In the forty years since Max first cried “Let the wild rumpus start,” Maurice Sendak’s classic picture book has become one of the most highly acclaimed and best-loved children’s books of all time. Now, in celebration of this special anniversary, introduce a new generation to Max’s imaginative journey to Where the Wild Things Are.

About Maurice Sendak

For more than forty years, the books Maurice Sendak has written and illustrated have nurtured children and adults alike and have challenged established ideas about what children’s literature is and should be. The New York Times has recognized that Sendak’s work “has brought a new dimension to the American children’s book and has helped to change how people visualize childhood.” Parenting recently described Sendak as “indisputably, the most revolutionary force in children’s books.”

Winner of the 1964 Caldecott Medal for Where the Wild Things Are, in 1970 Sendak became the first American illustrator to receive the international Hans Christian Andersen Award, given in recognition of his entire body of work. In 1983, he received the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award from the American Library Association, also given for his entire body of work.
Beginning in 1952, with A Hole Is to Dig by Ruth Krauss, Sendak’s illustrations have enhanced many texts by other writers, including the Little Bear books by Else Holmelund Minarik, children’s books by Isaac Bashevis Singer and Randall Jarrell, and The Juniper Tree and Other Tales from Grimm. Dear Mili, Sendak’s interpretation of a newly discovered tale by Wilhelm Grimm, was published to extraordinary acclaim in 1988

In addition to Where the Wild Things Are (1963), Sendak has both written and illustrated:

The Nutshell Library (1962), Higglety Pigglety Pop! (1967), In the Night Kitchen (1970), Outside Over There (1981), and, We Are All in the Dumps with Jack and Guy (1993). He also illustrated Swine Lake (1999), authored by James Marshall, Brundibar (2003), by Tony Kushner, Bears (2005), by Ruth Krauss and, Mommy? (2006), his first pop-up book, with paper engineering by Matthew Reinhart and story by Arthur Yorinks.

Since 1980, Sendak has designed the sets and costumes for highly regarded productions of Mozart’s The Magic Flute and Idomeneo, Janacek’s The Cunning Little Vixen, Prokofiev’s
The Love for Three Oranges, Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker, and Hans Krása’s Brundibár.

In 1997, Sendak received the National Medal of Arts from President Clinton. In 2003 he received the first Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award, an international prize for children’s literature established by the Swedish government. Maurice Sendak was born in Brooklyn in 1928. He now lives in Connecticut.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

Maurice Sendak, Author of Splendid Nightmares, Dies at 83

The New York Times Book Review – May 8, 2012 (Excerpt)

Maurice Sendak, widely considered the most important children’s book artist of the 20th century, who wrenched the picture book out of the safe, sanitized world of the nursery and plunged it into the dark, terrifying and hauntingly beautiful recesses of the human psyche, died on Tuesday in Danbury, Conn. He was 83.

The cause was complications of a recent stroke, said Michael di Capua, his longtime editor. Mr. Sendak, who died at Danbury Hospital, lived nearby in Ridgefield, Conn.

Roundly praised, intermittently censored and occasionally eaten, Mr. Sendak’s books were essential ingredients of childhood for the generation born after 1960 or thereabouts, and in turn for their children. He was known in particular for more than a dozen picture books he wrote and illustrated himself, most famously “Where the Wild Things Are,” which was simultaneously genre-breaking and career-making when it was published by Harper & Row in 1963.

Among the other titles he wrote and illustrated, all from Harper & Row, are “In the Night Kitchen” (1970) and“Outside Over There” (1981), which together with “Where the Wild Things Are” form a trilogy; “The Sign on Rosie’s Door” (1960); “Higglety Pigglety Pop!” (1967); and “The Nutshell Library” (1962), a boxed set of four tiny volumes comprising “Alligators All Around,” “Chicken Soup With Rice,” “One Was Johnny” and “Pierre.” [Read the full article...]

Maurice Sendak, author of ‘Where the Wild Things Are,’ other children’s books, dies at 83

The Washington Post – May 8, 2012 (Excerpt)

NEW YORK — Maurice Sendak didn’t think of himself as a children’s author, but as an author who told the truth about childhood.

“I like interesting people and kids are really interesting people,” he explained to The Associated Press last fall. “And if you didn’t paint them in little blue, pink and yellow, it’s even more interesting.”

Sendak, who died early Tuesday in Danbury, Conn., at age 83, four days after suffering a stroke, revolutionized children’s books and how we think about childhood simply by leaving in what so many writers before had excluded. Dick and Jane were no match for his naughty Max. His kids misbehaved and didn’t regret it, and in their dreams and nightmares fled to the most unimaginable places. Monstrous creatures were devised from his studio, but none more frightening than the grownups in his stories or the cloud of the Holocaust that darkened his every page.

“From their earliest years children live on familiar terms with disrupting emotions — fear and anxiety are an intrinsic part of their everyday lives, they continually cope with frustrations as best they can,” he said upon receiving the Caldecott Medal in 1964 for “Where the Wild Things Are,” his signature book. “And it is through fantasy that children achieve catharsis. It is the best means they have for taming wild things.” [Read the full article...]

Maurice Sendak’s imagination took him into the wild, and beyond

The Washington Post – May 8, 2012 (Excerpt)

The child is bathed, dusted with bath powder, snug in cotton pajamas and, finally, tucked into bed.

“Read to me, Daddy.”

Which book?

“You know the one.”

Of course, I do: I reach for the familiar volume, pause over the cover, then turn to the first page: “The night Max wore his wolf suit and made mischief of one kind and another, his mother called him ‘WILD THING!’ and Max said ‘I’LL EAT YOU UP!’ so he was sent to bed without eating anything. . . .”

Many people think that creating a children’s book must be easy. After all, it’s just for kids, can’t be all that hard, right? In fact, the text of a great picture book calls for the skills of a poet. When you’re telling a story in a couple of hundred words, every one of them must be exactly right.

And when you’re also telling that story in a dozen or so pictures, every one of them must be a miniature masterpiece. For one artist to manage to do both equally well doesn’t happen very often. Dr. Seuss managed it for a whole series of Early Reader classics. Chris Van Allsburg created a holiday favorite in“The Polar Express.” But if you were to ask anyone — man, woman, child or grandparent — to name the best children’s picture book of the past 50 years, the winner would be Maurice Sendak’s “Where the Wild Things Are.” [Read the full article...]

An Inside Look At Sendak’s ‘Wonderful Magic’

NPR Book Review – May 8, 2012 (Excerpt)

Besides his influence on generations of children and adults, author Maurice Sendak was also a personal mentor to a number of writers. Sendak, who died Tuesday at age 83, told NPR in 2005 that he felt it was his duty to pass on everything he’d learned.

“This big gorilla head that’s stuffed full of experience — I want to give it away before I’m gone,” he said. “I want to give it away to young artists who are as vehement and passionate about their lives and work as I was and am.”

Among his mentees was Gregory Maguire, the author of Wicked, a number of children’s books and Making Mischief: A Maurice Sendak Appreciation.

Maguire tells Melissa Block, host of All Things Considered, that he visited the Where the Wild Things Are author in the hospital shortly before he died and brought a photo of Lewis Carroll. In the image, the Alice In Wonderland creator is seen sitting on the edge of a window with his feet hanging outside.

Maguire says Sendak felt a deep connection to Carroll and other authors who had come before him, including Emily Dickinson, Henry James and Homer.[Read the full article...]

The Girl Without A Past

A Children’s Novel by Judith P. Vaughan

After being lured into a devious trap, eleven years old twins, Samantha and Alex Covington find themselves transported to a parallel world. They appear in the middle of the forest, a dangerous place were Minotaurs and Trolls roam freely. There they discover that they are not the only victims when they are rescued by Lilly, a girl whose life clock has stopped and all of her past memories erased. They are about to have a mystery on their hands, a mystery that is related to their kidnapping. The clock is ticking —Samantha and Alex must hurry and find a way to get back home before their kidnapper finds them first, if not they will suffer the same fate as their new friend, Lilly.

Kindle Edition: Amazon Kindle Store

All other eBook formats: Smashwords.Com

When soldiers arrive at his hometown in Cambodia, Arn is just a kid, dancing to rock ‘n’ roll, hustling for spare change, and selling ice cream with his brother. But after the soldiers march the entire population into the countryside, his life is changed forever. Arn is separated from his family and assigned to a labor camp: working in the rice paddies under a blazing sun, he sees the other children, weak from hunger, malaria, or sheer exhaustion, dying before his eyes. He sees prisoners marched to a nearby mango grove, never to return. And he learns to be invisible to the sadistic Khmer Rouge, who can give or take away life on a whim.

One day, the soldiers ask if any of the kids can play an instrument. Arn’s never played a note in his life, but he volunteers. In order to survive, he must quickly master the strange revolutionary songs the soldiers demand—and steal food to keep the other kids alive. This decision will save his life, but it will pull him into the very center of what we know today as the Killing Fields. And just as the country is about to be liberated from the Khmer Rouge, Arn is handed a gun and forced to become a soldier. He lives by the simple credo: Over and over I tell myself one thing: never fall down.

Based on the true story of Arn Chorn-Pond, this is an achingly raw and powerful novel about a child of war who becomes a man of peace, from National Book Award finalist Patricia McCormick.

About Patricia McCormick

Patricia McCormick is a former journalist who has won much acclaim for her compassionate approach to hard-hitting subjects. Her most recent book, Purple Heart, was a Publishers Weekly Best Book of 2009, and her book Sold was a National Book Award finalist. Other seminal books she has written are Cut and My Brother’s Keeper. Patty lives in New York with her family.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

Editorial Reviews

“Arn Chorn Pond is a fast-talking dynamo with endless energy and zest for life. In Never Fall Down, Patricia McCormick captures brilliantly the man, his heart, and his passion to make Cambodia and our world a better place for all. Arn’s against-all-odds survival story and McCormick’s crisp prose gripped me from the first page to the very end.” (Loung Ung, bestelling author of First They Killed My Father, and Lucky Child)

“One of the most inspiring and powerful books I’ve ever read. Never Fall Down can teach us all about finding the courage to speak our truth and change the world.” (Archbishop Desmond Tutu)

“Following the pattern of excellence McCormick began with her novel SOLD, she has created another amazing story through skilled and patient research.” (Voice of Youth Advocates (VOYA))

Not Just for Kids: ‘Never Fall Down’ details horrors of Khmer Rouge

The Los Angeles Times Book Review – April 29, 2012 (Excerpt)

When it comes to genocide, Hitler is obviously well covered. There are countless titles for young readers about the atrocities he inspired. The Khmer Rouge, which seized control of Cambodia in 1975 and, in its attempts to create an agrarian form of communism, killed millions of its own people, is less familiar territory, especially for young readers.

“Never Fall Down” offers a detailed look at what it was like to live under such a cruel government from the perspective of one of its best-known survivors, Arn Chorn Pond.

Pond was 11 when his village was invaded by the Khmer Rouge and his family was forced to march toward an uncertain future. Pond thought it was exciting at first, but after walking for days, passing babies left crying in the middle of the road and ditches filling with dead bodies, he began to realize: He wouldn’t be returning home in three days as his captors had said.

“Never Fall Down” is written in broken English from Pond’s present-tense point of view, which adds to the story’s authenticity and immediacy. But it is in the end a novel. [Read the full article...]

‘Never Fall Down’: Surviving The Killing Fields

NPR Book Review – May 19, 2012 (Excerpt)

Prize-winning author Patricia McCormick is known for tackling challenging — even harrowing — themes in her young adult novels. Her book Sold, a National Book Award finalist, took on child trafficking. In her new book, Never Fall Down, she describes the atrocities of the Cambodian genocide, drawing upon the experiences of Arn Chorn-Pond, a real-life survivor, who joined her and NPR’s Scott Simon to discuss the novel and the lingering impact of his ordeal. [Read the full article...]

THE LONDONDERRY AIR

Testament of an Ulster Gunman
A Novel by Garrad Gawler 

It all changed for Charles Cunningham, a Physics teacher at the local College of Technology in the County Derry town of Maddenstown, on a June afternoon in 1973 when a bomb exploded in his neighborhood. He answers an advertisement by the UDR, the Ulster Defence Regiment, but, in the time to come, he will experience the consequences of his decisions, and how his involvement complicates matters with family and friends, Protestants and Catholics alike, to an unexpected degree.

With “The Londonderry Air – Testament of an Ulster Gunman” Garrad Gawler describes in minute detail and with an astonishing level of authenticity not only the inner workings of the Ulster Defence Regiment, but also the activities of underground paramilitary groups of regular citizens who planned and carried out the assassination of suspected Republican terrorists in their neighborhood.

The Londonderry Air is available at Amazon.Com, Amazon Kindle (US), Amazon.co.uk, Amazon Kindle (UK), Barnes & Noble, smashwords.com, and any other good bookstore.

For more information on Garrad Gawler and to read an excerpt of “The Londonderry Air,” please see the author’s section on this website.

Soldier boys emerged from the darkness. Guns gleamed dully. Bullet bandoliers and scars draped their bare chests. Ugly brands scored their faces. She knew why these soldier boys had come. She knew what they sought, and she knew, too, that if they found it, her best friend would surely die.

In a dark future America where violence, terror, and grief touch everyone, young refugees Mahlia and Mouse have managed to leave behind the war-torn lands of the Drowned Cities by escaping into the jungle outskirts. But when they discover a wounded half-man–a bioengineered war beast named Tool–who is being hunted by a vengeful band of soldiers, their fragile existence quickly collapses. One is taken prisoner by merciless soldier boys, and the other is faced with an impossible decision: Risk everything to save a friend, or flee to a place where freedom might finally be possible.

This thrilling companion to Paolo Bacigalupi’s highly acclaimed Ship Breaker is a haunting and powerful story of loyalty, survival, and heart-pounding adventure.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

About Paolo Bacigalupi

Paolo Bacigalupi is the author of Ship Breaker, a Michael L. Printz Award winner and National Book Award finalist. He is also the author of The Windup Girl and Pump Six and Other Stories, and is a Hugo, Nebula, Locus, Compton Crook, John W. Campbell Memorial, and Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award winner. He lives in western Colorado with his wife and son.

Editorial Review

Bands of child soldiers roam from village to village, raping, pillaging and brutally murdering, all in the name of endless civil war. Against the backdrop of this blood-soaked chaos, two unlikely allies, a crippled teenage “war maggot” and a half-man/half-beast genetically altered killing machine, risk their lives and their freedom to save a boy forced into servitude by rebel soldiers. Mahlia and Tool (whom readers may recognize from Ship Breaker) venture deeper and deeper into the Drowned Cities, each fueled by unwavering loyalty. As they do, readers are given glimpses of proof that love and humanity can shine through even the most unimaginable darkness. Arguably, the novel’s greatest success lies in the creation of a world that is so real, the grit and decay of war and ruin will lay thick on the minds of readers long after the final page. The narrative, however, is equally well crafted. Told in the third person, the novel alternates between Mahalia and Tool’s stories, allowing both characters the time and space to imprint themselves on readers’ hearts. – Kirkus Reviews

Review: Paolo Bacigalupi brings chaos to life in ‘Drowned Cities’

The Los Angeles Times Book Review – April 22, 2012 (Excerpt)

Whether it’s a conscious or subliminal reaction to U.S. military involvement inIraq and Afghanistan, war is an increasingly common theme in modern young adult literature. But its horrors are rarely so thoroughly detailed as in Paolo Bacigalupi’s “The Drowned Cities.” One of the more graphically violent young adult titles of late, “The Drowned Cities” reads like a dystopian mash-up of the Vietnam War and modern geopolitics, where survivalism battles personal loyalties in a brutal and chaotic world.

Suzanne Collins may have put dystopian literature on the YA map with “The Hunger Games,” her bestselling series inspired by television coverage of the Iraq war, but Bacigalupi is one of the genre’s masters, employing inventively terrifying details in equally imaginative story lines. About half of the “The Drowned Cities” takes place in the same flooded cityscape as Bacigalupi’s young adult debut, “Ship Breaker,” which won the prestigious Michael L. Printz award last year and was also nominated for a National Book Award. Both novels feature similar themes of scavenging and survival in an environmentally degraded future, but the titles are otherwise unrelated, with entirely different characters and quests.

“The Drowned Cities” opens with a festering prison scene. A genetically engineered killing machine named Tool is rotting behind bars, believed to be dead, until a jailer makes the fatal mistake of unlocking the gate and unleashing him into the wild. This fusion of tiger, dog, hyena and man is not the main protagonist but the sidekick to an orphaned teenage girl named Mahlia who helps heal the monster’s wounds. [Read the full article...]

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QUEEN OF MISFORTUNE
A Lady Jane Grey Novel by Peter Carroll

A Love Story of Shakespearean Dimension!

Queen Of Misfortune is the fictional story of Lady Jane Grey as told by her beloved tutor, John Aylmer. At the time of her execution a stranger is recorded to have assisted her when, blind folded, she lost her way upon the scaffold. Was it the same strange who was also recorded to have visited her when she was imprisoned in the Tower? Little is known of this unfortunate girl who was beheaded for treason in the 16^th Century. She was only 16. She is omitted from the list of monarchs but was actually queen for nine days. Author Peter Carroll, in his novel, follows John Aylmer’s close relationship with Jane as her tutor and later, as she grows up, her lover. [More...]

Available at Amazon.Com, Amazon.co.uk, Barnes & Noble, and any other good bookstore.

Nine-year-old Nicholas Benedict has more problems than most children his age. Not only is he an orphan with an unfortunate nose, but he also has narcolepsy, a condition that gives him terrible nightmares and makes him fall asleep at the worst possible moments. Now he’s being sent to a new orphanage, where he will encounter vicious bullies, selfish adults, strange circumstances — and a mystery that could change his life forever. Luckily, he has one important thing in his favor: He’s a genius.

On his quest to solve the mystery, Nicholas finds enemies around every corner, but also friends in unexpected places — and discovers along the way that the greatest puzzle of all is himself.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

About Trenton Lee Stewart

Trenton Lee Stewart is the author of the award-winning and New York Times bestselling Mysterious Benedict Society series. He lives in Arkansas with his wife and two sons.

Editorial Review

The leisurely, discursive tale takes young Nicholas— “a boy of whimsical mind, to be sure (though whimsy was not the half of it, nor even the beginning)”—into the financially troubled Rothschild’s End (“or ’Child’s End, as it is often abbreviated”). There, along with the customary sets of brutal bullies, cowed children and myopically semi-competent staff, he encounters his first library, his first real friend and exciting hints of a lost treasure. His search for this last is complicated by his affliction, which is triggered by any strong positive emotion, as well as the fact that he’s locked into a storeroom every night and also continually at risk from the aforesaid thugs. Being smarter than everyone else put together as well as mechanically gifted, though, he turns every challenge into an opportunity and by the end has found the treasure (which turns out to something much better than money), saved the orphanage and forced a truce with the bullies. More significantly, having seen kindness and compassion in action “[h]e might not know what he wanted to be when he grew up, but he knew with absolute certainty how he wanted to be.” – Kirkus Reviews

Not Just For Kids: ‘The Extraordinary Education of Nicholas Benedict’ by Trenton Lee Stewart

The Los Angeles Times Book Review – April 15, 2012 (Excerpt)

Nicholas Benedict is best known to readers as a kindly father figure in Trenton Lee Stewart’s bestselling “Mysterious Benedict Society” series. In the author’s new prequel, fans finally get the back story on the narcoleptic genius, long before he placed the newspaper ad that sought four gifted orphans to help him save the world.

Set decades earlier in the same rural locale, the books’ namesake is just 9 years old in “The Extraordinary Education of Nicholas Benedict.” And, as the title hints, it isn’t only his education but Nicholas himself who is something of an oddity. Small in physical stature but intellectually gifted, he has an “unfortunate” nose that is long and lumpy and a medical condition that prompts “unpredictable sleeping episodes” that drop “him from consciousness like a trapdoor into a black dungeon” at the least opportune of times.

It’s a troubling combination for an unintentionally troublemaking but otherwise endearing boy who’s been kicked out of orphanage after orphanage and is headed to yet another one as the book opens. What has long made him a nuisance to less intelligent adults and target practice for bullies also makes him a curiosity for a slightly older boy who befriends him at his new home — the ominously named Rothschild’s End. The orphanage is housed in a two-story mansion built from drab gray stone that hints at the conditions inside. On the brink of closure for lack of funds, its director uses candles rather than electric lights to save money. [Read the full article...]

THE LONDONDERRY AIR

Testament of an Ulster Gunman
A Novel by Garrad Gawler 

It all changed for Charles Cunningham, a Physics teacher at the local College of Technology in the County Derry town of Maddenstown, on a June afternoon in 1973 when a bomb exploded in his neighborhood. He answers an advertisement by the UDR, the Ulster Defence Regiment, but, in the time to come, he will experience the consequences of his decisions, and how his involvement complicates matters with family and friends, Protestants and Catholics alike, to an unexpected degree.

With “The Londonderry Air – Testament of an Ulster Gunman” Garrad Gawler describes in minute detail and with an astonishing level of authenticity not only the inner workings of the Ulster Defence Regiment, but also the activities of underground paramilitary groups of regular citizens who planned and carried out the assassination of suspected Republican terrorists in their neighborhood.

The Londonderry Air is available at Amazon.Com, Amazon Kindle (US), Amazon.co.uk, Amazon Kindle (UK), Barnes & Noble, smashwords.com, and any other good bookstore.

For more information on Garrad Gawler and to read an excerpt of “The Londonderry Air,” please see the author’s section on this website.

Critical success for the original Go the F*** to Sleep, a #1 best seller at: New York Times, Amazon.com, Wall Street Journal, Publishers Weekly, and many more!

Seriously, Just Go to Sleep is the G-rated, traditional-sized, children’s version of the book every parent has been talking about. Go the F*** to Sleep, the picture book for adults, became a cultural sensation by striking a universal chord for parents. Now, Adam Mansbach and Ricardo Cortés reunite with Seriously, Just Go to Sleep, inviting the children themselves in on the joke. As parents know, kids are well aware of how difficult they can be at bedtime. With Cortés’s updated illustrations (including a cameo appearance by Samuel L. Jackson, who narrated the audio book version of Go the F*** to Sleep) and Mansbach’s new child-appropriate narrative, the book allows kids to recognize their tactics, giggle at their own mischievousness, and empathize with their parents’ struggles–a perspective most children’s books don’t capture. Most importantly, it provides a common ground for children and their parents to talk about one of the most stressful aspects of parenting.

Seriously, Just Go to Sleep came to be when Mansbach read a highly censored rendition of the original book to his three-year-old daughter, and she recognized herself as the culprit and was delighted. “We were getting a lot of feedback from parents, saying that their kids loved the book–read in an altered form–because they recognized themselves in the character of the mischievous kid who’s winning the bedtime battle, and thought it was hilarious. So we figured we’d do a companion volume that lets kids in on the fun.”

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

About Adam Mansbach

Adam Mansbach’s novels include The End of the Jews, winner of the California Book Award, and the best-selling Angry Black White Boy, a San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of 2005. His fiction and essays have appeared in the New York Times Book Review, the Believer, Granta, the Los Angeles Times, and many other publications. He was the 2010-2011 New Voices Professor of Fiction at Rutgers University.His daughter, Vivien, is three.

Editorial Review

The rhyming quatrains have been largely retained, with just the last line or two smoothed over for actual child audiences. “How come you can do all this other great shit / But you can’t lie the fuck down and sleep?” becomes “You’re incredibly cute, and super-duper smart, / But why’s it so hard to just sleep?” after a little massage (which often casts scansion to the wind). The book’s trim is larger than its original, and a few of the illustrations have been redone. In one scene, an African-American father tiptoes out of the room, as his cherubic child (maybe) nods off, where in the original both were Caucasian. But playing it straight just doesn’t work for this effort. If anything made its progenitor funny, it was the juxtaposition of the parentalcri de coeur against the worst excesses of the bedtime-book form. Syrupy imagery (“giant pangolins of Madagascar are snoozing”) combined with equally gooey metaphorical illustrations in gleeful parody. Here, it’s just another derivative piece of merchandising. The book’s creators make sure readers know this: On the floor of the African-American child’s bedroom,Go the Fuck to Sleep peeks out from underneath The Cat in the Hat andGoodnight Moon. – Kirkus Reviews

Adam Mansbach writes ‘Seriously, Just Go to Sleep’ for the kids

The Los Angeles Times – April 10, 2012 (Excerpt)

A year ago, Adam Mansbach was an award-winning novelist and aspiring screenwriter wrapping up a two-year teaching job at Rutgers University. That was before his off-color picture book, “Go the F— to Sleep,” became an international phenomenon, catapulting the sleep-deprived father of one to the tops of bestseller lists and into the eye of a parenting maelstrom.

Since its publication last June, actor Samuel Jackson and director Werner Herzog have recorded audio versions and Fox 2000 plans to make it into a major motion picture. The book has sold 600,000 copies and has been translated into 36 languages, making Mansbach inadvertently well-versed in foreign-language curse words. And a kid-friendly version of the book, “Seriously, Just Go to Sleep,” was released this week.

“Seriously” is published in a larger size more common to picture books that are actually written for children. The new, G-rated version replaces the profanity in the original with less sensational language and subtly alters the illustrations of artist Ricardo Cortés with the addition or removal of animals, objects or individual characters from the ribald bestseller.

Mansbach found that “Go the F— to Sleep,” became a polarizing symbol, inspiring a debate among health professionals about the proper way to put children to sleep, criticism from parents who thought the book was meant for kids, even an activist Christian group in New Zealand that attempted to have the book banned. [Read the full article...]

THE SABRINA STRONG SERIES by LORELEI BELL

Book One: Vampire Ascending [More Info...]

Book Two: Vampire’s Trill [More Info...]

Critically acclaimed nonfiction author Deborah Hopkinson pieces together the story of the TITANIC and that fateful April night, drawing on the voices of survivors and archival photographs.

Scheduled to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the tragic sinking of the TITANIC, a topic that continues to haunt and thrill readers to this day, this book by critically acclaimed author Deborah Hopkinson weaves together the voices and stories of real TITANIC survivors and witnesses to the disaster — from the stewardess Violet Jessop to Captain Arthur Rostron of the CARPATHIA, who came to the rescue of the sinking ship. Packed with heartstopping action, devastating drama, fascinating historical details, loads of archival photographs on almost every page, and quotes from primary sources, this gripping story, which follows the TITANIC and its passengers from the ship’s celebrated launch at Belfast to her cataclysmic icy end, is sure to thrill and move readers.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

About Deborah Hopkinson

Deborah Hopkinson is the author of such award-winning children’s books as SWEET CLARA AND THE FREEDOM QUILT; GIRL WONDER: A BASEBALL STORY IN NINE INNINGS; A BAND OF ANGELS; and Dear America: HEAR MY SORROW. Her nonfiction books, SHUTTING OUT THE SKY, LIFE IN THE TENEMENTS OF NEW YORK, a Jane Addams Peace Award Honor book and an Orbis Pictus Award Honor Book; and UP BEFORE DAYBREAK, COTTON AND PEOPLE IN AMERICA, a Carter G. Woodson Honor Award winner, have garnered much acclaim.

Deborah lives near Portland, Oregon, where, in addition to writing, she works full-time as the Vice President for Advancement for the Pacific Northwest College of Art.

Editorial Review

On Monday, April 15th, 1912, the magnificent Titanic sank after striking an iceberg in the North Atlantic. Of the 2,208 people on board, only 712 survived. It’s a well-known story, though maybe not to young readers, who, if anything, might have seen the movie. Hopkinson orchestrates a wealth of material here, using a third-person narrative voice to tell the story while incorporating eyewitness accounts of people on the “most luxurious ship the world had ever seen.” A huge number of archival photographs and reproductions of telegrams, maps, letters, illustrations, sidebars and even a dinner menu complement the text, yielding a volume as interesting for browsing as for through-reading. The voices include a stewardess, a science teacher, a 9-year-old boy, the ship’s designer, the captain and a mother on her way to a new life in America. Best of all is the author’s spirit: She encourages readers to think like historians and wonder what it would have been like on the Titanic and imagine each character’s story. Fifty pages of backmatter will inform and guide readers who want to know even more. – Kirkus Reviews

Not Just for Kids: ‘Titanic: Voices From the Disaster’

The Los Angeles Times Book Review – April 8, 2012 (Excerpt)

Few tragedies have captivated generations like the Titanic. There’s something about the disaster’s enormity and unlikeliness, coupled with the hubris that brought it about and the horrors that came afterward, that have made the Titanic a subject of enduring fascination even 100 years since it sunk in April 1912, killing 1,496 of the 2,208 people aboard.

With the centennial of the Titanic’s sinking approaching as surely as the iceberg that doomed the luxury liner on that chilly night, dozens of books are being released to commemorate it, including a nonfiction title for young readers from award-winning author Deborah Hopkinson. “Titanic: Voices From the Disaster” is exactly as its title indicates. It’s a meticulous recounting of the disaster culled from the accounts of survivors and witnesses, amply illustrated with black-and-white photos, handwritten ship’s logs, letters, menus and ice warnings sent from other ships that bring this eerie story to life in a way that words alone cannot. Though written for readers as young as 8, Hopkinson’s reporting is so rich with information that it will be equally fascinating to young readers and adults alike.

Hopkinson opens the book with a succession of photos that help readers visualize the people onboard and the epic proportions of the ship that was believed to be unsinkable and was, at the time, the largest ever built. Many of the pictures were taken by an amateur photographer named Frank Browne, who traveled aboard the Titanic from London to Queenstown, Ireland, but disembarked before it ventured out into the Atlantic. It’s haunting to see pictures of the actual people aboard, knowing what awaited them just a few days later. [Read the full article...]

THE LONDONDERRY AIR

Testament of an Ulster Gunman
A Novel by Garrad Gawler 

It all changed for Charles Cunningham, a Physics teacher at the local College of Technology in the County Derry town of Maddenstown, on a June afternoon in 1973 when a bomb exploded in his neighborhood. He answers an advertisement by the UDR, the Ulster Defence Regiment, but, in the time to come, he will experience the consequences of his decisions, and how his involvement complicates matters with family and friends, Protestants and Catholics alike, to an unexpected degree.

With “The Londonderry Air – Testament of an Ulster Gunman” Garrad Gawler describes in minute detail and with an astonishing level of authenticity not only the inner workings of the Ulster Defence Regiment, but also the activities of underground paramilitary groups of regular citizens who planned and carried out the assassination of suspected Republican terrorists in their neighborhood.

The Londonderry Air is available at Amazon.Com, Amazon Kindle (US), Amazon.co.uk, Amazon Kindle (UK), Barnes & Noble, smashwords.com, and any other good bookstore.

For more information on Garrad Gawler and to read an excerpt of “The Londonderry Air,” please see the author’s section on this website.

THE FALSE PRINCE is the thrilling first book in a brand-new trilogy filled with danger and deceit and hidden identities that will have readers rushing breathlessly to the end.

In a discontent kingdom, civil war is brewing. To unify the divided people, Conner, a nobleman of the court, devises a cunning plan to find an impersonator of the king’s long-lost son and install him as a puppet prince. Four orphans are recruited to compete for the role, including a defiant boy named Sage. Sage knows that Conner’s motives are more than questionable, yet his life balances on a sword’s point — he must be chosen to play the prince or he will certainly be killed. But Sage’s rivals have their own agendas as well.

As Sage moves from a rundown orphanage to Conner’s sumptuous palace, layer upon layer of treachery and deceit unfold, until finally, a truth is revealed that, in the end, may very well prove more dangerous than all of the lies taken together.

An extraordinary adventure filled with danger and action, lies and deadly truths that will have readers clinging to the edge of their seats.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

About Jennifer A. Nielsen

Jennifer A. Nielsen is the author of ELLIOT AND THE GOBLIN WAR, the first book in a humorous middle-grade fantasy series. She lives at the base of a very tall mountain in northern Utah with her husband, their three children, and a naughty puppy.

Editorial Review

For years, Sage has survived by lying and stealing in Mrs. Turbeldy’s Orphanage for Disadvantaged Boys. When scheming Bevin Connor removes him, Sage assumes he will serve Connor, but he quickly discovers he’s one of four orphan boys chosen by Connor for a more dangerous game. Connor plans to secretly transform them into gentlemen and select one to impersonate Prince Jaron, who is missing and presumed dead. Carthya’s current king, queen and crown prince have been murdered, and war could erupt at any moment. When the regents meet in two weeks, Connor plans to produce long-lost “Prince Jaron,” who will rule as his pawn. Competition becomes fierce as the boys realize the one chosen to play Jaron will be the only survivor. Sage’s disdain, defiance and reckless arrogance mark him for failure, but his boldness, instinct and innate decency indicate there’s more than meets the eye. Could Sage become Prince Jaron? Sage reveals his story in the first person in slowly unfolding layers guaranteed to shock. Ruthless ambition, fierce action and plotting, complex characters and lots of sword play and hidden passages keep pages flipping. – Kirkus Reviews

Not Just for Kids: ‘The False Prince’ by Jennifer A. Nielsen

The Chicago Tribune Book Review – March 25, 2012 (Excerpt)

Most children want to be recognized as someone special. In “The False Prince,” Jennifer A. Nielsen takes that desire to an extreme with a romp of a medieval-themed, middle-grade novel. This kickoff to her new “Ascendance Trilogy” is a swashbuckling origin story about orphans forced to compete with one another for a chance to take the crown.

The book opens with a boy running through the streets being chased by a cleaver-wielding butcher hoping to retrieve a stolen roast. The thief is Sage, a mischievous almost-15-year-old on the verge of being thrown out of an orphanage until he was purchased by a man identifying himself as a friend of the king’s court. Why this “friend” wanted such a delinquent isn’t immediately clear, but it becomes apparent as this man, Master Bevin Conner, wheels his horse-drawn carriage around the land of Carthya picking up other teen orphans with an uncanny resemblance to a missing prince.

Having collected four boys, Conner announces his intention “to conduct the greatest fraud ever perpetrated within the country.” He doesn’t provide any details. He does, however, allow the boys to leave if they aren’t interested in an admittedly dangerous plot that, if successful, could reap a major reward. One boy elects to depart. [Read the full article...]

The Sabina Strong Series Continues – Vampire’s Trill

Lorelei Bell has created another unique and mesmerizing mystery masterwork that tops its prequel Vampire Ascending in drama, fast-paced action, love, passion, heartache, and devastation. New friends, new adventures, shocking revelations, and harrowing experiences make for riveting reading in this second installment of the Sabrina Strong Series. Sabrina learns more details – through Vasyl’s recounting of his human and vampire life – of what her role as a sibyl means and how the past and the future will come together. She finally learns what role Vasyl has played in his search for the next sibyl and why she is so tremendously important. [Read more...]

Vampire’s Trill is available at Amazon.Com – including the Kindle Version, Barnes & Noble – including the Nook Version, and any other good bookstores.

Also available in the United Kingdom at Amazon.co.uk including the Kindle version.

Join the Mysterious Benedict Society as Reynie, Kate, Sticky, and Constance embark on a daring new adventure that threatens to force them apart from their families, friends, and even each other. When an unexplained blackout engulfs Stonetown, the foursome must unravel clues relating to a nefarious new plot, while their search for answers brings them closer to danger than ever before.

Filled with page-turning action and mind-bending brain teasers, this wildly inventive journey is sure to delight.

About Trenton Lee Stewart

Trenton Lee Stewart is the author of the New York Times bestselling Mysterious Benedict Society series as well as Flood Summer, a novel for adults. He lives in Arkansas with his wife and two sons.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

Editorial Reviews

Reynie, Kate, Constance, and Sticky return for a third adventure. This time, the megalomaniac Ledroptha Curtain schemes to regain his deadly Whisperer machine. As Constance develops her powers of mental telepathy, Reynie and the others use their gifted minds to puzzle through Curtain’s master plan even as they fall prey to his kidnapping attempt. Imprisoned by well-meaning and sinister characters alike, the Society members face choices that test their loyalty as well as their intellect. Sequels sometimes lack the intensity of the original works, and Prisoner’s Dilemma struggles with this syndrome at times. The children’s unique talents, long since revealed, are past the startling sparkle of their introduction. As character development yields to a dominant plot, the story lacks the facile agility of its predecessors. On the other hand, the opening gambit is fresh and frightfully funny, as is Constance Contraire always and forever. The writing is replete with rollicking metaphors. Finally, as in the best of E. L. Konigsburg’s novels, Stewart’s introspective characters examine the significance of their experiences. Unlike most adventurers, these special children see the world surrounding their story and share it with readers. If this is the last Society installment, readers had better, as Reynie says, “acquire a taste for the bittersweet.”—Caitlin Augusta, Stratford Library Association for School Library Journal

Running long but hung about with cantrips to catch clever readers, Stewart’s children’s debut pits four exceptional youngsters, plus a quartet of adult allies, against a deranged inventor poised to inflict an involuntary “Improvement” on the world. Recruited by narcoleptic genius Mr. Benedict through a set of subtle tests of character, Reynie, Sticky, Kate and Constance are dispatched to the Learning Institute for the Very Enlightened to find out how its brilliant founder, Ledroptha Curtain, is sending out powerful mental messages that are sowing worldwide discord. Gifted with complementary abilities that range from Reynie’s brilliance with detail to Constance’s universally infuriating contrariness, the four pursue their investigation between seemingly nonsensical lessons and encounters with sneering upper-class “Executives,” working up to a frantic climax well-stocked with twists and sudden reversals. Low in physical violence, while being rich in moral and ethical issues, as well as in appealingly complex characters and comedy sly and gross, this Lemony Snicket–style outing sprouts hooks for hearts and minds both—and, appropriately, sample pen-and-ink illustrations that look like Brett Helquist channeling Edward Gorey. – Kirkus Reviews

March Book Pick: ‘The Mysterious Benedict Society’

NPR Book Review – February 29, 2012 (Excerpt)

In the five months since NPR started the Backseat Book Club, we’ve dipped into fantasy, whimsy, history and even a ghoulish tale. For March we are rolling out a puzzling tale:The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart. This is a story full of swashbuckling adventure and the kind of head-scratching conundrums that will challenge and entertain young readers.

It is easy to see why this book was a best-seller: The characters careen from one adventure to the next, and as they face a series of baffling tests, the readers are pulled into the knotty problem solving. Don’t be surprised if young people grab their pencils or pens to mark up the pages and work out the puzzles and riddles by hand.

This is the story of a group of eccentric children who all respond to a curious newspaper ad: “Are you a gifted child looking for special opportunities”

Though dozens of children respond to the ad, only a few pass the series of mind-bending tests about logic, history and bravery. Those four children make up the Mysterious Benedict Society, named for the man who brings them all together to help stop an evil mastermind who wants to take over the world with a mind-control machine. [Read the full article...]

‘Mysterious Benedict’: Solve A Puzzle, Save The World

NPR Book Review – March 26, 2012 (Excerpt)

In The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart, four exceptional children wind up going on the adventure of a lifetime after answering a rather strange ad. The ad appears in a newspaper in a fictional place called Stonetown. It reads, “Are you a gifted child looking for special opportunities?”

Dozens of children answer the ad and try to conquer a series of mind-boggling tests. But only four are able to pass. All are orphans, and each is a genius in his or her own way.

Author Trenton Lee Stewart explains how these children come together to form a sort of pint-size Mod Squad. The character Reynie is “a remarkable problem solver,” says Stewart. “He’s got a quick and facile intelligence. He has a tendency to see things that other people miss.”

The character known as Sticky got his name because “everything he reads or observes sticks to his brain,” says Stewart. “He has a photographic memory.”

Kate is “athletic and acrobatic,” according to Stewart. “She’s handy with all sorts of tools. She’s sort of a genius at solving physical problems.”

And Constance “just appears to be a very small, slightly pudgy, angry poet who’s always making rude poems about the people around her,” says Stewart. [Read the full article...]

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CRIMSON DAWN
Book One of the Darklife Saga by Ronnie Massey

Two Women Hunting A Rogue Vampire

Vampire Valeria Trumaine must confront old demons and face new possibilities as she struggles to bring a rogue vampire to justice. Her best friend and powerful Sidhe princess, Irulan, joins the hunt. Valeria will find that Irulan’s motives for keeping her safe are not what she thinks. And soon she is faced with an undeniable attraction that makes her question everything she knew about herself. [Read More...]

Available at Amazon.Com, Amazon.co.uk, Barnes & Noble, and any other good bookstore.

Celebrate a major anniversary of a true classic!

In 1962, a little boy named Peter put on his snowsuit and stepped out of his house and into the hearts of millions of readers. The Snowy Day transformed children’s literature with its pioneering portrayal of an African-American child and the charming story and artwork that won it the Caldecott Medal. Fifty years later, Viking proudly celebrates Peter’s adventure in this very special edition. Featuring eight pages of bonus material and a festive cover, this oversized edition of Keats’s beloved book is a must-have.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

About Ezra Jack Keats

Ezra Jack Keats (www.ezra-jack-keats.org), who died in 1983, was one of the first people to create a realistic, friendly, multi-ethnic urban setting in picture books for young children. His legacy lives on in the popularity of his most famous character, Peter – the star of The Snowy Day, Whistle for Willie, Peter’s Chair, A Letter to Amy, Goggles, and others.

Editorial Reviews

The Snowy Day, a 1963 Caldecott Medal winner, is the simple tale of a boy waking up to discover that snow has fallen during the night. Keats’s illustrations, using cut-outs, watercolors, and collage, are strikingly beautiful in their understated color and composition. The tranquil story mirrors the calm presence of the paintings, and both exude the silence of a freshly snow-covered landscape. The little boy celebrates the snow-draped city with a day of humble adventures–experimenting with footprints, knocking snow from a tree, creating snow angels, and trying to save a snowball for the next day. Awakening to a winter wonderland is an ageless, ever-magical experience, and one made nearly visceral by Keats’s gentle tribute.

The book is notable not only for its lovely artwork and tone, but also for its importance as a trailblazer. According to Horn Book magazine, The Snowy Day was “the very first full-color picture book to feature a small black hero”–yet another reason to add this classic to your shelves. It’s as unique and special as a snowflake. – Amazon.Com Review

Now in a sturdy board-book format just right for youngest readers, Ezra Jack Keats’s classic The Snowy Day, winner of the 1963 Caldecott Medal, pays homage to the wonder and pure pleasure a child experiences when the world is blanketed in snow. – Publishers Weekly

‘The Snowy Day’: Breaking Color Barriers, Quietly

NPR Book Review – January 28, 2012 (Excerpt)

One morning many years ago, a little boy in Brooklyn named Peter woke up to an amazing sight: fresh snow.

Peter is the hero of the classic children’s book by Ezra Jack Keats, The Snowy Day, which turns 50 this year. Peter has a red snowsuit, a stick just right for knocking snow off of trees, and a snowball in his pocket. And, though this is never mentioned in the text, Peter is African-American.

“It wasn’t important. It wasn’t the point,” Deborah Pope tells weekends on All Things Considered host Guy Raz. Pope is the executive director of the Ezra Jack Keats Foundation.

“The point is that this is a beautiful book about a child’s encounter with snow, and the wonder of it,” Pope says. Peter was among the first non-caricatured African-Americans to be featured in a major children’s book. But Pope says Keats — who was white — wasn’t necessarily trying to make a statement about race when he created Peter.

“He said, well, all the books he had ever illustrated, there had never been a child of color, and they’re out there — they should be in the books, too,” Pope says. “But was he trying to make a cause book, was he trying to make a point? No.” [Read the full article...]

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QUEEN OF MISFORTUNE
A Lady Jane Grey Novel by Peter Carroll

A Love Story of Shakespearean Dimension!

Queen Of Misfortune is the fictional story of Lady Jane Grey as told by her beloved tutor, John Aylmer. At the time of her execution a stranger is recorded to have assisted her when, blind folded, she lost her way upon the scaffold. Was it the same strange who was also recorded to have visited her when she was imprisoned in the Tower? Little is known of this unfortunate girl who was beheaded for treason in the 16^th Century. She was only 16. She is omitted from the list of monarchs but was actually queen for nine days. Author Peter Carroll, in his novel, follows John Aylmer’s close relationship with Jane as her tutor and later, as she grows up, her lover. [More...]

Available at Amazon.Com, Amazon.co.uk, Barnes & Noble, and any other good bookstore.

A wonderful middle-grade novel narrated by Kenny, 9, about his middle-class black family, the Weird  Watsons of Flint, Michigan. When Kenny’s  13-year-old brother, Byron, gets to be too much trouble,  they head South to Birmingham to visit Grandma, the  one person who can shape him up. And they happen to  be in Birmingham when Grandma’s church is blown  up.

About Christopher Paul Curtis

Christopher Paul Curtis was born in Flint, Michigan, and grew up there. Bud, Not Buddy, his second novel, winner of the 2000 Newbery Medal and the Coretta Scott King Author Award, is available in a Delacorte hardcover edition.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

Editorial Reviews

The year is 1963, and self-important Byron Watson is the bane of his younger brother Kenny’s existence. Constantly in trouble for one thing or another, from straightening his hair into a “conk” to lighting fires to freezing his lips to the mirror of the new family car, Byron finally pushes his family too far. Before this “official juvenile delinquent” can cut school or steal change one more time, Momma and Dad finally make good on their threat to send him to the deep south to spend the summer with his tiny, strict grandmother. Soon the whole family is packed up, ready to make the drive from Flint, Michigan, straight into one of the most chilling moments in America’s history: the burning of the Sixteenth Avenue Baptist Church with four little girls inside.

Christopher Paul Curtis’s alternately hilarious and deeply moving novel, winner of the Newbery Honor and the Coretta Scott King Honor, blends the fictional account of an African American family with the factual events of the violent summer of 1963. Fourth grader Kenny is an innocent and sincere narrator; his ingenuousness lends authenticity to the story and invites readers of all ages into his world, even as it changes before his eyes. Curtis is also the acclaimed author of Bud, Not Buddy, winner of the Newbery Medal. (Ages 9 to 12) –Emilie Coulter, Amazon.Com Review

Grade 5-8-In the only Newbery Honor book to make my list, the weighty issues and historical perspectives don’t get in the way of a very funny family. Byron plays some awful tricks on his younger brother Kenny, but readers can’t help but laugh at some of his less harmful teasing. He tells a convincing story to little sister Joey about how garbage trucks scoop up frozen Southern folks who don’t dress warmly enough, and half-fools Kenny with his tall tale. While the boys supply many of the laughs, it’s clear that they get their sense of humor from their dad. His gentle teasing and tongue-in-cheek exaggerations can be hilarious. Laughter and Tears Award: More than any other book on my list, the humor in The Watsons shifts to near tragedy and many thought-provoking developments. The serious stuff succeeds in part because readers grow so close to this family through the humor that comes earlier in the book. – Library Journal

‘Birmingham’: A Family Tale In The Civil Rights Era

NPR Book Review – January 26, 2012 (Excerpt)

Welcome to the fourth installment of NPR’s Backseat Book Club, where we select a book for young readers — and invite them to read along with us and share their thoughts and questions with the author.

Our selection for January — The Watsons Go to Birmingham – 1963 by Christopher Paul Curtis — describes the civil rights era from the perspective of a young (and extremely mischievous) boy and his family.

When young Byron Watson becomes too much to handle, his family decides to send him from Flint, Mich. to his legendarily tough Grandma Sands in Birmingham, Ala. — that incendiary year of 1963 when tensions over school desegregation were roiling.

Daphne Kunin from Lancaster, Pa. wanted to know if Curtis based any of the scenes from the book on his own life — like the episode with the “Nazi flame thrower of death” — when Byron lights toilet paper parachutes on fire over the toilet and flushes them away.

Curtis says that the particular scene is actually the most autobiographical moment in the book.

“It was based on me,” says Curtis tells NPR’s Michele Norris. “I just threw matches in the toilet. I liked the sound they made when they hit the water.” When Curtis tried to get away with burning the matches by locking the bathroom door, his mother kicked the door down and lifted him in the air by the collar, much as it happens in the book. [Read the full article...]

The Sabina Strong Series Continues – Vampire’s Trill

Lorelei Bell has created another unique and mesmerizing mystery masterwork that tops its prequel Vampire Ascending in drama, fast-paced action, love, passion, heartache, and devastation. New friends, new adventures, shocking revelations, and harrowing experiences make for riveting reading in this second installment of the Sabrina Strong Series. Sabrina learns more details – through Vasyl’s recounting of his human and vampire life – of what her role as a sibyl means and how the past and the future will come together. She finally learns what role Vasyl has played in his search for the next sibyl and why she is so tremendously important. [Read more...]

Vampire’s Trill is available at Amazon.Com – including the Kindle Version, Barnes & Noble – including the Nook Version, and any other good bookstores.

Also available in the United Kingdom at Amazon.co.uk including the Kindle version.

A dark and provocative novel from the author of The Secret Year

Ryan spends most of his time alone at the local waterfall because it’s the only thing that makes him feel alive. He’s sixteen, post-suicidal, and trying to figure out what to do with himself after a stint in a mental hospital. Then Nicki barges into his world, brimming with life and energy, and asking questions about Ryan’s depression that no one else has ever been brave enough – or cared enough – to ask. Ryan isn’t sure why he trusts Nicki with his darkest secrets, but that trust turns out to be the catalyst that he desperately needs to start living again. Jennifer R. Hubbard has created a riveting story about a difficult but important subject.

About Jennifer Hubbard

Jennifer R. Hubbard (www.jenniferhubbard.com) is the author of The Secret Year. She lives and writes near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Editorial Review

Evocative symbols, carefully drawn details and hints of romance enrich a spare, redemptive character study.

Home from a stay at Patterson Hospital following a suicide attempt, Ryan hikes to a powerful waterfall each morning to stand under the crushing spray. Nicki, the younger sister of a boy Ryan knows from school, sees him there one day in August and strikes up a conversation. For the first time, Ryan finds himself opening up to someone besides the two Patterson friends he now talks to by phone and online. As trust, familiarity and perhaps attraction build between the two, Ryan and Nicki reveal pieces of their personal histories, though each still harbors secrets. Defying both sensationalism and cliché, the narrative explores Ryan’s suicide attempt and its aftermath with what Ryan calls “Patterson Honesty: the truth, stripped down of all formalities, all politeness.” Although much is made of understanding the past—the shame and numbness that led to Ryan’s attempt, the unknowable reasons behind Nicki’s father’s completed suicide—the story is also about moving forward: Can intimacies built inside a place like Patterson survive outside? How can the parents of a teen who attempts suicide trust their child again? What can we ever truly know about ourselves and each other? – Kirkus Reviews

Not Just For Kids: ‘Try Not to Breathe’ by Jennifer R. Hubbard

The Chicago Tribune Book Review – January 15, 2012 (Excerpt)

Suicide is the third-leading cause of death for young people ages 10 to 24, claiming 4,400 lives annually, according to theU.S. Centers for Disease Control. That statistic alone is alarming, but at least 149,000 more young people attempt suicide and survive each year. It’s this second statistic that Jennifer R. Hubbard humanizes in her young-adult novel “Try Not to Breathe,” about a teenage boy struggling to find meaning after attempting to take his own life.

The book opens with Ryan standing under a waterfall that “pounded my mind blank … so I couldn’t think,” he writes in a story told from his perspective. Ryan, 16, knows the waterfall is dangerous. Someone had died there doing the same thing not too long ago, yet Ryan prefers the numbness that comes from risk-taking to the pain and self-doubt of personal interaction — most of all with girls. He’s been teased by crushes for staring at them and taken advantage of by others. [Read the full article...]

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THE BLEEDING HILLS
A Novel by Wilfried F. Voss

I have fought a good fight,
I have finished my course,
I have kept the faith.
- 2 Timothy iv. 7

The Irish War is officially a part of history, but not for Finnean Whelan, an IRA veteran of almost 40 years. British Intelligence has produced evidence that he is the mastermind behind a conspiracy to assassinate the First Minister of Northern Ireland. For Whelan this is not only a mission of revenge, but marks the beginning of a journey into the past and the return to the one true love: Ireland. [More...]

The Bleeding Hills is available at Amazon.Com, Amazon.co.uk, Barnes & Nobel, and any other good bookstore.

The year is 2009.  Nineteen-year-old Jackson Meyer is a normal guy… he’s in college, has a girlfriend… and he can travel back through time. But it’s not like the movies – nothing changes in the present after his jumps, there’s no space-time continuum issues or broken flux capacitors – it’s just harmless fun.

That is… until the day strangers burst in on Jackson and his girlfriend, Holly, and during a struggle with Jackson, Holly is fatally shot. In his panic, Jackson jumps back two years to 2007, but this is not like his previous time jumps. Now he’s stuck in 2007 and can’t get back to the future.

Desperate to somehow return to 2009 to save Holly but unable to return to his rightful year, Jackson settles into 2007 and learns what he can about his abilities.

But it’s not long before the people who shot Holly in 2009 come looking for Jackson in the past, and these “Enemies of Time” will stop at nothing to recruit this powerful young time-traveler.  Recruit… or kill him.

Piecing together the clues about his father, the Enemies of Time, and himself, Jackson must decide how far he’s willing to go to save Holly… and possibly the entire world.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

About Julie Cross

Julie Cross lives outside Chicago, where she works at the local YMCA.  This is her first novel.

Editorial Reviews

“A good thriller moves forward at high speed, but only a superlative thriller can take you on a breathtaking journey through the fourth dimension. Julie Cross’s ingenious story  is vividly imagined and splendidly rendered, hitting just the right notes with liberal doses of suspense, intrigue, and romance. Throw in a pitch-perfect cast of engaging characters, and you’ve got a blockbuster young adult debut that will keep readers glued to the pages.” —Sophie Littlefield, Award-Winning author of BANISHED

For time traveler Jackson Meyer, the past is the key to his increasingly dangerous future. But who can he trust? The CIA? His mysterious father? Or his conspiracy-theory addicted best friend? A maze of ingenious twists and turns, TEMPEST takes you on a magic carpet ride that will have you flipping pages to the end. —Jana Oliver, author of THE DEMON TRAPPER’S DAUGHTER

“Jackson Meyer is a 19-year-old Upper East Sider with a loving and loyal girlfriend, a brilliant and funny best friend and an unexpected and exciting new talent. Jackson can suddenly “jump” back and forth in time. Cross takes readers on a thrilling ride as Jackson struggles to harness his abilities in a desperate attempt to learn the truth about who he is and, even more importantly, who he can trust. The characters are…complex and distinct, they will work their way into readers’ hearts and stay with them long after the book is finished.
Equal parts adventure, romance, science fiction…readers will turn the last page and find themselves wishing they could “jump” to the future and read the sequel.”—KIRKUS REVIEWS, starred review

“Debut author Cross launches a trilogy with an exciting and complex page-turner about difficult choices. Nineteen-year-old Jackson Meyer can travel in time, but he’s no Doctor Who—he can only make short jumps backward, and he can’t change anything. It’s all harmless experimentation until his girlfriend, Holly, is shot when two gunmen attempt to kidnap him. Panicked, Jackson jumps back two years and gets stuck there. The consequences of unprepared time travel and Jackson pretending to be his 17-year-old self are amusing, but as he explores his life and pursues Holly (now his girlfriend-to-be), the already gripping story escalates. Jackson discovers his father’s secret life with a shadowy government agency called Tempest, and father and son become tangled with violent rival time travelers determined to alter the course of history. As Jackson explores his powers, he has no idea which side to trust or who is trying to kill him, and failure to make the right decisions threaten worldwide repercussions. It’s a story packed with moments both tender and electric—Cross’s zippy writing and fresh plot are an exhilarating combination.”—Publishers Weekly

Not Just for Kids: Julie Cross’ ‘Tempest’

The Chicago Tribune Book Review – January 22, 2012 (Excerpt)

The dramatic potential of time travel has been exploited for decades in kid lit and in recent months has become something of a micro trend in modern young adult fiction, with books including Jay Asher’s “The Future of Us” and Ian McDonald’s “Planesrunner.”

There’s something about the vicarious thrill of watching characters alter life as they know it, the escapism of moving between realities, that’s irresistibly adventurous and empowering. In “Tempest,” the kickoff to a thriller series for young adults from debut author Julie Cross, the rules are just slightly different from other titles predicated on the ability to bend the laws of physics.

As Jackson Meyer explains in the book’s journal-entry opener, “[I]t’s not as exciting as it sounds. I can’t go back in time and kill Hitler. I can’t go to the future and see who wins the World Series in 2038.” Alas, Jackson can, at first, merely “jump” a few hours into the past, as he did when he first discovered his unique ability: During a French poetry class at New York University. One minute he was dozing off; the next he was waking up to a door slamming in his face outside a campus dormitory. [Read the full article...]

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CRIMSON DAWN
Book One of the Darklife Saga by Ronnie Massey

Two Women Hunting A Rogue Vampire

Vampire Valeria Trumaine must confront old demons and face new possibilities as she struggles to bring a rogue vampire to justice. Her best friend and powerful Sidhe princess, Irulan, joins the hunt. Valeria will find that Irulan’s motives for keeping her safe are not what she thinks. And soon she is faced with an undeniable attraction that makes her question everything she knew about herself. [Read More...]

Available at Amazon.Com, Amazon.co.uk, Barnes & Noble, and any other good bookstore.

Godspeed was fueled by lies. Now it is ruled by chaos.

It’s been three months since Amy was unplugged. The life she always knew is over. And everywhere she looks, she sees the walls of the spaceship Godspeed. But there may just be hope: Elder has assumed leadership of the ship. He’s finally free to enact his vision – no more Phydus, no more lies.

But when Elder discovers shocking news about the ship, he and Amy race to discover the truth behind life on Godspeed. They must work together to unlock a puzzle that was set in motion hundreds of years earlier, unable to fight the romance that’s growing between them and the chaos that threatens to tear them apart.

In book two of the Across the Universe trilogy, New York Times bestselling author Beth Revis mesmerizes us again with a brilliantly crafted mystery filled with action, suspense, romance, and deep philosophical questions. And this time it all builds to one mind-bending conclusion: They have to get off this ship.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

About Beth Revis

Beth Revis (www.AcrosstheUniverseBook.com) is the New York Times bestselling author of the Across the Universe trilogy. A Million Suns is her second book. Beth lives in rural North Carolina with her husband and dog, and believes space is nowhere near the final frontier.

Editorial Review

Opening soon after the bleak ending of Across the Universe (2011), this captivating middle volume takes Godspeed’s 2,763 residents through commotion, twists and game-changers.

Sixteen-year-old Elder (he refuses the title Eldest, despite being the ship’s leader now) learned in the trilogy openerthat Godspeed’s weakened engine offers no chance of planet-landing for many decades. But Elder’s been studying physics, and he’s newly skeptical. Confronting the Shippers who physically run Godspeed begins a string of surprising reveals, and so does a set of clues left by a cryogenically frozen rebel. Among this population that’s been shipborn for generations, Earthborn Amy sticks out like a sore thumb (in race-coded ways that are troubling when examined closely). Amy wants off the 10 square miles of this metal-walled spaceship. The environment (levels; elevators; fields under a solar lamp; crammed stacks of city buildings) gives the plot (food hoarding, rape, riots, revolution) an acute tension. Amy and Elder alternate narrating in first person. Their voices aren’t distinct, their actions and characterizations frustrating in many ways, but it hardly matters: Revis’ shining brilliance is the fierce tension about survival (is Godspeed deteriorating? can people survive terrorism inside an enclosed spaceship?) and the desperate core question of whether any generation will ever reach a planet.

Setting and plot are the heart and soul of this ripping space thriller, and they’re unforgettable. (Science fiction. 14 & up) – Kirkus Reviews

Not Just for Kids: ‘A Million Suns’ by Beth Revis

The Chicago Tribune Book Review – January 8, 2012 (Excerpt)

More than 80 years ago, Aldous Huxley imagined a genetically engineered society whose inhabitants were willfully drugged into submission. In the “Across the Universe” trilogy, author Beth Revis takes that pioneering concept and sets it afloat in space with a cast of cloned and cryogenically frozen characters who, in the second installment of this bestselling sci-fi series, become increasingly mutinous.

As “A Million Suns” opens, it’s unclear if the ship, known as Godspeed, will live up to its well-intentioned name. Is it moving toward its destination or merely floating motionless in some unknown galaxy? No one understands Godspeed’s exact location in relation to the planet it’s been traveling toward for 250 years, but one thing is certain: The ship is falling apart.

The Feeders, or farmers, aren’t able to produce enough food. And Godspeed’s leadership is in question now that its new ruler, 16-year-old Elder, has taken its inhabitants off the drug that had supplicated them into allegiance for more than two centuries.

Elder is a clone who was bred to lead, but he’s new to the job. The former leader was killed off in the series opener, and his successor, Orion, was put on ice. But before Orion was bathed in cryogenic fluid and put in a deep freeze along with the other “frozens,” he recorded a series of video messages and hid them for Amy — who was born on Earth and, as Orion believes, can figure out the best solution to the ship’s problems, both mechanical and otherwise. [Read the full article...]

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[Read all of Veronica Backham's Interviews...]

Veronica Backham – Interview with Judith P. Vaughan (Script)

VB: Hello Judith. It’s a pleasure to meet you and talk about your new book titled “The Girl Without A Past.” Ooh, that sounds intriga.. uhm… interesting. Unfortunately, the movie is not out yet, so I just looked through the book. I got myself a new Kindle, you know. It just makes me look so sophisticated when I carry it with me. (Pause) Anyways, I noticed your novel has many, many words. Sorry, I just didn’t have the time to read them. (Sigh.) You know how that is. I mean, being a celebrity… There are so many things to do… (Sigh) Anyways, can you explain in a few words what your book is about?

JPV: It is nice to meet you, Veronica.  I want to thank you for taking the time to interview me.

Well, since the movie is not out yet, I will be glad to tell you about my book. “The Girl Without A Past” is the story of eleven-year-old twins, Samantha and Alexander Covington.  The twins are very different from each other, and they are constantly getting on each other’s nerves. The twins mysteriously win tickets to the new attraction, Paxton’s House of Mirrors.  There they are given the opportunity to win a grand prize, all they need to do is find and ring the bell that is hidden somewhere inside the house of mirrors.  But little did they know that they were the target of Buford Paxton, a man from a parallel world, and that by ringing the bell they were going to be transported to an enchanted forest where they would be trapped.  There they meet a strange girl named, Lilly, who saves them from a Minotaur.  The twins learn that Lilly is also a victim of Paxton’s revenge and they want to help her escape too.  The twins put their sibling rivalry aside, since they have to stay and work together, if they want to make it home alive.  But when they discover a way to return home, there is a problem, only one can return.

VB: Oh, problems. I don’t like problems. I just don’t know how to deal with them, and, anyways, they cause way too much work. I’m not sure about children, either. They’re so much work, too. Well, I guess, I could hire a nanny… (Thinking) I guess, my question is, why do you write for children? For me that comes over as a very difficult audience. Your novel is for children, right?

JPV: Yes, Veronica, you are correct, my book is for children. It is aimed at an upper middle grade audience, but I don’t only write middle grade novels but young adult novels too.  However, what you really want to know is why I write for children. Well, I have to agree with you, children are a lot of work. I should know, I have two boys living at home and it’s not easy, but they are our future and we need to teach them.

One good reason why write for children, would be that children need to learn and understand that the world around them is a mysterious place, full of wonder and beauty but there is heartache and problems too.  A book is a healthy way to arouse their imagination and put their creative minds to work. I believe every child should have access to books and magazines, and I applaud the parents who encourage their children to read.

So bottom line in terms of writing for children for me personally, I’ll say that the main purpose is my own pleasure. I love to write, and tell stories, in addition, it gives me a way to revisit my own childhood, and at the same time I get to entertain the children.

VB: Well, can I tell you stories about heartache and problems! (Sigh) It’s not easy being a celebrity. (Sigh) So, I guess, we are somewhat similar. I mean, we both want to entertain. (Thinking) So, how do you prepare yourself… I mean, when do you write, and where do you write? I myself had my ghost writers, you know, but from the many interviews I made with authors I have learned they all do it by themselves. I don’t quite understand the concept, but that’s okay. Anyways… (Thinking) Where was I…? (Thinking) Do you have children?

JPV: Well, we all have problems, and I have a long list of them. Yes, I do have children, teens to be exact and they keep adding items to my list of problems. It is not easy to write a novel, when you are a single mother with a full time job, it can get crazy. I personally sometimes feel like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde –just like the slogan, ‘sometimes you feel like a nut sometimes you don’t.’

Unfortunately, I don’t have a ghostwriter, I do all the thinking and writing myself.  I have a designated corner in my bedroom, with a desk and computer, where I do my writing, and when I am feeling lazy, I get on my bed with my laptop computer and type away.  I do most of the writing in the evenings after serving dinner and on my free time on the weekends.  Sometimes I do not leave my room for hours.  The way I prepare for my brainstorming and I get all my creative juices going, is by putting on the headphones and listening to piano music or contemporary instrumental music on Pandora Radio.  The music relaxes me and it muffles the noise around me so that I can concentrate, even though I am all alone in my bedroom when I write, the kids and the dogs can get loud at times.

VB: Oh, how I can feel your pain! (Sigh) You know, I don’t have kids or dogs, but I have the pepperuzzi, or whatever they’re called… You know, reporters. They can be such a distraction, well, like your children and dogs, I guess… (Thinking) Maybe I should get my ghostwriters write about my pain… Anyways… (Pause) So, do you have more ideas for more books?

JPV: I hear the paparazzi can be such a drag, but that’s the price you pay for being famous.  I guess I am lucky that I am not as famous as you are.

I have a few ideas for a new book, but right now, I have to concentrate in the novel I am currently trying to finish, that book is about a ghost and a boy who is being bullied.  As you know, bullying is a serious problem so I thought I would mix real life with the supernatural.  I have also made time, in my busy schedule, to give a facelift to an old novel I finished in 2010 but never published.  That novel is about a young girl that falls in love with a vampire.  You know since vampires are cool and hip again, I thought why let a good book go to waste and publish it myself.

VB: Well, I, personally, am not very fond of vampires. I mean, every woman loves a bad guy every now and then, but I wouldn’t wanna deal with the bite marks, you know. They’re not good when it comes to maintaining my status as a celebrity. (Pause) So, what’s up next? Any photo ops or interviews with David Letterman or Jay Leno?

JVP: (Giggle) Well I know what you mean about the bite marks, they are never good for your reputation but those vampire marks can be deadly too!  As to being contacted by a talk show, that hasn’t happened to me yet, but maybe you should check back with me about this time next year, perhaps one of my novels will be a movie by then.

VB: Okay… (Thinking) I thank you for being here… I guess. Talking about Letterman and Leno… They haven’t returned my phone calls yet. That is an outrage! Hey, Bobbie, get me Dave or Jay on the phone! Right now! Sorry… Gotta run!

Veronica Backham shares her interviews with famous people from all over the world, including Jesus Christ, Che Guevara, Charlie Sheen, and more. As we all know, Veronica’s accomplishments include a long career as a “secret” model plus multiple recordings in the music industry. Veronica has just recently published her memoir, which is pretty good for someone who has never read a book in her life. We are looking forward to her next interview.

The Girl Without A Past

A Children’s Novel by Judith P. Vaughan

After being lured into a devious trap, eleven years old twins, Samantha and Alex Covington find themselves transported to a parallel world. They appear in the middle of the forest, a dangerous place were Minotaurs and Trolls roam freely. There they discover that they are not the only victims when they are rescued by Lilly, a girl whose life clock has stopped and all of her past memories erased. They are about to have a mystery on their hands, a mystery that is related to their kidnapping. The clock is ticking —Samantha and Alex must hurry and find a way to get back home before their kidnapper finds them first, if not they will suffer the same fate as their new friend, Lilly.

Kindle Edition: Amazon Kindle Store

All other eBook formats: Smashwords.Com

Bombed, beaten, banned, and imprisoned, the Reverend Fred J. Shuttlesworth led the civil rights struggle for equality in Birmingham, Alabama, using nonviolent actions to protest segregation in schools, stores, buses, and the hiring of police officers. He pressed his congregation to register to vote and to cast their ballots for civil rights supports. Eugene “Bull” Conner, backed by the Ku Klux Klan, became a symbol of racist hatred and violence as he organized the Southern segregationists to rally against Shuttlesworth. With a spacious design that includes archival pictures and primary source documents on almost every page, this accessible photo-essay recounts the events in three sections that focus first on the Preacher (“Fred”), then on the Commissioner (“Bull”), and finally, on their confrontation. For readers new to the subject, the biographies will be a vivid, informative introduction, but even those who have some familiarity with the landmark events will learn much more here. Thorough source notes document the sometimes harrowing details and provide opportunities for further research, as does a list of suggested readings. Never simplistic, Brimner shows the viewpoints from all sources: some middle-class blacks resented “Fred’s” heavy-handed style – fiery, confrontational, dictatorial – even if they agreed with the goals; some whites in Birmingham did not wish to see an end to segregation, though their voices were drowned out. A penetrating look at elemental national history. –Booklist

A fascinating look at one of the most crucial places ad periods in the civil rights movements through two polar opposites. . . . A clean, graphically interesting design abets a well-researched, engaging narrative that contributes a more nuanced view of the period that is often seen. (author’s note, further reading, source notes, index) –Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review

The relative fame of Martin Luther King, Jr., and Rosa Parks tends to obscure other primary, important players in the Civil Rights Movement. One of these was the Reverend Fred L. Shuttlesworth, a Baptist minister who served churches in Alabama from the late 1940s to the early 1960s. Committed to his belief in the equality of all people before God, he was the driving force in bringing about the integration of Birmingham; and in this endeavor, he had help from a most unexpected source. Eugene “Bull” Conner was the Birmingham Commissioner of Public Safety and strong proponent of the city’s segregation ordinances. His enforcement techniques were legendary: dogs, fire hoses, brutality. Klan supported and driven by a set of beliefs as strong as, but counter to, Shuttleworth’s, Conner was a in large part responsible for turning the tide of public opinion in favor of civil-rights progress. In this highly pictorial book, Brimner limns the characters of both men and the ways in which their belief systems and personalities interacted to eliminate the segregation from the Birmingham statutes. Black-and-White pages and red sidebars containing supporting information on topics such as the murder of Emmet Till and Autherine Lucy’s attempt to integrate the University of Alabama make this a visually arresting book. The writing style is lively and informative. A brief bibliography, excellent source notes, and a sound index round out this volume, which can stand alongside Russell Freedman’s Freedom Walkers (Holiday House, 2006) and Brimner’s own Birmingham Sunday (Calkins Creek, 2010) as fine examples of both civil-rights history and photo-biographies. –School Library Journal

Larry Dane Brimner’s ‘Black & White’: Nonviolent confrontation and civil rights

The Washington Post Book Review – January 3, 2012

The nonviolence credo adopted by the civil rights movement of the late 1950s and ’60s did not, of course, mean a lack of action or agitation. Leaders used the courts, demonstrations, public opinion and economic power to chip away at the South’s segregationist policies. A handsome introduction to an ugly time, “Black & White” tells how the Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth cannily utilized an unabashed racist, Eugene “Bull” Connor, to advance equality in Birmingham, Ala., and beyond. Larry Dane Brimner presents these two men as stubborn personalities on a collision course. One felt guided and protected by God to push for civil rights, to the point that he was considered by many to be dictatorial. The other was just as determined to maintain the racial status quo. Aided by a wealth of pertinent photographs, Brimner chronicles their interactions through the years, culminating in the events of May 1963. While the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. weighed whether young people should participate in protests, Shuttlesworth and hundreds of Birmingham’s youth went on ahead. With Connor voted out of office but still in charge of the police, Shuttlesworth, who died in October, knew the timing was crucial. The resulting footage of children and teenagers being blasted by water cannons helped persuade the nation to pass crucial civil rights legislation.

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THE BLEEDING HILLS
A Novel by Wilfried F. Voss

I have fought a good fight,
I have finished my course,
I have kept the faith.
- 2 Timothy iv. 7

The Irish War is officially a part of history, but not for Finnean Whelan, an IRA veteran of almost 40 years. British Intelligence has produced evidence that he is the mastermind behind a conspiracy to assassinate the First Minister of Northern Ireland. For Whelan this is not only a mission of revenge, but marks the beginning of a journey into the past and the return to the one true love: Ireland. [More...]

The Bleeding Hills is available at Amazon.Com, Amazon.co.uk, Barnes & Nobel, and any other good bookstore.

Humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth’s fate hinges on one girl…

Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg. She’s a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister’s illness. But when her life becomes intertwined with the handsome Prince Kai’s, she suddenly finds herself at the center of an intergalactic struggle, and a forbidden attraction. Caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal, she must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect her world’s future.

About Marissa Meyer

Marissa Meyer was born and raised in Tacoma, Washington, home of Almond Roca and Stadium High School, which was made famous when Heath Ledger danced down the stadium steps in 10 Things I Hate About You. Marissa didn’t actually go to Stadium High School, but she did attend Pacific Lutheran University, where she earned her bachelor’s degree in Creative Writing. She still lives in Tacoma, now with her husband. Cinder is her YA debut.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

Editorial Review

Although it packs in more genres than comfortably fit, this series opener and debut offers a high coolness factor by rewriting Cinderella as a kickass mechanic in a plague-ridden future.

Long after World War IV, with a plague called letumosis ravaging all six Earthen countries, teenage Cinder spends her days in New Beijing doing mechanical repairs to earn money for her selfish adoptive mother. Her two sisters will attend Prince Kai’s ball wearing elegant gowns; Cinder, hated because she’s a cyborg, won’t be going. But then the heart-thumpingly cute prince approaches Cinder’s business booth as a customer, starting a chain of events that links her inextricably with the prince and with a palace doctor who’s researching letumosis vaccines. This doctor drafts cyborgs as expendable test subjects; none survive. Cinder’s personal tenacity and skill, as well as Meyer’s deft application of “Cinderella” nuggets—Cinder’s ill-fitting prosthetic foot (loseable on palace steps); a rusting, obsolete car colored pumpkin-orange—are riveting. Diluting them is a space-fantasy theme about mind-controlling Lunars from the moon, which unfortunately becomes the central plot. A connection between Cinder’s forgotten childhood and wicked Lunar Queen Levana is predictable from early on.

Despite the simplistic and incongruous-feeling telepathic-enslaver theme, readers will return for the next installment in this sharp, futuristic “Cinderella” tale. (Science fiction/fairy tale. 12-15) – Kirkus Reviews

Not Just for Kids: ‘Cinder’

The Los Angeles Times Book Review – January 1, 2012 (Excerpt)

Few fairy tales have been as endlessly reimagined and riffed upon as Cinderella. The beloved rags-to-riches story of an oppressed beauty whose kind nature is rewarded with the rare happily-ever-after ending has been turned into countless movies, ballets, books — even an ice show. Now it’s getting a feminist, futuristic makeover in Marissa Meyer’s terrific young-adult debut, “Cinder,” the kickoff to the four-book Lunar Chronicles series that will incorporate fellow fairy-tale heroines Little Red Riding Hood, Rapunzel and Snow White.

It’s clear from the first page in this inventive and fast-moving novel that 16-year-old Cinder isn’t your average princess in the making. She’s a cyborg who, instead of a glass slipper, is outfitted with an uncomfortably small robotic foot that her abusive adoptive stepmother hasn’t prioritized for an upgrade. Cinder is the best mechanic in the sprawling metropolis of New Beijing and could easily jury-rig a replacement appendage, but she doesn’t have money for the parts because her stepmom has co-opted Cinder’s earnings to dress her two biological daughters in the finest gowns for an upcoming ball. Being a “wirehead,” as her stepsister says, Cinder isn’t allowed to attend the coronation-cum-dance-party of the handsome Prince Kai. The closest she’ll get is fixing her stepfamily’s hovercraft.

Or so it seems until an attractive 19-year-old shows up at Cinder’s workshop with a broken android whose repair is a matter of national security, he says. Despite the young man’s disguise in a gray hooded sweatshirt, his copper-brown eyes and tousled black hair immediately identify him as the prince even before the retina display scanner in Cinder’s eye confirms it or the cooling fan overheats in Cinder’s C3PO-esque robotic assistant. [Read the full article...]

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CRIMSON DAWN
Book One of the Darklife Saga by Ronnie Massey

Two Women Hunting A Rogue Vampire

Vampire Valeria Trumaine must confront old demons and face new possibilities as she struggles to bring a rogue vampire to justice. Her best friend and powerful Sidhe princess, Irulan, joins the hunt. Valeria will find that Irulan’s motives for keeping her safe are not what she thinks. And soon she is faced with an undeniable attraction that makes her question everything she knew about herself. [Read More...]

Available at Amazon.Com, Amazon.co.uk, Barnes & Noble, and any other good bookstore.

My wish is to fall cranium over Converse in dizzy daydream-worthy love.

If only it were that easy.

Marcie has been dragged away from home for the summer—from Idaho to a family summerhouse in New Hampshire. She’s left behind her friends, a group of freaks and geeks called the Leftovers, including her emo-rocker boyfriend, and her father.

By the time Labor Day rolls around, Marcie suspects this “summer vacation” has become permanent. She has to start at a new school, and there she leaves behind her Leftover status when a cute boy brings her breakfast and a new romance heats up. But understanding love, especially when you’ve watched your parents’ affections end, is elusive. What does it feel like, really? Can you even know it until you’ve lost it?

Love & Leftovers is a beautifully written story of one girl’s journey navigating family, friends, and love, and a compelling and sexy read that teens will gobble up whole.

About Sarah Tregay

Sarah Tregay is a graphic designer. When she isn’t jotting down poems at stoplights, Sarah can be found hanging out with her “little sister” from Big Brothers Big Sisters. She lives in Eagle, Idaho, with her husband, two Boston terriers, and an Appaloosa named Mr. Pots.

Editorial Review

A girl cheats on her boyfriend, regrets it and writes it all in poems in this new verse novel.

Marcie moves to New Hampshire with her depressed and inattentive mother when her parents split. Her dad, it seems, is gay and has begun life with a new boyfriend. Marcie wants to return to Idaho and her friends, the “leftovers” in her high school, including her own boyfriend, musician Linus. Meanwhile, however, she meets drop-dead handsome J.D. and allows an innocent friendship with him to become a romance. When she does return to Idaho to live with her father, her relationships with both Linus and the other friends she left behind have changed. Tregay’s choice to write in verse works well, her spare but effective language artfully evoking what otherwise might be a conventional high-school romance. Personalities stand out well, especially Marcie, Linus and J.D. Marcie’s loneliness and guilt drive the story until its resolution. The father’s completely accepted gay relationship, although mostly in the background, adds an element of interest. It all feels realistic and makes for an interesting, attractive novel.

A verse novel with real depth to accompany all that white space. (Fiction. 12 & up) – Kirkus Reviews

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CRIMSON DAWN
Book One of the Darklife Saga by Ronnie Massey

Two Women Hunting A Rogue Vampire

Vampire Valeria Trumaine must confront old demons and face new possibilities as she struggles to bring a rogue vampire to justice. Her best friend and powerful Sidhe princess, Irulan, joins the hunt. Valeria will find that Irulan’s motives for keeping her safe are not what she thinks. And soon she is faced with an undeniable attraction that makes her question everything she knew about herself. [Read More...]

Available at Amazon.Com, Amazon.co.uk, Barnes & Noble, and any other good bookstore.

Click on image to buy from Amazon.Com

A stunning modern-day fairy tale from acclaimed author Anne Ursu

Once upon a time, Hazel and Jack were best friends. But that was before he stopped talking to her and disappeared into a forest with a mysterious woman made of ice. Now it’s up to Hazel to go in after him. Inspired by Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Snow Queen,” Breadcrumbs is a story of the struggle to hold on, and the things we leave behind.

About Anne Ursu

Anne Ursu is the author of the three middle-grade novels that comprise the Cronus Chronicles trilogy: The Shadow Thieves, The Siren Song, and The Immortal Fire. She teaches at Hamline University’s MFA program in Writing for Children and is a lifelong Minnesota Twins fan. Anne lives in Minneapolis with her son and cats.

Editorial Reviews

“Devastatingly brilliant and beautiful…Ursu has sculpted a rich and poignant adventure that brings readers deep into the mysterious, magical, and sometimes frightening forests of childhood and change. Breadcrumbs is one of those rare novels that turned me on my head then sat on my heart and refused to budge.” (Ingrid Law, Newbery Honor-winning author of Savvy )

“This is a lyrical book, a lovely book, and a smart book; it dares us to see stories as spreading more widely, and running more deeply, than we had imagined.” (Gary Schmidt, Newbery Honor-winning author of The Wednesday Wars )

Like a fairy-tale heroine, Hazel traverses the woods without a breadcrumb trail to save a boy who may not want to be saved in this multi-layered, artfully crafted, transforming testament to the power of friendship. (Kirkus Reviews (starred review) )

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

‘Breadcrumbs’: Young Readers Follow A Wintry Tale

NPR Book Review – December 20, 2011 (Excerpt)

Welcome to the third installment of NPR’s Backseat Book Club, where we select a book for young readers — and invite them to share their thoughts and questions with us and the author.

Our selection for December is a perfect holiday story: the enchanting modern-day fairy tale Breadcrumbs, by Anne Ursu, author of the popular Cronus Chronicles trilogy.

Ursu tells NPR’s Michele Norris that Breadcrumbs was inspired in large part by her own “snow coated” memories of growing up in Minnesota: “When you’re a kid and you look out the window and it’s snowing and that seems so magical and the world just becomes something else, something other. Everything is quiet, and it feels like it’s almost your kingdom to go out and conquer.”

Navigating the wintery world of Breadcrumbs are best friends Hazel and Jack, fifth-graders in a working-class Minneapolis neighborhood. Adopted as a baby from India, Hazel feels like an outsider, especially after her parents split up and she’s forced to attend a new school. Meanwhile, Jack is facing his own family challenges, and the two friends begin to drift apart.

Their all-too-familiar problems are given a supernatural twist when Jack disappears, supposedly lured into the forest by a woman in white. It’s up to Hazel to brave the wintry woods and find her friend. [Read the full article...]

The Girl Without A Past

A Children’s Novel by Judith P. Vaughan

After being lured into a devious trap, eleven years old twins, Samantha and Alex Covington find themselves transported to a parallel world. They appear in the middle of the forest, a dangerous place were Minotaurs and Trolls roam freely. There they discover that they are not the only victims when they are rescued by Lilly, a girl whose life clock has stopped and all of her past memories erased. They are about to have a mystery on their hands, a mystery that is related to their kidnapping. The clock is ticking —Samantha and Alex must hurry and find a way to get back home before their kidnapper finds them first, if not they will suffer the same fate as their new friend, Lilly.

Kindle Edition: Amazon Kindle Store

All other eBook formats: Smashwords.Com

Click on image to buy from Amazon.Com

There is not one you. There are many yous. There is not one world. There are many worlds. Ours is one of billions of parallel earths.

When Everett Singh’s scientist father is kidnapped from the streets of London, he leaves young Everett a mysterious app on his computer. Suddenly, this teenager has become the owner of the most valuable object in the multiverse—the Infundibulum—the map of all the parallel earths, and there are dark forces in the Ten Known Worlds who will stop at nothing to get it. They’ve got power, authority, and the might of ten planets—some of them more technologically advanced than our Earth—at their fingertips. He’s got wits, intelligence, and a knack for Indian cooking.

To keep the Infundibulum safe, Everett must trick his way through the Heisenberg Gate his dad helped build and go on the run in a parallel Earth. But to rescue his Dad from Charlotte Villiers and the sinister Order, this Planesrunner’s going to need friends. Friends like Captain Anastasia Sixsmyth, her adopted daughter Sen, and the crew of the airship Everness.

Can they rescue Everett’s father and get the Infundibulum to safety? The game is afoot!

Editorial Reviews

“Smashing adventure fiction that spans the multiverse without ever losing its cool or its sense of style. Ian McDonald is one of the greats of science fiction, and his young adult debut is everything you could hope for: romantic, action packed, wildly imaginative, and full of heart.” –Cory Doctorow, author For the Win

“This is science fiction adventure at its best, and at its core is Everett, the heroic little geekling that we all wanted to be as kids… With “Ten Known Worlds” as part of this book’s lore… I want an interdimensional passport ASAP… The adventure simply never stops… Snappy dialogue…and fascinating details round out this marvelous series debut.” –Speculative Fiction Examiner

“Science fiction rules in this stellar series opener about a boy who travels to parallel universes. What joy to find science fiction based on real scientific concepts… In his debut for teens, established science-fiction writer McDonald builds a world just different enough to charm readers into believing, populating it with entertaining, quirky characters, spicing up the story with Punjabi cooking and a secret dialect (complete with glossary) and explaining the multiverse theory in readily comprehensible terms. Suspense rules, and Everett’s advantages come from both his football goalie skills and his intelligence. Shining imagination, pulsing suspense and sparkling writing make this one stand out. As [character] Sen would say, “fantabulosa bona.”" –Kirkus Reviews

Not Just for Kids: ‘Planesrunner’ by Ian McDonald

The Chicago Tribune Book Review – December 18, 2011 (Excerpt)

It’s an alluring idea that somewhere, somehow there’s an alternate version of the life you’re currently living. It might be better. It could be far worse. But if it exists, and it’s possible to get there, why not at least visit? That’s the basic idea at the center of “Planesrunner,” the first book in the Everness series and the young-adult debut from award-winning sci-fi novelist Ian McDonald.

In the case of 14-year-old Everett Singh, his visit to an alternate version of modern-day London might never have happened if it weren’t for his father’s kidnapping, which happened in the middle of a rainy, Monday evening rush hour 10 days before Christmas. One minute, father and son were bicycling along a busy thoroughfare heading to a lecture on nanotechnology trends. The next, Everett’s dad was snatched off the street and thrown into the back of an Audi. The question is: Why?

Everett knew his dad was a quantum physicist who was more than a little interested in getting his son to understand the Many Worlds Theory, which posits that reality is not a single unfolding history but multiple realities wherein all possible alternative histories and futures coexist. Everett probably wouldn’t have thought his dad’s research at Imperial College had anything to do with the disappearance until his dad’s boss showed up wanting to know if Everett’s father had given him anything — a memory stick, perhaps, or a data DVD or file transfer — some piece of the long-term, big-budget project he was working on to find experimental evidence of the existence of parallel universes. [Read the full article...]

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CRIMSON DAWN
Book One of the Darklife Saga by Ronnie Massey

Two Women Hunting A Rogue Vampire

Vampire Valeria Trumaine must confront old demons and face new possibilities as she struggles to bring a rogue vampire to justice. Her best friend and powerful Sidhe princess, Irulan, joins the hunt. Valeria will find that Irulan’s motives for keeping her safe are not what she thinks. And soon she is faced with an undeniable attraction that makes her question everything she knew about herself. [Read More...]

Available at Amazon.Com, Amazon.co.uk, Barnes & Noble, and any other good bookstore.

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Set in the future when teenagers are monitored via camera and their recorded actions and confessions plugged into a computer program that determines their ability to succeed. All kids given a “score” that determines their future potential. This score has the ability to get kids into colleges, grant scholarships, or destroy all hope for the above. Scored‘s reluctant heroine is Imani, a girl whose high score is brought down when her best friend’s score plummets. Where do you draw the line between doing what feels morally right and what can mean your future? Friendship, romance, loyalty, family, human connection and human value: all are questioned in this fresh and compelling dystopian novel set in the scarily forseeable future.

About Lauren McLaughlin

Lauren McLaughlin grew up in the small town of Wenham, Massachusetts. After college and a brief stint in graduate school, she spent ten “unglamorous” years writing and producing movies before abandoning her screen ambitions to write fiction full-time. Though she fondly remembers much of her time in Massachusetts—the marina, the beach, various teenage escapades—she cannot, for the life of her, remember her SAT scores, her GPA, or any of the numbers that once summed her up. You can visit her at LaurenMcLaughlin.net

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

Editorial Reviews

“The bold, aggressive narrative condemns both No Child Left Behind-style testing and current financial policies, cautioning about what could happen to social mobility in the face of stark inequity.” – Kirkus

“Most dystopian fiction takes place within an established totalitarian regime, but Scored allows readers to witness the very first stages of a changing society.” - VOYA

“A tense and chilling look at a near future that’s all too recognizable. Scored will bring out the rebel in every reader.” -Scott Westerfeld, author of Goliath

“the most rounded, thought-provoking and pulse-pounding exploration of the surveillance society I’ve yet read.” - Cory Doctorow

Reader Review

I added this to my ‘to read’ list after writing a post for our library blog on the slew of teen dystopia novels with one word titles. I read this after Matched and Bumped. I felt this one was at least equal, if not better, than the others, but looking at them together, I think the cover design let this one down. The summary on the back also failed to play up the romance.

And, speaking of that, here’s what I liked about Scored:
- the relationship between Diego and Imani. I didn’t feel invested in the relationships in Matched and Bumped, but the one here was funny and enjoyable. There was a subtle repeating motif between Diego’s one visible eye (he has a carefully sculptured hair style that covers the other) and the single eyes of the cameras. Two very different gazes.
- the author succeeded in making the main character do bad things without losing the reader’s sympathy for her. This is a tricky thing to pull off, and it worked well here.
- characters come in a variety of ethnic groups and socioeconomic demographics. This is openly acknowledged, including the tension this can cause, without taking over the plot.
- Mr Carol. I’m sure Imani will look back and appreciate him some day.
- the fact that it wraps up in a single book. Major plus.

Things I wasn’t so into:
- Dystopic fiction always claims to be an account of a ‘foreseeable future’ which I find silly. Dystopias are metaphors for society as it is today. The Time Machine was about fears in society at the end of the nineteenth century; Nineteen Eighty-Four was about the post WWII years. Scored reflects the unease in recent decades around the education system and economy in the USA. This book would never have been written in, say, Finland, which enjoys one of the highest literacy rates in the world and free university education.
- Along those lines, this was a very USA myopic book, but of course it was written with that audience in mind, so I understand that. Still, I think Imani could have made a good argument against the Score by describing other country’s successful education systems in the year 2011 where being from the poorest, smallest town was no barrier to attending the best university.
- You know that feeling when you hear older generations making remarks like ‘the internet has destroyed interpersonal relationships!’ and you just roll your eyes because you are married to someone you met on Twitter? Scored has a few of those technological paranoia moments. I’m Gen Y, and they always grate with me, so I’d imagine it’s worse for the current generation of teens who have never known a world without the internet. The line from the software developer, that he’d written software ‘smarter than us’ was probably the height of that for me.

Going by the length of this review, the book certainly had me thinking, so this is a good choice for teens who like books that make them think. I thought it would be enjoyble to both younger and older teens. – Natz2-D2, Amazon.Com Customer Review

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CRIMSON DAWN
Book One of the Darklife Saga by Ronnie Massey

Two Women Hunting A Rogue Vampire

Vampire Valeria Trumaine must confront old demons and face new possibilities as she struggles to bring a rogue vampire to justice. Her best friend and powerful Sidhe princess, Irulan, joins the hunt. Valeria will find that Irulan’s motives for keeping her safe are not what she thinks. And soon she is faced with an undeniable attraction that makes her question everything she knew about herself. [Read More...]

Available at Amazon.Com, Amazon.co.uk, Barnes & Noble, and any other good bookstore.

Click on image to buy from Amazon.Com

What can happen in just a second,
a minute, or an hour?

About Steve Jenkins

Steve Jenkins has written and illustrated many nonfiction picture books for young readers, including the Caldecott Honor–winning What Do You Do with a Tail Like This? His books have been called stunning, eye-popping, inventive, gorgeous, masterful, extraordinary, playful, irresistible, compelling, engaging, accessible, glorious, and informative. He lives in Colorado with his wife and frequent collaborator, Robin Page, and their children.

Editorial Reviews

“This subtly philosophical examination of time, scale, and the mechanics of life is all but certain to leave readers reconsidering the world and their place in it.”— Publishers Weekly, starred review

“This is a fascinatingly different way to approach natural history as well as time…”— Bulletin

Reader Review

Steve Jenkins has offered up yet another masterful science book aimed squarely at young readers. This time around, he takes on time itself and explains it in a way that is sure to engage the picture book crowd and older readers alike. The largest section is devoted to things that can occur in one second. On two page spreads, different animals and man made objects are portrayed in Jenkin’s signature colorful style, along with a small fact. Did you know that in one second, a rattlesnake shakes its tail in warning sixty times? How about a bumblebee beats its wings 200 times? Also, “Somewhere in the world, four babies are born (and two people die).”

Fortunately for us, Jenkins does not stop there. After the three spreads of one second facts, we get two double page spreads of one-minute facts, and one spread of one hour facts. Jenkins then addresses one day, one week, one month and one year. All of his facts are fascinating and of the type that trivia loving kids will just devour like candy. He states that “An estimated 50 people are killed by sharks” in one year, and humans cut down 4,000,000,000 trees. You can see the potential in this book to spark interest in a variety of subjects.

The final pages of this unique book are devoted to things that are very quick, and things that are very long. For example, who knew that A Koi lived to 226 years of age? Also included is a bar graph showing Earth’s human population growth and a very nicely done visual of the the history of the universe. The genius of this book is that it works on so many levels. The format is appealing to very young children who will enjoy the many animal facts. The sheer amount of information included marks it as an excellent choice for even older children who will gain more of a visual understanding of concepts such as population growth, lifespan and time itself.

I also liked that the author “took the time” to point out that the second, the minute, the hour, and the week were all created by humans and not based on any natural cycle. His distinction between those and the year, month and day will enable kids to look at time in a whole new way. This is an excellent choice for any classroom or family, especially those with a wide age range of children. It is a well formatted, beautiful book that offers a valuable perspective. If you purchase science books for your children, don’t miss this one. – J. Prather, Amazon.Com Customer Review

How to Really Tell Time

The New York Times Book Review – November 23, 2011 (Excerpt)

Impatient children have been known to wonder: “What’s the difference between ‘in a moment’ and ‘in a little while’?”

In his artfully designed book “Just a Second,” Steve Jenkins, an accomplished author and illustrator of science books for children, may not answer this exact question. But with great precision, he does offer young readers – both patient and dawdling – a useful perspective on the passage of time.

Jenkins isn’t here to lecture but to enlighten. With a dazzling array of science and nature facts on the order of Ripley’s Believe It or Not, he succeeds in teaching children about time even as he’s bound to pique their interest in a wide variety of behaviors, animal (in one second, a bumblebee beats its wings 200 times), human (in one second, four babies are born and two people die) and mechanical (in one second, “the Apollo 10 spacecraft traveled almost seven miles during re-entry – the fastest humans have traveled in a man-made vehicle”). Really. [Read the full article...]

The Girl Without A Past

A Children’s Novel by Judith P. Vaughan

After being lured into a devious trap, eleven years old twins, Samantha and Alex Covington find themselves transported to a parallel world. They appear in the middle of the forest, a dangerous place were Minotaurs and Trolls roam freely. There they discover that they are not the only victims when they are rescued by Lilly, a girl whose life clock has stopped and all of her past memories erased. They are about to have a mystery on their hands, a mystery that is related to their kidnapping. The clock is ticking —Samantha and Alex must hurry and find a way to get back home before their kidnapper finds them first, if not they will suffer the same fate as their new friend, Lilly.

Kindle Edition: Amazon Kindle Store

All other eBook formats: Smashwords.Com

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As senior year rolls around, two unlikely couples find themselves caught between desire and the fear of intimacy. Liz and Sean, misunderstood by their parents, confused but certain they are in love, have an affair that ends shatteringly. Maggie and Dennis, just as confused, take their first steps toward understanding the demands life makes on everyone. Faced with real-life dilemmas that have no easy answers, Maggie, Dennis, Liz, and Sean must make choices that will affect the rest of their lives.

Four friends,
Two couples,
One year that will change their lives.

Liz and Sean, both beautiful and popular, are madly in love and completely misunderstood by their parents. Their best friends, Maggie and Dennis, are shy and awkward, but willing to take the first tentative steps toward a romance of their own. Yet before either couple can enjoy true happiness, life conspires against them, threatening to destroy their friendships completely.

The Wrong Crowd: A Tale Of Teens Behaving Badly

NPR Book Review – November 21, 2011 (Excerpt)

In reality, I may be a middle-aged woman with two nearly grown sons, but in my heart I am a teenage girl who has found herself pregnant and doesn’t know what to do. For if you came of age, as I did, reading Paul Zindel’s My Darling, My Hamburger, then you probably still feel that you know what it’s like to be a high school student whose life almost derails.

I sometimes take out my old copy of this book and have a look; not because it’s a cautionary tale (the writing is too subtle) or because it speaks to today’s young readers (in some important aspects it seems dated), but because it reminds me of who I was when I first picked it up.

I turn the first page and recall my goofy adolescent self with the Keith Partridge shag haircut and the Huk-a-Poo blouse and the orange-tinted lotion supposedly hiding — but really highlighting — a breakout on my chin. I was pretty nerdy, and I didn’t have to worry that I would get pregnant like one of the novel’s main characters, Liz, who is popular and beautiful and has sex with her boyfriend, Sean, then gets an illegal abortion. [Read the full article...]

VAMPIRE ASCENDING
by Lorelei Bell

Exciting Hunt For A Vampire Serial Killer in Chicago

Sabrina Strong is a Touch Clairvoyant who knows a secret. She knows her mother was turned into a vampire when Sabrina was ten. Now that she is grown up, a powerful magnate in the Chicago business world hires her to reveal the identity of who relentlessly murders vampires in his ultra-modern stronghold of a hotel. [Read More...]

Vampire Ascending is now available at Amazon.Com, Amazon.co.uk, Barnes & Noble, and any other good bookstore.

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It’s 1996, and Josh and Emma have been neighbors their whole lives. They’ve been best friends almost as long – at least, up until last November, when Josh did something that changed everything. Things have been weird between them ever since, but when Josh’s family gets a free AOL CD in the mail,his mom makes him bring it over so that Emma can install it on her new computer. When they sign on, they’re automatically logged onto their Facebook pages. But Facebook hasn’t been invented yet. And they’re looking at themselves fifteen years in the future.

By refreshing their pages, they learn that making different decisions now will affect the outcome of their lives later. And as they grapple with the ups and downs of what their futures hold, they’re forced to confront what they’re doing right – and wrong – in the present.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

About Jay Asher and Carolyn Mackler

Jay Asher’s first novel, Thirteen Reasons Why, spent over a year on the New York Times bestseller list, with foreign rights sold in over 30 countries and more than 1,000,000 copies in print in the US alone. Visit his website at www.jayasher.blogspot.com and follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/jayasherguy.

Carolyn Mackler (www.carolynmackler.com) is the author of the teen novels The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things (A Michael L. Printz Honor Book), Tangled, Guyaholic, Vegan Virgin Valentine, and Love and Other Four-Letter Words. In 2008, Carolyn was a judge for the National Book Award for Young People’s Literature. She lives in New York City with her husband and two young sons.

Editorial Reviews

“These two top-of-their-game authors don’t disappoint.” - Publisher’s Weekly Starred Review

“A clever, timely story that will attract any teen with a Facebook account.” – Booklist, Starred Review

“Without question a page-turner.” – Kirkus Reviews

“Highly engaging.a tremendously likable, soul-searching romantic comedy and a subtle reminder to occasionally unplug and live in the moment.” School and Library Journal

Not Just for Kids book review: ‘The Future of Us’

The Chicago Tribune Book Review – November 20, 2011 (Excerpt)

With the exception of the psychically inclined, most people would prefer to let their futures remain unknown, fearing that what they discover might influence their current choices and, as a result, alter what was otherwise meant to be.

In the inventive new young adult novel, “The Future of Us,” two Pennsylvania teenagers aren’t given that choice.

Emma Nelson was a middle-of-the-road 16-year-old, running track and practicing saxophone at Lake Forest High when her divorcee dad gave her a guilt gift — a hand-me-down computer. The year was 1996, when PCs were as bulky as televisions and the Internet was accessed with dial-up service.

Facebook is still years away, yet the social networking site popped up on Emma’s computer screen after she downloaded an AOL CD-ROM that promised to give her 100 hours of free Web access. Emma Nelson, the site said, was 31 years old. And she was married. Though the elder Nelson shared the same birthday and liked the same movies and comfort foods, Emma was taken aback by this other Emma Nelson, who was contemplating highlighting her hair and wondering why her husband hadn’t come home over the weekend, according to her status updates. [Read the full article...]

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THE BLEEDING HILLS
A Novel by Wilfried F. Voss

I have fought a good fight,
I have finished my course,
I have kept the faith.
- 2 Timothy iv. 7

The Irish War is officially a part of history, but not for Finnean Whelan, an IRA veteran of almost 40 years. British Intelligence has produced evidence that he is the mastermind behind a conspiracy to assassinate the First Minister of Northern Ireland. For Whelan this is not only a mission of revenge, but marks the beginning of a journey into the past and the return to the one true love: Ireland. [More...]

The Bleeding Hills is available at Amazon.Com, Amazon.co.uk, Barnes & Nobel, and any other good bookstore.

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A Letter from Author N. D. Wilson

Source: Amazon.Com

I love history–and not just the official in-every-textbook stuff (though I enjoy that too). I love the classics of adventure–especially classics magical or piratical or exploratory. I love Latin and maps and running till I’m exhausted and hot days and my grandfather’s old leather flight jacket (which he lost). I have explored tombs in Jerusalem and back alleys in London. I have been lost in the tunnels of Brussels (with a van full of children), and I have been robbed in Rome (it was easy, anyone can do it). But my adventures are nothing compared to the adventures of men like Lewis and Clark and Magellan and Brendan the Navigator, and I can’t help but be stunned by what they were able to accomplish without our technological crutches and gifts (and internal combustion engines).

I love books that give me a thirst to step outside and blink in the sun (or blink in the rain), books that make me put on my boots or my shoes or my sandals, that make me want to climb, to dive, to dig, to have staring contests with anthills, to hold crabs or touch sharks or search out even fatter books.

Escapism in fiction can be a beautiful thing. But that’s not the only thing I hope to create. If kids around the world pass through The Dragon’s Tooth and become friends with Cyrus and Antigone Smith and form clubs and sit in circles to role-play with dice and wish they had more interesting lives, then I will have failed. But if they dream of learning to sail, to swim, to fly, if they dream of running faster than they’ve ever run and studying Latin (or Greek or Persian or Creole), if they walk outside and realize that their world is more wonderful, more surprising, more dangerous, and more exciting than anything I could ever create, if they discover that they themselves could become more interesting than any character I could ever shape, then I will have succeeded.

In The Dragon’s Tooth, I season my story with a pirate cook and flight lessons and truly electric lightning bugs and an old motel beside a quiet road in Wisconsin. I add one or two of history’s rogues (and whip spiders and a bull shark named Lilly and a giant snapping turtle named Leon), and then I put it all on a sizzling end-of-summer barbecue and serve it with lemonade.

Taste. Eat. I hope you like. But if you don’t, step outside and look at the sky. Right now, you’re standing on a ball that is hurtling through space at Mach 86. And that ball of fire up there in the blue is slinging us around like we’re on a string. Birds really can fly. And sing. The ocean is real. The platypus is no myth. Caterpillars turn into soup (and yes, that soup turns into butterflies). This is our fantasy world, and it is the world into which I hope my readers escape.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

About N. D. Wilson

N. D. WILSON lives in Idaho with his wife and their five young explorers. For more information, please visit ndwilson.com.

Editorial Reviews

“Wilson (the 100 Cupboards books) launches the Ashtown Burials series with this wildly imaginative and action-packed thrill ride…Wilson balances these hyperbolic plot elements with measured prose and smart dialogue, while combining pulp sensibilities, cinematic pacing, and fully developed characters readers will gladly follow down the rabbit hole.” – Publishers Weekly

Cyrus and Antigone Smith have been living with their brother, Dan, since the mysterious circumstances that caused their father’s death and their mother’s coma. Then Billy Bones appears out of nowhere with a ring of keys and a dragon’s tooth. Within moments of passing them to Cyrus, Billy is killed and Dan is kidnapped by the elusive Dr. Phoenix. The only possibility of rescuing their brother seems to reside in Ashtown with the Order of Brendan. This fast-paced fantasy quickly draws readers in to its alternate reality, where transmortal creatures cannot be defeated with ordinary weapons, and Dr. Phoenix’s experiments on Dan and others are reminiscent of history’s worst realities. Yet, on the positive side, there is the love the Smith family holds for one another, love that requires trust and self-sacrifice. Allusions to mythology and complex character development—not only of several young protagonists but also of Phoenix and the shifty cook, Sterling—make Wilson’s first in a proposed series helps make this a gem. In an embattled world, where evil seems insurmountable, a glimmer of hope arises from a tooth.
— Melissa Moore, Booklist

“This volume marks the birth of an extraordinary new series. Populated with well-crafted characters, peppered with mythological references, and brought to vivid life through Wilson’s masterful storytelling, this book is sure to appeal to the adventurous spirit in all who delve into its pages.” – School Library Journal

Epic Fantasy Meets Americana In ‘The Dragon’s Tooth’

NPR Book Review – November 10, 2011 (Excerpt)

In the fantasy world of N.D. Wilson, kids are the keepers of the world’s secrets, snakes also serve as protective necklaces, and death is not always the end.

Wilson is a writer of young-adult fiction, and in his latest book, The Dragon’s Tooth — the first in his Ashtown Burialsseries — he tells a story that blends the contemporary with the legendary.

The book begins with Cyrus, 12, and his sister Antigone, 13 — two American kids living in a roadside motel in Wisconsin who get caught up in the intrigues of an old man who shows up at the motel, gives the siblings a key ring, and then dies.

That’s when Cyrus and Antigone get swept up in an order of explorers that traces its roots all the way back to Brendan the Navigator, a sixth-century Irish saint who is said to have set sail in search of paradise.

Wilson tells NPR’s Guy Raz how his version of St. Brendan’s story ties into that of Cyrus and Antigone: “[He] sailed in a little leather boat across the ocean to North America and up the Hudson [River] and eventually into the Great Lakes and founded the outer outpost of his order of explorers, the Order of Brendan … [in] a place called Ashtown.”

When St. Brendan got there, Ashtown, Wis., was the end of the world — it was as far as you could go. But then more than a thousand years go by, and the end of the world becomes Wisconsin, home to the Order of Brendan and the secrets of the world. [Read the full article...]

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QUEEN OF MISFORTUNE
A Lady Jane Grey Novel by Peter Carroll

A Love Story of Almost Shakespearean Dimension!

Queen Of Misfortune is the fictional story of Lady Jane Grey as told by her beloved tutor, John Aylmer. At the time of her execution a stranger is recorded to have assisted her when, blind folded, she lost her way upon the scaffold. Was it the same ‘stranger’ who was also recorded to have visited her when she was imprisoned in the Tower? Little is known of this unfortunate girl who was beheaded for treason in the 16^th Century. She was only 16. She is omitted from the list of monarchs but was actually queen for nine days. Author Peter Carroll, in his novel, follows John Aylmer’s close relationship with Jane as her tutor and later, as she grows up, her lover. [More...]

Available at Amazon.Com, Amazon.co.uk, Barnes & Noble, and any other good bookstore.

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Not so very long ago, Eragon—Shadeslayer, Dragon Rider—was nothing more than a poor farm boy, and his dragon, Saphira, only a blue stone in the forest. Now the fate of an entire civilization rests on their shoulders.

Long months of training and battle have brought victories and hope, but they have also brought heartbreaking loss. And still, the real battle lies ahead: they must confront Galbatorix. When they do, they will have to be strong enough to defeat him. And if they cannot, no one can. There will be no second chances.

The Rider and his dragon have come further than anyone dared to hope. But can they topple the evil king and restore justice to Alagaësia? And if so, at what cost?

This is the much-anticipated, astonishing conclusion to the worldwide bestselling Inheritance cycle.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

About Christopher Paolini

Christopher Paolini is the author of three other bestselling novels about Alagaësia: Inheritance is the fourth and final volume in the cycle. Christopher lives in Montana, where the natural landscape has been a major inspiration in the creation of his stories. You can find out more about Christopher and the Inheritance cycle at alagaesia.com.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

Reader Review

I have been a Christoff Panini fan since 2003, when the first book in his highly original and never-been-done-before take on fantasy literature was published. I believe the first book back then was deemed Errorgon. I am happy to report to one and all that Panini continues his groundbreaking literary masterpiece series with Inheritance. I dare say that it is the best in the whole series of highly intelligent fantasy literature that is better than anything Michael Crichton has ever put out.

In the past, Panini always wrote about this dragon and this young lad who rode on this dragon. In this installment, said dragon has apparently flown away because the lad stupidly left its cage door open. This results in ensuing hilarity as the lad teams up with a green ogre and a blonde princess to track down his pet dragon. The plot of this novel is unbelievably trailblazing because I have never, ever heard or, rather, read of such an ingenious and clever story that has never, ever been attempted before.

I have to sheepishly confess that back in 2003, I had doubts about Panini as an author. He had serious trouble with properly writing compound sentences, dependent clauses and appropriate predicates; simultaneously, he had a hard time avoiding comma splices and dangling modifiers, that twit!

However, his writing and his storytelling prowess have improved to the degree that he is now a much better author than not only Michael Crichton, but also John Grisham, Tom Clancy, Bill O’Reilly, Mary Shelley, Saul Bellow, Ray Bradbury, Truman Capote and William S. Burroughs. He may even be a little bit better than Dr. Seuss, too. In short, please make Panini richer and buy Inheritance. I personally offer you my book-lover’s guarantee that even if you have to dig deep into your unemployment check (because Obama refused to create any jobs since he misdirected taxpayer money into the public sector through his idiotic shovel-ready jobs nonsense), you will have no regrets with Inheritance. - Hassan Z. Brockovich Sr., Amazon.Com Customer Review

Christopher Paolini offers answers about Eragon and friends in ‘Inheritance’

The Washington Post Book Review – November 8, 2011 (Excerpt)

Oh, how quickly they grow up. Just eight years ago, Eragon was an orphaned farm boy, and his inventor was a home-schooled wunderkind. Today, the dragon rider possesses immortal­ity, a light-up sword and enough magic to levitate Hogwarts. And Christopher Paolini, now in his 20s, is an internationally best-selling author. The fourth and final volume of the series, “Inheritance,” is being released Tuesday with a massive 2.5 million-copy print run.

Fans who have grown up with the series will be speed-reading the 880-page finale this week to find out if Eragon and Saphira and their allies will free Alagaesia from the evil King Galbatorix. Also hanging in the balance is the fate of Eragon’s half-brother, Murtagh, and his dragon, Thorn, who have been coerced by Galbatorix. For those disheartened by the lack of resolution in the third novel, “Brisingr,” “Inheritance” offers a propulsive plot and plenty of answers.

Paolini began writing the first book, “Eragon,” when he was 15, and his parents, who owned a press, published it. He traveled to schools and Renaissance fairs, hand-selling his opus, until Carl Hiaasenpicked up a copy for his son on a fly-fishing vacation and put in a good word at Knopf. The rest is publishing history.

Eragon and his blue dragon, Saphira, were an endearing duo, but critics, including this one, noted the novel’s debt to everyone from J.R.R. Tolkien and Anne McCaffrey to George Lucas. (I caught a David Eddings reference or two in the new one.) But Paolini had readers at “dragon.” [Read the full article...]

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THE BLEEDING HILLS
A Novel by Wilfried F. Voss

I have fought a good fight,
I have finished my course,
I have kept the faith.
- 2 Timothy iv. 7

The Irish War is officially a part of history, but not for Finnean Whelan, an IRA veteran of almost 40 years. British Intelligence has produced evidence that he is the mastermind behind a conspiracy to assassinate the First Minister of Northern Ireland. For Whelan this is not only a mission of revenge, but marks the beginning of a journey into the past and the return to the one true love: Ireland. [More...]

The Bleeding Hills is available at Amazon.Com, Amazon.co.uk, Barnes & Nobel, and any other good bookstore.