Booklist Online: Book Reviews from the American Library Association

Lynn: We left Todd Hewitt and Viola Eade in a breathless cliff-hanger at the end of The Knife of Never Letting Go. It has been a long year of waiting! The second volume, The Ask and the Answer (Candlewick, Sept. 2009), picks right up from that point. Todd and Viola have run right [...]

Lynn: Laura’s diary is filled with entries that could be found in any teenage girl’s journal: her crush on the boy next door, fights with her older sister, exam worries and her love for music and her band. What sets this book apart are the other entries! In Carbon Diaries 2015 (Holiday House, 2009) global [...]

Lynn: Kenneth Oppel does many things well in his writing but he especially knows how to create nail-biting cling-to-your-seat action scenes. Starclimber (Harper/EOS, 2000) does that right from the first page when pilot-in-training Matt Cruse discovers a ticking time bomb on board his ship. The first two books in this series, Airborn and Skybreaker introduced [...]

Cindy: It’s very exciting to have had an early peek at Catching Fire (Scholastic, Sept. 1, 2009) but that just means the wait for book three will seem even longer! One thing I know for sure, it will be worth the wait, whether you are a lucky soul in the same boat, or if you [...]

Lynn: The clock is ticking. Humanity’s days are numbered as the earth’s population sickens and dies following a close pass by the comet Bhaktul and the virus it spread through the atmosphere. Only those under 18 seem to be immune and as society breaks down, a scientist steps forward with a controversial [...]

Lynn: Our focus group has been hard at work lately, reading their way through a pile of new picture books. We’ve found some fabulous books (stay tuned for more reviews) but right now a pair of books from Templar Books, a new imprint of Candlewick Press, is at the top of Mason and Hayden’s [...]

Young readers love series. So do OLD readers for that matter. There is something comforting about settling in with the newest adventure of protagonists we’ve taken into our hearts and getting reacquainted with worlds we’ve come to love. How many Nancy Drew devotees grew up to grab each new Stephanie Plum the [...]