Marissa Lieberman

After his sister's fatal car crash and his father's subsequent departure, sixteen-year-old Quinn's screenwriting ambitions are on hold and his social life has evaporated. When best friend Geoff drags him to a party, Quinn meets college-guy Amir and reemerges from his shell as they develop a mutual attraction. The entire cast is well rounded in Federle's humorous, heartbreaking, and heartwarming YA debut.

Sixteen-year-old Quinn's life is static: less than a year after his sister's fatal car crash in front of their school and his father's subsequent departure, his screenwriting ambitions have been put on hold, his social life has evaporated, and he and his grieving mother stay mostly confined to their house. When his best friend Geoff (who is straight) manages to drag him to a party, Quinn meets college-guy Amir and reemerges from his shell as they develop a mutual attraction. Fearing being seen as a pitiable figure defined only by tragedy, Quinn avoids sharing details of his personal life with Amir, but as the story progresses and he is pushed toward honesty, he begins to reveal his perspective on his sister's accident, and in doing so learns that it might not be the whole story. Although Quinn describes his life as "a fairly standard coming-of-age LGBT genre film, with a somewhat macabre horror twist," the narrative focus is less on coming out ("It just seems like such a hassle to come out. I want to just be out") than it is equal parts romance and friendship, humor and healing. Quinn's relationships with his mom and Geoff are particularly well developed, but the entire cast is well rounded, flawed, funny, and human. Humorous, heartbreaking, and heartwarming, Federle's (Better Nate Than Ever) YA debut takes its place in the lineage of Stephen Chbosky's The Perks of Being a Wallflower and John Green's coming-of-age tales. kazia berkley-cramer

Set largely during the summer of 1976, this semiautobiographical graphic novel from the brother-and-sister team behind the Babymouse series includes an amiable grandfather, U.S. bicentennial festivities, and a trip to Disney World—but it is much more than a lighthearted nostalgia piece. Ten-year-old Sunshine “Sunny” Lewin had been looking forward to spending August at the shore as usual, but her parents have suddenly sent her to Florida to stay with “Gramps” instead. Her less-than-thrilling days at the retirement community, complete with early-bird specials and trips to the post office, improve after she befriends the groundskeeper’s son, comics-obsessed Buzz. The two spend their time doing odd jobs for spending money and mulling over age-old superhero dilemmas (“But they’re heroes. Why can’t they save the people they love?”). These discussions, and the series of flashbacks they often elicit, ultimately lead readers to the truth surrounding Sunny’s visit: back home in Pennsylvania, her teenage brother is struggling with substance abuse, and Sunny is convinced that she made the problem worse