Eighth grader Kacey Simon doesn’t think she’s a mean girl, she’s just brutally honest like a good journalist should be. Life is pretty good for Kacey until the tables are turned when a series of accidents leave her stuck with glasses and braces. Within a day, she goes from A-list to D-list as her cool girl friends pretend she doesn’t exist, she’s dropped from her school news segment and the lead in the school play. Her best friend seizes the opportunity to wrest the cool reins and goes on the attack, and a cruel YouTube video makes the rounds in school.
Alone for the first time, Kacey ends up teaming up with a former friend, Paige and emo musician Zander (aka Skinny Jeans) to get her popularity back. Along the way, Kacey learns that she may have been a mean girl after all – or just misunderstood.
The book is shallow, with an unlikeable heroine written to be likeable. Haston’s message of being real gets garbled; it’s as if the author herself is unsure of whether Kacey’s behavior pre-braces is reprehensible or defensible. I did not come away with the true feeling that she learned her lesson at the end of the day; rather, she just learned to find loopholes and how to use people to get her way. It sends out mixed messages.
Tween marketing powerhouse Alloy Entertainment packaged this title and the book has already been optioned to be a new Nickelodeon show, How to Rock, to air in 2012. Author Meg Haston’s website links to her blog and information about the book; she also has a Twitter feed. There is also an iTunes app that lets users take photos of themselves or friends and try on different braces and glasses combinations.
I am an unabashed fan of the Wimpy Kid series – I’ve read them all am waiting, with my kids, for Cabin Fever, the next book in the series (39 days from today!). My older son had the pleasure of meeting Jeff Kinney at ComicCon a few years ago and he was a very nice guy, autographing his book, mentioning that his son shared the same name as mine, my son and his son shared the same name, and really listening to what my son enjoyed about his book.
Greg Heffley is a middle school ne’er do well – he’s lazy, he’s selfish, and he can’t figure out what everyone else’s problem is. Despite these qualities, he’s wildly funny, and he does try to do the right thing (he just tends to get a little lost on the way to doing it). He’s a middle schooler, he’s just trying to navigate life and make things easier on himself. Can you blame him?
Diary of a Wimpy Kid is a good book for several reasons, aside from it’s compulsive readability: the characters are well-written and funny, Greg has a clear voice, and this book shows boys and girls alike that keeping a diary – or a journal, whatever you choose to call it – is a good thing. Writing, even to a slacker kid like Greg, can be something fun to do. The book even resembles a diary on the inside and out, with lined pages, handwriting font, and hand-drawn pictures that look like Greg had drawn them filling the book.
Jeff Kinney’s Wimpy Kid series is one of the most popular middle-grade series out today, with five book currently out and the sixth coming in November. The Wimpy Kid website offers information about all of the books (and a countdown clock for Cabin Fever) and offers news and information about the author, a link to “Wimp Yourself” where kids can create their own Wimpy Kid using preselected templates, links to merchandise.
Rob is a 12-year old boy whose main use for books is to throw them into his closet. He has better things to do, after all, than read. Plus, Rob’s closet is just strange. It’s not because it’s got a second-hand door with a pony sticker on it that says, “Smile”. For starters, the doorknob is big, gold, and has a bearded man’s face engraved on it – and his expression seems to change. For another, the closet is where Wonkenstein – a creature that seems to be a mashup of Willy Wonka and Frankenstein – comes from one day, and now Rob’s closet will not open so he can send him back.
Rob tries to keep Wonkenstein a secret while trying to get him back to his world, but he ends up getting into more trouble, whether at home or school, the harder he tries. Poor Rob just wants life to go back to normal, but at the same time, he finds himself getting attached to the little guy.
Wonkenstein is a cute book for younger readers and older readers that may have drifted from reading and just need something fun and familiar to pull them back. The book has fun black and white illustrations that look like a child’s drawings and helps, along with the first-person voice of the book, add to the fantasy that Rob is narrating his own true story.
Obert Skye’s website has information about all of his books, plus author and tour information, and the publisher’s website has a book detail page with much of the same information, plus links to the book’s pages on social networking sites incluing Shelfari and LibraryThing.
This was one of my favorite books growing up, and reading it again all these years later, I find that I love it as much now as I did when I was 8. Having spent the last few years watching multiple viewings of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (Gene Wilder is Willy Wonka), I ended up surprised on a few occasions when I realized that scenes from the movie – such as the Fizzy Lifting Drinks scene when Charlie and Grandpa have to belch their way down from certain doom – were not in the book after all! While the movie retained much of Roald Dahl’s dark comic humor, nothing beats the book, and Dahl’s wry observations on rude children and the parents who indulge them, and how the meek inherit… well, if not the earth, at least a lifetime’s supply of chocolate.
Charlie Bucket is starving – no, really, he is. He lives with his mother, father, and four sickly grandparents, who are so old and sick that they never get out of bed. Father has a menial job screwing the caps onto toothpaste tubes, and they family is very poor. They are so poor, all they can eat is cabbage soup, and Charlie refuses to take more than his share. Every day he walks past the famous chocolatier Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory and lifts his nose, inhaling the delicious smells; the only time he gets to enjoy a Wonka bar is on his birthday.
It all changes when Willy Wonka announces a contest where five winners will be allowed to tour the chocolate factory – and Charlie is holding one of the Golden Tickets. Grandpa Joe, his elderly grandfather who retains the joy and wonder of youth, jumps out of bed and insists that he go with him, and they’re off. Charlie meets the four other winners – the gluttonous Augustus Gloop, spoiled brat Veruca Salt, TV addict Mike Teavee, and boorish Violet Beauregarde – and their overly indulgent parents at the gates of the factory, and when Willy Wonka’s gates open for the first time in years, the fun really begins. Who will make it through the factory tour?
Dahl’s writing weaves words into pictures that are enhanced by Joseph Schindelman’s black and white illustrations. From Willy Wonka’s mysterious origins to the Oompa Loompa’s cautionary songs, this book is Mr. Dahl’s morality play. It’s a great reminder of the golden rules as children enter into the middle grades: be polite. Don’t be a bully. Share. Don’t be a glutton or have bad manners. Modesty and a humble demeanor reap their own rewards. Reading Dahl is like Emily Post for kids, but with chocolate rivers and candy flowers.
Roald Dahl is a well-known classic children’s author. There is an inactive wiki that appeared to be the start of a comprehensive body of work with 106 articles; there is a call to revive it on the home page. There is also a wonderful Roald Dahl website that is animated and features links to the Roald Dahl store, museum, and his children’s charity. The site features a “book chooser” that will match kids with a “splendiferous read” of his, a biography on the author, and a “Wonkalator” – a calculator game that asks kids to help Wonka with his latest magical formula.
Dork Diaries: Tales from a Not-So-Popular Party Girl has been hailed as “Wimpy Kid for girls”, and I’m inclined to agree. The book is writtten in similar format – a middle-schooler’s journal – and is complete with illustrations and “OMG!” moments in a pre-teen’s life. Nikki, the protagonist, is not the slacker that Wimpy Kid Greg is, but is definitely not in the cool crowd. She and her friends Chloe and Zoey wish they could be in the CCP (Cute, Cool and Popular) crowd, but Nikki’s nemesis, Mackenzie – a spoiled, rich, mean girl – will do anything and everything to ruin Nikki’s life – including canceling the school Halloween dance just to make Nikki look bad. Nikki and her friends need to pull together to make it happen, and Nikki hopes to get the attention of her crush, Brandon Roberts. The only trouble is, Mackenzie has her sights set on Brandon, too.
The book is fun. Nikki is a vibrant narrator, who speaks fluent middle-school – girls will love her. She writes from a very female point of view, as opposed to the more gender-friendly Wimpy Kid, so I don’t know if boys will get on board with the series (especially as this book has a purple cover). The black and white drawings make you believe you are looking at a ‘tween girl’s diary, as do the script and handwriting fonts. All around, a fun book with a spunky heroine that girls will enjoy – and grown-up girls will laugh along with the more cringe-worthy memories of their own middle school years.
The Dork Diaries website features information on the Dork Diaries books and has a countdown clock for the next book’s release. There is a link to the music inspired by the book, and the Nikki has a blog where she recaps memories (from the books), links fan videos, and features fun contests and printables.
Sixth-grader Rod Albright, better known as Rod the Clod among his classmates, is a target for the two bullies at school and the go-to babysitter for his toddler twin brother and sister at home. One day, while working on a science project for school, a miniature alien spaceship crashes into his window, and Rod is commandeered into helping the alien crew in their search for BKR, an intergalactic criminal infamous for his cruelty – and who just happens to be hiding out in Rod’s neighborhood. Can Rod, who is incapable of lying, keep his alien visitors a secret and help them succeed in their mission while getting his science project done on time?
Told from Rod’s point of view, Aliens Ate My Homework is a fun read for kids ages 9-12. As the first book in a four-book series, Coville sets up the story line and introduces the reader to a full cast of characters: Rod, Thing One and Thing Two, the toddler twins, their mother, the crew of the Ferkel, and BKR, the intergalactic villian. The crew of the Ferkel is a diverse group of aliens, illustrating that diversity is welcome in all parts of the universe; Grakker, the Ferkel’s captain, is a borderline hostile military man, but the crew and Rod all learn how to work with him – and vice versa. BKR, the criminal wanted across the galaxy, is guilty of cruelty. Says Ferkel ambassadaor Madame Pong of BKR’s crimes, “Millions have wept.” There are lessons to be learned within Coville’s bright narrative – different personalities and people and capable of working together; cruelty is wrong; and every being, no matter how powerful or how small, needs help.
Aliens Ate My Homework is the first in Bruce Coville’s 4-book series, Rod Albright’s Alien Adventures; the other books in the series are I Left My Sneakers in Dimension X; The Search for Snout; and Aliens Stole My Body. Coville’s website also offers printable door hangers and bookmarks, crossword puzzles, and information about all of Coville’s books.
I am writing one review for both of these books as they are by the same author and from the same series.
Fred and Anthony are two kids with one big wish: find someone to do their homework for them so they can relax, eat Chex Mix and Pez, and watch horror movies. In their first adventure, Escape from the Netherworld, they decide to make money so that they can afford to pay someone; because they already have a reputation for botched and unfinished jobs im their own neighborhood, they strike out for a new neighborhood and end up discovering The Netherworld when Anthony falls through a bathroom portal. Luckily, Fred has the foresight to grab a Guide to the Netherworld to help them navigate their way past evil dentists, deceptively dressed werewolves, and Count Dracula himself. They make their way back home only to discover that a ghost has followed them – so they hire him as a ghost writer (get it?) to write about their adventures. Their get rich quick plan is under way!
Their third adventure, Fred & Anthony Meet the Heinie Goblins from the Black Lagoon, catches readers up on the first two books, so readers can come in on any book in the series and not feel lost. Fred and Anthony are sent off to Camp Plenty Wampum summer camp in Heinie Goblins; naturally, the camp brochure is a ruse and the camp, run by two Wise Guys named Carmine and Vinnie, is a dump serving cold Hot Pockets with warm water, forcing recreation time in leaky canoes on the questionable Lake Gitchie Lagoonie, and haunting them by dressing up as The Burnt Marshmallow Mummy and The Lone Short-Sheeting Stranger. While out on Lake Gitchie Lagoonie, the boys’ canoe capsizes and they end up back in The Netherworld for a brief time, until their escape from the Creature from the Black Lagoon leads them back up to the Camp.
Deciding that they can make money by charging kids for trips to The Netherworld, the boys launch their next career venture. In The Netherworld, they meet the Heinie Goblins – cute, purple-feathered little batlike creatures with bare backsides. Despite the Guide to the Netherworld’s warning about the goblins being “a pain in the butt”, the boys allow a goblin to accompany them back to the camp, but the goblin brings friends along, who menace the other campers. When Carmine and Vinnie show up dressed as the Lone Short-Sheeting Stranger and the Burnt Marshmallow Mummy, the goblins become jealous of losing the audience’s attention – the book is, after all, named for them – and attack, leaving the boys to figure out a way to make things right.
The books are written with the lower end of the age range or the reluctant reader in mind, with black and white illustrations on every page and a mixture of graphic novel and chapter book format. Gross humor will appeal to boys (or girls!) who giggle at a good bathroom joke. The books are slightly more than 100 pages in length, making them easy and quick reads for younger children.
The author and illustrator, Elise Primavera, “ghost wrote” these books under the name Esile Arevamirp. There are four Fred & Anthony titles, but was surprised that the author’s website had no mention of them; I even attempted to find a website for her alter ego but found nothing. Turning to YouTube, discovered Rat Chat Reviews, an animated video review site for children’s books; the rats posted an interview with Fred and Anthony on the cancellation of their series. Regardless of whether or not there are any more Fred & Anthony books in the future, the series is still a fun set of books for a younger or reluctant reader.
Rafe Katchadorian is having a tough year: his mom is working double shifts at her diner job in order to support him, his sister, and her lazy, unemployed fiance, and he’s already attracted the attention of the school bully during his first week of middle school. What’s a kid to do? Make a name for himself, of course!
With some prodding by his best friend, Leonardo the Silent, Rafe decides that he’s going to break every single rule in the middle school code of conduct. There are guidelines to follow, though – he’s got to have witnesses every time he breaks a rule; he’s got three “lives” – he loses one if he passes up an opportunity to break a rule – and finally, he can’t hurt anyone in his quest to break the rules. How bad can a good kid get, and how far is Rafe willing to go to break all the rules, and will he break his own in the process?
I started this book expecting a light, humorous tale and was amazed at the punch Patterson and Tibbett packed into this middle school story. Rafe’s family issues aside, there are a multitude of issues in his life. In reality, he would be considered an at-risk tween with a need for a solid support system. Two major plot developments may suprise readers, but these are important stories for tweens and young teens to be exposed to – children with similar life stories may appreciate a literary figure they can relate to, and other readers will glimpse into another kid’s world, possibly starting a dialogue or creating a new sensitivity among them.
Chris Tebbetts is a YA author whose love of books and libraries began as a child. His website suggests links for writerw and readers, and provides a list of Good Reads for young readers and teens.
James Patterson is best known for his Alex Cross mystery series, but he is a Children’s Choice Award-winning author, receiving the award in 2010 for his book Max, one of the books in his popular Maximum Ride series. His Daniel X series has been praised by Good Morning America as being some of the best books for boys, and the first book in his Witch & Wizard series spent five weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. Patterson’s website, ReadKiddoRead, is dedicated to getting kids reading and suggests titles for all ages and interests.
What do you do when your parents are some of the baddest bad guys in history, and you just don’t match up? You get sent to Master Dreadthorn’s School for Wayward Villains. Dracula’s daughter, Jezebel, is there – she prefers hot chocolate to blood. The Big Bad Wolf’s son, Wolf, is in there, too – he saved a human child from drowning. The Green Giant’s son was expelled when they realized that his dad was just some green guy trying to get kids to eat their vegetables.
Rune Drexler, Master Dreadthorn’s 12-year old son, is at villain school, too, but he’s not getting any preferred treatment – quite the opposite; he can’t seem to do anything right in his father’s eyes. When his father calls him to his office and gives him a Plot – a dangerous and evil test to achieve his next EVil (Educational Villain Levels) level, Rune sees his chance to be the villain his father wants him to be. But can he and his two friends carry out the Plot without ending up being heroes?
The story takes a little bit of time to get started; Sanders concentrates on exposition early on in the story. Once the Plot is under way, though, the story becomes a fun read with just enough of a twist to take the reader by surprise. I did not feel cheated by the book’s end – I wanted to know what Rune was going to do next. Middle grade readers will enjoy the good-natured jabs that the characters throw at one another, and the idea of being good while you’re trying to be evil will show younger readers that there is something good in even the baddest of villains.
Ellie McDoodle is the nickname for sixth grader Eleanor McDougal, who fills her notebooks with doodles, journaling the people around her, her family, and her own daily happenings.
When Ellie’s parents announce that they’re moving, Ellie is crushed. She doesn’t want to leave her friends, her school, or her home. She creates a journal to document the move, insisting that “there won’t be much to keep track of… because this is the END of everything good.”
Or is it? Despite some rough patches, like discovering the “New Kid Bingo” card some of her classmates circulate at school or teachers not remembering her name, Ellie learns that being the new kid may not be so bad. Through her own actions, she makes friends, convinces her parents to give her a room of her own in the attic, and organizes her fellow classmates in a peaceful against long lunch lines in the cafeteria. Being the new kid may end up being sort of fun after all.
Ruth McNally Barshaw’s Ellie McDoodle series has been described by Student Library Journal as “reminiscent of Jeff Kinney’s Diary of a Wimpy Kid“, and it is to some degree: both stories have a vibrant narrator who tells his tale in the first person, accompanied by line drawings. To dismiss Ellie McDoodle as merely a feminine Wimpy Kid is selling the book short. Ellie McDoodle is not a Wimpy Kid clone; it is a smart, sensitive book featuring a character to whom both boys and girls can relate.
Ellie’s family is as realistic and provides a positive family model. The family eats meals together at the same table; they play friendly pranks on one another, like hiding a spooky-looking Mrs. Santa Claus figure all around the house to take family members off guard; even Ellie’s cranky older sister Risa is never outright abusive, but is more of an angsty teen. Her older brother Jonathan is a friendly clown who makes punny jokes, and her toddler brother, Ben-Ben, is a happy baby who gets into everything.
Readers will see Ellie as a positive role model who affects her own change rather than waiting for it to come to her. Rather than succumb to her sadness, Ellie seeks ways to make the best of her situation. She befriends a librarian at the local library; meets neighborhood children and accepts their invitiations to play, a move that helps her cope with insensitive schoolmates. Using her talent in art to help make a difference in her school, her peaceful protest gets not only the notice of the principal, but of the local television station.
Ruth McNally Barshaw’s website offers information on all of the Ellie McDoodle books and links to more of McNally Barshaw’s art. Readers can find out where she’ll be appearing and read her blog, and create Ellie mini-books and stationery. She offers teens advice on writing their own graphic novels, and has teaching guides available for educators.
The Ilsley Public Library in Vermont created a book trailer for New Kid in School, viewable below.
Recommended for ages 10-13
Mom Read It 