Author: Lauren DeStefano
Published: 2016 Marybeth and Lionel are orphans. Marybeth is a good girl who always helps their caretaker, Mrs. Mannerd. Lionel is a wild boy who would rather be an animal than a human. These two are friends, mainly because Marybeth is the only one who understands Lionel. One night the two are outside, and they see a mysterious blue creature that looks like a fox. Lionel, who loves animals, is intrigued and wants to learn more about the creature, but the creature runs away before they can get a closer look. One night, Marybeth sees the creature, and she follows it. She accidentally falls in a river and is about to drown. The blue creature follows her, and it runs into her chest, going inside of her. When she gets out of the river, the blue creature stays inside of her. Marybeth is scared. The creature sometimes takes over, and Marybeth can't control herself. She bites and scratches other children at the home when she feels threatened. Every night, she leaves her bed and ends up in the same barn. Lionel doesn't know how to help. The creature is beginning to take more and more of Marybeth. These two children have to figure out what the blue creature really is and why it needs Marybeth before it permanently takes over her body. The Peculiar Night of the Blue Heart was a great paranormal mystery. I enjoyed the story, and the characters were sweet and had a lot of depth. We learn about what happened to their parents and why the children are the way they are. This quick read had a very satisfying ending to a very interesting story.
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Author: Matt Phelan
Published: 2016 This version of Snow White takes place in 1928 in New York City. Samantha White, also known as Snow, loses her mother. Her father remarries an evil, beautiful woman. Her new stepmother sends Snow away. After her father mysteriously dies, Snow finds herself in danger. She must take refuge with a band of mysterious boys. This retelling of Snow White was very interesting. The graphic novel format added beautiful dark images. The red color used with the evil stepmother added a great accent to her character and her motives. This is a quick read for readers who love retellings of fairytales and graphic novels. It is a quick read that will have readers comparing the story of Snow White they know with this new version. Author: Sharon Cameron
Published: 2016 Imagine if every 12 years, everyone in your world forgets all their memories of who they are. They are scared, and they are confused. They must rebuild their lives within the next 12 years before it happens again. This is called the Forgetting. Nadia lives in a city called Canaan that is surrounded by stone walls that no one is allowed to cross. Everyone in Canaan has to keep record of their lives in books that they tie to their bodies. When a book is full, it goes to the Archives, a huge place filled with books that are full of records of people's lives. They do this so that they can read the books after the Forgetting to remember who they were and who their families are in Canaan. If someone is found after the Forgetting with no book, they are known as the Lost and must live with others like them. Everyone forgets after the Forgetting. Everyone except Nadia. Nadia was a young child when the Forgetting happened, and she remembers everything that happened before it. She doesn't know why she remembers, but she knows that the way life is doesn't make sense. Why is no one allowed to leave the walls of the city? When was Canaan built? Why aren't the leaders of Canaan, the Council, doing more to make sure that people don't become Lost? Why do people forget in the first place? This book was such a great combination of the dystopian and science fiction genres. I loved learning about Canaan and how it came to exist. This was a fantastic and dark book. This is great for readers who love The Hunger Games, Divergent, and The Testing series. Author: Sarah Dessen
Published: 2000 Caitlin's sister Cass has run away. Cass was supposed to go to Yale; instead, she leaves on Caitlin's birthday with only a note. Caitlin feels lost. She doesn't know who she is without her older sister. Then she meets Rogerson. Rogerson is different from everyone else. He is older and is your typical bad boy. When she is with Rogerson, she is happy. She meets some of his friends, and she starts doing drugs. She stops going to cheerleading and no longer spends as much time with her best friend. Caitlin has never felt the way she feels about Rogerson. Everything is great with him. Until it isn't. One day, Caitlin hangs out with a friend instead of Rogerson, and he gets mad. He hits her and yells at her in his car. Afterwards, they don't talk about it, and Caitlin starts to try to forget. But it keeps happening. Rogerson is so controlling and violent, and Caitlin begins to lose herself trying to make him happy. After every time he hits her, there is a period of time where he is the perfect boyfriend, and Caitlin can't believe that there are these two completely different sides to him. This is such a heartbreaking book about a girl who feels lost. Caitlin is in an abusive relationship, and she doesn't know what to do because she loves Rogerson. I think this book is a very important book for young girls to read. Sarah Dessen always knows how to tackle the hard issues teens face. Author: Victoria Aveyard
Published: 2015 There are two kinds of people. Those with red blood and those with silver. Silvers are people who have special, supernatural abilities. Reds are people with no special powers who live to serve the Silvers. Mare is a Red. She, like other Reds her age, will be forced to go to war on her next birthday. The Silvers and the Reds are on the same side in this war, but the Reds are the only ones who are called to fight and die for their country. Until she goes off to war, Mare has to help her family survive the only way she knows how--by stealing. One night she picks the wrong pocket, and instead of being punished, she receives a blessing. She will not have to go to war; instead, she will work as a servant for the king. On her first night as a servant, she discovers that she has a power beyond powers that any Silver has, but her blood is red. The king and queen come up with a story about how she was really born a Silver but raised by a Red family. She is now betrothed to a prince and living a lie. Meanwhile, there is a group of Reds forming a rebellion against the Silvers. Mare joins in the fight, but not everyone is who they seem, and dark times are ahead for Mare Barrow. Author: Kelly Barnhill
Published: 2016 Every year on the Day of Sacrifice, the newest baby is taken to the forest by the Elders (the leaders of the town) and left to be sacrificed to the evil witch to keep her happy. This sacrifice is to keep the witch from getting angry and killing the whole town. Usually the families who give up their babies are sad, but they always give up their child in order to save the rest of the people in the town. On this Day of Sacrifice, he and the Elders go to the house of the woman who has the newest baby. However, this time the woman refuses to give up her baby girl. She screams and runs and tries to hide. She is the first one who has decided to fight for her child. The Elders get the girl away from her, and they send the woman to the Tower to be imprisoned because they believe she is crazy. They bring this child to the forest and leave her there for the witch. Xan, the witch, comes to take the child. She doesn't know why the town leaves a baby to die in the forest on the same day every year, but she believes it is up to her to rescue the child. She always delivers the children to places on the other side of the forest where they will be taken care of and loved. She picks up this new baby just like any other. She usually feeds the children the stars to keep them nourished and strong for the journey. This time, she accidentally feeds the child the moon, which gives the child magical powers. Xan decides she must raise this child as her own. The town has very different ideas about who the witch is and what she's like. They are wrong about what she does with their children. There are some mysterious and dark powers at work in this town. Who is the real witch? Why do the Elders insist they need to sacrifice children? This book has such an interesting plot. It reminds me of books like The Hunger Games where children are at risk of dying in order to save the rest of society. This book kept me interested until the very end! Author: April Henry
Published: 2016 Another great thriller by April Henry! Olivia's mom was murdered fourteen years ago when Olivia was only three years old. Olivia, her mom, and her dad were going out to cut down a Christmas tree one day. Her mom was murdered, her dad was never found, and Olivia was found abandoned at a Walmart. Everyone assumed that Olivia's father murdered her mother and dropped Olivia off at the store before going on the run. However, fourteen years later, her father's jaw bone was found, meaning that he was murdered on that day too. Now everything Olivia believed about her family is wrong. She goes back to the town she used to live in and pretends to be a stranger. She wants to figure out who the real murderer was. She begins to have flashbacks to that day fourteen years ago, and she slowly starts to remember what happened. The real murderer is out there and knows who Olivia really is. She must solve the mystery before the killer can murder her too. I read this book in one weekend. It was so hard to put down! April Henry is a great YA thriller writer. I know kids will be putting holds on this book for the rest of the school year! I have been doing a lot of thinking about how we can get students a book that is right for them. I am an avid reader, but even I give up on a book when it's not the right choice for me. If I kept picking up the wrong kind of book for me and hardly ever found one that I liked, I probably wouldn't be the passionate reader that I am today. I came up with this I Need Book Recommendations form after going to a session at ILA on readers' advisory. I also have a similar Google Doc available on our Media Center's website. Students fill out the form and hand it in either in person or electronically. I then look at their answers, and I fill out my response form with at least three book titles they should try, along with a short description of the book. This is something I started doing recently, and so far I have had a few students fill out forms. They have all come back to the library and checked out at least one book on my recommendation list for them.
It is my goal this year to come up with more ways to get the right books in the hands of students. I will be revisiting this in my blog again soon. Author: Booki Vivat
Published: 2016 Abbie Wu thinks that Middle School is going to be the absolute worst. Anything having to do with middles is horrible. Everyone in her life tells her that Middle School will be great, that she shouldn't worry so much, and that she just needs to be herself. Abbie thinks that these people just don't understand. She thinks she is doomed. When Abbie goes to her first day of school, she finds that she was 100% right. It was awful. The school looks like a prison, Abbie is not in the same homeroom as her friends; and only the eighth graders are allowed to go in the special line at lunch where all the good food is served. Abbie thinks that she is the only one who doesn't have a "thing." Everyone else is good at something specific. They are passionate about something. When Abbie finally gets sick of the eighth graders and the lunch ladies bullying her and not allowing people in other grades to go to the "good" line, Abbie discovers a solution. She finally has a thing. I loved this quick read. I completely can relate to Abbie's thoughts of doom and all of her constant worrying! This is a great book for kids who get frazzled easily and for anyone who likes The Diary of a Wimpy Kid series. |
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