Tag Archive | US author

Clockwork Three, by Matthew Kirby (book review) – automated man, secret music, hidden clues

Jul19

book cover of The Clockwork Three by Matthew J Kirby, published by ScholasticMysterious doings, nefarious plots, and a green violin! Three young people from widely different backgrounds become friends as they seek the links between strange items, even stranger events, and villainous strangers in a seaside city with a wild parkland at its heart.

A woodcarver‘s long-stilled hands left behind clues in the hotel doors and banisters. Secret knowledge hidden by the Guild of Clockmakers could be key. A mechanical man has more heart than the city’s businessmen, and the treasure hidden in the park holds the city together.

Debut author Kirby said that a old newspaper article about a young boy kidnapped and forced to fiddle on the streets for his masters was his inspiration for the opening events of this wondrous tale. Share the city and its mysteries with Guiseppe, Hannah, and Frederick.
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Book info: The Clockwork Three / Matthew J. Kirby. Scholastic, 2010. [author’s website] [publisher site] [book trailer]

My Book Talk: A shipwrecked violin whose music is magical… 62 holly leaves carved into the hotel woodwork (or is it 63?)… a mechanical man with no head and a clockwork head with no heart…

In a seaport city, the paths of an orphaned street musician, a young hotel maid, and an apprentice clockmaker cross and recross as they struggle with missing pieces of memory and money and mystery. Who is the lovely lady that selects Hannah as her personal attendant from the hotel staff? Will Guiseppe be able to hide enough coins from the gangboss for a ship ticket back to his homeland? And what of the sinister crates which Frederick sees unloaded at the museum, but are quickly hidden from the Guild of Clockmakers?

When the green park at the heart of the city is threatened by greedy developers, the three young people rush to solve the mystery before the treasure hidden there is lost forever!

Is there really a clockwork man running out of control in the city? Is the park an escape or a trap? And what do the holly leaves mean? Realistic details of an exotic place bring readers deep into this exciting tale’s many twists and turns with Guiseppe, Hannah, and Frederick. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Briar Rose (fiction)

Jul16

Shh… Sneak-in Saturday has a double meaning today, as we consider an adult book that snuck itself into teens’ hearts and then snuck onto numerous award lists before I could blog about it.

Originally written as a novel for adults, Briar Rose won the Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Adult Literature in 1993, but gathered such a following among older teen readers that it was re-released as a Tor Teen paperback in 2002.

Memories of less-often told stories of the Holocaust spill into the present day as Becca tries to carry out her grandmother’s last wishes on a trek to Poland that becomes a heart-wrenching journey into the hellish days of World War II.

A strong, faithful book that reminds us that history’s headlines are not the only important stories.
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Book info: Briar Rose / Jane Yolen. Macmillan/Tor Teen, 2002. [author’s website] [publisher site] [book trailer]

Recommendation: Becca always loved her grandmother’s story about Briar Rose, no matter how many times Gemma told it to her and her sisters. The princess, the black-booted witch’s curse, the mist that covered the kingdom and made everyone sleep for a hundred years… not the same Sleeping Beauty story that you heard or read in books.

Years later, grown-up Rebecca promises her elderly grandmother that she will find out the rest of the story. Upon Gemma’s death, she inherits a small box of photos and papers – clues to the past and the rest of the Briar Rose story that journalist Rebecca must uncover.

From research to refugee camp, Becca traces Gemma’s mysterious arrival in the United States from Europe in the closing days of World War II. The path leads back to a Nazi extermination camp in Poland, not a concentration camp, but a place so deadly that only 4 men ever escaped… and no women ever left it alive.

Why does Gemma’s paperwork say that she came from that place of death? Is she the princess of Briar Rose? How can Becca find her family’s roots when no one in Chelmno will talk about the camp?

A powerful retelling of Sleeping Beauty that explores the brutal depths of the Holocaust. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Red Blazer Girls: The Vanishing Violin (fiction)

Jul15

Another Fun Friday, and a second Red Blazer Girls mystery to puzzle over!

This time, the four friends are given clues that could lead to a beautiful violin which disappeared from a locked room fifty years ago, and their principal hires them to look into mysterious good deeds at St. Veronica’s.

Eating ice cream makes solving the puzzles and codes easier, right? And they’ll have time for their new band and just a little bit of flirting, too, yes?

Hoping that the third volume wanders my way soon – so much fun to solve the puzzles along with Sophie, Margaret, Becca, and Leigh Ann!
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Book info: The Red Blazer Girls: The Vanishing Violin / Michael D. Beil. Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers, 2010 (*paperback 2011). [author’s website] [publisher site]

Recommendation:Disappearing world-class violin! Mysterious good deeds at school! The Red Blazer Girls are back on the case, as Sister Bernadette hires them to investigate strange things happening at St. Veronica School, like the library’s miraculous weekend renovation! The four friends look for hidden passages in the school’s creepy basement, stepping in red icky goo as they search. Who would clean the teacher’s lounge fridge – without being asked??

Margaret gets a puzzling note at the violin shop next door, urging her to decipher a code so she can get the next clue in a race to recover a violin that’s been missing for 50 years. If she finds it first, she can keep it! Time to get those clever minds racing, with two mysteries to solve at once, puzzles, riddles and all.

In the meantime, the girls form a band (The Blazers, of course), flirt a little (especially Sophie), work through puzzles and codes a lot, and close in on the culprits – but wait! A second violin disappears from the totally-locked violin shop whose new assistant hides his sketchy past. Three cases at once?

The Red Blazer Girls are determined to solve them all before their band’s first performance at the coffeehouse next door. Four fabulous friends, multiplying mysteries, and all the wonders and woes of middle school life make the Red Blazers Girls series a winner! (Be sure to read Ring of Rocamadour first to get the most of their stories) 336 pages (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Positively (fiction)

Jul12

How can anyone else understand what Emmy is going through?
Born HIV-positive, losing her mother to AIDS, struggling to make it through school and the move to her dad and stepmom‘s house…

Thankfully, there really are places like Camp Positive where young people like Emmy can learn to cope with HIV, as well as camps for kids with asthma or diabetes. The author is donating proceeds from sales of Positively to the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation.

Come to Camp Positive with Emmy – you’ll be glad you did!
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Book info: Positively / Courtney Sheinmel. Simon & Schuster, 2009. [author’s website] [publisher site] [book trailer]

Recommendation: AIDS took her mother, leaving 13 year-old Emmy alone and HIV-positive. Well, her father and stepmother wanted her, but did she really want to live with them? Especially with a new baby on the way?

After Mom’s funeral, being at junior high with Nicole was mostly the same, but it was really hard at Dad and Meg’s house with different rules and someone else’s favorite foods. Who wouldn’t get mad and lash out?

Emmy wasn’t happy when they sent her to Camp Positive for girls living with HIV – a whole summer away from her friends, and off in the woods! How will Mom’s spirit know that she’s away from their hometown? Can Emmy get used to sleeping in a cabin with other people? How many summers will she have in her life, even with all the new medications?

Explore the woods and worries with Emmy and the Camp Positive crew, learning to live well every day and be positive in more ways than they ever dreamed. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Die For Me, by Amy Plum (book review) – ultimate sacrifice for love?

Jul11

book cover of Die For Me by Amy Plum published by Harper CollinsOn this metaphysical, mysterious Monday, slip away to Paris!
City of Lights, city of Romance! What a place to try to mourn…

Oh, Kate loves her grandparents, but they can’t replace her mom and dad, gone in a heartbeat.

Her encounters with some most puzzling people startle Kate out of her haze of grief – swordfights in modern Paris? How can someone move fast enough to stop a falling stone block? Didn’t that guy fall under a Metro train??

A new variety of not-dead creatures in this great debut novel – and they aren’t vampires!
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Book info: Die for Me / Amy Plum. Harper Collins, 2011. [author’s website] [publisher site] [book trailer] Review copy and cover art courtesy of the publisher.

My Book Talk: Suddenly orphaned, Kate and Georgia hope for safety at their grandparents’ calm Paris home. But danger is always nearby, as the sisters witness a miraculous rescue from the Seine River followed by a sword fight, then Kate narrowly escapes falling stone blocks in their neighborhood.

Kate is magnetically drawn to the handsome young man she sees near each incident. He introduces himself as Vincent, and his friends as students and painters. A tiny glimmer of hope peeks into her sorrow, but then Vincent disappears. How can Georgia go out partying every night while the darkness of losing their parents swallows Kate?

Things get stranger and stranger. She hears Vincent’s friend being crushed, run over by the Metro train – but how can Jules be strolling along their street the very next week?
Why are Vincent and his friends always nearby when someone’s life is threatened?
Why do Georgia’s new party buddies give Kate the cold shudders, while Vincent’s touch is like light and life?

A new type of paranormal creature roams the Parisian nights in this adventure-thriller with a touch of romance – Paris is Paris, after all… Are there secrets too big for the living to understand, too strong for the dead to ignore? (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

Beastly, by Alex Flinn (book review) – yesterday’s bully, tomorrow’s Beast?

Jul9

book cover of Beastly by Alex Flinn published by Harper CollinsShhh… it’s Sneak-In Saturday, so I’m bringing you a book that swooped onto the bestseller and award lists before I could get it to you!

And darned if they didn’t go and make a movie of it, too… The book is much better, of course, as your mind’s eye visualizes Kyle’s transformation into a hairy beast and his sudden downfall from Mr. Popular to freakish recluse.

This modern retelling of Beauty and the Beast includes chatroom transcripts of a support group for the “unfortunately transformed” and roses in its symbolism.

Alex Flinn has updated other classic tales and also writes completely ‘contemporary’ teen fiction – check her website for full list. And don’t be Beastly to anyone, okay?
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Book info: Beastly / Alex Flinn. HarperCollins, 2007. [author’s website] [author interview] [publisher site] Review copy and cover art courtesy of the publisher.

My Book Talk: Kyle’s on the ballot for Prom King – no surprise since he’s the best-looking guy at school. But someone looks past the handsome surface to see his shallow, uncaring soul, and is going to make him pay for every insult.

When Kendra (the new girl with crooked teeth and the ugly non-designer clothes) protests about electing “royalty” just based on appearances and calls him a beast, Kyle tunes her out. Why should he worry about that loser when he’s taking the hottest girl at Tuttle to the prom? His dad, the television news star, says that no one should have to look at ugly people anyway.

Just for laughs, Kyle pretends to ask Kendra to the prom, knowing that he’ll dump her at the door as his friends mock her. Limo for his real date? On dad’s credit card, like the orchid corsage that the maid will get for him. But it’s a white rose waiting when Kyle’s ready to pick up Sloane, and she throws a fit about it, as he knew she would. The scholarship girl taking tickets admires the rose so he gives it to her – easier than walking over to the trashcan. As he and Sloane are crowned Prom King and Queen, Kendra arrives in her outdated dress and is snubbed by the popular crowd. Prom night, Sloane’s parents are away, Kyle gets home just before sunrise – to find Kendra in his room!

She puts a spell on him – his outside appearance will mirror his beastly inner nature, unless he finds someone who’ll kiss him for love of his true self. If he doesn’t find true love in two years, he’ll be a beast forever.

After medical experts can’t cure him, Kyle is dumped by his dad in a house on the other side of New York City, given a tutor and the maid to stay with him. He tries to find answers online, in books, anywhere but in his own heart.

Will Kyle ever find a girl who will even look at him, let alone love him? Is he doomed to live alone with the rose garden that he and his tutor create? A clever retelling of Beauty and the Beast with modern twists, be sure to read it before you see the movie! (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

Red Blazer Girls: The Ring of Rocamadour (fiction)

Jul8

It’s Fun Friday, and if you’re in the mood for a mystery with several twists, you are in the right place!

A scavenger hunt interrupted years ago leads three friends through the venerable old buildings of their Catholic girls’ school, solving logic puzzles and brainteasers find the location of each clue in the chain.

They’re not the only ones on the hunt for a possible archaeological treasure, so The Red Blazer Girls need to watch their backs! Mystery, history, and fun with friends… what more could you want? (oh, there are some cute guys, too)

Be sure to solve each puzzle before reading the next chapter – it’s so much more fun that way! And, yes, there are more Red Blazer Girl cases ahead!
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Book info: The Red Blazer Girls: The Ring of Rocamadour / Michael D. Beil. Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers, 2009 (*paperback 2010). [author’s website] [publisher site] [book trailer]

Recommendation: Sophie decides to investigate the white face she saw in the church tower window, which would make anyone scream during 7th grade English class, right? So she, Rebecca and Margaret cross the courtyard from St. Veronica School to St. Veronica Church, where they find mysterious passageways, a huge orange cat, and a new friend with an old family problem.

Mrs. Harriman hasn’t seen her daughter since her ex-husband took Caroline away on an archaeological dig 20 years ago, and they drifted apart. But yesterday, a birthday card addressed to Caroline from her beloved grandfather was found in Mrs. H’s study, giving the first clues for a birthday scavenger hunt. Grandfather Ev died the next day, so he never gave Caroline that card, and the retired archaeologist’s gift hasn’t been found yet. Perhaps it is the missing ruby Ring of Rocamadour, over 1,000 years old…

The card says that the next clue is in St. Veronica School’s library, so slightly eccentric Mrs. H asks Sophie and friends to please search for it. Perhaps if they can track down all the clues and find the gift, then Mrs. H can contact Caroline at last.

They find and work through clues and puzzles, they have to practice for the Dickens skit contest, and someone else is just half a step behind them as they scour their New York City neighborhood for the next clues. Who can they trust? Will the gift still be there after 20 years? What is that odd smell?

When they got their red blazers to start the year as upper school students at St. V’s, the girls never dreamed that they’d be solving mysteries between guitar lessons, art class, and violin studies!

Funny, suspenseful, and totally real, this first book in the Red Blazer Girls series will have you working through the puzzles right along with Sophie, Margaret, Rebecca, and Leigh Ann, just waiting with the St. V’s girls for the next adventure!(One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Deadly (fiction)

Jul7

Tracking down a killer is just not what “proper young ladies” do, even if the killer is a germ. Prudence would certainly rather unravel a medical mystery than please her instructors at the snooty School for Girls!

Diseases regularly have regularly swept through the poorer sections of cities from the time that humans began clustering together on a permanent basis. In the Middle Ages, people thought that evil humors caused these epidemics; by the early 1900s the theory that filth contained disease-transmitting germs was gaining ground.

How could healthy people in a well-kept household suddenly become deathly ill when they had no exposure to the city slums with their filth and diseases?

Part social commentary, part detective story, Deadly is enhanced by the sketches which Prudence includes as she journals her way through this perilous time, on the trail of Typhoid Mary.
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Book info: Deadly / by Julie Chibbaro; illustrations by Jean-Marc Superville Sovak. Simon & Schuster, 2011 [author’s website] [publisher site] [book trailer]

Recommendation: In her 1906 journal, Prudence worries and dreams and sketches, wondering why doctors couldn’t save her brother’s life, why her father hasn’t returned from the Spanish-American War, how she can make a difference for those who suffer in her neighborhood.

The etiquette lessons and needlework at her school seem so trivial, compared to the life and death, joy and pain that Pru and her mother see during Marm’s midwife duties. When final-year students are encouraged to get part-time jobs using their skills on those newfangled typewriters, Pru leaps at the chance to do useful work.

She is hired by the new Department of Health and Sanitation as a research assistant and is soon swept into their investigation of a typhoid outbreak. Mr. Soper investigates every aspect of any household where the deadly disease has struck. They travel throughout New York City as typhoid sickens some people and kills others – is there a common cause?

When they discover that a healthy cook has been in the kitchen of every typhoid-stricken family, Mr. Soper and Prudence must find medical experts who can help them prove their unusual theory and stop the epidemic.

A compelling account of Typhoid Mary’s history, retold from a young woman’s point of view. When does the public good override individual freedom? Does science have more answers or more questions? Will Prudence take the next step and become a doctor herself? (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher and author.

Cate of the Lost Colony, by Lisa Klein (book review) – favored by the Queen, banished to Roanoke Colony

Jul6
book cover of Cate of the Lost Colony by Lisa Klein published by Bloomsbury

This World Wednesday takes us from England to Roanoke colony, a voyage that ends in silence among whispering grasses on the sea dunes of the New World.

Orphaned young Lady Catherine was naturally enthralled by the dashing Sir Walter Raleigh and his tales about the bountiful new world, waiting across the sea for the rule and law of his gracious Queen Elizabeth I.

But Cate didn’t realize that showing even slight interest in the Queen’s favorite could be the end of her time at court. Being banished from such a hostile place – a death sentence or a blessing?

Enjoy this tale of the early English colony whose mysterious disappearance continues to intrigue us.
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Book info: Cate of the Lost Colony / Lisa Klein. Bloomsbury, 2010. [author’s website] [publisher site] [book trailer]

My Book Talk (no spoilers): Seeing Indians in Queen Elizabeth’s court, young Lady Catherine Archer is enthralled by Sir Walter Raleigh’s reports of his New World colony and by Sir Walter himself. But when poems from Sir Walter are found in her room, the orphaned Cate is sent away from the court by the jealous Queen, who keeps Raleigh close by her, not allowing him to even visit the colony that he raised money to establish.

Locked in the Tower of London, Cate worries that she will die alone and forgotten. But after weeks in prison, her fate is announced – she has been banished to Roanoke Colony in Virginia, never to return to England! For a 14 year old girl, raised to be a gentle lady, the long sea voyage (where pirates or the enemy Spanish are sure to attack the English ship) and the primitive conditions of the Colony are more likely a death sentence than any mercy from the Queen.

Cate is determined to see for herself the wonders of the New World that Raleigh’s captains reported, as she completes the voyage which brings the first women colonists from England to Roanoke. But they find the fort’s walls destroyed, the planted crops withered away, and the Roanoke soldiers dead or missing…

Will the colonists be able to survive with only the supplies in their ship?
Did the friendly Indians kill the soldiers or are there other enemies beyond the trees?
Will the Queen let Sir Walter visit his colony at last?
And will city girl Cate let go of her dreams of Raleigh and find a happy ending in this wilderness?
(One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Disunited States of America, by Harry Turtledove (book review) – alternate history with no USA!

Jul5

book cover of Disunited States of America by Harry Turtledove published by Tor TeenYesterday was a day for fireworks, picnics, and patriotic celebrations. At least, it was in this timeline for the USA… but what if the Constitution were never ratified? What if the states never united?

Welcome to “alt hist” – the alternative histories produced by wondering “what if” some key event of history had happened differently, then writing in great and grand detail about the results of that new path through time.

Turtledove is an acknowledged master of alternative history (his Guns of the South and WorldWar series are epic), and this trip with Crosstime Traffic to an alternate timestream is as thought-provoking as it is dangerous for Beckie (native to that timestream) and Justin (visiting with his mom on a trading mission).

Biological terrorism launched before the antidote is ready? Rampant racism and unrest? Remember, this is an alternate history, right?

Among all the freedoms that we celebrate today, be sure to exercise your freedom to read!
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Book info: The Disunited States of America (Crosstime Traffic #4) / Harry Turtledove. Tor Teen, 2011. [author’s website] [publisher site] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

My Book Talk: War between Ohio and Virginia? In Beckie’s world, it could happen any day. Justin’s seen enough alternate timelines to know that, as a Time Trader traveling through the many realities of how Earth’s history could have turned out.

Justin and his mom travel to Beckie’s alternate to make sure that researchers there hadn’t discovered Crosstime secrets and to help improve race relations. That North America is a crazy-quilt of big and little countries, and there are certainly no equal rights. If you weren’t white and male, you were powerless (except in Mississippi…strange, strange Mississippi).

This alternate never saw the states become united under the Constitution, so Beckie and her grandmother must have passports and visas and permission-to-travel letters for every border crossing between the civilized nation of California and Grandma’s hometown in rural Virginia. The “cousin” who gives them a ride across the bridge from Ohio gives her the creeps…the big guns hidden in his car give her the chills.

Beckie is glad to meet someone her own age when Justin visits the aunt and uncle she’s staying with. Justin is careful to speak like the locals, trying to blend in. Soon, they’re both glad that they met.

Suddenly, people in border towns start dying of a mysterious fever and Ohio is blamed for it. As Virginia soldiers roll in and bombing begins, Beckie and her ever-grumbling grandma search for a safe place, Justin is separated from his mom with communication lines cut, and the fever is confirmed as the plague. Plague! Who has a cure for the plague?

Will Beckie ever get home to California?
Will Justin and his mom find their way through time to their world?
Can Justin tell Beckie where he’s really from without poking holes in the fabric of time?

Turtledove is the master of alternate history, and his “Time Traders” series takes readers to fascinating timelines that truly make you wonder… what if? (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)