AN OLDIE BUT A GOODIE

Ten years-old Melanie is not quite ready to travel to Italy with her family, especially when she is charged with keeping an eye out for her wandering little brother. This is another winner in the series, with lots of art, gelato, pizza, all recorded in Melanie's travel diary with a great dose of humor of a long suffering older sister.

The Diary of Melanie Martin or How I Survived Matt the Brat, Michelangelo, and the Leaning Tower of Pizza by Carol Weston is still funny. A perfect read for 4th - 6th graders.

A SUMMER OF MYSTERIES: THE WRIGHT MYSTERY

Three classmates join together in order to save a house designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, a famous architect. Each experience the house "calling" to them in different unexplainable ways . Does the house posess the spirit of Frank Lloyd Wright himself or of the children who had once lived there? Or is something more sinister happening within the house? The three must overcome their individual jealousy and mistrust of each other in order to uncover the mystery before more accidents occur.

The Wright 3 by Blue Balliett is for those 4th-8th grade mystery lovers who enjoy a little supernatural spookiness in their stories.