Jan's Story by Barry Petersen starts out as a love letter to the author's wife. It is heart-warming to hear his unabashed adoration for his wife, Jan, who suffers from Early Onset Alzheimer…
Galax-Arena is an intense book. Think Hunger Games, but with aliens and gymnastics-to-the-death. It is definitely creepy and latches onto your mind so that you might not forget about t…
"I slipped my hand into hers. A strange and unfamiliar feeling ran through me. It felt like the ocean, like sunlight, like horses. Like love. I searched my mind and found the name for it. Joy."
The…
A delightful opening to a wonderful trilogy! With a hint of steampunk, plenty of magic, and an exciting adventure, Holmberg weaves a compelling tale. Ceony is a complex, well-written protagonist,…
I was homeschooled so for the majority of my childhood and adolescence I never felt the pressure to be "popular". So, in some sense, I couldn't really relate to what Maya writes about in this book. (H…
Like Water on Stone by Dana Walrath is historical fiction told in verse. Set in 1915, it is a fictionalized account of the Armenian genocide. Verse, done correctly, becomes invisible to the reader. …
Two things I loved about this book right away? That the protagonist, Maggie Lynch used to live in Chicago, and that there is a carnival mentioned in the title. Two things I didn't like as much? The co…
The Bunker Diary by Kevin Brooks was awarded the 2014 CILIP Carnegie Medal. This is an award given in the United Kingdom for an outstanding book for young people. I'm thinking that the standards in …
I've been reading Lisa Graff's books since I was a little kid. I picked up A Tangle of Knots out of curiosity because the cover was just so delicious. When I read the synopsis, I knew t…
I have to admit it. I am hooked by a book of poetry. While not a fan of this genre, I couldn’t put Jacqueline Woodson’s Brown Girl Dreaming down until I had finished it…
I must have inherited my fascination with the Holocaust from my mother. Whenever a new book chronicling any kind of history about the camps or a person involved in the Holocaust is published, it is al…
Cece Bell, the author of EL DEAFO, was four years old when a bout of meningitis resulted in a hearing loss of severe to profoundly deaf. EL DEAFO is the story of her struggle with this disabilit…
