Whitney Gardner

Julia is a graffiti artist and lives to tag (paint) She has two moms and is East Indian. She is also deaf. When she is kicked out of her special school, she must face a world of "hearies" (people with normal hearing). Julia is used to being in her own head and has problems reaching out to others, complicated by her deafness. Her best friend, also deaf but with a cochlear implant, turns out to be not to be a true friend and Julia is drawn to, improbably, a former cheerleader (aka YP for yoga show more pants). At turns, funny, sensitive, and combative, Julia is a typical teenager with an edge (understandable given her disability). Her moms are refreshingly sympathetic. Adult characters are not mere stereotypes. Most compelling is Julia's voice which rings true. Julia's tag = HERE and, thanks to this great YA novel, she definitely IS. F-bombs, some sexual activity, and Julia's anger make this a book better suited for older teens. show less

Ukulele-playing Margot is desperate for attention - from her parents and from online fans. But she only has a few followers, and her dad routinely flakes out on her and then moves to LA to try to gain followers of his own, leaving her to try to learn music on her own. Her mom is loving but often at work; her two laid-back friends' main activity is smashing stuff by dropping it from a treehouse platform (they have hundreds of followers for this).

Margot is, understandably, lonely and angry, show more and when she drags home a haunted '80s synthesizer - a Prophet-5 - it's life-changing in a weird way. The ghost of pop sensation Vision emerges and tries to get Margot to see that she should be playing for the love of music, not for the internet (whatever that is). But Vision isn't the one haunting the synth - that's her manager, Marty, who only ever wanted more, more, more.

Humor and pathos.

Quotes

"It's not like they actually know you. Who cares what they think?"
"I do! ...this is all I have." (128)

"So you wouldn't play music if you didn't have fans?"
"They're the whole point!"
"They're the least important point." (Vision and Margot, 142-143)

"My whole life revolved around what everyone else wanted." (Vision, 162) show less

Cameron and her twin brother, Cooper, are adjusting to life in smaller-and-more-backwoodsy-than-Portland Eugene, so when Cameron walks into the local comic shop looking for inspiration for her next cosplay costume, she is horrified at how the dude-bro behind the counter mistreats her as just a girl trying and failing to be a True Geek. She's suffering from massive troll attacks on her blog for her recent win at a con with her amazing cosplay designs and this is the last straw. So she has show more Cooper help her transform with the ultimate cosplay: into a boy. And the transformation opens up so many doors for her, including one into a fun D&D group at that same comic shop, with a completely dreamy DM. But keeping the secret will of course mean trouble down the line and Cameron needs to find the confidence and strength to be proud of her abilities *and* her gender.

This book is a perfect storm of all things I love: Shakespearean nods, comfortably predictable yet still well written YA romance, a main character who can sew amazing cosplay, excellent and totally loveable characters with wonderfully happy-making and believable interactions and relationships, and a fun D&D side story. If any of that is your jam, you *need* to read this book. show less

This vampire parody is pretty lifeless. The characters are all one-note or completely dull. One story twist is spoiled on the back cover and the other is incredibly predictable. Also, I have a keen dislike for stories where the main character tells a big, clumsy lie, and you then have to spend a good chunk of the book waiting for it to be exposed.

I don't know how an editor didn't put a stake through this before it got approved or definitely before it was allowed to sprawl over so many pages.