Another Kind of Hurricane
By Tamara Ellis Smith Publisher: Random House Children’s Books Pages: 336 Lexile: 570L Age Range: 9 – 12 Years ABOUT In this stunning debut novel, two very different characters—a black boy who loses his home in Hurricane Katrina and a white boy in Vermont who loses his best friend in a tragic accident—come together to find healing. A hurricane, a tragic death, two boys, one marble. How they intertwine is at the heart of this beautiful, poignant book. When ten-year-old Zavion loses his home in Hurricane Katrina, he and his father...
read moreRevenge of the Flower Girls
By Jennifer Ziegler Publisher: Scholastic, Inc. Pages: 240 Lexile: 720L Age Range: 8 – 12 Years ABOUT In this middle-grade Bridesmaids, hilarity ensues as triplets have to stop a wedding! One bride. Two boys. Three flower girls who won’t forever hold their peace. What could go wrong with this wedding? Everything! The Brewster triplets, Dawn, Darby, and Delaney, would usually spend their summer eating ice cream, playing with their dog, and reading about the US Presidents. But this year they’re stuck planning their big sister...
read moreCake Pop Crush: A Wish Novel
By Suzanne Nelson Publisher: Scholastic, Inc. Pages: 256 Age Range: 8 – 12 Years ABOUT Alicia Ramirez has always loved baking. Her family owns Say It With Flour, the small bakery in town. And Ali’s specialties are cake pops: delicious confections on a stick. But Ali’s sweet life turns sour when a sleek coffee shop opens across the street, giving her bakery a run for its money. Worst of all, the owner’s son, Dane McGuire, likes to bake, too. He’s the new kid in Ali’s school … and happens to be...
read moreGrounded: The Adventures of Rapunzel (Tyme #1)
By Megan Morrison Publisher: Scholastic, Inc. Pages: 400 Age Range: 8 – 12 Years ABOUT In all of Tyme, from the Redlands to the Grey, no one is as lucky as Rapunzel. She lives in a magic tower that obeys her every wish; she reads wonderful books starring herself as the heroine; her hair is the longest, most glorious thing in the world. And she knows this because Witch tells her so– her beloved Witch, who protects her from evil princes, the dangerous ground under the tower, even unhappy thoughts. Rapunzel can’t imagine any...
read moreMothman’s Curse
By Christine Hayes Illustrated by James K. Hindle Publisher: Roaring Brook Press Pages: 320 Lexile: 690L Age Range: 8 – 12 Years ABOUT A thrilling tale about when the borders between legend and reality blur–with dangerous consequences. When Josie and her brothers uncover a haunted camera, the Mothman legend becomes a terrifying reality that threatens their entire town in this spooky and action-filled novel. Josie may live in the most haunted town in America, but the only strange thing she ever sees is the parade of oddball...
read moreCoyote Moon
By Maria Gianferrari Illustrated by Bagram Ibatoulline Publisher: Roaring Brook Press Pages: 32 Age Range: 4 – 7 Years ABOUT A howl in the night. A watchful eye in the darkness. A flutter of movement among the trees. Coyotes. In the dark of the night, a mother coyote stalks prey to feed her hungry pups. Her hunt takes her through a suburban town, where she encounters a mouse, a rabbit, a flock of angry geese, and finally an unsuspecting turkey on the library lawn. POUNCE! Perhaps Coyote’s family won’t go hungry today. ...
read moreThe Stars of Summer: An All Four Stars Book
By Tara Dairman Publisher: Penguin Young Readers Group Pages: 352 Age Range: 10 Years ABOUT Joan Bauer meets Ruth Reichl—Tara Dairman’s charming sequel to All Four Stars brings Gladys Gatsby to summer camp. In this charming sequel to All Four Stars, eleven-year-old foodie Gladys Gatsby now has her first published review under her belt and is looking forward to a quiet summer of cooking and reviewing. But her plans quickly go awry when her friend Charissa Bentley delivers Gladys’s birthday gift: a free summer at Camp Bentley. As Gladys...
read morePrincess Juniper of the Hourglass
By Ammi-Joan Paquette Publisher: Penguin Young Readers Group Pages: 288 Lexile: 850L Age Range: 8 – 12 Years ABOUT In this royal adventure, Princess Juniper learns what it means to rule a kingdom—the perfect story for girls who love princesses AND adventure! For her thirteenth nameday all Princess Juniper wants is a country of her own. So when rumblings of unrest start in his kingdom, Juniper’s father decides to grant his daughter’s wish and sends her to a small, idyllic corner of the Hourglass Mountains until trouble blows...
read moreKeepers of the Labyrinth
By Erin E. Moulton Publisher: Penguin Young Readers Group Pages: 304 Lexile: HL700L Age Range: 12 Years ABOUT Courage is tested, myths come to life, and long-held secrets are revealed. Lilith Bennette runs at midnight. She scales walls in the dark and climbs without a harness. She hopes that if she follows exactly in the steps of her strong air force pilot mother, she’ll somehow figure out the mystery of her mother’s death—and the reason why her necklace of Greek symbols has been missing ever since. So when Lil is invited to Crete for a...
read moreWe’ve Got a Job: The 1963 Birmingham Children’s March
By Cynthia Levinson Publisher: Peachtree Publishers, Ltd. Pages: 180 Age Range: 13 – 17 Years ABOUT We’ve Got a Job tells the little-known story of the 4,000 black elementary-, middle-, and high school students who voluntarily went to jail in Birmingham, Alabama, between May 2 and May 11, 1963. Fulfilling Mahatma Gandhi’s and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s precept to “fill the jails,” they succeeded—where adults had failed—in desegregating one of the most racially violent cities in America. Focusing on four...
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