Toads and Diamonds
By Heather Tomlinson Publisher: Henry Holt and Co. (BYR) Pages: 288 Age Range: 12 – 18 Years ABOUT Diribani has come to the village well to get water for her family’s scant meal of curry and rice. She never expected to meet a goddess there. Yet she is granted a remarkable gift: Flowers and precious jewels drop from her lips whenever she speaks. It seems only right to Tana that the goddess judged her kind, lovely stepsister worthy of such riches. And when she encounters the goddess, she is not surprised to find herself speaking...
read moreThe Five Lives of Our Cat Zook
By Joanne Rocklin Publisher: Amulet Books Pages: 240 Age Range: 8 – 12 Years ABOUT In this warmhearted middle-grade novel, Oona and her brother, Fred, love their cat Zook (short for Zucchini), but Zook is sick. As they conspire to break him out of the vet’s office, convinced he can only get better at home with them, Oona tells Fred the story of Zook’s previous lives, ranging in style from fairy tale to grand epic to slice of life. Each of Zook’s lives has echoes in Oona’s own family life, which is going through a transition she’s not...
read moreThe Wrinkled Crown
By Anne Nesbet Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Pages: 400 Lexile: 910L Age Range: 8 – 12 Years ABOUT Fans of Anne Ursu will love Anne Nesbet’s tale of music and friendship, set against an age-old war between magic and science. In the enchanted village of Lourka, almost-twelve-year-old Linny breaks an ancient law. Girls are forbidden to so much as touch the town’s namesake musical instrument before their twelfth birthday or risk being spirited away. But Linny can’t resist the call to play a lourka, so she builds one...
read moreEleven and Holding
By Mary Penney Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Pages: 256 Age Range: 8 – 12 Years ABOUT Macy Hollinquest is eleven years old, and don’t count on her to change that anytime soon. Her birthday is just days away, but she has no intention of turning twelve without her dad by her side. He’d promised to be there for her big day, and yet he’s been gone for months—away after his discharge from the army, doing some kind of top secret, “important work.” So Macy’s staying eleven, no matter what—that is, until she meets Ginger, a nice older...
read moreA Whole New Ballgame (Rip and Red)
By Phil Bildner Illustrated by Tim Probert Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux Pages: 256 Lexile: 540L Age Range: 8 – 12 Years ABOUT Rip and Red are best friends whose fifth-grade year is nothing like what they expected. They have a crazy new tattooed teacher named Mr. Acevedo, who doesn’t believe in tests or homework and who likes off-the-wall projects, the more “off” the better. And guess who’s also their new basketball coach? Mr. Acevedo! Easy-going Rip is knocked completely out of his comfort zone. And for...
read moreFinding Perfect
By Elly Swartz Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux Pages: 304 Age Range: 8 – 12 Years ABOUT To twelve-year-old Molly Nathans, perfect is: —The number four —The tip of a newly sharpened No. 2 pencil —A crisp white pad of paper —Her neatly aligned glass animal figurines What’s not perfect is Molly’s mother leaving the family to take a faraway job with the promise to return in one year. Molly knows that promises are sometimes broken, so she hatches a plan to bring her mother home: Win the Lakeville Middle School Poetry Slam Contest. The...
read moreLike Water on Stone
By Dana Walrath Publisher: Random House Children’s Books Pages: 368 Age Range: 14 – 17 Years ABOUT “Evocative and hopeful,” says Newbery Honor-Winner Rita Williams-Garcia of this intense survival story set during the Armenian genocide of 1915. It is 1914, and the Ottoman Empire is crumbling into violence. Beyond Anatolia, in the Armenian Highlands, Shahen Donabedian dreams of going to New York. Sosi, his twin sister, never wants to leave her home, especially now that she is in love. At first, only Papa, who counts...
read moreSkating with the Statue of Liberty
By Susan Meyer Publisher: Random House Children’s Books Pages: 320 Lexile: 710L Age Range: 8 – 12 Years ABOUT “This rich story reminds us that America can be at its best as a melting pot. A page-turner for all the right reasons.”—VINCE VAWTER, Newbery Honor-winning author of Paperboy In this gripping and poignant companion to Sydney Taylor Honor Award winner Black Radishes, Gustave faces racism and anti-Semitism in New York City during World War II, but ultimately finds friendship and hope. It is January 1942, and...
read moreHow Not to Be Popular
By Jennifer Ziegler Publisher: Random House Children’s Books Pages: 352 Lexile: 720L Age Range: 12 Years ABOUT Maggie Dempsey is tired of moving all over the country. Her parents are second-generation hippies who uproot her every year or so to move to a new city. When Maggie was younger, she thought it was fun and adventurous. Now that she’s a teenager, she hates it. When she moved after her freshman year, she left behind good friends, a great school, and a real feeling of belonging. When she moved her sophomore year, she left behind a...
read moreThe Mesmer Menace (Gadgets and Gears)
By Kersten Hamilton Illustrations by James Hamilton Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Pages: 160 Lexile: 770L Age Range: 7 – 10 Years ABOUT Welcome to the Amazing Automated Inn, home of twelve-year-old inventor Wally Kennewickett, his genius scientist parents, and his dashing dog, Noodles. From the lightning harvester on the roof to the labs full of experiments in the dungeon, the inn is a wonderful place for a curious boy and his loyal dog to live. That is, until President Theodore Roosevelt himself calls the elder Kennewicketts...
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