We Need to Talk About Vaginas

We Need to Talk About Vaginas : an important book about vulvas, periods, puberty, and sex!  by Dr. Allison K. Rogers

St. Martin’s Press  9781684492848

A gynecologist explains, examines, and answers questions about female bodies and the changes experienced in the transition from childhood to adulthood.  Topics (in addition to those called out in the title) include: public hair, ovaries, cramps, hymens, masturbation, sexually transmitted diseases, gender identity, and the history of flying vaginas!  The narration is honest and straightforward, using correct medical vocabulary. The illustrations show a variety of differently colored and shaped bodies.  Recommended for age 8 and up.

Birth control, diversity, gender diversity, graphic novel, masturbation, mental health, non-fiction, on-page sex,  parents, pregnancy, rainbow+, sexual assault, teachers

How Not to Fall in Love

 

How Not to Fall in Love  by Jacqueine Firkins

Clarion Books, 9780358467144

After years of watching Bridezillas parade through her mom’s wedding shop, Harper is pretty convinced that “love” is something invented to sell stuff.  She wants nothing to do with it.  This is exactly opposite to the feelings of her neighbor and best friend, Theo, who falls in love on each first date.  The two offer to trade tips:  Theo will help Harper ace the ACT vocabulary test, and Harper will teach Theo how to avoid falling in love.  The vocabulary part goes well.  The rest…not so much.

Predictable but sweet boy-next-door romance made MUCH BETTER because the characters–including supporting characters–engage in honest, heartfelt conversations about self-care, birth control, and what they want (or think they want) from relationships.  Sweet and tactful sexual situations on the page.  

Birth control, friendship, high school, kissing, mental health, neurodivergence, off-page intimacy, on-page sex,  parents, rainbow+, Star Trek sex, straight friends

Plan A

 

Plan A by Deb Caletti

Labyrinth Road, 9780593485545

16-year old Ivy is strong, independent, opinionated…and pregnant.  She has plans and hopes and dreams for her future, and that future does not involve a child originating from sexual assault.  

Unfortunately for Ivy, she lives in contemporary Texas, which has some of the most restrictive women’s health laws in the country.  Ivy doesn’t realize that she is pregnant until she has passed the 6-week mark, after which an abortion is illegal in her home state.  Fortunately for Ivy, she is not alone:  her mother, grandmother, and a host of other women (and men) are willing to prioritize her choices, and so begins what Ivy and her adorable boyfriend Lorenzo call their “abortion road trip love story.”  

This book is serious and funny, timeless and timely.  It will absolutely be banned and challenged, and should absolutely be available for any reader who wants it–because these choices are important, and stories about these choices are possibly even more important. Highly recommended for ages 14 to adult.

Abortion, birth control, bullying, cussing, diversity, friendship, high school, kissing, parents, pregnancy, rainbow+, religion, sexual assault (on-page), Star Trek sex

Aftercare Instructions

Aftercare Instructions  by Bonnie Pipkin

17-year-old Genesis Johnson walks out into the waiting room at the Planned Parenthood clinic and discovers that Peter, her boyfriend and one true love, is gone.  Cramping and bleeding after the abortion she has just endured, Gen can't believe he has abandoned her.  But he isn't waiting for her, and he won't answer her calls or texts.  What else could it mean?

Events are revealed in alternating formats:  the present day episodes are a straightforward narration, but flashbacks to the past are written as a stage play starring Gen, Peter, and a few important supporting characters.  The details revealed build a story that will surprise readers almost as much as it surprises Genesis herself.

The chapters are titled with excerpts from the aftercare instructions booklet provided by the abortion clinic, which serves as an anchor point for the story and also offers insight into events as they unfold. 

Recommended for readers ages 14 to adult.

Once and For All

Once and For All  by Sarah Dessen

Louna is a high school senior set to graduate in a few weeks.  Her summer job is (as always) helping with her mom's wedding planning business.  Her college plans are set, her best friend is in place, and there is no romance for Louna on the horizon--which is just as well.  She has survived being in love with the perfect boy, but recovering from that wasn't easy and she's not eager to do it again.

Then Louna meets Ambrose:  trouble-making brother of the bride, always late, always fidgeting, always irreverent, always flirting with every girl he meets.  Louna wants nothing to do with Ambrose.

Because this is a Sarah Dessen novel, readers totally know where the story is going and where all the characters will end up.  The journey is familiar and relatively predictable, but it's still kinda fun.  Behind-the-scenes details of wedding planning are amusing, the banter between characters is catchy and cute.  There are some poignant details scattered gently into the story, but this is essentially a rom-com that should have starred Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks when they were both 17 years old.

Gold star for the appropriate mention of a condom, but no body parts on the page.  

100 Questions You'd Never Ask Your Parents

100 Questions You'd Never Ask Your Parents : straight answers to teens' questions about sex, sexuality and health  by Elizabeth Henderson & Nancy Armstrong, MD

When I have sex for the first time, will people be able to tell?
How old do I have to be to buy condoms?
What is the best birth control?
Does alcohol really kill brain cells?

These, and 96 other common questions are answered in simple, straightforward language. The questions are arranged in a random fashion (perhaps from most-frequently to less-frequently asked?), and the answers are succinct and factual--most Q/A entries are dealt with on a single page, with no fancy color formatting, no sidebars and no illustrations of any kind.

Most questions are related to sex and sexuality, but topics also include drug and alcohol use, suicidal thoughts, and friendships.  The "hot" topics of homosexuality, birth control (including abstinence, condom use and pills), and pregnancy are each addressed several times, but the topic of abortion remains untouched by this book.  Not all the responses are complete--it's notable that Planned Parenthood is not mentioned anywhere in the text or index, despite that agency's importance in the field of teen sexual health issues nationwide.

Index and glossary of terms are included. A list of additional resources, books, websites and governmental agencies would have been helpful, but was not included.

To Be Perfectly Honest : a novel based on an untrue story  by Sonya Sones

How can you tell

if Colette is lying?

Her mouth

is open.

Colette is a truly unreliable narrator.  She continually lies (she likes to call it "reimagining reality") to make her life seem more interesting...and to annoy her movie-star mother, who rarely pays attention to Colette and her little brother Will.

When Colette's summer plans change from "Paris with friends" to "San Luis Obispo with mom and Will and Mom's new co-star," she gets mad...and the lies start to stack up.  

In the middle of this comes Connor, Colette's first real boyfriend.  If only she could stop lying to him!  

HERE AT LAST is a book with a believable main character who actually says "NO, I don't want to have sex with you (yet) and sticks to her decision throughout the book.  Not because she isn't attracted to Connor--she is.  But because she really doesn't feel ready for sex.  

Connor is not prepared to accept "no" as a final answer from Colette...and he's prepared to lie through his teeth to get what he wants.

This book is a quick, fun book-in-verse filled with enjoyable--but unreliable--characters.  

No sex, but a few steamy close calls, some minor cussing, and some underage drinking and drug use.  The adults are easy to dislike at first, but they (especially Colette's mom) really redeem themselves at the end.

Recommended for readers ages 14 and up.

Reboot

Reboot  by Amy Tintera

Dystopic action adventure and zombie romance.  What's not to love?

 

5 years ago, 12-year-old Wren Connolly was shot and killed.  178 minutes later, she woke up.  Now, she's a Reboot, a dead soldier working for the government to protect the peace of the living humans who have--so far--survived plagues, starvation, drug addiction, and the violence of the slums.  At least, that's what she's been told.

 

When she agrees to train Callum (who was only dead for 22 minutes, and thus is still "mostly human") Wren begins to look beyond the orders she is given.  She begins to recognize that her own emotions are not gone.  She even begins to fall in love with Callum.

 

But time is running out for Callum.  Wren is going to need all her Reboot strength and all her human cunning to escape...and she's going to need the other Reboots to help her do it.

 

Nonstop action, quite a lot of violence and bloodshed, but minimal cussing and nudity, and a few delightful scenes of romance and tenderness.  Fans of the Hunger Games will eat this up. 

(Ohh, bad zombie pun, sorry!)

Recommended for readers ages 12 to adult. 

Impulse

Impulse  by Steven Gould

Cent has lived her whole life in isolation with her parents, hiding their secret:  they can jump, or teleport instantly from one part of the world to any other place they have already seen.  There are governmental agencies that would like to use jumpers...and there are other, more nefarious agencies that want jumpers for their own purposes.

Cent has travelled all over the world with her parents.  She is well-educated,, reads voraciously, and helps her mother with emergency relief efforts in third-world countries.  But Cent wants friends her own age. 

When Cent discovers that she can jump too, her parents agree to let her attend a regular high school in a regular American town.

And then, things go wrong.  And Cent may not be able to jump fast enough to avoid the trouble her family has brought to their new community.

This is the third book in the Jumper series; fans of the 2008 movie starring Hayden Christensen will be confused, as the film story has very little to do with the original novel.  However, both feature good action and adventure, mixed with compassion and romance.

Recommended for readers ages 14 to adult.

Ivy

 

Okeksyk, Sarah. Ivy.  (graphic novel)

Ivy is a talented high school artist growing up in a small town in Maine.  Her mom wants her to study business at a local college, but Ivy wants to study painting...as far away from her hometown as possible.  Her emotional roller coaster sometimes derails Ivy's good intentions, but gradually she works towards creating her own kind of freedom.

Although Ivy was published in 2011, one gets the feeling that it is set in a much earlier time.  She exchanges hand-written letters with her long-distance boyfriend, and they call each other on land-line telephones (the kind with cords!).  Still, the emotional journey towards adulthood is universally uncomfortable, and the story is well-drawn and well-told.  This graphic novel features on-page sex (tactful, but unmistakable), drug use and under-age drinking as well as lots of cussing and depictions of some seriously dysfunctional families.  Ivy is not a happy story, but the end promises just a bit of hope for the future.

Hooked

Hooked  by Catherine Greenman

Thea considers herself savvy and spunky, but she throws all that away when she starts dating Will, who "hooks" her with his good looks and charm.  Their love is strong, the sex is fantastic...and then, Thea gets pregnant.  The early-abortion plan (endorsed by parents, friends, and Will) is abandoned when Thea discovers that she loves her unborn child too much for abortion or adoption.  Plan #2 centers on everyone supporting Thea and baby Ian (and Will too), physically, emotionally and financially.  There is a bit of squeaking about this, but eventually, everyone falls in line because they love Thea and the baby is adorable.   Thea's plans for the future include spending more time with her formerly-estranged dad, making bundles of money by designing the latest crochet fashion merchendise, and eventually getting back together with Will.

Realistic?  Uh, no. 

Maybe that's how folks do things in The Big City, but in my small town, parents of unwed parents don't hand over $10,000 (each!) as starter money on top of the rent-controlled apartment they finance for the teens and little Ian.  Thea's narrative voice rescues this story from the round file:  she is spunky, and she stands up for the ideas and the people she values, including herself. 

Not a first purchase, but don't overlook this title if budgets can support it.  There is on-page (but not graphic) sex, minor cussing, and some underage drinking, but nowhere near as gratuitous as Gossip Girl and that ilk.  Ages 14 and up.