I first heard about Rebecca Stead’s When You Reach Me (Random House 2009) from a book editor who said, “There is so much buzz about this book, I think it might win the Newbery.” Set in the 70′s in New York City, the story centers on sixth grade Miranda and her best friend Sal. Miranda (a girl) and Sal (a boy) live in the same apartment complex, both are from single-mom families, and they’ve been best friends...
The Garden of Eve by K.L. Going (Houghton Mifflin, 2007) takes the images of the Biblical Garden of Eden and reworks them into a poignant novel about life, death and love. When ten-year-old Evie’s mother dies of cancer, her father decides to buy an old apple orchard far away in Beaumont, New York. Evie longs to stay in her childhood home, a home full of memories of her mother. These very memories break her father’s heart again...
When you’re a sister sandwiched between two sets of twins, you pretty much get ignored. It’s the twins everyone finds interesting, they’re the novelty–you’re just an extra. At least that’s how Miri feels in The Magic Half (Bloomsbury, 2008). This middle grade novel by Annie Barrows weaves a story of family and friendship with a unique time travel twist (and a surprise ending to boot). When Miri’s family moves to a new house, Miri has no one to...
Caddie Woodlawn, Hermione Granger, Violet Beauregarde, Anne of Green Gables–you gotta love the girls that are smart and spunky, clever and courageous. Author Kelly Easton gives us another plucky heroine in her middle-grade novel The Outlandish Adventures of Liberty Aimes (Random House, 2009). Liberty Aimes, nicknamed Libby, lived in a decrepit old house on 33 Gooch Street. It was so run down, “If it could walk, it would limp. If it could talk, it would stutter. If...
