Bad Houses
Lives intersect in the most unexpected ways when teenagers Anne and Lewis cross paths at an estate sale in sleepy Failin, Oregon. Failin was once a thriving logging community. Now the town’s businesses are crumbling, its citizens bitter and disaffected. Anne and Lewis refuse to succumb to the fate of the older generation as they discover—together—the secrets of their hometown and their own families.
Art by Carla Speed McNeil, Published 2013, Dark Horse Comics, B&W, 152 pages
The Rules for Hearts
Battle Hall Davies is sure of some things: she’s going to Reed; she loves girls; and her older brother, Nick, is cooler than she could ever be. Nick ran away when Battle was in high school, and four years later, he’s tracked her down. Now she’s spending her summer before college in “Forest House,†the co-op where he lives in Portland. Battle is quickly swept into Forest House’s community Shakespeare production, its all-night card games, and the arms of her new roommate, Meryl. It turns out that Nick isn’t who Battle thought he was–and Battle’s not who she thought she was, either.
Rules for Hearts is an Oregon Book Award winner and a Junior Library Guild selection. It is a companion book to Empress of the World, which was published in 2001.
Published 2007, Viking Books, Young Adult Fiction
Empress of the World
Empress of the World is about friendship, love, and the sometimes blurry lines between the two. Nicola Lancaster comes to the Siegel Summer Institute for Gifted Youth to decide whether or not she wants to be an archaeologist. She doesn’t expect to make the best friends she’s ever had, and she especially doesn’t expect to fall in love with another girl.
Empress is an Oregon Book Award winner, an ALA Best Book for Young Adults and a finalist for a Lambda Literary Award. A companion book, The Rules for Hearts, was published in 2007.
The book was reissued in 2012 with an introduction by David Levithan and three short stories featuring characters from the books: “Me and Edith Head,” “Click,” and the never-before published “Comparative Anatomy.”
Published 2001, reissued 2012, Viking Books, Young Adult Fiction