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6 YA Books For the John Hughes Fan in You!
So your Netflix queue is piled high with old school teen classics like Pretty In Pink, Sixteen Candles, and The Breakfast Club. News for you: you’re a John Hughes fan. Alas, the seminal 1980s writer-director died in 2009, so we can’t expect anymore insta-classics from him. But if vintage throwbacks with loads of charm are your jam, there are plenty of delicious YA reads reminiscent of the charm, angst, and fun Hughes brought to the big screen. And guess what! Not all of these books have completely straight, white casts! YAY. Herewith, a list of YAs worthy of a Hughes-ian adaptation.
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Trouble Is A Friend of Mine, by Stephanie Tromly
When Philip Digby shows up at her front door, Zoe “Princeton” Webster knows she’s in for one hell of a misadventure. He’s obsessed with figuring out what happened to his kid sister, Sally, who disappeared when she was little, and slowly Zoe is convinced (or tricked) into helping him find out. A zany, madcap misadventure that’s pitched as Ferris Bueller meets Veronica Mars, complete with mystery, romance, and explosives, quite literally. What’s not to love?
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Noggin, by John Corey Whaley
If one of your faves from the Hughes canon is the classic Weird Science—in which two geeky guys build their dream girl, from scratch—this book’s sci-fi twist with heart will be a sure pleaser. Travis is terminally ill, so his parents opt for an experimental new procedure in which his head is frozen, in the hopes of finding a donor body down the line. He finally gets one…five years later, when everyone around him—his parents, his best friend, his girlfiend—has pretty much moved on with life. And readjusting, well, let’s just say it’s definitely a weird experience.
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The Absolutely True Diary of Part-Time Indian, by Sherman Alexie
National Book Award winner Alexie’s classic centers on misfit Junior, a kid from the reservation who escapes a pretty dark fate—if his family’s fortunes are any indication—by going to a school off-res. He’s pretty much the only non-white kid there, and that’s just the beginning of all the ways he doesn’t fit in. He’s an artist, has epilepsy, is smaller than most of the other students, and is decidedly geeky to boot. His new kid in school experience teaches him way more than just reading, writing, and arithmetic.
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Paper Towns, by John Green
I know, I know! Too obvious. But you can’t deny that this “last few days of high school” romp, complete with Midwestern setting, everyguy protagonist, manic pixie dream girl love interest, heart-of-gold popular beauty hooking up with geektastic sidekick, and a road trip, doesn’t hit the John Hughes sweet spot. Bonus? It’s already a movie, too, so you can read then watch!
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Top Ten Clues You’re Clueless, by Liz Czukus
When $10,000 goes missing from the till at the GoodFoods grocery store—on Christmas Eve, no less—teen employees Chloe and her not-quite-pals are accused of the theft and locked up in the break room until one of them is willing to confess. This diverse and delicious Breakfast Club-y teen romp puts six very different teens (including Chloe’s crush, Tyson, of course) in close quarters and watches them implode with humor, snark, and plenty of surprises.
The Runaways, by Brian K. Vaughn
Evil parents? We’ve all got those, right? But in this book, the parents are really evil. The Breakfast Club meets The Descendants in this kickass comic series that centers on a group of misfit teens (are you sensing a pattern here?) who discover their parents are supervillains united in an organization called the Pride. The teens—each representing their Breakfast Club clique, naturally, like the goth and the jock—band together to take on the Pride after they discover some amazing powers of their own.