SO YESTERDAY

This clever, quirky romp through New York City tackles the question: “What makes something cool?” Seventeen-year-old Hunter works for a famous shoe company spotting trends and taking part in focus groups. Three years earlier, having moved from Minnesota to Manhattan and finding himself an outsider, Hunter began to analyze and write a blog about the “billion coded messages being sent every day with clothes, hair, music, slang,” which led to his job. When a radical group, out to undermine corporations, apparently kidnaps his boss, Mandy, Hunter and his adventurous friend and romantic interest Jen embark on a fast-paced, sometimes dangerous quest to rescue her. Unlike most realistic YA fiction, this one blends in interesting information as Hunter reflects on how trends spread and such unlikely topics as the popularity of certain names and the history of purple dye. While the plot occasionally requires a suspension of disbelief, the dialogue is snappy—and Hunter, whose anxiety underlies his need to be cool, is a charming narrator with an original take on teen life. (Fiction. 12+)