Your Summer Bucket List: Sizzling Summer YA Books

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This summer was filled with tons of highly anticipated young adult releases, and we can’t wait to read them all! We’ve listed our top 10 YA books that you’ll want to be sure to add to your TBR and read before the season ends. From epic fantasies to nail-biting mysteries, you will be sure to find your next favorite summer read! 

Take Me Home Tonight by Morgan Matson

Best friends Kat and Stevie have decided to spend a night at New York City without their parents’ knowledge. What was supposed to be a dazzling adventure filled with theatre, delicious food, and seeing the best sights in the city ends up being a disaster before they can even get off the train. The girls deal with broken phones, family trouble, Pomeranians, and cute boys. They explore museums and crash a few parties. During their hilarious overnight trip, Kat and Stevie come to terms with themselves, their future, and their friendship. 

Realm Breaker by Victoria Aveyard

A dark, mysterious force is approaching the kingdom of Allward and only one bloodline has the power to stop it and Taristan from continuing to wreak havoc by opening long dormant portals. Corayne an-Amarat, daughter of a fearsome pirate, finds out that she is the last of the ancient lineage and is the last hope to save the world from Taristan’s destruction. She and a group of rag-tag companions band together to take on monsters and attempt to save the world as they know it. Fans of Victoria Aveyard’s Red Queen series will want to be sure to get their hands on this newest trilogy!

XOXO by Axie Oh

Jenny’s goal is to get into a prestigious music program, and she is making no exceptions for distractions. That is, until she meets Jaewoo. Jenny allows herself to break free from her carefully made plans for one night with Jaewoo until he disappears without a word. Three months later, Jenny travels to South Korea with her mother to help her sick grandmother and soon discovers that Jaewoo is also in the program that she’s enrolled in. It turns out that he is in one of the biggest K-pop bands and is forbidden from dating. Jenny must choose between following her detailed plan or fighting for a chance at love with a mysterious boy. 

An Emotion of Great Delight by Tahereh Mafi

Shadi may be named for joy, but all she is surrounded by is sorrow. She’s a Muslim girl trying to navigate life in a post 9/11 world in 2003, where the Muslim community is recently being targeted and harassed. On top of that, Shadi must deal with her personal problems including her brother’s death, her father’s declining health, her mother spiraling, and her best friend refusing to talk to her. Shadi tries to keep it in, but she doesn’t know how much pain she can shelter within herself before breaking. This story delves deep into personal identity, love, and finding hope when all things seem lost. 

They’ll Never Catch Us by Jessica Goodman

Sisters Stella and Ellie couldn’t be more different but the one thing that they do have in common is their connection to the new girl Mila Keene, a threat to both sisters on the cross-country team. But over time, the sisters individually form a friendship with Mila. Ella is desperate for a friend after her boyfriend betrayed her and her best friend moved, while Stella allows herself to be distracted by Mila after she sees herself in the new girl. Regionals is just around the corner and the girls have put friendship aside for the sake of competition, but when Mila goes on a run and disappears, Stella and Ellie are considered suspects.

21 Questions by Alexandria Rose Rizik

Kendra Dime is training for the 2010 USA Surfing Prime West in honor of her late brother as a way to help her heal from the anxiety attacks she has had since his overdose. She soon meets Brock Parker, the new bad boy in school who deals drugs for his parents that are connected to a Mexican drug lord, at homecoming and they instantly connect. That night, they play 21 Questions, learning more about each other and themselves. Even though they are from two different worlds, Kendra and Brock try to fight for the hope of a brighter future and help each other heal in the process. 

Like a Love Song by Gabriela Martins 

Natalie is living her best life as a top selling Brazilian pop star, setting records, and having the best boyfriend. Her successful career seems to be perfect until her boyfriend breaks up with her on live television. This humiliating event could lead to the collapse of the career she worked so hard for, and people are starting to talk. Her PR team sets her up with William, a softhearted British indie star, as a way to help her get her way back to the top with a swoon worthy man by her side. But as Natalie starts to fall for William, she realizes that she may be the biggest fake there ever was. 

Rise to The Sun by Leah Johnson

Olivia has never had great success at romance and her latest breakup resulted in her being an outcast at school and at home. Determined to start fresh, she and her best friend attend the Farmland Music and Arts Festival. Toni’s first year of college is quickly approaching and she still isn’t sure what she wants to do with her life. She decides to attend the music festival as a way to follow her late musician-turned-roadie father’s footsteps. The two meet each other and spend the weekend learning about themselves and their growing feelings for each other. 

Tokyo Ever After by Emiko Jean

Izumi Tanaka feels alone in her mostly white California town, where she has to go by Izzy because it’s “easier that way.” She soon discovers her father’s identity and that he is the Crown Prince of Japan. Izzy travels to Japan to meet her father and to live the fairytale of being a princess in the country she has always dreamed of. However, being a princess is more difficult as she thought and she must manage difficult family, dreamy bodyguards, learning years of tradition, and proving that she’s “Japanese enough.” 

A Lair of Bones by Helen Scheuerer

Ever since the moment Roh was born, she has been despised by her own kind. Being the daughter of an infamous cyren criminal, Roh has been thrown down to the Lower Section of the Saddoriel lair and is forced to work as a bone cleaner. Believing that she is destined for greater things, Roh signs up for the Queen’s Tournament, a highly difficult and dangerous set of trials where the winner is crown Queen of Saddoriel. Roh must fight against the most powerful cyren in all the realms in order to win the crown and her freedom. 

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