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A Snicker of Magic
This has got to be my favorite book this year! I finished this story yesterday and it’s still filling up my mind (making my newest read that more difficult!), but it’s difficult for me to leave such an enchanting story on the shelf! A Snicker of Magic is about twelve-year-old…
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The Raven Boys
I finally had the chance to read Maggie Stiefvater’s The Raven Boys and I want to start the second book right away. I picked up The Raven Boys for a few reasons, it’s something I’ve been meant to read for awhile now and when I picked it up I was…
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The Key and the Flame
This was my first book by Claire Caterer and it was definitely a fun-filled magical adventure for middle grade readers and it’s definitely left with an open ending for a follow-up story. Eleven-year-old Holly is always being told that she needs to get her head out of the clouds and…
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The Real Boy
There’s been a lot of chatter about The Real Boy by Anne Ursu in the past few months and I was curious myself to find out what the story was all about. A glittering city called Asteri was saved from the plague by the magic of the island and the…
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A Corner of White
There were two things that made me want to read this book – the fist was the cover, I love all the bright colors and it looked like something right up my alley. The second was the author’s last name, I’m a little bit of a Sherlock fan and with…
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In Search of Goliathus Hercules
In Search of Goliathus Hercules honestly scared me a little when I heard about it. A young boy finds out that he can speak with 6-legged insects and soon realizes he is becoming more bug-like by the day. My immediate thought went straight to Franz Kafka’s Metamorphosis and I am…
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Summer Book Discussion Group for Middle School Students (Grades 5-8)
The job of a children’s librarian is never done. Just as I’ve finally caught my breath with a number of programs and projects, the summer planning is looming ahead of me. Each year we offer our rising 5th – 8th graders two different book discussion opportunities. The first is called…
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Seraphina
I had heard a lot about Seraphina before I picked it up to read. I really enjoyed the cover art with little color bust so much detail in a simple ink drawing. I do have to say that I’m quite particular about the fantasy books I read. They can’t be…
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Seeing Cinderella
Seeing Cinderella by Jenny Lundquist is fun, entertaining read – perfect for middle school girls, especially those who enjoy their fiction mixed with just a little fairy tale magic. When Callie Anderson, a sixth grader who already has frizzy hair, freckles, and finds that she has to…
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Starry River of the Sky
Starry River of the Sky is written by Grace Lin and is considered a companion novel to Where the Mountain Meets the Moon. In both of these stories, Lin takes the Chinese folklore that she so desperately did not want to hear as a child and creates her own spin…