I had an amazingly good week last week! Sorry to be late in posting my mailbox, but we are beginning our week of state testing tomorrow, so I have been otherwise preoccupied trying to get everything prepared. Friday will be a blessing to see!
Here's what came into my house, via the mailbox...
Farm by Elisha Cooper, from Scholastic
There is so much to look at and learn about on a farm - animals, tractors, crops, and barns. And children feeding animals for morning chores! With lyrical writing and beautiful illustrations that capture the rhythms of the changing seasons, Elisha Cooper brings the farm to life.
Vienna, Austria, 1938
Maestoso Petra is a world-famous Lipizzaner stallion. He has spent years in the Spanish Riding School, training to perform the complex airs above the ground that only Lipizzaner can accomplish. But when World War II breaks out in Europe, he learns to think less about performing and more about survival. Here is Maestoso Petra’s story . . . in his own words.
Eleven-year-old Megan is stuck in the wilds of Vermont for the summer with no TV, no Internet, no cell phone, and worst of all, no best friend. So when Megan gets lost on the Appalachian Trail with only her little dog, Arp, for company, she decides she might as well hike all the way to Massachusetts where her best friend, Lucy, is spending her summer. Life on the trail isn’t easy, and Megan faces everything from wild animals and raging rivers to tofu jerky and life without bathrooms. Most of all, though, Megan gets to know herself—both who she’s been in the past and who she wants to be in the future—and the journey goes from a spur-of-the-moment lark to a quest to prove herself to Lucy, her family, and the world!
Nobody can know your secret.
Nobody can know your power.
But if nobody knows who you are to begin with...what's stopping you?
I whisper, "What's so special about me all of a sudden?"
Nick says, "The Turning."
Mary feels different, but can't explain why. The fainting, the strange cravings...and worse, the things she's noticed about her body.
Mary doesn't know where to turn. If she tells her parents or her sister, she'll risk losing everything. She has no other family, no way of knowing if what she's going through is normal. Everyone she's ever known and loved could reject her...
This endearing story is about a small frog who is being teased and taunted for being different, in Cecil's case, for being so small. His mother attempts to hide him away to end the teasing. At the top of his tall tree in the middle of the rain forest, Cecil grows very lonesome. There is no one to play with or to visit.
One day a TV cameraman strolls into the forest and starts talking with Cecil. Cecil tells him that he is very lonesome. He even sheds a small tear.
The cameraman says "Let me take your picture with my camera. I can show it all over the world, for I am a TV cameraman. Perhaps some of your brothers, sisters. and cousins will come to visit you." The little frog croaked "okey dokey."
Then the cameraman begins the process of teaching Cecil how to smile and telling him why SMILING IS IMPORTANT.
The Alaskan landscape — so vast, dramatic, and unbelievable — may make it easier to believe that something or someone greater is in charge. Haines resident Heather Lende wonders whether that’s why people in her town (population 2,400) so often discuss the meaning of life. She thinks it helps make life mean more.
Lende, who writes the local obituary column and has been called "part Annie Dillard, part Anne Lamott" by the Los Angeles Times, revealed in her first book a deep awareness of what links all humanity. Since then, she was run over by a truck in an almost fatal accident and has had a few more reasons to consider matters both spiritual and earthly. In Where God Resides we meet the community that helped her get back on her feet: the eccentric, fiercely independent, always fascinating residents of Haines—Buddhists, bear hunters, Tinglit Indians, and her large, lively family. We follow Lende as she attends her small Episcopal church, cares for her mother, wonders how to forgive the driver who hit her and how not to faint with joy as she finally walks down to the beach for her daughter’s wedding. By the time we reach a certain age, most of us have been hit by trucks, in one way or another, and Lende shows us that our responses to those setbacks have everything to do with faith.
"The morning I died it rained. Poured down so hard it washed the blood off my face."
It seems everyone in young Lori Jean's life has a secret, but only one secret will cost her everything.
How far will a mother go to save her child?
Ten years ago, Ruby Leander was a drifting nineteen-year-old who made a split-second decision at an Oklahoma rest stop. Fast forward nine years: Ruby and her daughter Lark live in New Mexico. Lark is a precocious, animal loving imp, and Ruby has built a family for them with a wonderful community of friends and her boyfriend of three years. Life is good. Until the day Ruby reads a magazine article about parents searching for an infant kidnapped by car-jackers. Then Ruby faces a choice no mother should have to make. A choice that will change both her and Lark's lives forever.
The Art of Losing: Poems of Grief & Healing by Kevin Young, from Bloomsbury
Poetry serves a unique role in our lives, distilling human experience and emotion down to truths as potent as they are brief. There are two times most people turn to it: for love and loss. Although collections of love poetry abound, there are very few anthologies for the grieving. In The Art of Losing, editor Kevin Young Kevin Young has introduced and selected 150 devastatingly beautiful poems that embrace the pain and heartbreak of mourning. Divided into five sections (Reckoning, Remembrance, Rituals, Recovery, and Redemption), with poems by some of our most beloved poets as well as the best of the current generation of poets, The Art of Losing is the ideal a gift for a loved one in a time of need and for use by ministers, rabbis, and palliative care workers who tend to those who are experiencing loss.
Kiss in the Dark by Lauren Henderson, from Delacorte Press
With Dan McAndrews's murder finally behind her, Scarlett has high hopes for a fresh start at Wakefield Hall Collegiate, the elite English boarding school her grandmother runs. Unfortunately, those hopes are dashed when her nemesis, the infamous Plum Saybourne, is transferred to the school. Plum wastes no time turning Scarlett’s impressionable classmates against her.
Scarlett has dealt with Plum’s nasty schemes before, and she can handle her archenemy very nicely, thank you—until Plum sets her sights on Scarlett’s best friend, Taylor, and new boyfriend, Jase. Then Scarlett is more than willing to fight for what’s rightfully hers.
Things only get worse after Scarlett becomes entangled in a mysterious death on campus. Scarlett is compelled to investigate because she wants to protect someone close to her. She never imagines that she’ll uncover secrets related to her parents’ fatal accident so many years ago. . . .
Thief Eyes by Janni Lee Simner, from Random House
After her mother mysteriously disappears, sixteen-year-old Haley convinces her father to take her to Iceland, where her mother was last seen. There, amidst the ancient fissures and crevices of that volcanic island, Haley meets gorgeous Ari, a boy with a dangerous side who appoints himself her protector.
When Haley picks up a silver coin that entangles her in a spell cast by her ancestor Hallgerd, she discovers that Hallgerd's spell and her mother's disappearance are connected to a chain of events that could unleash terrifying powers and consume the world. Haley must find a way to contain the growing fires of the spell—and her growing attraction to Ari.
Unfamiliar Magic by R.C. Alexander, from Random House
Desi is a witch. And she knows she could be a great witch—if only her mom would teach her any spells. Unfortunately, Desi’s mom is more concerned with keeping them safe and their abilities hidden.
When her mom leaves town under mysterious circumstances, it should be Desi’s perfect opportunity to explore magic on her own. But Desi has been left in the care of the most unusual babysitter of all time: her pet cat—also her mom’s familiar—now transformed into a teenage girl named Cat. And Cat has only three goals: Learn how to eat sushi with her new hairless monkey paws, get the awkward boy next door to pay for her sushi, and keep Desi out of trouble. And that means no magic.
Yeah, right!
One Too Many: A Seek & Find Counting Book by Gianna Marino, from Chronicle Books
In this boisterous barnyard, the fun grows with each turn of the page. One bouncing flea is joined by two cows, then three horses, and so on, all the way up to twelve swooping bats. Children will delight in following the shimmering path of the flea, counting each bounce along the way to find the new arrival. Older readers can take the challenge further, counting all the animals on the page, or hunting for their favorite. And a surprise ending reveals which animal is just one too many! This frisky hodgepodge is sure to have the whole herd roaring with laughter and pouring over the pages for hours.
Ten years ago, Ruby Leander was a drifting nineteen-year-old who made a split-second decision at an Oklahoma rest stop. Fast forward nine years: Ruby and her daughter Lark live in New Mexico. Lark is a precocious, animal loving imp, and Ruby has built a family for them with a wonderful community of friends and her boyfriend of three years. Life is good. Until the day Ruby reads a magazine article about parents searching for an infant kidnapped by car-jackers. Then Ruby faces a choice no mother should have to make. A choice that will change both her and Lark's lives forever.
Poetry serves a unique role in our lives, distilling human experience and emotion down to truths as potent as they are brief. There are two times most people turn to it: for love and loss. Although collections of love poetry abound, there are very few anthologies for the grieving. In The Art of Losing, editor Kevin Young Kevin Young has introduced and selected 150 devastatingly beautiful poems that embrace the pain and heartbreak of mourning. Divided into five sections (Reckoning, Remembrance, Rituals, Recovery, and Redemption), with poems by some of our most beloved poets as well as the best of the current generation of poets, The Art of Losing is the ideal a gift for a loved one in a time of need and for use by ministers, rabbis, and palliative care workers who tend to those who are experiencing loss.
With Dan McAndrews's murder finally behind her, Scarlett has high hopes for a fresh start at Wakefield Hall Collegiate, the elite English boarding school her grandmother runs. Unfortunately, those hopes are dashed when her nemesis, the infamous Plum Saybourne, is transferred to the school. Plum wastes no time turning Scarlett’s impressionable classmates against her.
Scarlett has dealt with Plum’s nasty schemes before, and she can handle her archenemy very nicely, thank you—until Plum sets her sights on Scarlett’s best friend, Taylor, and new boyfriend, Jase. Then Scarlett is more than willing to fight for what’s rightfully hers.
Things only get worse after Scarlett becomes entangled in a mysterious death on campus. Scarlett is compelled to investigate because she wants to protect someone close to her. She never imagines that she’ll uncover secrets related to her parents’ fatal accident so many years ago. . . .
After her mother mysteriously disappears, sixteen-year-old Haley convinces her father to take her to Iceland, where her mother was last seen. There, amidst the ancient fissures and crevices of that volcanic island, Haley meets gorgeous Ari, a boy with a dangerous side who appoints himself her protector.
When Haley picks up a silver coin that entangles her in a spell cast by her ancestor Hallgerd, she discovers that Hallgerd's spell and her mother's disappearance are connected to a chain of events that could unleash terrifying powers and consume the world. Haley must find a way to contain the growing fires of the spell—and her growing attraction to Ari.
Desi is a witch. And she knows she could be a great witch—if only her mom would teach her any spells. Unfortunately, Desi’s mom is more concerned with keeping them safe and their abilities hidden.
When her mom leaves town under mysterious circumstances, it should be Desi’s perfect opportunity to explore magic on her own. But Desi has been left in the care of the most unusual babysitter of all time: her pet cat—also her mom’s familiar—now transformed into a teenage girl named Cat. And Cat has only three goals: Learn how to eat sushi with her new hairless monkey paws, get the awkward boy next door to pay for her sushi, and keep Desi out of trouble. And that means no magic.
Yeah, right!
In this boisterous barnyard, the fun grows with each turn of the page. One bouncing flea is joined by two cows, then three horses, and so on, all the way up to twelve swooping bats. Children will delight in following the shimmering path of the flea, counting each bounce along the way to find the new arrival. Older readers can take the challenge further, counting all the animals on the page, or hunting for their favorite. And a surprise ending reveals which animal is just one too many! This frisky hodgepodge is sure to have the whole herd roaring with laughter and pouring over the pages for hours.
5 comments:
Roseflower Creek looks interesting.
Interesting post, you have such a lovely place here :)
marinela x x
Wow, you had a great week! They all look good, but Kiss in the Dark catches my eye.
Great books Shelly.
I am anxiously awaiting The Turning and I am hoping to get Kiss In the Dark. I have read her previous books in the series and loved them.
Happy Reading
My oh My that is a big list!
Thief Eyes, Kiss in the Dark, Mothers and Other Liars, and The Turning all look like really great reads!
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