One Came Home By Amy Timberlake $16.99 ISBN: 978-0-375-86925-9 Ages 10 and up On shelves now I like children’s books that sock you in the gut. Not the books that telegraph their hits or do the old one-two punch you can see coming from a mile away. No way, man, I’m talking about the books [...]
Weekly Reviews: Historical Fiction
By on February 11, 2013
Some of you might think I’m stretching the definition of historical fiction with the first book up today. But if we consider historical fiction as works in which historical backdrop plays a strong role in the story, I think this qualifies. In any case, I am excited to introduce My One Square Inch of Alaska, a traditional [...]
More of the books!
By on January 27, 2013
Karyn just posted an impressive roundup of last minute reading, so I’m chiming in with some more. With Monday morning’s announcement looming large, it seems like everyone is trying to sprint through their last minute reads in order to feel prepared. Wonder Show by Hannah Barnaby Houghton Mifflin, March 2012 Reviewed from an ARC This [...]
Consider the Source: Getting History Right
By on January 16, 2013 1 Comment
History texts for young readers and young adults should invite them to participate in the process of thinking about, and thus re-imagining, who we are and how we got that way. Using annotated citations and other methods, our goal should be to let kids in on the process.
The 2013 Scott O’Dell Award for Historical Fiction
By on January 16, 2013
The 2013 Scott O’Dell Award for Historical Fiction goes to Louise Erdrich for Chickadee, published by Harper, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers. The annual award, created by Scott O’Dell and Zena Sutherland in 1982 and now administered by Elizabeth Hall, carries with it a prize of $5000, and goes to the author of a distinguished [...]
The post The 2013 Scott O’Dell Award for Historical Fiction appeared first on The Horn Book.
The Twelve Tribes of Hattie
By on January 8, 2013
The first big breakout novel of 2013 was actually published in 2012, thanks to Oprah’s Book Club. The Twelve Tribes of Hattie was originally scheduled to be published this month, but after Oprah’s big announcement, Knopf moved up the publication date. With recent reviews in the New York Times, Washington Post, L.A. Times, you name [...]
Review: Wonder Show
By on January 3, 2013
Wonder Show by Hannah Barnaby. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. 2012. Review copy from publisher. Morris Finalist. The Plot: Portia Remini has not run away from home to join the circus. First, its’s a carnival, not a circus, and it’s called Mosco’s Traveling Wonder Show. Second, it was not home, not a home with parents or family. Parents [...]
Dodger
By on December 27, 2012
Dodger, Terry Pratchett Harper, October 2012 Reviewed from ARC So, Dodger is a heartsong book for me. I realize it’s not perfect — certainly not with regard to accuracy, which we’ll get to in a moment — but it is almost perfectly put together, and is certainly enough of an exemplar of voice, style and [...]
Pick of the Day: The Diviners (Audiobook)
By on December 14, 2012 Leave a Comment
The Diviners. By Libba Bray. 15 CDs. 15:15 hrs. Prod. by Listening Library. Dist. by Listening Library/Books on Tape. 2012. ISBN 978-0-449-80875-7. $60.
Gr 10 Up–Printz winner Libba Bray’s latest literary masterpiece (Little, Brown, 2012) is stunning, suspenseful, and sure to leave listeners utterly breathless. Thoroughly modern flapper Evie O’Neill’s psychic ability to divine secrets from inanimate objects gets her exiled from her stuffy Ohio town. Sent to stay with her Uncle Will in Prohibition-era New York City, the last thing [...]
Weekly Reviews: Girls
By on November 29, 2012
Title Girls are all that tie these three books together. Otherwise, the combination serves as a great example of the variety of books that appeal to different teen readers.
We begin with a rather intellectual historical fiction novel, Eight Girls Taking Pictures. The tie-in to the arts is a great hook for young adults. Photography is [...]
Code Name Verity
By on November 21, 2012
Code Name Verity, Elizabeth Wein
Hyperion, May 2012
Reviewed from ARC
At last! I finally get to write about my one true love of the year, the book I will champion against all others as the be all, end all best book of the year.
(Sorry, Railsea, you rock, but you’re still not number one, Pyrite nomination notwithstanding.)
Oh god, [...]
Middle Age Girl Power: Grave Mercy vs The Wicked and the Just
By on November 6, 2012
Grave Mercy and The Wicked and the Just are, in so many ways, polar opposites.
But how often do we see YA books set in the Middle Ages? Not very, which makes it almost impossible not to think of these in a compare and contrast essay. So that’s what you get.
Both feature strong female heroines, well [...]
Does Never Fall Down Stand Up to the Hype?
By on October 31, 2012
Never Fall Down, Patricia McCormick
Balzer + Bray, May 2012
Reviewed from ARC
National Book Award Finalist. Three stars. Patricia McCormick. Never Fall Down is a critical and popular darling, and there is absolutely no question about the emotional impact of the story. You would need to be a stone to stay dry-eyed reading about the atrocities Arn [...]
“Oddities and Prodigies” | A Day at the Renaissance Fair
By on October 31, 2012 Leave a Comment
Author Karen Cushman is no stranger to the medieval and Renaissance world. Her first novel, the Newbery Honor book “Catherine Called Birdy,” examined the period from the perspective of a noble-born girl waiting to be married off. The author’s latest work, “Will Sparrow’s Road,” is set during 16th-century England and its title character lives a life that Birdy could only “[fantasize] about as she sat inside embroidering.”
Un-documented
By on October 26, 2012
Henry Cole’s Unspoken: A Story from the Underground Railroad (see the Review of the Week, by Betty Carter) presented us with some very complicated questions. It’s a terrific and intriguing book, a wordless, pencil-illustrated tale of a young girl feeding and protecting a person hiding behind the cornstalks in her family’s barn; soldiers and a [...]
Review: Never Fall Down
By on October 19, 2012
Never Fall Down by Patricia McCormick. Balzer & Bray, an imprint of HarperCollins. 2012. Review copy from publisher.
The Plot: Cambodia, 1975. Arn, eleven, lives with his sisters and brother. The family is poor, yes, but they are close and have each other.
The are about to lose even that.
The Khmer Rouge seize power. Arn and his [...]
Review: The FitzOsbornes at War
By on October 16, 2012
The FitzOsbornes at War, the Montmaray Journals, Book III by Michelle Cooper. Knopf Books for Young Readers. 2012. Sequel to Sequel to A Brief History of Montmaray and The FitzOsbornes in Exile. Reviewed from ARC from publisher.
The Plot: Life in Great Britain during World War II, as told by Sophie FitzOsborne. The FitzOsborne story began in the mid 1930s in A Brief History of [...]
The Formula for Murder
By on October 12, 2012
Victorian newspaper reporter Nellie Bly is at it again in Carol McCleary’s latest. Her investigations began in The Alchemy of Murder, and continued last year in The Illusion of Murder (see the AB4T review here). In The Formula for Murder she is joined by none other than H.G. Wells, Oscar Wilde and Conan Doyle.
Coincidentally, yesterday afternoon I had the [...]
Review: The Diviners
By on September 17, 2012
The Diviners by Libba Bray. Little, Brown. 2012. Reviewed from ARC from publisher. Series website.
The Post: New York City, 1926, is the best place in the world to be! At least, according to Evie O’Neill, who — get this — has been punished by her parents by being sent away from home to New York City [...]
Review: The Dark Unwinding
By on September 14, 2012
The Dark Unwinding by Sharon Cameron. Scholastic. 2012. Review copy from publisher.
The Plot: June, 1852. England. Orphaned Katherine Tulman owes everything to her Aunt Alice. Not in a good way. When Katherine was left orphaned, Alice was the one who took in her late husband’s niece. Aunt Alice makes it known that in every possible way [...]
