What to Read Based on Your Favorite Current YA Bestseller

If you loved The Hate U Give, by Angie Thomas, preorder Dread Nation, by Justina Ireland
If you loved the discussion of sociopolitical events, race, gender, and power in THUG, Ireland’s upcoming Dread Nation should be on your radar. Dread Nation opens in the aftermath of the Civil War, in an alt historical world where zombies rose from the battlefields. Jane McKenne is training to be an Attendant, someone who protects wealthy white people from the up-and-fighting dead. Because of the Native and Negro Reeducation Act, another form of slavery, being an Attendant is one of the only possible routes in life for a black girls. As Jane knows and continues to experience, those who have passed are not nearly as dangerous as those in power who haven’t.

If you loved Turtles All the Way Down, by John Green, read A Taxonomy of Love, by Rachael Allen
If John Green’s latest left you an emotional wreck, Allen’s A Taxonomy of Love will likewise exercise your tear ducts. Allen’s latest contemporary follows Spencer, a teen with Tourette syndrome, who has a habit of navigating life’s complications via taxonomies. As Spencer journeys through his formative years trying to find his place in his family and to understand his relationship with his crush, Hope, you’ll be awash in tissues and feels.

If you loved One of Us Is Lying, by Karen M. McManus, read Little Monsters, by Kara Thomas
As a murder mystery lover, I devoured McManus’ One of Us Is Lying, and was left ready to dive into another book with an edge-of-your-seat plot. Kara Thomas’ thriller Little Monsters filled that need and more. Kacey is relieved to make fast friends with Bailey and Jade in her new town. They help ease her transition into her new life—but when they start acting distant after a party Kacey wasn’t invited to, something feels off, even more so when Bailey never makes it home from that party. As the clues start piling up, Kacey must face harsh truths about her new friends…and herself.

If you loved Long Way Down, by Jason Reynolds, read The Poet X, by Elizabeth Acevedo
Reynolds’ novel in verse, following a young man with a gun and a plan for revenge as he takes a fateful elevator ride, is emotional, nuanced, and completely unforgettable. In a similar vein, Acevedo’s debut, The Poet X, follows Harlem teen Xiomara Batista as she makes the life-changing discovery of slam poetry. In this newly discovered medium, Xiomara finds a way to channel her voice in a way she couldn’t before. She uses it to understand her family, herself, and the world. Like Long Way Down, The Poet X is a thing of beauty that will capture your mind and heart.

For Thunderhead (Scythe #2), by Neal Shusterman, read Fate of Flames, by Sarah Raughley
Shusterman’s Scythe series is set in a world where humanity has conquered the causes of death, practically eradicating mortality. The story follows Citra and Rowan’s apprenticeships with the Scythedom, the group of people tasked with ending lives in the absence of disease, hunger, and irreversible accidents. The first in Raughley’s magical series, Fate of Flames, also follows a girl unexpectedly chosen to join a special group with a dangerous task. The four Effigies are girls who have command over one element, pulled from their normal lives in order to protect the world from Phantoms, creatures who enjoy terror and pain. Then a man called Saul appears, who is somehow able to channel the abilities of all four Effigies. But in games of power, secrets and deceit are always lurking.

If you loved Batman: Nightwalker, by Marie Lu, read Blood and Sand, by C.V. Wyk
If you’ve read any of Lu’s powerful books, you’ll know they’re filled with action and excitement on every page. Batman: Nightwalker spins a tale of a teenaged Bruce Wayne, before he put on the cape. Wyk’s historical, Blood and Sand, also focuses on the youth of a legendary figure: Spartacus. Attia, once meant to become queen, is now a slave given to Xanthus, a gladiator who is enslaved himself. Together, they form an unlikely alliance, one that will change the Roman Republic forever.

If you loved The Hazel Wood, by Melissa Albert, read By a Charm and a Curse, by Jaime Questell
In Albert’s contemporary set, fairy tale–inspired debut, readers go on a journey that exposes the darkest sides of magic. In Questell’s debut, readers walk a similarly sinister path, but within the world of a carnival rather than through the dark doors that lead to a world of fairy tales. Thanks to a cursed kiss, Emmaline King becomes tied to Le Grand Carnival Fantastic, forced to play the role of Girl in the Box to preserve a charm that keeps the carnival going. In order to be free, she would have to condemn someone else to her fate, but how can she do that when she knows the pain of the curse?

If you loved Piecing Me Together, by Renée Watson, read The Education Of Margot Sanchez, by Lilliam Rivera
Renée Watson’s Piecing Me Together tackles the nuances of school and neighborhood “opportunities,” parental wishes, and varying definitions of success; follow it up with The Education Of Margot Sanchez. Rivera’s contemporary debut centers on Margot, who must navigate her parents’ expectations and rich “friends” ready to drop her up at a moment’s notice. After an expensive attempt to impress those friends, she ends up grounded and forced to work in her family’s grocery store. When she receives an invitation to a beach party that could place her popularity goals within reach, she has to decide what’s worth the sacrificing, and whether she really wants what she thinks she does.

If you loved The Cruel Prince, by Holly Black, read The Replacement, by Brenna Yovanoff
Black is a master of portraying the Fae through a distinctly anti-Tinkerbell lens. They are often dangerous and, as the title of her latest fantasy suggests, cruel. Yovanoff’s The Replacement likewise reveals the malevolent nature of the fairies. Mackie Doyle is a Replacement, placed in a human crib with a human family when he was a baby. As much as Mackie grows to love the world he is raised in, his allergies to iron and blood prevent him from ever feeling like a normal human. When a missing person draws him into an underworld known as Mayhem, the two parts of him will war, and he must figure out his place in both realms.

If you loved This Is Where It Ends, by Marieke Nijkamp, read The Last to Let Go, by Amber Smith
Smith’s latest contemporary, The Last to Let Go, pairs well with the emotional depth, important social discussions, and characters who will break your heart of Nijkamp’s This Is Where It Ends. In Smith’s novel, Brooke Winters is determined to transfer schools in order to get into a good college and escape her family. Her plans are derailed when her mother is arrested for killing Brooke’s father, but no one seems to know what actually happened that day. With Brooke and her siblings left on their own, all she wants is for them to find their way forward together. But their history and complicated family dynamics weigh on them more and more as the year goes by, and each struggles in their own way to let go.