LEVELS OF STRANGE

IS IT NEWBERY WORTHY? 

Willow Chance feels like she's running out of chances.  Her favorite number is 7, but she doesn't want to use 7 chances on life and she's already starting number 3.  Given up as a baby, her wonderful parents adopted her and loved her for all her character and uniqueness (which her classmates call weirdness) - like her obsession with medical diseases and her favorite outfit which includes gardening pants and an obsession with the number seven.  Her uniqueness has left Willow with very few friends, up until a few weeks ago when she learned vietnamese, gained 2 friends, and was sent to mandatory counseling by her school.  Now, though, as her counselor pulls up to her driveway and she sees the police but not her parents, Willow wonders if the third time is the charm or if she'll have to keep trying to find stability over and over again.

Join Willow on the path through social acceptance, grief, and the path towards a new life in Holly Goldberg Sloan's novel, Counting by 7s for students in grades 6 and up.

YOU NEED YOUR LUNGS TO BREATHE...

...You need your brain to think, you need your heart to love. A long, long, time ago, well okay, 1940, it wasn't always easy to breathe. A terrible outbreak of the disease tuberculosis has taken over the bodies of many United States citizens. Men, women and children were dying if they didn't get help quick. This is what happens to Evvy, only her family thinks it is best if she goes to Loon Lake - a place just for people who have tuberculosis! Evvy is put into a room with four other sick girls, and the story talks all about what it's like living and dying with this disease. BREATHING ROOM  by Marsha Hayles is not a horror story, even though bad things happen. It IS a good historical fiction with interesting pictures and posters from that era. Evvy becomes good friends with many that come and go, and learns a lot about the importance of breathing. For 5th through 8th grades.

February 2013

A TURNING POINT IN HISTORY

There was a time when kids went outside to play, made up imaginary games evoking historical characters and aliens from the future, families went on road trips in search of gold, radiation was still a new treatment for cancer, and cancer was still mysterious. In THE LUCKY PLACE by Zu Vincent, families are becoming visibly dysfunctional through the eyes of Cassie, spanning ten years from age three to thirteen. There's Old Daddy, the drunk, and New Daddy, the one Cassie likes better. Jaime, her older brother, is not happy about New Daddy, but escapes his anger and frustration by taking as many dance classes as possible. There are complex relationships rich with emotion, told from a soft, gentle, very human perspective. This book will capture the attention of 5th grades and up.