Monday, February 25, 2013

New Release Round-Up: February 25-March 3, 2013

Young Adult


Also Known As
by Robin Benway

Release date: February 26, 2013
Available as: hardcover, Kindle edition, ebook, audiobook
Pages: 320
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Suggested tags: young adult, contemporary, romance



From Goodreads:
"Being a 16-year-old safecracker and active-duty daughter of international spies has its moments, good and bad. Pros: Seeing the world one crime-solving adventure at a time. Having parents with super cool jobs. Cons: Never staying in one place long enough to have friends or a boyfriend. But for Maggie Silver, the biggest perk of all has been avoiding high school and the accompanying cliques, bad lunches, and frustratingly simple locker combinations.

Then Maggie and her parents are sent to New York for her first solo assignment, and all of that changes. She'll need to attend a private school, avoid the temptation to hack the school's security system, and befriend one aggravatingly cute Jesse Oliver to gain the essential information she needs to crack the case . . . all while trying not to blow her cover.
"


Dualed
by Elsie Chapman

Release date: February 26, 2013
Available as: hardcover, Kindle edition, ebook, audiobook
Pages: 304
Publisher: Random House Books for Young Readers
Suggested tags: young adult, dystopia, science fiction



First in the Dualed series. From Goodreads:
"You or your Alt? Only one will survive.

The city of Kersh is a safe haven, but the price of safety is high. Everyone has a genetic Alternate—a twin raised by another family—and citizens must prove their worth by eliminating their Alts before their twentieth birthday. Survival means advanced schooling, a good job, marriage—life.

Fifteen-year-old West Grayer has trained as a fighter, preparing for the day when her assignment arrives and she will have one month to hunt down and kill her Alt. But then a tragic misstep shakes West’s confidence. Stricken with grief and guilt, she’s no longer certain that she’s the best version of herself, the version worthy of a future. If she is to have any chance of winning, she must stop running not only from her Alt, but also from love . . . though both have the power to destroy her.

Elsie Chapman's suspenseful YA debut weaves unexpected romance into a novel full of fast-paced action and thought-provoking philosophy. When the story ends, discussions will begin about this future society where every adult is a murderer and every child knows there is another out there who just might be better.
"

Other YA new releases for this week:



Middle Grade


Hold Fast
by Blue Balliett

Release date: March 1, 2013
Available as: hardcover, Kindle edition, ebook, audiobook
Pages: 288
Publisher: Scholastic
Suggested tags: middle grade, mystery



From Goodreads:
"From NYT bestselling author Blue Balliett, the story of a girl who falls into Chicago's shelter system, and from there must solve the mystery of her father's strange disappearance.

Where is Early's father? He's not the kind of father who would disappear. But he's gone . . . and he's left a whole lot of trouble behind.

As danger closes in, Early, her mom, and her brother have to flee their apartment. With nowhere else to go, they are forced to move into a city shelter. Once there, Early starts asking questions and looking for answers. Because her father hasn't disappeared without a trace. There are patterns and rhythms to what's happened, and Early might be the only one who can use them to track him down and make her way out of a very tough place.

With her signature, singular love of language and sense of mystery, Blue Balliett weaves a story that takes readers from the cold, snowy Chicago streets to the darkest corner of the public library, on an unforgettable hunt for deep truths and a reunited family.
"


Prisoner B-3087
by Alan Gratz

Release date: March 1, 2013
Available as: hardcover, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 272
Publisher: Scholastic
Suggested tags: middle grade, historical fiction, 20th century



From Goodreads:
"Survive. At any cost.

10 concentration camps.

10 different places where you are starved, tortured, and worked mercilessly.

It's something no one could imagine surviving.

But it is what Yanek Gruener has to face.

As a Jewish boy in 1930s Poland, Yanek is at the mercy of the Nazis who have taken over. Everything he has, and everyone he loves, have been snatched brutally from him. And then Yanek himself is taken prisoner -- his arm tattooed with the words PRISONER B-3087.

He is forced from one nightmarish concentration camp to another, as World War II rages all around him. He encounters evil he could have never imagined, but also sees surprising glimpses of hope amid the horror. He just barely escapes death, only to confront it again seconds later.

Can Yanek make it through the terror without losing his hope, his will -- and, most of all, his sense of who he really is inside?


Based on an astonishing true story.
"

Other Middle Grade new releases for this week:

Friday, February 22, 2013

Friday Freebies: February 22, 2013

Click on each title to go to the Amazon Kindle edition listing. Be sure to double-check the price before you download!



Blood Calling
by Joshua Grover-David Patterson

Available as: paperback, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 271 (Kindle edition)
Publisher: Red Iris Books
Publication date: January 2, 2013
Suggested tags: young adult, paranormal, vampires



First in the Blood Calling series. From Amazon:
"Lucy Leary's eighteen year old life is a wreck. Her parents divorced, she's earned a DUI, and her grandfather has died. He left her a single possession: A vampire slaying kit with a note that says, "They're real. Fight them."

Lucy finds answers in a place she never expected--the homeless shelter where she has to perform her community service. The Sundown Shelter is only open at night, and the man who runs it disappears during the day. But digging into the truth is dangerous. What Lucy learns will force her to abandon her life and confront an ancient vampire out to get her family.
"


Shadow Bound
by Angel Lawson

Available as: Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 214 (Kindle edition)
Publisher: unknown
Publication date: December 10, 2012
Suggested tags: young adult, paranormal, ghosts



Second in the Wraith series. (Book 1, Wraith, is also currently free!) From Amazon:
(BEWARE OF POSSIBLE SPOILERS AHEAD if you have not read the first book in the series!)
"After recovering from a horrific fire that took the lives of two people and released her best friend, Evan, to pass from this world to the next, Jane Watts finally has a chance to live a normal life.

If you consider seeing and guiding ghosts normal.

It’s summer and Jane and her friend, Ava, spend the hot, humid days working and hanging at the pool while Jane’s boyfriend, Connor, attends summer school. With the ghosts under control, things are going well until a friend from Connor’s past reconnects with him. Hours later she kills herself. Charlotte’s suicide throws Connor into a tailspin and her ghost latches on to Jane because, as they learned from Evan, ghosts only linger if they need something.

Unfortunately, Charlotte doesn’t need something. She wants something.

In Shadow Bound, Jane struggles with the fact that not every spirit is welcome and not all have good intentions. With Ava’s help, Jane stumbles into a decades-old murder, what her gift really means and how to save Connor from forces intent on destroying them all.
"


The Sun, the Moon, and Maybe the Trains
by Rodney Jones

Available as: paperback, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 253 (Kindle edition)
Publisher: Red Adept Publishing
Publication date: September 28, 2012
Suggested tags: young adult, time travel, romance



From Amazon:
"John Bartley’s days are filled with working in the mill or the garden, and he can’t wait to see Zella at the next barn dance. But when he stumbles through a hidden portal in the forest, everything he’s ever known falls behind him.

A hundred and thirty-four years behind, to be exact.

Tess can’t quite believe John’s tale of time travel. Does he really not know what a cell phone is? A car? Indoor plumbing? To convince the girl he’s swiftly falling for that he’s not crazy, John must delve into Tess’s history—his future—and solve the mystery of his hometown’s demise.

But when they learn its fate, each faces a wrenching choice. Save their love or save the past?
"


Whispers from the Grave
by Leslie Rule

Available as: paperback, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 216 (Kindle edition)
Publisher: Andrews McMeel
Publication date: April 3, 2012
Suggested tags: young adult, science fiction, time travel



From Amazon:
"The similarities between Jenna and Rita were uncanny. They looked and acted exactly alike. Each was experiencing the thrill of first love. Each was empowered with a gift of the supernatural. And each harbored dark secrets. Jenna and Rita could have been sisters. Except for one thing . . . Rita was murdered over a century ago.

Out of the yellowed pages of her diary, Rita's frightening legacy is reborn. But the more Jenna reads of Rita's spellbinding past--of murder, deception, and sinister experiments--the more she fears her own future. Because Rita's history is repeating itself, moment by horrifying moment. And Jenna has to live it.
"
Read my review of Whispers from the Grave.

Friday Finds #33


Friday Finds is hosted by Should Be Reading. Each Friday, you share the great books you heard about or discovered over the past week: "books you were told about, books you discovered while browsing blogs/bookstores online, or books that you actually purchased."




Geek High
by Piper Banks

Available as: paperback, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 242
Publisher: NAL Trade
Publication date: November 6, 2007
Suggested tags: young adult, realistic fiction, contemporary



First in the Geek High series. From Goodreads:
"At this school, everyone's a geek. And Miranda Bloom still can't fit in...

Miranda is a math genius with divorced parents, an evil stepmother, and no boyfriend in sight. She can't even fit in with the other geeks at the Nottingham Independent School for high-IQ students, because
they actually have useful talents. Miranda, on the other hand, is known as "The Human Calculator," which doesn't amount to much when people have, you know, their own calculators.

Then Miranda gets stuck planning the school's Snowflake Gala. And as she struggles to find a date and drum up some school spirit at Nottingham-aka "Geek High"-she finds that who you are means more than where you fit in.
"


Lights on the Nile
by Donna Jo Napoli

Available as: hardcover, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 288
Publisher: HarperCollins
Publication date: September 20, 2011
Suggested tags: middle grade, historical fiction, fantasy



From Goodreads:
"Kepi is a young girl in ancient Egypt, content to stay home with her family, helping her father, who was wounded in the construction of a pyramid for the cruel pharaoh Khufu. But that was before she and her pet baboon, Babu, were kidnapped and held captive on a boat bound for the capital city, Ineb Hedj. And when Kepi and Babu are separated, she knows she has only one choice: to make her way to the capital on her own, rescue Babu, and find a way to appeal to the pharaoh. Khufu is rich and powerful, but Kepi has her own powers, deep inside her--ones she herself doesn't even know about yet.

Donna Jo Napoli, acclaimed author of Zel and Beast, revisits the fabled origin of fairies in this strikingly original and affecting novel of friendship.
"


Spellbinder
by Helen Stringer

Available as: hardcover, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 384
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Publication date: September 29, 2009
Suggested tags: middle grade, paranormal, ghosts



First in the Spellbinder series. From Goodreads:
"Belladonna Johnson can see ghosts. It’s a trait she’s inherited from her mother’s side of the family, like blue eyes or straight hair. And it’s a trait she could do without, because what twelve-year-old wants to be caught talking to someone invisible?

It is convenient, though, after Belladonna’s parents are killed in a car accident. They can live with her the same as always, watching the same old TV shows in their same old house. Nothing has changed . . . until
everything changes.

One night, with no warning, they vanish into thin air—along with every other ghost in the world. It’s what some people think ghosts are supposed to do, but Belladonna knows it’s all wrong. They may not be living, but they’re not supposed to be gone.

With the help of her classmate Steve, a master of sneaking and spying, Belladonna is left to uncover what’s become of the spirits and to navigate a whole world her parents have kept well-hidden. If she can’t find her way, she’ll lose them again—this time for good.
"


Zoo
by Tara Elizabeth

Available as: paperback, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 290
Publisher: CreateSpace
Publication date: February 11, 2013
Suggested tags: young adult, dystopia



First in The Enclosure Chronicles. From Goodreads:
"A chronicle of my time living in a zoo . . . I'm not really sure where to start, and you may have trouble believing me even as I tell you my story. My family did. They laughed the first time I told them, so now I just say it was all a crazy dream. You see, I died in a totally preventable car accident . . . or so I thought. When I opened my eyes, I was shocked to discover that I had been resurrected into the year 2282 and, just as unbelievably, was locked up in a zoo! A HUMAN ZOO! Oh wait, I mean the People's Past Anthropological Center.

The Global Government created the Centers because all of the different cultures of the world had, over centuries of time, slowly absorbed into one uniform culture. Everything and everybody felt the same, and the world didn’t like it. So, to help the people of 2282 find cultures they thought worthy to live their lives by, they used time travel to zap the people of the past into the future. They created enclosures to house their live human exhibits. And that's what happened to me. I became a research project, a source of entertainment. I was a prisoner who was over two hundred years away from my family and friends.

Most of my time in the enclosure was spent trying to escape. I also made friends, lost friends, fell in love, was betrayed, was held captive within captivity, and lots of other fun stuff. There were some shocking moments and some devastating moments . . . It’s a lot to recount, but I’ll try my best to tell you all about my time travel . . . PAST, PRESENT, and FUTURE.

I'm Emma, by the way.
"

Wednesday, February 20, 2013

"Waiting On" Wednesdays: February 20, 2013



"Waiting On" Wednesday is hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine. Each Wednesday, you share upcoming releases that you're eagerly anticipating.





Escape from Mr. Lemoncello's Library
by Chris Grabenstein

Expected release date: June 25, 2013
Available as: hardcover, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 304
Publisher: Random House Books for Young Readers
Suggested tags: middle grade, mystery



From Goodreads:
"Kyle Keeley is the class clown, popular with most kids, (if not the teachers), and an ardent fan of all games: board games, word games, and particularly video games. His hero, Luigi Lemoncello, the most notorious and creative gamemaker in the world, just so happens to be the genius behind the building of the new town library.

Lucky Kyle wins a coveted spot to be one of the first 12 kids in the library for an overnight of fun, food, and lots and lots of games. But when morning comes, the doors remain locked. Kyle and the other winners must solve every clue and every secret puzzle to find the hidden escape route. And the stakes are very high.

In this cross between
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and A Night in the Museum, Agatha Award winner Chris Grabenstein uses rib-tickling humor to create the perfect tale for his quirky characters. Old fans and new readers will become enthralled with the crafty twists and turns of this ultimate library experience."

Tuesday, February 19, 2013

Teaser Tuesdays: February 19, 2013

Teaser Tuesdays is hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Each Tuesday, you grab the book you're reading, open to a random page, and share 2 teaser sentences from anywhere on the page.
NO SPOILERS - make sure the sentences you pick don't give too much away!





Frozen by Mary Casanova

"Everyone comes here--this place at the end of the earth--either running from something or looking for something. Which is it for you, dear girl?"


{Kindle edition, 53%}


Frozen
by Mary Casanova

Available as: hardcover, Kindle edition
Pages: 264
Publisher: University Of Minnesota Press
Publication date: September 7, 2012
Suggested tags: young adult, historical fiction, 20th century


From Goodreads:
"Sixteen-year-old Sadie Rose hasn’t said a word in eleven years—ever since the day she was found lying in a snowbank during a howling storm. Like her voice, her memories of her mother and what happened that night were frozen.

Set during the roaring 1920s in the beautiful, wild area on Rainy Lake where Minnesota meets Canada, Frozen tells the remarkable story of Sadie Rose, whose mother died under strange circumstances the same night that Sadie Rose was found, unable to speak, in a snowbank. Sadie Rose doesn’t know her last name and has only fleeting memories of her mother—and the conflicting knowledge that her mother had worked in a brothel. Taken in as a foster child by a corrupt senator, Sadie Rose spends every summer along the shores of Rainy Lake, where her silence is both a prison and a sanctuary.

One day, Sadie Rose stumbles on a half dozen faded, scandalous photographs—pictures, she realizes, of her mother. They release a flood of puzzling memories, and these wisps of the past send her at last into the heart of her own life’s great mystery: who was her mother, and how did she die? Why did her mother work in a brothel—did she have a choice? What really happened that night when a five-year-old girl was found shivering in a snowbank, her voice and identity abruptly shattered?

Sadie Rose’s search for her personal truth is laid against a swirling historical drama—a time of prohibition and women winning the right to vote, political corruption, and a fevered fight over the area’s wilderness between a charismatic, unyielding, powerful industrialist and a quiet man battling to save the wide, wild forests and waters of northernmost Minnesota. Frozen is a suspenseful, moving testimonial to the haves and the have-nots, to the power of family and memory, and to the extraordinary strength of a young woman who has lost her voice in nearly every way—but is utterly determined to find it again.
"

Monday, February 18, 2013

New Release Round-Up: February 18-24, 2013

Young Adult


Mind Games
by Kiersten White

Release date: February 19, 2013
Available as: hardcover, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 256
Publisher: HarperTeen
Suggested tags: young adult, paranormal, thriller



First in the Mind Games series. From Goodreads:
"Fia was born with flawless instincts. Her first impulse, her gut feeling, is always exactly right. Her sister, Annie, is blind to the world around her—except when her mind is gripped by strange visions of the future.

Trapped in a school that uses girls with extraordinary powers as tools for corporate espionage, Annie and Fia are forced to choose over and over between using their abilities in twisted, unthinkable ways… or risking each other’s lives by refusing to obey.

In a stunning departure from her
New York Times bestselling Paranormalcy trilogy, Kiersten White delivers a slick, edgy, heartstoppingly intense psychological thriller about two sisters determined to protect each other—no matter the cost."



The Different Girl
by Gordon Dahlquist

Release date: February 21, 2013
Available as: hardcover, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 240
Publisher: Dutton Juvenile
Suggested tags: young adult, science fiction



From Goodreads:
"Four nearly identical girls on a desert island. An unexpected new arrival. A gently warped near future where nothing is quite as it seems.

Veronika. Caroline. Isobel. Eleanor. One blond, one brunette, one redhead, one with hair black as tar. Four otherwise identical girls who spend their days in sync, tasked to learn. But when May, a very different kind of girl—the lone survivor of a recent shipwreck—suddenly and mysteriously arrives on the island, an unsettling mirror is about to be held up to the life the girls have never before questioned.

Sly and unsettling, Gordon Dahlquist’s timeless and evocative storytelling blurs the lines between contemporary and sci-fi with a story that is sure to linger in readers’ minds long after the final page has been turned.
"

Other YA new releases for this week:



Middle Grade


Destiny, Rewritten
by Kathryn Fitzmaurice

Release date: February 19, 2013
Available as: hardcover, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 176
Publisher: Katherine Tegen Books
Suggested tags: middle grade, realistic fiction, contemporary



From Goodreads:
"Des·tin·y: |destinÄ“/
(noun) The hidden power believed to control what will happen in the future; fate.

Eleven-year-old Emily Elizabeth Davis has been told for her entire life that her destiny is to become a poet, just like her famous namesake, Emily Dickinson. But Emily doesn’t even really like poetry, and she has a secret career ambition that she suspects her English-professor mother will frown on. Then a seeming tragedy strikes: just after discovering that it contains an important family secret, she accidentally loses the special copy of Emily Dickinson’s poetry that was given to her at birth. As Emily and her friends search for the lost book in used bookstores and thrift shops all across town, Emily’s understanding of destiny begins to unravel and then rewrite itself in a marvelous new way.

In her third novel, Kathryn Fitzmaurice again weaves a richly textured and delightful story about unexpected connections, about the ways that friends can help us see ourselves for who we truly are, and about the most perfect kinds of happy endings: those that happen just on time.
"


When Wings Expand
by Mehded Maryam Sinclair

Release date: February 23, 2013
Available as: paperback, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 150
Publisher: The Islamic Foundation
Suggested tags: middle grade, realistic fiction



From Goodreads:
"She wrapped her arms around me and said, "Nur! I know. I don't want to go. But all I can do is keep trusting in Allah. Nur, I will always be with you! My love and advice will always be with you to guide you in the right direction." She patted my heart. "They are forever sealed inside this little place."

Writing on the pages of her journal, Nur, a teenage girl in Canada, charts the onset and advance of her mother's cancer. Nur watches her mother's body begin to shrink and her mood begin to darken. And when family and friends begin to encroach, Nur must face the prospect of her mother's looming death.

Nur bears the crushing loss and finds her adolescent life more demanding and complex. But with the legacy of her mother's love, her family's support, and the guidance of her faith, she manages to overcome the searing pain and use her newfound strength to bring joy to the lives of others, showing them that after death wings can expand.
"

Other Middle Grade new releases for this week: