Part I: YALSA names 2010 top books for teens

This past week, the Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA), named its 2010 list of Best Books for Young Adults.

This week, Novel Novice will be featuring the top 10, so be sure to check back all week and tell us if you’ve read them, and if you agree with the choices.

Ninety books were nominated, but here are the top 10:

Brennan, Sarah Rees. Demon’s Lexicon. Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing/Margaret K. McElderry. 2009.
Griffin, Paul. The Orange Houses. Penguin/Dial Books. 2009.
Herlong, M.H. The Great Wide Sea. Penguin/Viking. 2008.
Jinks, Catherine. The Reformed Vampire Support Group. Harcourt/ Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. 2009.
Napoli, Donna Jo. Alligator Bayou. Random House / Knopf. 2009.
Small, David. Stitches: A Memoir. W.W. Norton & Co. 2009.
Stead, Rebecca. When You Reach Me. Random House/Wendy Lamb Books. 2009.
Stork, Francisco X. Marcelo in the Real World. Scholastic/Arthur A. Levine Books. 2009.
Taylor, Laini. Lips Touch: Three Times. Scholastic/Arthur A. Levine. 2009.
Walker, Sally M. Written in Bone: Buried Lives of Jamestown and Colonial Maryland. Lerner/Carolrhoda Books. 2009.

Today we’re featuring Alligator Bayou, by Donna Jo Napoli and The Great Wide Sea, by M.H. Herlong.

Synopsis:

Talullah, Louisiana. 1899.

Calogero, his uncles, and cousins are six Sicilian men living in the small town of Tallulah, Louisiana. They work hard, growing vegetables and selling them at their stand and in their grocery store.

To 14-year-old Calogero, newly arrived from Sicily, Tallulah is a lush world full of contradictions, hidden rules, and tension between the Negro and white communities. He’s startled and thrilled by the danger of a ’gator hunt in the midnight bayou, and by his powerful feelings for Patricia, a sharpwitted, sweet-natured Negro girl. Some people welcome the Sicilians. Most do not. Calogero’s family is caught in the middle: the whites don’t see them as equal, but befriending Negroes is dangerous. Every day brings Calogero and his family closer to a a terrifying, violent confrontation.

Awards:

American Library Association Top Ten Best Books for Young Adults
Parents’ Choice Gold Award for Historical Fiction
Junior Library Guild

Synopsis:

Ben, Dylan, and Gerry are still mourning their mother’s death when their dad decides to buy a boat and take them on a year-long sailing trip. Tensions flare between Ben and his father, but they gradually learn to live together in close quarters. But one morning, the boys wake up to discover their father has disappeared—and they are lost. What happened to him? Where are they? And what will they do when a treacherous storm looms on the horizon? M. H. Herlong spins a gripping tale of adventure, survival, and the bonds of brotherhood in The Great Wide Sea .

Awards: