Much like last month, this month is quiet on the young adult book news front. It’s been a busy publishing season, but there’s been far less talk about the books than it seems there has been in previous years. That’s not to say there’s nothing, and that’s not to say what’s here isn’t good or big. Rather, it feels like there’s been a shift in attention being paid to YA beyond the book community. We’ll see if this continues, but it is noteworthy during the year’s busiest publishing season.

September was a busy month here for book coverage. As noted above, the new book releases were plentiful, and we not only got a look at the 25th anniversary cover for M.T. Anderson’s YA classic Feed, but we also got the story behind the image of the back of a head that became the iconic cover.

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Adaptation News

  • Easily the biggest news of the last month is that we’ve got a new trailer for the adaptation of Sunrise on the Reaping. You can catch the film in theaters on November 20.
  • Sloan Harlow’s romantic thriller Everything We Never Said will be adapted by Miramax.
  • Here’s everything we know so far about the adaptation of Lynn Painter’s Better Than The Movies.
  • Christopher Pike’s Remember Me is being adapted for Tubi–news that was announced earlier this year–but this gives an update that it’s being taken seriously enough by the streamer to be considered for the Toronto International Film Fest.

Book Previews

  • Read your way into all of the science fiction and fantasy YA releases from last month.
  • Need a smaller list of science fiction and fantasy titles to dig into? Reactor has the most anticipated titles in these genres for September and October.

Awards News

  • Check out this year’s longlist for the National Book Awards in Young People’s Literature. The shortlists will be announced very soon.
  • Get to know the YA winner of Australia’s 2026 Prime Minister’s Literary Award.

Miscellaneous

  • It’s debatable whether The Baby-Sitters Club is YA or middle grade–it sits right in the middle of the two–but what isn’t debatable is that a good story about the series deserves to be shared. Here’s a look at 40 years of Kristy, Claudia, Dawn, Stacey, Mary Anne, Mallory, Jessi, and the rest of the gang.
  • Publishers Weekly has declared that YA dystopia is back. I’m not sure it ever went away, though I for sure know it wasn’t being marketed or published as heavily as it was in the early 2010s.
  • Speaking of dystopia, there’s an interview with Veronica Roth and Chloe Gong in PW about returning to and expanding the worlds they created in their dystopian series.