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Josh had sex with his teacher. As a 12 year-old seventh-grader his history teacher selected, groomed and eventually manipulated Josh into a sexual “relationship”. As Mrs. Sherman is brought to justice and the entire town learns of the sordid details Josh retreats into his own head. Now a senior in high school, a gifted baseball player with an amazing mind, Josh is having a hard time breaking away from his seventh grade self. For six years he has felt like the proverbial elephant in the room- the one that everybody notices and is curious about, but won’t address. Perhaps the redemption/conclusion he craves will comeRead More →

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23 interwoven stories and poems are edited by Holly Black and Ellen Kushner in Welcome To Bordertown: New Stories and Poems of the Borderlands.  Carefully crafted, skillfully interwoven, and richly textured, the collection flushes out the dark and the magical, the secrets and the mysteries, of the border between the Faerie Realm and The World.  Truebloods (High and Low-born Elves), Halfies (mixed race elves & humans), and mortals, as well as many other magical creatures live in, search for, and get lost in Bordertown.  It’s a city that’s been lost to The World for 13 years (only 13 days to those in Bordertown) where neitherRead More →

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You Are Not Here Book description:  Annaleah and Brian shared something special – Annaleah is sure of it. When they were together, they didn’t need anyone else. It didn’t matter that their relationship was secret. All that mattered was what they had with each other.  And then, out of nowhere, Brian dies. And while everyone else has their role in the grieving process, Annaleah finds herself living outside of it, unacknowledged and lonely.  Reader Review:   You Are Not Hereby Samantha Schutz was a great read it captured my interest within the very first few pages. It made me look at how to deal with theRead More →

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In: Action & Adventure, Action & Adventure (YA), Historical Fiction, Historical Fiction (YA), Middle Grade Reviews, Romance (YA), Young Adult Book Reviews
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Set in 1881 in New Pacifica (a fictional territory of the US, much like the Pacific Northwest), James Nelson’s On the Volcano is a coming of age story, laced with romance, loss, and adventure. Katie was born in a small cabin on the rim of a powerful volcano, far from the turmoil and dangers of the pioneer world. She’s only ever known her beloved father and two other adults, Lorraine – a travelling healer who stays with them from time to time, and Old Dan- a nomad who drops in every decade or so to visit.  Approaching 16, Katie wonders about the world off theRead More →

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Gayle Forman’s If I Stay is an incredible book.  It’s heartbreaking, lyrical, visceral and beautiful.  I shed tears a few times while reading it. And when Mia chose to come back to a broken body, a life without her parents and beloved younger brother, to an uncertain future, but to the fierce love of her grandparents and boyfriend Adam, I rejoiced.  Next month, Dutton will release Where She Went, Forman’s sequel to If I Stay.  Three years have passed and now, and from Adam’s perspective we learn what happened to Adam and Mia.  Adam’s band, Shooting Star, has propelled him to rock star existance: he’s rich; hounded byRead More →

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The long war between the Uplanders and the Downlanders is finally over: there’s a new lord, an Uplander; refuges, hoping for healing and a new life, are still fleeing south after their villages and livelihoods have been destroyed; battle-scarred soldiers are returning home to an uneasy welcome and must face questions about the fates of those did not; and the day-to-day life in every village will never be the same as everyone deals with the overt and subtle changes, wounds, and uncertainty about what lies ahead.  Cam Attling was 12 when he marched off to war. Now he’s 18 and has returned to the small village heRead More →

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Blake Nelson’s latest YA novel, Recovery Road, is a novel about a journey. At the opening of the book, high school junior Maddie is being committed to a rehab facility after a drunken car accident.  The story gets going a  few weeks later once she’s in the transitional program nearing her release.  On one of the weekly movie nights that the patients in the transitional program are allowed to leave the facility to attend, Maddie meets Stewart, a beautiful but remote guy about her age. Their attraction is instantaneous and soon they are finding ways to be together whenever they can.  Once Maddie is back homeRead More →

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In: Action & Adventure, Action & Adventure (YA), Middle Grade Reviews, Multicultural, Multicultural (YA), Mystery & Suspense, Mystery & Suspense (YA), Supernatural & Horror, Supernatural & Horror (YA), Young Adult Book Reviews
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I read a lot of books; fortunately, my profession and one of my hobbies jive like that.  And since I read so many books, I find myself jaded by the repetition on theme, the slight variations on popular books that are churned out in the hopes of finding “the next whatever“, and the lackluster writing and poor editing that occurs in the rush to print more and more.  So it’s a rare day when I am so engrossed in a book I cannot stop reading it and then cannot stop telling people about it.  And on Saturday, I got to have one of those days whenRead More →

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In: Historical Fiction (YA), Multicultural (YA), Young Adult Book Reviews
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Co-written with Maria Virginia Farinango, Laura Resau’s The Queen of Water will enchant, enlighten, and embolden you. Virginia’s story begins in an impoverished Ecuadoran village where at 7 years old, she is taken from her indigenous family to be an unpaid servant for a family of mestizos, Ecuador’s middle & upper classes who claim to be descendants of the Spanish conquerors.   While Virginia quickly becomes accustomed to the comforts of her employers’ lifestyle, the fierce beatings, daily humiliation, verbal and psychological abuse, and the hard work make her life unbearable at times. During the 8 years that Virginia is with these people, she waivers between feeling a loving connection to them andRead More →