I’ll admit it: I’m an eavesdropper. Whenever I work in the Carlton store, I eavesdrop on the books people are excited about, and in the last few weeks most of the conversations have gone like this:

“Hey, look, YA new releases.”
“Yeah, that one looks good. And that one, and – oh my god…”
“What? What?”

“It’s… the… new… PATRICK NESS!””

Of course, this level of excitement will come as no surprise to anybody who’s ever read a Patrick Ness. Ness is a master storyteller – from the edge-of-your-seat adventure in The Knife of Never Letting Go, to the heart-wrenching rollercoaster of emotions in A Monster Calls – hence our giddy excitement upon spotting one of his new books in the wild.

Ness’s latest book is proving to be divisive with our staff. One longtime Ness fan said, “This book should have been perfect for me as it exactly matched my literary interests. But, I found it lacking in empathy for the characters.” In contrast, our Hawthorn Children’s Expert Katherine Dretzke loved it. She said that Ness’ “…tongue-in-cheek descriptions of the impending apocalypse at the start of each chapter had me giggling away and the overall theme, that life isn’t always explosions and romance, is much needed in today’s YA fiction.”

Which side of the love/hate divide do you fall on?

DEMONS

I absolutely devoured Derek Landy’s latest book. You know – THE Derek Landy of Skulduggery Pleasant fame? Now that the irrepressible Skeleton Detective’s saga has come to an end, Landy has eased the heartache of saying goodbye to one series by gifting us with another. Demon Road introduces us to Amber, who might as well be Sarah Plain and Tall. She’s not special, she’s not a show-stopper. Even her own parents don’t seem to give her much attention – at least, not until the day she discovers her own demonic side. Now it seems like everybody is after her, and the only way to escape is to set off across America in a car that may or may not be haunted. This is a road-trip novel and then some, with all of Landy’s trademark humour and thrills.

#LOVE OZYA

September also gifts us yet another reason to #LoveOzYA with the release of Fiona Wood’s highly-anticipated third novel, Cloudwish. Vân Uoc is a hard-working scholarship student, and wishes are not a part her rational world, until she makes one and it comes true, sparking her on a journey of discovering what’s true and what isn’t. Readings Malvern’s Savannah Indigo says: “Maybe magic comes from a mysterious glass vial or an irrational wish. But maybe it comes from believing in possibility and in yourself. To watch Vân Uoc grapple with this makes for a wonderful, moving story.” (You can read Savannah’s full review here.)

GRAPHIC NOVELS AND ‘TOO’ GRAPHIC NOVELS

Graphic novel fans are spoilt this month with some excellent new releases. If you haven’t already, check out Bronte Coates’ post on the best new graphic novels for teens, including Honor Girl, a graphic memoir by Maggie Thrash, and Reading’s Children’s Book Prize winner Julie Hunt’s latest work, Kidglovz.

Making a tiny leap here from graphic novels to ‘too’ graphic novels – when is a YA novel too full-on to be considered a YA novel?

That’s the question a few of us have been asking ourselves after reading Emerald Fennell’s excellent new novel Monsters. Told from the cold, detached point-of-view of a sociopath in the making, Monsters is a chilling novel that is guaranteed to stay with you for a long time after you finish it, and it’s proven almost as divisive as the new Patrick Ness among our staff. As one staff members said, “If a customer came in, and I felt this was the perfect kind of book for them, I’d feel inclined to call the police.”

If this has you intrigued, you can read two of our staffs’ reflections on the book here.

Holly Harper