Need to take a little adventure this summer? Here are two titles that might be right up your alley!
The first one is called Champion's Quest: The Die of Destiny by Frank L. Cole. It starts with Lucas, a 12 year old in foster care. He is convinced that he would be better off away from the foster home where he has been living, so he hatches a plan to run away by train. Except that one of the other foster kids, Miles, is meant to give his story credence, and Miles doesn't really want Lucas to go. They end up in what seems like a store but is actually the offices of a magical adventure group. Two girls join them-one is Jasmine, a girl who seems to be perpetually in trouble, and Vanessa, the daughter of the foster parents where Lucas and Miles are living. The game sounds like some of the role playing games that people play on line like Dungeons and Dragons-there are magical beasts that can either help or hurt you, your welfare depends on your decision making and you have to keep track of food and sleep and energy, and other characters that may or may not be there to help you. There's also a fun subplot of how the makers of the games are trying to help or hurt different teams. The characters are interesting and it's an exciting adventure with lots of plot twists. There are also some fun references to other magical stories, like Harry Potter. For kids who like role playing games or magic kingdoms, this would be a fun read. It reminded me a bit of one I'd read a couple of years ago called Homework and Hall Passes by Tom O'Donnell. I think the kids will like this one a lot.
Here's the official book trailer.
Here's the cover.
The second one is called Stowaway. It's written by John David Anderson, who you might remember wrote a terrific book called Ms. Bixby's Last Day. Ms. Bixby is realistic fiction and the new one is science fiction, which I keep saying is not my favorite, but I always like these science fiction books I pick! Go figure. Anyway, this new one is great too. It's about Leo who is living with his older brother Garrett and his dad on a space ship. Leo and Garrett's dad is a scientist and he's been working with the alien beings that have colonized Earth to get their ventasium, a mineral that provides them with power. Leo's mom was killed in an attack by a rival alien group, which is part of why the boys and their dad are living in space now. At the beginning of the story, their ship is attacked and left floating in outer space with out power, communication, or food. Leo and Garrett's dad is taken prisoner. In desperation, Garrett puts Leo on a pirate ship in hopes that Leo will be able to get help back to the ship. The pirates are less than thrilled to find a stowaway, but eventually, Leo proves his worth and the band of pirates set out to track down Leo's dad. This is another very exciting story. The characters in this one are well conceived and there are some fun cultural touchstones thrown in along the way that may or may not resonate with middle grader readers (but totally did with me). The idea that Leo probably doesn't have the whole story about the different groups of aliens will ring true with readers and could be used to connect with more topical stories about a conversation about what is the truth and why it gets shaded. I thought this one was terrific and the ending left me thinking it was probably not the last one! I hope you'll like this one too.
I've been enjoying my spring break and since we were traveling, I had some long uninterrupted time to read (because when I'm at home, there's a lot of "Oh look! Something shiny!" going on). There are some terrific new middle grade fiction books in the pipeline. Here are two of my favorites. The first one is called "The Orphan Band of Springdale" by Anne Nesbet. It's historical fiction but it's based on the author's family stories. It's set in World War 2 and I really loved that it tells the story of what it was like growing up in America at that time, with some of the ugly prejudices that people held as well as some of the social issues that have since been resolved. Gusta's dad leaves her on a train as they were heading to Maine because Gusta's dad is a socialist and believes that workers should have rights and he is being pursued by the police. Gusta ends up at her grandmother's house, which is a kind of an orphan
I'm pretty excited about some big changes here at my house. My husband and I both decided to retire at the end of the school year and we've spent most of the summer traveling (not quite finished with THAT but since we're retired, it gets to be an ongoing thing, YAY!). Also, being 'she of the short attention span', I had some ideas about things I wanted to be able to do once I retired, so here's the latest new thing-in addition to doing book reviews, I'm also writing lesson plans! I started with the Sunshine State Young Reader Award Jr. books (because I'm pretty familiar with them and they are some amazing new books!) and they are now available on Teachers Pay Teachers ! I've created packets with librarians and classroom teachers in Florida in mind, so they're vetted by a certified school librarian (that's me!), they are tied to the Florida state curriculum (BEST standards, but handily, this also links them to other curricula), there are
I've been waiting and waiting to get to this part of my TBR pile-I have this HUGE stack of books that are being published in the next few weeks and I'm so excited to get to read them! These were DEFINITELY worth the wait! The first one is called Nimbus by Jan Eldredge. The main character is Nimbus, Nim for short, an 11 month old black cat, who lives with a boy named Fletcher. They live with Fletcher's aunt because Fletcher's dad is working so much. Fletcher doesn't mind living with his aunt, but Aunt Connie is not a big fan of Nim but Fletcher rescued Nim when she was a really small kitten and had been hit by a car. He took very good care of her and they are tightly bonded. One night, Fletcher finds an old jar and tries to open it. It turns out what's in the jar is REALLY bad-it's a nightmare demon and it's trying to suck out Fletcher's life essence. Nim attacks the demon and thinks she's destroyed it, but she's also been badly injur
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