Notable Young Adult Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror of 2024

Ali takes readers to a future version of Earth where two teens, Lower Earth crown prince Lein and spoiled Upper Earth rich girl Raisa, are forced into an arranged marriage. Nada, a Lower Earth ex-con, wants to stop their marriage; she suspects the marriage won’t bring peace between the warring groups but even more oppression. Action-packed, romantic, and sweeping, this is a revolution for the ages.

For some reason we keep getting YA dystopians involving highly stratified societies where the wealthy mooch off the exploited labor of the poor. I wonder why. Anyway, The Pangu Star System has a rigid caste system, and Aryl and Ver are low in the hierarchy. Aryl longs to be a dancer, but her parents’ careers as domestic servants hold her back. Ver, meanwhile, deals with a degenerative disease and chronic pain caused by the manufacturing pollution on her planet. When their boss Cal is murdered, they’re at the top of the suspect list. Their rivalry turns into a romance as they try to clear their names.

Val is a typical New Jersey teen, until her uncle Umberto suddenly dies. She finds herself the heir to his position as an intergalactic ambassador. Val discovers not only was he probably murdered, but that he was right in the middle of negotiating peace between the Etoscans and the Levinti, alien civilizations competing over colonizing rights to a planet. Part sci-fi adventure, part murder mystery, all fun.

It’s 2364 and the US is now run by a tech company where everyone living in the Metro works for them. Lower class teens like Liv are Proxies, meaning they sell memories to rich people. After a job goes wrong and Liv’s memories are erased, she attracts the attention of Forceman Adrian, basically a cop for Proxies. In the Outerlands beyond the Metro, Adrian and Liv have the fight of their lives to survive a capitalism-wracked hellscape.

An inventive, twisty fantasy about two Black Boston teens with overbearing families. Aoife is the child of influencer parents who have documented every aspect of her life, whether she wants them to or not. Luna is the granddaughter of the head of the Witch Council and is set to lead her community, whether she’s ready or not. A spell gone wrong keeps pulling the girls together and pushing them apart. Sometimes love takes work. 

Loosely inspired by the movie Seven Samurai, this book stars seven “kindlings,” or warriors with magic, who are pulled together for one last job. After being conscripted as child soldiers to fight in an ancient war, the kindlings were abandoned the moment peace was declared. A farm girl seeks the help of the seven kindlings (six of whom are women and one who is nonbinary), but before they can do that, they must confront their own traumas.

Ellery doesn’t believe in magic even though their region has been trapped in winter for the last five years. Knox is a familiar who longs to see the world after being stuck working for a witch the last few years. The two teens strike a deal—Knox gets to stay on Earth while Ellery gets help breaking the wintery curse. A soft, queer relationship blooms amidst a story of poverty and faith.

It may be 400 years in the future, but India is still dealing with invading British colonial forces. Adya and Priya are both technomancers, making them valuable commodities in this violent era. Priya disappears and Adya is captured by a crime boss, but with the help of family, new friends, a potential lover, and a sentient Yamaha motorcycle, Adya might just make it through this chaos alive. I loved the way Nayak blended fantasy with technology and dystopian fiction. 

Hanalei’s father committed a crime against the state when he stole a dragon’s egg, known as “dragonfruit,” to save her at the expense of the future queen of Tamarind. Now, Hanalei is reunited with Prince Samahtitamahenele as they chase down a seadragon. But they’re not the only ones after its eggs. A pirate from a colonizing nation will slaughter anyone who gets in the way of him getting rich off dragon parts. Lucier imbues this book with Pacific Island culture and mythology in a wholly unique way.

I love a horror story where a house party goes awry. Arden, Maddy May, and Remi are celebrating grad night with a rager at the abandoned mansion Deinhart Manor. Turns out the house really is haunted. Blood pours from the walls and no one can leave. How do you escape a house that wants you dead? Anderson does teen horror so well.

Listen, Scream is one of my favorite horror movies. Alex Brown (not me, another one) took a lot of inspiration from that movie and expanded the concept with queerness and conversations about race and privilege. It’s also a ton of fun. After her career as the school mascot is derailed, Quinn is determined to figure out who’s behind the crime. When a serial killer targets people close to her, Quinn teams up with her ex-friend and current crush Tessa. Things get bloody and goofy.

Sometimes you want a horror novel that is introspective and tackles tough topics. Riley and Madelyn are both dealing with difficult parents. Riley’s mother vanished years ago after a long battle with drugs and poor decisions. Madelyn’s mother is an abusive witch who takes her frustrations out on her daughter. When Madelyn raises Riley from the dead, Riley brings a malevolent guest with her. Something wicked lurks in the Voynich Woods.

Pretty sure this is the first YA horror I’ve ever read with an intersex main character. Sisters Isla and Renata are shipped off to a finishing school, Alarie House. Isla rejects the school immediately, but Renata stays long enough to change into someone her sister doesn’t recognize. Then she disappears. Isla returns to the school to figure out what the hell happened to her sister and discovers a nightmare. I’d call this more gothic than horror, but either way it’s delightfully unsettling.

Speaking of tough topics, this YA horror story is one of the most intense books I read all year, including adult horror. The night Miles comes out as trans, he’s nearly killed by the son of the cruel sheriff. Generations ago, that sheriff’s ancestor brutally murdered Miles’ ancestor for leading a strike at the local mine. Now Miles wants revenge for what was done to him and the town by the Davies family, even if getting it means killing or being killed.

8th century, Wales. Ffion is not only the last hedgewitch in Foxhall, but also is caught in a love triangle between Prince Taliesin and his brother Dafydd. Ffion believes destroying Offa’s dyke will restore magic to Wales. Meanwhile, Tal wants magic to stay gone while Dafydd would rather be a blacksmith than a monarch. This book blends Welsh mythology and cozy fantasy romance in an intriguing way.

1765, in the Gévaudan region of France. Shepherdesses Joséphine and Clara are barely surviving in their patriarchal village, but things get even worse when a beast begins terrorizing young women. The girls use the monster as a distraction to escape their abusers, but the bodies keep piling up and the townie dudes are getting increasingly violent. Inspired by the Beast of Gévaudan from French legends, this historical horror shines with feminist rage.

1970s, Texas. Shane (Ellie’s Lipan Apache grandmother in Elatsoe) is only 17, but she’s had lots of experience using her ability to summon animal spirits to rescue lost people with her mother Lorenza. But when Lorenza vanishes on a search for two missing children, it’s up to Shane to pull on her Indigenous ancestry and the love and strength of her community to save the day. A lovely story rooted in kindness, culture, and surviving generational trauma.

1930s, Haiti. Lucille’s plans to open a school for girls is derailed when her best friend Fifina is forced to marry a section chief. Soon after, Lucille is exiled from her village and sent to the big city to work as a domestic, first for a wealthy family with a charming son and then for Zora Neale Hurston. Throughout it, the mapou trees, giant native trees seen as sacred in vodou, remind Lucille of the magic and beauty of her homeland.

This is billed as The Cruel Prince meets Ninth House and YES. Plus: vampires. Kidan, an heiress and an orphan, believes her sister was kidnapped by the vampire Susenyos. She enrolls in Uxlay University, ostensibly to learn how their society keeps vamps and humans working together instead of killing each other, but the violence from home follows her. Cue enemies to lovers.

YA speculative fiction with protagonists who are fat or autistic are few and far between, but this book delivers a character who is both while also having a fantastic storyline. Her whole life, Alesta has been told she’s worthless. When she makes a big mistake, her best friend Kyrian takes the fall and ends up being sacrificed to a monster. Alesta descends into the abyss to save him, only to find him transformed into something monstrous. Loosely inspired by Dante’s Inferno. 

Sabaa Tahir is a titan of YA fantasy. She’s back and better than ever with this new sprawling epic fantasy about three teens in the Martial Empire. It’s about two decades after the events of the Ember in the Ashes series. Aiz, an orphan, Sirsha, an outcast, and Quil, the reluctant crown prince, are brought together to save the empire from invaders. 

This dark fantasy anthology looks at queerness through the lens of monstrosity. We see how queer people are often treated like monsters by the majority and how the majority can behave like monsters when confronting identities they don’t understand or respect. I highly recommend the stories ‘‘The Girl with Thirteen Shadows’’ by Merc Fenn Wolfmoor and ‘‘Boys Who Run with the Boars” by Sam J. Miller. Anthologies are pretty popular right now in YA, but this is a must-read.

Similarly to the anthology above, this one examines an identity—in this case Blackness—as it intersects with horror. Some of the stories are more social horror where the character’s identity is directly tied to the horrific experiences they endure, while others are simply fun horror stories with Black protagonists. Two of my favorites are  “The Brides of Devil’s Bayou” by Desiree S. Evans and “Local Color” by Eden Royce.

Queer horror is one of my favorite subgenres of YA horror, and this is a great example of why. In the town of Bridlington, kids like Paz are outcasts. When a local popular kid is killed, Paz is convinced he was murdered by a monster. Other queer teens join Paz on her hunt as the story jumps around in time and perspectives. It’s a challenging book that pushes the reader to the edge.

Rosie, Caro, and Zeke bond through their shared experiences of dysfunctional families and magical talismans. Zeke has a ring that will deliver him true love, Rosie has a jacket that grants her the power to make people do whatever she says, and Caro has a baseball bat that fixes what it breaks. The book is charming, funny, and full of heart.

One night in 1722, Babylou Mac and her siblings escape into the Great Dismal Swamp after killing the white man who murdered their mother. Three centuries later, Atlas returns from college to celebrate the Bornday cookout. Grannylou disappears into the swamp, and Atlas must use her ancestral magic to find her. An introspective look at generational trauma and the power of cultural heritage.

Two teens venture into the underworld to bring back their girlfriend in a story inspired by Orpheus and Eurydice myth. Andres moves from Brazil to Miami after dying and making a deal with Death for more time. In Florida, he starts a polyamorous relationship with Renee and Liora, but when an accident leaves Liora in a coma, the remaining duo are desperate to get her back. A poetic tale of reckoning with your past to build a better future. And that cover: wow!

This is for the girlies who love queer pirates on a rollicking high seas adventure. Betsy and Ophelia’s mother was a notorious pirate queen. After her execution, the girls split up, with Ophelia joining the navy and Betsy building a life of her own on land. When their father dies and Betsy discovers Ophelia stole her identity, the girls take on heartless masters, self-discoveries, and deadly hurricanes.

I don’t know about you, but whenever I hear the phrase “YA urban fantasy,” I get very excited. Eli and Malcolm are two British Jamaican teens dealing with magical mayhem in London. Eli uses magic to heal, while Malcom uses it to bring back the dead. The boys are sent on a quest to track down the leopard god Osebo’s fang, a powerful, dangerous weapon. Infused with Afro-Caribbean folklore, this story is a wild ride.

Avery, who is biracial Kanyen’kehá:ka (Mohawk), just wants to graduate from high school and leave her small town behind for college. While on a run, she encounters something terrible in the pond deep in the forest, something that latches onto her even when she flees. After the disappearance of her crush, Key, Avery reaches out to her Elders; the key to solving the mystery lies in her Indigenous heritage, but it may cost Key his life. A YA horror from a perspective we rarely get in kidlit.

This gothic, atmospheric novel packs a punch. Isa Chang returns to her hometown, a declining rural town near a defunct mine, after her father’s death. For years, kids have died strange deaths, including two of her best friends. Her only surviving friend, Mason, convinces her to help him investigate their deaths, which pulls them into the orbit of a malevolent spirit haunting the hills. 

Ash is so desperate to learn alchemy that he takes a job as a groundskeeper at the prestigious Lancaster College. Richie rich kid Ramsay offers to teach him alchemy in exchange for helping them track down a rare book of magic. It’s the magic school trope queered to all get out and full of social commentary, high stakes, and romance.

Arthie, an orphan street kid, runs a tearoom by day, vampire bar by night in the rundown city of White Roaring. To protect her “bloodhouse” from being taken over by imperial guards, she agrees to steal a ledger that may hold the secrets to tearing down the entire empire. Vampires? Heists? Anti-colonial commentary? Check, check, and check!

This new series inspired by Vietnamese culture features a teen with the ability to manipulate biological functions. Although Nhika can use her powers to heal, most fear her for also being able to use it to kill. Nhika is forced to collaborate with Kochin, an enigmatic young man who works against her as much as he helps her. It’s bloody and action-packed.

Sideways Pike has been through the ringer the last few months. The local covens plan to put Madeline on trial for her crimes against the Scapegracers, but the witchfinders are a much bigger and more immediate problem. Sideways, Jing, Daisy, and Yates must deal with a bunch of bigots who want them dead, magical adults trying to tell the Scapegracers what to do all the time, the hassles of senior year, and falling in love.

After all the violence and bloodshed of the first book, Gem Echols is ready to finally finish this. The teens—who may look human but who are really reincarnated gods from another dimension—are all after the Ouroboros knife. Gem, the Magician, holds the power to destroy them all…or save them.

Teo refusing to sacrifice another semidios in the Sunbearer Trials has led to the disappearance of the sun and the reemergence of the Obsidian gods. Now, to save Reino del Sol, Teo, Aurelio, and Niya set off on a quest to Los Restos to bring back the Sol Stone. This is a crackling fantasy duology with plenty of queer, trans, and Latinx flair.

This series launched a little before the Disney+ show Agatha All Along, but the two couldn’t be more different. Think of this series as a manga-esque AU magic school webtoon. Sixteen-year-old Wanda Maximoff enters an elite academy and immediately makes a nemesis out of fellow student Agatha. It’s part of Marvel’s Infinity Comics line, meaning (so far) they’re only in the Marvel Unlimited app. 

An isekai manga about three boys who accidentally get yanked into a parallel universe. The teens, known as “the small three,” gain strange powers and encounter aliens. But if the premise isn’t enticing enough, the mind-blowing artwork should be. Ikeda plays with illustration styles to depict the two worlds, blending classic manga with hyper-realism. 

Chihiro’s pops is a famous samurai, but all she cares about is Tatsuo Nakano, the first woman to get into the samurai school Kesi Academy. When she and Tatsuo are sent on a mission to kill a demon, Chihiro learns why people always say “never meet your heroes.” Schaeffer’s lively art is perfectly matched to Tokuda-Hall’s anachronistic, feminist, and humorous tone.