Submitted by Sydni, Age 11 from Rhode Island

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This book, “Diary Of A Wimpy Kid,” was a very good book! It makes a lot of non-reader’s read! At some parts, it was very funny.

Submitted by Alexis, Age 12 from Rhode Island

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This novel is about a middle schooler named Emily. Her mom died when she was young and she lives with her father. She is being picked on by a trio of mean girls at school, and she is completely sick of it.

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So when she and her father take a trip to New York, she sells the bracelet her mother gave her before she died to hire a woman to make her popular. Please read this book if you are interested in a mix of love stories, confusion, and new beginnings. This is a good book for ages 10-14.

Submitted by Ryan, Age 11 from Rhode Island

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I really think that Peak is a good book because it gives you the feeling that you are really there. In peak a boy and his father go to Mount Everest and try to get to the top because if they do the boy will be the youngest to get there.

Submitted by Charlie, Age 11 from Rhode Island

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This book is very good. As Firestar and Thunderclan deal with problems, warriors from the Dark Forest try to recruit living cats so they can fight Starclan, their warrior ancestors. Also, Leopardstar, RiverClan’s leader, loses her 9th life and dies. Dovepaw has to help Lionblaze and Jayfeather.

Submitted by Derek, Age 11 from Rhode Island

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This book is major action.Read, as Griffin Bing and his friends get their monkey Cleopatra stolen by someone. Will they ever get her back?

Submitted by Hope, Age 12 from Rhode Island

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This book has so many mysteries, but not the best. In this book Percy tries to save Manhattan from Kronos, an evil god. He used to kill his sons until he got cut up by his other son and got set down in a pit in the underworld.
If you like action,and mysterious books you will like this book.

Sure, Nancy and I run a website and we both work on digital stuff for our day jobs too — but neither of us could ever compare to Adam Henderson, the tech prodigy hero of Patrick Carman’s newest series, Trackers.*

Well, “hero” may not be the right word for Adam. He’s definitely the main character and you’re rooting for him, but it appears that he’s gotten himself and his three best friends into some serious trouble. How serious? It’s hard to say, because there’s only one Trackers book so far, and not all the details are revealed. But you learn pretty quickly that Adam and his fellow Trackers (Finn, Lewis, and Emily) are experts at trailing other people by following digital clues. But it turns out… someone else has been watching them! [cue scary music and dramatic flashing lights]

I don’t want to give away too much because the fun of Trackers is that it’s set up for readers themselves to steadily get to the bottom of things, through a combo of the book and short online videos. To be honest, at first I was a little frustrated because I really *hate* not knowing what’s going on. And, as I’ve mentioned before, I’m pretty impatient. Imagine a monkey who sees a banana through a window but doesn’t realize there’s glass in the way. Yeah, that’s me (except not as hairy)… But once I got over it, I really got into the suspense of the story and I enjoyed trying to guess what would come next.

Here, check out the official trailer for a peek into the Trackers experience:

So, now the most frustrating part is waiting for the next book to come out! Luckily Patrick Carman — er,  I mean, the Trackers have put together a Trackers Missions hub where you can take on assignments from them — if you dare! (Okay, okay, the missions aren’t actually dangerous as far as I can tell, but they are addicting! I started working on Adam’s mission just now, and I almost forgot to come back and finish writing this post!)

— Karen

Karen still remembers the first time she went on the internet. It was 12th grade. She was at a friend’s house, and Karen was all like, “What’s this search doing? Where are these pages coming from?” That same day, she discovered mp3s and it blew her mind!

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* Trackers is published by Scholastic, which is where I work, but I have no involvement in the making of the series. Wish I did! Then I’d know what’s coming in the next book!

Do you ever play that game where you and your friends try to decide which super power would be the awesomest one to have? Would you want to fly through the atmosphere, control people’s minds, wield extreme strength? The possibilities are endless, and all delicious in their own way. (I’ve always been partial to invisibility, myself.)

Well, in Savvy by Ingrid Law, each member of the Beaumont family gets a super power when they turn 13. And sure that sounds really cool, but unfortunately, no one gets to choose their power — and guess what: it’s actually really hard to control your gift. So Grandpa ends up causing earthquakes when he’s upset, and the two oldest kids create hurricanes and electricity. Momma’s perfect, but that means she also makes perfect mistakes, never little oversights. And now… it’s Mibs’ turn.

But just before Mibs turns 13, her father is in a horrible car accident and lands in a coma. So when she wakes up on her birthday, Mibs is convinced that the universe intends for her to use her power to heal her dad. But that means traveling to the hospital in another town — so somehow Mibs ends up on a bus with a random crew of companions, including one who seems to hate her and one who’s a total stranger. Oh, and did I mention that the bus is headed in the wrong direction? Yeah…

With this set-up, you can see why I was totally captivated by this story. I couldn’t wait to see what was going to happen! And I loved Mibs as the narrator; even though there are obviously major fantastical elements to the book, I found Mibs to be totally real. I just hope that Mibs puts in an appearance in Scumble, Ingrid Laws’ companion book to Savvy, which just came out this month!

Well, I guess I’ll have to wait until I read Scumble to get an answer to my question. But you don’t have to wait to read Savvy, so go pick up a copy today! And if I still haven’t convinced you, then check out this AMAZING video created by an 11-year-old fan of Savvy named Sunny (with some help from her own family). It’s a stop-motion video of a scene from the book:

Pretty awesome, right? Dude, I think Nancy’s gonna be super jealous when she sees this…

— Karen
Karen once heard that only people with something to hide would rather be invisible than have the ability to fly. But Karen has nothing to hide from her Kidsmomo readers! OR DOES SHE?

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I’ve mentioned before that I’m a HUGE fan of Edward Eager, who wrote a bunch of sweet, playful books about kids who discover temporary access points to magical adventures in their everyday world. His books include Half Magic, Magic by the Lake, Magic Or Not?, and The Time Garden (which was my pick for our time travel theme). There are seven books in all, and I’ve read each one multiple times over the years. It’s always been one of my great disappointments that Edward Eager never wrote more.

But thanks to Laurel Snyder, I now have one more chance to feel the same delight that Eager’s books always brought me. Her book, Any Which Wall, is a wonderful tribute to Eager, who is also one of her favorite authors.

The story is about four kids who come across a mysterious wall in a field near their neighborhood. They quickly realize that the wall grants wishes, and so the adventures begin — with Henry, Emma, Roy, and Susan zipping through time and space to the destinations of their dreams.

We included Any Which Wall in our beach reads booklist, and it really is perfect for sunshiney summer reading. If you’re looking for deep magical mythology or dramatic and dangerous exploits, then this is not the book for you. But who needs all that stuff all the time? Not me!

A couple weeks ago, I took the book with me on an hour-long subway ride to go bike riding on a little island by NYC. Reading Any Which Wall on the way there was amazing, because it set just the right tone for my day of fun in the sun, and it also made the time go by super quickly. So thank you, Laurel Snyder! I guess you could say that the kids in Any Which Wall found magic through a wall, and I found magic through a book!

Have any of you guys read Any Which Wall or any of Edward Eager’s books? Leave a comment and let me know, or send in a review of your own!

— Karen

Karen hasn’t come across any magical walls yet, but she often wishes for a magical subway train to take her away on an adventure — particularly on Monday mornings when she’s on her way to the office…

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Reviewed by: Ayra, Age 10 from Ohio

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“Warriors” is a book series about cats that live in the wild. The first book, “Into the Wild”, features Rusty: A nice house-cat who lives with his humans. However, Rusty soon realizes there is a world beyong his yard. Rusty ventures into the wild and discovers a whole new community of wild cats. Rusty then abandons his easy life and goes to live with the wild cats. Will Rusty survive, or will the whole forest plunge into peril? This book is very interesting, and hooks you into the story as you go along. I would reccomend “Warriors” by Erin Hunter to you anyday! I hope you enjoy this book as much as I do!