Zombie Baseball Beatdown by Paolo Bacigalupi

Recently, I ordered several books for our school library, including this much-hyped middle grade novel about immigration reform. I mean, about conditions in the meat processing industry. No! It's about corruption in the legal system based on the evils of money. Ack! What I am trying to say is, a novel about ZOMBIES. Yeah, that's right! It's about zombies, and baseball. Or so I am reminded, when I look at the cover....

It's Kind of a Funny Story, by Ned Vizzini

Craig Gilner "wasn't someone you'd pay a lot of attention to."

According to him, "you wouldn't see me in the halls at school and go "There he goes, Craig Gilner - I wonder what he's up to."" He's just a regular guy, gets decent grades, got into a good high school and can't quite handle the stress, has a crush on his best friend's girlfriend, and, oh yeah, his depression is so bad he can't eat, ever, and one night he walks into a hospital and tells them he wants to kill himself, and ends up in an adult psychiatric ward surrounded by a fascinating cast of characters that are simultaneously very funny and very sad.

It's Kind of a Funny Story is a novel, but it's based on the author's actual experiences of hospitalization for suicidal ideation. "It's 85% true," he said in an interview.

And the title is perfect, because it really shouldn't be funny. But it is. When Craig calls a suicide hotline, the operator isn't helpful: "For someone in Anxiety Management, he's giving me an exercise that is fairly confusing and anxiety-provoking." When the cop assigned to watch him him in the emergency room is talking on his cell phone, Craig wonders 'what company gives you service in here; they could like use it on a commercial: a guy behind padded walls, "can you hear me now?" Craig is smart and complex enough to see the humor in his extraordinarily painful situation, and that makes him a really likable protagonist. His responses to depression and stress feel real and comprehensible. Many young men experiencing sadness or depression will be able to connect immediately to his perspective, and will follow him into some pretty tough and introspective places.

Also, the fact that it was made into a movie with Zach Galifianakis might also help get teen boys interested.

The Ruins of Gorlan by John Flanagan

Choosing Day. How does one choose what they want to do for the rest of their life? Will is struggling to decide. He's not big enough to go to battle school and train to be a knight, he's not good enough with words to be a diplomat or a scribe and he definitely doesn't want to end up as a field laborer on a local farm. As an orphan and a ward of Castle Redmont, Will has no "family business" to go in to. What Will doesn't know is that he has been watched his whole life by Halt - the Ranger.

 To the average Araluen citizen, Rangers are near magical people. Moving from place to place without being seen, knowing things seemingly unknowable and defeating opponents in battle no other warrior would face. Will is not sure if he wants to be the apprentice to the mysterious Ranger. He has many questions about the skills required, the methods of training and about his own past. Halt, not much of a talker, needs to adjust to the life of being a mentor as he trains Will in the arts and skills needed to be a Ranger of the Realm.

This first installment in the Ranger's Apprentice series sets up all of the adventure, honor and glory awaiting Will, Horace, Alyss, and the rest of Will's friends from Castle Redmont.

How my list of books to read got way longer

It's amazing what a good list can do. Make you think, make you—meaning me—feel old (because nostalgia and all that), but also introduce you to new things.

The Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA) puts out several lists of recommended books each year. All are worth checking, but this year, the one that really caught my attention was the Outstanding Books for the College Bound list.

In the past, I have to admit, this is the list I paid the least attention to. But this year's list includes so many of my favorite books from the past few years (like Packing for Mars by Mary Roach, Patrick Ness's Chaos Walking series, Quiet by Susan Cain, and especially Spillover by David Quammen, which tops my personal Favorite Books Published Recently list, hands down) that I seriously want to go and read everything else on the 2014 Outstanding Books for the College Bound list that I haven't yet read.

According to the list's introduction, "the 2014 list is designed to mirror academic disciplines. It is divided into five categories: Arts and Humanities, History and Cultures, Literature and Languages, Science and Technology, and Social Sciences." And while it does include books college students have been assigned to read, such as Rebecca Skloot's The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, the purpose of the list is not to mimic college reading lists, but to encourage teens to "broaden your horizons and deepen your understandings, whether you are preparing for college or looking to expand your learning in other ways."

A number of books on the Outstanding Books for the College Bound list have been reviewed here at Guys Lit Wire, which will give you an idea of the breadth of the list:

Dare Me by Eric Devine

I thought for sure that my first official review for this blog would be an big honking fantasy, because that's where my heart lies in a lot of ways. But instead it's going to be a YA contemporary that I decided to read because it sounded like a YA contemporary that I was planning to write and I'm glad I did. Dare Me by Eric Devine is an older YA book that is hard to categorize (I'll get to that in a moment) and was a fantastic read with a little bit of something for every kind of reader.

Road to Reckoning by Robert Lautner

Road to Reckoning by Robert Lautner is a western novel taking place in 1837 This is Mr. Lautner’s debut novel.

At age 12 Thomas Walker, a sheltered boy living in New York City, joins his father, a traveling salesman, to go out west and sell Samuel Colt’s revolutionary "Improved Revolving Gun". Not long after their travels start, Thomas’ father is killed by robbers, and the young orphan tries to make it back home with his few possessions, including a wooden model of the gun, and no money, relying on the kindness of strangers.

The Case of Charles Dexter Ward by Ian Culbard

Lovecraft has always been a subject of interest for folks looking to adapt works to other media. He’s probably the literary figure of the last century who casts the largest shadow, in terms of direct and indirect influence. I’m thinking of this, in part because of my fascination with the new HBO series True Detective and its allusions to Lovecraft with images of “a spaghetti faced man” and “the King in Yellow” (by way of Robert W. Chambers). But Ian Culbard’s series of graphic novels adapting Lovecraft consumed me even more when I encountered them recently, and they are perhaps the finest adaptations of Lovecraft’s stories I’ve yet seen.

Black Helicopters by Blythe Woolston

 Black Helicopters is about choices, the ones that come automatically, like scratching an itch and the ones that were made for us. It's also about tension, reading it feels like being caught in an ever-tightening vice.  Valkyrie (Valley) lives with her father, referred to as Da, and her brother Bo. To say that Da “enjoys” nature would be like saying Charles Manson “enjoyed” the Beatles. Valley and her family are off the grid. Way off the grid. It’s safe to assume that they are living in the wilds of Montana but it could be anywhere, really.

Da teaches Valley & Bo how to survive in the wild. The only trouble is that he isn’t just prepping them for a Camper Activity badge from the Scouts, he’s teaching them paramilitary and bomb-making skills. Together they make that Ruby Ridge family look like the Brady Bunch. The bombs are for Da’s customers, people who want to send judges, lawyers, abortion doctors and anyone else who pisses them off, a message.

In addition to having them make weapons, Da fills his children’s heads with a steady helping of paranoia and fear. He tells them that government-controlled Black Helicopters are everywhere and that they will kill them on sight. He tells them that their mother was murdered by the helicopters eleven years before and that they must be prepared for “Those People” to burst through their door at any moment.  

Black Helicopters is short, (166 pages) so it’s hard to write about it and not spoil it a little bit. I would stop reading now unless you want to know at least part of the ending.

Sidekicked by John David Anderson

 Drew is a very sensitive kid- his five senses are amplified. He can see what his classmates are writing on tests from across the room, he can smell what the neighbors are having for dinner. He is a superhero in training, as are all the members of H.E.R.O. a school club formed by Mr. Masters, who himself is a superhero. Drew and his friends are all paired up with mentors who will train them to one day be heroes themselves.  Drew's mentor is battling demons of his own and can't help Drew as he could or indeed should.  When a strange menace begins threatening the city, Drew and his friends must come together to prevent catastrophic consequences.

The Port Chicago 50 by Steve Sheinkin

We talk so much about nonfiction these days.  What does common core mean for nonfiction?  What can we do to make nonfiction and common core mesh with our larger readers’ advisory goals?  Where is nonfiction headed, especially the relatively new subgenre of nonfiction for young adults? How can we connect nonfiction with the right readers?  And even more than that: how can we encourage more readers to discover they may just be the right readers for nonfiction even if they don’t know it?

These are great and important questions to ask.  But I don’t want us to lose sight of the heart of nonfiction.  A great true story, told well and with passion and attention to craft, can change and challenge readers in the same way any fictional tale can.  Steve Sheinkin’s latest book, The Port Chicago 50, is that kind of true story and that kind of nonfiction.