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Although occasionally bawdy with its vulgar language, illicit activities, and other questionable behaviors, Those Girls examines the lives of three girls attempting to deal with their insecurities, fears, and vulnerabilities about being pretty or talented or special.  In this debut novel by Lauren Saft, Mollie Finn, Alex Holbrook, and Veronica Collins have been BFFs since fifth grade, and their friendship has served as a life raft in the turbulent waters of private school at Harwin, an all-girls academy in Greencliff, Pennsylvania. But junior year—with its boy troubles and other social challenges—stretches the bonds of their friendship to the breaking point, and it might take moreRead More →

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Twelve year old Peter Lee and his family are avid baseball fans. Even his strict Chinese immigrant father Ba -who has Peter do homework on the way to games- has some regard for the sport. However, once tragedy strikes, and takes with it a cherished loved one, no one talks about baseball anymore. Peter’s mom stops talking altogether. Convinced that what brought them together before can keep them together now, Peter joins a Little League team. The only problem? The league is short one coach. Ba steps in to seemingly save the day, but his methods rub Peter and his teammates the wrong way. Now whatRead More →

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The Brothers of the Ikkuma Pit have fended for themselves since birth. They have no Mothers; only themselves and each other. When they arrive outside the Pit as babies, they must spend a whole night alone before they are welcomed inside to be cared for and guided by the Brothers that came before them. Every time a new Little Brother enters the Pit, a Big Brother must leave to make room for him. No Big Brother has ever returned after leaving to tell of what the outside world holds. Urgle is a Big Brother and he’s not very good at it. His Little Brother CubbyRead More →

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When they were fifth graders, May Harper—a budding writer—and Libby Deaton—a budding artist, created Princess X.  “A blue-haired girl in a puff-sleeved princess dress, wearing a big gold crown and red sneakers” (3), Princess X was born on a sidewalk as chalk art, but the two girls took her home and built an imaginary empire—filling notebooks and sketchbooks with her adventures.  “The princess became their alter ego, their avatar, their third best friend” (8). Several years later, as the girls were entering high school, Libby and her mother were in a mysterious car accident.  Separated from her best friend, May couldn’t shake the dream that toldRead More →

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How do three twenty first century tweens from the prestigious east coast Fredericksville School in New Jersey end up in a smelly stable standing over the most important guy in United States’ history? After being left behind at Christmastime by parents who are too busy, too famous, or too self-absorbed to care for their children, Beverly, Brandon, and Mel go on a field trip with their chaperone Mr. Hart to view a reenactment of the famous Crossing of the Delaware.  When Brandon fiddles with a Macbook, the trio ends up participating in the historical event instead. Victims of time travel, Beverly, Brandon, and Mel areRead More →

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In the hands of a master storyteller. That’s where I like to find myself. Where I can let go completely, feast on the imagery, devour the delicious characters, and fall head over heels into an exquisitely constructed world.   Chock full of insights, life lessons, patient wisdom, and human truths, the work of a true craftsman (or woman) serves them to you like your favorite dessert, allowing you to savor, wanting more, and leaving you ultimately satiated and satisfied beyond belief.  What a sublime treat, then, to have spent time in the deft hands of master Deborah Wiles, in the second of her documentary novelsRead More →

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One part mystery, one part science fiction, and one part realism with a dash of romance and a huge helping of dystopian fiction, Now That You’re Here by Amy K. Nichols is a multi-genre novel, one that potentially holds appeal for a wide variety of readers.   It plays what if in many of the intriguing ways that Libba Bray posed possibilities in Going Bovine. Set in Phoenix, Arizona, Nichols book explores the presence of parallel universes and whether teleportation—universe jumping—may occur via electromagnetism.  And who better to perform the research than a couple of teens seeking a science fair project? Eevee Solomon, a sophomore at Palo BreaRead More →

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This post comes from Brian Griggs: The Tallest Librarian in the World; check out his blog briangriggs.com. Wow. No, seriously. Wow. To call Steelheart epic would be a horrible pun and I will resist the temptation to call it that, but it’s an accurate description. I am an avid fan of sci-fi action stories and yet I have hesitated in picking up the latest spec fic greatness because I’ve been burned out by the genre – more specifically, the overpopulating of the market with Hunger Games/Divergent/Uglies clones. The farther you go down the line of clones, the more the DNA of a good story starts to degrade. That may not be theRead More →

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This post comes from Brian Griggs: The Tallest Librarian in the World; check out his blog briangriggs.com. I’m really liking the amount of humorous, realistic fiction that has come out recently. It takes a lot of skill to write characters that are believable and yet live in big enough experiences to keep the narrative interesting. Tommy Greenwald succeeds in doing that with Jack Strong Takes a Stand. Jack is an overscheduled middle-schooler who decides to stage a sit-in on his family’s couch until his schedule frees up. It reminded me a little bit of Avi’s Nothing but the Truth as one tiny action escalates into a media storm. Newspapers,Read More →