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Lynn: Cindy and I may differ on our favorite genres but we are in complete agreement about funny books.  It is REALLY hard to write funny books and we LOVE them.  Kristen Tracy writes really funny books and today we are going to talk about two of them.  I get to start with The Reinvention [...]

Lynn: What happens at your house when the lights go out?  Shrieks of dismay?  Frantic calls to the power company?  John Rocco’s wise and funny book Blackout (Disney/Hyperion 2011) shows us that it can also be a great opportunity to slow down and appreciate our world and the people in it. On a normal summer [...]

Cindy: If the cover of Flip Flop! (Random House 2011) doesn’t say “SUMMER,” I don’t know what does. Sitting on a dock with a friend, a popsicle, an ice cream cone and wearing flip flops….ah. The two girls in this book are not only wearing flip flops, but their minds are flip flopping with all [...]

Cindy: The word from France is that the Focus Group loved the visit to Leonardo Da Vinci’s home last week. Here’s the report for those of you interested in traveling vicariously with me: Lynn:  First we mastered the mysteries of the French washing machine and left our laundry spread over two drying racks on the [...]

Cindy: As I said last week, while Lynn is spending the month in France I am soothing my travel lust with literature. To Timbuktu: Nine Countries, Two People, One True Story (Roaring Brook 2011) is just the ticket! I admire adventurous people and these two young adults spin a good tale about their travels. Casey [...]

Cindy: Holy cow, Lisa McMann! I’m glad I can’t experience your dreams if your fiction is any indication of what goes on at night in your head! McMann’s WAKE trilogy is very popular in our high schools, but I can’t wait to booktalk Cryer’s Cross (Simon Pulse 2011) with my eighth graders this fall. I [...]

Cindy: It sounds like Lynn and the focus group are having enormous fun in France and still keeping up on their reading…They are currently reading The Great Hamster Massacre by Katie Davies, which they love but Lynn says is gorier than she would have guessed. It is a mystery and they are having a LOT of discussion about [...]

Lynn:  My family are zoo and museum-addicts.  I freely admit it and will further admit that we have sometimes eschewed a famous site or two for the pleasure of going to yet another zoo or crazy museum.  So I was instantly drawn to Strange Creatures:  The Story of Walter Rothschild and His Museum (Disney/Hyperion 2011).  [...]

Cindy: Dana Reinhardt gets better with every book and The Summer I Learned to Fly (Random/Wendy Lamb 2011) is no exception. Last year’s The Things a Brother Knows was a piercing look at the relationship between two boys and the impact of war. In this story, Reinhardt examines the intricacies of mother-daughter relationships and perfectly captures [...]

Lynn: Cindy and I write Bookends separately, I from my kitchen and Cindy from school or home.  We plan in person or by phone and it works pretty well but we’re adding a new challenge to this arrangement.  I am heading to France for 25 days on a family trip so working remotely is now [...]