It’s Back to School time again and there are some great new books with that subject in mind. We’ve got recommendations for all your favorite literary ducklings, from preschool to high school. Read on…
Bedtime Math: A fun excuse to stay up late
By: Laura Overdeck
Overdeck debuts with a just-irreverent-enough book based on bedtimemath.org, the phenomenally successful math education Web site she created. Instead of dividing her book by arithmetic operation, she uses ripped-from-cable-TV themes (“Exploding Food,” “Sports You Shouldn’t Try at Home”) and breezy reality-based topics to tee up three levels of challenge: “Wee ones” (for those still counting on fingers), “Little kids” (simple arithmetic), and “Big kids” (bigger numbers, more complex problems). Whether Overdeck is asking readers to noodle on the Scoville scale of pepper hotness (“Habanero peppers score 350,000, and some peppers actually crack 1 million”) or the speed of a cheetah (“They’re zooming faster than the cars on a highway, and without ever getting a speeding ticket”), she shows that she knows her audience and loves her subject. Paillot (the My Weird School series) is a great choice for collaborator: called upon to illustrate everything from praying mantises to human cannonballs, he does it all with a good-hearted, goofy energy that should propel readers through the pages. Ages 3 – 8. (Publishers Weekly)
The Bears Go to School (A Pete & Gabby Book)
By: Kay Winters
Pete and Gabby are bored so they go in search of something to do. When they come across a school, they know it must be fun! The two bear cubs prowl through the school and wreak havoc in the music room, art room, gymnasium, and the cafeteria before having to be escorted back to the campground by the ranger. It turns out that school is a very fun place! Ages 5 – 7 (Publisher’s Marketing)
Junie B’s Essential Survival Guide to School
By: Barbara Park
Hello, school children! Hello! It’s me . . . Junie B., First Grader! I have been going to school for over one and a half entire years now. And I have learned a jillion things that will help you survive at that place. And guess what? NOW I AM GOING TO PASS THIS INFORMATION ON TO Y-O-U!!! I wrote it all down here in Junie B.’s Essential Survival Guide to School! Here is some of the stuff I wrote about: * Bus Rules * Teachers (and other bosses) * Carpools * How to Stay Out of Trouble (Possibly) * Homework * Funwork * Friends (Plus Children You May Not Actually Care For). And that is just the tip of the ice cube! ‘Cause I drew all the pictures myself. Plus also, there are pages where Y-O-U can write and draw, too! So open it up and get started. You will have fun, I think! Ages 6 – 9 (Publisher’s Marketing)
The School for Good and Evil
By: Soman Chainani
This year best friends Sophie and Agatha will discover what it is to be a student at the fabled School for Good and Evil, where ordinary boys and girls are trained to be fairy-tale heroes and villains. With her pink dresses, glass slippers, and devotion to good deeds, Sophie knows she’ll earn top marks at the School for Good and graduate a storybook princess. Meanwhile, Agatha, with her shapeless black frocks, wicked pet cat, and dislike of nearly everyone, seems a natural fit for the School for Evil. But when the two girls are swept into the Endless Woods, they find their fortunes reversed—Sophie’s dumped in the School for Evil to take Uglification, Death Curses and Henchmen Training, while Agatha finds herself in the School for Good, among handsome princes and fair maidens in Princess Etiquette and Animal Communication. But what if the mistake is actually the first clue to discovering who Sophie and Agatha really are? The School for Good and Evil is an epic journey into a dazzling new world, where the only way out of a fairy tale . . . is to live through one. Ages 8 – 12 (Publisher’s Marketing)
Escape from Mr. Lemoncello’s Library
By: Chris Grabenstein
Bibliophiles unite! Melvil Dewey is alive and well and residing within Mr. Lemoncello’s new library. Billionaire game-maker Luigi Lemoncello wants to pay homage to his childhood library by constructing a technological marvel in his hometown that went without a library for 12 years. He invites a dozen 12-year-olds to a lock-in at the new building, and when they arrive they find the eccentric game-maker has offered them a further challenge—if they can find their way out using only what’s in the library, they will become the new spokesperson for Mr. Lemoncello’s company. Kyle Keeley teams up with other students as unlikely alliances form, some children’s true (not so nice) personalities emerge, and suspense builds while the kids enlist the aid of Mr. Lemoncello’s childhood librarian, an Electronic Learning center, and book clues and references galore. The story feels like a cross between a reality show, an online game, and a tightly woven mystery. Dewey Decimal clues will hook librarians and teachers, while book lovers will delight at myriad references from Mr. Lemoncello, such as, “And now, I must return to my side of the mountain… I have great expectations for you all!” Book and game lovers alike will delve into this delicious tale and put on their thinking caps. Ages 8 – 12 (School Library Journal)
My Weird Writing Tips
By: Dan Gutman
It would be hard to find a funnier children’s guide to writing and grammar than this one, or a writer with greater credibility on the topic than Gutman, whose My Weird School and Baseball Card Adventures series have persuaded many young readers that they can handle chapter books and, even better, enjoy them. Always entertaining and sometimes laugh-out-loud funny, this guidebook leads off with an introduction, entitled Don’t Be a Dumbhead, explaining why readers should care about the topic. The first half of the book deals with writing and revision, while the second half presents grammar, complete with confessional comments (Lie or Lay? I get this one wrong all the time); spelling tricks; and amusing sample sentences. Cartoon-style drawings add to the fun. A broad range of readers will find the book helpful. Insecure students will benefit from the disarming presentation, while motivated ones will appreciate the short list of websites that publish student writing. A comical yet practical introduction to writing. Ages 9 – 12 (Booklist)
The Sweet Revenge of Celia Door
By: Karen Finneyfrock
Ninth-grader Celia Door lives in Hershey, Pa., home to chocolate and a sea of vanilla classmates. With a black wardrobe to match her outlook, Celia considers herself “Dark, ” a permanent outsider who has accepted that she’ll never be one of the cool kids. The arrival of Drake, a new student from New York City, is a bright spot in Celia’s Dark life. She starts to fall for him, but it turns out that Drake is gay; far from a problem, it sets up a wonderful scenario for friendship, as Celia helps Drake woo his crush back home, and Drake helps Celia prioritize her dreams of becoming a poet rather than revenge over mean girl Sandy Firestone. In her YA debut, Finneyfrock gives Celia a drily funny voice that keeps the narrative zipping along. Although the serious secret Celia has been keeping comes a bit out of nowhere, readers who also feel like they have no place in the mainstream will easily identify with her, even when she makes a few seriously Dark mistakes. Ages 12 – up. (Publisher’s Weekly)
William meets the Stick Family
By: Karen Voss Peters
William is very nervous about his first day at a new school until he meets a strange boy called Wrickety Stick. Wrickety—along with the rest of the Stick family—has bendable bones. He can make his bones go soft and thin just by concentrating. This means that he can do things that William can only imagine, like sliding under doors and squeezing into cracks, or slipping between the bars of a grate. After witnessing it for himself, William becomes fascinated and wants to know more about this strange family and their unusual bones. But it’s not just William who is interested in the Sticks’ bones. The Sticks soon find out they are in danger—and William intends to help them. Though he can’t slide under doors, he’ll do everything he can to save his new friends. Ages 12 – up (Publisher’s Marketing)
Maggot Moon
By: Sally Gardner
Just when it seems that there’s nothing new under the dystopian sun, Gardner (The Red Necklace) produces an original and unforgettable novel about a boy in a totalitarian society who risks everything in the name of friendship. Standish Treadwell narrates in short, fast-paced chapters, illustrated by theatrical designer/director Crouch with flipbook-style images of rats, flies and maggots: creatures that represent the oppressive forces at work in the Motherland, a brutish government intent on being first to the moon, at whatever cost to its citizens. Fifteen-year-old Standish is dyslexic (as is the author), making him a target of bullies, which is the least of his problems. He lives with his resourceful grandfather in Zone Seven, but the Motherland has taken away his parents, as well as his best friend, Hector. The loss of his parents has created a hole Standish cannot fill; the disappearance of Hector leaves Standish unprotected at school and bereft of a friend who saw past Standish’s disability to recognize his intelligence. “I believe the best thing we have is our imagination,” Standish recalls Hector telling him, “and you have that in bucketloads.” Though Standish’s grandfather keeps the boy purposefully in the dark about many things, Standish figures out one of the government’s big secrets on his own, and he concocts a brave and personally risky plan to reveal it. Parts of the story are very hard to read early on; a classmate is beaten to death by a teacher in the schoolyard, but the violence asks readers to consider what the world would be like if certain events in history had turned out differently. Gardner does a masterful job of portraying Standish’s dyslexia through the linguistic swerves of his narration, and although the ending is pure heartbreak, she leaves readers with a hopeful message about the power of one boy to stand up to evil. Ages 12 – up. (Publisher’s Weekly)
Night School
By: C.J Daugherty
Only gutsy first-time novelists would tackle the well-worn sinister boarding school trope, complete with a troubled new girl navigating the social scene and various shadowy dangers. After all, where to go with such familiar ingredients? Yet Daugherty knows exactly where she wants to take us, and soon enough, readers will be hooked. The lean prose certainly helps, as does how the plot is punctuated by several unforgettable scenes of suspense, including a skinny-dipping escapade complicated by a panic attack and a rooftop encounter with a bottle of vodka that ends in . . . well, that would be telling. Connecting such episodes is protagonist Allie Sheridan’s efforts to learn why she was admitted to such an elite institution, and about Night School, a shadowy training program within it. If initially some students seem stereotypical, keep reading: Daugherty is expert at revealing character through action. Similarly, Allie can appear too reactive, letting others rescue her, but then she notes this tendency, thereby incorporating it into her character arc. Ultimately, both the story and the writing itself are full of surprises. Ages 14 – up (Booklist)