Tween Book Buying Guide for the Holidays- Romantics

So many of my girls are romantics at heart. They love reading love stories and I spend a lot of time finding appropriate teen romance novels.

Shug is a perennial favorite. Annemarie, nicknamed Shug, has a pretty tough life. She has a beautiful, popular older sister who gets all the attention, an alcoholic mother, and a father who’s always on business trips. On top of all of that, she has developed a huge crush on Mark, her best friend. My girls have fallen in love with this one!

Stargirl is another popular choice (and one of my personal favorites!) Stargirl reminds me a lot of Spinelli’s Maniac Magee. More than just a first love story, it deals with nonconformity and the perils of popularity. There’s even a Stargirl Journal!

3 Willows: The Sisterhood Grows has slowly been gaining ground with my girls. The story of three lifelong best friends who are beginning to grow apart in 8th grade, they are spending the summer apart dealing with divorce, new surroundings, and, of course, boys!

Sarah Dessen is practically sacred among my girls. One of her most popular novels is The Truth About Forever. Macy has suddenly turned into the good girl- straight A’s, punctual, helpful. She’s trying to convince herself and the world that she ok even though her Dad died. Then she gets a job at Wish Catering. It’s run by pregnant, forgetful Delia with help from her nephews, Bert and Wes, and her neighbors Kristy and Monica. Macy falls in love with gorgeous Wes…..and her perfect life is changed forever.

The Indigo Notebook is part adventure, part romance. Zeeta’s mother loves moving and they have lived all over the world. When she moves the family to Ecuador, Zeeta is determined to make her settle down. She enlists the help of some vendors in the market to set her mother up on dates but ends up meeting an intriguing boy herself.

Tween Book Buying Guide for the Holidays- Post Apocalyptic and Dystopian

I am a dystopian fiction fanatic.  Hand me a dystopian book or a post apocalyptic novel and I am forever in your debt. My students always fall in love with these dystopian/post apocalyptic novels!

Life As We Knew It and the dead and the gone never fail to hook my most dormant readers. Both books tell the tale of two teens whose lives are forever altered when an asteroid crashes into the moon, moving it closer to the earth.  Because of this, every conceivable natural disaster occurs. Life as we knew it forever gone and the dead are piling up all over the world.  Soon, humanity begins turning on itself!

Maybe you know a tween who has read Lois Lowry’s The Giver? Did you know there are two companion novels? Gathering Blue and Messenger wrap up the story of Jonas and Gabe. They are a must-read for anyone who read The Giver and couldn’t wait to find out what really happened to both of them.

Hasn’t every teen and tween wished away their parents at some point? But what if everyone over the age of 14 disappeared in the blink of an eye, leaving behind only kids to run the world? Gone explores this “dream” scenario with frightening results!

What if your parents lied to you, under the guise of protecting you? In a moment of panic over a nuclear attack, Eli, and his family rush into an underground bunker built by Eli’s eccentric father. Unfortunately, his grandmother and twin brother don’t make it into the bunker. For the past six years, life has been fairly routine. But with 9 years left, some things just aren’t adding up. Eli is starting to have doubts about his father’s motives, explanations, and sanity. The Compound is a fast-paced must read for dystopian/post apocalyptic fans!

Finally, what if all of the adults in your life were brainwashing you? Candor is a model community, but Oscar knows that parents bring their teenagers to Candor to make them “better”–through subliminal Messages that carefully control their behavior. Can he give up the girl of his dreams to escape the Messages?

Finally, there is the ever popular The Hunger Games. Talk about a page-turner!

What are some of your favorite dystopian or post apocalyptic tween/teen books?

Tween Book Buying Guide for the Holidays- Mythology Buffs

Mythology is huge in my classroom.  I imagine it will only get crazier with the upcoming February release of Rick Riordan’s The Lightning Thief movie.  But there are lots of other mythology books out there for tween readers.  If you are looking for some great mythology-based books for your favorite tween, here are some of my favorites…..

We have to start with one of my all-time favorites- Percy Jackson.  I read the first book in the series aloud to my students each year and they love it.  Percy is funny, always getting in trouble, and easy to identify with.  I’m sure when the movie is released there will be a second wave of Percy Jackson fans running around my hallways at school.  The entire series has been released and there is an awesome boxed set available: Percy Jackson and the Olympians Hardcover Boxed Set: Books 1 – 5.

Maryrose Woods’s Why I Let My Hair Grow Out is a fantastic romp through Celtic mythology.  It’s a different culture and very different from the typical Greek and Roman mythology typically seen in middle grade/YA literature.  Plus, I’m Irish and I love seeing Irish mythology/literature in mainstream middle grade/YA books!

Irish mythology not what your tween is looking for?  How about some Egyptian mythology? Theodosia and the Serpents of Chaos is the first book in a series that focuses on the ever-popular Egyptian mythology. Theo is like a combination of Nancy Drew and Indiana Jones. While not focused solely on Egyptian mythology, the story deals with ancient Egypt and evil curses. How can that not be fun?

The Seven Serpents Trilogy is a reissuing of Scott O’Dells fantastic epic based on Mayan culture and mythology. It includes all three books in the original series, repackaged into a single book.

Finally- I have many tweens who want to know every.single.thing. about Greek mythology. I’ve recently discovered the Mythlopedia series from Scholastic and I can not keep it on my library bookshelves. The books include: All in the Family: A Look-it-Up Guide to the In-laws, Outlaws, and Offspring of Mythology (Mythlopedia), Oh My Gods!: A Look-it-Up Guide to the Gods of Mythology (Mythlopedia), She’s All That!: A Look-it-Up Guide to the Goddesses of Mythology (Mythlopedia), and What a Beast!: A Look-it-Up Guide to the Monsters and Mutants of Mythology (Mythlopedia).  Each book is set-up like Facebook profiles which really appeals to my students.  Plus, I’ve even learned a lot while reading!

This is just a taste of some of the mythology books out there for tweens.  Do you have any favorites I forgot?  Please leave them in the comments!

Tween Book Buying Guide for the Holidays- Pairing Fiction and Nonfiction

I find that a lot of my more reluctant readers love informational books, even if they do not consider themselves readers.  One of the ways that I help turn those students into readers is by finding fiction books that pair well with the informational books they enjoy reading.  It’s also a great way to get tweens to try out historical fiction, a genre many of my students avoid at all costs.  Here are some of my favorite pairings.

The Brilliant Fall of Gianna Z. is a fantastic middle grade realistic fiction novel. It pairs well with Trees, Leaves & Bark (Take-Along Guide), an informational book that will help readers identify trees in their neighborhood and town. (And while it is not nonfiction, Swinger of Birches: Poems of Robert Frost for Young People is a great book to give with Gianna Z., too!).

Operation Redwood is a realistic eco-adventure that made me want to learn more about redwood trees. It would make a fantastic companion to The Ever-Living Tree: The Life and Times of a Coast Redwood.

Moon: Science, History, And Mystery is a popular nonfiction book in my classroom right now. I love to pair it with Shooting the Moon, a historical fiction novel that takes place during the Vietnam War. It also makes a great companion to Every Soul A Star. And all of these books work well with another popular nonfiction book, Almost Astronauts: 13 Women Who Dared to Dream.

Before Columbus: The Americas of 1491 is a recent favorite of mine and I use it all the time in my “Journeys: The Monarch Butterfly” class when we talk about MesoAmerica. A few of my students have become very interested in ancient Mesoamerica and have gone on to read fiction set in that time period. Jake Ransom and the Skull King’s Shadow is a very popular companion to the book, as is The Seven Serpents Trilogy. Both deal with the Incan and Mayan cultures during the conquering of the New World.

Chasing Lincoln’s Killer has slowly been building steam in my room. This narrative nonfiction book is being passed from student to student and they are raving about it. Many of those who finish it come to me looking for more books about Lincoln, before his death, and I have been handing them Lincoln and His Boys.

The Great and Only Barnum: The Tremendous, Stupendous Life of Showman P. T. Barnum is a fantastic biography of the legendary P.T. Barnum. I would pair this with Tony Abbott’s great middle grade/YA mystery The Postcard.

I love dolphins and so do many of my students. Thus, Face to Face with Dolphins (Face to Face with Animals) is always a popular choice when it comes to independent reading. Lately, I have had a lot of luck pairing it with A Ring of Endless Light, a personal favorite of mine.

These are just a few suggestions for nonfiction/fiction pairings. Really, you can find a fiction companion to almost any nonfiction middle grade/YA book.  (And it works just as well the other way around!)  Do you have any favorite fiction/nonfiction pairings?  Please share them in the comments!

All the Broken Pieces by Ann E. Burg

Wow.  That is all I can say about Ann E. Burg’s All The Broken Pieces. I picked this off my pile of Cybils nominees and began reading without looking at the flap cover. I was caught completely off guard by how amazing this verse novel is!

Matt Pin is haunted by his memories of Vietnam. He was born a bui doi, the dust of life, son of an American GI and Vietnamese mother during the Vietnam War. He has nightmares of falling bombs, land mines, and the awful secret he left behind in Vietnam. He was airlifted out of Vietnam at ten years old, leaving behind his mother and brother.

Through the course of the book Matt is forced to come to terms with his with his horrifying past and his American present. Unsure if he can exist in both worlds, or if he even should, he comes face to face with the effects of the Vietnam War on American soil.

This is an extremely powerful novel. As a huge Miss Saigon fan, my middle school self would have loved this book.  I found myself humming Bui Doi throughout the novel.    However, I don’t think reading the novel requires any previous knowledge of the Vietnam War. Even readers with no knowledge of the Vietnam War will close this book understanding the ramifications of war. The book explores its effects on soldiers, civilians, parents, sons, daughters, and those left behind.

The verse format of this novel also works exceptionally well. The verse is spare yet you can not breeze through it. Being in Matt’s head connects you to him more than a standard 1st person perspective. I know many of my students look for verse novels because they are less intimidating than prose novels. However, this novel is a perfect example of how deeply evocative verse novels can be.  I can’t wait to recommend this to all of my sixth graders.  It will connect with boys and girls, I think.

 

*Review copy courtesy of the publisher, via the Cybils. All opinions are my own and not necessarily shared by the panel as a whole.

Tween Book Buying Guide for the Holidays

Last year was the first installment of my Tween Book Buying Guide for the Holidays.  I’m very excited to bring it back again, updated, for this year!  You can check out last year’s posts here.

Unfortunately, many tweens and middle schoolers are blank slates when it comes to reading.  For the next few weeks I will be posting lists to help you find that perfect book or book gift for the 10-13 year old in your life, whether they are an avid reader or dormant readers.  Lists will be categorized according to trends I see in my classroom, so you can count on the fact that the books I recommend will be kid-tested and approved.

Give the tweens in your life the gift of reading.  A book is a gift you can open again and again, and it does not have to be an expensive gift.  What other gift will take tweens to new places, back in time, or away from their world?  For approximately ten dollars, you can do all that for the tweens in your life by wrapping a book and giving it to them for the holidays.

Check back here starting December 1st for the first installment of  my Tween Book Buying Guide for the Holidays 2009!

English Companion Ning

I love the English Companion Ning. I always learn so much when I stop by and I have a great time when I follow along with their book clubs.  Right now, the Ning has almost 10,000 members so it is a great way to reach out and network with other Language Arts/English teachers.  I think of it as my own personal learning network with personalized professional development.

 

Unfamiliar with a Ning?  It works a lot like a traditional message board and is easy to navigate.  You simply register and then explore!  The English Companion Ning has forums, blogs, groups, and book clubs.  I love following the conversations in the forum, the ideas in the book clubs, and the camaraderie of the groups.  If you aren’t a member yet I highly recommend it!

Operation Redwood by S. Terrell French

Julian Carter-Li’s mother is following her photography dreams in China but that means she left him behind in San Francisco for the summer. Unfortunately, she left him with his aunt and uncle, who seem to hate him.  He does love his younger cousin, Preston, but he really wishes that his mom would come home sooner rather than later. His aunt and uncle are far from kind (and reminded me a little of the Dursleys!).  When the school calls to say Julian is sick, no one will pick him up!  His aunt sends a cab to take him to his uncle’s office, where he is left to lay on the couch til later that night.  However, while his Uncle Sibley is at a meeting, Julian intercepts an email from a girl his age, Robin, who is furious that Sibley will be clear cutting a redwood forest near her home.  Julian spontaneously responds to her and he and his friend, Danny, begin exchanging emails with her.  The boys and Robin come up with a scheme that helps Julian escape the dreaded math camp  he is being sent to and lands him an exchange with the Robin’s family. On their farm, he discovers the true meaning of family of the beauty of the redwood forest.

Before he realizes it, Julian is working against his uncle’s company to save the grove of old-growth redwood trees from the clear cutting Sibley has planned.

I really enjoyed this book.  It’s a good companion for Carl Hiassen’s eco-novels and I imagine it will really appeal to my middle schoolers.  Julian and his friends are in middle school themselves and their reactions and plans for the protest are very realistic.  I could imagine myself making the same decisions they did as a preteen.  Plus, who has not wanted to run away and live in a treehouse at some point in their life?

*Review copy courtesy of the publisher for the Cybils. All opinions are my own and not those of the panel as a whole.

Escape Under the Forever Sky by Eve Yohalem

I picked this book off my TBR pile because I could have sworn it was a middle grade Cybil nominee. Apparently, I have lost my mind (not a surprise if you know me) because it is not a nominee. However, it must have been fate because boy, am I glad I read Eve Yohalem’s gripping novel, Escape Under the Forever Sky!  I am always looking for great adventure novels to hand to my students and this one is perfect for middle grade readers. I finished it during reading workshop today and immediately handed it off to a student.

Thirteen-year old Lucy’s mom is the American ambassador to Ethiopia. At first, living in Africa sounds great to Lucy. She is a budding conservation biologist and dreams of spending her days on game drives and observing wildlife. Instead, she is practically held prisoner in the ambassador’s residence because her mother thinks the city and the country are too dangerous for Lucy to travel through. Instead, she is forced to go to boring state dinners and can only go on game drives every two weeks. So when she and her friends cut out of school to go to the city market, she knows she is asking for trouble. Her mother completely flips out when she catches Lucy in such a dangerous place and grounds her for a month. No game drives, no friends, no going out. Nothing but sitting on the verandah and sending sporadic emails to her friends.

Lucy is angry and resentful, so she plans an escape to a local coffee shop with her best friend Tana.  She even manages to send her “babysitter” home with the promise not to do anything stupid.  But when Lucy is kidnapped by Tana’s new driver, she realizes that her mother might have been right about the dangers she could face on her own.

Beaten and left to drink parasite-filled water, Lucy knows her only hope is to use her gymnastics training and her knowledge of the African bush to escape.  Otherwise, her kidnappers plan to kill her.  When she does manage to get away, she is alone and injured in the African wilderness and must avoid almost-certain death from a variety of means. I could not put this book down and found myself on the edge of my seat the entire time. Lucy is a normal 13 year old in an extraordinary situation. However, Yohalem makes it believable.

Readers will find themselves fascinated by the information about Africa and Ethiopia. I can see myself sharing with with adventure lovers and animal lovers alike. At a little more than 200 pages, this is a quick read that will keep students interested and on the edge of their seats. Highly recommended for classroom and school libraries!

This would also make a great read aloud because each chapter ends on a cliffhanger or leaves the reader wondering. The action-packed pages will keep even the most dormant reader’s attention and students will be left wanting to know more about Ethiopia and the African bush.

 

*Review copy purchased from Scholastic Book Clubs

NCTE 2009

Today was uplifting, inspiring, and outstanding. I regret that I did not go to all four days of NCTE and I definitely plan to go back the next time the convention is in the area. If you have not gone to NCTE you need to get there- it is unreal! (I do, however, regret having to get up at 4:30am to get into Philly by 7:45am)

My panel presented at 8:30am and I figured we would have no more than ten people, due to the early hour and the fact that it was the last day of the conference. Needless to say, I was shocked because we had close to 50 people attend! I had so much fun preaching about the merits of read alouds in the upper grades and I think I convinced a few audience members to give it a try.

For those of you who could not attend, I have attached my handouts below.

View this document on Scribd

View this document on Scribd

View this document on Scribd

Please feel free to email me or comment if you have any questions!