Miss Maisie’s School for Wayward Girls is a stable home for young orphan Audacity Jones. She has good friends and good times but wishes for something to shake up the routine. When the school’s wealthy benefactor asks for a volunteer to come on a top-secret mission, problem solved—or is it? 

Newbery Honor winner Kirby Larson plops Audie into an adventure that has real roots in history: a plot to kidnap President Taft’s niece. Audie still grieves for her lost parents but lives very much in the here and now, using intelligence and intuition to solve each new problem that comes along. She gets help not just from her chums back at school but from a paperboy, his stable-hand grandfather, some circus performers and a cat with a knack for detective work.

Avid and reluctant readers alike will appreciate the Punishment Room at Miss Maisie’s. Audie’s hesitation to go there conceals the fact that it’s an enormous library with snacks and a fireplace—and not a bad punishment after all.

With an afterword that breaks down the true and fictional aspects of the story, Audacity Jones to the Rescue is rich in history and vocabulary, but it’s also great fun.

This article was originally published in the February 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Sara Pennypacker, author of the light-hearted Clementine series, proves with her new novel that she’s capable of writing stories with more heft and just as much heart. 

Peter and his fox, Pax, have been close companions for five years. After his mother’s death, Peter adopted Pax as a kit, and caring for his fox has offered a kind of healing. As Peter’s father prepares to fight an unnamed war, Peter is sent to live with his grandfather, and Pax is forced to return to a wild he’s never really known. Pax has never slept outdoors nor eaten raw meat, so he must rely on new acquaintances, although the scent of human on his fur makes it hard for other foxes to trust him.

As for Peter, he almost immediately regrets leaving Pax and sets off on foot to find his friend. But when injuries waylay him and he’s taken in by an eccentric woman with her own battle scars, Peter begins to recognize that his relationships with his father and Pax might never be the same.

As much a powerful tale of the costs of war as it is a story of boy and dog (or fox), Pax offers insights into the toll that violence takes on humans and animals alike. Told in well-paced short chapters alternating between Pax and Peter’s points of view, Pennypacker’s simply told but thematically rich story, punctuated with black-and-white drawings from Caldecott winner Jon Klassen, steadily builds toward a thoughtful conclusion.

This article was originally published in the February 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

BookPage Children's Top Pick, February 2016

Patches the calico cat is on a mission to find a special place of her own. A golden leaf pirouettes by the window, teasing her to follow. Filled with longing, she springs at the screen and chases the leaf into the wide, wide world. She’s never been on an adventure before, but one glance at the blue-and-gold sky tells her that thousands of special places must await her.

When Patches encounters Gus—the meanest, fiercest dog in the neighborhood—she stands right up to him, admiring his water bowl and supply of kibble, before moving on. But she’s soon starving and alone, so she seeks shelter beneath a postbox and wakes to a mouse scurrying across her whiskers. Hungry as she is, she considers eating the mouseling but converses with him instead. When the mouse politely asks Patches not to eat him, she honors his request and, with some help from a small red squirrel and the moon, decides that Gus’ doghouse will be “her special place.”

In the night, a fierce stomachache has Patches crying out for help, and Gus answers the call. Patches learns why finding her special place was so important—and why making new friends is more important still.

Young readers will treasure Little Cat’s Luck, a companion book to Little Dog, Lost by renowned Newbery Honor-winning author Marion Dane Bauer. Her engaging poetic style, paired with Jennifer Bell’s whimsical illustrations, makes for a poignant tale of a cat on the run.

Billie B. Little is the Founding Director of Discovery Center at Murfree Spring, a hands-on museum in Murfreesboro, Tennessee.

This article was originally published in the February 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Unlike most 12-year-olds who face being uprooted, Jeremiah is excited to move. Hillcrest, Ohio, has one of the best high-school baseball teams in the country, with a state-of-the-art field and a town full of fans. Baseball is especially important to Jeremiah following his heart transplant. Since he can no longer play, Jeremiah must stay on the sidelines and work on his new dream of becoming a coach.

Everything in Hillcrest seems perfect at first, but then the Hornets’ star pitcher dies of a heart attack. Soon the coach is being investigated for giving steroids to his players. Hillcrest’s winning tradition has withered into a culture of winning above all else, and the town is fed up. This complicates Jeremiah’s plan to revive the defunct middle-school team, but his health problems have taught him tenacity and optimism. With Coach Jeremiah to remind them of the true importance of baseball, the middle-school team just might be able to restore Hillcrest’s faith in the game.

Soar explores some familiar territory with sickness and sports themes, but Joan Bauer’s detailed novel feels unique and realistic. Jeremiah’s life is not a cliché, but a series of challenges to be confronted with resilience and hope. Jeremiah’s relationship with his adoptive father, Walt, is charming, and his frank musings about his birth mother and the girl who died so he could have a heart are intensely moving. (He named the heart Alice since the doctors wouldn’t disclose her name.) Jeremiah’s wry humor and charm keep his personality believable and, most importantly, likable. For these reasons and so many more, Soar stands apart from the crowd of sports novels for middle-grade readers.

Imagine if Sherlock Holmes were an 11-year-old girl at a ritzy boarding school. That’s the premise of Friday Barnes: Girl Detective, the first in a series by Australian writer R.A. Spratt. This children’s comedy TV writer and author of the award-winning Nanny Piggins series has crafted a likable, intriguing heroine and a lighthearted, breezy mystery.

Friday is the unexpected fifth child of busy, brilliant parents, who name her after the day on which she was born. (Turns out she was actually born on a Thursday, a fact about which they were too distracted to notice.) Friday has been largely left to her own devices, but after helping her beloved Uncle Bernie solve a crime, she uses the reward money to enroll in the ultra-exclusive Highcrest Academy.

Mystery after mystery presents itself, and even though Friday prefers to fly under the radar, she can’t help but take on each challenge. A special clock has been stolen from the Headmaster's desk, homework assignments turn up missing, and fake history presentations are just waiting to be revealed. Barnes uses her innate Sherlockian abilities to solve these conundrums, and also gets help from her Watson―roommate Melanie Pelly, a brilliantly observant girl. There’s an even bigger mystery afoot involving a Yeti said to be haunting the nearby swamp, and before long the Headmaster comes to Friday for help.

Spratt’s characters are entertaining, although she relies too heavily on boarding-school stereotypes of both students and teachers. For instance, the geography teacher informs Friday, “My dear girls, this is a private school. You’ve entered Lord of the Flies now.” Spratt’s writing is nonetheless snappy and smart, and her clever plotting moves the action right along. Everything ends with a giant cliffhanger, which will definitely leave readers ready for more.

Public speaking tops the list of the most common fears, followed closely by claustrophobia and the fear of the unknown. The latest heart-pounding novel from Newbery Award winner Phyllis Reynolds Naylor (Shiloh) taps into these fears in very real ways.  

Small seventh-grader Buck stutters and suffers from bullying at the hands of his peers, even as he pursues a path of self-improvement and tries to reduce his stutter. He and his best friend, David, spend their spare time secretly exploring the caves of Northern Virginia, where they dream of finding a never-before-entered cave. Their fun explorations end when David moves away, but Buck continues to search, ultimately finding an opening that leads far underground. But Buck breaks the cardinal rule of caving by exploring this new fissure by himself, and readers will find themselves holding their breath as Buck struggles to free himself from the tunnel. 

Cavers use the term “going down in” for descending deep into a cave. Readers will enjoy “going down in” this book, traversing Buck’s above and belowground worlds, right up to the story’s intense climax.

This article was originally published in the January 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

At the start of World War II, more than 3.5 million people were evacuated from British cities to the countryside. But it wasn’t until Cheryl Blackford began writing Lizzie and the Lost Baby that she realized her father had been sent away from the embattled city of Hull in Yorkshire, where she was born. Although she now lives in Minnesota, Blackford draws on her love of rural Yorkshire in her warmhearted debut novel for young readers. Ten-year-old Lizzie and her world come alive with sparkling details, from the blacked-out windows of the train that takes Lizzie and her little brother, Peter, to safety in the countryside, to the potted meat sandwiches their mother has packed for them. 

Everything is new and strange in Swainedale, the fictional village where the evacuees are sent, and Lizzie feels less than welcome. Here readers meet Elijah, a Gypsy boy trying to cope with local prejudice and to bring in money to help his mother and sisters, including baby Rose. But when Elijah is pressured into making a mistake that puts Rose in jeopardy, Lizzie and Elijah are brought together in unexpected ways.

This is a well-told story of two young people making difficult choices on their own. Though the setting and situation may be new to American children, a helpful glossary defines unfamiliar terms.

This article was originally published in the January 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

After a devastating tsunami strikes Osaka, Japan, Kai Ellstrom’s parents send him to stay with family in Oregon until their city stabilizes. Kai barely remembers his father’s brother and family, including his teen cousin Jet, and awkwardness persists until Kai and Jet discover a common interest: their fathers’ boat, the Saga. Kai and Jet decide to sail the Saga in the same race their fathers did as teenagers, but they’re unaware of the unexpected challenges that await them.

Rosanne Parry’s The Turn of the Tide offers middle-grade readers a window into the dangerous lives of bar pilots. Much of the setting centers on the Columbia Bar, a treacherous coastal region infamously known as the “Graveyard of the Pacific.” While lacing her third-person narrative with all things maritime, Parry includes one real character in her well-defined fictional cast: Captain Deborah Dempsey, the first woman to pilot the Columbia Bar and Jet’s personal heroine. Parry builds tension between Jet’s secret bar pilot aspirations, Kai’s familial struggles and Jet and Kai’s relationship, all while accelerating toward the Treasure Island Race. 

As well as a glossary and recommended resources, the book includes a personal message from Captain Dempsey to young mariners. This is an endearing story of courage and determination from the award-winning author of Heart of a Shepherd.

This article was originally published in the January 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

BookPage Children's Top Pick, January 2016

Refreshingly old-fashioned: There’s no better way to describe When Mischief Came to Town. Standing in contrast to the futuristic sagas and sci-fi series that abound nowadays, Katrina Nannestad’s richly detailed story of an orphan named Inge, set in 1911 in Denmark, has an antique air that’s irresistible. 

After her mother dies, 10-year-old Inge goes to live with Grandmother on her farm on the Danish island of Bornholm. Her new life is nothing like the one she led with her mother in Copenhagen, where they had an apartment and servants. Grandmother, a prickly, inaccessible sort with dark eyes “pressed like raisins into her wrinkled face,” soon has Inge working in the stables and cleaning the kitchen—tasks that she tackles good naturedly. But her playful, spontaneous spirit seems to attract trouble. Inge sings the wrong songs in church, talks to the jam spoon and sometimes makes a mess of her chores. The starchy adults on the island—including elderly twins Olga and Tina Pedersen—don’t know what to make of her lively ways.

Will the farm ever feel like home to Inge? Although her mischievousness makes Grandmother “grumble like an ogre,” the answer is yes. Filled with moments of high humor, this delightful tale introduces a heroine readers are sure to love. Nannestad’s book has all the makings of a classic.

This article was originally published in the January 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Life has always been routine for 12-year-old twins Eryn and Nick. They reside in a quiet suburban town and take turns living with their psychologist mother and goofy but good-natured father, who have been amicably divorced since the twins were little. They’ve embraced this arrangement until their mother reveals she’s getting remarried to a professor at a local college. The family is going to move into a new home in the same town, and the twins will get two new stepsiblings, Ava and Jackson. Although Nick easily accepts their mother’s news, Eryn is ruffled by the changes, especially when their mother informs the twins that they will never meet their new siblings. Astute and inquisitive Eryn can’t understand how her logical mother would agree to keep the kids apart. Moved by curiosity, the twins defy their parents and seek out the enigmatic Ava and Jackson. Their discovery shatters everything they’ve understood about themselves, their parents and the world in which they live.

Without spoiling too much, Under Their Skin, like Margaret Peterson Haddix’s Shadow Children series, poses moral questions about the sanctity of life and what makes something human. Although this is a science-fiction story, the novel is set in a familiar 21st century, making each revelation that much more surprising for readers. The first in a duology, Under Their Skin is a page-turner and would make for an excellent addition to a middle-school book club discussion.

Kimberly Giarratano is the author of Grunge Gods and Graveyards, a young adult paranormal mystery.

In this fast-paced thriller set in the swamps of the Gulf Coast, 13-year-old Cort is pitted against venomous snakes, a vicious wild boar and a Category 3 hurricane—all at the same time. After he and his father prep for the oncoming storm, Cort and his two young neighbors, Liza and Francie, are inadvertently left at home alone when the worst hits.

As the ruthless storm rages, Francie disappears with Cort's dog, Catfish, so Cort and Liza venture out into the worst to save them. But along the way, the trio is literally swept away, their survival skills put to the test amid wind, cold, blackout darkness, rising waters, hunger and, perhaps the most imposing threat, wild animals also seeking higher ground.

While angered that his father was tending to Cort’s estranged mother while the kids were home alone, Cort must keep his focus on getting them all to the Bottle Creek Indian Mound, where, disastrously, they are met with angry, hungry, scared and violent animals.

There are dark moments indeed, and the reader’s pulse quickens with every page turn. Watt Key has the pacing and personalities down for this thrilling tale of family, friends and triumph over adversity in the face of literal and metaphoric storms. It’s an epic journey for both the characters and the readers.

Like many fifth-graders, Chloe just wants to fit in at school. Trouble is, that’s pretty much impossible for her. With her blonde hair and blue eyes, she’s automatically marked as an outsider at her new school in New Delhi. Chloe’s older sister, Anna, has had no trouble adjusting to the family’s move from Boston to India, but Chloe still feels like a fish out of water.

When another new girl, Lakshmi, joins Chloe’s class, Chloe realizes that even girls from India can be viewed as outsiders. Lakshmi, whose family doesn’t possess anything like the kind of privilege that the other girl’s families enjoy, is all but shunned by Chloe’s classmates—and even when Lakshmi and Chloe begin a friendship outside of class, Chloe can’t bring herself to take the next step and support her new friend at school. When Lakshmi’s talents threaten the ambition of the most popular girl in class, Chloe must decide where her loyalties lie.

In her debut middle-grade novel, Kate Darnton draws on her own experience of living in New Delhi for five years, offering lots of personal details about what it’s like for an American family to live in India. Chloe in India offers plenty of cultural insights as well as opportunities for readers to reflect on class, privilege and discrimination. Chloe’s voice is genuine, her outlook likable and realistic, and her revelations about friendship and identity will resonate with many readers.

The Tin Snail begins in Paris in 1937, when 12-year-old Angelo Fabrizzi sits in a cafe with his father, a pioneering car designer. Inspired by the shape of a lopsided pastry, Angelo gives his father an idea for a new aerodynamic car design. A year later, at the Paris Motor Show, several Nazis clear the way for Dr. Ferdinand Porsche, while Angelo gets behind the wheel of his father’s creation and makes an impactful, unexpected debut.

Angelo and his father end up living in the French countryside, continuing to work on a prototype of their car (nicknamed the Tin Snail), which is meant for everyday people, not just the rich. However, as the Nazis threaten to invade, desperate measures must be taken to hide the innovation. The excitement ramps up once the Germans arrive, along with a German car designer sent to spy. “Hitler himself wanted to see our car?” Angelo wonders in astonishment.

British television writer Cameron McCallister was inspired to write this book after reading a newspaper account about several car prototypes that were discovered, having been hidden in a French barn for 50 years. While McAllister uses World War II as his backdrop, he keeps the tone fairly light, concentrating on thrills and adventure during a dangerous era. Middle-grade car enthusiasts will keep turning the pages of this rollicking, imaginative novel.

RELATED CONTENT: Read a Q&A with McAllister about The Tin Snail.