Books

A YA Valentine's Day Tug-of-War: He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not

Valentine's Day is a polarizing holiday, particularly for women. Some tie up their hair in pink and red ribbons and hand out homemade valentines to all their friends. Others shun valentines as commercial trickery and skip the holiday all together. If you're in a relationship, it can be a pressure-filled day, second only to New Year's Eve in terms of expectations, but if you're single, it can be a great excuse to go out and party with girlfriends. It seems no matter where you are on the relationship spectrum, there are reasons to love and hate the holiday.

Literature is ripe with romance, first love, and forbidden affairs, but how you interpret the stories can tell you a lot about your approach to Valentine's Day. Take the arguable greatest love story in history: Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet. It's the archetype of the first, forbidden love story, where two star-crossed lovers would rather literally die than be apart. Swoon! On the other hand, Romeo and Juliet died, you guys. (Romeo, you couldn't wait three more seconds to see Juliet is alive?!) It's a story about two shortsighted kids in lust — Romeo weren't you just in love with Rosaline? — who barely know each other, yet make these proclamations of undying love and kill each other over a five-day relationship. Five days. Sigh.

Whether you're an eternal romantic optimist or you think love is built to crush souls and dreams, there's a novel for you. These 13 YA novels speak to the polarizing nature of Valentine's Day; a tug-of-war of love and heartache.

Images: Pexels

by Caitlin White

He Loves Me: 'This Lullaby' by Sarah Dessen

Sarah Dessen is on the lovey-dovey side of the spectrum. Many of her novels talk about first love, but The Lullaby is perhaps her best outright love story. Remy’s mother is a romance novelist — working on her fifth marriage.The title of Dessen’s novel is the title of a song written for Remy by her hippie father she never knew, and its melody echoes the idea that men will always let you down. So Remy doesn’t have swoony expectations of love when she meets Dexter, who plays in a band, but with the help of music, Remy might be able to get down to what love really means. Love, just maybe, is a personal experience, and other people’s failures can’t touch your own chances.

He Loves Me Not: 'The Breakup Bible' by Melissa Kantor

Everyone has been there. The “maybe we should just be friends” conversation with someone you definitely have more-than-friends feelings for. And that’s what happened to Melissa Kantor’s Jen Lewis. When she spirals in the aftermath of her high school relationship, her grandmother offers her Dr. Emerson’s The Breakup Bible, a self-help book that claims quick heartbreak recovery in a few simple steps. Kantor’s honest, hilarious story uses this plot device to give the middle finger to the preachiness of dating books.

He Loves Me: 'The Summer I Turned Pretty' by Jenny Han

Jenny Han’s sun-soaked summer love story will transport you from the depths of February to the freedom of July. Belly spends her summers crushing on the Fisher brothers, Conrad and Jeremiah, at a beach house, until the one summer when something actually comes from those crushes. Be prepared to pick #TeamConrad or #TeamJeremiah, but ultimately, Han has created an ode to the magic young summers, so clear you can practically taste the salt air.

He Loves Me Not: 'Shug' by Jenny Han

Jenny Han can give you love, but she can also take it away. Forget love triangles, the only team you’ll pledge allegiance to by the end of this book is Team Shug. The 12-year-old gawky Shug has known Mark all her life, and as she starts junior high, she’s ready for him to give her her first kiss. But as all of us who went to junior high know, things never happen as you daydream. Mark, instead, crushes on Shug’s popular older sister Celia, and Shug is pretty much invisible. Ugh, junior high. Valentine or now valentine, just be glad you’re not in junior high.

He Loves Me: 'Forever...' by Judy Blume

In senior year of high school, it seems nothing will last forever. But Cath and Michael are trying to make firsts that will be firsts forever. OK, most 20- and 30-somethings know this Judy Blume classic is about losing your virginity. (And kudos to Blume for discussing safe sex and Planned Parenthood in 1975, when it was published.) But when forever only lasts until summer vacation ends, what becomes of first love and first experiences? Let Aunt Judy give you some life lessons.

He Loves Me Not: 'The Boyfriend List' by E. Lockhart

Ruby Oliver is having one of those weeks. Within 10 days, she’s lost her boyfriend and all of her friends, became a social outcast, “did something advanced” with a boy, had a panic attack, and drank her first beer, among other trying events. She knows this, because her therapist has asked her to make a list. Lockhart’s sub-heading is “15 Guys, 11 Shrink Appointments, 4 Ceramic Frogs and Me, Ruby Oliver,” so you know you’re in for a whirlwind, but it certainly rings true to everyone who’s taking a few laps in the dating pool.

He Loves Me: 'Delirium' by Lauren Oliver

According to Lena’s government, love is a disease: deliria. It confuses the mind with passion and rids the country of logic, causing chaos. When you turn 18, you go under the knife to “cure” yourself of ever being able to feel love. Lena has been anxiously awaiting her cure, because she watched her mother fall victim of deliria. But with three months to go, Lena meets Alex, who has been living under the government’s radar, uncured. Alex, of course, changes everything, and Lena and Alex embark on a secret, passionate affair where he teaches her the upsides of love, even at the loss of order and logic. Just let me prepare you: Don’t read this one in public or without tissues.

He Loves Me Not: 'Paper Towns' by John Green

Oh boys and their manic pixie dream girls. At least, in Paper Towns, John Green recognizes the downfall of falling for this fantasy. Margo Roth Spiegelman’s name is like a prayer to Quentin “Q” Jacobsen. Q has loved her from afar for his whole life, so when one night she jumps into his bedroom window dressed as a ninja and primed for adventure, Q is game. But when Margo disappears, leaving Q hints to find her, his lovestruck ideal starts to crumble. Q comes to a slow realization that he may never have known Margo all along.

He Loves Me: 'My Life Next Door' by Huntley Fitzpatrick

Like the Montagues and Capulets, next door neighbors the Garretts and the Reeds are polar opposites and bitter rivals. But like Romeo and Juliet, that doesn’t stop their kids from falling in love. Samantha Reed, the daughter of a state senator, has always watched the large, messy Garrett family next door with longing; her perfectionist family could never compare to the affection she sees in the Garretts. And when she and Jase Garrett fall in love, she gets her wish, and the Garrett family takes Samantha in as one of their own. This brings Samantha to a turning point: Can you choose love and betray family?

He Loves Me Not: 'Crushed' by Laura McNeal and Tom McNeal

Everyone in Laura and Tom McNeal’s novel, like everyone in the world, has their chance to get crushed. The trouble for nerdy Audrey starts when the hot new guy Wickham starts flirting with her. Then an underground school newspaper starts dredging up dirt on everyone at the school, and Audrey starts to wonder about Wickham — not to mention her friends and family. As a “grown-up” (as much as I could be at this point), I couldn’t help but feel like reaching into this novel and warning Audrey. We nerdy ladies have been there, girl.

He Loves Me: 'Eleanor & Park' by Rainbow Rowell

If you haven’t had the means to read Rainbow Rowell’s highly praised book yet, Valentine’s Day would be the time. Rowell’s titular protagonists meet on the bus over a comic book. The two outcasts form a bond, each looking forward to that time on the bus every day, sharing music and comics and eventually falling in love. Of course, there are obstacles at school and in their families that test the relationship, but Eleanor & Park will have you dreaming of meeting your match who makes 1980s mixtapes for you.

He Loves Me Not: 'Hard Love' by Ellen Wittlinger

Like Eleanor and Park, John and Marisol bond over music and zines, but their obstacles may prove too much to overcome. John’s parents are divorced, his parents don’t seem to care about him, and his soon-to-be stepfather wants to move away. So John isn’t in a lovey place when he meets Marisol, but he falls for her anyway, and they grow closer and closer — but only as friends, Marisol thinks. Ouch.

He Loves Me: 'The Infinite Moment of Us' by Lauren Myracle

Lauren Myracle’s The Infinite Moment of Us has drawn comparison’s to another book on this list: Blume’s Forever. So with the characters Charlie and Wren, you have an idea what you’re in for. Myracle doesn’t shy away from the intensity and intimacy of first love, from the awkward fumblings to defining what relationships really mean, and she gives the young lovers depth and pacing that is missing from many “romance” novels.

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