Showing posts with label Summertime. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Summertime. Show all posts

Tuesday, July 4, 2017

38. The Matchstick Castle by Keir Graff

read the book from Bosler Library
2017, G. P. Putnam's Sons
277 pgs.
Middle Grades Realistic Fantasy
Finished 7-4-17
Goodreads rating: 3.59 - 138 ratings
My rating:  Probably, personally, a 2, but please read below
Setting:  Contemporary Boring, Illinois

First line/s:  "It was supposed to be the perfect summer.  I was going to camp out, build forts, have adventures, and score the championship-winning goal in the New England All-Star Under-12 Soccer Tournament.  When I wasn't doing those things, I was going to stay up late with my friends, eat as much junk food as I wanted, and pretty much do whatever I felt like until sixth grade started in September.  It was going to be epic:  the all-time, best summer ever."

My comments:  This book reminded me somewhat of the books I read and loved as a kid - Gone Away Lake and The Lemonade Trick, The Four Story Mistake and Half Magic.  I can't remember anything at all about those books except that I loved them.  This gave me the same feel.  Except....now I'm old.  And I didn't like it at all, it was just too far-fetched and ridiculous.  So I'm betting there's lots and lots of youngish kids out there that are going to love it like I loved those old titles of long ago.  So I can't rate it, really. Or I shouldn't.   I'd rate it a 2, but that's an old fogey's rating.  I'll leave this to the experts ... and the kids.

Goodreads synopsis: Brian can think of a few places he'd rather spend his summer than with his aunt and uncle in Boring, Illinois. Jail, for example. Or an earplug factory. Anything would be better than doing summer school on a computer while his scientist dad is stationed at the South Pole. 
Boring lives up to its name until Brian and his cousin Nora have a fight, get lost, and discover a huge, wooden house in the forest. With balconies, turrets, and windows seemingly stuck on at random, it looks ready to fall over in the next stiff breeze. To the madcap, eccentric family that lives inside, it's not just a home--it's a castle. 
          Suddenly, summer gets a lot more exciting. With their new friends, Brian and Nora tangle with giant wasps, sharp-tusked wild boars, and a crazed bureaucrat intent on bringing the dangerously dilapidated old house down with a wrecking ball.

Wednesday, July 20, 2016

40. Summerlost by Allie Condie

listened to unabridged cd in the car
2016 Dutton Books for Young Readers
272 pgs.
Middle Grades CRF
Finished 7/20/16
Goodreads rating: 3.86 - 3067 ratings
My rating: 4.5
Setting: contemporary middle class America

First line/s:  "Our new house had a blue door.  The rest of the house was painted white and shingled gray."

My comments:  I've read at least 50 books since I read this one, and I had forgotten to write a review when I finished it, but here's what I remember.  I remember a lot, which I usually don't after this much time has gone by (it's now April, '17).  I listened to this in the car riding around PA with Ella last summer.  She loved it.  I liked most of it.  I was disconcerted by the amount of things the kids actually got away with without letting their parents know.  Sneakiness bothers me, but what they did was for their own good reasons, it worked out, and was actually quite clever.  I liked the relationship between the two protagonists, and I ached for the family in this unending time of grief.  The interaction with the acting theater festival participants was out-of-the-ordinary for a children's book and quite well done, as was the somewhat-flimsy but perfect-for-kids mystery.

Goodreads synopsis:  It's the first real summer since the devastating accident that killed Cedar's father and younger brother, Ben. But now Cedar and what’s left of her family are returning to the town of Iron Creek for the summer. They’re just settling into their new house when a boy named Leo, dressed in costume, rides by on his bike. Intrigued, Cedar follows him to the renowned Summerlost theatre festival. Soon, she not only has a new friend in Leo and a job working concessions at the festival, she finds herself surrounded by mystery. The mystery of the tragic, too-short life of the Hollywood actress who haunts the halls of Summerlost. And the mystery of the strange gifts that keep appearing for Cedar. 
          Infused with emotion and rich with understanding, Summerlost is the touching middle grade debut from Ally Condie, the international bestselling author of the Matched series, that highlights the strength of family and personal resilience in the face of tragedy.

Sunday, June 8, 2014

35. This is What Happy Looks Like - Jennifer E. Smith

2013 Little Brown & Co.
407 pgs.
YA CRF
Finished 6/7/2014
Goodreads Rating: 3.71
My Rating:  4/Really liked it a lot
TPPL
Setting: Contemporary small-town southern Maine coast

1st sentence/s:  (email) "Hey, we're running pretty behind here.  Any chance you could walk Wilbur for me tonight?"

My comments:  This is a charming story of unlikely teenagers in a place very familiar to me -- smalltown coastal Maine. Although over 400 pages it was a fast read, all in one day - and you can't keep telling yourself how improbable it all is.  Just take it as it is, a sweet, feel-good, thoughtful kind of tale.

Goodreads Review:  If fate sent you an email, would you answer?
          When teenage movie star Graham Larkin accidentally sends small town girl Ellie O'Neill an email about his pet pig, the two seventeen-year-olds strike up a witty and unforgettable correspondence, discussing everything under the sun, except for their names or backgrounds. 
          Then Graham finds out that Ellie's Maine hometown is the perfect location for his latest film, and he decides to take their relationship from online to in-person. But can a star as famous as Graham really start a relationship with an ordinary girl like Ellie? And why does Ellie want to avoid the media's spotlight at all costs.