by Linda Sue Park

Julia and Patrick have to do some kind of project for their agricultural club, but they don’t have enough space to do a typical farm project.   Patrick comes up with the idea of raising silkworms, but Julia really doesn’t want to do.  The project reminds her of Korea, where her parents came from.  She wants to do a more “American” project.

In the book, Julia shares her opinion of how the story is going with Ms. Park, the author.  You don’t see that very often in books!

by Gennifer Choldenko

Moose Flanagan’s life is uprooted when his electrician father takes a job as a prison guard on Alcatraz. His parents are trying to find a place that can help Moose’s older sister, Natalie, who has what we would know as autism today. Although his parents are always telling him that everything is not as black and white as it seems, they seem to have a hard time remembering that fact themselves.

The book includes fascinating facts about life on Alcatraz, and shows what life is like for the sibling of an autistic person. Gennifer Choldenko knows what she’s writing about. Her own sister had a severe form of autism.

Mark Twain Award Nominee 2006-2007

Originally posted April 10, 2005

I tried to read Crescent Dragonwagon’s To Take a Dare over the summer, but it was a non-starter. The storyline was interesting– I’ve always liked books about road trips– but it was like she was describing the book she planned to write, rather than showing what the character was doing. I ended up abandoning it a few chapters in.

A Time for Dancing, by Davida Wills Hurwin, is the story of best friends Jules and Sam, who are dealing with Jules’ diagnosis of cancer. This book alternates chapters in each girl’s voice to look at how Jules’ cancer affects everyone around her.

This book has a five-star average rating on Amazon, with 168 reviews. I would have loved this book when I was about 15. I loved it now, but we all know how sometimes adults pick books teenagers would find extremely boring. This one is especially good if you like to read about best friends, death, or cancer.

Robert Cormier’s masterpiece about a boy on a desperate journey to find his father and unlock his past. Things are not what they seem in this novel.

Susan Callaway is the overweight daughter of the Wayne High School football coach. She is constantly harassed, especially by Kale Krasner, her main tormentor. When Blake, the quiet kid who works in the library, takes revenge against Kale for other wrongs, Susan ends up getting in trouble along with him. As part of her punishment, she must spend each Wednesday after school in a session with the school counselor, along with five other kids. Of course, those kids include Blake, Kale, a cute athlete, a popular girl, and a tough girl. Throughout the sessions, the kids grudgingly learn to respect each other as people.

The Year of Secret Assignments is a fun novel about tenth graders at rival schools who begin a pen pal assignment for school. Lydia, Emily, and Cassie are each paired with a boy from Brookfield High. They exchange letters that soon lead to pranks, mysteries, love, and a major fight. Will their friendships survive this assignment?

In Olive’s Ocean, by Kevin Henkes, 12-year-old Martha Boyle finds out she was mentioned in the diary of a classmate who died a month ago. Olive Barstow’s mother brings her the page from the journal just as Martha and her family are preparing to leave for the coast. This coming-of-age novel is written in very short vignettes, making it a quick and easy to read, but ultimately, it’s not a very satisfying read.

When school weirdo Christopher Creed disappears without a trace, he leaves behind a note mentioning several students by name. Privileged, happy Torey Adams is on the list. As Torey tries to figure out why Creed mentioned him and where Creed disappeared to, he starts to see a side of life he never imagined existed. He starts to notice the hypocrisy of his friends and wonder why he didn’t treat Creed better. Author Carol Plum-Ucci does a very good job capturing a teenage boy’s thoughts in her first novel. Although they’re probably going to make a movie out of this one, do yourself a favor and read the book first.

REVIEWS BY ADULTS:

A review by a librarian in Chandler, Arizona
Short Review by Teenreads.com
Reviews by teens and adults at sff world

RELATED LINKS:

Carol Plum-Ucci’s query letter (might be of interest to aspiring writers)
An article about Plum-Ucci in a New Jersey community paper
Young adult novels set in New Jersey (I include this link because my family is from New Jersey.)

Have you read this book? What do you think of it?
If you’ve reviewed this book, send me a trackback!

Life in the Fat Lane by Cherie Bennett reads like the Sweet Valley twins decided to tackle eating disorders and health problems. Lara Ardeche is a beauty queen who thinks she’s also a nice, sweet person. However, when she starts to gain weight unexplainably, she finds out she’s not so nice after all. in fact, she’s angry, judgmental, and kind of mean. She keeps gaining weight as doctors try to figure out what’s wrong with her and her parents keep insisting that if she would just diet and exercise, she could get back to her perfect weight. Meanwhile, her boyfriend feels alienated and her family is falling apart. As I read this, I thought several times that I could figure out why she was gaining weight (midnight binge eating and denial of her anger at her parents) but that’s not the direction Bennett took this novel.

Praise for this book has been nearly unanimous, and it does do a pretty good job of capturing the rage and helplessness of gaining weight in an image-obsessed society. The light tone might make it easier for kids to relate to Lara’s problems.

If you’ve been the new kid or the fat girl, you might like this book.

Reviews by Students:

A review by a student in Illinois
A review by a student in Missouri
A review included on a page from a Rhode Island school

Reviews by Adults:

Annotation from the New York University Literature, Arts, and Medicine Database
Children’s Book Page review
Teenagers Today review

Related Links:

All Consuming page about the book (This site is not YA specific.)
Teen CyberCenter list of books about food and weight
A Kansas school’s list of books about eating disorders

Have you read this book? What do you think of it?
If you’ve reviewed this book, send me a trackback!