The Big Field

Baseball fans will enjoy this title!

Fourteen-year-old Keith "Hutch" Hutchinson is a shortstop at heart. Too bad that there is another player, Darryl Williams, who gets the coveted spot as shortstop. Hutch is assigned to second base.

Hutch finds it hard to adjust to this position and his "second-best" player status.

Hutch's relationship with his father is also strained.

How will the team fare in the South Florida regionals and at the state championship on the big field in Roger Dean Stadium?

Since it is baseball season, why not enjoy this sports fiction title by Mike Lupica?

The Grimm Legacy

How cool would it be to work in a type of museum called a repository where articles of historic value could be circulated? In The Grimm Legacy by Polly Shulman, the main character, Elizabeth Rew, gets the chance to become a page for the New York Circulating Material Respository after her social studies teacher, Mr. Mauskopf, recommends her for the position of student page.
There is much for Elizabeth to learn. Many of the items are of great historic value; some have magical powers and require the patron circulating the item to give up something--such as his/her sense of direction--if they want to take the item out.
What Elizabeth and two of the male pages find most fascinating is the floor in the basement where items from the original Grimm's Fairy Tales are housed.
Imagine being able to circulate the sinister mirror from Snow White or magical boots that let the wearer fly through time and space!
Items from the respository have started to disappear and there is fear that they could end up in the wrong hands who would use the magic in evil ways.
This highly engaging fantasy will have you dreaming about magical items in your sleep! I imagine that there might be a sequel or perhaps an entire series developed from this book.

Wolves, Boys & Other Things That Might Kill Me

I loved this book! It has romance! It's set in one of our National Parks--Yellowstone. Its conflict centers around understanding how nature and humans often come into conflict, especially when a species is reintroduced to an area where there has been a problem. It's well written and sure to be popular with both boys and girls.

K.J. Carson is 16. Her father owns a hunting store and arranges hunting trips. K.J. works in the store and also accompanies her dad on some of the hunting trips he arranges.

Virgil Whitman is new in town. His mother is there to study the wolves that have been reintroduced to the area.

K.J. accompanies Virgil and his mom to check on the status of the wolves. K.J. becomes fascinated with the wolves and decides to write a newspaper  column called "Wolf Notes" to try to inform townspeople and ranchers so that they will be less fearful of the wolves. This column only stirs up people and alienates both sides.

Why is virgil shot at in the Christmas parade? Who sets fire to K.J.'s dad's store? What do both of these incidents have to do with the wolves and the ranchers?

Crazy Beautiful

Lauren Baratz-Logsted's book entitled Crazy Beautiful is a modern day Beauty and the Beast tale. Told in alternating chapters by Lucius and Aurora the story unfolds.
Lucius has lost both hands in a self-made explosion. He has heavy scarring on his chest and two steel hooks in place of hands. He's changing schools for a new start.
Aurora has also changed schools. Her father has recently been widowed.
The two could not be more different from each other.
Yet, they meet on the bus on the first day of school.
Lucius seems arrogant and standoffish while Aurora is beautiful and always smiling. Beauty and the Beast with an updated feel!

Tropical Seasons

I was very excited to see this new title: Tropical Secrets: Holocaust Refugees in Cuba by Margarite Engle. I was lucky enough to meet this author when she gave a book talk on another book she wrote called The Surrender Tree in 2009 at New Haven Public Library.

It is unlike other historical fiction novels because it is written in free verse, but also because of its subject matter. Until I read this title, I was totally unfamiliar with the role that Cuba played in the acceptance of Jewish immigrants before and during World War II.

The story centers around a young Jewish boy named Daniel. Daniel's parents realize the growing threat and although Daniel is just barely bar-miztvahed, in 1939 they purchase a ticket (using all their money) for  Daniel's passage on a ship with other refugees destined for New York.The ship is turned away due to immigration quotas already having been met in the United States. Canada also turns the ship away. Finally, Daniel lands in Cuba. There he befriends a local girl of the same age, Paloma and an older Jewish man. Since Daniel is alone in a new place unlike any where he has ever lived, he needs all the help he can get from these two friends. Will his family ever find him?