by Jen Moyers (@jen.loves.books)
This month, our Unabridged Podcast Buddy Read pick is Mackenzi Lee's A Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue (Bookshop.org | Libro.fm)—an absolutely fabulous, frothy novel with a serious core—and it inspired me to recommend these eight amazing YA historical fiction books. Each of these offers a new perspective on history, a new facet of our past about which I just didn't know enough.
Traci Chee's We Are Not Free (Bookshop.org | Libro.fm)
"And I get it, finally. Gaman. The ability to hold your pain and bitterness inside you and not let them destroy you. To make something beautiful through your anger, or with your anger, and neither erase it nor let it define you. To suffer. And to rage. And to persevere" (39).
This former Unabridged Podcast Buddy Read pick was one of my favorite books of the year when I read it in 2020. It tells the story of fourteen Japanese-American teenagers who have to leave their homes during World War II to live in incarceration camps. Their chapters are wide ranging in voice and style—there's one told through verse and another told entirely in second person—but their relationships form a link between these interconnected short stories. Bridging each chapter are historical artifacts that share the larger story of the United States government's treatment of these American citizens. Chee also frames the teenagers' time in the camp with their lives before they leave their homes and the challenges and racism they face when they return.
The brilliance of this novel goes beyond what it's about: Chee's writing is gorgeous, and both her dedication and her Author's Note explore the family and friends whose real stories inspired her book. She also explores the shift in terminology from "internment" (the word I had learned in school) to "incarceration." I learned so much. I cannot urge you strongly enough to pick up Traci Chee's novel (and I'll definitely be exploring her backlist!).
Sacha Lamb's When the Angels Left the Old Country (Bookshop.org | Libro.fm)
I first heard of this novel when I saw that it had won three (THREE!) American Library Association Youth Media Awards: a Printz Honor Award, a Stonewall Book Award for English-language works of exceptional merit for children or teens relating to the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender experience, and the Sydney Taylor Book Award for outstanding books for children and teens that authentically portray the Jewish experience.
As you can tell from those awards, this is a wide-ranging, unique book. Its three protagonists are an angel, Uriel; a demon, Little Ash; and Rose, who planned a trip to America with her best friend who then abandons her to get married. The story begins in Russia in the early 1900s in a village called Shtetl (it's too small to have it's own name) and moves to America via a long stay in Ellis Island.
Lamb explores the centuries-long relationship between Uriel and Little Ash with humor and nuance as they bicker and push each other and (sometimes) cooperate. Their writing is vivid, offering a compelling look at history through the eyes of characters who offer a unique perspective on events.
Stacey Lee's The Downstairs Girl (Bookshop.org | Libro.fm)
Here are five things to know about this book:
Jo Kuan, the seventeen-year-old protagonist of this novel, is a Chinese-American citizen living in Atlanta with Old Gin, the elderly man who has taken care of her since she was a baby, when her parents abandoned her. They live secretly in the basement beneath a print shop—the basement was created by abolitionists who were helping enslaved people, and Jo and Old Gin have lived here (sometimes alone and sometimes with other members of their community) unseen by the family who runs the print shop.
Jo is a talented hatmaker who loses her job because of her ethnicity and her outspokenness. As a last resort, Old Gin gets her a job as a house maid on the estate where he works as a horse trainer. Jo will be working mostly for Caroline, who she knew when they were girls. Caroline's cruelty began when they were young and has only increased now that they're teenagers.
One night, Jo overhears the Bells (the family who run the print shop and newspaper above their home) talking about their financial difficulties, and she decides to help. Though they've never officially met, Jo feels that she knows them well after years of listening to them in the shop. She knows that there's an advice columnist at a rival paper, so Jo decides to write a "Dear Miss Sweetie" column to gain subscribers. What ensues is a sensation, as the paper's popularity soars, and Jo is able to express her ideas about gender roles, racism, and class issues in a way she has seldom been able to do as herself.
The pacing of this book is incredible—I didn't want to stop listening—and the way the plot illuminates these characters but also plays through some mysteries is just brilliant.
I listened to this one on audio absolutely loved Emily Woo Zeller's narration.
Malinda Lo's Last Night at the Telegraph Club (Bookshop.org | Libro.fm)
I admire so much authors who excel in different genres—they're just plain good writers. With Last Night at the Telegraph Club, Malinda Lo confirmed for me that she is an amazing writer. (I mean, I already knew, but this book is FANTASTIC.)
The book is set in 1950s Chinatown. For most of the novel, we're following Lily Hu, a seventeen-year-old girl who feels as if her life doesn't quite fit. She has friends, and she has a family she loves, but she also doesn't feel as if anyone truly knows her. She is, however, beginning to understand herself more, but in secret. At school, Lily begins to become closer with an acquaintance, Kathleen Miller, and together, they take a big step and go together to the Telegraph Club, a lesbian bar in a part of town Lily isn't supposed to enter. It's there that Lily finally feels as if people truly know her and that she may, at last, know herself, too.
The novel addresses the ways that Lily's other relationships change as a result of her decisions. Periodically, the book flashes back to other characters' stories: when her parents first met or when they realize that they won't be moving to China, as planned. Lo includes a historical timeline that also features important events in Lily's family's lives. Because of her family's country of origin, they come under suspicion at one point as Communists, another type of prejudice with which Lily must contend.
Last Night at the Telegraph Club is an amazing YA work of historical fiction, a beautiful coming of age story with a compelling, nuanced protagonist and vivid supporting characters. It absolutely swept me away.
Tahereh Mafi's A Very Large Expanse of Sea (Bookshop.org | Libro.fm)
This book would not let go. I picked it up at 10:00 one night, realizing suddenly that it was due ASAP at the library. I stayed up 'til after midnight and finally made myself go to bed because I had to work the next day. I almost finished it before school but had to wait to devour the last 20 pages after school. Tahereh Mafi, whose Shatter Me series I ended up really enjoying, crafted a masterpiece here. In 2002, Shirin, the Muslim daughter of Iranian immigrants, enters her umpteenth new school already having given up on the human race and, in particular, all fellow high schoolers. She has been dealing with the discrimination of post-9/11 America in moments large and small that dominate every day. Because Shirin chooses to wear a hijab, her visible differences make her a target in a way that her older brother Navid is not.
Shirin goes through life with her head down, just aiming to survive the next three years of high school. Her outlook starts to change, however, with the addition of two factors: Ocean, a white boy in her biology class who continues to show polite and friendly interest in her, and breakdancing, which becomes her first extracurricular activity when her brother forms a crew. Watching Shirin contend with her own reaction to others' prejudice is heartwrenching, and reading her attempts to be vulnerable and open made me giddy. Beautiful book!
Meg Medina's Burn Baby Burn (Bookshop.org | Libro.fm)
Meg Medina's Burn Baby Burn, which I listened to on audio, is a fantastic YA historical novel centered on seventeen-year-old Nora Lopez who lives in New York in 1977 when the Son of Sam was terrorizing the city.
Nora lives with her brother Hector and her mother; her father, who is remarried and has a young son, isn't part of her life. Nora is ready to be done with school, and though her guidance counselor is encouraging her to enroll in college, Nora just isn't sure. She loves her shop classes and excels at construction and design; she also loves hanging out with her best friend (the daughter of a fire fighter), dancing disco, and working at a local grocery store where she meets a sweet, handsome guy.
The threat of a serial killer looms, but for Nora, the more pressing danger lies in her own home. Facing abuse and reckless outbursts, Nora yearns to feel safe again. She's too afraid and embarrassed to share the truth of her life, even when the violence starts bleeding outside of her small family.
This book has so much going for it: a great consideration of women's roles and opportunities that came along with the feminist movement; plenty of action and thrills with the Son of Sam stories; fun references to disco and 70s glamour; and a vivid protagonist. The written voice here is so strong, and it's only accentuated by narrator Marisol Ramirez.
Christina Hammonds Reed's The Black Kids (Bookshop.org | Libro.fm)
"Seems sometimes like growing older means the ground beneath you starts to shake and you keep trying to find the right structures to hide under, the right people to huddle with, the right roots" (38).
The Black Kids takes place in 1992 L.A., during the riots after the trial of the police officers who assaulted Rodney King. It focuses on Ashley, a Black teenager who lives in a wealthy section of the city that is largely untouched by the violence. She attends a private school where she is one of a small group of Black students, though all of her close friends are white. At the beginning of the book, Ashley is only vaguely aware of the situation in the city, but as the trial ends and more of the city becomes involved, her awareness grows, and she begins to see her own life and identity through a new lens.
Ashley's sister has rebelled against the family, leaving college and getting married in secret, and Ashley is constantly struggling with being the new focus of her parents' high expectations. She's also trying to figure out—as she and her friends grow and change—how to both fulfill the roles she's always filled but also to make space for the person she wants to be now.
This is a powerful novel about race and class, about coming of age, about who our real friends and family are. I cannot recommend it highly enough.
Allan Wolf's The Snow Fell Three Graves Deep: Voices from the Donner Party (Bookshop.org | Libro.fm)
I listened to this amazing book on audio—it features Bahni Turpin leading a full cast and is just a phenomenal interpretation of this novel in verse.
This novel in verse focuses on heart-breaking story of the Donner Party, the group who set out for California in the mid-1800s and became stuck in the mountains in the depths of winter. Wolf chooses to alternate between myriad voices here: two of the leaders of the expedition, George Donner and James Reed; Donner's wife; two Miwok Indian guides; several of the expedition's children; an outsider-turned-scapegoat; two of the oxen; and so on. Considering the goals of the party and the small choices that lead to tragedy is powerful, as is watching how different individuals reacts to each new obstacle. Turpin reads the voice of Hunger, which serves as an omniscient narrator. There are also some fantastic notes at the end about Wolf's methods and about the real history vs. this novelization.
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