About Victoria Waddle
Victoria Waddle is a Pushcart Prize-nominated writer and has been included in Best Short Stories from The Saturday Evening Post Great American Fiction Contest. Her books include a collection of feminist short fiction, Acts of Contrition, and a chapbook on grief, The Mortality of Dogs and Humans. Her YA novel about a polygamist cult, Keep Sweet, launches in June 2025. Formerly the managing editor of the journal Inlandia: A Literary Journey and a teacher librarian, she contributes to the Southern California News Group column Literary Journeys. She discusses both writing and library book censorship on her Substack, “Be a Cactus.” Join her there for thoughts on defiant readers and writers as well as for weekly library censorship news.
Frozen Fire by Tim Bowler Fifteen-year-old Dusty picks up her phone to find that a strange boy is calling her to say that he is dying. She tells him to call the police, but he refuses. As they talk … Continue reading →
Posted in Family Problems, Fiction, Grief, Horror/Mystery/Suspense, Supernatural, Young Adult Literature
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Tagged book reviews, death, family problems, Frozen Fire, grief, parent-teen relationships, Tim Bowler, YA fiction, YA literature
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How to be Brave by E. Katherine Kottaras Georgia Askeridis defines herself through her fears, which are many. She has every right to remain the girl in the shadows. Her severely overweight mother has recently died of complications of … Continue reading →
Posted in bullying, Family Problems, Fiction, Grief, Romance, Young Adult Literature
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Tagged book reviews, diabetes, E. Katherine Kottaras, grief, How to be Brave, romance, YA fiction, YA literature
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Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates “This is your country, this is your world, this is your body, and you must find some way to live within the all of it.” Often books have an opening sentence–or … Continue reading →
Posted in Biography/Memoir, Grief, Human Rights Issues, Multicultural, Non-fiction
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Tagged #AdultBooksForTeens, #AfricanAmericanWriters, #BetweenTheWorldAndMe, #bookReviews, #Ta-NehisiCoates, #YALiteraure, Adult books for teens, African Americans, American History, book reviews, death, United States, US History
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Having a great time with keynote speakers Jay Asher, Marissa Meyer and Andrew Smith. During “Speed Date the Author,” we met most of the writers and got to ask them anything!
The Meursault Investigation by Kamel Daoud Many teens read Albert Camus’s The Stranger in high school. From what they tell me, it’s a book they like. Algerian journalist Kamel Daoud has given us Albert Camus’s The Stranger from the … Continue reading →
Posted in Classic Fiction, Family Problems, Fiction, Multicultural
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Tagged Adult books for teens, Albert Camus, Algiers, book reviews, death, existentialism, guilt, Kamel Daoud, Meursault Investigation, philosophy, The Stranger readalike
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The Alex Crow by Andrew Smith Andrew Smith has another novel that will easily become a hit with teens and YA librarians. The publisher describes it as the interweaving of four stories–that of “of Ariel, a Middle Eastern refugee … Continue reading →
Posted in Family Problems, Fiction, Horror/Mystery/Suspense, Humor, Mature Readers, Sci-Fi/Futuristic, Young Adult Literature
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Tagged Andrew Smith, book reviews, family problems, parent-teen relationships, rape, refugees, reluctant readers, sci-fi, science fiction, Teen Issues, The Alex Crow, YA fiction, YA literature
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The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins Rachel Watsons might be able to stop obsessing over her ex-husband,–who is now remarried and has a child–if she could stop drinking, stop envying the new wife, and most of all, … Continue reading →
Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson While I found The Warmth of Other Suns enlightening in many ways, I was truly astonished by the revelation that African Americans leaving the South during the early years of the Great … Continue reading →
Posted in Family Problems, Historical Fiction/Historical Element, Human Rights Issues, Multicultural, Non-fiction, Over 375 pages
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Tagged Adult books for teens, African Americans, book reviews, Great Migration, Isabel Wilkerson, Warmth of Other Suns
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Did you know that more than 180,000 of the items in our Digital Collections are in the public domain? That means everyone has the freedom to enjoy and reuse these materials in almost limitless ways. Source: Public Domain Collections: Free … Continue reading →