As a judge for the first round of the Nerds Heart YA tournament, I had the tough task of deciding which of these two books advance to the next round. I’ll start with reviews of each one, but if you can’t bear the suspense any longer feel free to skip to the end of this post for the decision!

The Latent Powers of Dylan Fontaine

Author: April Lurie
Category: Fiction, Young Adult

Summary: After Dylan’s mom moved out, his dad threw himself into work and his older brother threw himself into pot. Dylan’s the glue holding the household together, but when his best friend Angie doesn’t see him that way and Dylan gets picked up by the cops, how much longer can the glue hold up?

What I Loved: The engrossing story made me immediately care about Dylan and what he was going through. This is how it starts:

I can tell you from experience that a jail cell is not a place you’d like to visit.

I loved the humor throughout. It was funny without trying too hard to be clever, so it felt like I was reading about a real kid and his problems. Here’s one part of a scene with Dylan’s older brother Randy and his stoner friends Headbone, Nick, and Moser. Moser has a bit of a hygiene issue and refuses to shower.

Suddenly Nick says, “Shut up, Headbone! Don’t you see what’s going on here?”

Headbone looks confused. “No…what? Ohhhh.”

Now Moser gets it too. He shakes his head, and I pray to God the white stuff in his hair is dandruff and not larvae.

I also genuinely thought a couple of the subplots could go either way, which made for a fun read.

What I Didn’t Love: As the story lines started to wrap up, that understated humor seemed to drop away when it was most needed. So the emotional scenes sometimes felt overly sentimental to me. Also with the ending, I thought the characters tended to be a little too forthcoming with how they really felt—not necessarily realistic.

Borrow: Your local library | Swap
Buy: Your local bookstore | Powell’s | Amazon

Leftovers

Author: Laura Wiess
Category: Fiction, Young Adult

Summary: Best friends Blair and Ardith have done something wrong, something very wrong. After you hear their story, will you understand?

What I Loved: This book takes a chance, and I will always love a gutsy story that pushes the boundaries of what is “right” and acceptable. The main risk in my eyes was the prevalent use of second person voice. (More on that in a bit.)

The book also had a few gems that made me stop and think for a bit, like this one after one of the girls was teased at school:

So you…get busy writing your name in your notebook. Homeroom ends in seven minutes and if you drag it out, you can make your preoccupation with penmanship last just about that long. You stare at the page. Your name is a lone bottle floating on an ocean of blue-lined paper. You frown and erase the small, cramped letters. The words disappear but the impression remains and there’s nothing you can do about that.

What I Didn’t Love: The second person voice was off-putting. I guess it was intended to make you feel like you’re part of the story so you connect to the events and can understand the main characters’ actions. But for me, it was constantly jarring, throwing me out of the story and introducing a distance so I couldn’t fully connect with the main characters.

Here’s another snippet to help you decide if this is the book for you. I’m curious to know what you think after reading it.

When your mother finally makes partner in a prestigious law firm, she decides it’s time to buy one of the big, new McMansions across town. She says you need a new house because you’ve outgrown your current one, a cozy cape in a mostly blue-collar neighborhood, but that’s not really true, because besides you and your parents, the only other living thing in the house is your old golden retriever Wendy Darling, and she doesn’t take up much space. She’s slept in your room for the last fourteen years, first in your bed, but now on her orthopedic mattress next to your bed.

You don’t want to move and say so, but nobody cares.

Probably because of this distance, a little ways in, the girls’ stories started to feel melodramatic and even a bit whiny.

Borrow: Your local library | Swap
Buy: Your local bookstore | Powell’s | Amazon

The Decision

The book that will continue to the next round is…

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The Latent Powers of Dylan Fontaine!

If you’re a numbers sort of person, here’s the ratings breakdown:

Dylan: 3.5/5
Leftovers: 3/5

To see how Dylan fares in the next round of the tournament, keep an eye on Stephanie’s Confessions of a Book-a-holic for her decision.

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