5 TO 1

In the year 2054, after decades of gender selection, Koyanagar-a country severed from India-now has a ratio of five boys for every girl, and women are an incredibly valuable commodity. Tired of wedding their daughters to the highest bidder and determined to finally make marriage fair, the women of Koyanagar have instituted a series of tests so that every boy has the chance to win a wife. But after fighting so hard for freedom against the old ways of gender selection, these women have become just as deluded as their male predecessors. Sudasa Singh doesn't want to be a wife and Contestant Five, a boy competing to be her husband, has other plans as well. Sudasa's family wants nothing more than for their daughter to do the right thing and pick a husband who will keep her comfortable-and caged. Five's family wants him to escape by failing the tests. As the tests advance, each thwarts the other until they slowly realize that they might want the same thing. This beautiful, unique novel is told from alternating points of view-Sudasa's in verse and Five's in prose-allowing readers to feel both characters' pain and grasps at hope.

Released May 12, 2015 from Knopf Books for Young Readers (Penguin Random House).