Lisa’s Looking Forward To #76 – September 1st, 2020

Once again I’ll be joining up with the Can’t Wait Wednesday posts hosted by Wishful Endings.  As usual, the first week of a month has a TON of new titles, so hold onto your hats, because here we go!

From my ARC list for September 1st, 2020:

The synopsis sounds really good. And I actually thought I was going to be a part of a blog tour for this, but when I never got a confirmation, I found out it had changed to a bookstagram only tour. So maybe sometime down the road I’ll get to it. Also, I love the comparison to The Silence of the Lambs.

Here is the blurb from Goodreads:

The Silence of the Lambs meets Sadie in this riveting psychological thriller about two teenagers teaming up with the FBI to track down juvenile serial killers.

In 1982, two teenagers—serial killer survivor Emma Lewis and US Marshal candidate Travis Bell—are recruited by the FBI to interview convicted juvenile killers and provide insight and advice on cold cases. From the start, Emma and Travis develop a quick friendship, gaining information from juvenile murderers that even the FBI can’t crack. But when the team is called in to give advice on an active case—a serial killer who exclusively hunts teenagers—things begin to unravel. Working against the clock, they must turn to one of the country’s most notorious incarcerated murderers for help: teenage sociopath Simon Gutmunsson. Despite Travis’s objections, Emma becomes the conduit between Simon and the FBI team. But while Simon seems to be giving them the information they need to save lives, he’s an expert manipulator playing a very long game…and he has his sights set on Emma.

Captivating, harrowing, and chilling, None Shall Sleep is an all-too-timely exploration of not only the monsters that live among us, but also the monsters that live inside us.

Sound good? Add to Goodreads HERE.

I’ve enjoyed anothr book by this author, and this one sounds really good as well. Plus it looks to be part of a series.

Here is the blurb from Goodreads:

Meet the Flyy Girls. The group of girls who seem like they can get away with anything. Veteran author Ashley Woodfolk pens a gorgeous and dynamic series of four Harlem highschoolers, each facing a crossroads of friendship, family, and love. 

Lux Lawson is on a spree. Ever since her dad left, she’s been kicked out of every school that would take her, and this is her last chance: Harlem’s Augusta Savage School of the Arts. If this doesn’t work, Lux is off to military school, no questions asked. That means no more acting out, no more fights, and definitely no boyfriends. Focus on her photography, and make nice friends. That’s the deal.

Enter the Flyy Girls, three students who have it all together. The type of girls Lux needs to be friends with to stay out of trouble. And after charming her way into the group, Lux feels she’s on the right track. But every group has their secrets, including Lux. And when the past starts catching up with her, can she keep her place as a Flyy Girl?

In this searing series opener, Lux takes center stage as she figures out just how hard it can be to start over.

With simply stated text and compelling characters, Flyy Girls is a series that’s perfect for readers of any level.

Sound good? Add to Goodreads HERE.

While I haven’t really been reading dystopian stories lately, this one just sounds so close to current events that I want to read it!

Here is the blurb from Goodreads:

Co-founder of the Women’s March makes her YA debut in a near future dystopian where a young girl and her brother must escape a xenophobic government to find sanctuary.

It’s 2032, and in this near-future America, all citizens are chipped and everyone is tracked–from buses to grocery stores. It’s almost impossible to survive as an undocumented immigrant, but that’s exactly what sixteen-year-old Vali is doing. She and her family have carved out a stable, happy life in small-town Vermont, but when Vali’s mother’s counterfeit chip starts malfunctioning and the Deportation Forces raid their town, they are forced to flee. 

Now on the run, Vali and her family are desperately trying to make it to her tía Luna’s in California, a sanctuary state that is currently being walled off from the rest of the country. But when Vali’s mother is detained before their journey even really begins, Vali must carry on with her younger brother across the country to make it to safety before it’s too late. 

Gripping and urgent, co-authors Paola Mendoza and Abby Sher have crafted a narrative that is as haunting as it is hopeful in envisioning a future where everyone can find sanctuary.

Sound good? Add to Goodreads HERE.

I still want to read this author and have yet to do it! I finally got a copy of her last book, Dealing in Dreams, but haven’t had a chance to read it yet.

Here is the blurb from Goodreads:

Featuring contemporary Afro-Latinx characters, acclaimed author Lilliam Rivera blends a touch of magical realism into a timely story about cultural identity, overcoming trauma, and the power of first love.

Eury comes to the Bronx as a girl haunted. Haunted by losing everything in Hurricane Maria–and by an evil spirit, Ato. She fully expects the tragedy that befell her and her family in Puerto Rico to catch up with her in New York. Yet, for a time, she can almost set this fear aside, because there’s this boy . . .

Pheus is a golden-voiced, bachata-singing charmer, ready to spend the summer on the beach with his friends, serenading his on-again, off-again flame. That changes when he meets Eury. All he wants is to put a smile on her face and fight off her demons. But some dangers are too powerful for even the strongest love, and as the world threatens to tear them apart, Eury and Pheus must fight for each other and their lives.

This Own Voices retelling of the Greek myth Orpheus and Eurydice is perfect for fans of Ibi Zoboi’s Pride and Daniel José Older’s Shadowshaper.

Sound good? Add to Goodreads HERE.

Sounds like it could be a very good mystery!

Here is the blurb from Goodreads:

Caroline Lawson is three months away from freedom, otherwise known as graduation day. That’s when she’ll finally escape her rigid prep school and the parents who thought they could convert her to being straight.

Until then, Caroline is keeping her head down, pretending to be the perfect student even though she is crushed by her family and heartbroken over the girlfriend who left for California.

But when her best friend Madison disappears, Caroline feels compelled to get involved in the investigation. She has her own reasons not to trust the police, and she owes Madison — big time.

Suddenly Caroline realizes how little she knew of what her friend was up to. Caroline has some uncomfortable secrets about the hours before Madison disappeared, but they’re nothing compared to the secrets Madison has been hiding. And why does Mr. McCormack, their teacher, seem to know so much about them?

It’s only when Caroline discovers other missing girls that she begins to close in on the truth. Unlike Madison, the other girls are from the wrong side of the tracks. Unlike Madison’s, their disappearances haven’t received much attention. Caroline is determined to find out what happened to them and why no one seems to notice. But as every new discovery leads Caroline closer to the connection between these girls and Madison, she faces an unsettling truth.

There’s only one common denominator between the disappearances: Caroline herself.

Sound good? Add to Goodreads HERE.

So, I should be starting this one either today or tomorrow and am so excited to read it! I put both the cover of the ARC I have as well as the cover shown for the Kindle copy in my post because I really like the one on the right better. It makes it more obvious that it takes place in a bookstore.

Here is the blurb from Goodreads:

To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before meets You’ve Got Mail in this charming and hilarious rom-com following two teen booksellers whose rivalry is taken to the next level as they compete for the top bookseller bonus.

Shoshanna Greenberg loves working at Once Upon, her favorite local bookstore. And with her moms fighting at home and her beloved car teetering on the brink of death, the store has become a welcome escape.

When her boss announces a holiday bonus to the person who sells the most books, Shoshanna sees an opportunity to at least fix her car, if none of her other problems. The only person standing in her way? New hire Jake Kaplan.

Jake is an affront to everything Shoshanna stands for. He doesn’t even read! But somehow his sales start to rival hers. Jake may be cute (really cute), and he may be an eligible Jewish single (hard to find south of Atlanta), but he’s also the enemy, and Shoshanna is ready to take him down.

But as the competition intensifies, Jake and Shoshanna grow closer and realize they might be more on the same page than either expects…

Sound good? Add to Goodreads HERE.

I’ve been hearing a lot of good reviews on this one, so I’m eager to get to read it myself! Again, a part of World War II that I didn’t learn a lot about when I was in school as a kid, so I’m glad to see more books about it coming out.

Here is the blurb from Goodreads:

“All around me, my friends are talking, joking, laughing. Outside is the camp, the barbed wire, the guard towers, the city, the country that hates us. 

We are not free. 

But we are not alone.”  

From New York Times best-selling and acclaimed author Traci Chee comes We Are Not Free, the collective account of a tight-knit group of young Nisei, second-generation Japanese American citizens, whose lives are irrevocably changed by the mass U.S. incarcerations of World War II.

Fourteen teens who have grown up together in Japantown, San Francisco.

Fourteen teens who form a community and a family, as interconnected as they are conflicted.

Fourteen teens whose lives are turned upside down when over 100,000 people of Japanese ancestry are removed from their homes and forced into desolate incarceration camps.

In a world that seems determined to hate them, these young Nisei must rally together as racism and injustice threaten to pull them apart.

Sound good? Add to Goodreads HERE.

This right here makes me think I will cringe, yet totally feel all the emotions, shame and rage, that girls deal with just for being girls.

Here is the blurb from Goodreads:

This powerful, timely novel in verse exposes provocative truths about periods, sex, shame, and going viral for all the wrong reasons.

After school one day, Frankie, a lover of physics and astronomy, has her first sexual experience with quiet and gorgeous Benjamin—and gets her period. It’s only blood, they agree. But soon a gruesome meme goes viral, turning an intimate, affectionate afternoon into something sordid, mortifying, and damaging. In the time it takes to swipe a screen, Frankie’s universe implodes. Who can she trust? Not Harriet, her suddenly cruel best friend, and certainly not Benjamin, the only one who knows about the incident. As the online shaming takes on a horrifying life of its own, Frankie begins to wonder: is her real life over?

Author Lucy Cuthew vividly portrays what it is to be a teen today with this fearless and ultimately uplifting novel in verse. Brimming with emotion, the story captures the intensity of friendships, first love, and female desire, while unflinchingly exploring the culture of online and menstrual shaming. Sure to be a conversation starter, Blood Moon is the unforgettable portrait of one girl’s fight to reclaim her reputation and to stand up against a culture that says periods are dirty.

Sound good? Add to Goodreads HERE.

Another scary one to save till October?

Here is the blurb from Goodreads:

Full of menace and suspense comes this unputdownable original paperback thriller perfect for fans of Natasha Preston and Natalie D. Richards!

Sofia isn’t so sure about Fright Night. When she suggested it to her friends, she was only thinking of it as an excuse to get closer to Dylan. Now that it’s happening, she’s worried that spending the night in a deserted forest is a bad idea.

But it’s totally safe–there’s even a safe word if things get too intense. And they do. Sofia and her friends are forced to face their greatest fears, and suddenly? It’s too late to turn back.

Sound good? Add to Goodreads HERE.

So I am either finished reading this as of this post, or just about done. I have loved this series so far, and was excited for this one. Just got the physical ARC through a booksfortrade deal on Twitter, so got started reading a bit late, even though I had the e-galley, because I prefer to read a real book!

Here is the blurb from Goodreads:

Rose Mortiz has always been a fixer, but lately she’s been feeling lost. She has brand-new powers she doesn’t understand, and her family is still trying to figure out how to function in the wake of her amnesiac father’s return home. Then, on the night of her Deathday party, Rose discovers her father’s memory loss has been a lie.
 
As she rushes to his side, the two are ambushed and pulled through a portal to the land of Adas, a fairy realm hidden in the Caribbean Sea. There, Rose is forced to work with a group of others to save Adas. Soon, she begins to discover the scope of her powers, the troubling truth about her father’s past, and the sacrifices he made to save her sisters.
 
But if Rose wants to return home so she can repair her broken family, she must figure out how to heal Adas first. 

Sound good? Add to Goodreads HERE.

This is another one I’ve been seeing some good reviews of. I wanted to read the other book by these authors, Unpregnant, but haven’t got to it yet.

Here is the blurb from Goodreads:

Steve Stevenson is an asshole. That might not be a cool thing to say about someone with cancer, but it’s true. Yeah, he throws legendary parties and is the most popular guy in school, but he also loves humiliating pranks, Cardi B, and doesn’t recycle. Worst of all, he’s dating Kaia—the girl of nice guy Cam’s dreams.

But when a desperate Kaia asks Cam to help her raise money to pay for Steve’s experimental treatment, Cam offers to organize the biggest, most viral fundraising campaign—SaveSteve.com. Maybe then Kaia will finally see Cam as the perfect, thoughtful, altruistic, good guy for her. But Steve’s no fool. He’s totally on to Cam’s plan. And to stop him from stealing his girlfriend, he’s going to do whatever it takes to make Cam’s life as miserable as his own.

From Jenni Hendriks and Ted Caplan, authors of Unpregnant, comes a quirky, funny story about the pressures of who others expect you to be and what it really means to do the right thing.

Sound good? Add to Goodreads HERE.

Final Thoughts:

Eleven this week! Are any of these on your TBR, or have you already read them? If so, which do you recommend? Leave me a link to your post in your comment and I’ll be sure to return the visit!

Also, while you’re here, make sure to go enter my monthly giveaway HERE, it’s open for about another week!

And we’re celebrating my 11th blogoversary this month with another giveaway HERE.