True Legend

Drew "True" Robinson is already a star, and he's headed for NBA.  Everyone knows it including the ultra  rich Seth Gilbert who "discovered" Drew playing street ball in New York and moved him and his mom to California complete with a private school, a house, and a job for his mom.  But Darlene Robinson isn't buying all the hype; she knows Gilbert wants to be the man next to man.

Even Drew's best friend covers for him in school making sure his grades are high enough and giving him rides.  And his high school coach leaves pretty much everything up to Drew from practice schedules to plays on the court.

The problem is Drew is starting to believe the hype.  Why should he worry about school when it's just a stepping stone to the NBA?  Why should he worry about being a team player when everyone knows he's the real star?

One night Drew will meet someone on the playground who will force him to face reality, to see the truth of what his life has become.  Is it too late for Drew to become the real "True" Robinson?

Read Mike Lupica's latest sports story about living with integrity, especially when you're a star.

Smart Girls Get What They Want

Gigi, Neerja, and Bea have been best friends since kindergarten. They do everything together, and they're three of the smartest girls in their class.  Maybe they aren't the most popular girls in school--ok, most people don't even know who they are--but they aren't too worried about it.  They know the real fun will start in college.

But something happens to show them that maybe they are missing out on too much by not participating in high school life, and they make a plan.  They are the smartest girls in school, and there's no reason they can't have everything they want including grades, athletics, arts, student government, and maybe even cute guys!

Join these three friends on their journey to get the most out of life as they realize smart girls may not know everything, but they can get what they want if they put their minds to it.

This is Sarah Strohmeyer's first book for YA's, and it's a great ride through high school and teen romance.

Girl Stolen

Imagine you are sick and sleeping in the back seat of your mom's SUV while she goes into the pharmacy to pick up your prescription.  A stranger casually gets in the car, starts the engine, and drives away without even realizing you are there.  Now imagine you are blind.

This is exactly what happens to Cheyenne Wilder one cold December day.  Cheyenne is terrified and miserably sick with pneumonia.  As she struggles to think of some way to save herself, she finally realizes she will have to let the carjacker know she is there.  Maybe he will let her go, especially once he knows she can't recognize his face.

Griffin can't believe his luck!  A practically brand new Cadillac Escalade just sitting there in the shopping center parking lot with the keys in the ignition.  Surely his dad will be proud when he sees this beauty.  Once he notices Cheyenne in the back seat, everything changes.  Griffin isn't a kidnapper, but he doesn't want to go to jail.  Can he keep Cheyenne from harm and protect himself?

Things quickly spiral out of control in April Henry's story of a carjacking gone awry.  I read this suspenseful book in one sitting because I couldn't wait to find out what would happen next!

Steve Jobs: The Man Who Thought Different

Do you have an iPod, iPad, or iPhone?  How about any of the many devices that are modeled after these products?  If so, you should thank Steve Jobs.  Karen Blumenthal's new biography follows the
Apple co-founder and CEO through a life filled with moments of brilliance and insight as well as defeat and frustration.

Steve Jobs's path in life was never easy.  He was adopted as an infant, struggled to make friends in school, and dropped out of college after just one semester.  He struggled to find his path.

But when he reconnected with Steve Wozniak who was trying to build a computer for an individual to use, Jobs quickly recognized the genius of this plan, and soon Apple Computers was born. 

Blumenthal's biography is highly readable and fascinating revealing the innovative thinker as well as the demanding control freak.  If you were ever curious about how your iPod came to be or about how computers evolved from massive behemoths largely confined to academia to the tools for business and life we use today, this is a must read!

One Came Home

Georgie Burkhart knows her sister Agatha can't be dead.  It doesn't matter that there is a body with auburn hair wearing Agatha's dress.  Georgie believes Agatha is alive.

No one wants to listen, so Georgie decides to conduct her own investigation into her sister's disappearance.  With little more than her savings and her beloved shotgun, Georgie makes a plan.  Of course, plans were made to be unraveled, and Georgie has to alter her plans along the way.

In the unsettled back country of 1871 Wisconsin will have to face criminals and deadly animals in her quest to find out the truth about Agatha and assuage her own conscience.  She's willing to do it because Georgie's keeping a secret of her own, and if Agatha really is dead, Georgie could be to blame.

Part mystery and part western, this is a great read and a thrilling adventure!  Read Amy Timberlake's newest book; you won't be sorry you did!

The Hound of the Baskervilles

When Doctor Charles Mortimer arrives at 221B Baker Street, he has a tale for Sherlock Holmes that is strange and difficult to believe.  His friend and former owner of Baskerville Hall is dead from a heart attack.  His body was found on the moor, and Dr. Mortimer believes he died of fright.

Mortimer tells the story of a terrifying hellhound that haunts the Baskerville family.  It sounds difficult to believe, and Mortimer struggles to believe it himself, but it true that something happened at Baskerville Hall.

Now Holmes and Watson are on the case to discover the truth about the hound of the Baskervilles and to protect the life of the new heir. 

Holmes and Watson are both skeptical, but once they are confronted with strange events on the moor, will they be able to deny the evidence of their own eyes?  Will they be able to solve the case before the cursed hound claims another victim?

Read Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's classic mystery to find out!

Enchanted

Sunday Woodcutter is the youngest of seven daughters named for the days of the week.  Sunday loves to write, but she only writes about the past, never her own stories.  Strange things happen when she does.

One day she meets an enchanted frog in the forest, and the two strike up a conversation that quickly becomes a true friendship.  When Sunday returns to find him missing one day, she is heartbroken and confused.  What has happened to her friend, and can she really be in love with a frog?

Rumbold is a prince and a victim of an ongoing battle between enemy fairy godmothers.  He was transformed into a frog in retaliation for something his fairy godmother did, but she was able to soften the curse.  The enchantment would end with true love's kiss. 

This is only the beginning of a complex and well-written story that references every fairy tale you've ever heard (and probably a few you haven't)!  It's a little piece of heaven for a fairy tale nerd like me!  If you like romance, fantasy, and twisting plots involving evil rulers and family secrets, you'll love Alethea Kontis's new book!

Outlaw

Fifteen -year-old Jake Knight would much rather live at the British Embassy in Burkina Faso with his family than at his boarding school in England, so he's not really too upset when he is suspended for the rest of the semester.

Jake thinks Africa will be one long adventure full of fun and entertainment.  How could he know that almost immediately, he and his sister would be kidnapped and held for ransom.  This isn't the adventure Jake bargained for.

Now he is in the desert with terrorists and Yakuuba Sor, the most wanted outlaw in the Sahara.  Armed with only a cell phone, can Jake and his sister survive the harsh elements and a terrorist cell?

But things are not always what they seem, and Jake will have to face greater danger than he's ever imagined.

Author Stephen Davies is a missionary in Burkina Faso and speaks several languages including a local dialect that gives authenticity to this book.  Fans of Alex Rider will love this action-packed thriller!

Tokyo Heist

Violet has been looking forward to spending the summer with her artist  father, but things get off to a bad start when he is so wrapped up in his work that he forgets to pick her up.  On top of this, her father is dismissive of Violet's beloved manga including her work on her own Manga, Kimono Girl.

But Violet is intrigued when she learns that some lost Van Gogh prints have been stolen from the Yamadas, a wealthy Japanese couple who want to hire her father to paint a mural.  No one wants to listen to a teenager, but Violet does some amateur sleuthing and soon becomes convinced she's on the right track.

That track and her father's work for the Yamadas soon lead to Tokyo, and Violet is in her beloved Japan secretly investigating an art theft that seems to have started in the past.  Family secrets and the Japanese mafia both play starring roles in this globe trotting tale of adventure, art, and crime.

Fans of Ally Carter's Heist Society novels will love Diana Renn's Tokyo Heist!  My only complaint about this book was the lack of actual manga.  Violet loves manga and uses her her art to help her figure out the mystery, and I think it would've been nice to actually see the art instead of just reading about it.  But I enjoyed the book anyway, and I'm sure you will, too.

Every Other Day

Kali D'Angelo isn't a normal girl; she's just pretending to be one.  From the outside she looks normal, maybe a bit of a loner, and no one knows about her practically nonexistent relationship with her father.  But all this pretending to be normal is a cover for her secret.  Every other day Kali is anything but normal, she's a superhuman hunter, unstoppable and gifted with incredible strength and healing powers.  Even on the days when she is human, she's not normal.

In Kali's world, Darwin didn't just find proof of evolution, he found proof of preternatural beings that once discovered seemed to pop up everywhere--chupacabras, zombies, hell hounds, dragons.  You name it, Kali feels the overwhelming desire to fight it.

Now she's in bigger trouble than she's ever imagined.  It all started when she saw the mark on Bethany Davis's back.  Kali could have ignored it, but she didn't.  In her efforts to save Bethany from a death sentence, Kali sets off a chain reaction even she couldn't have predicted.  Now she has a voice in her head that may or may not be trustworthy giving her advice and direction, and the girl that has kept all her secrets close for years will have to learn to trust an odd assortment of people who may just be able to help her get some answers about who and what she is.

But the truth will come at cost that may break her heart.

Jennifer Lynn Barnes's new thriller is filled with monsters, gore, and plenty of plot twists!

Breathing Room

Evvy Hoffmeister is thirteen years old, her twin brother Abe is her best friend, she loves to help her father in the garden, and she has tuberculosis.

Evvy arrives at Loon Lake Sanatorium for treatment in the summer of 1940.  This treatment involves a lot of rest, cold air, and silence.  She isn't even allowed to sit up in bed or feed herself at first!  All this is in an effort to defeat the disease that is destroying lungs and stealing her breath. 

It takes some time to get to know the other girls in her room.  Pearl dreams of movie stars, Dena is stubborn and argumentative, and Beverly just tries to keep the peace.  Then Sarah arrives, and she and Evvy form an instant bond.  Each girl hopes to get better, but everyone know it is much more likely they will either graduate to the adult ward or die.  Even if you do get to leave the sanatorium, you're a bug for life with the possibility of of a relapse and contagion.

Some of the people at Loon Lake are cold and unsympathetic, but there are others who seem to care and want to provide comfort in the long and dull days.  How can you focus on recovery when the people you love are dying around you?

With images from the 1940's, and an informative author's note about tuberculosis at the end, Marsha Hayles's story is engaging and informative, but it is also heartbreaking and triumphant.  

Seraphina

Seraphina lives in a world where humans and dragons live with an uneasy peace.  Some of the Saar live among humans in human form, but dragons are not humans; they are logical, mathematical, and they generally despise humans and their emotions.

The people of Goredd are preparing for the anniversary of the peace treaty and the arrival of the Ardmagar, leader of the dragons.  Amidst the bustle of the preparations, Seraphina senses something is amiss.

Seraphina has spent her life in hiding at the request of her father, but now that she has a position as assistant music mistress in the palace, it will be difficult to keep a low profile.  In a world were people hate dragons and dragons hate people, she is what the impossible, the thing no one wants to believe exists.

To make things worse, she is having completely inappropriate and irresponsible feelings for the man who just happens to be a prince and engaged to be married to the girl who is third in line to the throne.

Now Seraphina must keep her secret while she guards her heart and tries to uncover a dangerous political plot.

I love this book!  It's one of the best fantasies I've read in ages.  It's smart, complex, and compelling.  Fans of Christopher Paolini's Eragon series will love it!

You must read Rachel Hartman's debut novel.  You don't want to miss out on this one!

Ripper

Fourteen-year-old Carver Young has lived in an orphanage all his life, but just as he's about to forced out on his own, he's adopted by a strange and cranky old man named Hawking.

Carver soon learns that Hawking is a former Pinkerton, an agent from the elite Pinkerton Detective Agency.  This is a dream come true for Carver who's always dreamed of becoming a detective but with no way to get the training he needs.

Soon he is on the trail of a ruthless killer.  Could it be that Jack the Ripper has abandoned his London killing grounds for New York society?  Carver thought he would have the help and training of Hawking, but the man seems determined to make Carver do this on his own, so instead he turns to Delia and Finn, both former orphans who've been adopted.

With a notoriously corrupt police force only recently placed under the charge of Teddy Roosevelt, the Pinkertons may be the city's only hope.  Should Carver trust the Pinkertons, the police, Roosevelt himself?  How could he convince anyone to listen to a poor orphan like himself anyway?

Filled with twists, turns, and heart-pounding action, Stephan Petrucha's Ripper is sure to excite mystery and detective fans!

Keeping the Castle

Patrice Kindl's new book is an homage to Jane Austen and her fabulous heroines and a laugh out loud tale of romance and crossed signals.

Seventeen-year-old beauty Althea is her family's only hope for saving their home, a crumbling castle built in the medieval style on the edge of a cliff.  Because of the time, Regency England, women have no means of making money other than marrying well.  Thus begins Althea's quest to marry a rich man and save her family's lands and home.

When a crop of new visitors, including a recently promoted Earl arrive in the village of Lesser Hoo, Althea sees her chance.  Will she persuade Lord Boring to fall for her womanly charms in spite of two badly behaved stepsisters, a crumbling castle, and Boring's ill-mannered friend, Mr. Fredericks?

With hints of Pride and Prejudice and Emma, fans of Jane Austen and newcomers to regency romance will love this one!

Bewitching

Fans of Alex Flinn's Beastly should start getting excited!  This book follows Kendra, the witch who cursed Kyle into a beast is back with more problems.  This time she can't decide if she should intervene in the life of a friend whose new stepsister is beautiful but sneakily evil.

As Kendra tries to decide what to do, she reviews other times she's intervened in the past that didn't turn out so well.  There's the time she tried to help a prince with an overbearing mother and the time a mermaid came to her looking for true love.

Meanwhile, Emma is watching her life slowly unravel under the influence of the deceptively beautiful Lisette.

This take on Cinderella looks at the story from a new perspective.  Maybe the beautiful Cinderella character isn't so pure and wonderful after all, and maybe the "ugly" stepsister isn't the evil one.

If you enjoyed Beastly, you'll definitely want to read Bewtiching!

The Girl of Fire and Thorns

Sixteen year old Elisa has spent her life feeling useless.  She is the shy and overweight younger daughter of a king who avoids the spotlight and soothes her insecurities with food.  There is one thing about her that makes her special; she bears the Godstone.  Only one person in a century is chosen to bear the bear the stone and perform an act of service.  But Elisa knows she isn't worthy and fears she will never fulfill her destiny.

Now she is marrying the king of a neighboring land, a man she's never met.  It's a political alliance, and she's never met her future husband.  With her marriage to the suave and handsome Alejandro, Elisa moves into a world of danger and confusion.  She's always been so certain about her place in the world, but now she is surrounded by new dangers and traitors at every corner.

There is an enemy at the gate ready to destroy everything in their way. The Inviernos are wild and savage, and they are led by animagi who burn villages and people with an unnatural fire.  How can Elisa be of any use against such a numerous and powerful enemy?

As Elisa transitions from a pampered and frightened princess into a bold and hardened warrior, she will deal with palace intrigues, rugged wilderness journeys, and forbidden love.  Rae Carson's debut novel is a wild and romantic fantasy in the tradition of Robin McKinley and Tamora Pierce.

Insignia

I love this book!  It's more than just good science fiction; it's a great story about friendship and loyalty.  Plus, there are moments of laugh out loud humor.  You must read it ASAP!  You might have to wait a while, though, because I've been booktalking it to people as I read.  S.J. Kincaid's website says it will be a series, so there are sure to be more!  Hooray!

Tom Raines is a nobody, a skinny kid with acne and an alcoholic father who is also addicted to gambling.  He's not good at anything except playing video games.  Tom Raines is destined for failure.  All that changes when the military plucks him from obscurity in a run down casino in Arizona to join other trainees in the Spire.  Once there, Tom gets a neural processor installed in his brain that makes him smarter and faster, but it also makes him susceptible to viruses and other dangers just like any other computer.

His ultimate goal is to join CamCo, a team of elite fighters that control the robots in space that fight earth's wars.  Tom will get physical, mental, and technical strength in the Spire, but he will also find real friends for the first time in his life and uncover conspiracies and dangerous enemies.

You won't be able to put this SciFi thriller down!  Again, you must read it NOW!

Sophia's War

New York City in 1776 is a dangerous place to be for loyal patriots.  The city has been captured by the British, and Sophia Calderwood and her parents must pretend loyalty in order to keep their home.  As if this weren't enough, they haven't heard from her soldier brother, William, in months, and they can do nothing but remain hopeful that he is still alive and out of British hands.  Sophia trusts in her hero, General Benedict Arnold, to lead the patriots to victory.

As part of the pretense of loyalty to the crown, the Calderwoods must take in a British officer, John Andre.  Sophia is prepared to despise this man who fights against her brother and her home, but she must admit that his charm wins her over.

When tragedy strikes, Sophia vows revenge against the British.  She will do anything to support the American cause including becoming a spy!  As she is plunged into even more danger, Sophia will meet with old enemies and former friends, and her greatest conflict may be with her own mind.  Who can she turn to for support?  And once she discovers a terrible plot, who will believe her?

Avi's newest book is perfect historical fiction filled with romance, intrigue, and danger!  Read the author's note to discover that all the people (except for Sophia and her family) where real actors in this revolutionary tale of traitors and spies.

If you want to learn more about real spies of the revolution, read George Washington, Spy Master, one of my personal favorites.  To learn more about Benedict Arnold, read The Real Benedict Arnold.

Shadow and Bone

Alina Starkov's life hasn't been easy.  Her parents died long ago in the border wars that have plagued Ravka for over a century.  Her only family is her best friend, Mal, a fellow orphan. Now that they are older, her friendship with him has blossomed into love, but Mal only sees her as a friend.

The two friends are headed to the Shadow Fold with the First Army.  Mal as a tracker and Alina as a cartographer.  When they enter this area of mysterious and unnatural darkness on sandskiffs, they are attacked by horrifying creatures.  When Mal's life is endangered, Alina feels a power rising up inside her to overwhelm her body and mind.

When she awakes, she is caught in a whirlwind of activity and questioning from the Darkling, the most powerful magician in the land. Soon she finds herself in the world of the Grishas, magicians who are pampered and talented.  The Grishas and even the King are convinced that Alina has the power to destroy the Fold, but she isn't so sure.  And she certainly isn't prepared for this new world of sophisticated Grishas with their jealousies and intrigues.  Will the luxuries of her new life and the confusing attentions of the Darkling be enough to make Alina forget Mal and take her place among Ravka's elite?

Set in an alternate and magical Russia filled with snow, ice, and furs, Shadow and Bone is dark, twisting, and hypnotic.  Visit this world created by first time author, Leigh Bardugo, and you will be hungry for more.