What if Andie MacDowell had figured out Bill Murray was caught in a time loop? For 16-year-old Harmony, a recent dropout working in her mam’s cafe, it’s the first time she’s lived this Thursday in May – but she’s observant, and notices the swaggering way Liam moves through the world, like he knows exactly what’s going to happen. The rugby lad has proclaimed himself “King of Dublin”, embracing “the wonders of the loop” – which Harmony quickly diagnoses as him “throwing money around and acting the maggot”.
Oran Doyle’s compelling debut Give Me ’Til Midnight (Everything With Words, £8.99) is a refreshing take on the now-familiar time-loop plot, featuring a boy seemingly happy to stay stuck and a girl determined to set him free (it becomes, of course, more complicated than that).
Their wanderings around contemporary Dublin inspire commentary on its juxtaposition of glamour and grime, with an extra metaphysical edge: Harmony witnesses the gold-chained Lord Mayor mere moments after passing by a homeless person and thinks, “In some alternate universe he might be living in a tent himself.”
Immediately following up with “My brain is fried” allows this to be a relatable thought rather than a soapbox moment, letting the city be a well-rendered character in the novel without taking centre stage. The spotlight belongs to the two teens – figuring out how to make choices in a world that seems (and sometimes genuinely is) set against them. This is an absolutely terrific first novel from a writer we can hope to see more of.
There’s a different kind of exploration of autonomy and agency in Alan Carrigan’s Then We’ll Be Happy (Chicken House, £8.99), based on the author’s own experience of quadriplegic cerebral palsy. Sam is on the verge of legal adulthood, navigating his relationship with his mother, his current carer, while trying to advocate for himself in a school system that excludes him (“Sorry, Sam, I don’t know what to tell you; it’s not in the budget”).
Learning about “internalised ableism” and “the social model of disability” through a new group of powerchair football friends provides hope without diminishing the genuine challenges of living with an impairment. As Sam puts it, “Sometimes it can feel like you’re expected to fall on one of two sides – either super depressed or super positive and inspirational. There’s no in between.”
Focusing on what you can control may be a cliche – but it is also true, and made relatable with this warm, funny debut.
“A gun did feel like cheating. It certainly didn’t have the elegance of an up-close maiming but needs must.” It would be wise not to get overly attached to any of the characters in Cethan Leahy’s Dead Teenager Movie (Little Island, €11.99), a Cork-set slasher horror. Leahy’s first-hand knowledge of filmmaking is evident in this twisty tale about a girl who understands “not to go into the basement or to read aloud the Latin from books covered in human flesh”. Wry commentary on familiar tropes and appalling rich people pairs well with a series of reveals about who is filming this deadly weekend away, and why.
The world of Russian ballet in the last days of communism is vividly evoked in Bluebird (O’Brien Press, €11.99), the first novel from former dancer and now psychotherapist Harriet Parsons. For Hope and her best friend Emily, ballet is an extracurricular activity they are excited to pursue more seriously when they are accepted to the school in Pavlovgrad. They soon learn that for their peers in Russia, “choice is ballet school or factory … the chance to travel, to be an artist”.
A trivial comedy for serious YA readers, and more summer page-turners for teens
Convoluted queuing systems, food shortages and a lack of washing machines make their new home feel like stepping into a different era (although some of the living conditions which shock the middle-class girls would not be unheard of amid today’s housing crisis). For Hope, a Russian orphan adopted by Irish parents, it nevertheless is a place she yearns to belong to, and she is prepared to devote herself to the demanding discipline of ballet in order to succeed here.
The immersion in this strange, obsessive world compensates for the slightly meandering and sometimes implausible plot; dance lovers will appreciate the level of detail and respect given to their art form.
“Sometimes I think one of the reasons we dismiss this violence is because we can’t face the truth of how terrible it is. It feels too much.” It should surprise no one that Holly Bourne’s latest YA novel tackles a feminist issue; what is new about And Then We Screamed (Usborne, £9.99) is the setting. The British author uses a picturesque American small town – the sort of place where bad things aren’t supposed to happen – as the backdrop for an account of a strange epidemic in which teenage girls begin having screaming fits.
Five years on, a documentary crew investigates the strange incident, facilitating a range of voices aside from the two young protagonists – student journalists Clover and Brody – who narrate in real time. The device adds suspense but also smooths the way for expert opinions (along with the inevitable conspiracy theories about Satan, the HPV vaccine, and secret government poisonings).
It’s tricky writing about social contagion and psychogenic illness without it being read as undermining or dismissing teenage girls; Bourne uses the form to slip in reminders that male violence against women is also contagious, and that so-called “hysteria is a form of communication born out of desperation, for people who feel they can’t say what they want to through any other means”.
Summer YA reads: from a Snow White who’d prefer not to to same-sex love-love on the tennis court
A few too many Britishisms slip through, and it is depressing that in YA, a field with so much talk about diversity, an American setting is still regarded as the most marketable one. Nevertheless, I’ve never encountered a Holly Bourne teen novel I didn’t immediately want to press into the hands of young people, and her latest page-turner is no exception.
Fantasy settings so often allow for a thoughtful look at power – who holds it, how it is wielded, what might threaten it. Of one chaotic leader in the realm of Thaletal: “He lost the ability to sleep, and spent the nights roaming the battlements instead. He became savage and unpredictable. Nobody dared say it aloud, but he was losing his mind.” Imagine!
The beautifully weird world of Frances Hardinge’s latest novel, Traitors’ Nest (First Ink, €13.99), is inspired by medieval history but also very much its own universe, in which castles jump from location to location in a strange game understood by no mortal, its origins shrouded in myth. Fifteen-year-old Burr is part of a group of rebel farmers who take over one such castle, and are then faced with considering how to rule in uncertain circumstances: “the last thing he wanted to do was behead a monster and then grow a monster’s head himself”.
Much as I adore the swoony sea of romantasy we are now swimming in, it is a pleasure to explore what fantasy does so well: morality. The always-excellent Hardinge gently invites us to reflect on what it means to be good in an imperfect world, wrapping it up in some nifty magic and enchanting, though dangerous, creatures. What a gorgeous, thought-provoking, captivating read.