A special set of twins

I didn't want The Other Half of My Heart by Sundee T. Frazier to end!  In this absolute gem of a story, Minni and Keira are twins, but it's not obvious - Minni looks a lot like their white father, and Keira takes after their black mother.  They live in a mostly-white, artsy community in the state of Washington.  Minni doesn't realize how Keira often feels out of place until the girls have a summer visit to North Carolina to visit their domineering grandmother and participate in the Miss Black Pearl Preteen Program.  Now it's Minni's turn to feel like a fish out of water, with her pale skin, red hair, and blue eyes. While some girls in the program give her grief for her appearance, her grandmother obviously favors her compared to Keira.  The twins' feelings, questions, and concerns are very authentic, and although the issues of race relations and identity are serious, there are some warm and humorous parts to the story as well.  This book would be perfect for either a middle school girls' book club or a mother/daughter book club.

A safe home at last?

Ruby Holler by Sharon Creech was comforting, amusing, and touching.  Dallas and Florida are 13-year-old twins and orphans.  They've had a rough life, being shuffled between absolutely awful foster homes and the equally terrible Boxton Creek Home for Children, run by the Trepids.  It was no surprise that the twins didn't expect anything good at their new (temporary, of course) home with elderly Sairy and Tiller, but the couple's gentle care and the beautiful, rolling countryside of Ruby Holler start to win the children over.  As Florida and Tiller prepare for a boat trip and Dallas and Sairy get ready for a bird-watching expedition, they don't know that nasty Mr. Trepid and the mysterious "Z" have something planned that could ruin their futures....

Who's stealing the Oreos?

By looking at the cover, you can tell that Slob by Ellen Potter might have something to do with Oreos.  You'd be right, but there's much more to the story.  Owen is twelve; he's almost a genius, and he's definitely a brilliant inventor.  He's also now the fattest kid in school, and you gradually learn that something happened a couple of years ago that was so awful, he started to overeat as a way to cope.  He lives with his sister Caitlin, who's joined the group GWAB (Girls Who Are Boys) and now wants to be called Jeremy, and his mom.  While dealing with both an incredibly cruel P.E. teacher and Mason Rigg, the school bully, Owen is working on two inventions: one will nab the person who's been stealing the Oreos out of his lunch, and the other, with the help of a TV, will help him see that terrible event from the past.  This is a great example of realistic fiction - some of it is funny, some of it is heartbreaking, but it's all authentic.

Not your typical 11-year-old

The main character in Fiendish Deeds by P. J. Bracegirdle is definitely a little different!  Joy is 11 and she lives with her family in Spooking, "the terrible town on the hideous hill."  Think of words like dark, creepy, abandoned, overgrown...you get the idea.  But Joy loves it.  She and her brother Byron ride the school bus with the few other "Spooky" kids to Darlington, a town of perfect lawns, plenty of plastic, and boring, matching houses.  A contest to bring more people into the area results in a plan to build a water park (with a mermaid theme, much to Joy's horror) over the Spooking bog.  Joy is convinced that there's an endangered species living in the bog; she's determined to stop the project, but someone is determined to stop her.  Perfect for fans of scary stories who don't mind a bit of black humor, the story continues with Unearthly Asylum and Sinister Scenes.

Life on this island isn't quite what you'd imagine

I didn't know what to expect when I saw the title of this book, Al Capone Does My Shirts by Gennifer Choldenko.  Al Capone the gangster and laundry?? Well, yes.  The year is 1935, and Moose and his family have just moved to Alcatraz Island, where Al Capone is serving time.  Moose's dad took a job there so they could be close to San Francisco and a special school for Moose's sister Natalie, who's autistic.  Moose ends up meeting several other kids who live on the island, including Piper, the warden's cute but very scheming daughter (and the source of the Al Capone and laundry connection).  As Moose gets used to his unusual living arrangements, the story includes interesting facts about Alcatraz, Piper's crazy ideas for making money, and Moose's devotion to his sister.  It may sound like an odd combination of ideas, but it works!  A funny, touching, and fascinating story.

What does "family" mean?

Many of the older girls in the middle school have read Lock and Key by Sarah Dessen, so I decided to check it out. Ruby is 17, and after her alcoholic mother deserts her, she's sent to live with her sister Cora, whom she hasn't seen in ten years. Ruby's life was poor and rough, and she has a hard time getting used to the nice home and fancy school that she's moving to. She's also been so self-reliant for so long that she's determined not to have to depend on anyone. The characters in the story are great: Nate, the way cute neighbor boy with dark secrets of his own; Jamie, Cora's likable husband and founder of a popular social networking site (think Facebook); Harriet, the hyper owner of a jewelry store at the mall who hires Ruby to help out. The author's books tend to be formulaic, but sometimes that's alright. If you like to read about a strong girl making her way through a tough situation - and it's okay for a little romance to be thrown in - you should check this one out, too.

Creepy...in a good way

If you like stories that are kind of spooky, I definitely recommend The Old Willis Place by Mary Downing Hahn (an excellent writer of ghost stories). Diana and her brother Georgie live on their own in the woods near the empty, creepy Willis mansion. They can't leave the grounds, and they aren't allowed to be seen by anyone because of..."the rules." Caretakers for the house have come and gone over the years, but now somebody new is there - a man and his daughter Lissa, who's about Diana's age. Diana decides to break "the rules" and become friends with Lissa, but this decision becomes dangerous when Lissa tempts Diana into the mansion and accidentally releases the nasty ghost of the woman who used to live there. And what IS it about Diana and her brother? How do they live on their own? Why aren't they ever hungry? This creepy story moves at a good pace, has characters you really care for, and finishes with a great ending. What more could you want?

Do you know your fairy tales?

If you like series, here's the start of another: The Fairy-Tale Detectives by Michael Buckley. Sabrina and Daphne are orphans (a common situation in children's books), and they're sent to live with their Granny Relda, whom they never even knew was alive. They learn that they're descended from the Brothers Grimm - yes, the famous storytellers - and the town Granny lives in is populated by fairy tale characters. When Granny gets kidnapped by a giant, the girls try to rescue her, of course, meeting such characters as the slimy Mayor Charming and the questionable Jack of beanstalk fame. Lots of action and clever characterization, but if you aren't familiar with fairy tales, legends, and folk tales, you won't appreciate a lot of the author's cleverness.

Vanished into thin air

A snow day from school?  What a great time to curl up with a blanket and a good book like The London Eye Mystery by Siobhan Dowd.  The story is told by Ted, a 12-year-old who is very bright and probably autistic, or as he describes it, "having a...brain that runs on a different operating system."  Ted and his sister Kate take their cousin Salim to ride the London Eye, an enormous Ferris wheel.  They watch Salim get into one of the pods, but he doesn't get off.  He's vanished!  Ted has a special way of looking at things, and it takes his special brain and hard work to figure out what happened.  Not only is this a good mystery (looking back, I noticed some of the clues), but the realistic insight into how Ted thinks - very literally and logically - was equally fascinating.

If you like Lemony Snicket...

...I bet you would like The Kneebone Boy by Ellen Potter.  Otto (who never speaks and refuses to take off his scarf), Lucia, and Max are the Hardscrabble siblings.  Their mom mysteriously disappeared five years ago, and their father goes on faraway trips to paint portraits of royalty who...aren't quite so royal any more.  The kids are on a quest to find their mother, and they end up at Snoring-by-the-Sea, with a pretty cool great-aunt who's staying at a "castle folly" - a life-size children's castle full of mystery and secret passages.  A few British terms may be unfamiliar ("torch" = flashlight; "trainers" = gym shoes), but the reader will still enjoy plenty of cleverness, humor, and adventure.  The ending is definitely not Lemony Snicket-y; instead, it was unexpected and bittersweet, but still quite satisfying.

The secret to everlasting life?

Hold on to your hats and get ready for nonstop action when you read The Alchemyst by Michael Scott.  Sophie and Josh are 15-year-old twins living in modern day San Franscisco, but once they start helping to recover a stolen book called the Codex (not a biggie...it only contains the secret to immortality!), their world is filled with a 14th-century alchemist (Nicholas Flamel), various gods, magic, and myth.  The twins learn that not only do they have magical powers that were predicted in the ancient Codex, but it may be up to them to save the world from the evil Elder Race.  It's a hard book to put down, since the end of almost every chapter ends in a cliff-hanger, and at the end of the book...aauugh!  What happens now?  You'll have to pick up the next book in the series, The Magician, to find out.  

What special ability do YOU have?

I don't know why it took me two or three times to get into Savvy by Ingrid Law, but once I did, it was a pretty cool journey.  Mibs Beaumont is about to turn thirteen, and in her family, that means she'll get her a "savvy" - a very special, very unusual ability.  (One of her brothers, for example, can whip up hurricanes, and another can create electricity.)  But just when Mibs is discovering her new talent, her father is injured in a car accident, and she becomes desperate to get to the hospital where he's staying.  Soon she's a stowaway on a the bus of a Bible salesman, trying to head to Salina, Kansas, with her two brothers, the local preacher's two kids, and big-hearted Lill.  The story alternates between being funny, sweet, and touching, and will keep you interested until the last page.  Another great Caudill nominee!

From the author of The Lightning Thief

Fans of The Lightning Thief will probably appreciate author Rick Riordan's newest book, The Red Pyramid.  The formula is similar, but this time the main characters are dealing with gods, magicians, and monsters from Egyptian mythology.  The chapters are told in the alternating voices of siblings Carter and Sadie.  After their father blows up the Rosetta Stone, he's entombed by the gods he released, and the kids are determined to get him back.  After meeting a bunch of bizarre characters and discovering some unusual abilities,  Carter learns that his body (and mind!) are hosting Horus, god of war, while Sadie is hosting Isis, goddess of wisdom.  This is a relatively long book, but there's a lot to like - non-stop adventure, very clever (and funny) dialogue, and a hook for the next book in the series.  The book is confusing at first, but readers who stick with it will be glad they did.

Fast-paced adventure at sea

If you're looking for a page-turner, The Great Wide Sea by M. H. Herlong is a winner.  Fifteen-year-old Ben is shocked when his father, still grieving over the sudden death of Ben's mom, decides to sell the house, buy a boat, and take Ben and his two younger brothers sailing...for a year.  After a nasty, night-time storm in the middle of the Atlantic, the boys wake up and find their father is gone.  They eventually wash up on a deserted island and have to learn to survive on their own.  Ben's range of emotions, from righteous anger at his dad to concern for his brothers, rings true, and his brother's characters are equally believable.  I thought the ending wrapped up a bit too quickly and neatly, but I couldn't put this one down.

Bet your summer isn't like this one

Your "what I did on my summer vacation" essay will probably never tell of an experience like that in One Crazy Summer by Rita Williams-Garcia. The year is 1968, and 11-year-old Delphine has been sent to Oakland, California, with her two younger sisters to spend a month with Celine, the mother she barely remembers. With no sign of a motherly bone in her body, Celine sends the girls to a community center run by the Black Panthers to spend every day, orders them out to pick up Chinese food for every dinner, and clearly tells her daughters, "No one told y'all to come out here." The story is told in the voice of Delphine, who is trying to care for her sisters, learning a new (to her) aspect of the black community, and hoping to gain some sign of affection from her mother. The humor of sisters bugging sisters blended with the serious historical information of a turbulent time make for a great read.

Not your typical fairy tale

Toads and Diamonds by Heather Tomlinson is a fascinating story based on a Charles Perrault fairy tale. Set in pre-colonial India, stepsisters Diribani and Tana individually encounter the goddess Naghali-ji. Afterwards, gems and flowers tumble from Diribani's lips when she speaks, but Tana speaks toads, frogs, and snakes. Each of these abilities is a gift, and when the girls are separated, they are determined to discover the purpose behind the goddess's blessings. Although it seems as though Diribani is the luckier of the two, she's not as happy as one might expect. Alternating chapters focus on one stepsister or the other; the sights, sounds, and smells of the different cultural settings and customs that the girls encounter are vividly described. Read along, and in your imagination you can join the journeys, too.

A true gem

What an absolutely enchanting book! Diamond Willow by Helen Frost is told in first person; twelve-year-old Willow's narration is in diamond-shaped verse, each one containing a secondary message in bold type. Willow lives in remote Alaska. She helps her father care for their sled dogs and is finally allowed to mush the dogs to her Grandma and Grandpa's by herself. On the way home she has an accident that blinds her favorite dog, Roxy. After learning that her parents plan on putting Roxy to sleep, Willow enlists the friend of her friend Kaylie to rush Roxy back to her grandparents', but a blinding blizzard leaves them stranded in the forest overnight. Unbeknownst to the girls, the spirits of their ancestors, in the form of various animals, provide protection and guidance. A surprising family secret is revealed about two-thirds of the way through the book, and the voices of the animal ancestors become even more meaningful. The touches of magical realism are simply delightful.

On a more serious note

With a title as goofy as Drums, Girls & Dangerous Pie, written by Jordan Sonnenblick, I figured this book would provide a light-hearted read. Yes, some parts were pretty funny, but others were deadly serious. Steven is an eighth-grader concerned with typical middle school issues: his impressive drumming talent, a mild obsession with beautiful Renee, and his annoying little brother Jeffrey. Then Jeffrey is diagnosed with leukemia, and the roller-coaster begins. Their mother quits her job to deal with doctors, hospitals, and endless cancer tests and treatments; their father worries about finances and becomes withdrawn; Steven takes refuge with his drums and the All-City High School Band which he was talented enough to join. His emotions are realistically described, ranging from elation after a conversation with Renee to fury at feeling neglected by his parents, from being "in the zone" with his drumming to worry for Jeffrey. Get the tissues - you'll want to laugh and cry with this book.

From the mountains of North Carolina

Twelve-year-old Dovey is the likable, plain-spoken narrator in Dovey Coe by Frances O'Roark Dowell. This fast-paced story takes place in the 1920s in small and poor Indian Creek, North Carolina. Dovey's beautiful older sister Caroline dreams of going away to a teacher's college, but that idea doesn't sit well with Parnell Caraway, son of the richest man in town. Parnell want to marry Caroline, but Dovey lets us know he's "the meanest, vainest, greediest man who ever lived. Seventeen years old and rotten to the core." After being publicly rejected by Caroline, Parnell gets revenge by locking up one of the dogs of Amos, Dovey and Caroline's brother who is deaf. When Dovey goes to retrieve the dog, things go wrong - Dovey gets knocked out, Parnell has been killed, and Dovey is falsely accused of his murder. The mountain dialect used in this book is authentic (although some readers may struggle with it a bit), the setting is described in a wonderful way, and ending is definitely a satisfying one.

Sisters...sisters...

Okay, so you might not know the song that begins with those words, but it's a perfect way to describe Peace, Love & Baby Ducks by Lauren Myracle. It's the beginning of the school year, and older sister Carly is a high school sophomore. Her younger sister Anna is now a freshman, and Carly thinks it's going to be great seeing Anna at her school. Only...it's not. Anna's really sweet, but over the past summer, she started getting super curvy. Guys are drooling over her, and the relationship between the sisters begins to change. Add to the mix their lives in an affluent neighborhood and exclusive high school, Carly's crush on the wrong boy when the right one is right under her nose, and a shifting landscape of friendships, and you get an authentic, funny, and touching look at sisterhood.