Top Ten Tuesday | April 26, 2022

Happy Tuesday!

Top Ten Tuesday is a Bookish Meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, and this week’s theme is BOOKS WITH (BLANK) ON THE COVER!

Happy Tuesday!

This week I’m highlighting books where the title is the focus of the cover! I was having the hardest time trying to articulate what I mean by that, so I’m hoping that looking at all of these beautiful covers below will let you know what I’m talking about!

And now without any further ado, here’s this week’s Top Ten Tuesday!

Aces Wild: A Heist by Amanda DeWitt
Published on September 6, 2022 by Peachtree Teen
Genres: Contemporary, Thriller, YA, Queer, Aspec
Pages: 352
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Author Links: Website, Twitter, Goodreads, Amazon, Instagram

Some people join chess club, some people play football. Jack Shannon runs a secret blackjack ring in his private school’s basement. What else is the son of a Las Vegas casino mogul supposed to do?
Everything starts falling apart when Jack’s mom is arrested for their family’s ties to organized crime. His sister Beth thinks this is the Shannon family’s chance to finally go straight, but Jack knows that something’s not right. His mom was sold out, and he knows by who. Peter Carlevaro: rival casino owner and jilted lover. Gross.
Jack hatches a plan to find out what Carlevaro’s holding over his mom’s head, but he can’t do it alone. He recruits his closest friends—the asexual support group he met through fandom forums. Now all he has to do is infiltrate a high-stakes gambling club and dodge dark family secrets, while hopelessly navigating what it means to be in love while asexual. Easy, right?

This Golden State by Marit Weisenberg
Published on March 1, 2022 by Flatiron Books
Genres: Contemporary, Mystery, YA
Pages: 400
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Author Links: Website, Twitter, Facebook, Goodreads, Instagram

The Winslow family lives by five principles:
1. No one can know your real name.
2. Don’t stay in one place too long.
3. If you sense anything is wrong, go immediately to the meeting spot.
4. Keeping our family together is everything.
5. We wish we could tell you who we are, but we can’t. Please—do not ask.
Poppy doesn’t know why her family has been running her whole life, but she does know that there are dire consequences if they’re ever caught. Still, her curiosity grows each year, as does her desire for real friends and the chance to build on something, instead of leaving behind school projects, teams, and crushes at a moment’s notice.
When a move to California exposes a crack in her parents’ airtight planning, Poppy realizes how fragile her world is. Determined to find out the truth, she mails in a home DNA test. Just as she starts to settle into her new life and even begins opening up to a boy in her math class, the forgotten test results bring her crashing back to reality.
Unraveling the shocking truth of her parents’ real identities, Poppy realizes that the DNA test has undone decades of careful work to keep her family anonymous—and the past is dangerously close to catching up to them. Determined to protect her family but desperate for more, Poppy must ask: How much of herself does she owe her family? And is it a betrayal to find her own place in the world?

Why Would I Lie? by Adi Rule
Published on April 5, 2022 by Scholastic Press
Genres: YA, Contemporary
Pages: 336
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A ripped-from-the-headlines thriller about a charismatic, sociopathic valedictorian . . . and the only girl brave enough to try to bring him down.
Bitter. Angry. Paranoid.
It doesn’t matter how you label Viveca North. Her focus is on academic excellence, not popularity. She’s always tried her best to be perfect, and now that she’s a senior, it’s time for all her hard work to pay off. The early-morning runs. The constant studying. The peer tutoring. It will all be worth it when she’s named valedictorian and finally granted admission to her dream school, the elite Everett College. Too bad Jamison Sharpe is trying to steal it from her….
Or is he? Jamison doesn’t need to try to be perfect. Everything seems to come so easily to him. He’s charming, funny, and has the ability to make anyone feel special. He has his pick of glowing college recommendations and his grades are flawless. Obviously Viveca is just jealous, right?
Viveca knows something is off about Jamison. But as she investigates his past, she seems to find a web of lies and deceit that she struggles even to fathom. The further she goes in her quest for the truth, the more impossible her own dreams become.
Will Viveca be able to take down her school’s golden boy and reveal him as a fraud? Or will she—and what she believes—be silenced by labels?
In this twisty, suspenseful thriller Adi Rule weaves the unforgettable story of a girl who won’t back down from what she knows she deserves.

The Year I Stopped Trying by Katie Heaney
Published on November 16, 2021 by Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers
Genres: Contemporary, YA, Queer
Pages: 256
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Author Links: Website, Twitter, Goodreads, Instagram

Mary is having an existential crisis. She's a good student, she never gets in trouble, and she is searching for the meaning of life. She always thought she'd find it in a perfect score on the SATs. But by junior year, Mary isn't so sure anymore.
The first time, it's an accident. She forgets to do a history assignment. She even crosses history essay off in her pristine planner. And then: Nothing happens. She doesn't burst into flames, the world doesn't end, the teacher doesn't even pull her aside after class.
So she asks herself: Why am I trying so hard? What if I stop?

The Castle School (for Troubled Girls) by Alyssa B. Sheinmel
Published on March 2, 2021 by Sourcebooks Fire
Genres: Contemporary, Mystery, YA
Pages: 400
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When Moira Dreyfuss's parents announce that they're sending her to an all-girls boarding school deep in the Maine woods, Moira isn't fooled. She knows her parents are punishing her; she's been too much trouble since her best friend, Nathan, died―and for a while before that. At the Castle School, isolated from the rest of the world, Moira will be expected to pour her heart out to the odd headmaster, Dr. Prince. But she isn't interested in getting over Nathan's death or befriending her fellow students.
On her first night there, Moira hears distant music. On her second, she discovers the lock on her window is broken. On her third, she and her roommate venture outside...and learn that they're not so isolated after all. There's another, very different, Castle School nearby―this one filled with boys whose parents sent them away, too.
Moira is convinced that the Castle Schools and the doctors who run them are hiding something. But exploring the schools will force Moira to confront her overwhelming grief―and the real reasons her parents sent her away.

Wicked As You Wish by Rin Chupeco
Series: A Hundred Names for Magic #1
Published on March 3, 2020 by Sourcebooks Fire
Genres: Fantasy, Mythology, Retellings, YA
Pages: 432
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When a hidden prince, a girl with secrets, a ragtag group of unlikely heroes, and a legendary firebird come together…something wicked is going down.
Many years ago, the magical Kingdom of Avalon was left encased in ice when the Snow Queen waged war. Its former citizens are now refugees in a world mostly devoid of magic. Which is why the crown prince and his protectors are stuck in…Arizona.
Prince Alexei, the sole survivor of the Avalon royal family, is hiding in a town so boring, magic doesn’t even work there. Few know his secret identity, but his friend Tala is one of them.
A new hope for their abandoned homeland reignites when a famous creature of legend, the Firebird, appears for the first time in decades. Alex and Tala must unite with a ragtag group of new friends to journey back to Avalon for a showdown that will change the world as they know it.

How Rory Thorne Destroyed the Multiverse by K. Eason
Series: The Thorne Chronicles #1
Also in this series: How Rory Thorne Destroyed the Multiverse, How the Multiverse Got Its Revenge
Published on October 8, 2019 by Daw Books
Genres: Adult, Alternate History, Fantasy, Multiverse, Retellings, Science Fiction
Pages: 408
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Author Links: Website, Twitter, Goodreads, Instagram

Rory Thorne is a princess with thirteen fairy blessings, the most important of which is to see through flattery and platitudes. As the eldest daughter, she always imagined she'd inherit her father's throne and govern the interplanetary Thorne Consortium.
Then her father is assassinated, her mother gives birth to a son, and Rory is betrothed to the prince of a distant world.
When Rory arrives in her new home, she uncovers a treacherous plot to unseat her newly betrothed and usurp his throne. An unscrupulous minister has conspired to name himself Regent to the minor (and somewhat foolish) prince. With only her wits and a small team of allies, Rory must outmaneuver the Regent and rescue the prince.

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab
Published on October 6, 2020 by Tor Books
Genres: Fantasy, Contemporary, Historical Fiction, Mystery, New Adult, Queer, Romance
Pages: 444
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France, 1714: in a moment of desperation, a young woman makes a Faustian bargain to live forever and is cursed to be forgotten by everyone she meets.
Thus begins the extraordinary life of Addie LaRue, and a dazzling adventure that will play out across centuries and continents, across history and art, as a young woman learns how far she will go to leave her mark on the world.
But everything changes when, after nearly 300 years, Addie stumbles across a young man in a hidden bookstore and he remembers her name.

Spellhacker by M.K. England
Published on January 21, 2020 by HarperTeen
Genres: Fantasy, YA, Neurodivergent, Queer, Science Fiction, Thriller
Pages: 416
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In Kyrkarta, magic—known as maz—was once a freely available natural resource. Then an earthquake released a magical plague, killing thousands and opening the door for a greedy corporation to make maz a commodity that’s tightly controlled—and, of course, outrageously expensive.
Which is why Diz and her three best friends run a highly lucrative, highly illegal maz siphoning gig on the side. Their next job is supposed to be their last heist ever.
But when their plan turns up a powerful new strain of maz that (literally) blows up in their faces, they’re driven to unravel a conspiracy at the very center of the spellplague—and possibly save the world.
No pressure.

It Came From the Sky by Chelsea Sedoti
Published on August 4, 2020 by Sourcebooks Fire
Genres: YA, Contemporary, Science Fiction
Pages: 512
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This is the absolutely true account of how Lansburg, Pennsylvania was invaded by aliens and the weeks of chaos that followed. There were sightings of UFOs, close encounters, and even abductions. There were believers, Truth Seekers, and, above all, people who looked to the sky and hoped for more.
Only...there were no aliens.
Gideon Hofstadt knows what really happened. When one of his science experiments went wrong, he and his older brother blamed the resulting explosion on extraterrestrial activity. And their lie was not only believed by their town―it was embraced. As the brothers go to increasingly greater lengths to keep up the ruse and avoid getting caught, the hoax flourishes. But Gideon's obsession with their tale threatened his whole world. Can he find a way to banish the aliens before Lansburg, and his life, are changed forever?
Told in a report format and comprised of interviews, blog posts, text conversations, found documents, and so much more, It Came from the Sky is a hysterical and resonant novel about what it means to be human in the face of the unknown.

What covers did you talk about today? Let me know in the comments below and don’t forget to have a magical week!