Theatrical! When his parents go missing, young Max must take up the mantle of responsibility and live independently. With his Grammie there for support, he sets out to find a job, and along the way discovers his calling. He is a solver of problems. Each case he comes across connects to the others...
When I was at the library looking at the spine of this book I noticed how well worn and tattered it was,(a sure sign the book has been checked out many times). I began to scratch the back of my head wondering "Do I really want to read this again and run the risk of ruining my image of the book? "...
HomecomingCynthia Voigt- Main CharactersDicey: Dicey is a leader, and she is forced to grow up too fast. She is just thirteen, but when her mother leaves her and her syblings alone in the car, she has to be their parent. She must work to pay for their journey, and lead them to a place where they ...
This book touched me in a way, I felt really bad for the main character, Mina Smith. She was a dancer, she loved it so much and always practiced at the dance class she showed up to all the time. She worked very hard and even got a scholarship into an amazing dance camp. Mina was the only black gi...
The book is a fun book and I liked it. The book starts in the lunch room at a school there are two friends. They are both in sixth grade. There is a meeting about drama club in the middle of lunch. Both of them are on the tennis team. Both have the same coach. They just got done with practice. Th...
"People can be unimaginably foolish...and they can be unimaginably grand, at times." —Aunt Constance, The Callender Papers, P. 9 "Men, and women too, are unpredictable creatures. You have seen little of this. I wonder now if your innocence is enough protection for you." —Aunt Constance, P. ...
"Love stories aren't about how they end."A chance meeting on a street corner with her childhood friend Orfe plunges Enny into the tough world of popular music. As Orfe's business manager, Enny sees Orfe and her band, the three Graces, arrive at the brink of success -- and watches Orfe's dangerous...
The Runner is the fourth book in Voigt's Tillerman Cycle. This installment goes back several decades to focus on Bullet, the long-dead uncle of the children in Homecoming and Dicey's Song. The book itself stands on its own with no problems; certain incidents and themes that are mentioned in the f...
THE LEGEND MUST NEVER DIE!At 16 Gwyn is one determined female protagonist--a brave Innkeeper's Daughter who refuses to watch complacently while the common people--like herself--are bullied and butchered. My major confusion stemmed from the lack of a specific country or time: the novel was set in ...
Fantasy books get a lot of flack from "established" literature. Children or young adult fantasy books get ignored by adult fantasy readers. So between the two, I guess it's not surprising to find that this book is an undiscovered gem. But I urge anyone who has a few hours and spare 99p or whateve...
So you think you know what it means to be lonely? Let me introduce you to Jeff Greene, a boy who was raised by his father after his mother ran off. Jeff’s dad is a college professor who has very little time to spend with his son, so he leaves the household chores to a series of graduate student...
When a book is essentially plot-less, it's got to have some amazing characters for me to like it and, if it doesn't, then I can't help but feel like I've wasted my time.Building Blocks is a slice-of-life story about a young boy from the 1970's who travels through time back to the depression era w...
I wanted to like this book. The setting certainly connected with me - a coastal peninsula in Maine around WWI - and I really liked Clothilde, who was a very realistic and well-drawn character. The other characters were not as compelling. Clothilde's mother was a cypher - sometimes practical and h...
Life had always been predictable for Ann . . . until she met her college roommates, Niki and Hildy. Niki is always in motion, brash, often vulgar, with a philosophy of "win at any cost." And Hildy's aura of serene wisdom cloaks a most unusual way of looking at things. They became inseparable -- u...
Look out! Mikey Elsinger's in love! Mikey never does anything halfway, so it's no surprise that when she develops a not-so-secret crush on Shawn Macavity, the heartstoppingly gorgeous star of the school play, she goes a bit overboard. Soon Mikey -- Mikey? -- has a stylish new wardrobe, and she'...
Mikey and Margalo are two best friends attempting to navigate the difficult life of junior high. Mikey is a tomboy with an abrasive personality, whereas Margalo, despite her poor economic status, is well-dressed and has potential to be popular. Junior high proves to test their friendship as they ...
I'm pretty sure my mom handed me a copy of Dicey's Song during one of our summer reading list deals. Surely you're familiar with the concept. I read so many of the books on the list and she, in turn, gave me some sort of reward. You see this was back in the pre-Chronicles of Narnia phase in my li...
To be clear, Elske is the fourth book in Cynthia Voigt's loosely tied together series called The Kingdom. The other three (Jackaroo, Wings of a Falcon and On Fortune's Wheel) are all set in the Kingdom that Beriel hails from, while Elske is set in Trastad, a small country to the north of The King...
I wanted to like this book, especially since it was recommended to me by a friend. The writing itself is really good, and I like the character interactions (when they focus on the characters' conflicting worldviews instead of romance), and the world is intriguing... but the protagonist infuriates...
Angus is black and white and strong.Sadie is reddish brown and white and small."They don't look much alike," says Missus."They don't act much alike," says Mister.Angus and Sadie are brother and sister. Angus is bigger. He is a good, brave, and clever dog -- and he likes that. Sadie isn't as quick...
Must be read if you've read the first five books in the series and have become enamored of all things Tillerman. It doesn't stand on its own, which was okay by me. It doesn't really start and it doesn't really end, which, also, was okay by me. It's like reading a diary of a good friend who is ...
MUMMY, MUMMY, WHO'S GOT THE MUMMY? It's not a terribly valuable mummy, but its disappearance spells big trouble for Phineas and Althea's father, who is the curator of a small collection of Egyptian antiquities bequeathed to the college where he works. A whispered phone call leads Phineas and Al...
The Prince invited the city to his castle grounds, for food and drink, entertainments and dancing, on the day of the second night of the next full moon but one. Word spread quickly, like fire across a hayfield, until the talk of the market was only of the feast, and winter, winter and the feast. ...
This was the third such summer the people of Selby had enjoyed and they made the most of it. For with every year of peace, the likelihood of war closing in upon their fruitful fields and orchards in the next year became greater, and the fear of it also. On some nights, distant lights would burn a...
Da’s anger and unease at the robbery was fueled by the men who came to the barroom in the evening. The men drank little but talked much, as word spread, and rumors of attacks on isolated holdings and along the King’s Way spread. The men, speaking in low voices so as not to be heard by the two Lor...
Run off where Fredle didn’t know, but run off why he was afraid he could guess. What if Bardo’s go-between job was really a keep-away job? Or even a push-out job? When he understood that Bardo had intended to abandon him there on the compost pile, Fredle could only feel the not-all-rightness of e...