Tuesday, January 6, 2015

Top ten teen books to save your life

Jennifer Niven's new novel is All the Bright Places.

At the Guardian she tagged her "top 10 lovely, tough, honest, and ultimately life-affirming YA books," including:
It’s Kind of a Funny Story by Ned Vizzini

Craig Gilner always thought he was brilliant and exceptional. Until he’s accepted at Manhattan’s elite Executive Pre-Professional High School, where he finds out he’s actually pretty average. Life as he’s always known it is over – suddenly his perfectly planned future seems improbable, maybe impossible. Craig stops eating and sleeping. And he tries to kill himself. He’s so rattled by the near-death experience, he checks himself into a mental hospital, where he attempts to put the pieces of himself and his life back together. Ned Vizzini tragically died of suicide in 2013, but what he’s created on these pages is a reassuringly funny, human, and touching tale of hope.
Read about the other entries on the list.

The Page 69 Test: It's Kind of A Funny Story.

--Marshal Zeringue