5/11/14

This week's round-up of middle grade science fiction and fantasy from around the blogs (5/11/14)

Welcome to this week's round-up, and Happy Mother's Day to all those who celebrate it.   I am celebrating it by cleaning up after my children, in particular cleaning up after my 11 year old's birthday party, which is the reason I'm late getting this post up.

But I would like to take this opportunity to thank my own mother (not that she reads my blog) for reading me The Silmarilian.   Lots of parents read The Hobbit to their kids, many read The Lord of the Rings, but only really special mothers (with special children) read every word of The Silmarilian (which is something I haven't done, but in fairness, it was easier/more interesting for my mother to do it because it was her first time reading it too).

In any event.

The Reviews:

The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents, by Terry Pratchett, at Fantasy Literature

Ancient Fire, by Mark London Williams, at Charlotte's Library

The Bravest Princess, by E.D. Baker, at Ms. Yingling Reads

The Castle Behind Thorns, by Merrie Haskell, at Log Cabin Library

The Door, by Andy Marino, at On Starships and Dragon Wings

Dragon Slippers, by Jessica Day George, at On Starships and Dragon Wings

The Dyerville Tales, by M.P. Kozlowsky, at Page In Training
and The Book Monsters

The Forbidden Library, by Django Wexler, at Bestfantasybooks

The Ghosts of Tupelo Landing, by Sheila Turnage, at Semicolon

Gregor and the Curse of the Warmbloods, by Suzanne Collins, at Fyrefly's Book Blog

The Hero's Guide to Being an Outlaw, by Christopher Healey, at The Book Monsters and Sharon the Librarian

The Invisible Order, by Paul Crilley, at The Book Brownie

The Islands of Chaldea, by Diana Wynne Jones and Ursula Jones, at Librarian of Snark 

The Little White Horse, by Elizabeth Goudge, at Tor

The Mark of the Dragonfly, by Jaleigh Johnson, at Nerdy Book Club

The Night Gardener, by Jonathan Auxier, at Waking Brain Cells, The Book Monsters, and Karissa's Reading Review

Nightingale's Nest, by Nikki Loftin, at Geo Librarian

The Peculiar, by Stefan Bachmann, at Librarian of Snark

The Riverman, by Aaron Starmer, at Kid Lit Geek

The Shadow Throne, by Jennifer Nielsen, at Reads For Keeps

Stonewall Hinkleman and the Battle of Bull Run, by Michael Hemphill and Sam Riddleburger, at Madigan Reads

The Thickety, by J.A. White, at The Social Potato

Three Pickled Herrings (Wings and Co.), by Sally Gardner, at Wondrous Reads

The Unicorn Thief, by R.R. Russell, at Word Spelunking

Two Rumplestiltskin retelligs at thebookshelfgargoyle



Authors and Interviews

M.P.  Kozlowsky (The Dyerville Tales) at The Book Monsters and The Haunting of Orchid Forsythia (giveaways)

Nikki Loftin (Nightingale's Nest) at The Book Cellar

R.R. Russell (The Unicorn Thief) at Wondrous Reads 

Daniel Nanavati (Midrak Earthshaker) Carpinello's Writing Pages


Other Good Stuff

The finalists for the Locus Awards (chosen by readers of Locus Magazine) have been announced, and here are the Young Adult finalists, which include two that are more Middle Grade:
 
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Zombie Baseball Beatdown, Paolo Bacigalupi (Little, Brown) 
The Coldest Girl in Coldtown, Holly Black (Little, Brown; Indigo) 
Homeland, Cory Doctorow (Tor Teen; Titan) 
The Summer Prince, Alaya Dawn Johnson (Levine) 
The Girl Who Soared Over Fairyland and Cut the Moon in Two, Catherynne M. Valente (Feiwel and Friends)
Zombie Baseball Beatdown, Paolo Bacigalupi (Little, Brown) The Coldest Girl in Coldtown, Holly Black (Little, Brown; Indigo) Homeland, Cory Doctorow (Tor Teen; Titan) The Summer Prince, Alaya Dawn Johnson (Levine) The Girl Who Soared Over Fairyland and Cut the Moon in Two, Catherynne M. Valente (Feiwel and Friends) - See more at: http://www.locusmag.com/News/2014/05/2014-locus-awards-finalists/#sthash.JBwPc1uv.dpuf
YOUNG ADULT BOOK
- See more at: http://www.locusmag.com/News/2014/05/2014-locus-awards-finalists/#sthash.JBwPc1uv.dpuf
YOUNG ADULT BOOK
- See more at: http://www.locusmag.com/News/2014/05/2014-locus-awards-finalists/#sthash.JBwPc1uv.dpuf
YOUNG ADULT BOOK
- See more at: http://www.locusmag.com/News/2014/05/2014-locus-awards-finalists/#sthash.JBwPc1uv.dpuf

Save the date!  June 6-8 is the 9th Annual 48 Hour Book Challenge, organized by MotherReader.  To continue the momentum of #WeNeedDiverseBooks, this year's challenge is "dedicated to reading, sharing and reviewing books that show diversity in all ways."

And speaking of links, here's a lovely roundup of book diversity links at Jen Robinson's Book Page 

Thoughts on boys and fairy tale movies and gendered merchandise at Once Upon a Blog (my response is to advocate keeping children away from merchandising altogether, raising them in a world as far away as possible from the pressures of late stage capitalism... although I did just buy a Lego Movie tie in lego set.....).

The latest issue of Middle Shelf Magazine is out, with lots of good spec. fic. content.



Thanks for stopping by, and please let me know if I missed your post!


3 comments:

  1. Your mother no doubt read you the Silmarillion because she was trying to bore you into sleep! When I was reading through the library, I thought that book would make me stop. It took me about six months to make it through the entire thing! The fact that you enjoyed it probably explains a lot about our differences of opinions about some books. (I did read The Borrowers out loud to my own children, and even that was somewhat painful.)

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  2. She is also in the special category of mothers who read the Lord of the Rings aloud twice, to two different children.

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  3. Happy b-lated Mother's day! and thank you for the links.

    ~Akoss

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