Nerdfighters are counting down the days until “Paper Towns”—the movie version of John Green’s 2008 novel, following last summer’s blockbuster version of The Fault In Our Stars—hits theaters on July 24.
While you wait to watch Q and co. take their road trip on the big screen, help pass the time with a few other character-driven YA titles with elements of mystery and travel.
Join 17-year-old Evie O’Neill at the Museum of American Folklore, Superstition, and the Occult in Libba Bray’s The Diviners. Set in New York City in the Roaring Twenties, the book follows Evie as she and her uncle—the curator of the museum—investigate a rash of murders. (The second book in this trilogy is due out in August.)
A blind protagonist and her brother travel from London to New York to look for their missing father in She Is Not Invisible. Author Marcus Sedgwick tells the story in first person as Laureth experiences it, without visual clues or context, and makes readers question what it really means to see.
Take the ultimate road trip with Douglas Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. This classic tale of intergalactic travel after Earth is destroyed to make room for a space highway appeals to all ages. Don’t panic, and don’t forget your towel.
Picture Me Gone by Meg Rosoff also features a London-to-New-York journey. After the disappearance of her father’s best friend, exceptionally perceptive Mila collects clues about his life and her own relationship to her family. (Rosoff’s debut, How I Live Now, flips that journey, with a protagonist traveling from NYC to London, only to be trapped there when a world war breaks out.)
Try some magical realism with Meg Wolitzer’s Belzhar. Five students at a school for “fragile” teens take a special English class in which journals transport them, literally and figuratively, to the sources of their grief. They have to find their own ways out.
And don’t miss John Green’s backlist, including An Abundance of Katherines— another book with a teen road trip.