If You Like...

As a librarian, one of the joys of my job is matching a book with a potential reader. Reluctant readers are not generally forthcoming with their reading interests, mainly because they themselves don’t know what type of story they like or are interested in. Among the many questions I ask when trying to match book with reader is: What was the last book you read that you liked? If I am able to illicit this information from them I can use my magical librarian skills to find potential books of interest.

Of course the readers of this blog are most likely avid readers and need no prodding, but I know one thing about readers, if nothing else, and that is when we find something we like, if not love, then we want more of it. This is where a problem can arise. Because for many people, other than reading other books by the same author, it is hard to find something similar to what they found a connection with.

Please don’t get me wrong. I have no way of knowing what book you will make that special connection with, reading is so subjective. But what I offer to you is a suggestion. So without further explanation I present:

If you like…

The Hunger Games* by Suzanne Collins

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.

        Then you might like…

The Maze Runner by James Dashner (Maze Runner Trilogy #1)

Sixteen-year old Thomas wakes up with no memory in the middle of a maze and realizes he must work with the community in which he finds himself if he is to escape.

Epic by Conor Kostick

 On New Earth, a world based on a video role-playing game, fourteen-year-old Erik persuades his friends to aid him in some unusual gambits in order to save Erik's father from exile and safeguard the futures of each of their families.

  

Mortal Engines by Philip Reeve (Hunger City Chronicles #1)

In the distant future, when cities move about and consume smaller towns, a fifteen-year-old apprentice is pushed out of London by the man he most admires and must seek answers in the perilous Out-Country, aided by one girl and the memory of another.

  

 
For the Win by Cory Doctorow

In a future where poor children and teenagers work for corrupt bosses as gold farmers, finding valuable items inside massively-multiplayer online games, a small group of teenagers work to unionize and escape this near-slavery.

*Though these books aren’t exactly alike,they have similarities and certain things in common. Because of course who would be happy reading (or writing) a book that is exactly like another book.

*I figured I’d start with a title that most people have read, if not, at least are familiar with.