Esperanza Rising

Rating: Cleanest

Audience: 3rd grade and up (though younger readers can enjoy).

Plot: Esperanza is the daughter of a wealthy ranch owner in Mexico, and lives with her parents and grandmother in an almost fairy tale existence, but when her father dies and her uncles seize control of the family ranch, Esperanza and her mother flee to California.  Desperately poor, they are taken in by relatives of their previous servants and become field workers.  Esperanza goes from riches to rags and has to rebuild her life the middle of the great depression.

What makes it great?

Esperanza grows from her trials and eventually rises above them. I love the lyrical voice of the narration and it is interesting to learn about how life might have been for an immigrant and a field worker in the great depression.  Also . . . I love Miguel.

This is a beautiful book, and I recommend it to anyone who likes coming of age stories and/or historical fiction.

Spy X: The Code by Peter Lerangis

Rating: Cleanest

Audience: Third grade and up (though younger readers can enjoy).

Plot:  Andrew and Evie are twins who have just moved to a new town with their Dad.  Their mom went missing a year ago on their birthday and all three are still trying to adjust.  One day, however, the twins get a package of random junk from Alaska accompanied by a cryptic note. But further study reveals that each item has a special purpose (like a kaleidoscope that is actually a camera). Under the training of their new crazy next door neighbor, they enter the world of spying and begin to unravel the mystery of their mother's disappearance.

Warning: This is the first book in series that, alas, will never be finished. You can find books two (Hide and Seek), three (Proof Positive), and four (Tunnel Vision), but the series is now out of print, and Lerangis never wrote a fifth or sixth or seventh book.  I was so upset when I learned this that I went on to his website and emailed him, begging him to consider continuing the series, or to at least tell me how he would have ended it, and within a day or two he emailed back! Props to him! He told me that he wished he could have continued the series, but in the end it was up to his publishers and he had to move on.  He told me that he was considering many possibilities for the ending but never decided on one specific path. So really, I couldn't expect a nicer answer, but I was  still a little sad.  I guess I hoped that he would be a depressed man who had given up on his dream to write a series about child spies fighting against a top secret operation, and that he would read my email and suddenly have a purpose again--to write for his one true die-hard fan, and that through me, all would be made right.  Of course, I am glad that he isn't depressed, and he is still writing awesome books, so I should just move on.  Maybe this post can be my way of getting closure.

Allright, here goes nothing...

FAREWELL SPY X! THANK YOU FOR ALL THE HOURS OF JOY YOU GAVE ME! I WILL NEVER FORGET YOU!

Well, I feel a little better. "Spy X" is an awesome series, and I highly recommend it, but just know before you start that you will have to make up your own ending. Thanks for reading.

The Lost Hero by Rick Riordan

Book 1 of the Heroes of Olympus series

Read book 2: The Son of Neptune
and book 3: The Mark of Athena

Rating: Cleaner

Audience: Fourth grade and up. As always, it depends on the child. There is a good dose of violence and the complexity of the myths can be hard to follow.

Plot: This is a separate series from Percy Jackson and the Olympians but it's the same world, with some of the same characters and places.  Percy and Annabeth come back in later books, but this book is about three new demigods: Leo, Piper, and Jason.  All three are found at a school in the desert for juvenile delinquents, and taken to Camp Half Blood, where they are almost immediately sent off on a quest to rescue the goddess Hera, who is imprisoned by a new threat to Olympus.  The main twist of the series is that the Olympian gods have two main personalities/forms--Greek and Roman, and Jason, who is suffering from hard-core amnesia, recognizes all the gods by their Roman names. If that isn't weird enough, he already has a sweet weapon and battle reflexes, though he has no idea where he got them.

What makes it great?

This book was awesome--I loved it! If you liked the Percy Jackson books, I can almost guarantee that you'll like this one too.  It has the same funny, adventure-packed writing, and all sorts of great plot twists.  I don't suggest reading this series if you haven't read the Percy Jackson series yet;  Riordan gives you all the background you need to at least understand the story, but you'll get so much more out of it if you've read the first series.

My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George

  

Rating: Cleanest

Audience: Fourth grade and up (though younger kids can enjoy).

Plot: Tired of living in his family's cramped city apartment, Sam decides to run away to his family's deserted ancestral farm in the Catskill mountains and lives there alone for an entire year.  He learns how to trap animals, makes a home inside a giant tree, and raises a hawk named Frightful to help him hunt, all while trying to avoid being found by civilization. It's pretty cool.

What makes it great?

This book is a classic.  I read it with my family a long time ago, and it is still one of my brother's favorite books.  Sam's story of survival is cool, but even cooler is the way he makes survival look fun and exciting.  He builds a fireplace and makes all these gourmet meals with acorn pancakes with homemade jam--I hate to call Sam's wilderness survival "glamping," but it totally is.  I think a lot of us just have this desire to live in the great outdoors, far from civilization, and while we probably won't ever do that, Sam does.  Reading about his life makes us feel like we are living that dream too.

Elephant Run

Rating: Clean/Cleaner

Audience: There are some war horrors (like beatings and be-headings), so I'd say sixth grade and up.  The target audience is middle school, but I enjoyed it and my grandma (who lived in Cambodia for a few years) loved it, so there is no cap on the upper end of the age range.

Plot:  Nick Freestone is sent to Burma (Myanmar) to live on his father's Teak Plantation after his mother's London apartment in WWII.  His parents, who are divorced, both think he will be safer in Burma, but it isn't long before the Japanese invade and Nick's father is sent to a prison camp.  Nick spends some time as a prisoner in his own home, and eventually breaks out with a girl named Mya,an old monk named Hilltop, and a couple elephants to find his father and get safely out of Burma.

What makes it great?

1. elephants 2. WWII historical fiction from Southeast Asia perspective 3. secret passageways 4. Sargent Sonjii.

If any of those things intrigue you, I can guarantee that you will like it.  If you still need convincing, let me tell you that it is exciting and a page turner and you will come away satisfied.  I like reading war books that highlight on the humanity of both sides, and I think this book really did that.  The characters are a mixture of Japanese, Burmese, and British, and there are good and bad on every side.  I don't really care which of these teasers convinces you to read it, but I hope that one of them does, because I think this is one that everyone should read, if only just to learn about a part of the world that we usually don't focus on when we talk about WWII.

A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket

Rating: Cleanest

 

Audience: The nastiest word in the series is "cakesniffer" so you don't have to worry about language or sexual content. However, Count Olaf and his henchmen do get drunk a lot and the books are very dark for young readers.  So I would recommend sixth grade and up.

The Story: Violet, Klaus, and Sunny Baudelaire lose their parents and their mansion in a horrible fire.  They inherit an extensive fortune from their parents, but the evil Count Olaf wants it for himself. He will stoop to any low and wear any ridiculous disguise in order to get it.

What makes it great?

Disclaimer--the orphans never do get a happy ending. In every book you think "Yes! This is the one where fortunate events are going to happen" and then . . . they don't.  So know before you start that these books are not happy. They just aren't.  But they ARE brilliant, and if you go into them just planning to enjoy Lemony Snicket's awesome writing and the horribly wonderful characters and bizarre plot twists, then I believe you really will.

I love the way Lemony Snicket portrays himself as a man on the run and has to leave his research about the Baudelaires in weird places for his editor to trck down.  I also love the series because it taught me so much cool vocab and so many strange facts. But the best part of the series is the villains, from Count Olaf to Principal Nero to Esme with the dangerous stiletto heels.  Villain perfection.

P.S. if you enjoy this series go on to YouTube and watch the Arthur episode about Fern and Persimmony Glitchet.  It's very funny.  Fern writes to Persimonny Glitchet (the Lemony Snicket of Arthur), who gives her top secret writing advice to use a fake name when she writes her stories so people will tell her what they really think.  She writes a story called "Happy Happenings", which is a lot like "A Series of Unfortunate Events" except NOTHING bad happens.  

The Wanderer

Rating: Cleanest

Audience: Fifth grade and up.

Plot:  Sophie, her two cousins, and her three uncles set off on a modern pilgrimage across the Atlantic ocean, crewing their own boat, to visit their Grandfather "Bompie" in England.

But that's not the whole story. Sophie has deep, scarring fears she refuses to acknowledge except in fictional stories about the grandfather she's never met, Cody's never good enough for his father, Uncle Mo wishes he had followed his dream to be an artist, Uncle Dock is still longing for the love of his past . . . deep stuff.  Through Sophie and Cody's travel logs, we see all the real desires of the characters unfold, and they learn how to support each other and confront their own fears.

What makes it great?

Sharon Creech doesn't write thrillers--her stories are moved forward by emotion, not by plot.  That being said, I think this one has the most interesting plot out of the ones I've read. Reading about life on a ship is exciting, especially to someone (like me) who doesn't live anywhere near an ocean. The characters learn the phonetic alphabet (alpha, bravo, charlie, foxtrot, etc.), and how to navigate the seas, as well as how to dig for clams, juggle, draw caricatures, and tell stories. They run into a storm, and have to get their small boat through it with only six people (three of them children) on crew. That's just cool!  But the novel is also lyrical and beautifully written.  I can read this book again and again.  It's probably not for everyone. If you want a book is mostly action instead of emotion, this is not the book for you, but if you want to walk away from a book feeling something deeper, I highly recommend it.

Airman

Rating: Cleaner

Audience: My whole family enjoyed this one, but it is a little dark and there is some violence. I would recommend fifth grade and up.

Audio book recommendation: Yes! Loved it.  The narrator does all the accents and voices.

Plot: Conor Brokehart is born in a hot air balloon and has always felt a connection to the air. He lives with his parents on the island nation of Great Saltee off the Irish Coast, where he befriends Princess Isabella and works with with the great inventor, Victor, to build the first working flying machine. But when he is convicted of a crime he did not commit, he is sent to work the underwater diamond mines on the prison island Little Saltee.  Now he must invent for himself a new identity as "the airman" to escape the island and save his family, his home, and the princess from the evil Bonvilain.

What makes it great?

The Saltee Islands are a real place but the story is fantastical and high-adventure, which is why it's fun to read. Conor is smart and resourceful and survives prison by giving the main thug advice on hair gel.  That's just awesome! Also, there is just something about the desire to fly that I think we can all relate to. 

Howl's Moving Castle

Rating: Cleanest

Audience: This is a good fantasy for any age, but I think the target age is maybe fifth grade through ninth.

Plot: Sophie is the eldest of three daughters and is resigned to her future as a failure (in tales it is always the youngest who succeeds) and to her life in her parent's hat shop.  But when the Witch of the Waste turns Sophie into a ninety-year-old woman for no apparent reason, Sophie sets out on a quest to break the spell and ends up in the moving castle of the disreputable wizard Howl, where she finds more than one spell in need of breaking.

What makes it great?

What I like about this book is that it is very different from any fantasy I've ever read.  Sophie's world is relatively normal. She works in a hat shop, after all. But the weird stuff is considered just as normal as working in a hat shop.  Sophie lives in a wizard's house, befriends Calcifer the fire demon, and wields magic of her own without even realizing it.  I also love the idea of Howl's door.  The moving castle has one door that leads to at least four different places depending on where the knob is turned, which is really clever.  Mostly though, I just love the characters.  Sophie is stubborn and funny, Howl is dashing and mysterious, and you just can't help but love Calcifer.  The romance between Sophie and Howl is the cherry on top.

A word on the film:

This is one of the few times when I can recommend the movie just as highly as the book. The book is weird.  The movie is weird in a completely different way.  I like them both. The plots are slightly different, but I think Miyazaki did a great job of capturing the every-day magic of Sophie's world. Check it out!