That's it! Thanks, Sophia.

A Summer to Die, her first book, is still one of my all-time favorites. Still makes me cry, too. And Find a Stranger, Say Goodbye (about an adopted girl who goes in search of her birth mother) is just as good.

But those were my YA era. I didn't keep up after that -- I've still never read The Giver, although I'd like to.

The Giver was dystopia before it was a thing in YA. The same with MT Anderson's Feed which is Ah-May-ZING.

I'm swiping my way through a book written by the parent of a former student. Not impressed and should just abandon. Then I'm going to read Wildwood, which is middle grade fiction I think.

Some days, I miss reading for the awards committee because it forced me to increase my breadth of what I read in middle grades fiction and YA.

Wait--so all YA dystopias *are* the same, or they might as well be the same? That's what I don't understand. If you keep selling A as B, you do risk a backlash.

Seriously? This is Hollywood. Instead of development hell, this is development fast-track to jump on the pile. Does this really surprise you?

I should add, that I'm in the middle of (and enjoying the hell out of) TALES FROM DEVELOPMENT HELL, which has my Hollywood cynicism on code red.

I suspect there's a companion book that could be written such as TALES FROM DEVELOPMENT TOO-FAST TRACK for getting like minded movies out for things that were phenoms.

The same with MT Anderson's Feed which is Ah-May-ZING.

Oh boy, I disagree. I wanted to like it! It has a great premise!

The Uglies series was pre-Hunger Games YA dystopia that seemed to be pretty popular but didn't make as big a splash, but Scott Westerfeld said that the books have been selling a lot more since Hunger Games.

The Uglies series was pre-Hunger Games YA dystopia that seemed to be pretty popular but didn't make as big a splash

Loved that series. Although I loved Westerfeld's Midnighters series even more.

I liked it all right. I found it kind of mediocre overall, and I didn't really like the protagonist. The fourth book was actually my favorite.

I didn't really like the protagonist

Tally is kind of insufferable. I just loved the worldbuilding a lot. And I loved Zane. I actually liked Tally when she was with Zane.

P-C, I read Feed as opposed to listening to it and had a very different experience than you did which makes sense. Also, I think I read it right after I had read Jennifer Government which I also enjoyed. I think that I was in my phase of corporate takeover dystopias.

I spend a lot of time with dystopias, and slightly less time with post-apocalyptic stories. I still haven't finished Oryx and Crake because it was just so ridiculously violent.