Fifteen-year-old Green is so named because of her green thumb, but her abilities are much more than that.  One day, a great fire in the city changes her life forever.  Green has a difficult time coping until she meets a boy who cannot speak.

This story had great potential and I loved the idea of the plot.  The delivery, however, was less than satisfying.  Hoffman loves similes and metaphors, so much so that they overrun the book, even when they don’t make sense.  In addition to beating a metaphor to death, Hoffman seems to love repetition, which, while perfect for poetry or Dr. Seuss, has no real place in this story.  Most of the story seemed to be fluff, which dragged on and on, and I had to wonder when she was going to get to the point.  If you took out the fluff, this one hundred and sixteen page story could have been simply a long poem, and I probably would’ve been happier with it.  I had heard good things about Alice Hoffman and I was, unfortunately, disappointed.

This book is the first in a series and the third book is scheduled to be released in February 2012.  I can’t say I recommend this book, but you might like it if you are a fan of diary fiction and angst-ridden teens.  I’d give it two stars.

In this sequel to Watersmeet, Abisina must fight to unite the North and the South in the aftermath of the war against Charach. Watersmeet's supplies are exhausted due to refugees flooding in from the South and the surviving villages in the South are in the same situation. It's up to Abisina to help them all.

I was skeptical at first, because I thought Watersmeet was a decent stand-alone book. However, I actually liked The Centaur's Daughter better. This book deals more with the depth of the characters and their attempts to overcome generations of prejudice. I highly recommend this book to fans of fantasy and anyone looking for a great allegory.

In the village of Vranille, where perfection is a requirement, Abisina is an outcast. When Charach comes to Vranille, Abisina must flee from her village to keep her life. She embarks on a dangerous journey over the mountains to find Watersmeet and, potentially, her father. To survive the journey, she must overcome years of fear and prejudice and learn to accept help from others.

Toward the end of the book, it seems as though the author is trying to tie everything up quickly to make the story work in as few pages as possible. This book could easily have been five hundred pages. There are several aspects of the story that simply cannot be rushed without appearing unrealistic or leaving the reader unsatisfied in some way. There were also a couple of times that I felt the writing a bit too juvenile for the intended audience and other times I felt the writing was too advanced for the intended audience. It just wasn’t uniform.

These are, however, fairly minor objections in comparison with the story as a whole. Watersmeet is very imaginative and unique. There are many lessons to be taken from it. While it wasn't an "I couldn't put this book down" experience, it was a good read. I recommend it to anyone who loves Quest Fantasy or High/Epic Fantasy.  I give it four stars!

Katniss Everdeen, a sixteen year old girl from a poor district, enters The Hunger Games to save her younger sister, Prim.  Prim’s name was drawn in the lottery to determine which boy and girl from her district will go to The Hunger Games and Katniss isn’t about to let her go.  Katniss has been hunting to feed her family for the last five years and would have a better chance of surviving than Prim, who has spent those years learning to heal people. 

The Hunger Games are a televised, gladiator-like fight to the death between twenty-four teenagers.  The last person standing wins, which means he or she will receive a lifetime of food, shelter, and money.  For Katniss, this is a confusing prospect.  Her family could certainly use the security that winning the games would provide, but without hunting, who is she?  Katniss fights to survive the games, while discovering who she is and dealing with love and loss.

I couldn’t put this book down and am looking forward to reading the other two books of the trilogy.  I highly recommend this book to anyone who likes post-apocalyptic settings and future dystopias.  The Hunger Games is reminiscent of The Running Man and Rollerball, while maintaining a style that is entirely its own.  I give it five stars! 

Sorry for the delay, but here's the last of the new Teen Scene books (at least until next year):

Hothouse by Chris Lynch

Teens D.J. and Russell, life-long friends and neighbors, had drifted apart, but when their firefighter fathers are both killed, they try to help one another come to terms with the tragedy and its aftermath.

Rot and Ruin by Jonathan Maberry

In a post-apocalyptic world where fences and border patrols guard the few people left from the zombies that have overtaken civilization, fifteen-year-old Benny Imura is finally convinced that he must follow in his older brother's footsteps and become a bounty hunter.

Before Columbus: The Americas of 1491, by Charles C. Mann

Contents: 1: How old was the "new world"? — Cities in the desert — Genetic engineering — From Olmec to Maya — To the land of four quarters. 2: Why did Europe succeed? — The great meeting — Long, long ago — Extinction — Disease-free paradise? 3: Were the Americas really a wilderness? — Amazonia — Land of fire — The created wilderness.

Wicked Lovely by Melissa Marr

Seventeen-year-old Aislinn, who has the rare ability to see faeries, is drawn against her will into a centuries-old battle between the Summer King and the Winter Queen, and the survival of her life, her love, and summer all hang in the balance.

Trash by Andy Mulligan

Fourteen-year-olds Raphael and Gardo team up with a younger boy, Rat, to figure out the mysteries surrounding a bag Raphael finds during their daily life of sorting through trash in a third-world country's dump.

Monsters of Men by Patrick Ness

As a world-ending war surges to life around them, Todd and Viola face monstrous decisions, questioning all they have ever known as they try to step back from the darkness and find the best way to achieve peace.

The Wee Free Men: The Beginning, by Terry Pratchett

In the first story, a young witch-to-be named Tiffany Aching teams up with the Wee Free Men, a clan of six-inch-high blue men, to rescue her baby brother and ward off a sinister invasion from Fairyland. In the second story, Tiffany learns about magic and responsibility as she battles a disembodied monster with the assistance of the six-inch-high Wee Free Men and Mistress Weatherwax, the greatest witch in the world.

Condoleezza Rice: A Memoir of My Extraordinary, Ordinary Family and Me, by Condoleezza Rice

A look at one of America's most outstanding women, from her remarkable childhood in Birmingham, Alabama, in the 1950s through her rise to the highest echelons of power in the U.S. government.

Not That Kind of Girl by Siovhan Vivian

High school senior and student body president, Natalie likes to have everything under control, but when she becomes attracted to one of the senior boys and her best friend starts keeping secrets from her, Natalie does not know how to act.

Adios, Nirvana by Conrad Wesselhoeft

As Seattle sixteen-year-old Jonathan helps a dying man come to terms with a tragic event he experienced during World War II, Jonathan begins facing his own demons, especially the death of his twin brother, helped by an assortment of friends, old and new.

OK, that's it for Teen Scene new books. Drop by and check some out.

More new Teen Scene books:

The Scorch Trials by James Dashner

After surviving horrific conditions in the Maze, Thomas is entrapped, along with nineteen other boys, in a scientific experiment designed to observe their responses and gather data believed to be essential for the survival of the human race.

Wildthorn by Jane England

Seventeen-year-old Louisa Cosgrove is locked away in the Wildthorn Hall mental institution, where she is stripped of her identity and left to wonder who has tried to destroy her life.

Beastly by Alex Finn

A modern retelling of "Beauty and the Beast" from the point of view of the Beast, a vain Manhattan private school student who is turned into a monster and must find true love before he can return to his human form.

Pies & Prejudice by Heather Vogel Frederick

Four girls, and their mothers, continue their mother-daughter book club via videoconference between Massachusetts and England, reading Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice," and try to put friendship before romance.

Crossing Stonesby Helen Frost

In their own voices, four young people, Muriel, Frank, Emma, and Ollie, tell of their experiences during the first World War, as the boys enlist and are sent overseas, Emma finishes school, and Muriel fights for peace and women's suffrage.

Beautiful Darkness by Kami Garcia & Margaret Stohl

In a small southern town with a secret world hidden in plain sight, sixteen-year-old Lena, who possesses supernatural powers and faces a life-altering decision, draws away from her true love, Ethan, a mortal with frightening visions.

Black Hole Sun by David Macinnis Gill

On the planet Mars, sixteen-year-old Durango and his crew of mercenaries are hired by the settlers of a mining community to protect their most valuable resource from a feral band of marauders.

Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice, by Phillip Hoose

Contents include First Cry: Jim Crow and the Detested Number Ten—Coot—"We Seemed to Hate Ourselves"—"It's My Constitutional Right!"—"There's the Girl Who Got Arrested"—"Crazy" Times—"Another Negro Woman Has Been Arrested"—Second Front, Second Chance—Playing for Keeps: Browder v. Gayle—Rage in Montgomery—History's Door.

Firelight by Sophie Jordan

When sixteen-year-old Jacinda, who can change into a dragon, is forced to move away from her community of shapeshifters and start a more normal life, she fall in love with a boy who proves to be her most dangerous enemy.

My Most Excellent Year: A Novel of Love, Mary Poppins, & Fenway Park, by Steve Kluger

Three teenagers in Boston narrate their experiences of a year of new friendships, first loves, and coming into their own.

OK, one more list tommorrow and we'll have everything done for new teen books.

Here's today's list of new books in Teen Scene:

The Kid Table by Andrea Seigel

Explores the quirky dynamics in an extended family full of close-knit cousins who both help and hinder each other as they celebrate holidays and momentous occasions together.

The Thin Executioner by Darren Shan

In a nation of warriors where weakness is shunned and all crimes, no matter how minor, are punishable by beheading, young Jebel Rum, along with a slave who is fated to be sacrificed, sets forth on a quest to petition the Fire God for invincibility, but when the long and arduous journey is over, Jebel has learned much about fairness and the value of life.

Bruiser by Neal Shusterman

Inexplicable events start to occur when sixteen-year-old twins Tennyson and Brontë befirend a troubled and misunderstood outcast, aptly nicknamed Bruiser, and his little brother, Cody.

The Dark Deeps by Arthur Slade

Fourteen-year-old Modo, a shape-changing hunchback, and Octavia take on another mission as secret agents for the Permanent Association in Victorian London, investigating the cause behind the sinking of several ships in the same place.

Fear: 13 Stories of Suspense and Horror, edited by R.L. Stine

Includes: Welcome to the Club (R.L. Stine), She's Different Tonight (Heather Graham), Suckers (Suzanne Weyn), Perfects (Jennifer Allison), Shadow Children (Heather Brewer), Poison Ring (Peg Kehret), Dragonfly Eyes (Alane Ferguson), Jeepers Peepers (Ryan Brown), Piney Powers (F. Paul Wilson), Night Hunter (Meg Cabot), Tuition (Walter Sorrells), Tagger (James Rollins), and Ray Gun (Tim Maleeny).

The Haunted by Jessica Verday

When Abbey returns to Sleepy Hollow, she throws herself into school, her perfume making, and her friendship with Ben to get over Caspian.

Paranormalcy by Kiersten White

When a dark prophecy begins to come true, sixteen-year-old Evie of the International Paranormal Containment Agency must not only try to stop it, she must also uncover its connection to herself and the alluring shapeshifter, Lend.

Jack: Secret Histories, by F. Paul Wilson

Teenaged Jack, later to be known as Repairman Jack, begins to uncover some unsuspected talents in himself after he and his friends, the clever, imaginative Weezy and her brother Eddie, discover a corpse deep in the mysterious Pine Barrens near their New Jersey town.

All the Broken Pieces: A Novel in Verse, by Ann E. Burg

Two years after being airlifted out of Vietnam in 1975, Matt Pin is haunted by the terrible secret he left behind and, now, in a loving adoptive home in the United States, a series of profound events forces him to confront his past.

Only the Good Spy Young by Ally Carter

When a terrifying encounter in London reveals that one of her most-trusted allies is actually a rogue double-agent, Cammie Morgan no longer knows if she can trust her classmates, her teachers—or even her own heart.

Almost done! The last two installments will be posted in the next two days.

We're getting close to the end of this list. Here's some more new Teen Scene books:

Gimme a Call by Sarah Mlynowski

After accidentally dropping her cell phone into a fountain at the mall, fourteen-year-old Devi Banks starts to get phone calls—and an earful of advice on how to live her life to avoid making disastrous choices—from her seventeen-year-old self.

The Cruisers by Walter Dean Myers

Friends Zander, Kambui, LaShonda, and Bobbi, caught in the middle of a mock Civil War at DaVinci Academy, learn the true cost of freedom of speech when they use their alternative newspaper, The Cruiser, to try to make peace.

Jack Blank and the Imagine Nation by Matt Myklusch

Twelve-year-old Jack, freed from a dismal orphanage, makes his way to the elusive and impossible Imagine Nation, where a mentor saves him from dissection and trains him to use his superpower, despite the virus he carries that makes him a threat.

Dead is a State of Mind by Marlene Perez

When a gorgeous new student's prediction that a teacher will be murdered comes true, seventeen-year-old Daisy is determined to solve the crime, but when all signs point to the killer being a werewolf, she fears she is in over her head.

Dead is So Last Year by Marlene Perez

In the beach town of Nightshade, California, home to both human and supernatural beings, the Giordano sisters find summer employment and uncover mysteries involving doppelgangers and oversized football players.

Suspect by Kristen Wolden Nitz

As the family gathers at her grandmother's bed-and-breakfast for a murder mystery weekend, seventeen-year-old Jen confronts her ambivalent feelings about her mother, who disappeared fourteen years earlier, and about the possibility that she might be dead.

Ascendant by Diana Peterfreund

When sixteen-year-old Astrid Llewellyn, now a fully-trained unicorn hunter, joins the quest to discover The Remedy at a laboratory in the French countryside, she begins to question her love for Giovanni, her loyalty to the Cloisters, and even her duty as a hunter.

I Shall Wear Midnight by Terry Pratchett

Fifteen-year-old Tiffany Aching, the witch of the Chalk, seeks her place amid a troublesome populace and tries to control the ill-behaved, six-inch-high Wee Free Men who follor her as she faces an ancient evil that agitates against witches.

Heart of a Samurai: Based on the True Story of Nakahama Manjiro, by Margi Preus

In 1841, rescured by an American whaler after a terrible shipwreck leaves him and his four companions castaways on a remote island, fourteen-year-old Manjiro, who dreams of becoming a samurai, learns new laws and customs as he becomes the first Japanese person to set foot in the United States.

The Candidates by Inara Scott

Fifteen-year-old Dancia is recruited by a boarding school for teenagers with special abilities, where she makes friends for the first time, is attracted to a popular junior, and becomes involved with a dangerous classmate.

That's all for today. We'll be back tomorrow with more new Teen Scene books.

More new Teen Scene books:

Annexed by Sharon Dogar

The story of the boy who loved Anne Frank.

Magic Under Glass by Jaclyn Dolamore

A wealthy sorcerer's invitation to sing with his automaton leads seventeen-year-old Nimira, whose family's disgrace brought her from a palace to poverty, into political intrique, enchantments, and a friendship with a fairy prince who needs her help.

The Half-Life of Planets by Emily Franklin & Brendan Halpin

An unlikely romance develops between a science-minded girl who is determined to reclaim her reputation and a boy with Aspgerer's Syndrome.

Truancy by Isamu Fukui

In the City, where an iron-fisted Mayor's goal is perfect control through education, fifteen-year-old Tack is torn between a growing sympathy for the Truancy, an underground movement determined to bring down the system at any cost, and the desire to avenge a death caused by a Truant.

The Wonder of Charlie Anne by Kimberley Newton Fusco

In a 1930s Massachusetts farm town torn by the Depression, racial tension, and other hardships, Charlie Anne and her black next-door neighbor Phoebe form a friendship that begins to transform their community.

The Julian Game by Adele Griffin

In an effort to improve her social status, a new scholarship student at an exclusive girls' school uses a fake online profile to help a popular girl get back at her ex-boyfriend, but the consequences are difficult to handle.

Crank by Ellen Hopkins

Kristina Georgia Snow is the perfect daughter, gifted high school junior, quiet, never any trouble. But on a trip to visit her absentee father, Kristina disappears and Bree takes her place. Bree is the exact opposite of Kristina. Through a boy, Bree meets the monster: crank. And what begins as a wild ecstatic ride turns into a struggle through hell for her mind, her soul—her life.

Fallout by Ellen Hopkins

Written in free verse, explores how three teenagers try to cope with the consequences of their mother's addiction to crystal meth and its effects on their lives.

Radiant Shadows by Melissa Marr.

Ani, a half-mortal driven by her hungers, and Devlin, a faery assassin and brother to the High Queen, have reason to fear one another even as they are drawn together to save all of Faerie.

The Wake of the Lorelei Lee: Being an Account of the Adventures of Jacky Faber on Her Way to Botany Bay, by L.A. Meyer

Now rich, Jacky Faber has purchased the Lorelei Lee to carry passengers across the Atlantic, and believing she has been absolved of past sins against the Crown, she docks in London, where she is arrested and sentenced to life in the newly formed penal colony in Australia.

Check back tomorrow for more new books

Here's today's list of new Teen Scene books:

On the Blue Comet by Rosemary Wells

When the Depression hits in Cairo, Illinois, and Oscar Ogilvie's father must sell their home and vast model train set-up to look for work in California, eleven-year-old Oscar is left with his dour aunt, where he befriends a mysterious drifter, witnesses a stunning bank robbery, and is suddenly catapulted onto a train that takes him to a different time and place.

Behemoth by Scott Westerfeld

Continues the story of Austrian Prince Alek who, in an alternate 1914 Europe, eludes the Germans by traveling in the Leviathan to Constantinople, where he faces a whole new kind of genetically-engineered warships.

Dead Beautiful by Yvonne Woon

After her parents die under mysterious circumstances, sixteen-year-old Renee Winters is sent from California to an old-fashioned boarding school in Maine, where she meets a fellow student to whom she seems strangely connected.

The Reckoning by Kelley Armstrong

Fifteen-year-old Chloe, a necromancer, struggles to understand her feelings for werewolf Derek and his sorcerer brother, Simon, while seeking a way to enter the headquarters of the sinister Edison Group and rescue her aunt Lauren and friend Rachelle.

The Education of Bet by Lauren Baratz-Logsted

Denied an education because of both her gender and background, sixteen-year-old Elizabeth cuts her hair and alters suits belonging to Will, her wealthy patron's grandnephew, to take his place at school while Will pursues a military career in nineteenth-century England.

The Frenzy by Francesca Lia Block

When she was thirteen, something terrifying and mysterious happened to Liv that she still does not understand, and now, four years later, her dark secret threatens to tear her apart from her family and her true love.

Prom Nights from Hell by Meg Cabot and others

Presents five stories about proms where unexpected events take a turn for the worse, offering up everything from fledgling superheroes and grim reapers to a creepy update on the classic three-wishes-gone-bad tale.

Soccerland by Beth Choat

One day I'm going to play for the U.S. Women's National Team." That's what Flora Dupre promised her mom, before her mom died of cancer. Flora and her mom had created a place called Soccerland, an escape world where they went and just talked soccer. And now Flora's dream of playing for the U.S.A. might be coming true.

Girl Parts by John Cusick

The lives of David, wealthy and popular but still lonely, and Charlie, soulful outsider, intersect when Rose, the female Companion bot David's parents buy to treat his dissociative disorder, forms a bond with Charlie.

No and Me by Delphine de Vigan

Precocious thirteen-year-old Lou meets a homeless eighteen-year-old girl on the streets of Paris and Lou's life is forever changed.

The list continues tomorrow, so check back.