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 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...]

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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.

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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 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...]

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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...]

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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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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.

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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

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

Click on image to buy from Amazon.Com

In early August 2010, the unthinkable happened when a mine collapsed in CopiapÓ, Chile, and 33 miners were trapped 2,000 feet below the surface. For sixty-nine days they lived on meager resources and increasingly poor air quality. When they were finally rescued, the world watched with rapt attention and rejoiced in the amazing spirit and determination of the miners. What could have been a terrible tragedy became an amazing story of survival.

Now, with exclusive interviews with rescuers and expert commentary, Marc Aronson brings us the backstory behind this incredible event. By tracing the psychological, physical, and environmental factors surrounding the rescue, Trapped highlights the amazing technology and helping hands that made it all possible. From the Argentinean soccer players who hoped to raise morale, to NASA volunteering their expertise to come up with a plan, there was no shortage of enterprising spirit when it came to saving lives.

About Marc Aronson

Marc Aronson is the author of the critically acclaimed Sir Walter Ralegh and the Quest for El Dorado, winner of the ALA’s first Robert L. Sibert Information Book Award for nonfiction and the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award. He has also written Art Attack: A Brief Cultural History of the Avant-Garde. A passionate spokesperson for young-adult literature, he has written many articles on the subject that have been published in two collections, the most recent of which is Beyond the Pale: New Essays for a New Era. He has won the LMP Award for editing and has a PhD in American history from NYU. He lives in Maplewood, New Jersey, with his wife and son.

Editorial Reviews

“Masterful storytelling brings to life a story that most think they already know; the 33 miners trapped in a Chilean copper mine for 69 days in 2010…. It was a gripping story then, and Aronson manages to make it even more exciting, more inspirational, and more personal, all by gathering pieces of the puzzle and showing how they fit together. Explanations of how the Earth’s formation and plate tectonics created the copper lines that are so valuable to the world today are a critical beginning. Filling them in with a brief history of metalworking and mining leads readers to the small, out-of-the-way mine in the Atacama Desert region. From there the story becomes as intriguing and suspenseful as any work of fiction; the miners’ struggle to survive below ground is juxtaposed with the frenzy of the work aboveground by the mine officials, the government, and many others working to save the men. Detailed descriptions of the conditions that the miners endured and how they coped paint a vivid picture of just what an ordeal it was. The global response to the disaster was enormous, with organizations, governments, and individuals from Australia, New Zealand, the United States, and Japan offering resources and expertise to find a solution. Ample source notes, black-and-white photographs, websites, and a brief explanation of research methodology round out this must-have for any library.” –School Library Journal

“There’s something here to rivet just about anyone, from gearheads who follow the approaches to drilling, to humanists who empathize with the trapped men and their anxious families, to nascent activists who recognize that behind the heroics lies a corrupt, neglectful system of mine operation that endangers workers to maximize profit. Students using this title as a foundation for a written report will appreciate the annotated sourcing, timeline, index, glossary, and perhaps most important, the motherlode of useful websites. Teachers and librarians might also want to direct their students’ attention to Aronson’s appended essay on how he conducted his own Internet-based research.” –The Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books

“Aronson zips readers through a whirlwind primer….The succinct text is enhanced by a strong selection of photographs, illustrations, and diagrams, all of which help make the abstract technical issues clear. The remainder of the book is structured in a riveting day-by-day, “above-and-below” account of the rescuers’ struggle to locate survivors and bring them to the surface. Well-chosen quotes and interviews humanize the headlines, and Aronson’s dramatic writing achieves a sense of taut suspense that will captivate young readers. The extensive back matter includes biographical sketches of the miners, as well as a glossary, time line, bibliography, and list of suggested websites. Teachers will welcome this excellent title for classroom discussion, which closes with Aronson’s “How I Wrote This Book,” detailing his research methods.” –Booklist

Marc Aronson’s ‘Trapped: How the World Rescued 33 Miners From 2,000 Feet Below the Chilean Desert’

The Washington Post Book Review – November 1, 2011 (Excerpt)

In a book about Chile’s famously trapped miners, you expect a certain depth of research.

But it’s Marc Aronson’s wide, expansive view that is so refreshing. From geology and engineering to economics, mythology and religion, Aronson provides young readers with insights and analogies that can be applied far beyond what happened last year in an under-supervised Chilean mine.

Of course, he has a dramatic story to tell, pivoting between the miners’ situation (profound darkness, scarce food, impressive teamwork) and the rescuers’ complicated efforts to recover the 33 men. Rounding out all the facts, maps and diagrams, Aronson displays a certain storytelling bravado. [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.

Click on image to buy from Amazon.Com

Melding the entirely true and the wildly fictional, Dead End in Norvelt is a novel about an incredible two months for a kid named Jack Gantos, whose plans for vacation excitement are shot down when he is “grounded for life” by his feuding parents, and whose nose spews bad blood at every little shock he gets. But plenty of excitement (and shocks) are coming Jack’s way once his mom loans him out to help a fiesty old neighbor with a most unusual chore—typewriting obituaries filled with stories about the people who founded his utopian town.

As one obituary leads to another, Jack is launced on a strange adventure involving molten wax, Eleanor Roosevelt, twisted promises, a homemade airplane, Girl Scout cookies, a man on a trike, a dancing plague, voices from the past, Hells Angels . . . and possibly murder. Endlessly surprising, this sly, sharp-edged narrative is the author at his very best, making readers laugh out loud at the most unexpected things in a dead-funny depiction of growing up in a slightly off-kilter place where the past is present, the present is confusing, and the future is completely up in the air.

About Jack Gantos

Jack Gantos has written books for people of all ages, from picture books and middle-grade fiction to novels for young adults and adults. His works include Hole in My Life, a memoir that won the Michael L. Printz and Robert F. Sibert Honors, Joey Pigza Swallowed the Key, a National Book Award Finalist, and Joey Pigza Loses Control, a Newbery Honor book.

Jack was born in Mount Pleasant, Pennsylvania, and grew up in nearby Norvelt. When he was seven, his family moved to Barbados. He attended British schools, where there was much emphasis on reading and writing, and teachers made learning a lot of fun. When the family moved to south Florida, he found his new classmates uninterested in their studies, and his teachers spent most of their time disciplining students. Jack retreated to an abandoned bookmobile (three flat tires and empty of books) parked out behind the sandy ball field, and read for most of the day. The seeds for Jack’s writing career were planted in sixth grade, when he read his sister’s diary and decided he could write better than she could. He begged his mother for a diary and began to collect anecdotes he overheard at school, mostly from standing outside the teachers’ lounge and listening to their lunchtime conversations. Later, he incorporated many of these anecdotes into stories.

While in college, he and an illustrator friend, Nicole Rubel, began working on picture books. After a series of well-deserved rejections, they published their first book, Rotten Ralph, in 1976. It was a success and the beginning of Jack’s career as a professional writer. Jack continued to write children’s books and began to teach courses in children’s book writing and children’s literature. He developed the master’s degree program in children’s book writing at Emerson College and the Vermont College M.F.A. program for children’s book writers. He now devotes his time to writing books and educational speaking. He lives with his family in Boston, Massachusetts.

Editorial Reviews

“This winning novel, both humorous and heartwarming, takes place during the summer of 1962, when narrator Jack Gantos turns 12 and spends most of his days grounded. Jack’s main ‘get out of jail free card,’ and one of the novel’s most charming characters, is Miss Volker. The blossoming of their friendship coincides with the blooming of Jack’s character.” —Shelf Awareness Pro

“An exhilarating summer marked by death, gore and fire sparks deep thoughts in a small-town lad not uncoincidentally named ‘Jack Gantos.’ The gore is all Jack’s, which to his continuing embarrassment ‘would spray out of my nose holes like dragon flames’ whenever anything exciting or upsetting happens. And that would be on every other page, seemingly . . . Characteristically provocative gothic comedy, with sublime undertones.”  —Kirkus Reviews, starred review

“Nobody can tell a story like Jack Gantos can. And this is a story like no other. It’s funny. It’s thoughtful. It’s history. It’s weird. But you don’t need me to attempt to describe it. Get in there and start reading Gantos.”  —Jon Scieszka, founder of guysread.com and author of the Spaceheadz series

‘Dead End in Norvelt,’ by Jack Gantos

The Washington Post Book Review – November 1, 2011 (Excerpt)

The summer of ’62 proves to be a bumper-car ride through history for young Jack Gantos in this wonderfully wacky semi-autobiographical novel by the author of the same name.

Grounded by his parents, Jack still manages to be in the thick of small-town doings, thanks to Miss Volker, whose arthritic hands necessitate his services as scribe for her newspaper obituaries. In her free-ranging tributes, Miss Volker blends details about the deceased with town history (Norvelt was founded in 1934 by Eleanor Roosevelt) and world events (such as the English Peasants’ Revolt of 1381). These, in turn, pique Jack’s quirky reflections on gossip, war movies, factories and the gold-crazed Spanish explorers lauded in American textbooks of the time. [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.

Click on image to buy from Amazon.Com

A newly published book by author, Judith P. Vaughan. This book will stir the children’s imagination as they read and try to solve the mystery.

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.

The twins fight against time and risk their lives to get to the only place they can open the portal, and enter the last place they want to be in the house of their kidnapper. The twins are a step closer to solving the mystery, and getting the last clue to set everything right, but what happens next depends on how they decide.

Ordering Information

• Kindle Edition: Amazon Kindle Store
• All other eBook formats: Smashwords.Com

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

About Judith P. Vaughan

Judith was born in Panama, and her family relocated to the U.S. in the late 70’s. She lived in New York as a teenager, but a few years later her family decided to move again, and this time they headed to Houston, Texas, and that is where Judith has set her roots. She chose to make a living working as a legal assistant and has been doing so for over twenty years, but during this time she felt that something was missing, that she needed to follow her dreams. In 2008, Judith rediscovered her love for writing, and took pen and paper and started to come up with creative ideas for a book, since then it has been an incredible journey learning the craft of writing.

Judith is a single mother of three boys, Jonathan, Justin and Jason, and recently became the proud grandmother of a beautiful baby girl. She lives in Houston with her two younger sons, and their two rescued dogs.

See her website at http://judithpvaughan.com/.

Click on image to buy from Amazon.Com

An inspired collection of short stories by an all-star cast of best-selling storytellers based on the thought-provoking illustrations in Chris Van Allsburg’s The Mysteries of Harris Burdick.

For more than twenty-five years, the illustrations in the extraordinary Mysteries of Harris Burdick by Chris Van Allsburg have intrigued and entertained readers of all ages. Thousands of children have been inspired to weave their own stories to go with these enigmatic pictures. Now we’ve asked some of our very best storytellers to spin the tales. Enter The Chronicles of Harris Burdick to gather this incredible compendium of stories: mysterious, funny, creepy, poignant, these are tales you won’t soon forget.

This inspired collection of short stories features many remarkable, best-selling authors in the worlds of both adult and children’s literature: Sherman Alexie, M.T. Anderson, Kate DiCamillo, Cory Doctorow, Jules Feiffer, Stephen King, Tabitha King, Lois Lowry, Gregory Maguire, Walter Dean Myers, Linda Sue Park, Louis Sachar, Jon Scieszka, Lemony Snicket, and Chris Van Allsburg himself.

Van Allsburg’s Harris Burdick illustrations have evoked such wonderment and imagination since Harris Burdick’s original publication in 1984; many have speculated or have woven their own stories to go with his images. More than ever, the illustrations send off their eerie call for text and continue to compel and pick at the reader’s brain for a backstory—a threaded tale behind the image. In this book, we’ve collected some of the best storytellers to spin them.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

About the Authors

Chris Van Allsburg is the winner of two Caldecott Medals, for Jumanji and The Polar Express, as well as the recipient of a Caldecott Honor Book for The Garden of Abdul Gasazi. The author and illustrator of numerous picture books for children, he has also been awarded the Regina Medal for lifetime achievement in children’s literature. In 1982, Jumanji won the National Book Award and in 1996, it was made into a popular feature film. Chris Van Allsburg was formerly an instructor at the Rhode Island School of Design. He lives in Rhode Island with his wife and two children.

Sherman Alexie is the author of several novels and collections of short fiction including the National Book Award Winner The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007) and War Dances, winner of the 2010 PEN / Faulkner Award for Fiction. Alexie lives with his wife and two sons in Seattle, and has published 14 books of poetry and short stories about life on a contemporary Indian reservation, and Indian-white relationships.

M. T. Anderson is the author of The Game of Sunken Places, Burger Wuss, Thirsty, and Feed, which was a finalist for the National Book Award, a Boston Globe-Horn Book Honor Book and the winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Young Adult Fiction. Anderson also received the Printz Honor and the National Book Award for Octavian Nothing. He lives in Boston, Massachusetts.

Kate DiCamillo is the author of The Magician’s Elephant, a New York Times bestseller; The Tale of Despereaux, which was awarded the Newbery Medal; Because of Winn-Dixie, a Newbery Honor book; and six books starring Mercy Watson, including the Theodor Seuss Geisel Honor Book Mercy Watson Goes for a Ride. She lives in Minneapolis.

Cory Doctorow (craphound.com) is a science fiction author, activist, journalist and blogger — the co-editor of Boing Boing (boingboing.net) and the author of the bestselling Tor Teens/HarperCollins UK novel Little Brother. He is the former European director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation and co-founded the UK Open Rights Group. Born in Toronto, Canada, he now lives in London.

Jules Feiffer’s artistic sensibility permeates a wide range of creative work, from his Pulitzer-winning comic strip in the Village Voice, to his Obie Award-winning play Little Murders, to his Oscar-winning anti-military short subject animation, Munro, to his beloved illustrations for The Phantom Tollbooth. Feiffer s cartoons have appeared in The New Yorker, Esquire, Playboy, and The Nation, and he has recently reinvented himself as a children s book author. His first book, The Man in the Ceiling, was selected by Publisher’s Weekly and the New York Public Library as one of the year’s best children’s books.

Stephen King has since published over 40 books and has become one of the world’s most successful writers. Stephen lives in Maine and Florida with his wife, novelist Tabitha King. They are regular contributors to a number of charities including many libraries and have been honored locally for their philanthropic activities.

Tabitha King has published eight novels (the eighth in 2006 with Michael McDowell as co-author), all of which were released in hardcover and paperback by Macmillan and New American Library. She has also published two works of non-fiction, one of which was published in paperback by Dendrite.

Lois Lowry is the author of more than thirty books for children. She has received countless honors, among them the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award, the Dorothy Canfield Fisher Award, the California Young Reader’s Medal, and the Mark Twain Award. She received Newbery Medals for two of her novels, Number the Stars and The Giver. Her first novel, A Summer to Die, was awarded the International Reading Association’s Children’s Book Award.

Gregory Maguire is the author of five novels for adults, including the best seller Wicked, and more than a dozen novels for children. Mr. Maguire has been the recipient of several awards and fellowships. He lives in Massachusetts.

Walter Dean Myers is the critically acclaimed New York Times bestselling author of more than 80 books for children and young adults. His award-winning body of work include Sunrise Over Fallujah, Fallen Angels, Monster,Somewhere in the Darkness, SLAM!, Jazz and Harlem. Mr. Myers has received two Newbery Honors and five Coretta Scott King Awards. In addition, he is the winner of the first Michael L. Printz Award. Mr. Myers lives in Jersey City, New Jersey.

Linda Sue Park is the author of Newbery Medal title A Single Shard as well as numerous other novels, picture books, and poetry. She lives in Rochester, NY, with her family.

Newbery Award-winning author Louis Sachar is the creator of the entertaining Marvin Redpost books as well as the much-loved There’s a Boy in the Girls’ Bathroom, winner of 17 child-voted state awards. His book Holes, winner of the 1999 Newbery Medal, the National Book Award, and the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award, is also an ALA Best Book for Young Adults, an ALA Quick Pick, an ALA Notable Book, and was made into a major motion picture.

Jon Scieszka was appointed the first National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature in January 2008. He is the author of several bestselling children’s titles, including The Stinky Cheese Man, which won a Caldecott Honor medal, The True Story of the Three Little Pigs and the Time Warp Trio, a chapter book series. Scieszka is the founder of Guys Read, a nonprofit literacy organization.

Lemony Snicket is the author of several unpleasant stories, including those in the bestselling A Series of Unfortunate Events and The Lump of Coal.

Editorial Reviews

“This star-studded exercise in creative writing tests the wits of favorite authors and shows readers how even the big shots hone their craft.”—Publishers Weekly, starred review

“The stories embrace a range of styles and subjects, but, like their enigmatic and mysterious inspirations, each touches on the strange, the odd, and the fantastic.”—The Horn Book Magazine

“While the stories are distinct—by turns funny, sinister, and touching—they have much in common, sharing an arch tone, a curious metaphysicality, and some familiar folk-tale tropes, and the authors’ commitment to the original conceit gives the volume additional cohesion.”—Booklist

Not Just For Kids: ‘The Chronicles of Harris Burdick’

The Los Angeles Times Book Review – October 23, 2011 (Excerpt)

For 26 years, it’s been one of kid lit’s greatest mysteries: Who was Harris Burdick, and why did he leave 14 of his cryptically captioned illustrations in the possession of one Peter Wenders back in 1984?

If author Lemony Snicket’s introduction to “The Chronicles of Harris Burdick” is to be believed, Burdick is by now “either very old, quite dead, or both.” The 14 chronicles that have been penned in his name were likely written by “pretenders” who were “drawn to Mr. Burdick’s striking images and captions” and wanted to claim his work as their own. Among the Burdick impostors: Stephen King, Kate DiCamillo and Sherman Alexie, not to mention Louis Sachar, Lois Lowry, M.T. Anderson and numerous other authors who have, collectively, won five Newberys, three National Book Awards, two Caldecotts, one Printz and one Pulitzer.

For a fictional character, Mr. Burdick has quite the star-studded coterie of admirers — as does Mr. Burdick’s creator, Chris Van Allsburg. The author and illustrator of the classic (and award-winning) picture books “Jumanji” and “The Polar Express” is beloved for his apocryphally whimsical storytelling and artwork that blurs the lines between photo and drawing, between childlike wonder and adult intrigue.

Almost a quarter-century ago, Van Allsburg’s “The Mysteries of Harris Burdick” picture book amazed and delighted readers with its pencil drawings of wildly imaginative scenes and tantalizing snippets of text. There’s a man poised with a chair above his head prepared to smack a lump beneath a rug, and there’s an enormous ocean liner attempting to bully its way through a Venice canal. There’s a nun floating impossibly through the air in a Paris cathedral, a house lifting off from its foundation like a rocket. [Read the full article...]

Barry’s – The Finest Quality Teas from Ireland

Barry’s Irish Tea – Breakfast Blend, Golden Blend, Decafinated – The finest quality teas with a uniquely refreshing flavour and a bright golden color.

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For as long as Estrella Alvarez can remember, her mother has been planning to throw her an elaborate quinceañera for her fifteenth birthday — complete with a mariachi band, cheesy decorations, and a hideous dress. Just thinking about her quince makes Estrella cringe. But her mother insists that it’s tradition.

Estrella has other things on her mind, anyway — like dating Speedy. Does it matter that her new friends — and her parents — would never approve of a guy from el barrio? Estrella’s almost fifteen and wants to start making her own decisions. But is she ready to find out who she is — and who she really wants to be?

About Malin Alegria

Malín Alegría is the author of Estrella’s Quinceañera. She is an accomplished educator, dancer, and actress who has cowritten and performed in several stage plays. Ms. Alegría lives in San Francisco.

Editorial Reviews

Estrella Alvarez is finally getting her life together. She has earned a scholarship to an elite private school in San Jose and made friends with some of the wealthy girls. Now, however, she is ashamed of her mother and her home, and has dropped her former best friends. To make things worse, her mother and Tía Lucky are insisting on going through with her quinceañera, complete with mariachi band and puffy-sleeved orange dress. She has fallen for Speedy, a classmate from the barrio, but is forbidden to see him. As the plans for the party progress, Estrella’s world implodes as she alienates her family and friends with half-truths and deceptions. It is left to her to cobble together a quinceañera, be proud of her heritage, and still be true to herself. The plot is fast paced, with engaging and likable characters. The protagonist’s search for identity and fight for independence from her loving but strict family are wrought with humor, yet remain poignant and true. The tone of the book is light, but the teen’s journey through the maze of culture and class is deftly handled.-Melissa Christy Buron, Epps Island Elementary, Houston, TX for Library Journal

Estrella is mortified when plans begin for her fifteenth-birthday celebration. She envisions a large, tacky celebration and a gaudy, fufu rufu gown. Even worse, her damas (female escorts) are bitter childhood friends who accuse Estrella of abandoning them since she won a scholarship to a private school in the ritziest neighborhood in San Jose. Then Estrella falls for Speedy, a former grade-school classmate who is also Mexican American, and she feels increasingly conflicted as she moves between her wealthy school friends and the “one big crazy family” of her barrio. The ending ties things up a bit too neatly, but in her first novel, Alegria writes about Mexican American culture, first love, family, and of moving between worlds with poignant, sharp-sighted humor and authentic dialogue. Teens of all backgrounds will see themselves in Estrella’s struggle to discover herself and to stand firm against outside expectations. A laugh-out-loud Spanglish glossary concludes. Also suggest Nancy Osa’s Cuba 15 (2003). Gillian Engberg, Booklist

Reader Review

This is a very quick read and should engage girls who live in an urban and Latino setting. Many of the girls in our school will love this story of Estrella and her upcoming Quinceanera. The story takes place in the San Francisco Bay Area where Estrella has just entered a prestigious private school. She is thrilled that she has been accepted and now has a new group of friends. However, with her upcoming party she feels she is being pulled between a group of old friends and her new friends who may not understand the importance of the party from a heritage standpoint and consider it old fashioned. I think it will be very easy for all middle school girls and they will to be able to identify with Estrella and all her “friend” problems. There is a glossary at the end of the book to help those who don’t know all the Spanish references. This was a great book to read and share with young girls.

My 6th grader read this book faster than any mystery (her previous favorite genre). I was thrilled to see her engaged with girl issues. She was extremely anxious to discuss the book and share her opinions about Estrella’s emotional “rollercoaster” ride on the way to her Quinceanera. There are wonderful lessons on culture and ethnic identity to be learned, all with peer pressure. The humor keeps all the topics light, not heavy like a lecture. This will be a very popular addition to our library with our large Latino population.  - L. J. Baker, Amazon.Com Customer Review

Author Malin Alegria Builds On ‘Estrella’s’ Star Power

NPR Book Review – October 18, 2011 (Excerpt)

Writer Malin Alegria’s first novel, Estrella’s Quinceanera, covers familiar territory for anyone who has ever been a 15-year-old girl battling with her mother — but the fact that the book’s sassy protagonist, Estrella Alvarez, is Mexican-American makes her unique in the world of young adult fiction.

Alegria’s book follows Estrella through that quintessential coming-of-age experience for many Latinos — the traditional party that happens when a girl turns 15. Seduced by her new friends’ luxurious lifestyles, Estrella becomes embarrassed by her home, her family and, most of all, the quinceanera birthday party her aunt and mother insist on throwing her.

Estrella’s Quinceanera came out in 2006, but it has found enduring success in the country’s Latino communities. So much so, that Scholastic has commissioned her to write a four-book series for Latino teens, the first installment of which comes out in May 2012. [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.

Click on image toi buy from Amazon.Com

Some race to win. Others race to survive.

It happens at the start of every November: the Scorpio Races. Riders attempt to keep hold of their water horses long enough to make it to the finish line.

Some riders live.

Others die.

At age nineteen, Sean Kendrick is the returning champion. He is a young man of few words, and if he has any fears, he keeps them buried deep, where no one else can see them.

Puck Connolly is different. She never meant to ride in the Scorpio Races. But fate hasn’t given her much of a choice. So she enters the competition – the first girl ever to do so. She is in no way prepared for what is going to happen.

As she did in her bestselling Shiver trilogy, author Maggie Stiefvater takes us to the breaking point, where both love and life meet their greatest obstacles, and only the strong of heart can survive. The Scorpio Races is an unforgettable reading experience.

About Maggie Stiefvater

Maggie Stiefvater is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the novels Shiver, Linger, and Forever. She is also the author of Lament: The Faerie Queen’s Deception and Ballad: A Gathering of Faerie. She lives in Virginia with her husband and their two children. You can visit her online at www.maggiestiefvater.com.

Reader Review

Maggie Stiefvater has already mastered faeries and werewolves. But in “The Scorpio Races,” she turns her sights to a more obscure supernatural creature — deadly Celtic water-horses — and wraps them in a story of blood, sea mist and windswept beaches. While the story itself is rather slow to unfold, it gives Stiefvater lots of time to flesh out her teen riders.

On a small Irish island, there is a special race every November. Many men and boys ride the capaill uisce (pronounced “copple ooshka”) — the swift, beautiful, bloodthirsty water horses, which want to either drown their riders or eat their flesh. They often succeed.

Puck is the first girl to ever enter the race, but terrible memories make her reluctant to accept a capall uisce, so she decides to ride her land mare, Dove. If she doesn’t win, she and her brothers will lose their home. Sean Kendrick is a boy with a special knack with the capaill uisce. He catches, trains and sometimes kills the water horses, and no one knows their ways better than he does.

But as the race approaches, both the young riders are confronted by terrible problems — the entire village is opposed to Puck racing, and Sean clashes with his cold, cruel employer over a prize stallion. And even as Sean and Puck grow closer, they begin to fall in love… but only one of them can possibly win the race.

“The Scorpio Races” is a story rich with Irish atmosphere — salt spray, grey stones, ancient rituals and a tradition reaching back further than memory. And unlike most teen fantasies, this one doesn’t have supernatural creatures who look like sexy teenage boys — the capaill uisce are violent, wild beasts who crave blood and the sea, evoking both terror and awe.

Like her Wolves of Mercy Falls trilogy, Stiefvater alternates between Sean and Puck’s perspectives, giving us different glimpses of their lives. The only problem with the plot is that it moves very slowly, but Stiefvater splashes it with stormy action scenes and a climax that races by at lightning speed. And her prose is simply exquisite — one capall uisce is “a fearful dull Pegasus with disintegrating wings of sea foam” and teeth “the color of dead coral.”

Stiefvater also crafts a pair of truly compelling lead characters — Puck is a fierce, strong-willed young woman hurt by the loss of her family, and unwilling to let anyone tell her what she can’t do. And Sean is a near-silent young man who has an innate touch with all horses, and a passionate connection to the stallion Corr. Their romance is handled delicately, with few words and lots of horse-training; it’s also unusually complicated, since they both desperately need to win the race, but only one can.

While recognizable in its poetic prose and haunting tone, “The Scorpio Races” is unlike any other book Stiefvater — or other paranormal-romance writers — have ever created. Slow but sublime. – E. A. Solinas, Amazon.Com Customer Review

Not Just for Kids: ‘The Scorpio Races’ by Maggie Stiefvater

The Chicago Tribune Book Review – October 16, 2011 (Excerpt)

Maggie Stiefvater is the bestselling author of the werewolfian romance, the Shiver trilogy — a series that wrapped up over the summer with more than 1.6 million books printed in the U.S. and foreign rights sold to 36 countries. Now the young-adult novelist is turning her attention to another breed of mythological creature — the maniacal water horse.

American readers are probably unfamiliar with such a thing, but the capall uisce (pronounced “copple ooshka”), as they’re called in “The Scorpio Races,” are a Celtic legend. The flesh-eating equines emerge from the water each November, simultaneously terrorizing the townspeople and electrifying them with their beauty and strength.

It’s the rare individual brave enough to mount such a horse. Rarer still is the individual who will race one along the beach, unsure of whether a competing horse will pluck them out of the saddle for a snack or gallop into the crashing waves, bringing certain death to its rider.

On the tiny island of Thisby (population 4,000), only a couple of dozen riders are so foolish, er, brave, as to compete in the annual Scorpio Races that take place each Nov. 1, including, for the first time, a young woman named Puck. One of three kids who were orphaned when their parents were eaten by carnivorous stallions, she’s determined not only to compete but to win. Fellow islander and soon-to-be love interest Sean Kendrick is equally motivated. He witnessed his dad’s demise under trampling hooves nine years earlier. [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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It’s 1952 and the Scott family has just moved from Los Angeles to London. Here, fourteen-year-old Janie meets a mysterious apothecary and his son, Benjamin Burrows – a fascinating boy who’s not afraid to stand up to authority and dreams of becoming a spy. When Benjamin’s father is kidnapped, Janie and Benjamin must uncover the secrets of the apothecary’s sacred book, the Pharmacopoeia, in order to find him, all while keeping it out of the hands of their enemies – Russian spies in possession of nuclear weapons. Discovering and testing potions they never believed could exist, Janie and Benjamin embark on a dangerous race to save the apothecary and prevent impending disaster.

Together with Ian Schoenherr’s breathtaking illustrations, this is a truly stunning package from cover to cover.

About Maile Meloy

Maile Meloy (www.mailemeloy.com) is the award-winning author of the short story collection Half in Love and the novels Both Ways Is the Only Way I Want It, Liars and Saints, and A Family Daughter. This is her first novel for young readers. She lives in California.

Reader Review

I got an advanced reading copy of this book from the publisher. This was an excellent book. It is based during the cold-war and touches on issues that were important then (Communism and the atomic bomb, Nationalism) as well as entwining magic throughout the story. Very well written and a pleasure to read, with beautiful black and white illustrations. I finished it in one sitting and enjoyed every minute of it.

In the early 1950′s Janie’s parents are suspected of being sympathetic to Communism; as a result Janie and her family are forced to flee from America to London. In London Janie is miserable until she stumbles into Benjamin Burrows. Benjamin is the son of an apothecary and wants to be a spy; he ropes Janie into helping him spy in the park one day. Little do they know that there are very dangerous events afoot and Benjamin’s father is part of them. Their innocent spying turns into a flight for their lives as they are drawn into a conflict that spans nations and involves a magical book called the Phramacopia.

I loved this book because it just covered so many different things and made them into a wonderful cohesive and magical story. There is a lot in here about cold war politics, the atom bomb, international spies, and war in general; but there are also other issues covered like fitting in at a new school, the morality of war, idealism in science, and the responsibilities of those who wield great (magical and scientific) power.

Janie is a wonderful character; she is realistic, resourceful, and very easy to relate too. I loved her parents; they treat her like the smart kid she is and are witty and funny. Benjamin was another fascinating character; his obsessions with international spies gets him into a ton of trouble, but he is a realistic character that is again easy to relate to. I loved following Janie and Benjamin through the story as they struggle to unravel the mystery and master the spells presented by the Pharmacopia.

The story was presented in a very creative way; I love how it was presented as something Janie couldn’t remember until she got her diary back to read through. There are many twists and turns throughout; yet the story is never hard to follow. At times though you are not sure who is bad and who is good and it is hard to predict how everything will turn out; which I loved.

There was a lot of action and adventure; the story was fast-paced and hard to put down. I read the whole thing in one-sitting. The story wraps up nicely.

Overall I thought this was an absolutely wonderful book. I loved all the different elements of history, science, and magic that were blended together to make this story. Janie and Benjamin are fun characters that are easy to relate too. The book is fast-paced and full of excellent plot twists. There is fun magic in the story too: invisibility potions, transformations into birds…lots of fun things to surprise and delight readers. I really enjoyed this book and recommend it to people middle grade and older who love historical fantasy with some war politics woven throughout. A great read and I can’t wait to see what Meloy writes next. – Karissa Eckert, Amazon.Com Customer Review

Not Just for Kids: ‘The Apothecary’ by Maile Meloy

The Los Angeles Times Book Review – October 9, 2011 (Excerpt)

A quick Amazon search for books on World War II yields an astonishing 45,961 titles. There are far fewer stories about its Cold War aftermath, and even fewer that attempt to channel the early ’50s from a teenager’s point of view — but Maile Meloy’s “The Apothecary” does just that. A gem of historical fiction for the middle-school set, Meloy’s children’s debut is a pitch-perfect melding of postwar intrigue and ancient medicinal arts told from the perspective of a 14-year-old girl.

Janie Scott is the only daughter of screenwriter parents who, suspected of communist activity in 1952, were blacklisted in L.A. and flee to London — a move Janie describes as “leaving a Technicolor movie and walking into a black-and-white one.” The transition from sock-hopping Hollywood High to the uniformed strictures of St. Beden’s is, to be sure, abrupt. But it isn’t long before Janie befriends Benjamin and is drawn into the strange and mysterious world of alchemy.

Benjamin’s father is an apothecary, carrying on a family tradition that dates to the Middle Ages. Benjamin, however, wants nothing to do with his dad’s profession. He’s far more interested in espionage, which he practices in the park while playing chess with Janie, keeping tabs on a peg-legged Russian he suspects is passing secrets to real spies. [Read the full article...]

A Child of the Blacklist Becomes a Teenage Spy

The New York Times Book Review – October 14, 2011 (Excerpt)

Maile Meloy, author of two novels and two story collections that have been praised for their meticulous realism, has written her first book for young readers, and defying expectations of admirers such as myself, it’s a fantasy. Though a longtime fan of Meloy, I couldn’t help approaching “The Apothecary,” a story of teenage spies and transformative elixirs, with trepidation.

So it was a happy surprise that the book, with its intricately constructed plot, well-paced suspense, credibly rendered fantastical elements, thoughtfully drawn characters and authentically detailed settings, satisfies on all levels. Even for a reader predisposed against the genre.

The opening chapters are reassuringly Meloy: 14-year-old Janie Scott describes her life in 1950s Hollywood with her parents, a radio-television writing team, “the smartest, funniest parents I knew.” Childhood in postwar California is blissful — eating oranges off sweet-smelling trees in the front yard, playing in the ocean waves — even if punctuated by atomic bomb drills at school and shadowed by a new war in faraway Korea. But when Janie is followed home by a black sedan, the hitherto unrecognized threat of McCarthyism and blacklisting changes her life. Fleeing an upcoming court appearance, her parents whisk her, grumpy and protesting, to London, where they have been promised work on a new television series. “It’ll be like living in a Jane Austen novel,” her mother en­thuses. “You mean I’ll get married in the end?” Janie shoots back. “I’m 14.” [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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“I know that many of you here have waited years for this Hour,” Mater Motley said, using that voice that, though it was barely conversational in volume, was somehow heard everywhere. “The waiting is over. Tomorrow there will be no dawn. Only midnight, absolute and eternal.”

And so begins a new chapter in the epic story of sixteen-year-old Candy Quackenbush and her journeys through the world of the Abarat, where every hour is an island in one eternal day, and nothing is as it seems.

Candy travels through the Abarat from island to island and across the sea with an unlikely band of friends: the escaped prisoner Malingo the Geshrat, the quarrelsome John Brothers, who all share the same body but never the same opinion, and the many other colorful characters they meet along the way.

The problem is that trouble finds Candy wherever she goes. And soon she discovers a secret plot, masterminded by the diabolical Mater Motley, who is obsessed with becoming Empress of the Islands. Her method is simple. She will darken the skies, putting out the suns, moons, and stars. She will bring absolute midnight.

About Clive Barker

Clive Barker is the bestselling author of twenty-two books, including the New York Times bestsellers Abarat; Abarat: Days of Magic, Nights of War; and The Thief of Always. He is also an acclaimed painter, film producer, and director. For twelve years Mr. Barker has been working on a vast array of paintings to illuminate the text of The Books of Abarat, more than one hundred and twenty-five of which can be found within this volume.

Mr. Barker lives in California. He shares his house with seven dogs, three cockatiels, several undomesticated geckoes, an African gray parrot called Smokey, and a yellow-headed Amazon parrot called Malingo.

Book review: ‘Abarat: Absolute Midnight’

The Los Angeles Times Book Review – October 3, 2011 (Excerpt)

In the opening scene of “Abarat: Absolute Midnight,” the third installment in Clive Barker’s lavish fantasy adventure series, a blind man is alone in his island home, intuiting the messages transmitted by tarot cards. The cards foretell that a war is coming, one that will remake the land — an archipelago of 25 islands, each of which stands at a given hour of the day and one mysterious island that represents “time out of time.”

This conflict also will align the fortunes of the Card-Reader with the unlikely heroine of the story, one Candy Quackenbush from Chickentown, Minn., the resourceful young woman at the center of Barker’s expansive tale.

Like Dorothy or Alice before her, 16-year-old Candy is an innocent plucked from the mundanity of her everyday life and thrust into a mystical place filled with untold wonders and horrors. Barker acknowledges his heroine’s literary lineage, but he also crafts a wonderfully contemporary girl who is brave, resourceful, loyal and willing to sacrifice herself for the betterment of the world. [Read the full article...]

VAMPIRE ASCENDING
by Lorelei Bell
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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The story of America and African Americans is a story of hope and inspiration and unwavering courage. But it is also the story of injustice; of a country divided by law, education, and wealth; of a people whose struggles and achievements helped define their country. This is the story of the men, women, and children who toiled in the hot sun picking cotton for their masters; it’s about the America ripped in two by Jim Crow laws; it’s about the brothers and sisters of all colors who rallied against those who would dare bar a child from an education. It’s a story of discrimination and broken promises, determination and triumphs.

Kadir Nelson, one of this generation’s most accomplished, award-winning artists, has created an epic yet intimate introduction to the history of America and African Americans, from colonial days through the civil rights movement. Written in the voice of an “Everywoman,” an unnamed narrator whose forebears came to this country on slave ships and who lived to cast her vote for the first African American president, heart and soul touches on some of the great transformative events and small victories of that history. This inspiring book demonstrates that in gaining their freedom and equal rights, African Americans helped our country achieve its promise of liberty and justice—the true heart and soul of our nation.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

About Kadir Nelson

Kadir Nelson is one of the most accomplished, award-winning illustrators working today and is known for his stunning oil paintings depicting the African American experience. He received Caldecott Honors for Henry’s Freedom Box by Ellen Levine and Moses: When Harriet Tubman Led Her People To Freedom by Carole Boston Weatherford, for which he also garnered a Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award and won an NAACIP Image Award; Ellington Was Not A Street by Ntozake Shange won a Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award. Nelson’s authorial debut, We Are The Ship, was a New York Times bestseller, a Coretta Scott King Author Award winner, and a Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor Book.

Kadir Nelson’s paintings have been exhibited in many galleries and museums around the world, including the Simon Wiesenthal Center and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, both in Los Angeles; the Museum of African American History in Detroit; the Smithsonian Anacostia Museum in Washington, DC; the Citizen’s Galley of Yokohama, Japan; and the Studio Museum in Harlem. He is also the cover artist for Michael Jackson’s posthumous album, Michael.

Kadir Nelson lives with his family in Southern California.

Editorial Reviews

“Nelson…adds to his notable titles with this powerful view of African American history. Illustrated with 44 full-page paintings, this handsome volume is told in the fictionalized, informal voice of an African American senior looking back on her life and remembering what her elders told her.” (Booklist (starred review) )

“As in WE ARE THE SHIP, Nelson knits together the nation’s proudest moments with its most shameful, taking on the whole of African-American history. He handles this vast subject with easy grace. [Nelson’s] jaw-dropping portraits radiate determination and strength. A tremendous achievement.” (Publishers Weekly (starred review) )

“The dramatic oil paintings heighten the dignity of this story, whether they are of well-known historical figures, common folk or landscape…This intimate narrative makes the stories accessible to young readers and powerfully conveys how personal this history feels for many African-Americans.” (Kirkus Reviews (starred review) )

‘Heart And Soul’: An African-American History

NPR Book Review – September 26, 2011 (Excerpt)

The American story is filled with hard truths. They’re woven tightly into our history, and they’re impossible to ignore.

So how do you teach children the whole American story — from the violence to the racism to the slavery — when so much of it deals with the very things parents try to shield kids from? That’s the challenge illustrator and author Kadir Nelson takes up in his new book,Heart and Soul: The Story of America and African Americans.

Nelson’s book tracks the history of America and African-Americans from Colonial times through the civil rights movement, and he tells the story in a voice that was inspired by the people around him.

“I love my grandmother to pieces, so I thought maybe I’d use my grandmother’s voice because she really gives it to you straight, she’s the matriarch of our family. But I also wanted to sweeten it up a little bit,” he tells NPR’s Michele Norris. “I thought of my friend Debbie Allen, who’s from Texas. She talks with a bit of a Texas twang, and she puts ‘honeys’ and ‘childs’ at the end of every sentence to sweeten it up a bit. So I would combine these two voices to find a voice for this narrator.” [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.

Click on image to buy from Amazon.Com

Since the publication of his classic Outside Over There in 1981, Maurice Sendak’s book illustrations have focused on interpreting the texts of such authors as James Marshall, Tony Kushner, Wilhelm Grimm, Ruth Krauss, Herman Melville, and Mother Goose. And beginning in 1980, with his sets and costumes for The Magic Flute, Sendak launched a busy second career as the designer of stage productions of opera and ballet. Now comes Bumble-Ardy, the first book he has written as well as illustrated in thirty years.

Bumble-Ardy has evolved from an animated segment for Sesame Street that aired in the early 1970s to a glorious picture book about a mischievous pig who has reached the age of nine without ever having had a birthday party. But all that changes when Bumble throws a party for himself and invites all his friends, leading to a wild masquerade that quickly gets out of hand. In this highly anticipated picture book, Maurice Sendak once again explores the exuberance of young children and the unshakable love between parent (in this case, an aunt) and child. Bumble-Ardy is the first book illustrated and written by Sendak since Outside Over There in 1981.

About Maurice Sendak

Maurice Sendak received the Caldecott Medal for Where the Wild Things Are. He has also received the Hans Christian Andersen Medal, the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award, the National Medal of Arts, and the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award.

Editorial Review

Young pig Bumble-Ardy has had no birthday parties. His parents, anti-party animals, eventually “gorged and gained weight. And got ate.” Adopted by “Adeline, that aunt divine,” Bumble, 9, is promised a party, but tries to start it early and unsupervised. (Remember Max?) The guests, “some grubby swine,” who’ve been requested to come in costume, do so (part Hollywood, part opera), but behave piggishly. Adeline throws the rowdies out but still loves her Bumble-Ardy. “Now, ain’t that fine?” What 4-year-olds will make of this is unclear, but a wild rumpus, crossing the edge and back again, is always fun. – The Chicago Tribune

Reader Review

Anyone who knows Sendak shouldn’t expect his work to be “easy.” It is defiantly idiosyncratic and often disturbing, unlike most of the garish pap out there these days. Sendak is less interested in telling a neatly tied-up story, than he is in creating an emotional narrative that invites repeated viewings. At 83, his art has lost none of its vibrancy, and he paints this one in loose and light watercolor spreads with thankfully no evidence of computer enhancement. The masks worn by the guests at Bumble Ardy’s party are clearly bizarre, but intriguingly so. I suspect children will immerse themselves in Bumbe’s environment despite what their parents might feel. And this is one of Sendak’s strengths; he doesn’t water down his work to please overly sensitive adults who have forgotten the wildness of their own childhoods. These days, awash as we are in political correctness, that takes balls! So celebrate this new work from a master of his craft and pray it won’t be his last! – Geoffrey Hayes, Amazon.Com Customer Review

This Pig Wants To Party: Maurice Sendak’s Latest

NPR Book Review – September 20, 2011 (Excerpt)

Bumble-ardy, the latest from author and illustrator Maurice Sendak, is dark and deeply imaginative, much like his classic works Where the Wild Things Are and In The Night Kitchen.

Bumble-ardy is an orphaned pig, who has reached the age of 9 without ever having a birthday party. He tells his Aunt Adeline that he would like to have a party for his ninth birthday, so Aunt Adeline plans a quiet birthday dinner for two. But Bumble-ardy instead decides to throw a large costume party for himself after his aunt leaves for work — and mayhem ensues.

When his aunt returns she says, “Okay smarty, you’ve had your party but never again.” Bumble-ardy replies, “I promise, I swear, I won’t ever turn 10.”

Sendak tells Fresh Air‘s Terry Gross that those two lines — his favorite in the book — sum up his life and his work.

“Those two lines are essential. ‘I’ll never be 10′ touches me deeply but I won’t pretend that I know exactly what it means,” says Sendak. “When I thought of it, I was so happy I thought of it. It came to me, which is what the creative act is all about. Things come to you without you necessarily knowing what they mean. … It comes at a time when I am getting ripe, getting old — and I want to do work that resonates.”

Sendak says that he worked on Bumble-ardy while taking care of his longtime partner, Eugene Glynn, who died of lung cancer in 2007. [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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A spider lives inside my head
Who weaves a strange and wondrous web
Of silken threads and silver strings
To catch all sorts of flying things,
Like crumbs of thought and bits of smiles
And specks of dried-up tears,
And dust of dreams that catch and cling
For years and years and years . . .

Have you ever read a book with everything on it? Well, here it is, an amazing collection of never-before-published poems and drawings from the creator of Where the Sidewalk Ends, A Light in the Attic, and Falling Up. You will say Hi-ho for the toilet troll, get tongue-tied with Stick-a-Tongue-Out-Sid, play a highly unusual horn, and experience the joys of growing down.

What’s that? You have a case of the Lovetobutcants? Impossible! Just come on in and let the magic of Shel Silverstein bend your brain and open your heart.

Shel Silverstein, beloved author of the acclaimed and bestselling poetry collections Where the Sidewalk Ends, A Light in the Attic, and Falling Up, will have a brand-new book of poetry published by HarperCollins Children’s Books in September 2011. This is only the second original book to be published since Silverstein’s passing in 1999. With more than one hundred and thirty never-before-seen poems and drawings completed by the cherished American artist and selected by his family from his archives, this collection will follow in the tradition and format of his acclaimed poetry classics.

Generations have grown up with the works of Shel Silverstein, known not only as a poet and illustrator but also for his work as a cartoonist, playwright, performer, recording artist, and Grammy Award–winning songwriter. He has encouraged children to dream and dare to imagine the impossible with his extraordinary poetry and unforgettable characters. Now fans will have a chance to discover even more riches, and new readers will delight in the timeless magic of his works.

About Shel Silverstein

Shel Silverstein is the author-artist of many beloved books of prose and poetry. He was a cartoonist, playwright, poet, performer, recording artist, and Grammy-winning, Oscar-nominated songwriter.

Shel Silverstein’s Poems Live On In ‘Every Thing’

NPR Book Review – September 20, 2011 (Excerpt)

When Shel Silverstein wrote the poem “Years From Now,” he seemed to know that one day he’d be gone but that his playful words and images would still be making children happy. “I cannot see your face,” he writes to his young readers, but in “some far-off place,” he assures them, “I hear you laughing — and I smile.”

The beloved children’s poet and illustrator died in 1999 at age 68. “Years From Now” is one of the poems in a new book called Every Thing On It that has just been released by Silverstein’s family. If you liked Silverstein’s other books, such as Light in the Attic and Where the Sidewalk Ends,you’ll recognize poems — like “Frightened” — as vintage Shel:

“There are kids underneath my bed,”
Cried little baby monster Fred.
Momma monster smiled. “Oh, Fred,
There’s no such things as kids,” she said.

Every Thing On It includes 145 poems in all. Silverstein eliminated many of them from his earlier books, not because he didn’t like them, but because they just didn’t happen to fit in the perfect order he was looking for in a given collection. Toni Markiet, editor of the new collection, worked on other projects alongside Silverstein. Markiet says the poet paid close attention to every last detail.

“He would move a piece of art over an 18th of an inch … and look at how it looked on a page,” she tells NPR’s David Greene. ” … It’s a slight adjustment, but to him, it mattered. I think one of the reasons his books are still so immensely popular after almost 50 years is that every tiny detail was considered.” [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.