Young Adult Fantasy Series

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you've probably figured out by now that I love young adult books.  I've previously discussed young adult dystopian fiction and young adult realistic fiction.  Today, I'll talk about another one of my favorites - young adult fantasy.

I'm not sure what it is about young adult fantasy - often these are giant thick tomes with lots and lots of characters to keep track of over the course of multiple books in a series - yet they are also just so much fun to read.  My 13 year old daughter (almost 14) Allison is also a big fan of the genre, so she's read many of these as well and I'll fill you in on her opinions too where applicable.

So, if you share my love for the genre here are some of my favorite young adult fantasy series:

What To Read This Summer

As the weather starts to warm up (intermittently, that is), I'm thinking about what I'm going to read this summer.  I'm going to highlight some books that either were recently published or will be published this summer (May through August), and which sound like they'll make good summer reading.   For the purposes of this post, summer reading excludes anything that sounds too heavy or overly literary, but includes books that are either set in the summer or that sound like fun, juicy, reads.   Below you'll find some books that hopefully will fit the bill - a few books I've recently read, and other recent/forthcoming books that I'm hoping/planning to check out this summer.  Dates in parentheses are publication dates.

From the Top 10 Archives - Jen's 10 Favorite Books of 2004

Continuing my series of posts looking back at my top 10 book lists from years past, today I'll re-visit my 10 favorite books from 2004.  As a reminder, that means books I read in 2004, not necessarily books published that year.  2004 was a very eventful year for me personally, in that I became a mother for the first time!  (And yes, that means Allison will be 14 next month - crazy!)  I definitely did somewhat less reading in the latter half of the year being a new mom.  But nonetheless, this is a pretty good selection of books!

Here's my list from 2004, in alphabetical order by author's last name:

Virtual Book Club: The Female Persuasion and The Power

Today, I bring you a virtual book club discussion with Jennie Rothman, who was brave enough to volunteer to discuss books with me for your consumption!  I met Jennie MANY years ago when I was a summer associate and then an associate at Hughes Hubbard and Reed, and we later reconnected on Facebook and Goodreads, and she is definitely a trusted reader friend.  We both separately read the book The Power by Naomi Alderman for our respective book clubs this year, and then Jennie read The Female Persuasion by Meg Wolitzer and recommended it to me, and suggested that discussing them together for the blog could be interesting since, although they are very different books, they both deal with feminist themes.

Our discussion took place over e-mail, a lightly edited version of which is below.  Enjoy!

Middle Grade Fiction Adults Can Enjoy Too

So far, I've discussed adult books and young adult books, but for the most part I haven't really discussed children's books, other than a mention or two.  So you may not realize that I'm just as passionate about children's literature, and about encouraging a love of reading in my kids.  I also volunteer at the school library at my kids' elementary school, so I love seeing what the kids are reading there and recommending some of these books to them too!

Today's post focuses on kids books that are so great, I recommend them even if you don't have a kid in your life to share them with.  These are also books that I recommend for kids who are strong independent readers, or for read-alouds with your kid.  Many of the books on this list I either read aloud to one of my kid, or I read them at the same time as one of my kids and then we discussed, though some I read purely for my own enjoyment.

Two series adults can enjoy too!