The Summer My Life Began by Shannon Greenland

Elizabeth Margaret's life has always gone according to plan. High school valedictorian: check. Summer internship at a law firm: check. Acceptance at an Ivy League university: check. Then she gets the chance to spend the summer with her aunt - an aunt that she barely knows. As Em unwinds at her aunt's resort, she starts to question the direction of her life and wonders about what she really wants. Mixed in with her own self-discovery is the uncovering of long held family secrets that threaten to shake (and possibly destroy) the foundation of her family. It's going to be a summer that Em never forgets.

There's a lot to be mined from the teen on the cusp of something more, particularly someone who has always lived by someone else's rules. I had a bit of a hard time into the novel at the beginning; Em's family (with the exception of her sister) seem to be so cold and formal, and some of the dialogue seemed forced. Then I realized that it seemed forced because it was forced - all of the interactions seemed to be driven by duty and obligation.  But once she arrived at her aunt's place, the change in tone was so complete. There were times when the book reminded me of Gilmore Girls (a single mom, running an inn, a bit of a free spirit, creating family out of friends), but the story very clearly spins into its own space. Fans of Gilmore Girls and summer reads should definitely toss this one into their beach bags.

See more about author Shannon Greenland at her website.

I received a review copy from NetGalley courtesy of Penguin Publishing.

Find it at IndieBound.

Read it with:
The Specialists: Model Spy by Shannon Greenland
The Lifeguard by Deborah Blumenthal
The Summer I Turned Pretty by Jenny Ha
Peace, Love, and Baby Ducks by Lauren Myracle

From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E.L. Konigsburg

Claudia has decided to run away. Being a practical child, she has decided to run away not to a forest or a park, but instead to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. She's taken her brother with her, which was a great choice, because he has some money saved up. When they reach the museum, they are excited to be at such a beautiful place, but it isn't long before they find themselves in the middle of a mystery. Determined to get to the bottom of the mystery, they might just be in over their heads. And how does Mrs. Frankweiler fit in to everything?

I really knew nothing about this book before it showed up on the Fuse 8 Production Poll list. I enjoyed Claudia and Jamie's practicality (especially in the unpractical situation of running away from home at the age of 11). I liked their belief that they could and would solve the mystery, which was something I think I would have believed at the age of 11 as well. I also love that E. L. Konigsburg (a recent discover for me - where have I been?!) won both the Newbery Medal (for this book) and the Newbery Honor (for Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley and Me, Elizabeth) in the same year - and for her first two books! That's just incredible.

Find it at IndieBound.

Read it with:
Savvy by Ingrid Law
The City of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau
The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin
You Can't Take a Balloon Into the Metropolitan Museum by Jacqueline Preiss Weitzman and Robin Glasser
The Master's Apprentice by Rick Jacobson

The Egypt Game by Zilpha Keatley Snyder

April Hall - or April Dawn, as she likes to think of herself - has just moved in with her grandmother. She quickly makes friends with Melanie, a girl who lives in the same apartment building. Both girls love making up stories and imaginary worlds, and it isn't long before they've created an entire fictional landscaped based on Egyptian mythology. Over time, other children join in the game, but when mysterious things start happening, have they taken the Egypt Game too far?

Reading this book was sort of unsettling because I had no idea where the story was headed. I really felt like anything could happen - and given the dark undertones present in the story, I was prepared for the worst. The incident around Marshall (Melanie's brother)'s missing toy Octopus, Security, was really well-done in terms of plotting, atmosphere, and suspense. I'm not sure how well the original illustrations have held up in the decades since the book was first published (although I did love the image of April in her furs and fake eyelashes).

Find it at IndieBound.

Read it with:
The Great Gilly Hopkins by Katherine Paterson
There's a Boy in the Girls' Bathroom by Louis Sachar
Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
The Alchemyst by Michael Scott

Johnny Tremain by Esther Forbes

Before I start, I have to come clean: before reading this book, all I could think about was this:

Marge: Bart, I'd like you to read this copy of ``Johnny Tremaine''. It's a book I read as a girl.
Bart: A book!? Pfffft.
Marge: I think you might like this. It's about a boy who goes to war. His hand is deformed in an accident.
Bart: Deformed? Why didn't you say so?They should call this book ``Johnny Deformed''!
(From The Simpsons.)

And then there is the time Peter Griffin of Family Guy was caught reading while intoxicated:



So that's what I was working with.

Johnny Tremain is a silversmith's apprentice in 1770s Boston. He's extremely talented...and extremely arrogant. Then his hand is injured in a silversmithing accident, and he is forced to find a new way of life. He befriends the nephew of a printer, who teachers him how to ride a horse - which comes in handy with the American Revolution right around the corner. Johnny quickly finds himself interacting with people like Paul Revere, Samuel Adams, and many other actual historical figures.

I was ready for the worst; the copy I was reading was old and the print was small-ish. But the story gets really exciting, and Esther Forbes has a really great way of keeping the action moving. I wanted to know what was going to happen to Johnny, even when I didn't like Johnny (he spends a lot of time trying to learn to control some of his worst habits). It's been awhile since I've studied American history so I only vaguely knew about the events they were describing (the specific details, that is), but that didn't really matter. It was a great read and one that would probably be enjoyed by any child looking for an exciting story with lots of action (as long as the edition looked a bit more relevant than the one above - the one I read - I know you shouldn't judge a book by its cover, but...yeah). Of course, as with some pieces of historical fiction, the depiction of people of other races and ethnicities is not exactly sensitive, so there is that to consider, too.

Find it at IndieBound.

Read it with:
A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
Chains by Laurie Halse Anderson
The Many Rides of Paul Revere by James Giblin
The Pox Party and The Kingdom on the Waves by M.T. Anderson

A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle

I feel like I'm the last person on Earth to read this book, which came in #2 on A Fuse #8 Production's countdown of the Top 100 Children's Novels. (Many of the 'older' books that I've been reading lately have come from this list, because I like reading from lists, and because I wanted to have a better background in children's novels. I actually think I'm going to do a tag for them.) I definitely didn't read it when I was younger; I wasn't a huge reader of science fiction, and I also didn't read a lot of middle grade fiction when I was actually an elementary school student (I seemed to go from Baby-Sitters Club to...something?...to adult novels.)

But anyway, the book really started being on my radar last year when I read When You Reach Me - I enjoyed it, but I think I would have had a much deeper reaction if I had known about A Wrinkle in Time. Now I've read it, and I'm looking forward to going back and re-reading When You Reach Me. I enjoyed the book, although I just let a lot of the science details just wash over me. I liked Meg as a protagonist and was really moved by the ending. I haven't looked at it too deeply from a religious point of view (is that why it's been such a banned and challenged book?). I haven't been inspired - yet - to pick up any of the other books, but I'm glad that the Fuse 8 Poll was the kick I needed to actually read this book.

Find it at IndieBound.

Read it with:
When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead
Charlotte's Web by E.B. White
Candor by Pam Bachorz

The Penderwicks by Jeanne Birdsall

The subtitle of this book pretty much sums it up: a summer tale of four sisters, two rabbits, and a very interesting boy. When the Penderwicks go on vacation, they have all kinds of adventures. There are the rabbits that are kept by the groundskeeper of the estate where they rent a cottage, and there's the very interesting son of the estate owner, Jeffrey Tifton, and Mrs. Tifton's very evil plans to send him to military school. It doesn't take long for the Penderwick sisters to run afoul of this woman and her fiance, but will they be able to keep their new friend safe from his mother's plans?

I hadn't picked this book up because I thought it might be science fiction (it's not); I think I had it confused with the Spiderwick Chronicles. So, with that out of the way, I thought that it was a very enjoyable read. I like the dynamics of large families, and even the absent-minded (and absent-bodied) father came across well. I liked the different voices and characters of each of the sisters. I'm intrigued enough to pick up the sequel, The Penderwicks on Gardam Street.

Find it at IndieBound.

Read it with:
All-of-a-Kind Family by Sydney Taylor
A Perfect Gentle Knight by Kit Pearson
Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
The Year I Turned Sixteen by Diane Schwemm

Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson

You may have noticed that I've reading a fair bit of not-that-recent books lately. While i love discovering what's brand new in the book world, there's also an embarrassingly high number of books that I haven't read. I've been working my way through some of the books listed on A Fuse 8 Production's list of Top 100 Children's Novels, which is an excellent place to read about a discussion of children's novels.

I had never read Bridge to Terabithia, probably for two reasons: one, I thought it was a fantasy novel, and two, I also thought it was a cat story (because I got it confused with The Three Lives of Thomasina, which was on pretty high rotation on the Family Channel when I was younger). So its appearance on the list (at number 13) convinced me to pick it up.

It's a beautiful story about imagination and friendship, growing up and being yourself. Would I have enjoyed it as a child? Probably. I admit that while I didn't cry when reading it, there were times when I was close, and I had been in a different mood when reading it, it's likely that tears would have been falling. This is a really lovely book that has a real resonance with current economic times (as does Ramona and her Father, published in the same year and a Newbery Honor book to this book's Newbery Medal) as well as being pretty timeless in terms of friendship.

Find it at IndieBound.

Read it with:
Charlotte's Web by E.B. White
Ramona and her Father by Beverly Cleary
There's a Boy in the Girls' Bathroom by Louis Sachar
Jeremy Thatcher, Dragon Hatcher by Bruce Coville
The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis

Because of Winn-Dixie by Kate DiCamillo

India Opal Buloni is living with her father, the Preacher, in Naomi, Florida when she finds a dog she names Winn-Dixie...that she found at the Winn-Dixie. He doesn't seem like an ordinary dog: he's a great listener, hates to be alone, and seems to have a special gift for bringing people together. Which is great, because there are some people in Naomi in need of a dog like Winn-Dixie.

I was prepared to not like this book. I'm not a big pet person in real life, and I don't tend to read a lot of books about animals. I was really pleasantly surprised, then, by how much I liked both Opal and Winn-Dixie. There was depth to the supporting characters; they weren't one-dimensional plot-points used to tell us how special Winn-Dixie is. Kate DiCamillo has described this book as "a hymn of praise to dogs, friendship, and the South," and I think that sums it up perfectly.

Find it at IndieBound.

Read it with:
A Season of Gifts by Richard Peck
Marley: A Dog Like No Other by Josh Grogan
Dogs by Emily Gravett
The Higher Power of Lucky by Susan Patron
The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo

Jeremy Thatcher, Dragon Hatcher by Bruce Coville

I think this book is one of the most straightforward titles I've ever read. What happens in this book? Well, Jeremy Thatcher hatches a dragon. Jeremy is twelve, and likes to draw. He's trying to escape bullies when one day he stumbles into a magic shop that he's never seen before. That's how he ends up with a dragon's egg - or how the dragon's egg ends up with him. He must quickly out how to care for his dragon while keeping her a secret - which is not easy as she grows bigger and bigger...

For some reason, I thought that this book had a lot of similarities to Hanging on to Max. Has anyone ever read Jeremy Thatcher as a teenage father? Keeping it a secret, trying to take care of something tiny and defenseless, parents not understanding, having to figure out if you can keep it or not, and (in the end, spoiler alert) ultimately giving the baby/dragon up for a better life, and the depression that follows.


Find it at IndieBound.

Read it with:
Hanging on to Max by Margaret Bechard
Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling
Dodger and Me by Jordan Sonnenblick
How to Train Your Dragon by Cressida Cowell

All-Of-A-Kind Family by Sydney Taylor

(This week I'm doing my first series, and it's books that I found delightful. I mean this in the best possible way: books that filled me with delight. This came about organically; I realized I was using 'delightful' to describe a lot of the books I was using, and rather than reaching for a thesaurus I'm going to embrace it.)

I'd never heard of this book until it appeared on A Fuse #8 Production's list of Top 100 Children's Novels, but I found it (you guessed it) delightful. Written over fifty years ago and set about a hundred years ago, it tells the story of a Jewish family in New York City. The parents were immigrants and the children have embraced life in America. They love thinking about the candy they can buy with their pennies and they really love the library (and the kind library lady who works there). I learned a lot about Jewish holidays and observances from this book. I wasn't expecting to really enjoy this book as much as I did, but its tone, spirit, and content just really got to me. I wish I'd read it years ago, but I'm glad I found it now.

Find it at IndieBound.

Read it with:
Gravity by Leanne Lieberman
Karen's Wish by Ann M. Martin
Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret by Judy Blume
Beezus and Ramona by Beverly Cleary

Where the Mountain Meets the Moon by Grace Lin

Minli lives with her parents in the Village of Fruitless Mountain; everything there is dirty, muddy, and brown. She and her parents have little money and little rice to live on, but she loves hearing the stories of legends that her father tells her. Then, one day, after conferring with a goldfish, Minli decides to head out to change her family's fortune. Along the way she meets many different creatures, including a helpful dragon, a pair of twins, a boy who lives with a buffalo, a dangerous tiger, and talking fish.

This book had been on my To Be Read pile for a long time (since before the Newbery winners were announced), but I just never managed to actually pick it up. By the end of the first chapter, though, I was hooked. I was so into Minli's story and eager to read about her journey. The book, physically, is also beautiful; the pages are thick, the print is easy to read, and the illustrations are rich. I loved the way that Grace Lin danced on the line between the story and the story's legends; it was like a puzzle, watching all of the pieces coming in to fit together perfectly. This was a highly enjoyable book that celebrates love, family, friendship, creativity, and hope.

Where the Mountain Meets the Moon was a Newbery Honor Book for 2010.

Find it at IndieBound.

Read it with:
When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead
Jack and the Beanstalk by E. Nesbit
Tales from China by Cyril Birch
Igraine the Brave by Cornelia Funke
The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate by Jacqueline Kelly

Frindle by Andrew Clements

When Nick decides to replace the word 'pen' with the word 'frindle,' it seems like he's bitten off more than he can chew! It started as a way to match wits with his language-loving teacher, but before long it's a national phenomenon. As with many of Clements' other books, the kids are spirited and enterprising and the adults are well-meaning and multi-dimensional. It's an fun look at the fluidity of language and the power of a grass-roots campaign.


Find it at IndieBound.

Read it with:
No Talking by Andrew Clements
The Dunderheads by Paul Fleischman
Freaky Monday by Mary Rodgers
Thesaurus Rex by Laya Steinberg

The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin

Sixteen people are mysteriously invited to live in the mysterious Sunset Tower building, in the shadow of the mysterious home of the Mysterious Sam Westing. Before long, Mr. Westing dies, and his heirs (mostly the people who live in this building) are drawn into a mysterious puzzle/contest to see who will inherit the Westing estate. What are people's connections to Mr. Westing? Why did he die? How can they figure out their clues? Who will win the millions?

I had this book as a child, but I can't remember if I read it or not. I had a feeling that I had - I was able to puzzle through the main mystery of the clues, but I forgot all of the subsequent details. I enjoyed many of the characters, particularly Turtle Wexler and her sister Angela, the Theodorakis brothers, and Flora Baumbach. I love playing with the ideas of identity, responsibility, greed, and guilt, and those are some of the major themes in this book.

Reading this book was part of my own project to read more middle grade fiction. So look for more reviews of 'vintage' books to come!

Find it at Amazon.

Read it with:
When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead
The Puzzling World of Winston Breen by Eric Berlin
The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee
Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson

Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret by Judy Blume

I feel that it's really important to mention that the copy I was reading was an updated copy - that is, Margaret's pads stuck to her underwear with adhesive, and she did not have to use a belt. I remember that the copy I read years ago was the 'classic' version, which didn't leave me as confused as I might have been, all things considered.

Also, I had misremembered a lot of things about this book. I had thought that Laura, the girl with the large breasts, was also the one with the sunburn. And that Margaret's grandparents overlap at her house. Neither of those things really matter, but it did made me think about how many books I'm carrying around with my head that aren't really true.

Anyway, the story is sort of complicated to describe. Margaret, a 12 year old girl with no fixed religion, moves to a small town in New Jersey where everyone is either Christian or Jewish. Margaret quickly makes friends with a group of girls (they call themselves the Pre-Teen Sensations, which, unless this was another rewrite, has held up remarkably well). The girls giggle and wonder over bras, boys, and periods, while Margaret carries on a personal quest to find religion. All the time she continues talking to God, and I really like the idea that you can have a relationship with God independant of any organized religion.

I never talked about my period with my friends, and bras were a giant source of embarrassment, and not pride, but I still have a fondness for this book. I didn't read Forever, another Judy Blume book, until I was much older, so this one is the one that hit me in my formative years. I'm glad that it's still out there for kids to look through, the kind of book that they might feel embarrassed about reading but still pour through anyway. I think that Margaret would have read this book, which in a twisty way is one of the best indicators of telling whether or not a story works.