Tag: middlegrade
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Book Review: The House at the Edge of Magic
by Amy Sparkes publisher’s synopsis Nine is an orphan pickpocket determined to escape her life in the Nest of a Thousand Treasures. When she steals a house-shaped ornament from a mysterious woman’s purse, she knocks on its tiny door and watches it grow into a huge, higgledy-piggeldy house. Inside she finds a host of magical…
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Book Review: The Many Assassinations of Samir, the Seller of Dreams
by Daniel Nayeri publisher’s synopsis A new all-ages adventure tale from Printz Medal Winner, Daniel Nayeri This is the tale of an exciting journey along the Silk Road with a young Monk and his newfound guardian, Samir, a larger than life character and the so-called “Seller of Dreams”. The man is a scammer; his biggest…
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Book Review: The Mythmakers
by John Hendrix publisher’s synopsis From New York Times bestselling, award-winning creator John Hendrix comes The Mythmakers, a graphic novel biography of two literary lions—C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien—following the remarkable story of their friendship and creative fellowship, and how each came to write their masterworks Through narrative and comic panels, Hendrix chronicles Lewis and…
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Book Review: The Bletchley Ridde
by Ruta Sepetys and Steve Sheinkin publisher’s synopsis Remember, you are bound by the Official Secrets Act… Summer, 1940. Nineteen-year-old Jakob Novis and his quirky younger sister Lizzie share a love of riddles and puzzles. And now they’re living inside of one. The quarrelsome siblings find themselves amidst one of the greatest secrets of World…
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Book Review: Everything Sad Is Untrue
by Daniel Nayeri publisher’s synopsis At the front of a middle school classroom in Oklahoma, a boy named Khosrou (whom everyone calls “Daniel”) stands, trying to tell a story. His story. But no one believes a word he says. To them he is a dark-skinned, hairy-armed boy with a big butt whose lunch smells funny;…
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Book Review: Egg & Spoon
by Gregory Maguire publisher’s synopsis Elena Rudina lives in the impoverished Russian countryside. Her father has been dead for years. One of her brothers has been conscripted into the Tsar’s army, the other taken as a servant in the house of the local landowner. Her mother is dying, slowly, in their tiny cabin. And there…
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Book Review: The Luminous Life of Lucy Landry
By Anna Rose Johnson publisher’s synopsis Lucy, a spirited French-Ojibwe orphan, is sent to the stormy waters of Lake Superior to live with a mysterious family of lighthouse-keepers—and, she hopes, to find the legendary necklace her father spent his life seeking… Selena Lucy Landry (named for a ship, as every sailor’s child should be) has…
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Book Review: A Ranger’s Guide to Glipwood Forest
by Andrew Peterson publisher’s synopsis A Ranger’s Guide to Glipwood Forest expands the legend and lore of this treacherous land of fatal flora and fanged beasts—and the history of the first adventurers daring enough to brave the forest depths. Through detailed line-art, maps, and directions, travelers can safely marvel at the majestic glipwood trees, poke…
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Book Review: Cosima Unfortunate Steals a Star
by Laura Noakes publisher’s synopsis Cosima Unfortunate has spent all her life at the Home for Unfortunate Girls – a school where any disabled children, or children deemed different, are sent, whether their families want it or not. It is there that she meets her friends – Pearl, Mary and Diya – and they start…
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Book Review: The Winterton Decpetion – Final Word
by Janet Sumner Johnson publisher’s synopsis Hope Smith can’t stand rich people—the dictionary magnate family the Wintertons most of all. Not since she and her twin brother, Gordon, learned that their dad was one. So when Gordon enters the family into the Winterton’s charity spelling bee, Hope wants nothing to do with it. But with…
