Guest Post: S.M. Reine

According to her bio, S.M. Reine is a twenty-something writer/geek/mom dwelling in a dodgy corner of Sin City with too many cats. She writes books to escape the drudgery of the desert and bakes a lot of cookies. Mmm, cookies. Her personal blog can be found here.

According to me, she's the author of Six Moon Summer, which just came out - well, yesterday!

Rylie's parents are going through a messy divorce. They send her to summer camp to get her out of the way of their fighting lawyers, but she's just as miserable at the girls' camp as she was at home-- there's nothing vegetarian for her to eat at the mess hall, she hates hiking and archery, and the other campers taunt Rylie mercilessly.

One night, the bullying goes too far, and Rylie runs away. She doesn't get far. It's a full moon, and she isn't alone in the forest. A wild animal mauls her. She's certain she won't survive.

Instead of dying, she wakes up unharmed in her cabin the next morning. The only sign that something has changed are the healed scars on her chest, her increasingly keen senses, and her sudden craving for raw, bloody meat. A boy from the other camp seems to know what's happening to her, but Rylie isn't sure if she can trust herself with Seth.

Rylie soon learns that she only has until the end of summer before she becomes just like the monster that attacked her: a man-eating werewolf hungry for human flesh. Unless she can find a cure, she's only six moons away from transforming forever and losing her life to the hunger...

And without further ado...

Essential YA Books for Non-YA People
I’ve been a grown up longer than I’d like to admit, but I will never give up on young adult fiction. There’s something so special about books written for teens that I can’t quite place-- maybe a youthful optimism lacking in cynical adult fiction, or a knack for pacing that escapes lengthier books for an older audience.

Who knows? There’s definitely something that keeps drawing me back to the young adult section of the library even though I graduated high school... um... well, it was a couple years ago. Cough. That said, my enthusiasm for YA bemuses the normal adults around me. “Why are you reading that?” they ask. “Isn’t that book meant for kids?” I feel no shame. I love YA and I’ll shout it loud and proud!

I ruthlessly attempt to convert these detractors with recommendations for YA books any adult might enjoy. Once they have their nose buried in one of these instant classics, I can skip along enjoying Priscilla the Great for the umpteenth time without earning any new confused looks from coworkers more interested in boring things like the weather, mortgages, and grocery lists.

The first I always recommend is Harry Potter. Everyone loves Harry Potter! My husband isn’t much of a reader (I know, it’s weird), but he absolutely devoured those books. I have yet to meet anyone who has read the entire series and disliked it. How can you not love the grubby kid under the stairs conquering evil?

For those people who disdain YA but gobble up Anne Rice, I like to recommend The Last Vampire Series by Christopher Pike. The books are short, but brutal. Sita is a ruthless heroine, but lovable. There’s plenty of violence and action on top of its sneaky moral lessons. Bonus: Christopher Pike has started publishing more of them! It’s called the “Thirst” series now, so it’s easy to pick up the reprints.

My tender little feminist heart is always eager to recommend anything by Tamora Pierce, especially the Alanna series. I read these so much as a kid that they disintegrated and I had to buy new ones for my Kindle. The world of Tortall is well-developed throughout her books, and I’ve turned many a lover of Tolkien onto Tamora Pierce!

Fans of romances will often find themselves endeared to the Twilight series, which offers enough aching passion and innocent longing to satisfy anyone wishing for a good love story. I’ve even met a few grown men who loved Twilight! Whatever you think of Stephenie Meyer’s writing, there’s no denying it has a lot of crossover appeal.

Young adult is a wonderful genre and anybody who refuses to read it because of the target market is seriously missing out on some amazing books. What are your favorite books with crossover appeal? My coworkers are coming to me for recommendations and I can’t read fast enough to appease them!