81. Everything Beautiful is Not Ruined by Danielle Younge-Ullman

read on my iPhone
2017 Viking Books for Young Readers
368 pgs.
YA CRF
Finished 8/18/18
Goodreads rating:  4.22 - 1251 ratings
My rating: 4
Setting:  The woods of northern Ontario, Canada

First line/s:  "Dear mom,  Thanks.  Really.  I can't wait for this tiny excuse for an airplane to take off into the sky, and then deliver me into the dismal middle of nowhere."

My comments:  I do enjoy these books that put the protagonist ubri a summer camp/survival situation, a sort of upward/outward bound of staggering proportions.  This is the second one I've read this year, but very different from Wild Bird (Van Draanen).  It's told by slipping back and forth between the three-week tough hiking/survival experience and Ingrid's life, which is entirely dependent upon and wrapped up by and with her mother.  A few interesting twists and turns, though not especially unexpected, add to the story, which is set in the forests of northern Ontario, Canada.  And I really did read this in one long sitting!

Goodreads synopsis:  Wild meets The Breakfast Club in this story of a girl who must survive an extreme wilderness experience to prove to her mother that she has the strength to pursue her dreams.
Then 
Ingrid traveled all over Europe with her opera star mother, Margot-Sophia. Life was beautiful and bright, and every day soared with music.
Now 
Ingrid is on a summertime wilderness survival trek for at-risk teens: addicts, runaways, and her. She’s fighting to survive crushing humiliations, physical challenges that push her to her limits, and mind games that threaten to break her.
Then 
When the curtain fell on Margot-Sophia’s singing career, they buried the past and settled into a small, painfully normal life. But Ingrid longed to let the music soar again. She wanted it so much that, for a while, nothing else mattered.
Now 
Ingrid is never going to make it through this summer if she can’t figure out why she’s here . . . and why the music really stopped.

33. Macy McMillan and the Rainbow Goddess by Shari Green

read the actual book - from Bosler Library
2017, Pajama Press
239 pgs.
Mid Grades CRF in verse
Finished 4/9/18
Goodreads rating:  4.37 - 254 ratings
My rating: 4.5
Setting: Contemporary anywhere, USA

First line/s: 
"Our house on Pemberton Street
with the red front door
wildflower garden out back
window seat just right for reading
has a For Sale sign jammed
in the front lawn.
It's the ugliest thing
I've ever seen."

My comments:  Wow. As an adult, this book really spoke to me. Powerfully. It actually has many themes, but the strongest for me was the relationship that formed between the 11-year-old girl, Macy,  and her elderly neighbor, Iris, – who ended up being the rainbow goddess of the title. It’s all about the value of our stories, our memories, our “family.”  Since it’s written in verse, it didn’t take very long to read - and it was lovely. I’m going to want to read this one again.

Goodreads synopsis: Sixth grade is coming to an end, and so is life as Macy McMillan knows it. Already a For Sale sign mars the front lawn of her beloved house. Soon her mother will upend their little family, adding an unwelcome stepfather and pesky six-year-old twin stepsisters. To add insult to injury, what is Macy s final sixth grade assignment? A genealogy project. Well, she'll put it off―just like those wedding centerpieces she's supposed to be making. 
          Just when Macy's mother ought to be sympathetic, she sends her next door to help eighty-six-year-old Iris Gillan, who is also getting ready to move―in her case, into an assisted living facility. Iris can't move a single box on her own and, worse, she doesn't know sign language. How is Macy supposed to understand her? But Iris has stories to tell, and she isn't going to let Macy's deafness stop her. Soon, through notes and books and cookies, a friendship grows. And this friendship, odd and unexpected, may be just what Macy needs to face the changes in her life. 
          Shari Green, author of Root Beer Candy and Other Miracles, writes free verse with the lightest touch, spinning Macy out of her old story and into a new one full of warmth and promise for the future.

31. Tell Me Three Things by Julie Buxbaum

read on my iPhone
2016, Delacourt Press
328 pgs.
YA CRF
Finished 5/31/17
Goodreads rating: 4.11 - 16,116 ratings
My rating: 4.5
Setting: Contemporary Los Angeles, CA

First line/s:  "Seven hundred and thirty-three days after my mom died, forty-five days after my dad eloped with a stranger he met on the Internet, thirty days after we then up and moved to California, and only seven days after starting as a junior at a brand-new school where I know approximately no one, an email arrives."

My comments:  4.5  This was a dreamy YA romance, cleverly told with a combination of first person narrative and text messages between the protagonist and her best friend from Chicago, her new friends in LA, and a mystery classmate at her fancy new unfamiliar high school....who befriends her by text message and won't share his identity.  No, I am not an enjoyer of romance fiction, but this one suckered me in (and I do mean suckered, not sucked...)  right from the start.  An excellent cast of characters, the LA setting (that I wish she'd given a bit more attention to) and the epistolary aspects of the book worked very well together.  The plot includes typical high school angst, typical bullying, but not-so-typical dealing with grief, a new step family...and poetry.  The new stepbrother is even gay, so lots of issues are being "hit."  There's lots of older ya stuff going on - Jesse is a junior in high school - so I wouldn't recommend this for middle schoolers because of some very explicit conversations about sex.  Possible Spoiler alert:  Even though you know practically from the start who her secret admirer is, it's still pretty cool how it's revealed at the very end of the book.

Goodreads synopsis  Everything about Jessie is wrong. At least, that’s what it feels like during her first week of junior year at her new ultra-intimidating prep school in Los Angeles. Just when she’s thinking about hightailing it back to Chicago, she gets an email from a person calling themselves Somebody/Nobody (SN for short), offering to help her navigate the wilds of Wood Valley High School. Is it an elaborate hoax? Or can she rely on SN for some much-needed help?
          It’s been barely two years since her mother’s death, and because her father eloped with a woman he met online, Jessie has been forced to move across the country to live with her stepmonster and her pretentious teenage son.
          In a leap of faith—or an act of complete desperation—Jessie begins to rely on SN, and SN quickly becomes her lifeline and closest ally. Jessie can’t help wanting to meet SN in person. But are some mysteries better left unsolved?
           Julie Buxbaum mixes comedy and tragedy, love and loss, pain and elation, in her debut YA novel filled with characters who will come to feel like friends.

15. Unraveling Isobel - Eileen Cook

2012, Simon Pulse (Simon & Schuster)
TPPL Teen
290 pgs.
Rating:  2.5/It was okay

Setting:  An island off the coast of Washington state, big enough for its own high school.
OSS:  When Isobel's mother marries a guy with a "hot" son her own age, she has to move to a strange high school during her senior year and deal with weird, ghostly things that happen in the huge old mansion she must now inhabit.
1st sentence/s:  "When the minister asked if anyone knew any reason why these two shouldn't be married, I should have said something.

Isobel's mother is a self-centered woman who has never been a particularly good mother, and this sort of things irritates me (of course).  It's a real happenstance, and I like that it was written that way.  The new stepfather, Dick, has only been widowed for seven months, so that's cause for head scratching and great and immediate questioning about his   The developing relationship between Isobel and her stepbrother Nathaniel is.....interesting.  And then there's the weird happenings in Isobel's bedroom - the room that used to house Nathaniel's drowned sister.
A fast read, perfect for reluctant teen readers. I found it predictable, but I've read many similar books. It went fast and was interesting, but isn't a standout for me. There were also a number of misspellings that hadn't been caught or edited, and this bothered me (although it shouldn't have!)

3. Hereville - Barry Deutsch

How Mirka Got Her Sword
A graphic novel
Amulet Books, 2010
HC $15.95
For: Middle Grades
142 pgs.
Rating: 5

Now here’s a winner. The first graphic novel I’ve really enjoyed…enjoyed enough to finish, too! Hereville is a fairy tale, set solidly in an Orthodox Jewish community somewhere in contemporary America. However, it could have been set just about anywhere. It is isolated and totally Orthodox. Residents speak Yiddish and Hebrew, words are sprinkled thorough the story. The translations are thoughtfully stuck onto the bottom of the page, but most of the text is in English.

Clever. Funny. Fun. And even educational, when it comes to learning about Orthodox Judaism. I can’t even begin to go into the plot, which is multi-layered. The protagonist, Mirka, is one of nine children in a blended family. She respects and cares about her stepmother, Fruma, who is wise and my favorite character in the book. Mirka has studied monsters, she keeps a hidden book about them under her mattress. It his her great desire to become a dragon slayer. She has a younger brother, Zindel, who spends much time with her, and a stepsister, Rochel, who seems wise beyond her years.

The characters, including a huge talking pig, a witch that lives in a nearby house just discovered, and a knitting troll are wonderful. Fresh, believable, fun, and funny. Adventurous, animated, well-illustrated, clear…a wonderful book!

Barry Deutsch has a Hereville BLOG that he writes almost every day. It’s fun.

Stephen Frug has a blog that reviews Hereville beautifully and thoroughly. So does the Bob Hayes Online blog. So I'd suggest reading one (or both) of those for more in-depth information about the plot.