"The Grace Year" by Kim Liggett

If you liked “The Handmaid’s Tale” or “The Hunger Games,” read this one next.

In Tierney James’s village, girls are believed to carry a dangerous magic that makes men weak and women wild. On their sixteenth birthday, they’re sent into the wilderness for a year to burn it out of them. This is the grace year. It is never discussed, and everyone knows that some girls don’t come back.

Tierney goes in knowing the odds. Out there, there is no one to rely on but a group of girls who have been taught to fear each other, and the danger doesn’t come only from the woods. Suspicion spreads, loyalties fracture, and survival comes at a price.

Liggett writes a dark, tense story of control, fear, and what women are made to carry. It’s fast, unsettling, and hard to put down, and the questions it raises will stay with you after you finish. It’s a good choice for a book club, since it’s easy to talk about.

A word of warning: it’s violent and dark, so it isn’t for everyone. For readers who like their dystopian fiction sharp and uncomfortable, it delivers.

This paperback is in very good condition, and you can find it at Dead Tree Dreams.