Twelve-year-old Connie is determined to find her way in life and not be tied to having to live based on others' expectations. Her parents have decided to move from Scotland to Australia, and Connie is thrust into an unfamiliar environment with few opportunities to make...

Welcome to the wonderful and colorful world of marine life. More specifically, life on the reefs. Sammy & Scarlett’s Coral Reef Adventure by Robert Andrew Provan is a great introduction to life in the ocean for 4th through 6th graders. Learning about marine life is...

Jeff Pennant's Field Guide to Raising Happy Parents by Kelli McKinney is charming, fun, and witty. It has lots of heart and personality. The main character is Jeff, who tells how he can't relate to his parents. They tell him one thing and then something...

Laura Wiltse Prior’s early chapter book, Emma Just Medium: The Beach Dilemma, is about family dynamics and finding your place. Emma was the middle child, stuck between her older brother, Big, and her younger brother, nicknamed Little. That made Emma’s nickname, Medium, though few people...

Rose and Linney had been together for as long as they could remember. Linney lived next door to her, exactly one hundred and one steps from her bedroom door. Rose O'Reilly could not imagine life without her best friend, someone she always expected to be...

Zoey Isabella Sweezy Presents . . . Behind the Curtain: The Tooth Fairy, A Journalistic Investigation is a children’s picture book by Steven M Stack with illustrations by Jayden Shambeau. Zoey’s teeth have been replaced with a coin whenever she puts one that falls out...

Perfect by Kiri Jorgensen is a charming middle-grade novel that follows the main character Sal, a girl with OCD searching for the perfect snowflake, and her mission to catch the phone thief plaguing her school. When Sal is invited to attend the weather club at...

Grinza's Orchard by Leonard I Eckhaus is an enthralling story about a gypsy family. It follows Grinza Lovell, a gypsy girl born in 1890 in the small village of Cojasca, Romania. When Grinza was five, her parents planted a cherry tree in their front yard...

P.T. Grumbles: A Christmas Story by Helen Stehlin Hunter, with illustrations by Sarah Miller, is a poignant and original story for the holiday season. P.T. Grumbles is a well-known and respected critic who focuses on the negative when writing his reviews. One magical Christmas Eve,...

I initially chose to read The Unsuper Adventures of Norma by Mark Svartz because of the colorful, fun-looking, and ethnically mixed children on the cover art. The illustration looks professionally done and has quite an overall appeal. However, as I began to read, I was...