Rating: 
Sam Jones has some plans for his life. Mainly, be the first in the family to go to college, and not to impregnate anyone while still in his teens. While his grades aren’t stellar, they’re not bad, and his Art teacher recently recommended he study Art & design after school. He’s single, and spends most of his time skating (on a board) so all in all, his plans seem to be going all right. He worries, every now and then, whether it will all really turn out all right, but who doesn’t? Pretty much, he’s content.
When his mother wants to bring him to a party to meet a girl, he has the reaction you’d expect. No way. But she presses the point, and off he goes. And Alicia is certainly something to look at. Not much to be with though. Obnoxious, pretty much. But the approach of telling her so and walking away seems to be some sort of magic for soon enough, she’s at his side and pulling him back to the living room.
Alicia is not the kind of girl Sam would have expected to go for him. But she did. And soon his life has whittled down to a very small world. Mainly, Alicia. They hang out, they watch tv in her room, they have sex. That’s about the extent of it. Which of course worries the parents. But as far as Sam and Alicia are concerned, everything’s fine.
Until it’s not.
Eventually, Sam goes back to skating. Somehow, one day he was tired of her. And rather than tell her, well, he just stopped going round, or answering calls. He figured she’d get the point. Unfortunately for him, there was this whole potential incident he’d kept to himself, and would like to have forgotten. So when he gets a text one morning at breakfast, he’s not really surprised. He’s not happy either. But he goes to meet her.
And then he runs away.
And comes back.
Out the window go the plans. In come a whole new slew of worries. Like death at parent’s hands. And how can this work? And how can it be, even though he’s pretty sure he knows that part. Not that he’s telling anyone.
A couple of trips into the future while sleeping don’t do much to make Sam feel any better about the way things have turned out, though when he gets to those moments in real time it turns out they’re not so bad.
This is a pretty funny look into accidental pregnancy. While the subject is itself heavy, Sam’s dealings with it, while oh so wrong at points, are a riot to read about. And in the end he does what’s right, which is the important part. And things will be ok, or they won’t, but not for lack of trying
Rating:
Tessa Scott is dying, and there’s some things she’d really like to get to before she does. Ideas scribbled everywhere around her room. On the wall. On scraps of paper. Her best friend, Zoey, thinks she should gather them together, make a real list, get on with it. Anything’s better than lying about in bed all day. And as much as Tess would like to disagree, she eventually comes to realize she has two choices. Get on with living or get on with death. And since her life has already been cut short, isn’t making the most of the rest of it the best plan?
The list is not necessarily the kind of thing a parent would love. In fact, Tessa’s pretty sure that her dad will hate most of it. But it’s her life. And she wants to get to experience it. After all, what’s the worst that can happen?
Of course, making up one’s mind to go through with something so big and actually doing it are different stories. And when Zoey comes to collect her for their night out, where they intend to take care of number uno–sex–Tess isn’t so keen to leave the house. Nor is her dad keen to have her out late. Zoey cares about neither objection, and off they go. It’s not exactly everything Tessa was hoping for. In fact it might be nothing she was hoping for. But it’s still one off the list. And it’s a start. Which might make it easier to keep going. But nothing can make it easy.
Her relationships are strained at best. Her father is at wit’s end. Zoey comes and goes. She meets the neighbor boy, after a long stretch of watching him through the window, only to get close, push him away, get close, push him away.
The day she decides to say yes to everything lands her in a river, and afterwards in hospital. Her wish for fame leads to a radio interview where she divulges some details her father could have done with out. But once she’s really made up her mind to go out on her own terms, there’s certainly no stopping her.
Not the easiest story to read, in terms of sunshine and happy times, but it’s certainly well worth the read. Tessa is someone to aspire to, when all is said and done.
Twelve-year-old Blake Winters is about to discover something at the library that will change his life…
While at Oxford with his mother, Blake finds himself wandering the deep, expansive library on campus and finds a curious book with a serpentine clasp. When the clasp pricks Blake’s finger, the volume opens and he is led into a a strange mystery that has spanned generations–who was Endymion Spring? Unfortunately, Blake is not the only one drawn into this strange quest; a Person in the Shadows is also seeking to learn the truth about Endymion Spring and will stop at nothing to get what they want.
Skelton has created an entralling fantasy that will appeal to fans of Funke’s Inkheart, and to all those who love books about books, fantasies or mysteries or any combination of the three.
Find it in the Catalog
Rating:
David Case’s life took a definitive turn towards desolation the day his baby brother contemplated flight at the suggestion of a passing bird. Only happening to look up by chance, David is just in time to pull Charlie back from the window ledge before he leaps. Charlie can see his brother is very disturbed by this, but no matter how clearly he tries to explain himself, David doesn’t seem to understand.
Certain that fate is out to get him, David decides drastic action is needed. He must go into hiding. He will become someone else. Justin Case.
While shopping at a thrift store for a new wardrobe to go with his new persona, Justin meets Agnes, a very eclectic sort of girl who seems to love nothing better than photographing him. They strike up a friendship of sorts, which goes well for awhile, and then takes a turn towards disaster once Justin decides he’s in love.
Justin also invents an invisible dog for himself–a greyhound called Boy. His friend Peter and his sisters, and Justin’s brother Charlie are able to see him too, but otherwise, he mainly gets strange looks when interacting with his pet.
Charlie continues throughout the year to try to explain himself to Justin. He can see that his older brother is a changed person, ever since the incident with the flying. But even when he manages to spell out JST IN CASE WHAT with his ABC blocks, he can’t get through to Justin.
After being present for a completely incredible plane crash at Luton Airport, Justin sleeps even farther into despair in paranoia. He moves in first with Agnes, and then with Peter. What will it take for Justin Case to get his life back?
Find it in the Catalog
Rating:
Ruben Ford has always felt things. Other people’s thoughts, other people’s feelings… It makes him different, but he’s never minded it, really. Until the night he’s alone in the backseat of a car in the rain, and alone in the dark on a deserted moor with his sister Rachel, about to be dead.
The police don’t seem to know what they’re doing when it comes to investigating Rachel’s death. Ruben’s brother, Cole, has taken to assaulting the press, and his mother just wants to be able to bury her daughter. With their father in jail, the boys knows it’s up to them.
Cole sets his mind to going out to where it all happened, and following in Rachel’s footsteps. Ruben sets his mind on going with him, with or without Cole’s approval. Along the way they uncover a great deal–about themselves, about their past, about life, and the conspiracy of events into the middle of which their sister just happened to fall.
Find it in the Catalog
Rating:
First and foremost, if you haven’t read the first two books of this trilogy (The Amulet of Samarkand, The Golem’s Eye), I wouldn’t start with this one. Without all the back-story there’s a lot to miss. That being said, I think this might have been the best of the three.
We’re back in London, after the downfall of the Lovelace affair, and Nathaniel/Jonathan Mandrake, is now Information Minister. The Commoners are growing restless, the war in America is going poorly, and Bartimaeus has been kept in service for so long that his powers are all but gone. The government is beginning to split into factions, everyone is always looking over their shoulders, and the lower magicians seem to be plotting something.
It turns out the elusive Hopkins is returned. Finding him becomes top priority. In the meantime, Mandrake also learns that Kitty Jones is not, as he had thought, dead. Finding her then becomes his top priority. And just when it seems like things might be falling into place….everything comes apart.
The entire government is kidnapped, the streets overflow with commoners who’ve noticed a lack of government response, and Mandrake and Kitty have fallen into the middle of a most sordid plot.
This was the quickest read of the trilogy, for me, and even though I knew it was winding down, in the end I harbor hopes that perhaps there will be another story someday.
Find it in the Catalog
May 31st, 2006
1:47 pm
Book Review, Harry Potter Read-Alikes, Series
boarding schools, charlie bone, children of the red king, children's books, england, fantasy, juvenile fiction, magic, wizards, ya fiction
Rating:
The trouble in and around Bloor’s Academy grows even greater, as the Children of the Red King struggle on with their fight. All the town’s animals have disappeared over night, and no one knows why. With the help of Billy’s rat Rembrandt, Charlie Bone uncovers the answer. And with the help of a mysterious girl named Naren, is able to find the animals and bring some back. But as he only brings his friends’ animals back, he then finds himself to blame for the rest of them being missing. Having sworn never to tell the secret of Naren’s family, he can only hope that the rest of the animals will return on their own. Luckily, they do.
Meanwhile, there are rumors circulating of a mysterious Shadow. One which Rembrandt tried to warn them about, but the boys could make no sense of his cryptic message. While it’s widely known that there was someone called the Shadow who tore the Red King’s family apart, there is almost nothing to be found about him, outside of travel journals written by Bartholomew Bloor, which he gets to Charlie, and which Charlie must then hide, once he’s read them and discovered all he can.
And if that’s not enough, his best friend’s parents have been sneaking around Bloor’s, his mother has been bewitched and is forgetting his father, and the nicest teacher at the Academy has turned out to be an enemy. Armed with a charm that can free the King and the knowledge of where his father is, Charlie aims to set his life straight.
A fun and fast read that’s rather difficult to write well about without giving it all away.
Find it in the Catalog
Rating: 
I ran into this book while setting up one of the lists on the Read Something New page and the title cracked me up, so I went out front and picked it up.
Jess Jordan seems pretty sure of her station in life: she’s got a big bum, and no boy will ever notice her because her best friend, Flora, looks like a blonde goddess. Two goddesses, in fact. Venus and Flora. But this is alright by Jess, as she wants nothing to do with boys in that fashion anyway.
She’s rather fond of daydreaming away, instead of completing in-class assignments, and has a very vivid and active imagination. She also has quite the crush on Ben Jones. Only when he starts talking to her, she has no idea what to do with herself. In fact, she eventually comes to the conclusion that he’s not interested in her at all, and only talks to her in order to get information on his true interest. Flora.
Amidst all this confusion, over some miscommunication, Jess has also had a falling-out with her other best friend, Fred. Every time she wants to make it right, back circumstance intervenes, generally in the form of Ben. When Fred is asked to edit a school newspaper and doesn’t ask her to participate it seems things can’t get any lower. Until Flora confesses she’s left the boy she’d been seeing because she’s crazy for someone else. That someone being, not Ben, but Fred.
Suffice it to say Jess has quite the end of a year. And though the task of being the one to feel Fred out for Flora is harsh and unwelcome, she meets it head on. The outcome is most unexpected.
Quick read, full of British humor, good for a lot of laughs.
Find it in the Catlog
Matt hasn’t had the best life. His parents died when he was eight, on their way to a wedding. His mother’s half-sister showed up afterwards to claim him (for the money), and had little use for him (once she blew through the cash). He had no friends at school, and so sought out the company of a boy down the way, who was himself a troublemaker, and led Matt nowhere but down the wrong path. When their latest scheme goes awry, Matt is given two options. Imprisonment, or LEAF. Though he doesn’t like the look of the woman who’s agreed to look after him under the LEAF project, he figures it has to be better than prison, because hey, he can just run away, right?
Wrong.
It doesn’t take long for Matt to figure out there’s something very wrong with Lesser Malling. And when he’s had enough and tries to run away, every road out of the tiny town leads him back to where he began. He meets a man who says he can help, only to find him dead the next morning upon his arrival for their visit. When he returns with the police, the scene has been cleaned up, making it look like just one more troublemaker’s stunt.
Everywhere Matt turns, he finds help, followed swiftly by trouble. One by one, anyone who seeks to aid him ends up dead.
After finding a picture of himself at his parents’ funeral in his guardian’s closet, he knows something sinister is going on, and none of it accidental. Somehow, he manages to escape with a local reporter, only to end up once again back where he began. Wherever he goes, the darkness of Lesser Malling finds him. Because they need him.
The town of Lesser Malling and all its inhabitants live a life of old ways, worshipping dark powers long since run aground. With Matt’s “help,” they hope to set them free. Long ago, 5 children saved the world. The time has come for them to do so again. With Matt’s story, it begins.
Find it in the Catalog
Goshen Public Library & Historical Society | 203 Main St Goshen, NY 10924 | Phone: 845.294.6606 | Fax: 845.294.7158 | RCLS Member
