Difficult Teens

When 15-year-old Romeo's mother leaves one day and doesn't return, he finds himself homeless and trying to survive on the streets. Mute and terrified, his silence makes him vulnerable, and one night, he is beaten by a gang of other kids, only to be rescued by a boy who pledges to take care of him. Julian is barely two years older than Romeo. After running away from an increasingly violent home life, he makes some difficult choices and ends up selling himself on the street to survive. Taking care of Romeo changes him, gives him a purpose in life.

When eighteen-year-old Dylan wakes up, she’s in an apartment she doesn’t recognize. The other people there seem to know her, but she doesn't know them—not even the pretty, chiseled boy who tells her his name is Connor. A voice inside her head keeps saying that everything is okay, but Dylan can’t help but freak out. Especially when she borrows Connor’s phone to call home and realizes she’s been missing for three days. Dylan has lost time before, but never like this.

After a lifetime of being bullied, Daelyn is broken beyond repair. She has tried to kill herself before, and is determined to get it right this time. Though her parents think they can protect her, she finds a Web site for "completers" that seems made just for her. She blogs on its forums, purging her harrowing history. At her private Catholic school, the only person who interacts with her is a boy named Santana. No matter how poorly she treats him, he just won’t leave her alone. And it's too late for Daelyn to be letting people into her life...isn’t it?

Always be ready for the worst day of your life. This is the mantra that Becca Aldaine has grown up with. Her family is part of a community of doomsday preppers, a neighborhood that prioritizes survivalist training over class trips or senior prom. They're even arranging Becca's marriage with Roy Kang, the only eligible boy in their community. Roy is a nice guy, but he's so enthusiastic about prepping that Becca doesn't have the heart to tell him she's planning to leave as soon as she can earn a full ride to a college far, far away.

Lauren DeStefano’s New York Times best-selling Chemical Garden trilogy has drawn immense praise from an ever-growing fan base. In the saga’s chilling conclusion, Rhine’s race against time brings her to Vaughn’s eccentric brother, Reed. Elsewhere, Rowan’s involvement in the underground resistance reaches dangerous new heights. When Rhine’s search for answers finally comes to an end, the truth about her past will forever change her view of the future.

Best friends Jack and Conner can’t stay away from Marbury. It’s partly because of their obsession with this alternate world and the unresolved war that still wages there. But it’s also because forces in Marbury - including the darkest of the dark, who were not revealed in The Marbury Lens - are beckoning the boys back in order to save their friends… and themselves.

Vlad’s running out of time. The Elysian Council has given him only weeks to live, and that’s if the Slayer Society doesn’t kill him - along with all the citizens of Bathory - first. Then there’s the issue of Vlad’s father, who may or may not still be alive after all these years. Oh yeah, and that tiny little detail in the Pravus prophecy about Vlad enslaving Vampirekind and the human race. So much for college applications.

Shiv's younger brother, Declan, died while their family was on holiday in Greece. Shiv doesn't know how to live any more - she is tormented by guilt. Now she finds herself at the Korsakoff Clinic, undergoing a most unorthodox therapy, which is often painful. The clinic must help her find a way to live again. But first, they will make her face what really happened to her brother.

A broken-hearted Tennessee tomboy and her sisters are forced to relocate to the underprivileged side of El Segundo Beach, California ,after their mother dies. Her recovery somehow rides on a worn, hole-ridden, broken-down, balsa-wood surfboard.

Niya Moto is the only one-legged samurai kid in Japan, famous for falling flat on his face in the dirt. None of the samurai schools will teach crippled Niya, until an offer arrives from the legendary samurai warrior Ki-Yaga, sensei of the Cockroach Ryu. Niya and the other Cockroaches must defeat the fierce samurai students from the Dragon Ryu at the Samurai Trainee Games. Though they seem to be at a terrible disadvantage, it’s not long before they learn that if they stick together, there is no journey that they cannot complete, no fear that they cannot face....

In publishing-speak, here's what we at the LQ office sometimes describe as the Queer lovechild of Sholem Aleichem and Philip Roth: Uriel the angel and Little Ash (short for Ashmedai) are the only two supernatural creatures in their shtetl (which is so tiny, it doesn't have a name other than Shtetl). The angel and the demon have been studying together for centuries, but pogroms and the search for a new life have drawn all the young people from their village to America. When one of those young emigrants goes missing, Uriel and Little Ash set off to find her.

Jay is living his best life at Karloff Country, one of the world's most famous resorts. He's got his family, his crew, and an incredible after-school job at the property's main theme park. Life isn't so great for the rest of the world, but when people come here to vacation, it's to get away from all that. As things outside get worse, trouble starts seeping into Karloff. First, Jay's friend Connie and her family disappear in the middle of the night and no one will talk about it. Then the richest and most powerful families start arriving, only... they aren't leaving.

It's been 19 days since Isis Blake forgot about him. The boy she can't quite remember. She's stuck in the hospital with a turban-size bandage on her head, more Jell-O than a human being should ever face, and a tiny bit of localized amnesia. Her only goal? To get out of this place before she becomes a complete nut job herself. But as Isis' memories start to return, she realizes there's something important there at the edges of her mind. Something that may mean the difference between life and death.

Reeling from betrayal at the hands of the Whispers, Renata Convida is a girl on the run. With few options and fewer allies, she's reluctantly joined forces with none other than Prince Castian, her most infuriating and intriguing enemy. They're united by lofty goals: find the fabled Knife of Memory, kill the ruthless King Fernando, and bring peace to the nation. Together, Ren and Castian have a chance to save everything, if only they can set aside their complex and intense feelings for each other.

With his father’s mysterious disappearance and his brother Ronnie enlisting in the Vietnam War, 13-year-old TJ Crowley is left alone with his racist, unstable mother, Kate. The newly enforced Fair Housing Act results in the unthinkable for the Crowleys when a Black family, headed by the eminent Dr. Washington, crosses the racial red line and moves in next door. Kate is quick to warn TJ that their new neighbors are strictly off-limits and makes a panicked call to beg Ray, her old flame, to travel to their home in Wichita Kansas to help deal with “the problem next door.”

Jonathan’s older brother is away fighting with General Washington in Pennsylvania. But at 13, Jonathan is too young to fight. Still too young. Then one morning, April 3, 1778, the tavern bell sounds, calling men to arms. Eager to prove his mettle, with blood pounding in his ears, Jonathan joins the gathering men at the tavern to hear the news. With a 12-pound, six-foot-long flintlock musket loaned to him by the tavern keeper, Jonathan finds a place in with the other men, marching to battle.

There are only two rules to becoming part of the Hemlock crew: You have to be single. You have to be invited. Karissa is definitely single, and now that she caught the eye of Jasper, she just might get the invite. Nothing about him is her type, except for the fact that he's drop-dead gorgeous and every sophomore girl’s dream boyfriend. Add in his killer personality and piercing blue eyes along with his blonde hair and a skateboard hanging from his bag and she just might reconsider—but dating him is a slippery slope that she's not sure she wants to walk.

Rosalinda Fitzroy has been asleep for 62 years when she is woken by a kiss. Locked away in the chemically induced slumber of a stasis tube in a forgotten subbasement, 16-year-old Rose slept straight through the Dark Times that killed millions and utterly changed the world she knew. Now her parents and her first love are long dead, and Rose -  hailed upon her awakening as the long-lost heir to an interplanetary empire - is thrust alone into a future in which she is viewed as either a freak or a threat. Rose must face the ghosts of her past with open eyes....

The Walls Around Us introduces Violet, a dancer on the cusp of stardom, and Amber, who's been jailed in a juvenile detention home for years. Tying them together is the home's long-dead Orianna, who holds the key to dark mysteries.

Meet Will Carter, but feel free to call him Carter. (Yes, he knows it's a lazy nickname, but he didn't have much say in the matter.) He has a stuttering problem, particularly around boobs and belly buttons. He battles Attention Deficit Disorder every minute of every day...unless he gets distracted. He's a virgin, mostly because he's no good at talking to girls.