My first book: [link]

I have on clue what my first book was. Possibly a Dick and Jane thing.

Ooh, who is she, megan? I'd like to check out her blog.

You've read a lot of the YA I would recommend, but I'd also say anything by Laurie Halse Anderson, Libba Bray's Going Bovine or the spectacular Great and Terrible Beauty trilogy. Also How We Live Now by Meg Rosoff, which blew me away.

And I just remembered another favorite from that time, Richard Peck's Ghosts I Have Been

I adored that book. There was a sequel, too, I believe. Anything by Peck I gobbled up.

the spectacular Great and Terrible Beauty trilogy.

With the caveat that she engages in some significant India!fail. (I am ashamedly ignorant of Indian culture during that time period, so it did not ping me at all. However, I've read a fair amount of criticism that the parts in India are stereotypes verging on caricatures.)

All that said, I love those books. (Possibly because my embarrassing ignorance allows me to overlook the faily parts.) I recently re-read them, and I have to learn to not read to the end of book 3.

Ooh, who is she, megan? I'd like to check out her blog.

She is actually the friend I stayed with outside of Seattle during the F2F there. Here is her blog, Writer on the Side. She has worked in publishing since forever (as a full-time freelancer since the first of her four [!!] boys was born) and gives lots of good practical advice on writing reading guides, author appearances, etc.

Richard Peck's Ghosts I Have Been

I adored that book. There was a sequel, too, I believe

Loved both of those books! IIRC, the sequel's hero(ine) was the psychic/medium girl from the first book, and she gets involved with ghosts from the Titanic.

or the spectacular Great and Terrible Beauty trilogy

Oh, I did not enjoy those. I thought the first book did a great job portraying the sort of changeable and complicated alliances of teenage girls. I thought the third book was WAY too long. And yes on the India fail.

Thanks for the recs, Amy! I've been adding them to my Goodreads list and it looks like S. hasn't read a few of those (which means she wouldn't have covered them in her blog yet).

I guess she agrees with you about Laurie Halse Anderson. One of her reviews was simply, "Nobody does historical fiction like LHA."

IIRC, the sequel's hero(ine) was the psychic/medium girl from the first book, and she gets involved with ghosts from the Titanic.

Yes!

And yes on the India fail.

I don't remember any India scenes except in the first book, really, but I do remember thinking they read like someone who had simply seen movies about India, or read The Secret Garden a lot.

One of her reviews was simply, "Nobody does historical fiction like LHA."

Her historical fiction is fantastic, but Speak was the first book of hers I read, and it's about a girl who was raped. It's ... there are no words for how good it is. Absolutely a must-read.