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Something dark is afoot in Sanera, California, and four teens decide to solve the mystery. Let’s Split Up by Bill Wood features sensible Amber Grayson, quirky Jonesy with a high IQ, the track star Cameron who keeps the mood light, and a newcomer to town—the perceptive Buffy Allen who may be just a bit too interested in the case. These four sleuths are pressed into service after the deaths of football player Bradley Campbell and cheerleader Shelley Jones, who appear to have fallen victim to the Carrington Ghoul. Although the ghoul and the haunted Carrington Manor are urban legends, the eerily similar deaths between thatRead More →

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Whether through empathy or some other form of understanding, humans will frequently attempt to form a connection with others in order to perceive alternate life experiences and to consider how those experiences might differ from their own. When documentary filmmaker James Robinson writes his memoir about seeing and being seen, he seeks to build not only understanding but compassion and a more accurate representation of the disability experience in the media. Whale Eyes relates Robinson’s experience from childhood through young adulthood as he contends with a condition often referred to as strabismus. With his misaligned eyes, which can make such tasks as reading and playingRead More →

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Randy Ribay, an author who writes through the lens of experience as a Filipino, shares tremendous history in his novel Everything We Never Had. Telling his story from multiple perspectives, Ribay provides the reader with insight into the Manong Generation, the Watsonville riots, Stockton’s Little Manila, the Delano grape strike, the Ferdinand Marcos dictatorship, the assassination of Benigno Aquino, Jr., and the rise in anti-Asian hate crimes during the COVID-19 pandemic. The story opens in 1929 when Francisco Maghabol is sixteen years old. Believing in the Land of Opportunity, Francisco comes to the United States from Manila in the Philippines by way of Japan toRead More →

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Written by Kate Marchant and illustrated by CJ Joaquin, Float is a humorous graphic novel about teen drama. Float’s protagonist is Waverly Lyons, who lives in Fairbanks, Alaska, but is visiting her Aunt Rachel in Florida. According to Waverly, Aunt Rachel is a “weird, colorful, not super put together . . . but charming” artist (15). Waverly, who considers herself “bad at most things,” describes herself as “the anxious offspring of two brilliant scientists who could never agree on anything” (13). Eventually, her parents divorce, and for the past ten years, Waverly has felt like deadweight being tossed between the two. Florida might just provideRead More →

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Molly X. Chang’s The Nightblood Prince features a royal love triangle complicated by a prophecy and politics. Set in a world inspired by ancient China and predicating a sequel, the novel explores gender roles, the reasons for war, and the process of identity formation.   Now seventeen, Fei Lifeng is destined to be the future Empress of Rong. Betrothed to Siwang and feeling like nothing more than a pawn in a quest for power, she hungers for choice, control, and freedom. Fei hopes that if she can kill a Beiying tiger during the season’s first imperial hunt, the emperor will be obligated to grant herRead More →

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With her graphic novel Free Piano (Not Haunted), Whitney Gardner uses her protagonist Margot to remind middle grade readers that self-worth cannot be measured by the number of followers a person achieves on social media platforms.  Furthermore, having followers doesn’t let you know if you’re good at something or not. Feeling abandoned since her mother works so much and her father is focused on his music career, Margot thinks if she’s famous, she’ll never have to be alone. When she finds a Prophet-5 synthesizer on the sidewalk, Margot decides to ask her dad to teach her how to play. However, he has determined that aRead More →

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Targeted for middle grade readers, Blood in the Water by Tiffany D. Jackson features twelve-year-old Kaylani McKinnon. Given her focus on being strategic about #operationFREEDAD, Kaylani has no time for frivolity. So, when her mother suggests a summer of fun at the vacation home of a family friend in Martha’s Vineyard, this Brooklyn-based girl is resistant. After all, she has pre-law camp to consider if she hopes to get her wrongfully accused dad out of prison. When Kaylani arrives, she is even more certain that this place is not her jam. As the ferry docks in the town of Oak Bluffs, Kaylani feels like DorothyRead More →

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With her debut graphic novel, On Guard!, Cassidy Wasserman creates a clever metaphor between fencing and life.  As the story unfolds, Grace Collins is beginning seventh grade at Marshall Middle School. To further complicate life, her parents have divorced, the custody agreement adds challenges, and her best friend has moved on to a new friend group, replacing Grace with Lana. Adrift, angry, and alone, Grace starts watching the eighth grade fencers during her lunch hour. Although she imagines herself armed with a sword, she considers herself unathletic and chooses to sit on the sidelines instead. However, when her father notices Grace’s withdrawn demeanor, he encouragesRead More →

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Just as William Blake, in his poem “The Tyger,” explores the duality of human nature and our potential for both good and evil, SF Said takes up the task in his novel Tyger illustrated by Dave McKean.  Although the novel is targeted for middle grade readers, its themes, morals, and complexity suit a much broader readership. Both the poem and the novel ultimately suggest that the imagination is the location of a miraculous but dangerous kind of creative strength. The willingness to “dare,” as the poem would put it, to create anything of any worth out of the “fire” of creativity, requires both bravery andRead More →