7 YA Books That Would Make Excellent Prom Themes

Soulless, by Gail Carriger
No offense to Tater Tot Tuesday, but if this had been my prom theme it would’ve been the single greatest thing to ever happen to me in the nightmarish hellscape known as high school. Soulless is the steampunk Victorian romance of your wildest dreams. You’ve got your corsets. You’ve got your tricked-out parasols. You’ve got all things paranormal. In this version of London, werewolves and vampires walk among us, and it’s totally acceptable. It’s just something that happens. But when Alexia Tarabotti—a social outcast and spinster who has no soul, rendering her immune to the ways and means of supernatural creatures—is attacked by a vampire and accidentally kills it, breaching social etiquette, she gets tangled up in a dangerous high-society mystery.

The Night Circus, by Erin Morgenstern
There’s a secret to making prom not suck, and the secret is this: make it a magical traveling circus. Le Cirque des Rêves appears suddenly and without preamble in the dead of night. I swear, this book is like an atmospheric jackpot. Contortionists, acrobats, and fortunetellers operate under a caramel-scented haze of spells and charms; harlequin jugglers vanish into thin air; and lovers Celia and Marco are two rival illusionists whose fates have been puppet-mastered by their respective ringmasters. The narrative skips around—sometimes you’re following their slow-build love story, and other times you’re an unassuming circusgoer just taking it all in. But either way, this is a prom-worthy juggernaut of ambience that’ll have you feeling weirdly nostalgic for a circus you’ve never been to.

Hotel Ruby, by Suzanne Young
Imagine a glamorous old hotel, minus the possibility of bedbugs, plus a whole lot of intrigue. After the death of her mother, Audrey, her brother, and their dad make an unplanned detour en route to their grandmother’s house to check in at the Hotel Ruby. It’s an alluring distraction from their grief—complete with fancy decor, nightly ballroom parties, and handsome hotel guest Elias Lange—but there might be something sinister lurking just beneath the surface. Now, I’m not saying I wanted to spend my prom solving a spooky mystery in an elegant hotel venue I may never have been able to leave, except, well, that’s exactly what I’m saying. I wanted ghost stories. I wanted a seriously weird concierge. I wanted to make out with a hot, tuxedo-clad stranger. Was that so much to ask?

A Court of Thorns and Roses, by Sarah J. Maas
Someone needs to make this prom happen so I can live vicariously through its attendants. It’s a Beauty and the Beast retelling that starts with our protagonist, Feyre, setting out to hunt in the icy forest and killing a wolf that was actually a faerie in disguise. This prompts the appearance of faerie Tamlin, who shows up demanding retribution for his fallen friend. He captures her and takes her to his world, from which humans have long been banished. Turns out Tamlin’s the High Lord of the Spring Court—a land with whispering grasses and ponds made of starlight—but there are six other courts (Summer, Autumn, Winter, Dawn, Day, and Night) and an evil High Lady who wants dominion over it all. Imagine seven sets of prom kings and queens, one for each court, and a highly luxurious, thematically appropriate seven-room dance floor!

The Diviners, by Libba Bray
Meet Evie O’Neill, a 1920s flapper who has just been exiled from her sleepy hometown and shipped off to the hustling, bustling streets of New York City. Evie’s dynamic personality has always been a bit too big for Zenith, Ohio, but New York is exactly where she wants to be, even if it means she has to live with her uncle and his weird fascination with the supernatural. But it’s not all speakeasies, jazz, and rakish pickpockets. Evie has a secret power that has been known to get her into trouble, and with a murderer on the loose who she may be able to stop, it’s only a matter of time before things come to a head. Warning: things get creepy. Like, 10/10 creepy. I want a 1920s prom theme as much as the next person, but leave the ouija board at home.

Starflight, by Melissa Landers
Ever thought how much prom could be improved by having it in outer space? Here’s your chance to live out those fantasies. Our tough and savvy heroine Solara Brooks is a convicted felon just looking for a fresh start, and she thinks she has found it: the newly terraformed Vega settlement on the outer edge of the solar system. With no money to get there, she finds herself woefully tethered to Doran, the entitled son of a fuel mogul, on a smuggling ship captained and crewed by a band of ragtag criminals and misfits. It’s kind of like Pirates of the Caribbean meets Star Wars, and for someone whose prom theme was probably just “Balloons. Balloons EVERYWHERE,” I would’ve been all over this.

The Girl From Everywhere, by Heidi Heilig
Nothing says prom like time-traveling pirate ships. Sixteen-year-old Nix and her father can travel to worlds both real and imagined aboard the Temptation. They’ve been to modern-day New York City! Nineteenth-century China! The land from One Thousand and One Nights! All they need is a hand-created map, and they can sail anywhere they want to go. And where Nix’s father, Captain Slate, wants to go is Honolulu in 1868—that’s where Nix’s mother died giving birth to her, and he thinks he can stop it from happening. But what will become of Nix if he does? Will the person she has become disappear forever? It’s heavy stuff, but all I’m seeing are prom pictures with a green-screen background that can take you and your date wherever your heart desires. Medieval England? Africa? Atlantis? Why not? This is the prom we need—nay, this is the prom we deserve.