Teens’ Top Ten Nominations 2009-2010

These books were nominated for the ALA teens' top ten books. The winner was Paper Towns by John Green.

• Cashore, Kristin. Graceling.
  In a world where some people are born with extreme and often-feared skills called Graces, Katsa struggles for redemption from her own horrifying Grace, the Grace of killing, and teams up with another young fighter to save their land from a corrupt king.
• Cast, Kristin & P.C. Untamed.
  Zoey's adventures at vampyre finishing school take a wild and dangerous turn as loyalties are tested, shocking true intentions come to light, and an ancient evil is awakened in the fourth House of Night novel.
• Clare, Cassandra. City of Ashes.
  Sixteen-year-old Clary continues trying to make sense of the swiftly changing events and relationships in her life as she becomes further involved with the Shadowhunters and their pursuit of demons and discovers some terrifying truths about her parents, her brother Jace, and her boyfriend Simon.
• Collins, Suzanne. The Hunger Games.
  In a future North America, where the rulers of Panem maintain control through an annual televised survival competition pitting young people from each of the twelve districts against one another, sixteen-year-old Katniss's skills are put to the test when she voluntarily takes her younger sister's place.
• Fukui , Isamu. Truancy.
  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.
• Fukui , Isamu. Truancy: Origins.
  Relates how Truancy, an underground movement determined to bring down the Mayor's goal of control through education, began with the birth of twin boys who grew up to take divergent paths after being adopted by the Mayor.
• Gaiman, Neil. The Graveyard Book.
  Nobody Owens is a normal boy, except that he has been raised by ghosts and other denizens of the graveyard.
• Green, John. Paper Towns.
  One month before graduating from his Central Florida high school, Quentin "Q" Jacobsen basks in the predictable boringness of his life until the beautiful and exciting Margo Roth Spiegelman, Q's neighbor and classmate, takes him on a midnight adventure and then mysteriously disappears.
• Harris, Joanne. Runemarks.
  Maddy Smith, who bears the mysterious mark of a rune on her hand, learns that she is destined to join the gods of Norse mythology and play a role in the fate of the world.
• Hopkins, Ellen. Identical.
  Sixteen-year-old identical twin daughters of a district court judge and a candidate for the United States House of Representatives, Kaeleigh and Raeanne Gardella desperately struggle with secrets that have already torn them and their family apart.
• Lockhart, E. The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks.
  When Frankie's boyfriend joins a secret society that she isn't supposed to know anything about, she surprises everyone—including herself—by trying to beat them and become the biggest prankster of them all.
• Marriott, Zoё. Daughter of the Flames.
  After learning that she is the sole heir to the Ruan throne, orphaned Zira, trained in weaponry and martial arts as a warrior priestess, must unravel the secrets of her identity, decide her people's fate, and accept her feelings for a man who should be her enemy.
• McMann, Lisa. Wake.
  Ever since she was eight years old, high school student Janie Hannagan has been uncontrollably drawn into other people's dreams, but it is not until she befriends an elderly nursing home patient and becomes involved with an enigmatic fellow-student that she discovers her true power.
• Meyer, Stephenie. Breaking Dawn.
  Pulled in one direction by her intense passion for vampire Edward Cullen, and in another by her profound connection with werewolf Jacob Black, Bella Swan has endured a tumultuous year of temptation, loss, and strife to reach the ultimate turning point.
• Moran, Katy. Bloodline.
  While traveling through early seventh-century Britain trying to stop an impending war, Essa, who bears the blood of native British tribes and of the invading Anglish, makes discoveries that divide his loyalties.
• Ness, Patrick. The Knife of Never Letting Go. (Chaos Walking. Book 1).
  Pursued by power-hungry Prentiss and mad minister Aaron, young Todd and Viola set out across New World searching for answers about his colony's true past and seeking a way to warn the ship bringing hopeful settlers from Old World.
• Noёl, Alyson. Evermore.
  Since the car accident that claimed the lives of her family, sixteen-year-old Ever can see auras and hear people's thoughts, and she goes out of her way to hide from other people until she meets Damen, another psychic teenager who is hiding even more mysteries.
• Palmer, Robin. Geek Charming.
  Rich, spoiled, and popular high school senior Dylan is coerced into doing a documentary film with Josh, one of the school's geeks, who leads her to realize that the world does not revolve around her.
• Pierce, Tamora. Melting Stones.
  Residents of the island of Starns send for help from Winding Circle temple, and when prickly green mage Rosethorn and young stone mage trainee Evvy respond, Evvy finds that the problem is with a long-dormant volcano and tries to use her talents to avert the looming destruction.
• Scott, Elizabeth. Living Dead Girl.
  Alice, kidnapped by Ray when she was ten, is now fifteen and too old to please him so now she must find Ray a replacement for her.
• Smith, Cynthia Leitich. Eternal.
  When Miranda's guardian angel Zachary recklessly saves her from falling into an open grave and dying, the result is that she turns into a vampire and he is left to try to reinstate his reputation by finally doing the right thing.
• Smith, Sherri L. Flygirl.
  During World War II, a light-skinned African American girl "passes" for white in order to join the Women Airforce Service Pilots.
• Weingarten, Lynn. Wherever Nina Lies.
  Two years after the disappearance of her older sister, sixteen-year-old Ellie goes on a quest to find her.
• Werlin, Nancy. Impossible.
  When seventeen-year-old Lucy discovers her family is under an ancient curse by an evil Elfin Knight, she realizes to break the curse she must perform three impossible tasks before her daughter is born in order to save them both.
• Yee, Lisa. Absolutely Maybe.
  When living with her mother, an alcoholic ex-beauty queen, becomes unbearable, almost seventeen-year-old Maybelline "Maybe" Chestnut runs away to California, where she finds work on a taco truck and tries to track down her birth father.