Life in a Small Town!
Yep! I am going off topic again, but I was thinking about this a lot lately. Last week, when we were all talking about things that make us pick up a book, I saw a few people mention small town settings. Then, I smiled, and thought, "me too". I lived in Brooklyn, NY until I was 13 (and a half), but spent the rest of my teen years in a one square mile town near Rutgers University. It was a bit of a culture shock at the time, but when I look back at that small town, I do so with some fondness for the distinguishing things about small towns. Below is a list of some YA books set in small towns, that I read and loved, and since I haven't done this topic before, I am going back as far as I want.
- Famous in a Small Town by Emma Mills
- Small Town Hearts by Lillie Vale
- The Serpent King by Jeff Zentner
- This is What Happy Looks Like by Jennifer E. Smith
- Second Chance Summer by Morgan Matson
- The Distance Between Us by Kasie West
- Play On by Michelle Smith
- Dress Codes for Small Towns by Courtney C. Stevens
- Cold Day in the Sun by Sara Biren
- On Thin Ice by Julie Cross
What's your favorite small town book?
Let us know in the comments!
Cool topic. I loved the town in The Serpent King because it reminds me a lot of where I grew up.
ReplyDeleteAj @ Read All The Things!
That's awesome. The Serpent King was such an amazing book too.
DeleteI love small town settings too. In any genre. Living in one, I can relate:) Love that song and will be humming it all day now. LOL
ReplyDeleteHa! Then my job is done. I am always getting earwigs and I apparently love planting them as well.
DeleteI love books in small towns!! There are some here I have loved and some I need to check out!
ReplyDeleteThey just add a little something cosy to the story for me
DeleteI grew up in a beautiful, quaint little town that I miss dearly. I didn't appreciate it when I lived there, but now I'd kill to live there again. For now, I'll have to get my small town fix through fiction.
ReplyDeleteI didn't do TTT this week, but I enjoyed your twist on the topic :)
Same. I appreciate HP so much more as an adult, but when I was a kid, I thought it was the worst!
DeleteI love the small town setting. My home town is about 50,000, which isn’t exaclty small, but a heck of a lot smaller than Portland or Phoenix. My dad grew up in a town with 283 people, and I loved going there to spend summer with my grandparents. I will have to check out a few on your list. I have heard great things about that Emma Mills book.
ReplyDeleteMy teen hometown comes in about 14000 these days and only has three schools - one elementary, one middle, one high school. I graduated with 105 kids, which compared to the size of the schools I taught at, is really small. All Emma Mills books are wonderful! I cannot scream about them enough.
DeleteOh Sam there is another author famous for her small town stories: Devney Perry!
ReplyDeleteI will have to check Perry out.
DeleteNice topic switch! I enjoy small towns too! For me though, they usually have something more dark and sinister going on at being that creepy small town! Lol.
ReplyDeleteHere's my Tuesday Post
Have a GREAT day!
Old Follower :)
I had nothing for this week's topic, so I did my own (per my normal MO). Yep, I could totally see the small town being more on the dark side in an paranormal/UF/fantasy book.
DeleteI kinda like small town settings in books, especially YA. Lots of possibilities. I'll have to mark some of these down in case I get a hankering for a good "small town" book. :)
ReplyDeleteI think it's the way everyone's lives are so intertwined that grabs me. It works well in the books I have read, and I love the community aspect.
DeleteI also grew up in a really small town so I could probably identify with some of these. They're all new to me though!
ReplyDeleteThey are all contemporaries (obviously, since, you know, it's me). I feel like there are a bunch of UF/paranormals/mysteries out there that use small town settings as well, I just don't read enough of them.
DeleteI grew up in a small town, but it didn't really have the characteristics of small towns in books!
ReplyDeleteHP definitely did. Not to the extent that these books did, because I did not grow up in the country. I mean, I was 30 mins from NYC, but there were families, who grew up there for generations, as well as a strong sense of community.
DeleteI do like the small town feel in books. There is just something about a tiny town that really feels like a community. Great topic!
ReplyDeleteExactly! I love the community aspect and it's probably something I miss most about my adult life. So, I am lucky to at least have an online community, where I "know" so many people, right?
DeleteLove this topic. I adore books set in small towns as well and I've actually not read any of these yet so I'm grateful for the recs. :)
ReplyDeleteI hope you get to read some of these, because they were all really wonderful.
DeleteSince I don't come from a small town I don't know why I love a small town setting so much but I do. I think it's the idea of small town gossip and everyone being up in each others business and the sense of community which appeals. I'm surprised I've only read two of the books on your list, though! I need to get reading!
ReplyDeleteI think it's easier to idealize a small town if you never lived in one, because some of the nice things are also annoying.
DeleteI'll Meet You There jumps to mind when I think of books set in small towns. The only truly small town I've lived in was a fishing village in Latvia. The school was K-12 and had about 500 kids total, so that gives you a sense of the size of the town. I've taught in some kind-of-small towns (17-24K people) but lived mostly in suburbs of Portland. Something to be said for each, of course, but small towns do really work in books. Lots of great mystery authors, from Agatha Christie to Louise Penny, set detectives in small towns too.
ReplyDeleteI saw I'll Meet You There mentioned a LOT, and I finally own the book, which I intend on reading during the summer (when I have less review books). Everyone seems to love it, and I think I will too.
DeleteI'd like to read more books set in small towns or in a rural setting even.
ReplyDeleteI personally have not read too many set in rural settings, but I sort of love every time an authors takes me to life on a farm.
DeleteObviously, a different genre, but one of the things I love about mysteries in small towns is that there's a whole different level of intimacy because people know each other so well -- and that makes secrets, lies and mysteries all the better
ReplyDeleteIt seems there are a lot of small town mysteries out there. The last mystery I read, Two Can Keep a Secret, was set in a small town
DeleteI love books set in a small town! And I love so many of these!!!
ReplyDeleteI am all about that cosy feel and sense of community
DeleteI used to read a lot of books set in creepy towns-Stephen King's Castle Rock, Richard Laymon's Malcasa Point as good examples.
ReplyDeleteA lot of horror readers have been talking about Stephen King books. He did creepy small town well.
DeleteDress Codes to Small Towns definitely had that small town feeling! I really need to read The Serpent King. Mostly when it comes to small towns books I like them to be romances :) No idea why!
ReplyDeleteTSK was so, so good. I cried, when this one thing happened, but it really was a wonderful story of friendship, even if the coming of age came with such a large price tag.
DeleteI grew up in a village and I remember returning home after a couple of years away at uni and waiting at a bus stop and one of the old ladies giving me the third-degree because they didn't recognise me and basically wanted me to state my business in the village... Reading books set in small towns always make me giggle.
ReplyDeleteIt was sort of like that in the two I lived in as a teen. If they didn't recognize you, you were deemed an outsider. Funny.
DeleteI think a lot of my books are set in small towns. I lived in a small town most of my life also it was 3 miles by 3 miles. Interesting. I will have to check on my books. I don't remember a lot being set in big city. Great topic.
ReplyDeleteMary
I read so many books set in NYC, so big city life is all over my read-shelf, but I enjoy books set there, since I lived in Brooklyn until I was 13, and just a short train ride outside of the city for most of the rest of my years. I like the familiarity of it, though, it's more anonymous than small town books.
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