Fall Book Recomendations

From its opening lines, Truly Devious transports you to a cozy, autumnal, academic setting. At the elite boarding school Ellingham Academy, Truly Devious by Maureen Johnson, follows Stevie Bell, a 15-year-old aspiring detective. Johnson does an excellent job of setting the scenes of this dual timeline novel. In 1936,  Ellingham Academy founder Albert Ellingham’s wife and daughter went missing. Nearly 30 years later, this incident is what inspires Stevie to apply to the academy. After she is accepted and moves in, strange and mysterious incidents begin to occur. Before she knows it, Stevie is sucked into her own real-life mystery at Ellingham Academy. Will she solve it? Will she even live to? Find out by reading this amazing novel by Maureen Johnson.

In The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls paints an emotional picture of hardships, pain, love, fear, family, money, and addiction. The way she writes is so engaging, you almost forget that you are reading a memoir. The Glass Castle is Walls’ story. The very first pages take place in the future, but then the story returns to when she was little. From age three, she and her family were on the road, constantly moving from one place to another and evading the law. The story follows Jeannette’s relationship with her parents and siblings, her friendships, her homes, and her and her father’s dream of building a “glass castle.” This book is extremely emotional, and there are some trigger warnings you should be aware of before diving into it. Please be aware of these things: substance abuse, addiction, sexual assault, corporal punishment, irresponsible parenting, mentions of racism, and food insecurity. Though the content is certainly intense, this memoir is still very much worth reading. It is an experience, and although it can be a little tough to get through, it is definitely a good book to read in fall.

Rebecca Ross is one of the best fantasy authors out there. Her young adult series, “Letters of Enchantment,” is full of beautiful writing, and its first book, Divine Rivals, is truly a work of art. Divine Rivals is a historical fantasy novel set in a fictionalized version of the late 1800s – a world with gods who have all been asleep for a very long time. Somehow, two of the gods wake up and go to war, destroying all towns in their paths and causing devastating damage. The main character Iris’s brother has gone off to fight in the war and she works at a newspaper as a reporter. Soon Iris discovers that letters written on her typewriter can be sent through her wardrobe to a mysterious stranger…  Run, don’t walk, to read this cozy fantasy book full of excitement, adventure, love and secrets.

“Mysterious, exciting, thrilling, addictive.” These words all have one thing in common: they were used by South students to describe A Good Girl’s Guide To Murder by Holly Jackson. Jackson captivates her readers through her strong way with words. Her books are easy to read but extremely interesting, and they suck you in. A Good Girl’s Guide To Murder is by far some of her best work. In the book, Pippa Fitz-Amobi decides to reopen the cold case of teenager Andie Bell’s murder five years later for her senior capstone project. Little does she know, she will end up uncovering the shocking truth about what happened on that fateful Friday night, Apr. 18, 2014.