Fave YA I read in 2019

In 2019 I got back into reading YA, after a year of reading almost none. This post lists my favorite new to me young adult fiction that I read in 2019, organized by trope. (Not all of them were published in 2019, of course.) It definitely shows my bias towards contemporary romance and particularly queer and trans YA, but there is a smattering of YA without romance, sports YA, speculative fiction, and graphic novels. I link to reviews where I have written them; and also where I have only posted trigger warnings, so you can easily find those.

I’m listing rep at the end of my descriptions. If you spot something incorrect, please do feel free to let me know. Also, I am not intending to out anyone; I get author info from the web and the book bio. If an author would like me to remove any info listed, please do let me know. I want to note that I use the word fat as a neutral descriptor when listing rep, and use the word queer when a character or author identify that way or when I am unclear about their identity but know they fall under the LGBTQIA+ umbrella.

For folks looking for books with no on-the-page sex, I am putting three asterisks*** at the end of the description. For ones I listened to on audiobook, I’m including the narrator’s names.

Note: All links to Amazon will be affiliate ones. If you buy through those links, I will make a small amount of money on that sale (which I plan to use to buy more books to review), but it will not add any to the cost of your product. It comes out of the company’s profits.

Graphic Novels

• Check, Please by Ngozi Ukazu (2018 contemporary m/m romance graphic novel)*** I enjoyed this so much! It was utterly delightful. It centers the most adorable gay boy hockey player ever. He figure skates! He bakes pies! He has a crush on the captain of the team! He is new to college, and new to college hockey, and so completely charming that I fell really hard for him. It’s more a story about his experiences playing hockey in his first two years of college, but there is a romance plotline that was really sweet. (Rep: Gay white man MC. Nigerian American woman author.)
• Mooncakes by Suzanne Walker and Wendy Xu (2019 paranormal f/enby romance graphic novel)*** I adored this cozy second chance romance between childhood friends who reunite as older teens. I loved the feel of the art, so cozy with muted colors. All this glorious witchiness and magic school and magical experimentation. (Rep: Chinese-American, Deaf, queer Jewish girl MC. Chinese-American non-binary survivor MC. Lebanese American woman author. Asian American illustrator.)

Great Jewish Representation

• It’s a Whole Spiel ed by Katherine Locke (2019 anthology) I loved this anthology. My favorite stories were by Katherine Locke, Hannah Moskowitz, Rachel Lynn Solomon, Dahlia Adler, Nova Ren Suma and Laura Silverman. (Rep: Jewish MCs. Jewish authors. For more info see review.)
• Sick Kids in Love by Hannah Moskowitz, read by Amy Melissa Bentley (2019 YA contemporary m/f romance novel) Some of the best chronic illness & chronic pain rep I’ve ever read. So resonant with my own experience in so many ways, for the spoonie stuff & also just in its NY Jewishness. Also, a really lovely swoony m/f YA romance with a bisexual hero! I especially love the audio & highly recommend you read it that way. The performance is great & the feels are more inescapable that way, I think. (Rep: Jewish white bisexual heroine with arthritis. Jewish white bisexual hero with chronic illness. Jewish white lesbian woman author with chronic illness.)
• Kissing Ezra Holtz (and Other Things I Did for Science) by Briana R Shrum (2019 YA contemporary m/f romance novel) I loved this enemies to lovers romance; I loved how queer and Jewish it was, and how much it engages with complex issues around imagining a future and being framed as a slut. The casual inclusion of trans and non-binary secondary characters made me especially happy. (Rep: Jewish Sephardic bisexual teen girl MC who I read as having ADHD. Jewish white teen boy love interest. Many white queer, trans and non-binary secondary characters. Jewish white queer woman author.)

Meet Cute Romance

• Truly, Madly, Royally by Debbie Rigaud (2019 YA contemporary m/f romance novel)*** A lovely YA modern royals romance with an awesome Black heroine who meet-cutes with a prince, accidentally. It was completely delightful and had a seriously awesome heroine who I adored to pieces. The hero was just gone over her and how competent she was, and I love those kinds of romances. (Rep: Black woman MC. White man MC. Black woman author.)
• I Wish You All the Best by Mason Deaver (2019 YA contemporary enby/m romance novel)*** I’d been looking forward to reading this for a very long time, and it gave me so many feels. The book felt rather bleak, partly because it was so full of trauma. It feels like a book that was written for non-binary readers instead of cis readers, which I especially appreciate, and the romance subplot was sweet. (White enby MC. Queer white boy love interest. White enby author.)

Movies and Angst

• This is Kind of An Epic Love Story by Kacen Callender (2018 contemporary YA m/m romance) I really liked the bi representation in this story, so much. It was full of angst and push pull and so much was fraught and the MC was supremely frustrating in his inertia and not communicating or taking action, but all of that felt so real, and resonant. As a friends to lovers romance, it doesn’t follow a traditional arc, but I didn’t mind that. (Rep: Bisexual Black teen boy MC. Latinx Hard of Hearing queer teen boy love interest. Queer white secondary characters. Black queer trans author.)
• Now a Major Motion Picture by Cori McCarthy (2018 contemporary m/f YA romance novel) I enjoyed this rather angsty YA centering a teen girl with deeply neglectful parents that push her to take over parenting her younger brother, who gets stuck traveling with him to visit the fan-filled set of a movie based on her grandmother’s fantasy series. She’s an anti-fan, who falls for a fan playing one of the main characters, and their romance arc is lovely. (Rep: Demisexual white woman MC with trauma. White man love interest. Queer white woman secondary character. Irish-Lebanese American queer non-binary author.)

Queerest of the Queer

• What Makes You Beautiful by Bridget Liang (2019 YA contemporary m/f romance novel with a trans girl lead)*** I enjoyed this YA that’s mostly about a teenager exploring gender and sexual identity but also has a sweet friends to lovers romance in it. It’s got a bit of a complex gender journey depicted, which is rare to find in YA, and I really appreciated that about it. (Biracial Chinese American trans girl MC. Many white queer secondary characters. Mixed race, queer, transfeminine, neurodiverse, disabled, fat author.)
• You Know Me Well by Nina LaCour and David Levithan (2016 contemporary YA novel) I asked on Twitter for book recs that centered queer friendship, and this was one of the first I got. It was beautiful, and perfect for June, as it centers Pride week. And it was very much about friendship, old and new, and about being afraid you are not enough, about change and getting your heart broken and fear of success and falling in love. It gave me so many feelings and I completely adored it. (Rep: Lesbian white girl MC. Gay white boy MC. Lesbian white woman author. Gay white Jewish man author.)
• Not Your Backup by CB Lee (2019 YA fantasy novel)*** This is the third installment in a queer YA superhero series that I adore, and I think it might be my favorite. It has a lovely aroace questioning arc that runs parallel to the resist the corrupt government arc, and resolves to a queerplatonic relationship with the person who started out as the MC’s boyfriend. It’s about friendship, identity, finding your place in activist movement, and it’s such a hopeful book to have right now in 2019. (Rep: Latinx aroace questioning teen girl MC. Black trans teen boy secondary character. Chinese-Vietnamese biracial bisexual girl secondary character. Queer white girl secondary character. Chinese-Vietnamese biracial bisexual woman author.)

Sports YA

Photo cover depicts a close up of an Indian American fat teen girl who is laughing with her eyes closed. She has colored dust in blue, red, and yellow on her face, is weating sunglasses in her hair. The title is to her right, white letters on a purple background: THERE’S SOMETHING ABOUT SWEETIE. The author;s name is across the bottom: SANDHYA MENON

• Home and Away by Candice Montgomery (2018 contemporary YA m/f romance) I fell super hard for the MC, and was swept along for the ride as she tries to sort out what to do about all this new information she now has about her family that has been kept from her for years. I loved the way she insists on going through her own process, makes completely reckless decisions that felt exactly right for her, and I was really into this as a sports YA, on top of all the other things it was. The romance had me worried for her the whole time, but the way she threw herself into it felt so real, and the arc really worked. I could not put this down stayed up way too late to finish reading it. (Rep: Black girl MC. Bisexual white boy love interest. Black non-binary author.)
• There’s Something About Sweetie by Sandyha Menon (2019 contemporary YA m/f romance novel)*** I loved this book so much. It hit on every level for me: engaging characters, swoony romance that I was rooting for hard, awesome friendships that were really important to the story and the MCs, extremely well paced and well-plotted, unputdownable, with this glorious fat rep that made me incredibly happy. (Rep: Fat Indian American teen girl MC. Indian American teen boy MC. Indian American woman author.)