Lynn: Looking for a great spooky book to hand teens as Halloween approaches? Cherie Priest’s The Agony House (2018) is a perfect choice! High-school senior Denise, her mom, and new stepdad are the newest residents of Argonne House in New Orleans. Over 100 years old and standing alone on a hurricane-ravaged block, the house is literally falling down […]
Lynn: Here at Bookends, we do our best to review books in the old-fashioned sense, by using literary standards and keeping personal responses out of the mix as much as possible. For this review of Apollo 8: the Mission that Changed Everything (2018) by Martin W. Sandler, I want to say strongly that our literary […]
Lynn: When I heard that a movie of Philip Reeve’s brilliant Mortal Engines (2003) was in the works, I immediately wanted to reread the series. (I hear a chorus of “Sing it, sister!”) If you HAVEN’T read the series, RUN to get the first book NOW! If you’re a fan of world-building, this series is like […]
Lynn: On the first day of high school in a new town, with a chance to make a new life, Quinn looks at the two wigs on her bureau. Should she be Guinevere or Sasha? It’s been 408 days since she lost all her hair to an autoimmune disorder, during which time her eighth-grade friends drifted […]
Lynn: We count you Bookends readers as friends. Having just read The Assassination of Brangwain Spurge (September) by M.T. Anderson and Eugene Yelchin, I know that, were I a goblin, I would affectionately address you as follows: You clammy, sweaty pedant! Get your toad-like hands on this book ASAP (as-soon-as-published)! Brilliant and very, very funny, writer […]
Lynn: Are you still watching videos of Meghan and Harry’s wedding on YouTube? Yup, me too. If you and your teens are ready to move on to royal-watching in a different format, here’s a delightful new book that checks all the boxes for fans of crowned-heads-on-anything. Gorgeous clothes? Check. Handsome princes? Check. Behind-the-scenes secrets? Check. […]
Lynn: Maureen Johnson sets her latest mystery, Truly Devious (2018), at Ellingham Academy, a unique private school in Vermont where all the students have a “spark.” “If interested,” reads the school literature, “[just] get in touch.” Ellingham Academy is famous for more than its unique approach to education: It is the site of a famous, unsolved 1936 kidnapping […]
Lynn: Author Sarah Albee makes it clear right at the beginning of Poison: Deadly Deeds, Perilous Professions and Murderous Medicines (2017) that her book is NOT a how-to manual for murder! Rather, it’s a history with far more than murderous intentions. But what mystery fan doesn’t want the inside scoop on this crime-writer favorite method? Authors from […]
Lynn: Many mystery fans will happily follow the trail of a good mystery into a wide variety of other genres. Mystery and fantasy fans take note: Makiia Lucier’s Isle of Blood and Stone (2018) is right up your dark alley! In the prologue, we learn of the tragedy that has befallen the island nation St. […]
Cindy and Lynn: It’s May, and you know what that means! Booklist is rolling out their May 1 Mystery Showcase and The Booklist Reader will be focused on mysteries, crime, and sleuthing all month long. We have been training our magnifying glasses on recent book covers to fit the theme. It’s no mystery that despite admonishments […]
Encouraging Middle-Schoolers to Choose Books
There’s been a lot of discussion among the librarians I know about what to do with middle-schoolers: they just don’t seem to read as much as they used to. I know that here in Chicago, we have a unique perspective on this situation, since our schools run K–8. In my former school system in Maryland […]
Getting Started with the Global Read Aloud
The 2017 Global Read Aloud kicked off yesterday, and I’m here to help. Author and educator Pernille Ripp founded the program as a way to connect students and teachers from different locales around the topics of books. (Think One Book One School or One Book One City, but on a global scale.) Each year, Ripp […]
TWO TRUTHS AND A LIE: Practice Recognizing Fake News
Cindy: There have been a number of YA fiction books with the title “Two Truths and a Lie,” but we’ve found a creative, informational book for middle-grade students that reinforces evaluating information for truth. Fake news, anyone? Two Truths and a Lie: It’s Alive (2017) by Ammi-Joan Paquette and Laurie Ann Thompson is the first […]
Encouraging Middle-Schoolers to Choose Books
There’s been a lot of discussion among the librarians I know about what to do with middle-schoolers: they just don’t seem to read as much as they used to. I know that here in Chicago, we have a unique perspective on this situation, since our schools run K–8. In my former school system in Maryland […]
Getting Started with the Global Read Aloud
The 2017 Global Read Aloud kicked off yesterday, and I’m here to help. Author and educator Pernille Ripp founded the program as a way to connect students and teachers from different locales around the topics of books. (Think One Book One School or One Book One City, but on a global scale.) Each year, Ripp […]
TWO TRUTHS AND A LIE: Practice Recognizing Fake News
Cindy: There have been a number of YA fiction books with the title “Two Truths and a Lie,” but we’ve found a creative, informational book for middle-grade students that reinforces evaluating information for truth. Fake news, anyone? Two Truths and a Lie: It’s Alive (2017) by Ammi-Joan Paquette and Laurie Ann Thompson is the first […]
Follow the Booklist Reader