larry does in the book), what things would stay and what things would go?
We also loved:
it's kind of a funny story, a novel by Ned Vizzinni
The Giver by Lisa Lowry
Skellig by David Almond
the Twilight series by Stephenie Meyer

MSLibrarian says:
My latest obsession is Twilight by Stephenie Meyer (and New Moon, the sequel, and Eclipse, book 3, which will be published in August).
* When her mother remarries, Bella moves from sunny Phoenix, AZ to the rainiest town in America, Forks, WA to live with her father, the town sheriff. As the new girl, she is an instant fascination and crush for almost everyone at the high school. Except the Cullen family and especially Edward Cullen, the most beautiful boy Bella has ever seen; he seems to be repulsed by her. This book is bigger than basic chick lit -- it is well-written and involves action, adventure, and vampires. It is the sort of book that I read and instantly wanted more, all of my students are begging for subsequent books in the series. Meyer's web site (www.stepheniemeyer.com) has the first chapter of Twilight written from Edward's perspective (a potential book project called Midnight Sun).

A few others that I love:
The Lightning Thief (great fun, although I cannot agree with Amy on the Harry Potter comment), by Rick Riordan
Lush, by Natasha Friend
The Boyfriend List, by E. Lockhart
Looking for Alaska, by John Green
Finding Lubchenko, by Michael Simmons
Tangerine, by Edward Bloor


Amy says:
Copper Sun by Sharon Draper took my breath away.
I Am The Messenger by Mark Zusak was captivating and engrossing
Autobiography of My Dead Brother by Walter Dean Myers broke my heart, and The Lightning Thief and The Sea of Monsters, by Rick Riordan are better than H. Potter, in my book!


LibrarianJack says:
Jane Yolen has written some really interesting books for young adults, my favorite of which is Queen's Own Fool: A Novel of Mary Queen of Scots. It's historical fiction that's full of adventure and a touch of gruesome war for the boys. The story is of royalty told from the vantage point of a poor traveling player whose fate changes when she becomes, as the title indicates, the Queen's own fool.

A few other favorites right now are:
Ashes of Roses by Mary Jane Auch
Chicks with Sticks: It's a Purl Thing by Elizabeth Lenhard
Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card
Gossamer by Lois Lowry
Make Lemonade by Virginia Euwer Wolff
Sand Dollar Summer by Kimberly Jones
Something Invisible by Siobhan Parkinson
Twilight Child by Sally Warner


Olivia says:
I loved all fantasy books when I was in upper grade school and junior high. Some of my favorite authors were Anne McCaffrey, Terry Brooks, Piers Anthony, and Mercedes Lackey. I think there's just something about that young adult age that draws you to sci-fi and fantasy.


Julia says:
Summer of My German Soldier by Bette Green is one of my favorites.
Holes by Louis Sachar
Tuck Everlasting by Natalie Babbitt
Running Out of Time by Margaret Peterson Haddix
City of Ember and People of Sparks by Jeanne Duprau.

Young adult books really impress me. There's always something new and unique about them. The stories are so original.

Jane Hyde's Favorites

Airborn -- Kenneth Oppel
Mortal Engines -- Philip Reeve
Redwall -- Brian Jacques
The Dark is Rising -- Susan Cooper
Tamar -- Mal Peet
Goldengrove -- Jill Paton Walsh
Unleaving -- "
The House in Norham Gardens -- Penelope Lively
His Dark Materials -- Philip Pullman

edref says:
Douglas Adams
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Universe
The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
Life, the Universe and Everything
So Long, and Thanks for all the Fish
Mostly Harmless
M. T. Anderson
Feed
Joan Bauer
Hope Was Here
Edward Bloor
Tangerine
Ray Bradbury
The Martian Chronicles
Fahrenheit 451
Kimberly Brubaker Bradley
For Freedom: The story of a French Spy
Ann Brashares
The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants
Sherry Bunin
Dear Great American Writers School
Gennifer Choldenko
Al Capone Does My Shirts
Robert Cormier
Frenchtown Summer
The Rag and Bone Shop
Christopher Paul Curtis
The Watsons Go to Birmingham -- 1963
Terry Davis
If Rock and Roll Were a Machine
Jennifer Donnelly
A Northern Light
William Golding
Lord of the Flies
Nikki Grimes
Jazmin's Notebook
Frank Herbert
Dune
Ken Kesey
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
Ron Koertge
Confess-O-Rama
John Marsden
Letters From the Inside
Walter Dean Myers
145th Street: Short Stories
Monster
Slam!
Somewhere in the Darkness
Handbook for Boys
Scorpions
Fallen Angels
Lauren Myracle
ttyl
An Na
A Step from Heaven
George Orwell
1984
Boris Pasternak
Dr. Zhizago
Katherine Paterson (Great writer! I want to read more of her books.)
Jacob Have I Loved
Gary Paulsen (Also great -- see Nonfiction, below.)
Hatchet
The Schernoff Discoveries
The Amazing Life of Birds
The Boy Who Owned the School
Richard Peck
A Year Down Yonder
A Long Way from Chicago
Daniel Pinkwater
The Education of Robert Nifkin
Alan Mendelsohn, the Boy From Mars
The Snarkout Boys and the Avocado of Death
Young Adult Novel
The Worms of Kukumlima
Borgel
Uncle Boris in the Yukon and Other Shaggy Dog Stories
Louise Rennison
Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging
Meg Rosoff
How I Live Now
Jerry Spinelli
Stargirl
Neal Stephenson
Snow Crash
Booth Tarkington
Seventeen
Rob Thomas
Rats Saw God
Doing Time: Notes from the Undergrad
J.R.R. Tolkien
The Hobbit
The Fellowship of the Ring
The Two Towers
The Return of the King
Kurt Vonnegut
Breakfast of Champions: or, Goodbye Blue Monday!
Cat's Cradle
Slaughterhouse-five: or, The Children's Crusade, a Duty-Dance with Death
Welcome to the Monkey House
Bill Watterson
The Complete Calvin and Hobbes (3 volumes)
H. G. Wells
War of the Worlds
Gloria Whelan
Homeless Bird
Gene Luen Yang
American Born Chinese
Nonfiction
Always Running: La Vida Loca: Gang Days in L.A., by Luis J. Rodriguez
Apollo 13, by Jim Lovell and Jeffrey Kluger (Original title: Lost Moon)
Between Silk and Cyanide: A Codemaker's War, by Leo Marks
Blind Courage, by Bill Irwin with David McCasland (blind Irwin hiked the entire Appalachian Trail, with his dog, Orient)
Book Review Digest
The Chess Mysteries of the Arabian Knights, by Raymond Smullyan (If you like chess, also try Learn to Play Go)
Critical Path, by R. Buckminster Fuller
Flight of Passage, by Rinker Buck
From Chocolate to Morphine: Everything You Need to Know about Mind-Altering Drugs, by Andrew Weil and Winifred Rosen
Fuller's Earth: A Day with Bucky and the Kids, by Richard Brenneman and R. Buckminster Fuller
Grayson, by Lynne Cox
Guts: The True Stories Behind Hatchet and the Brian Books, by Gary Paulsen
Hokkaido Highway Blues: Hitchhiking Japan, by Will Ferguson
Homage to Catalonia, by George Orwell
Humans in Universe, by Buckminster Fuller and Anwar Dil
I Thought My Father Was God and Other True Tales from NPR's National Story Project, edited by Paul Auster
Journey to the Ants: A Story of Scientific Exploration, by Bert Holldobler and Edward O. Wilson
Learn to Play Go, by Janice Kim (a 5-volume set)
Life in Prison, by "Tookie" Williams
Making Comics: Storytelling Secrets of Comics, Manga and Graphic Novels, by Scott McCloud
Maus: A Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History, by Art Spiegelman
Maus II: A Survivor's Tale: And Here My Troubles Began, by Art Spiegelman
The Medium is the Massage: An Inventory of Effects, by Marshall McLuhan and Quentin Fiore
My Life in Dog Years, by Gary Paulsen
Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood, by Marjane Satrapi
Persepolis 2: The Story of a Return, by Marjane Satrapi
Puppies, Dogs, and Blue Northers: Reflections on Being Raised by a Pack of Sled Dogs, by Gary Paulsen
Real Lives: Eleven Teenagers Who Don't Go to School Tell Their Own Stories, edited by Grace Llewellyn
Te-Tao Ching, translated by Robert Henricks (other translators call it Tao Te Ching)
The Teenage Liberation Handbook: How to Quit School and Get a Real Life and Education, by Grace Llewellyn
Uncle Tungsten: Memories of a Chemical Boyhood, by Oliver Sacks
Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art, by Scott McCloud
We the Media: Grassroots Journalism By the People, For the People, by Dan Gillmor
Winterdance: The Fine Madness of Running the Iditarod, by Gary Paulsen
Woodsong, by Gary Paulsen
Zombification, by Andrei Codrescu ("Our televisions have turned us into mute extensions of their shadow worlds. This is... zombification.")