Best Friend Thief opens with Nathalie and her best friend Reagan making plans for the beginning of 5th grade. They have great plans for the International Costume Contest that the school holds every year—a plan that is sure to win! But when school starts, Blair Bennett, one of the popular girls, latches on to Reagan. […]
Lily Dale
April 9, 2012 by 1 Comment
Although this series is made up of four books—Awakening, Believing, Connecting, and Discovering—they’re really better considered a complete novel split into four parts. In fact, they’re probably best read back to back. (I only figured out the A, B, C, D naming convention as I started the fourth novel.) The series follows high school senior […]
Theodosia and the Serpents of Chaos
April 3, 2012 by Leave a Comment
Overall, Theodosia and the Serpents of Chaos was fine. It has a spunky, super smart, and mystically aware 11 year old heroine and the vocabulary isn’t dumbed down, which is something I always appreciate. Theodosia lives in Edwardian London and spends much of her time in the museum her parents run. She has a younger […]
Aurelia
March 29, 2012 by Leave a Comment
Aurelia feels like a logical stepping stone between the princess stories of Gail Carson Levine and adult novels of romance and intrigue. In many ways, Aurelia is a typical princess from stories like this—she chafes against authority, she thinks she’s less beautiful than her golden younger sister, the common people love her, and she’s smarter […]
The Season
March 21, 2012 by 2 Comments
Set in Regency England (the season of 1815, to be exact), The Season follows the first few months of the social debuts of Alex Stafford and her best friends, Ella and Vivi. In addition to the social pitfalls inherent to their status, there’s also a murder, spies, and romance. The story is full of the […]
The Penderwicks
March 16, 2012 by Leave a Comment
The Penderwicks: A Summer Tale of Four Sisters, Two Rabbits, and a Very Interesting Boy is a sweet story about the adventures of the four Penderwick sisters—Rosalind, age 12; Skye, age 11; Jane, age 10; Batty, age 4—during their three weeks renting a summer house in the Berkshire Mountains with their father and Hound the […]
A List of Series for Younger or Reluctant Readers
March 10, 2012 by 4 Comments
The Princess in Black by Shannon Hale and Dean Hale – basically princess as superhero, also featuring goat boy as superhero. Full of cute and colorful illustrations, it’s a great chapter book series for new or reluctant readers. The first book is reviewed in more detail on this site. The Adventurers Guild by Zack Loran […]
The Birthday Ball
February 29, 2012 by Leave a Comment
The Birthday Ball is a cute farce of a fairy tale, with sketches by Jules Feiffer (you may recognize his distinctive style from The Phantom Tollbooth) throughout. It’s patently ridiculous, with exaggerated characters—there’s no attempt at realism. Although in most ways it’s a fairly standard princess-story setting, there are throw away lines about spandex and […]
