The Beast of Cretacea
By Todd Strasser

Maybe you've never read the classic Moby-Dick...I haven't (yet!)...but this sci-fi retelling of Herman Melville's epic adventure on a whaling ship may make you want to check it out!
Set in the future, when Earth is covered by a Shroud of thick pollution, food and all other resources are scarce.  Humans struggle to survive--at least most of them do.
Ishmael, age 17, has no other choice than to be transported to another galaxy to harvest resources from a different Earth-like planet--that way he can make money to get his parents off of Earth and somewhere safer.
Little does Ishmael know that by joining the crew of the mighty Pequod, dangerous adventures lie ahead: a giant, lethal underwater beast the captain of the Pequod is obsessed with hunting down, savage pirates, gentle islanders etching out an alternative way of life on land, new friends--and new enemies.
All of this for a boy who has never eaten solid food, taken a shower, nor seen the ocean...
A page-turner!

The Search for WondLa

The Search for WondLa
By Tony DiTerlizzi

This sci fi novel is the beginning of a wonderful trilogy by the author of The Spiderwick Chronicles. The illustrations are fabulous, and you can "interact" with them via webcam on the author's website: wondla.com/home/wondla-vision/).

Eva Nine is a human girl, raised for 12 years by a robot named Muthr (short for Multi-Utility Task Helper Robot). They have only ever lived underground, and Eva Nine has never even seen the sun...

Until the day a dangerous beast attacks her cozy home and forces Eva to flee into the unknown and strange above-ground.

Thus ensues a wild adventure with roaming trees, crazy giant creatures, and a hope that Eva Nine will find the human companions she longs to meet.

Uglies

Uglies
By Scott Westerfield

Loved the premise of this dystopian series! Uglies is the first of four books.

As Tally is about to turn 16, she anticipates the operation every person in her city gets to turn them "pretty"; after that, teenagers lead a carefree and beautiful life full of parties in New Pretty Town, as Tally has observed  from across the river.

However, one evening Tally meets Shay, who is also about to turn 16 and has a different--and rebelious--personality, and a dark outlook on what it means to be turned "pretty".

When Shay runs away from the city in search of a mythical community of outlaws in a place called the Smoke, Tally must decide how important it is to be "pretty", and what kind of friend she will be to Shay.

The Giver Quartet

The Giver
Gathering Blue
Messenger
Son
By Lois Lowry

This summer I decided to check out the whole Quartet from the library--well, actually just the three books following The Giver, because I had already read that one and written about it here.
What a treat! I enjoyed so much how characters appear and reappear throughout the different stories, and how themes weave together and overlap.
In Gathering Blue, we learn about the difficult life of young Kira, and also of her special gift--which the leaders in her community are trying to manipulate in order to control the future.
Messenger is the story of Matty, who was just a rascal of a boy in Gathering Blue. He too has a special gift he is learning to understand and use for good. The depictions of the Forest are creepy and unnerving in this one!
And finally, in Lois Lowry's latest wonderful book Son, Jonas and Kira from previous stories are again important characters...but this is the story of Claire, a "Birthmother" from the same community in The Giver, searching for her stolen son, Gabe.

Bridge of Time

Bridge of Time
By Lewis Buzbee

This is a fun time travel story, mostly because it's set right here in San Francisco!
Middle schoolers Lee Jones and Joan Lee are best friends, and both have just heard that their parents are planning to divorce...the next morning, while on a boring school field trip to Fort Point, they are suddenly transported back in time to 1864. And who do they run into? Mark Twain (who introduces himself as Sam Clemens).
They have many crazy adventures while learning some unpleasant history lessons, especially with regard to how Chinese immigrants were first treated in San Francisco. And they travel to some other time periods in the City, too, including the future.

The Chronicles of Harris Burdick

The Chronicles of Harris Burdick: 14 Amazing Authors Tell the Tales
By Chris Van Allsburg
AND Lemony Snicket, Tabitha King, Jon Scieszka, Sherman Alexie, Gregory Maguire, Cory Doctorow, Jules Feiffer, Linda Sue Park, Walter Dean Myers, Lois Lowry, Kate DiCamillo, M.T. Anderson, and Louis Sachar

 An "esteemed collection of highly decorated authors" have written short stories to accompany Chris Van Allsburg's intriguing and bizarre pictures from the original Mysteries of Harris Burdick...and the stories are just as intriguing and bizarre!
If you were ever inspired by Harris Burdick to think of your own stories to accompany those black-and-white drawings, you will probably enjoy this collection. The stories range from strange to funny to creepy, and beyond...

Ender's Game

Ender's Game
By Orson Scott Card

Ender Wiggins is six years old when they take him away from his family on Earth and put him in space-based Battle School.  There, he meets other gifted children like himself, all being trained to fight the "buggers"--the supposed alien enemy.  Ender quickly rises to the top, becoming the best chance Earth has in the space war against the buggers.  Meanwhile, his brother and sister on Earth, also gifted, are planing to take over the world and start an Earth-based war.
This is an intense, action-packed, but pretty serious sci fi novel about adults using children as soldiers, the threat of invasion from other worlds, and the purpose of war.  I couldn't put it down!
There are more books in the Ender series, too, but I haven't read them yet.