Visit Teach Mentor Texts and Unleashing Readers to participate in the kidlit version of this weekly meme.
On my blog:
- A curation of my favorite online reading in Sunday Salon
- Part 3 of #cyberPD, Wild Readers in a College Children’s Literature Course
- A slice about my lead learner, Kelsey
In reading:
Amazingly, as much as I have read online about E. Lockhart’s We Were Liars, I haven’t read any spoilers, so I will keep to that here on my blog. Of course, writing about this book spoiler-free makes it difficult to say much of anything about it. Now that I’ve read it, I need to find some spoiler-full reviews, because I know that many readers love this book but it didn’t work for me. I would like to understand what others love about it. I always think Lockhart’s writing is strong, but I found the characters to be underdeveloped and neither compelling nor believable. That made it difficult for me to care when I discovered the twist (which I had actually guessed fairly early on.) I suspect I would have liked the book a lot more if the big reveal had truly been a surprise. As it was, the whole story felt like a clever but ultimately hollow exercise to me.
Gail Carriger’s Eitquette & Espionage has been my audiobook for the last couple of weeks, and it’s delightfully narrated. This first novel in a YA steampunk series with some paranormal elements (vampires and werewolves) has a lively main character, Sophronia, who discovers that her new finishing school is really an academy for spies. There is much adventure and misadventure, and it’s all quite fun and amusing. I’ll be looking for the next book on audio.
My son and I read Stranded, the first book in Jeff Probst’s middle-grade series. While there isn’t much in the way of character development or theme, there are plenty of plot twists and the story is fast-paced and competently written. I’m not sure we’ll be reading the rest of the series, but this is one I would want to have in a classroom library as I think it would appeal to many different readers.
We read so many superb picture books this week (as well as a few duds, but I won’t include those!). Herman and Rosie and Emily’s Blue Period were my absolute favorites.
the dirigible plum 
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