Mailbox Monday - 1/19/09

This is my first week to participate in Mailbox Monday.  I have been reading others' posts and wanting to join in, but I just couldn't get it all together to get it done.  Well, this past week, I made it a point to keep all of the books that came in the mail, together so that I could start doing Mailbox Mondays. 

This was a good week for me.  Here's what showed up "in my mailbox" last week.

Kids on a Case - The Case of the Ten Grand Kidnapping - I was contacted by the author and asked to review this.  I read it this weekend.  Look for the review this week.

Houston, we have a problema - When Jessica feels lost, she asks the universe for directions.  Jessica Luna is your typical 26 year old: she has man trouble, mom trouble, and not a clue what to do with her life (though everyone else in her family seems to have plenty of suggestions!) After a lifetime of being babied by her family, Jess is incapable of trusting herself to make the right choices. So instead, she bases all of her life decisions on signs. She looks to everything for guidance, from the direction her rearview-mirror-Virgin-de-Guadalupe sways to whatever Madame Hortensia, her psychic, sees in the cards.

Scat - Scat follows two adventurous students who set out to solve the mystery of missing feared, biology teacher, Mrs. Bunny Starch.  Mrs. Starch disappears during a field trip to the Black Vine Swamp.

Abigail Iris the One and Only - Abigail Iris is sick of being One-of-Many—brothers and sisters, that is. She’d rather be an Only, like all her best friends, and not have to compete with siblings for time or attention. So Abigail is thrilled when she joins her friend Genevieve’s family on a trip to San Francisco. She gets to stay in a fancy hotel, visit Chinatown, order room service—and she doesn’t have to share anything with her pesky older siblings! Amid all the fun, though, Abigail discovers that having a set of parents to yourself might be nice some of the time, it just isn’t right for Abigail all of the time. An adorable story for Onlies and One-of-Many alike starring a one-of-a-kind new character!

Chasing Boys - El Marini just isn’t fitting into the new life she’s been forced to create without her dad. Her mom and sister have accepted his absence and moved on, but El is convinced things will get back to normal if she just keeps her feelings of loss to herself and waits it out. Life at her new public school would have been unbearable if weren’t for Eric Callahan. As her crush grows to epic proportions, she’ll do anything to be more like the popular girls he notices, even buying the first pink top she’s ever owned. But then she meets Dylan, a quiet artistic-type who is both unnerving and annoying as he shines a light on El’s misguided attempts to attract Eric. El’s need for acceptance will hit home with teens as she finally sees that chasing boys has distracted her from making peace with the past and finding herself.

My Penguin Osbert in Love - It's love in a cold climate for Osbert the penguin...One morning there's a knock at Joe's door. It's Osbert the penguin. He's escaped from the zoo, and he and his friends (all twenty-one of them) want to travel to Antarctica for a once-in-a-century spectacle: the southern lights. Luckily Joe has a helicopter, for everyone knows that penguins can't fly. But when they land at the South Pole and pile out to watch the skies, it seems Osbert is more interested in something - or someone - else. Can Osbert and Joe still be friends now that Osbert has found love?

Keyholders 1: This Side of Magic - The first in a series of light fantasy chapter books set in Morgantown, a town on the border between the real world and the magical world, by the authors of the Publishers Weekly bestselling BAILEY SCHOOL KIDS—a series of 50 books with more than 30 million copies sold!

“You are my chosen apprentices,” said Mr. Leery.  Penny and Luke aren’t sure they want to be apprentice Keyholders. A Keyholder’s job, explains their neighbor, Mr. Leery, is to guard the border between the real world and the magical world.   But when they meet their “links”—magical helpers from the other side of the border—they change their minds. Penny’s link is Kirin, a sarcastic unicorn. Luke forms a link with a clumsy baby dragon named Dracula. And just in time! For the evil Queen of the Boggarts is determined to invade their world—and only the Keyholders and their links can stop her.

Keyholders 2: The Other Side of Magic - The second in a series of light fantasy chapter books set in Morgantown, a town on the border between the real world and the magical world, by the authors of the Publishers Weekly bestselling BAILEY SCHOOL KIDS—a series of 50 books with more than 30 million copies sold!  “I need your help, Natalie,” Mr. Leery said. “Yours and Penny’s and Luke’s.”  Natalie is surprised to learn from her neighbor, Mr. Leery, that her classmates Penny and Luke are apprentice Keyholders. A Keyholder’s job is to guard the border between the real world and the magical world. Natalie is even more surprised when she finds out that she could be a Keyholder too—if she forms a “link” with a rat named Buttercup. Will Natalie choose to join the Keyholders? Can she, Penny, and Luke learn how to work together with their links and protect the border from the goblins sent by the evil Queen of the Boggarts?

Little Skink's Tail - While Little Skink hunts yummy ants for breakfast, she is suddenly attacked by a crow! But she has a trick to escape she snaps off her tail, and it keeps on wiggling! Little Skink is happy to be alive, but she misses her bright blue tail. Readers will enjoy pretending with her, trying on tail after tail. The first is too puffy-fluffy, and another too stinky! Then one day Little Skink gets a big surprise...and she doesn t have to dream of tails anymore. The For Creative Minds section has information on tail adaptations and communications and a mix-and-match tail activity

Kisses and Lies - After discovering that someone saw what looked like Dan’s emergency EpiPen in A-lister Plum’s designer handbag, Scarlett and her tough American sidekick, Taylor, sneak into a posh London nightclub, where Plum has a private table. Scarlett is stunned to discover a piece of evidence that might implicate another girl in Plum’s exclusive circle, Lucy Raleigh. Which means Scarlett must cast a wider net in order to catch the right suspect.  Back at school, groundskeeper Jase is hoping to take Scarlett’s mind off her troubles with some heart-stopping kisses. Scarlett can’t help but feel guilty for indulging in romantic rendezvous when she should be hunting down Dan’s killer. However, once Scarlett finds out how Lucy is connected to Dan, she knows she must drop everything and travel to the McAndrew estate in Scotland to hunt for more clues. But when she arrives, Scarlett becomes the target of a dangerous hunt herself.

The ABCs of Kissing Boys - Parker Stanhope has played soccer practically since she could walk. And now that she’s a high school junior, everything she’s worked for is finally coming together. She’s paid her dues on the field, and as an upperclassman, she’s a shoo-in for the varsity team. But that’s not what happens.

This year, Coach Hartley moved up every JV player but two—and one of those two was Parker. Now, she’s stuck with the freshmen, her friends are cutting her loose, and her love of the game is seriously beginning to fail. But Parker is determined to get her life back. She has to get on the varsity team, and she has the perfect plan. All she needs now is the right kind of coach.

The Devil's Paintbox - When orphans Aiden and Maddy Lynch first meet trailrider Jefferson J. Jackson in the spring of 1865, they’re struggling to survive on their family’s drought-ravaged Kansas farm. So when Jackson offers an escape—a 2000-mile journey across the roughest country in the world—Aiden knows it’s their only choice.  They say there are a hundred ways to die on the Oregon Trail, and the long wagon journey is broken only by catastrophe: wolf attacks, rattlesnakes, deadly river crossings, Indians, and the looming threat of smallpox, “the devil’s paint.” Through it all, Aiden and Maddy and a hundred fellow travelers move forward with a growing hope, and the promise of a new life in the Washington Territory. But one question haunts them: who will survive the journey?

Mailbox Monday is hosted by The Printed Page.  What was in your mailbox?