"This beautiful and important book is dystopian YA at its finest, and its themes of queer resilience and community will resonate for many years to come." -BCCB (starred review) "[One of] the best YA novels hitting shelves . . . More necessary and timely than ever. This story of state-run schools in a post-climate disaster world that teach select young women to be perfect wives and mothers to help repopulate society doesn't feel as alien-or far away-as it once might have. Timely and thoughtful." -Paste Magazine In the style of Kazuo Ishiguro, details [are] dabbled out in tiny, delicious morsels and flashbacks . . . The writing is painterly, yet tight; the book ties up every detail . . . A haunting dystopian amalgamation for the 21st century. Superlative, powerful, and timely. -School Library Journal (starred review) "Oakes employs evocative prose and worldbuilding shot through with equal parts melancholy and hope to craft an intelligent dystopian tale that proves a biting interpretation of contemporary issues surrounding conversion therapy, homophobia, misogyny, and racism." -Publishers Weekly (starred review) "The Meadows is built with extraordinary parts-stunning language, complex characters, and the most exquisite heart. It's a stop-you-in-your-tracks book, a reach-inside-and-grab-you book. I love its beating, beaming essence-that we are all good, and deserving of love, just as we are. A story of pain, injustice, love, resistance, and hope, this glorious book will lodge inside you and make you feel everything." -Helena Fox, award-winning author of How It Feels to Float and The Quiet and the Loud "Gripping . . . A YA Handmaid's Tale [that] toggles seamlessly between past and present. [For] readers who enjoy dystopian books with feminist themes and stories that highlight the power of queer community." -Booklist" Cogent and incisive in its remarks on our present world, [The Meadows is] timely and gripping, [with] tension at a constant simmer and a new revelation always around the corner." -Kirkus Reviews "I was utterly swept away from page one. Atmospheric and unsettling, The Meadows is a dystopia that belongs in every collection. This is an incisive examination of the quiet violence of conversion therapies and the revolutionary power of self-love." -Natalie C. Parker, award-winning author of the Seafire series "A profound story with fantastic writing that will be a great companion-read to classics like Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale. And once you have finished reading it, do go back and read The Sacred Lies of Minnow Bly [by Stephanie Oakes], which also tackles a lot of important discussions about what it means to be a teen girl in our world." -Teen Librarian Toolbox "The Meadows is a book that I cannot prise out of my head. This is one spilling over with emotions: anger, sadness, and a tiny kernel of hope. It is a quietly devastating book, [and] Eleanor is a protagonist like no other. She has a fierce passion and desire to be loved and accepted, but it is veiled beneath years of programming and a paranoia from a world determined to squash her. . . . The narrative structure of moving between then and now-within the Meadows and outside-allows [for] hints beyond this dystopian reality [to] the dangers of climate change. Oakes' writing is incredibly captivating. Every page carries a keen sense of urgency and suspense . . . Sometimes a book just makes you ache. The Meadows is one of those books." -The Nerd Daily

Stephanie Oakes is the author of The Sacred Lies of Minnow Bly, which was a Morris Award finalist and a Golden Kite Honor book, and The Arsonist, which won the Washington State Book Award and was an ALA/YALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults pick. An elementary school librarian, Stephanie lives in Spokane, Washington with her wife and family.