The Haters by Jesse Andrews

Three teens ditch out of jazz camp to hit the road and try their luck as a band: Wes and Corey are enthusiastic but merely average players on bass and drums - Ash, on the other hand, is exceptional as a blues fusion guitarist and songwriter and singer and instigator and dream girl ...

It's a fantastic road trip book with relatable characters and the kind of accidents and happenstance that occur on an ill-planned youth odyssey. The gang's on-going banter about band names especially rings so, so true.

This book's been getting a lot of press as a hot summer teen fiction release, and it's well worth the time.

The Alex Crow by Andrew Smith

What's worse than a cabin full of surly, tech-deprived teenaged boys forced into six weeks of rustic summer camp? Well, at age 15 Ariel has already survived a civil war, refugee encampment, and relocation. Camp can't be THAT bad.

I adore Andrew Smith's books, and this one is no exception. It's got 4 main storylines: Ariel's past, Ariel's present, an arctic exploring vessel circa 1880, and a crazy guy with a bomb. They're woven together and build toward a climax that you're never quite able to put your finger on, as a reader.

The cover is super creepy on this one - it's a black bird beak holding a bomb ... or is it an EYE watching you?! And it's filled with wonderfully unusual - and yet typically Andrew Smith - kind of characters: a suicidal pet bird, the kid who pretends he's listening to his iPod through wads of toilet paper in his ears, horny teenagers with a million euphemisms for masturbation.

And while it's very, very funny it's also quite dark, even a bit bleak. Business ethics, cloning, de-extinction, war, and more. Highly recommended.

Vacationland by Sarah Stonich

While some entitled people believe the planet revolves around them, the truth is that we each DO have a kind of world that circles around us - a web of friends, family, places, and acquaintances that are all connected (and maybe only connected) by you. This book, a series of interconnected yet independent short stories, is about one of those webs - a world that revolves around a way-north Minnesota resort.

Through these stories, you get a feel for the small town of Hatchet Inlet, for the guys who hang out in the coffee shop and the visitors to the resort. We see the resort in the 1960s during its heyday, and also through its decline, piece-by-piece demolition, and rebirth. Immigrants and draft-dodgers, native tribes, locals, and tourists all fill the stories with depth and diversity of view.

This is my very favorite form of storytelling, and Stonich does it incredibly well. Each story stands alone and tells its own tale, but taken together they intermesh and marry to provide a multi-faceted view of life. I thoroughly enjoyed this book.

Hidden by Helen Frost

On a trip to the store, eight-year-old Wren was accidentally kidnapped during a car jacking. Six years later, the new girl in Wren's cabin at summer camp has a connection to that long-ago incident.

The tension between the girls is well-told: Each is scared and wary of the other, and both have spent six years wondering about and kind of hating the other, without really ever having met. The story's told in alternating chapters between Wren and Darra, and each girl has her own poetic form - Wren in short, visually creative stanzas, and Darra in longer free-verse, with another facet of the story constructed between the lines.

It's a great story - something I haven't seen a bunch of times before - and I was completely captivated by the girls' stories and connection. They're relate-able characters with honest feelings and complicated lives. The book brings up some interesting subjects: victimization, difficult family relationships, mixed emotions, and childhood trauma. But it's not a heavy story. The story zips along briskly, and Frost has made every word work its hardest in less than 150 pages.