In another world where there are witches of all kinds; Tea finds that she is a rare bone witch, a witch that can raise creatures good and bad from the dead. Tea is confronted with what she is, when she accidentally raises her brother from the dead. Now her and her brother must head to an unfamiliar city, so Tea can train with another bone witch. As Tea trains her skills grow quickly and the whole city become curious about her and her powers. Tea realizes there’s a fine line between good and evil that her powers allow her to tread, but there forces out there wanting to pull her into the darkness.
Tag: middle school
Warcross by Marie Lu
Hacker and bounty hunter Emika Chen is short on cash and options. When she hacks into the world championship game of Warcross, an online game everybody plays, she can’t pass up an opportunity to grab a power up equal to her monthly rent payment. It was grand opportunity, but once she grabbed the power up the whole world, including Warcross founder Hideo Tanaka, knew she had hacked in. Instead of finding the police banging on her door the next morning, she instead has a phone call from Hideo asking her to come to Tokyo for a meeting. Turns out someone else is hacking into Warcross and Hideo needs Emika to track that person down. As part of her cover Emika is drafted on to a Warcross team, and has to dig into her team mates personal lives. As she digs Emika begins to realize that the Warcross plot goes far deeper and is more dangerous than she dreamed.
Bang
Guilt is a heavy thing. Sebastian doesn’t know if he can live with it anymore. At age four Sebastian picked up his father’s gun and accidentally shot and killed his baby sister. Sebastian and his family never fully recovered. Now as a teen Sebastian is planning out his last days. But, his plans are put on pause when new neighbors move in, including fellow teen Aneesa. Aneesa and Sebastian soon become besties, spending much of the summer launching a YouTube pizza making channel. But, Aneesa doesn’t know Sebastian dark secret and he’s afraid what will happen when she figures it out.
Chains by Laurie Halse Anderson
Sisters Isabel and Ruth have been slaves their whole lives. Miss. Mary Finch, their owner, has just passed away. Miss. Finch promised Isabel they would be freed upon her death and even made it legal with a lawyer. But now that lawyer is gone and Miss. Finch’s son, Robert, wants to make a few bucks off them and sells them straight away. To make matters worse Ruth and Isabel are sold to a cruel loyalist family, the Locktons, who reside in New York, far from their home in Rhode Island.
It’s the middle of the revolutionary war and Isabel is determined to get her and her sister their freedom. After meeting a young slave, Cruzon, whose owner fights with the rebels Isabel thinks that she can trade information about Loyalists in return for her safe passage to freedom. Things don’t go as planned and as the war intensifies in New York, things go from bad to worse in the Lockton house, but Isabel is a survivor. If the rebels won’t help her maybe the British will. Chains, is an excellent and devastating piece of historical fiction, it illustrates the hardships of the war and the extreme cruelty of people, but also the determination of others. After reading the first in this series, you’ll want to delve into the rest.
Riding Chance by Christine Kendall
Troy’s life has been a roller coaster lately. His mom passed away and now it’s just Troy, his dad and grandma. Things have changed so much and Troy has started to get into trouble with his best friend Foster. When Foster and Troy are busted for their most recent incident they are given the option of working at the horse stables in the city instead of going to juvie. Cleaning up after horses does not seem like a great option, who wants to spend their time shoveling horse poop? But, Troy and Foster get a chance to learn to ride the horses too. Troy begins to enjoy working with the horses and even starts to get excited at opportunity to join the stable’s polo team, but Foster is not interested at all. Troy really begins to bond with a horse named, Chance, who he rides during polo practice. As Troy gets more involved at the stables he has to make decisions about his friendship with Foster and also how to handle some tricky situations that come with the other polo players. Riding Chance is a great read for fans of G. Neri and Jason Reynolds.
It All Comes Down to This by Karen English
It’s the summer before her freshmen year in high school in 1965. Sophie is planning on writing, hanging out with friends and just having a good time, but life and the rest of the world starts to get in the way her plans. First, the reality of racism really starts to set in for Sophie as she continually encounters prejudice in her almost all-white community; from being uninvited to pool parties to being accused of stealing. Her parents aren’t much help because they’re busy with their own lives and trying to salvage their marriage. Luckily, her older sister has always has her back, but that will change at the end of the summer when her sister leaves for college. Suddenly life isn’t as clear cut as she thought it was and once a close friend is arrested for no reason Sophie finds herself questioning things even more. An excellent piece of historical fiction that rings very true in today’s world.
Short by Holly Goldberg Sloane
There’s one word Julia, never says out loud anymore. In fact she tries not to even think it. Short. Julia is tired of being short, called short and excluded because she’s short. While summer has just kicked off for Julia, she’s not really excited for it. She’s still mourning the loss of her beloved dog, Ramone and her best friends are both gone for the summer.
The outlook for the summer completely changes, when Julia’s mom takes her and her younger brother to try out for a production of The Wizard of Oz. Julia’s never thought of herself as an actress, singer or dancer, but all that is about to change. Even though she’s cast as a munchkin, Julia begins to see things in a new light. Julia’s new friend and munchkin co-star Olive, shows her how being an adult with dwarfism doesn’t stop her from going after her dreams. Plus the director, Shawn Barr, really sees something in Julia and assigns her a second role. Julia starts to look at herself and her abilities in a whole new way. Short is a lovely summer and realistic read with characters that can inspire anyone.
The Emperor of Any Place by Tim Wynne-Jones
Evan’s father died with a yellow bound book in his hand. The yellow book contains the journal of a Japanese soldier, who was stranded on a small island in the Pacific during WWII. As Evan cracks the journal open he realizes that it was recovered by his estranged grandfather, a U.S. Marine and that the stranded Japanese soldier never made it off the island. Now this grandfather (Griff), who Evan’s never met, is coming to help put Evan’s father’s estate in order.
The arrival of his grandfather and the information contained in the yellow book send Evan down the rabbit’s hole. If his father hated Griff so much, why was he reading this journal? The night before he died Evan’s father said that Griff may have been a murderer. What did he mean? Did his father read something in the journal? Evan has to get to the truth and is seems like Griff is actively hiding something from him. The Emperor of Any Place blends Evan story and the story of the Japanese soldier seamlessly. The tension between Evan and his grandfather, Griff keeps the reader engaged the whole story. This is a great blend of historical fiction and realistic fiction.