Here are the 10 books shortlisted for the YA Book Prize 2024
Gwen, the quick-witted princess of England, and Arthur, future duke, have been betrothed since birth. Unfortunately, the only thing they can agree on is that they hate each other.
When Gwen catches Art kissing a boy and Art discovers where Gwen hides her diary (complete with racy entries about Bridget Leclair), they become reluctant allies.
By pretending to fall for each other, their mutual protection will be assured. But how long can they keep up the ruse? With Gwen growing closer to Bridget, and Art becoming unaccountably fond of Gabriel, Gwen's bookish brother, the path to true love is looking far from straight...
London-born Abel has landed the role of a lifetime for an upcoming blockbuster. On the face of it he's Hollywood's latest teen star, but below the surface he's an undercover journalist on a mission to expose the 'squeaky clean' entertainment industry and the part they played in his brother's 'accidental' death.
As Abel steps into the spotlight alongside actors Lucky, Ryan and Ella, he soon discovers that beneath the fame lies a darker world of secrecy, scandal and murder. Nobody is who they seem when the cameras are off, and everybody has something to hide. But who's next in line to die famous?
To hell with love, this goddess has other plans. Thousands of years ago, the gods told a lie: how Persephone was a pawn in the politics of other gods. The real story is much more interesting.
Persephone wasn't taken to hell: she jumped. There was no way she was going to be married off to some smug god more in love with himself than her.
Now all she has to do is convince the Underworld's annoyingly sexy, arrogant and frankly rude ruler, Hades, to fall in line with her plan. But consequences can be deadly, especially when you're already in hell.
When Hugh Henry Van Boren, one of the most popular kids in Jess Choudhary's school, is found dead, the student body is left reeling and wondering who the murderer could be... Jess, a pupil under strict instructions to keep her record clean or risk losing her scholarship, finds herself at the centre of the investigation when it's revealed that Hugh died in the exact same way as a character in a short story she wrote. And then Jess receives an anonymous text thanking her for the inspiration.
Jess knows if she doesn't solve this mystery she'll finally have something in common with Hugh Henry. She'll be dead too.
Zara loves love in all forms and she's desperate to have her own great love story. Crucially, a real one. So when her best friend Adnan begs her to pretend to date him to cover up his new top-secret relationship, Zara is hesitant. But there's something in it for Zara too: making her parents, who love Adnan, happy might just stop them arguing for a while. She may not be getting her own love story, but she could save theirs.
With fake dating comes fake hand-holding and fake kissing and real feelings...and when a new boy turns up in Zara's life, things get more confusing than ever.
Juliet believes girls like her - girls with arthritis - don't get their own love stories. She exists at the edges of her friends' social lives, skipping parties to play online chess under a pseudonym with strangers around the world. There, she isn't just “the girl with crutches”.
Ronan is the new kid: good looking, smart, a bad boy plagued by guilt over what happened to his brother Ciaran. Chesslife is his escape.
Juliet thinks someone like Ronan could never be interested in someone like her. Little do they know they've already discovered each other online, and have more in common than they think
Tirzah, Sophia and Polly are best friends who’ve left boarding school and gone back to very different lives. Polly is teaching in an orphanage. Sophia is looking for a rich husband at the London Season. And Tirzah is stuck acting as an unpaid companion to her grandmother. In a series of letters, they share their hopes, their frustrations, their dramas ... and their romances. Can these three very different young women find happiness?
Download ExtractWhen Seb is offered a place on a radical retreat designed to solve the national crisis of teenage unhappiness, he is determined to change how people see him and make his parents proud. But as he finds himself drawn to the enigmatic Finn, Seb starts to question the true nature of the challenges they must undergo. The deeper into the programme the boys get, the more disturbing the assessments become, until it's clear there may be no escape.
Download ExtractPenny’s supermodel mother has fans around the world, and Penny is ready to begin her journey to international adoration, starting with joining Dorian Drama School.
When Penny's new mentor offers her an opportunity she cannot refuse, to have a portrait painted by a mysterious artist who can grant immortal beauty, Penny happily follows in the footsteps of Dorian's most glittering alumni.
When her mentor is found murdered, Penny realises she's made a mistake - someone is using the portraits to kill off the subjects one by one. As more perfectly beautiful students start to fall, Penny knows her time is running out.
All Kerry wants to do is stay at home with her rom-coms and strict retainer schedule. Instead, Annie has roped her into going to their first sixth form party to investigate who's cyberbullying Heather, the most popular girl in school.
On the cusp of kissing her dreamy crush, Scott, Kerry discovers the body of Heather's second in command - suffocated with a menstrual cup. Within days, another student turns up dead, this time with a sanitary pad across the eyes. Now Annie and Kerry are officially on the case to stop the menstrual murderer... period.
The most popular pages across the site