Here's another intriguing premise from Ana Maria Machado – one of Brazil’s preeminent writers for children, and winner of the highly prestigious 2000 Hans Christian Andersen Award for Writing ...
Back when Kenji and the gang were young enough to be concerned about little more than just having fun, an equally young Fukube was trying very, very hard to be included. When sharing his extensive, pristine manga collection doesn't get him invited to "secret headquarters,"...
From the creator of some of my favorite kiddie books ever comes another 'free-to-be-me' invitation. Peter H. Reynolds has an uncanny ability to capture children both visually and literally ...
If the writing is a bit stilted and uneven in this middle grade novel, Ana Maria Machado – one of Brazil's preeminent writers for children – has a plausible excuse. Her fictional writer/narrator here is a schoolboy named Mariano who is "only writing – or trying to write –...
The slim, startling volume begins with an aged, family photograph which essentially contains the contents of the pages that follow ...
Need some freak-out adventures you can't put down? Time to continue the Death Note series with four more volumes that will get us to the half-way mark of this international phenomenon – in addition to the expected mega-million copy sales, anime and live-action spin-offs, novelizations, etc....
Here are the two most important things I got out of Snow: 1. it definitely had memorable glimpses of Turkish social and cultural history that I had little to no knowledge of previously; 2. Orhan Pamuk is a clever, intelligent writer, which – given his array...
The story of the brave Tessier children, begun in last year's Resistance, continues here with the focus on the middle child, teenager Paul and his courageous tenacity. The year is 1943, and the German occupation of France is an everyday nightmare. "[T]o ensure their continued control,...
Here I go again starting with a book backwards … in the ending “Translator’s Note,” Paul Starkey writes, “Readers of Maryam’s Maze who are already familiar with the author’s short stories will quickly feel themselves at home in this more extended work, which again reveals...
We all probably have a little bit of devil in us, but what do you do when you find out that your birthfather is Satan himself? Twin brothers (and, not surprisingly, polar opposites), Rin and Yukio, have been raised all their lives by Father Fujimoto,...
Heidi is not your average soon-to-be-13-year-old: "One thing I knew for a fact, from the time I knew anything at all, was that I didn't have a father. What I had was Mama and Bernadette, and as far as I was concerned, that was plenty."...
When I handed this striking volume to my son (as I often do with most graphic titles, as they seem to be the best way to get him to read), he instantly replied with "oh, I read that already." I insisted that couldn't be possible as...
The Pope is on his way to Japan in time for the opening ceremony of the 2015 World Expo ...
*STARRED REVIEW In an introductory galley letter, National Book Award winner Ha Jin (Waiting, 1999) announces his intent to reclaim American missionary Minnie Vautrin’s heroism during the 1937 Nanjing massacre: “She suffered and ruined herself helping others, but she became a legend. At least her story has...
Within minutes of finishing Nicole Krauss' The History of Love, I felt so bereft without Alma Singer and Leo Gorsky, that I immediately clicked my iPod to The Great House. [Thank goodness the hubby keeps my gadgets well-stocked!] How pleased I was to discover that, of the sizable...
Manga addict that I’ve become in my old age, I tend to start books-with-pictures from the back cover. This, I’ve learned, often yields insightful rewards. [And no, I am not one of those skippers with novels, ahem!] Going backwards worked well here: author Joan Schoettler, who...
Here's how I finally came to read The History of Love ...
The announcement is over a week old, but better late than never, especially when it's such well-deserved fabulous news: ...
In the six months since Mama passed away, Chanda's life has changed completely. As the sole provider for her sister Lily and brother Soly, Chanda is unable to continue her own education and instead substitutes at the primary school. With Mama gone, Chanda's best friend...
