The Alex Awards are given to books written for adults that have special appeal to young adults, ages 12 through 18. The winning titles are selected from the previous year's publishing.
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The boy who couldn't sleep and never had to : a novel
by D. C. Pierson
Forging an instant friendship based on a shared love for drawing and their bottom-rung social status, high school teens Darren and Eric ambitiously create a graphic novel series that is shaped by Eric's increasingly hallucinatory sleeplessness. A first novel. Original.
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Girl in translation
by Jean Kwok
Emigrating with her mother from Hong Kong to Brooklyn, Kimberly Chang begins a secret double life as an exceptional schoolgirl during the day and sweatshop worker at night, an existence also marked by a first crush and the pressure to save her family from poverty. A first novel.
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The house of tomorrow
by Peter Bognanni
In a first novel by a Pushcart Prize nominee, homeschooler Sebastian Prendergast is forced by his grandmother's stroke to venture out of his geodesic dome habitat and form a punk band with a chain-smoking teen who introduces him to pop culture.
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The lock artist
by Steve Hamilton
After miraculously surviving an act of violence as a child, Michael stops talking and grows up with the ability to open any lock or safe, a talent he sells to any buyer in the crime world, until a botched heist forces him to go home to find the only person he loved--and to face the secret that has kept him so quiet. By an Edgar Award-winning author. 60,000 first printing.
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The particular sadness of lemon cake : a novel
by Aimee Bender
Discovering in childhood a supernatural ability to taste the emotions of others in their cooking, Rose Edelstein grows up to regard food as a curse when it reveals everyone's secret realities. By the Pushcart-winning author of An Invisible Sign of My Own.
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The Radleys : A Novel
by Matt Haig
Struggling with overwork and parenting angst, English village doctor Peter endeavors to hide his family's vampire nature until their daughter's oddly satisfying act of violence reveals the truth, an event that is complicated by the arrival of a practicing vampire family member. 75,000 first printing.
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The reapers are the angels : a novel
by Alden Bell
In a fallen America infested with zombies, a young girl named Temple is on the run, haunted by her past and pursued by a killer, and she must decide where she can find the salvation she seeks--in the insulated remnants of society or on the bleak, brutal frontier. Original.
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Room : a novel
by Emma Donoghue
A 5-year-old narrates a riveting story about his life growing up in a single room where his mother aims to protect him from the man who has held her prisoner for seven years since she was a teenager. 125,000 first printing.
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Garden State Teen Book Awards
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Teens in New Jersey vote for the award winners, nominated by New Jersey librarians.
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The invention of Hugo Cabret : a novel in words and pictures
by Brian Selznick
Living in the walls of a busy Paris train station in 1931, clock keeper and orphan Hugo Cabret must constantly work to keep his secrets safe, but when an inquisitive girl and an old man who owns a toy store begin probing, he must do all he can to keep them at a safe distance. 150,000 first printing. $150,000 ad/promo.
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The Hunger Games
by Suzanne Collins
In the best-selling first volume of the trilogy set in the cruel world of Panem, the annual Hunger Games pit young children against one another in a battle to the death on national television, so when Katniss is ordered to represent her district, she knows an important decision between survival and the love of another will have to be made when she is called to enter the ring. Reprint.
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Houdini : the handcuff king
by Jason Lutes
Painting a bold portrait of the legendary escape artist, this graphic biography traces Houdini's fascinating life, from the anti-Semitism he dealt with to the adulation he received from the American public, and reveals the secret behind his most amazing trick. Reprint.
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The Michael L. Printz Award is awarded to a book that exemplifies literary excellence in young adult literature.
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Where things come back : a novel
by John Corey Whaley
Seventeen-year-old Cullen's summer in Lily, Arkansas, is marked by his cousin's death by overdose, an alleged spotting of a woodpecker thought to be extinct, failed romances, and his younger brother's sudden disappearance
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Why we broke up
by Daniel Handler
Writing a letter to her ex-boyfriend about the reasons for their breakup, Min Green assembles items from their relationship to put into a box of mementos including a movie ticket from their first date, an old cookbook and a comb from a motel room. By the author of A Series of Unfortunate Events titles.
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The returning
by Christine Hinwood
When the six-year war between the Uplanders and Downlanders is over and Cam returns home to his village, questions dog him, from how he lost an arm to why he was the only one of his fellow soldiers to survive, such that he must leave until his own suspicions are resolved
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Jasper Jones : a novel
by Craig Silvey
In small-town Australia, teens Jasper and Charlie form an unlikely friendship when one asks the other to help him cover up a murder until they can prove who is responsible
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The Scorpio Races
by Maggie Stiefvater
The best-selling author of Shiver follows the experiences of a pair of youths who are swept up by a fantastical horse race across a treacherous cliff that makes them feel supremely alive and threatens dire consequences. 150,000 first printing. $150,000 ad/promo.
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