Riot Recommendation

32 Of Your Favorite Sci-Fi YA Novels

S. Zainab Williams

Executive Director, Content

S. Zainab would like to think she bleeds ink but the very idea makes her feel faint. She writes fantasy and horror, and is currently clutching a manuscript while groping in the dark. Find her on Twitter: @szainabwilliams.

This giveaway is sponsored by Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, publisher of Defy the Stars by Claudia Gray.

She’s a soldier.

He’s a machine.

Enemies in an interstellar war, they are forced to work together as they embark on a daring journey through the stars. Their efforts would end the fighting for good, but they’re not without sacrifice. The stakes are even higher than either of them first realized, and the more time they spend together, the more they’re forced to question everything they’d been taught was true.


Because high school is more thrilling in space, and saving the galaxy is (maybe?) as important as that first romance. We asked you to share your favorite Sci-Fi YA novels, and you responded. Here are 32 of your favorites!

Carve the Mark by Veronica Roth

The Lunar Chronicles Series by Marissa Meyer

The Hunger Games Series by Suzanne Collins

The Blue Sword by Robin McKinley

Grasshopper Jungle by Andrew A. Smith

A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle

Insignia by S.J. Kincaid

Illuminae: The Illuminae Files, Book 1 by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff

Shade’s Children by Garth Nix

Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card

Red Rising by Pierce Brown

Feed by Matthew Tobin Anderson

The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey

The Uglies Series by Scott Westerfield

The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness

The Love That Split the World by Emily Henry

Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi

Fortune’s Pawn by Rachel Bach

Across the Universe Series by Beth Revis

Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard

A Thousand Pieces of You by Claudia Gray

Dark Matter by Blake Crouch

The Giver by Lois Lowry

The Lost Girl by Sangu Mandanna

All Our Yesterdays by Cristin Terrill

Ship Breaker Series by Paolo Bacigalupi

Starfall by Melissa Landers

Insurgent by Veronica Roth

Beyond the Red by Ava Jae

Faerie Wars by Herbie Brennan

Starflight by Melissa Landers

The Forgetting by Sharon Cameron