Any author that has the guts to use an opening line like “It’s midnight, it’s sweltering, and I might be high on Vicodin, but that guy — that guy right over there—that’s him” will get their reader hooked.  Thus was the case when reading Isla and the Happily Ever After.  The title gives it away, that there will be a happy ending but readers will not remember it for it’s ending — though that is fairytale-ish good too. No, it will be remembered for the intricacies of the characters Stephanie Perkins brings out.  Set at a private school in France, Isla is a junior who has kept to herself most of her freshman and sophomore year.  She is the highest ranking person in her class of only 24 elite students.  Both of the past two school years she has had a huge crush on Joshua Wasserstein.  In this opening scene, they are actually both back in New York City for the summer and Isla’s dental work has left her loopy with the confidence she’d never have had to talk to Josh. This chance and single meeting sets the spark for all of the stars to align.  The plot really picks up once they are back at school in the fall.  But it’s not all Josh and Isla.  Perkins creates a wonderful best friend companion of Isla in Kurt.  Kurt is has Asperger’s, the high functioning form of autism, that tells Isla how it is without the mush that best girl friends would have likely brought to the scenes.  Kurt is a guy who wants Isla’s attention because they’ve been friends since they were in diapers.  This creates tension, of course, but the maturity in which the characters all handle it is a lesson for all teens to learn from.  There’s passion that’s slightly graphic. But there’s drama without a lot of drama and the scenes clip along at a nice pace, especially as the main conflict begins to unfold.  For being a student who studies abroad, Isla’s insecurities don’t always ring true, but that could also be a reminder that even the most confident people on the outside have worries too.  There is the happily ever after, of course, so upper high school readers who like the Sarah Dessen, Deb Collasanti books will find another author right up their alley in Stephanie Perkins.

The pressures of being the star football player is not a wholly original conflict for a novel. But with alternating chapters voiced by the two main characters Colby and Lauren, what could just be another run of the mill high school romance has a bit more clout in The Bridge from Me to You.  The author begins with Lauren’s voice, composed in free verse instead of prose.  She has been relocated to live with her aunt and uncle in a new small town.  There’s an air of mystery as to why she’s moved and author Lisa Schroeder lets it hang in the air for a good portion of the book.  Lauren wants to be back in her previous life but is seeing how family can genuinely love each other.  This love will also blossom with Colby.  Colby’s voice comes in prose.  He’s independent but is learning how to speak his own mind to the adults in his life.  There’s just enough side stories to weave a story that could be on the Hallmark channel.  Colby is a gentleman at heart and this book could span down into middle school libraries with no worries.  There are definitely girls in my library who will enjoy this story.

Every parent/teacher has seen it.  The terrible temper that comes out of the kid that can’t handle a situation.  This is a cute story about Sam’s temper.  But he doesn’t own it.  He’s totally separated from it.  The temper finds him one day on the playground and he thinks it will be his pet.  At first the temper makes it fun because the temper scares the kids off the toys so he can have them all to himself.  But when they get home, the pet temper causes problems with his mother and father.  When Sam tries to blame his actions of “the temper”, he only receives a harsher punishment.  The next day the temper gets Sam in so much trouble he is sent home from school.  By Saturday, Sam tries to make the temper stay away, but that only fuels the temper.  Sam then uses 3 different strategies to calm himself.  This is the stand out factor for this book.  First he tries counting to 10 like he’d seen his father do, but the temper squirms away.   Next he says the alphabet backwards as his teacher has had them do in class.  The temper fights even harder not to be suppressed.  Finally Sam tells the temper he is stronger than it and lets out a huge, deep breath.    The temper finally gives up.  The whimsical illustrations keep the story playful and interesting, especially as the temper morphs into a dragon during the final strategy used to calm down.  There are other children’s books about the almighty temper, but this one’s focus on management strategies makes it an R*.  Highly recommended.

This storybook and music CD collection begins with a picture book telling of the title’s namesake.  This super silly song is matched in wits with PisHier’s bold, geometric and whimsy illustrations of what could be happening in the old lady’s stomach.  Following the song-tale are 11 more children’s songs, with words on one page and an illustration on the other.  A music CD accompanies the book.  I could see librarians using this with K-1 grades and having students asking again and again to read/sing along.  Fun!

John M. Feirerabend only changed a small amount of the original tune to flow with the beautifully crafted scratchboard etchings.  Any librarian who can carry a tune will thrill k-3 grade students with this traditional call and response songtale, perhaps before they leave for the summer with thoughts of camping and hiking in their future plans.  The last page of the book gives a brief history of the song and a small paragraph about the artwork.  Smart teacher-librarians will explain the art before the reading/singing of the song so that students appreciate the amount of time it took to create these illustrations.  The music for the original tune and a set of the lyrics are also at the back and two free mp3s of the song are available for download.  This is  one of ten in a series of picture books from GIA Publications, Inc. in an effort to preserve children’s folk songs.  Recommended.

Jennifer Anne Moses’ author bio in the back of this book has more girth than the 300 pages prior in Tales from My Closet.  This is the story of five teenage girls, none of whom are good friends with each other, but all of whom will influence the others in terms of fashion, body image and self-confidence.  Each chapter is told in one of the girls’ points-of-view, with multiple chapters examining the same event from different character’s eyes.  Moses’ does keep the plot moving despite these varying entries that feel very diary-esc. But he cover says it all.  Clothes. Drama. Friends.  Most of this is so “Oh My!” that readers that don’t regularly watch Bravo or E Entertainment television channels will probably bring it back.  There are some in your face real life drama that real teens deal with such as an alcoholic parent, a parent that cheats on their spouse, or romantic feelings for a sports coach, but the drama that spins the entire story is really the focus of the book.  When the teens have their moments of reckoning, the moments happen too fast and non-realistically.  This is definitely an additional purchase for most libraries.

Part of The Alternative series, Patrick Jones’ book explores the effects upon a ‘normal’ but emotionally-stunted family as they take in a damaged, out-of-control niece, Misty, upon the death of her neglectful, troubled, drug-addicted mother.

Rachel, attending Woodbury High School, wants to help her pushy cousin, but Misty’s arrival turns out to be more than challenging, bordering on outright mental illness, while Rachel’s life is orderly, planned, and relatively quiet. As her father and mother become embroiled in Misty’s blatant disrespect, Rachel begins to empathize with her cousin in the face of her straight-laced parents’ inability to fathom Misty’s wild, sexually dangerous, self-abusive behavior: Misty cuts herself.

Expelled from Woodbury, CPS sends Misty to Rondo Alternative School, but even here she cannot cope, and when rules at home prove too much, Misty flees, ending up in a horrible situation from which she needs rescuing by Rachel.

When Rachel needs rescue herself, it is Misty who comes for her since Rachel’s perfect friends have deserted her. As their understanding grows, it is not enough to keep Misty from being admitted, as a final resort, to a mental health facility with a diagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder that fits Misty like a glove. Misty has the chance to overcome her illness with hard work, and Rachel will be her friend as they learn to care for themselves.

This book is a convincing and easy-to-read look at what is at stake when a child, neglected from the start, must learn to cope in whatever way she can while exposing the difficulties for a family taking in such a damaged person for whom rules are meaningless.

Recommended, of course.  It’s Patrick Jones!

In this re-telling of Little Red Ridinghood with a super-hero twist, Super Red Riding Hood is a little girl who loves red and pretends to have super-hero powers when she wears her red cape.  On a journey to pick red raspberries for a snack, she encounters the wolf, of course.  First she uses her quick movements to avoid him.  Then she uses her mental prowess to make him leave her alone.  But when he explains that the only reason he is bothering her is because he is so hungry, Super Red uses her generosity to share her berries.  At first the book feels a little slow and trite, like a student wrote it.  But once wolf comes into the story, students will be entertained again from the suspense and then the friendly ending.  Author/illustrator Claudia Davila’s whimsical illustrations will help entertain young readers.  This could be used as an example of how to adapt classic tales to a contemporary audience and teach a lesson at the same time.  If your library already has books that will fill this niche, then this is only an additional purchase for you.

Runaway Tomato is Kim Cooley Reeder’s 1st children’s book and boy is it should be a runaway success!  This is the story of a tomato that grew so big in one night of rainfall that it blocked the door to the farmer’s house on a large hill.  The whole town comes out to try to move it.  When they finally do, the tomato begins to roll down the hill and thus begins more farcical pieces involving townspeople trying to stop the tomato, until it eventually explodes.  Sauce runnth everywhere!  The whole town pitches in to clean up the mess, moving some of it to the city hall where they create a tomato fest for everyone to enjoy.  And when all is said and done, with the remnants in the city landfill, night has fallen again.  More rain comes, and the reader is left with visions of hundreds of tomatoes growing like crazy.

The premise of the story is so original, and it is heightened by Reeder’s use of rhyming and rhythmically symmetrical quatrains throughout.  But credit for this picture book’s success also has to be given to Lincoln Agnew and his illustrations.  Primary colors accented with black make for bold, beautifully crafted scenes.  This is a work of art that could be enjoyed any time but especially in the fall when tomatoes are ripe or spring when students often do seed planting activities.  Highly recommended for school and public libraries for read alouds.