We may all be English teachers and a little obsessed with the fact that “a lot” is not one word — but we also all love books. Dave Walsh and Alison Edwards are, unlike me, on the frontlines of educating junior-high and high-school students, so they have their fingers on the pulse of YA fiction (and some non-fiction), what kids are reading these days, what kids used to read, and what they think about what kids should be reading (which is, spoiler, pretty much what kids want to read!). Check out the list below for some of the books we talked about. You can hear the podcast at Soundcloud, or on iTunes or any other podcast platform.
Books Alison talked about:
On the Come Up by Angie Thomas
Opposite of Always, by Justin A. Reynolds
Front Lines by Michael Grant
Code Name Verity by Elizabeth E. Wein
Bomb by Steve Sheinkin
Trinity: A Graphic History of the First Atomic Bomb by Jonathan Fetter-Vorm
Pride, by Ibi Zoboi
The Poet X, by Elizabeth Acevedo
Long Way Down, by Jason Reynolds
Books by John Green
The Robber Bride and The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
The Anne of Green Gables books, by L.M. Montgomery
Marilla of Green Gables, by Sarah McCoy
The Hate You Give, by Angie Thomas
I Hunt Killers, by Barry Lyga
The Love and Lies of Rukhsana Ali, by Sabina Khan
Books Dave talked about:
I Am Princess X, by Cherie Priest
The Agony House, by Cherie Priest
The Harry Potter series, by J.K. Rowling
The Percy Jackson series, by Rick Riordan (and other series by Riordan)
The Shadowhunter series, by Cassandra Clare
Books by Sarah Dessen
The Lord of the Rings, by J.R.R. Tolkein
The Belgariad, by David Eddings
A Series of Unfortunate Events, by Lemony Snicket
The Arrival
The Bone series, by Jeff Smith
Akata Witch, by Nnedi Okorafor
Comic Books/Graphic Novels about:
Books I talked about:
The Outsiders, by S.E. Hinton
Children of Blood and Bone, by Tomi Adeyemi
The “Rick Riordan Presents” books
Shelf Esteem 