Avalon High by Meg Cabot

Do you find the legend of King Arthur facinating? Would you believe he has been reincarnated and is living in Anapolis, Maryland and attends Avalon High School? Neither does Elaine, who has moved to Anapolis for the year with her parents who are Medieval scholars on sabbatical. When Elaine meets Will the most popular boy at Avalon High she finds out her English teacher, Mr. Morton, believes him to be the reincarnation of King Arthur. There are so many parallels from his life to King Arthur's. The question is how does Elaine fit in?

This is a fun story, very interesting. It moves along very quickly. I recommend this story for those of you who enjoy stories about King Arthur.

Happy Reading!

Mrs. B

Blue Bloods

If you are into books about vampires, check out Blue Bloods by Melissa De La Cruz. The elite families in New York City all have one thing in common, they are vampires. The children of these families all attend Duchesne Academy. These families have memories from The Mayflower, since they never die. At least, they are not supposed to die. Something has been hunting and killing other vampires.
At 16 Schuyler Van Alen starts noticing these marks on her arms. Her grandmother seems pleased about them. Little does Schuler know, that these are the markings of a vampire until her first meeting of The Committee where everything is explained. When Schuyler's friend Dylan is accused of killing another vampire, she and two more friends try to clear his name.

The Vanished

For those of you who have read and liked the Celia Rees books we have Witch Child and Pirates, do not miss out on The Vanished. Oh my! If you like stories about the supernatural read this. They are just playground chants and urban legends right? You know what I'm talking about; how not to play here, or if you play in the woods you will disappear, or if you find the seven steps and go down you will never be heard from again. Cassie, Jake, and Fraser thought these were just made up to scare children. In an effort to boost sales of the school newspaper, Fraser comes up with the idea for the psi files. Students could submit weird things that they had heard and the paper would publish them. Cassie is the newspaper editor and she thinks some tales like those of vampire children are just too much. When Fraser begins investigating some of the tales the students had submitted, he finds out there is some truth to them. Jake investigates missing children from around the city, then Jake's sister goes missing. When Jake, Fraser, and Cassie go looking for Jake's sister in the underground cave and mining system, they learn many of the tales are scarier than they ever imagined. This kept me on the edge of my seat.

Happy Reading!

Mrs. B.

A Certain Slant of Light

This is one book that I have wanted to read for a long time. It is a ghost story, but not the typical ghost story. This is about Helen. She can't remember how she died, but she knows it must be something awful. Whatever she did is the reason she did not go to heaven. Helen learns how to attach herself to a human host. She goes from host to host over the span of about 150 years. The hosts never know she is there. One day when she is with her host at his job in a high school she notices a boy looking at her. How can this boy see her? Helen is drawn to this boy, James, only to find out he is also a ghost, but he has inhabited a human body. James wants Helen to also find a body to take over. Once Helen finds a body there are all new challenges. I really enjoyed this book. If you are looking for a scary ghost story, don't read this book. It has some creepiness about it, but I would not consider this a scary ghost story.

Happy Reading!

Mrs. B.

The Ranger's Apprentice: The Burning Bridge

I really liked the first book The Ruins of Gorlan, but I loved this one! This book is very fast paced, you just don't want to put it down. I feel like the characters have been well developed. This book takes off where the first book left off. This story has more to it than the first book because by now Will has been an apprentice for six months and he is doing well. The kingdom of Araluen is gathering its army to fight Morgarath and his forces of wargalls. This book focuses more on Will, Horace, and Gillan. Halt is becoming more of a background character, but still very important to the story. This book had a cliffhanger ending! I think I sat there with my mouth open when the book was over. Of course, I am eager to read the third book! I hope you will like it as much as I did.
Happy reading!
Mrs. B.

P.S. Please excuse the picture goof up!

The Ranger's Apprentice: The Ruins of Gorlan

The Ruins of Gorlan is the first book in The Ranger's Apprentice series by John Flanagan. If you like The Lord of the Rings, you might like this one also. This is the story about Will, who was not accepted into any apprenticeship program. After not knowing what to do, Halt the ranger steps up to offer Will an apprenticeship as a ranger. Will accepts not knowing what to expect. Of course this whole story is not just about Will learning to become a ranger. The kingdom is having to prepare for war as the evil warlord Morgarath begins having the kingdoms lords assasinated. This is a great adventure story with many twists and turns. I felt like this was a great opening to a series.
Happy Reading!
Mrs. B.

London Calling

London Calling by Edward Bloor is a story about Martin Conway, a seventh grader at All Souls middle school. A bad experience at the end of the school year leaves Martin not wanting to return the next year. Strange things happen to Martin that summer starting with the unusual calls from his grandmother asking him if he would help Jimmy. Martin has no idea who Jimmy is. After Martin's grandmother passes away he inherits her old radio. The first night Martin plugs in the radio and goes to sleep, he wakes up to meet Jimmy an eight year old English boy. Martin discovers the radio will transport him through time to 1940 London in the middle of the World War II bombings. Martin has one question to answer: What did you do to help? This is one of those books that I start reading and I'm not sure how I feel about it. I felt unsure for several reasons, but somewhere after the halfway point I started to really like the book and by the end it was hard not to cry because I was deeply touched. It is without a doubt worth the time to read this book.
Happy Reading!
Mrs. B.

Vampirates

I can't believe it has almost been a month since my last post! I have read several books since then. Vampirates the title just gets you, doesn't it? Vampirates is written by Justin Somper an oh my goodness it's exciting! I read the first book of the series and am eager to read the second. This is the story of twins Grace and Connor Tempest. After losing their father, they have nothing left but a boat. Unfortunately, the boat belongs to the bank! The two options they have are the town orphanage or the banker and his wife. They choose neither, instead they take their father's boat and make an escape. They encounter a bad storm and the boat sinks. Grace and Conner lose track of each other and are each picked up by different pirate ships. Connor is rescued by Cheng Lee of the Diablo, while Grace is rescued by Lorcan Furey of the Vampirates. Both Grace and Connor learn about the ways of the ship the land on. Will Grace and Connor ever find each other?
It is a wonderful story and I enjoyed it very much. This is a must have series.
Happy Reading!
Mrs. B.

"I'd Tell You I Love You, but Then I'd Have To Kill You"

Hello reading fans! Spies, romance, and an all girls boarding school? That's right! "I'd Tell You I Love You, but Then I'd Have To Kill You" by Ally Carter has it all. The story is about Cami Morgan, who attends The Gallagher Academy for Exceptional Young Women. More than just go to school there, her mother is the headmistress of the school. No one on the outside knows what goes on inside the school, most people just think it is a boarding school for weathy families. That is also the feeling shared by the people of the town Roseville where the school is located. And then Cami meets Josh in town one night while on a covert operation and her life is turned upside down. Cami struggles with what she should tell Josh. There were parts of the story where I laughed out loud! This book is a must have for the library.
Happy reading,
Mrs. B.

How to Be Popular

Hello again! I completed "How To Be Popular" by Meg Cabot just the other day. I found this to be a cute story. It is a story about Stephanie Landry and her plan to become popular after an embarassing incident five years ago. "Way to pull a Steph" is the catch phrase at Stephanie's high school, the problem is, she's the Steph in the saying. With the help of a book she finds Stephanie works her way up the social ladder, while nearly losing her two best friends along the way. The story has parts that made me laugh out loud. It is an easy story to read and get involved in. There are not too many twists and turns. It is something I think our middle schoolers would enjoy.
Happy reading!
Mrs. B.

"The Death Collector"

I finished "The Death Collector" by Justin Richards yesterday. This book had me hooked from the very beginning. "Four days after his funeral, Albert Wilkes came home for tea"(Richards). This was how it started the description given made my eyes bulge out. The story is set in Victorian England. The story begins by telling about Albert, then Liz, then George, then Eddie. After that their stories intertwine and the story really takes off. It would take a long time to really describe the book well, but here is the gist: George, Liz and Eddie have a clue to something the wealthy industrialist Augustus Lorimore wants. Lorimore sends his henchmen and a monster to retrieve the clue. This story is full of twists and turns, tons of action. The only thing to me that seemed out of place was the title. The title didn't really seem to fit the book until the very end of the story and then it made perfect sense.
This is a book I would like to get for the library I think it would appeal to many students.
Happy Reading!

Incanation

I listened to "Incantation" on audiobook recently and suprisingly I liked it. "Incantation" by Alice Hoffman is the story of Estrella deMadrigal set at the time of the Spanish Inquisition. The story is told by 16 year old Estrella. This tale follows Estrella as she discovers love, betrayal, intolerance and a family secret that changes her life forever.
I have never been a fan of historical fiction, but my views are changing as I read more and more historical fiction. When I first chose this book I didn't realize that the setting was the Spanish Inquisition (I'm not sure how I missed it!). Once I discovered the setting I did not want to read the book at all, in fact I pushed it to the end of my stack of books. I was so wrong in my initial judgement of this book. It is fast paced and easy to get into the feelings. I felt very connected to Estrella and I loved the story!
We do have another Alice Hoffman book in the library "Indigo". You may want to read this to get a feel for the style of writing even though the books are not connected in any way.
Happy Reading!