Tempest by Julie Cross

19-year-old Jackson Meyer can time travel.  Not much, usually just back a few hours or days.  And when he does go back, nothing he does actually impacts the future - no one remembers interacting with him if it happened on one of his jumps, if he hurts himself he isn't seriously damaged when he gets back, and if he does something on one of his jumps, like break a window, that thing is undone when he gets back to the present.  It's not really serving a purpose, but he's having fun experimenting, and keeping it a secret from everyone but his science genius friend who is helping him figure out why it's happening and how to use it.  At least it is all fun until some people who also appear to be able to "jump" back in time show up at his girlfriend's college dor, attempt to kidnap Jackson, and kill his girlfriend in the struggle.  Now Jackson has jumped back 2 years, farther than he's jumped before, and no matter how hard he tries, he can't get back to his "real" time.  And the Enemies of Time are still after him.

Ruby Red by Kerstin Gier

1st in Ruby Red series.  Sequel is Sapphire Blue.  First published in Germany.

Gwen is 16 and lives with her mum, siblings, grandmother, aunt and cousin in an upperclass London neighborhood.  Her extended family doesn't pay much attention to her, focused on her cousin, believed to be the carrier of the time-travel gene that runs through her family and sure to show up very soon in the form of an abrupt trip to somewhere in the past.  But all is not as it seems.  Since a mathematical formula had worked out that Gwen's real birth  date was the birth date of the next time traveler, and her cousin was also born that day, Gwen's mum and (late) father secretly falsified her records to indicate Gwen was born the day before, allegedly in the hopes that she would be able to live a normal life (and since she was born at home with a midwife, no one was the wiser.

Prepare to Die by Paul Tobin

Despite being at their mercy, Steve Clarke, aka superhero Reaver, is inexplicably given a boon by arch-nemesis Octagon and his cadre of supervillains, Eleventh Hour - instead of killing him outright, they grant him 2 weeks to take care of his affairs before he reports back to them to fight to the death.  Steve uses the two weeks to come to grips with how he became a superhero in the first place, the loss of superfriends, his own moral ambiguity at times, and to reunite with his high school love, the girl who got away (or was pushed away due to Steve's unanticipated mutation caused by a chemical spill which transformed some of the cars occupants and killed others).

Insurgent by Veronica Roth

Sequel to Divergent

Tris, now on the run as war erupts, attempts to figure out what information is so vital, or so dangerous, that some factions would destroy others just to contain it.  

Divergent by Veronica Roth

In dystopian Chicago, society has been divided into 5 factions, each dedicated to cultivating a certain value:

• Amity (the peaceful)
• Candor (the honest)
• Abnegation (the selfless)
• Erudite (the intelligent)
• Dauntless (the brave) 

Scarlet by A.C. Gaughen

The early days of the Robin Hood story, told from the perspective of "Will" Scarlet.  Known to Robin, John, and a few others as just Scarlet, she is a young woman posing as a young man after running away from an arranged marriage.

Close to Famous, by Joan Bauer

13-year old Foster McFee and her mother leave Memphis in a hurry when her mom's Elvis-impersonator boyfriend gives mom a black eye.  Leaving with only the items they can fit in their car, which is pretty much everything they own, they end up randomly stopping in Culpepper, West Virginia.  With no other destination in mind, they decide to stay in Culpepper, at least for the rest of the summer, and meet and befriend some of the town's inhabitants.  Because it is a small town, of course many of the inhabitants are eccentric and quirky, but at least their quirks are a different than the usual fare:  Miss Charleena is a former movie star who is hiding out after losing her confidence when her husband left her for a younger woman, Angry Wayne, owner of Angry Wayne's Bar and Grill is...if not angry, at least crotchety and a bit cranky, and Macon is a budding documentarist, just a tweenage one without a camera. 

The False Princess by Eilis O'Neal

Nalia spends the first 16 years of her life thinking she is the princess and heir to the throne of Thorvald, only to be told that she was only a decoy, switched at birth with the real princess to try to avoid a prophecy made during the queen's pregnancy that the princess would be murdered horribly before her 16th birthday.  The king and queen, having averted their real daughter's death, send the false princess, named Sinda at birth, unceremoniously away from the castle to live in a small village with her only living relative, an aunt who is less than delighted to have a fully grown niece with no domestic skills sprung on her with no means of support.

Please Ignore Vera Dietz, by A. S. King.

This book evoked mixed feelings in several friends, but overall, I liked it.  Vera seemed pretty realistic in terms of not wanting to/not being able to talk about her feelings about her mom leaving, her dad withdrawing and especially her best friend's abandonment and then death.  She also seemed realistic in her self-destructive behavior, needing an outlet for the things she couldn't figure out how to express otherwise.  My main quibble is that Vera seemed to get over her dabbling with alcohol pretty easily - maybe she wasn't a full-fledged alcoholic, but she was definitely using it as a crutch, and that need seemed to evaporate after getting blotto and beaten up at the work Christmas party.  That struck me as a pat way of dealing with her developing problem.

Ninth Ward, by Jewell Parker Rhodes

Dealing with the days leading up to and immediately after Hurricane Katrina, through the eyes of a 12 year old girl living in NOLA's Ninth Ward with her 82-year old caretaker, Mama Ya-Ya.  Allows the reader to see the neighborhood and the life through the eyes of a bright, creative child who sees ghosts, believes in signs, loves math and words and learning and longs to build bridges when she grows up.

The Rise of Renegade X, by Chelsea M. Campbell

Damien Locke is all set for his 16th birthday - it's the day his life of crime officially begins.  It's basically a technicality - Damien's mom is the mad scientist Mistress of Mayhem, he is a shoe-in for Vilmore Academy, the ultimate school for teenage supervillains and he's already got his supervillain name picked out: Midnight Marauder.  But in Golden City, all supers have a letter appear on their hand on their 16th birthday to make it official - H for heroes and V for villains.  So imagine Damien's surprise when his V doesn't show up, but neither does an H; an X appears instead.

Paranormalcy, by Kiersten White

One in a spate of paranormal-themed YA books, this one held my interest more than many of the others I've read lately.  Evie is a teen who has been fostered with the International Paranormal Containment Agency since she was 8 years old, working for them during that time as the only person able to see through any glamour from any paranormal.  It's not breaking new ground in terms of content or teen angst, but it does have some nice "surprises". 

Only the Good Spy Young, by Ally Carter, Bk 4 in the Gallagher Girls series

In the previous three books in the series Cammie aka Chameleon Morgan has found out how serious being a Gallagher Girl is.  In the beginning it was fun knowing that she was a spy-in-training, sneaking out to meet a townie boy in Book 1 and using their special skills at detection, evasion, invention and deception to learn more about the mysterious boys from Blackthorne Academy in Book 2. 

Incarceron, by Catherine Fisher

Finn is a "cell-born" member of a Scum gang in Incarceron, the living prison with millions of electronic eyes and torture chambers, designed to recycled and re-use everything, even the people who are imprisoned there.  Finn remembers nothing before waking up in a cell, apparently remade from DNA of others who died, but his flashes of memory of the outside world convince him that he belongs outside.

White Cat by Holly Black, Curse Workers, Bk. 1

It was extremely hard not to read ahead in this book because I wanted to know what was going to happen next.  Little clues and pieces of info get scattered out like breadcrumbs, drawing you on, making you want to keep reading.  I figured out some of the twists before they came, but not all, and not too much before they were revealed.

It's a Mall World After All by Janette Rallison

Charlotte has a grudge against her best friend's boyfriend because of how he treated her in middle school, teasing her and making her life miserable.  As seniors now, Charlotte is convinced that Bryant is cheating on Brianna, and spies on him to prove it.  Instead of finding hard evidence of cheating, she keeps getting herself in embarrassing (and messy) situations, usually involving Colton, a guy in many of her classes, president of the National Honor Society club she belongs to, and also the guy who is Bryant's best friend and convinced he isn't cheating.  Charlotte has to face her own prejudices against Bryant and hope Colton and Brianna can get past their preconceived notions of Bryant's honesty in a light and fluffy book about high school and friendships.  A sub-plot in which Charlotte helps a little boy get shoes for his mom by organizing a Christmas gift drive offers some real heart, and Rallison's writing offers real opportunities for laughing out loud.

SLJ recommendation for grades 6-10

One Night That Changes Everything by Lauren Barnholdt

Eliza is looking forward to a quiet night watching movies with her best friends while her parents are out of town, but a club of boys from her school, including the ex-boyfriend that only dated her as initiation into the club, use her notebook of secret things to blackmail her into doing stunts around Boston. Includes under-age drinking, references to drugs and sex that might make some teens (and unparents) uncomfortable, but the overall message doesn't glorify any of them. The relationships with best friends are depicted pretty realistically (both friends get distracted by their own concerns - other friends, boys, etc. - but pull together for Eliza when she needs them most. A touch of romance, a supportive relationship with her older sister, and the thrill and danger of staying out all night will appeal to teen readers, probably of the female variety.

My recommendation - 9th grade and up.

Will Grayson, Will Grayson

Told from alternating POV's, this story focuses on a few months in the lives of two teens with the same name who meet through change and whose lives intersect at the large point of Tiny Cooper, the best friend of one Will and the new boyfriend of the other Will. Themes include looking at what makes people friends, dealing with romantic interest, how people can be very different but still love each other, a bit about telling friends and family that you are gay and a bit about depression and mental illness in teens. Funny, witty, relationships told from a guy's point of view, matter of fact about homosexuality. Lots of IM and texts quoted.

SLJ grades 9 and up