Hi guys! I'm Kate from the YouTube channel GirlReading and I've spent the
past year pining for season 2 of Stranger Things to start. Whether or not
you've watched the show you're probably at least somewhat familiar with Stranger
Things but if not, very simply put, it is a Netflix original series that premiered
in 2016 and it is set in a small town in America
and basically follows the disappearance of a young boy and the strange
circumstances in which his mother, the chief of police and his misfit group of
friends have to face in order to get him back. There are secrets and superpowers
and murder alongside family, friendship, love and humor and it is basically a
total emotional rollercoaster. So, if you're like me desperately waiting for the next
series to start or you're watching this having already watched it and you're not
entirely sure what to do with yourself anymore, today I thought I would share
with you some bookish recommendations that hopefully may help to fill that
Stranger Things hole in your heart at least until you inevitably decide to
binge watch it from season 1 all over again. I have a somewhat eclectic mix of
books to recommend today: from young adults to adult to graphic novels but
each recommendation I do have is based off one or more specific element of
Stranger Things so hopefully I'll have something in here that contains an
aspect of the show that you especially love. My first recommendation is based
on the Upside Down, alternate reality aspect of Stranger Things and that is
Dark Matter by Blake Crouch. This follows Jason Desson who is a father, a husband
and a scientist as his world is turned completely upside down as one night,
after a night out Jason is followed home and knocked unconscious. When he is woken
up by a masked stranger, he finds himself in his life, but a life that has
completely changed. He is now a celebrated genius instead of a teacher,
his wife is not his wife and his son was never born. We follow Jason as he tries
to untangle the mess he's found himself in whilst also tried to work out which
of these words is real and trying to get back to the world he once knew.
Dark Matter plays with the idea of an alternate reality in a way that will
totally mess with your mind and make you question and think about everything your
life is and everything it could have been and all the what-ifs of life. It's
basically perfect if you were looking for a more scientific, realistic
explanation of the possibility of alternate universes and the Upside Down.
My next recommendation is one that I genuinely, the entire time I was reading it,
couldn't stop thinking about how perfect it would be for fans of
Stranger Things and that is The Call by Peadar O'Guilin: this is a young adult novel
set in an island that has been cut off from the rest of the world and is
basically a place where at any moment children and teenagers are at risk of
being Called and disappearing into a horrific other world in which they have
to spend the entire day fighting for their lives against the Sidhe who are
essentially these kind of evil fairies and this basically follows a group of
teens at a boarding school where they have been trained to fight to survive in
this ruthless other world, despite the fact that the majority of the people
that do end up being Called are either murdered whilst there or they've returned
extremely injured or mutilated in a multitude of ways. This is bizarre and
creepy and gruesome and surprisingly disturbing for a young adult book and
honestly if this and the show hadn't have been released around the same time,
I would have thought one had inspired the other and that's not because they're
exactly the same but they both do have very similar elements to them. If you
enjoyed the show I'm certain you will love this and if you enjoyed this I'm
also certain that you will really enjoy the show. If the 80s setting and group of
badass kids fighting monsters is what sucked you into Stranger Things then i
110 percent recommend Paper Girls which is a graphic novel, following four 12 year
old paper girls on the morning after Halloween in 1988 when they essentially
encounter an alien invasion. There's time-travel, vanishing
townspeople, spacecrafts, these giant flying dinosaur bird kind of things. The
art style and colors in this are absolutely gorgeous. You're basically
dropped right into the action from the first page. It's incredibly fast paced
plus it is the start of an ongoing series so although you will probably get
through this quite quickly, there are currently three volumes out with more to
come. For those of you looking to read something with magic and elements
similar to Eleven's powers, I have Gilded Cage by Vic James. This is a YA novel
set in a modern-day Britain in which the magic users control everything; from
wealth to power to politics and the people. If you are not one of the magical
elite, the ultimate one-percenters, then you owe them ten years of your service.
If you do those years when you are old, you'll never get through them but if you
do them when you are young, you'll never get over them. This follows two families
that have absolutely nothing in common except that they each have three
children but after one family enters the service of the other, their destinies
begin to entwine. This is another one that is the start of a series so
you'll definitely be able to get your alternate-reality, special power Stranger
Things fix from it for quite a while. For my last Stranger Things inspired
book recommendation, I couldn't not mention IT by Stephen King. It follows a
gang of kids investigating a horrifying force terrorizing their town. It is set
in the 80s. It is dark, it is twisted (even more so than Stranger Things) and I'm
going to be honest, I have not watched nor have I read IT by Stephen King because I
have enough trouble sleeping as it is. I have seen and heard it being compared to
Stranger Things so many times even I can't deny the similarities between the
two stories plus the new movie adaptation has just been released, giving
you even more opportunities to get your Stranger Things fix. So those are the
books that I would most definitely recommend to any Stranger Things fan
looking to fill that Stranger Things void and I really hope that I have
mentioned something that has intrigued you. If so, I would absolutely love to
know which ones. If you happen to have any Stranger Things-inspired
recommendations yourself whether that be graphic novels or books or TV shows or
movies or anything please leave them in the comments because I would very much
appreciate them and I'm sure somebody else would too. Lastly, I wanted to say
thank you so much to Book Break for having me and I hope you're all having
the most wonderful day! Bye :)