When You Reach Me, Rebecca SteadObviously you already know that this won the Newbery Medal this week, and obviously you know it's terrific. A million people have written a million things about it, so I'll just say that I was very, very pleased to see how much space was spent discussing $20,000 Pyramid. That's a topic that just doesn't come up nearly enough, esp in books for young people.
Dread Locks, Neal Shusterman
Apparently Shusterman has written several books in a little series called "Dark Fusion" where he takes two different myths or fairy tales and re-works them into ultra-rad modern teen lit masterpieces. Here we've got a Medusa / Goldilocks and the Three Bears mashup. So... the new girl in town who has really curly hair and always wears dark glasses introduces herself to the neighbors, the Baers (get it??), by sneaking into their house and eating their cereal before falling asleep in their bed. And then kids at school mysteriously start turning gray and sluggish; they eat dirt and eventually turn completely to stone. "Don't expect subtlety or character development," says Booklist.
Sunrise Over Fallujah, Walter Dean MyersA young soldier from Harlem and his unit go into Iraq in 2003, in the shock and awe days when everyone was expecting to be home soon. And of course it doesn't work out that way. It's messy and directionless, and it made me cry.
This week: 3
YTD: 8
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