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In: Elementary Book Reviews, Historical Fiction, Middle Grade Reviews, Realistic Fiction
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In a beautifully crafted, delicately told story about hope, family, and love, Patricia Reilly Giff enchanted me with Gingersnap. Set in 1945 in a small town in Upstate New York, Jayna lives with her older brother, and only family, Rob.  When he’s called to active duty on a naval battleship in the Pacific, Jayna goes to stay with their difficult landlady.  But before he left, Rob told Jayna about a suitcase in his closet that contains a cookbook with a name and an address for a bakery in Brooklyn. Could it be a clue to family they don’t know they have?  Then Rob’s ship isRead More →

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In Tne Opposite of Hallelujah, Anna Jarzab returns to the familiar territory of a mystery enveloping a dysfunctional family.  But instead of teens trying to deal with grief and solve the mystery of their friend’s death (All Unquiet Things), here we have a long-lost sister returning to a family broken by her absence and a haunting secret that threatens to resurface and wreak havoc again. When Caro was 8, her much older sister Hannah, left home.  Too young to understand why and at a loss to explain her sister’s sudden departure to her friends and schoolmates, Caro started telling everyone that Hannah had died.  ThisRead More →

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Linda Gerber’s recent release, Lights, Camera Cassidy captures common tween conflicts such as searching for independence, navigating identity issues, and developing relationships with the opposite sex.  Twelve year old Cassidy Barnett, daughter of reality television stars, likes a challenge and craves attention—until she is in the spotlight and experiences all the drawbacks of the limelight, which demands she wear a plastic smile and practice her princess wave.  When she sneaks out of the house while in Valencia, Spain, to take video and pictures for the blog she writes to stay connected to her deceased grandfather, Cassidy inadvertently catches a contrabandista in the act of committingRead More →

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What would you do if you had a problem so large, so immensely and terrible, you just couldn’t bring yourself to face it? Would you want run away from it or deal with it head on? Kendra is in deep trouble and she is anxiously pinioned, unable to decide whether to fight or fly. She’s been cheating for months and someone has finally caught her. She panics, just as her older brother, Grayson, is returning home from rehabilitation. In her despair, she superimposes her problems onto him, believing she can somehow ameliorate her situation by fixing her brother’s obsessive compulsive behavior. With this in mind,Read More →

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Readers of science fiction or dystopian literature like Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games trilogy will likely find fascination in Alaya Dawn Johnson’s inaugural young adult novel, The Summer Prince.  For her story’s setting, Johnson has created Palmares Três, a dream city which rose from the ruins of a world ravaged by plague, war, and destruction.  The city is governed mostly by women since men have done so much to destroy the world with their war games and power plays.  To keep the world from ever dying again, the Queen of Palmares Três creates a composite of the best that the previous world had to offer,Read More →

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Set in the early 1940s, Kimberly Newton Fusco’s upcoming release, Beholding Bee, features Beatrice Rose Hockenberry, an adolescent girl whose life readers follow from age eleven to thirteen.   During this time of victory gardens, sugar rations, and fuel stamps, Bee—whose  parents died when she was four—works for a travelling carnival show and lives in the back of a hauling truck with sixteen year old Pauline as her guardian. Bee’s greatest nemesis is Ellis, the owner of the show, who threatens to put Bee on display in the freak show because she has a birthmark, “the color of rose at dusk” (4), that stretches from her hairlineRead More →

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In: Ideas You Can Use, This is interesting, What We're Reading, What's Happening at PBC
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We’ve made it easy to ensure you have the best new releases; we now offer seasonal collections. Got $500? Choose our Cream of the Crop Collection- it includes the MUST HAVE new titles for each season. Got $1000? Choose our Best of the Best Collection- it includes everything in the Cream of the Crop, plus more of the BEST NEW releases! Or, mix and match to create your own custom collections. Plus, add library processing to any order to have it delivered shelf-ready. Just check out these links to see the full lists! $500 Cream of the Crop Collections: Elementary Fall 2012 Elementary Spring 2013Read More →

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In: Action & Adventure (YA), Sci-Fi & Fantasy (YA), Uncategorized Posts, Young Adult Book Reviews
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Book One in the Three Doors Trilogy by Emily Rodda, The Golden Door, tells the story of three brothers: Dirk, Sholto, and Rye who are residents of Southwall, a community in the city of Weld governed and over-regulated by a suspicious Warden. Eighteen-year-old Dirk is brave and determined if not a bit of a conspiracy theorist who thinks the Warden is up to no good.  Sholto is equally determined but dark and cynical, although the thirst for knowledge glows in him.  As an apprentice Healer, he tends to seek out peace. Rye, the youngest, is cautious, perceptive, and pragmatic. Their home, previously a place of peaceRead More →

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In: Romance (YA), Young Adult Book Reviews
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Although Lauren Morrill’s debut novel, Meant to Be, tells the story of Julia Lichtenstein, a junior at Newton North High School in Newton, Massachusetts, it also tells the turbulent tale of teen relationship building, the random chaos of life and love. Julia, who doesn’t know the word fun because it wasn’t on the SATs, is a stickler for history and geography and rules.  Because of her reputation, she has earned nicknames like Book Licker, Professor, and Little Miss Guidebook.  When she signs up for the class’ spring break field trip toLondon, she hopes to immerse herself in the rich culture and history of the place, butRead More →