Publishers

Quintana of Charyn by Melina Marchetta, Candlewick Press, 2013. Reviewed from the Australia edition (Viking, an imprint of Penguin Group (Australia), 2012), a gift from a friend. will be published April 2013. Background: This is the final of three books (and one short story) that make up the The Lumatere Chronicles. It began with Finnikin of [...]

Benjamin Bear’s bright ideas include unique methods of getting rid of fleas, herding sheep, and making two things out of nothing, but even the bear’s brightest ideas are out-shined by those of Phillipe Coudray, the artist/author who created Benajmin and, therefore, does all of his thinking for him. Bright Ideas is Coudray’s second offering through [...]

Today’s reviewed novels are most likely to appeal to strong, mature teen readers looking for a challenge. Yet each includes a teen character, an authentic teen voice, that will keep the adventurous reading. The starred review belongs to A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki. This novel is difficult to categorize. It begins [...]

The fairies conspire to throw a surprise party in the latest volume of Disney Fairies, Tinker Bell and the Most Precious Gift, but the guest of honor goes astray. These books are fun for Disney Fairies fans and stand well on their own; this one is out ...

Black Helicopters by Blythe Woolston. Candlewick Press. 2013. Reviewed from ARC from publisher. The Plot: “I’m Valkyrie White. I’m fifteen. Your government killed my family.” Valley has been bathed, so that she doesn’t smell of wood smoke and instead smells like other teen girls. Valley has been dressed, in jeans and a T-shirt and a hoodie, [...]

Today’s reviews are all notable debut novels by women. I spent part of my spring break tearing through Kimberly McCreight’s Reconstructing Amelia, and let me tell you — teens are going to eat this up. It came out just yesterday, so go order a couple copies now. There are several appeal elements here. First, the [...]

Publishers are already thinking about their summer book releases. Fortunately, they seek to share that enthusiasm with the library community through special book preview events, where librarians and children's book reviewers get to join their peers for an early insider peek at the upcoming books. In this first of a series, School Library Journal shares these peeks with our readers, highlighting which titles especially got our attention.

I fully admit that this may seem strange to many readers of this blog, but one of my favorite things to do after reading a historical novel is to read up about the facts of the history the novelist used.  Similarly, if a novel I’m reading revolves around some particular subject–anthropology, math, whatever–I tend to [...]

The Dork Diaries has been steadily circulating in my middle school library for some time now, but for the last 5 months, this series has been the most requested and on the top 10 list of items circulated since September. The series reads like Diary of a Wimpy Kid but actually skews to a younger [...]