Middle Grade

The Chronicles of Harris Burdick

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by Chris Van Allsburg, and 14 other writers
ages: 10+
First sentence: “Is there any author more mysterious than Harris Burdick?”
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Back in 1984, Chris Van Allsburg authored a book called The Mysteries of Harris Burdick. Supposedly, he was recreating the art of one Harris Burdick, who left fourteen paintings at a man called Peter Wender’s office, with only the titles and a brief caption. The drawings were mysterious and wondrous all at the same time: something for parents and children to pour over and imagine.

Of course the next logical step — albeit nearly 30 years later — is to get fourteen (including Van Allsburg himself) of the most talented children’s (and adult) writers to do the imagining for us. Each author — and there are some brilliant ones here: from Sherman Alexie and Lois Lowry, to M. T. Anderson and Kate DiCamillo , to Stephen King and Gregory Maguire — takes a different painting, and spins a story around it, incorporating the tantalizing caption that “Harris Burdick” gave to each painting.

Let me say right off: this is not a picture book. I cannot imagine curling up with my 5-year-old and reading these stories. For one, they are much too long. For two, they are much too… old. This is an illustrated set of short stories, ranging from the disturbing to the strange to the whimsical, meant for older audiences to savor and think about.

Like every short story collection, the stories themselves are uneven: I found Cory Doctorow’s “Another Place, Another Time” to be odd, full of science I couldn’t quite grasp; and Sherman Alexie’s “A Strange Day in July” to be terribly cruel in a ten-year-old bully sort of way. But, when the writing is on, the book is a marvel: Jon Scieszka’s “Under the Rug” is hilarious; Linda Lois Lowry’s “The Seven Chairs” is simple and magical; both Linda Sue Park’s “The Harp” and Louis Sachar’s “Captain Tory” are deliciously sweet; and Stephen King’s “The House on Maple Street” is perfect. It’s fascinating to see how each author’s imagination works with the painting, taking the small details and spinning them into a larger, more complex story, and yet leaving enough space that the reader can invent and hope and dream right along with.

It’s one of those books that begs to be taken out time and time again, to read and look at, inspiring you to dream about both the possible and the impossible. In other words: it’s just the perfect sort of book.

Ten Miles Past Normal

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by Frances O’Roark Dowell
ages: 11+
First sentence: “No one can figure out where the terrible smell is coming from, but everyone on the bus this morning can smell it and has an opinion.”
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I wish I had read this book when I was 11. Seriously. I was a mixed up, not “normal”, and yet yearning to be, 11-year-old (granted, this is all faded memories now), and I would have loved a book that essentially showed me that you can find your space, that you can be yourself, and that “normal” is really what you make it out to be.

Janie Gorman, age 14, just wants to be normal. She lives on a mini-farm (just goats and chickens on five acres) that when she was 9 years old, she was enthusiastic about. Now, in her freshman year of high school, set adrift from her middle school friends and faced with seemingly endless teasing about the smell of her lifestyle, she’s not quite as enthusiastic. In fact, she’s downright disdainful. Nothing about this year seems to be going right; even her best friend, Sarah, seems to be drifting away.

All Janie really wants to be is normal. Normal life, normal friends, normal interests. And yet, in this small North Carolina town, she slowly learns — through new friends, new interests and getting to know people better — that normal is relative. And that sometimes, being past normal and into your own little thing is a better way to be.

It’s a sweet book, with Dowell’s trademark simplicity and tenderness without being too sappy. Janie felt like a real teenager: she’s not a bad kid, just someone who yearns for something… simpler, something she can hold on to as her own. I loved the characters in this book, and the fact that the message of being yourself is there without being preachy or hitting you over the head.

And I really do wish I’d read it when I was 11.

Addie on the Inside

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by James Howe
ages: 11+
First sentence: “The poems that follow are written in the voice of Addie on the inside.”
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Addie Carle is tall, plain, outspoken: basically everything a popular girl is not. It doesn’t really bother her; she believes deeply and is passionate about the things she’s outspoken about, and she has several good friends, though they’re all boys. What does get to her is the constant teasing, the names, the questions. Especially about why her boyfriend, DuShawn, is going with her.

For a novel in verse, where every word is carefully chosen, this book packs a punch. I haven’t read the ones it’s a companion to, but you don’t need to in order to enjoy Addie and empathize with her feelings. She is very much the smart misfit, a middle school girl who both does and doesn’t want to fit in. She’s finding her way, not only at school, but in life. True, that sounds cliche, but perhaps it’s because of the verse that it doesn’t come off that way. In addition, there are issues here: tolerance for those different, women’s rights, bullying… and yet the book is not heavy-handed. Howe does a masterful job giving us a book full of meat and character, and yet not lecturing us on what to think.

Now I want to go back and read the ones that this is a companion to.

Latasha and the Little Red Tornado

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by Michael Sotto
ages: 8-10
First sentence: “Momma told me that there is a time in a puppy’s life — right around its second birthday — when it just starts to get it.”
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Release date: November 15, 2011
Review copy provided by the author.

Although she is just eight years old, Latasha can handle quite a bit. Her mother has finally finished her schooling and has gotten a job as a nurse, and Latasha can get herself to and from school. (And doesn’t need the “baby”sitter that her mother insists upon her having!) She can handle making friends. She can handle the reading challenge at school. She just doesn’t know if she can really handle her puppy, Ella, who is a complete handful.

Over the course of the book, Latasha realizes that while she can handle a lot of things by herself, sometimes it’s better to have the help of friends. Which includes her energetic, but loveable, puppy.

This book skews younger than I normally read, but it works great on the level of a early-chapter-book reader. Latasha is a spunky girl, and the novel has a great voice; Latasha’s personality just shone through. In addition, while it’s a story simply told, it never felt like Scotto was talking down to his readers, which is a common difficulty in books like these. The relationship between Latasha and her mother and her sitters are complex, and while issues such as cheating or boy-girl friendships come up, they’re dealt with in ways an 8-year-old can relate to.

In short: hand it to an 8-year-old who loves dogs, and you’ll probably have a very happy reader.

Audiobook: Second Fiddle

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by Rosanne Parry
Read by Bri Knickerbocker
ages: 10+
First sentence: “If we had known it would eventually involve the KGB, the French National Police, and the Supreme Allied Commander in Europe, we would have left that body in the river and called the Polizei like any normal German citizen; but we were Americans and addicted to solving other people’s problems, so naturally, we got involved.”
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Review copy provided by the author.

It’s 1990 (oh, man, I AM getting old if 1990 can be counted as “historical fiction”…), and Jody, Giselle and Vivian are Americans living in Berlin, Germany. The wall has just fallen months before, but the 13-year-olds have more important things to think about: like preparing for a string trio competition in Paris and the fact that the military base is being dismantled (is that right? I’m lousy at military speak), which means that these best friends may never see each other again. They’ve planned for Paris to be one last adventure, but they have no idea how big that adventure will be.

Because right before they go, they witness the attempted murder of a Soviet soldier, whom they drag out of the river and take upon themselves to save. Of course everything gets complicated in ways that include a lot of lying on the girls’ part. But, it also is a grand adventure, one that, as we were listening, M and I wished we’d had.

Much like Parry’s Heart of a Shepherd, this book is subtle and quiet, even with all the running around. Although there are spies and military personnel and soldiers, the Paris that these girls experience is a quiet one, with artists and immigrant populations; with music and art and quirky bookshop owners. And to Parry’s credit, even though the book is set in the 1990s (making things much more complicated without cell phones and computers being so available), the book feels timeless: what girl doesn’t want to have an adventure with her friends? What girl doesn’t worry about the future? She also did a wonderful job portraying a country in transition; even though the girls were Americans and didn’t interact with Germans very much, you could get the sense that Berlin, at least, was hit hard by the wall coming down and they were struggling with that.

As for the narration: at first the reader’s voice bothered me. I felt like they were aiming too young, and the way she read grated on my nerves. I also wish she did voices, until she actually had a voice for the rescued Soviet soldier. Then I was glad she didn’t. But I became involved in the actual story and the annoyances with the reader went away. If I had this one in paper copy, I wouldn’t have been able to put it down.

Another good book by a talented writer.

13 Gifts

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by Wendy Mass
ages: 10+
First sentence: “Like all big mistakes, mine started with a goat.”
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First of all: this is the third in a series that includes, 11 Birthdays and Finally, and if you haven’t read those two, you could possibly still read this one and enjoy it (I did, even though it’s been ages since I read the other two, and we all know how my memory is), you will get more out of the story if you read those two first. Besides, they’re good books, and you won’t be sorry you did.

Tara Brennan is one of those invisible people. She doesn’t really stand out, she doesn’t do much to be involved. It’s partly because of her mother’s job, they’re constantly moving, but it’s also by choice: Tara doesn’t want to be involved. Which means she’s as surprised as anyone to find herself stealing a (stuffed) goat from the principals office. After hours. She gets caught, of course, and as punishment is sent to Willow Falls to live with some relatives she barely knows. If that isn’t bad enough, she ends up working for Angelina D’Angelo, oldest person in town and resident mysterious busybody, collecting an odd assortment of things. Before her 13th birthday.

The best thing about this book is how it weaves the three books together. Tara has her own story, of course, but Amanda and Leo (from 11 Birthdays) and Rory (Finally) become not only involved but a crucial part of the plot. Additionally, there’s neighbor David and cousin Emily (not to mention the resident crazy-Aussie-guy, Ray) to add dimension to the story, since unlike the other kids, they have no idea what’s really going on.

It’s a nice balance of the magical — the second-hand shop that Angelina runs appears and disappears as needed — and the ordinary — Tara grows and develops and learns to be involved and have friends on her own merit, without magical assistance. Which makes it perfect for kids like C, who don’t particularly like fantasy, but don’t mind a touch of the magical.

It’s possibly my favorite of the three books, as well: even with the lying that Tara does to get her in the mess, it has a sweet and tender heart to it.

Wonderstruck

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by Brian Selznick
ages: 9+
First sentence: “Something hit Ben Wilson and he opened his eyes.”
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Brian Selznick has a lot to live up to with The Invention of Hugo Cabret. It was so unique, so astounding, so novel, that it literally took everyone’s breath away. Going into Wonderstruck, one can only hope for the same breathtaking beauty and novel storytelling that Selznick gave us in Hugo Cabret.

And on one hand, he delivered. The story is completely different: is the tale of two children, Ben and Rose, who live 50 years apart, one told in words and the other in pictures. Both are deaf, and have to deal with the impact of that in their lives. Their stories are separate, but their lives and actions impact on each other in surprising ways. Like Hugo Cabret, the less said about the story the better: it’s one that is best experienced fresh for the first time. The art is, as expected, gorgeous, and flows seamlessly into the text, even though the stories are separate.

Yet, in the end, I wasn’t left with the same sense of having experienced something fantastic that I was after finishing Hugo Cabret. It’s possibly because this style of novel writing has been done before (alas, one can only be new once), and it just didn’t have the same surprising factor. I knew what to expect from this book — lovely art, good storytelling — and while it filled my expectations, it never surpassed them. Though, I wonder if it could also be because this story, unlike Hugo Cabret, doesn’t necessarily have to be told in this fashion. It could be a story in pictures, or a story in words, but it’s not necessarily bound to this medium. And perhaps because of that, it fell short of true grandeur.

I know I’m nitpicking; it’s a good book, even if it didn’t quite live up to my (possibly too high) expectations.

Darth Paper Strikes Back

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by Tom Angleberger
ages: 9+
First sentence: “It is a dark time at McQuarrie Middle School…”
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I adored The Strange Case of Origami Yoda (which went on to win last year’s Middle Grade Cybils Award) and so I was more than excited to see that there was a sequel picking up where the story left off.

It’s the beginning of seventh grade and Dwight’s nemesis, Harvy, has brought the dark side to the middle school in the form of Darth Paper. His mission is to convince the believers that Origami Yoda is not real, that while maybe his advice is good, it’s just Dwight being weird. His methods get extreme, and Dwight has ended up suspended and may be expelled. It’s up to his friends Tommy and Kellan to collect “case studies” to prove that Dwight and Origami Yoda are doing good.

In many ways, this book is more of the same: instances in which Origami Yoda helps kids by giving them weird, but ultimately good, advice. And while the stories were amusing and interesting, it didn’t really feel like this book helped the overall story progress much. Everyone was still basically the same: from Dwight and Harvey down to the smaller, minor characters, so I didn’t feel like we were really learning anything new. That said, the book ends with a nice little twist, that almost made up for the “the publisher pushed me into writing a sequel” feeling I had throughout most of the book.

Then again, he’s writing for the middle grade crowd, and they love sequels. It just didn’t quite hold water for me.

Angel in My Pocket

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by Ilene Cooper
ages: 10+
First sentence: “There was a pile of money on Bette Miller’s kitchen table.”
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Bette Miller is dealing with her mother’s sudden death. (Yes, at the outset this is another one of those mother-is-dead books.) However, once Bette finds an angel coin in a charity jar, her life takes a turn. A neighbor moves in downstairs to help keep an eye on Bette, and gradually Bette finds that while life without her mother is sad, it’s still liveable.

But the story doesn’t end there: the coin gets passed to others: Joe Garcia, whose mother is often sick and who is struggling to find a place at the prestigious art school he (and Bette and the other characters) attends; and twins Andy and Vivi who have been growing apart in the year since Vivi’s asthma became really crippling both get a turn with the angel coin. And their lives are invariably changed, though in small and subtle ways, for the better.

I was kind of lukewarm on the book; on the one hand, I thought it handled the whole overused dead parent thing well. It wasn’t heavy handed, and the fact that the book branched out to deal with other kids and their problems helped as well. In fact, my favorite thing about the book was the way it transitioned between one kid and the next seamlessly. No jerky stops and starts, no ending of sections, announcing “here comes the next problem”. It was seamless and effortless.

But it was also kind of predictable. I knew, and perhaps this is the way the author wanted it, that having the angel coin would somehow 1) bring an angel into the life of the person who has the coin and 2) help them get over their problems. There weren’t any surprises in the process, and the book fell flat because of that. It would have helped if one could connect to the characters (and maybe some will), but they came off as one-dimensional and flat. It was also a little on the message-y side for my taste: be yourself, find joy in your life, and don’t sweat the small stuff. It’s not a bad message, but I would have liked it to be more about the characters and less about What They Learned.

But I’m nitpicking. It’s a sweet little story, one that I think kids will like.

Molly Moon’s Incredible Book of Hypnotism

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by Georgia Byng
ages: 10+
First sentence: “Molly Moon looked down at her pink, blotchy legs.”
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Molly is an orphan in a not very happy-making orphanage. It’s a dismal, dank place, full of bullies, run by the meanest director this side of Miss Hannigan.

Then, Molly discovers (in the library!) an old how-to book on Hypnotism, which she furtively devours and discovers that she’s got the gift. From there, she takes control of her life, hypnotizing people left and right: she wins a talent competition, heads to New York, becomes a famous starlet. Everything is going great, except her best friend Rocky has been adopted. However (again through hypnotism), once they’re reunited, nothing can stop them.

Except for a bad guy who wants them to seal a bunch of jewels. Can Molly hypnotize her way out of the muddle she’s gotten herself into?

It’s a fun little book, and even though I found the middle of the book to be a bit sluggish, and the end a bit preachy, I had a fun enough time with the book. It’s quite silly, with it’s tongue-in-cheek, over-the-top situations. And it’s a grand fantasy, giving a 10-year-old girl not only control, but almost superhuman power.

Which makes it, in the end, quite fun.