Picture Books
by Deborah Hopkinson
A young girl named Marcia Shaw loves helping around the house and prides herself on her chores, even though her biscuits usually turn out as hard as doorstops. When her mother gets pregnant and hires Fannie Farmer to help cook, Marcia feels resentful and replaced. She's eventually won over when Fannie invites her to help in the kitchen and teaches her to cook properly by writing instructions in a shared journal.
This is the true story about how some kitchen notes from the 1800s became the world-famous cookbook, The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book that changed American cuisine.
Please note: Jealous Marcia is not very welcoming to her new baby sister.
by Patrick Horne
To distract them as they wait for their hot campfire s'mores to cool down, the Goldilocks family goes for a hike in the woods. Unbeknownst to them, a curious little bear cub smells the delicious food and wanders into their empty campsite. Hungry, he samples the s'mores. After finding one that is "just right," he ends up eating them all. He then breaks a camping chair, smashes a collection of musical instruments, and accidentally puts out the campfire. The Goldilocks family returns to find the site in a mess. But what can they do? Their intruder is a bear.
This is a hilarious fractured retelling of the famous fairytale Goldilocks and the Three Bears.
The Storm Book
by Charlotte Zolotow
The story starts on a quiet, dusty, and very hot summer day in the countryside. When the sky shifts and dark shadows roll in, a little boy becomes frightened and runs home to his mother. Lightning flashes and thunder rumbles loudly, but the boy is no longer afraid. He's soothed by hearing a gentle explanation of how the storm affects not just the countryside, but also a busy city and the nearby seashore.
This award-winning living book will introduce young children to complicated weather themes through a simple story.
A Boy Called Dickens
by Deborah Hopkinson
Twelve-year-old Charles dreams of going to school and making something of himself. However, his family falls deep into debt, and his father is sent to a debtors' prison. Charles is forced to move out on his own. He works grueling, long hours in a rat-infested shoe-blacking factory. Despite his miserable daily routine, Charles uses his imagination to buoy himself. He becomes a keen observer of the people around him.
This beautifully illustrated living book highlights how Charles's painful childhood experiences did not break him. Instead, they gave him deep empathy for the poor and provided him with the material he needed to write beloved books later in life.
Leveled Readers
by Patricia Lakin
Bud loves being covered in mud. It makes him look and feel great! He spends his time rubbing and scrubbing in the dirt to get as messy as possible. One day, when he sees other muddy cars heading into a building together, he assumes they too love mud and follow them inside. He's in for a shock when he sees suds instead of mud.
This level one reader contains three to five word sentences on each page.
by Kevin Henkes
One day while gardening with her mother, Penny the mouse receives a package in the mail from her grandmother. Inside, she finds a beautiful doll with pink cheeks, a pink bow, and a pink dress. Penny instantly falls in love with her new toy.
Penny excitedly introduces the doll to her mother, her father, and her baby siblings. However, when her father asks what the doll is named, Penny realizes she does not know. She wants the name to be absolutely perfect. Her parents give her some suggestions, but none of them feel quite right.
Penny decides to take the doll on a big tour around her house. Eventually, she takes the doll back out to the garden and remembers that it is the exact place where they first met. It's there, in the garden, that Penny has a sudden burst of inspiration and knows exactly what to name her new friend.
The publisher has deemed this three chapter book, a level 1 story. However, I think the robust word count makes it more appropriate for level 2 or level 3 readers.
Illustrated Chapter Books
Andi's Pony Trouble
by Susan K. Marlow
Andi wants a real horse more than anything in the world. She thinks she is not only big enough to ride on her own but also ready for the responsibility of caring for one. Unfortunately, her mother disagrees, tells her she is too young, and encourages her to ride a "pokey," worn-out pony named Coco. The trouble is, Andi is not very good at remembering to take care of Coco, which makes it hard to prove she can handle a bigger animal. Can she change her parents' minds and show them she's responsible enough to earn her dream horse?
This is the first in a six-book series about a young girl on a 19th-century ranch in California.
Doggo and Pupper
by Katherine Applegate
Doggo loves his quiet life. He likes his routine of eating, napping, and checking the trash. The household Cat even jokes that Doggo has become a bit boring. Everything changes when the humans bring home Pupper.
Pupper is full of endless energy, asks a million questions, and makes a massive, playful mess of the house. The humans decide Pupper's wild behavior is too much, so they send him away to "charm school" to learn some manners. When Pupper returns, he is perfectly well-behaved. However, Doggo notices that Pupper is no longer happy or playful. Realizing that the school took away Pupper's joy, Doggo steps in to help.
This is the first in a three-book series about the antics of an old dog and his new, young sidekick.
Please note: One page shows Doggo dressed in different costumes his owners bought for him, including a white sheet for a Halloween ghost and a pink tutu for a ballerina.
Middle-Grade Novels
The Blossoming Summer
by Anna Rose Johnson
Nervous to reunite and stay safe after having been separated for years because of poverty and the looming threat of war, Rosemary and her family flee the London Blitz and move across the ocean to live with her long-estranged grandmother in America. Rosemary has only heard clipped stories about the matriarch from her father and is nervous to make a good impression. Turns out Grandmother isn't anything as she expected, and she's surprised to find that the two share a love of gardening.
Her time with the ailing older woman has Rosemary wondering what happened in the past that would make Dad so angry at Grandmother. And why do mother and son share the same last name, yet their spellings are different? Rosemary is determined to uncover a family secret that Dad buried years ago when he left America for England to marry Mom.
This is a story about forgiveness, family bonds, and learning to be proud of one's family nationality and heritage. Fans of Anne of Green Gables and The Secret Garden will enjoy this soft, domestic fiction.
Diamond Fever!
by Steve Sheinkin
Late one night in San Francisco, two rough-looking mining cousins named Philip Arnold and John Slack walk into the office of investor George Roberts. They ask to put a small canvas bag into his safe. Inside the bag are uncut, rough diamonds that look like glassy pebbles. They claim they stumbled upon America’s very first diamond mine out in the Wild West, but they refuse to tell anyone exactly where it is.
Word quickly gets out. Wealthy bankers, business tycoons, and even a former Confederate pirate get desperate to buy a piece of the action. The cousins are master tricksters. They "seed" a remote hill in Wyoming by burying cheap, uncut diamonds and rubies they bought in London. They even manage to trick the country's top geologist into believing the mine is real. As thousands of regular prospectors rush to the deserts and mountains looking for gems, a brave and honest government surveyor steps in. But can he stop the diamond hysteria before it is too late?
Fans of The Mona Lisa Vanishes will enjoy this narrative nonfiction about a little-known diamond heist in the American West during the Gilded Age.
Please note: One line states that diamonds were made billions of years ago.
The Hunt for the Kraken
by Kathryn Butler
It's a normal summer day in Massachusetts; you are fishing with your dad near a 200-year-old lighthouse. You notice a strange, glowing blue light coming from the lighthouse, which sweeps you and your father back in time to the 18th century. You wake up aboard a historical whaling ship called the Valiant. The ship is controlled by a greedy pirate named Captain Blackviper. You quickly discover that the crew isn't looking for whales at all—they are hunting the legendary, giant sea monster known as the Kraken.
This is the first in a choose-your-own-adventure Christian fiction series, told in the second person. At the end of every short chapter, the reader must face a tough choice by picking between two or three different actions. There are 12 possible endings to the story. Some paths lead to terrible disaster, some safely return the reader home to the present day, and others unlock secrets about the mysterious blue light and set up the next book in the series.
When Life Gives You Lemons, Make Peach Pie
by Erin Soderberg Downing
When widowed Mr. Peach learns that one of his wife's inventions has been sold posthumously for a million dollars, he decides to take his three grieving kids on a grand adventure. He buys a food truck and invites them to join him for "The Great Peach Experiment" so that they might find a new normal after the loss of their wife and mother.
The plan is for them to spend the summer driving across the Midwest selling slices of their Great Aunt Lucinda’s famous peach pie and win the food truck festival in Delaware, Ohio. The only major problem is that absolutely none of them know how to bake!
Fans of The Penderwicks and The Vanderbeekers series will enjoy the humor and hijinks of this cross-country domestic fiction.
Please note: Mr. Peach was not honest with the kids about what kind of work he was doing in the evening, leading up to their experiment. Additionally, in an effort to appease a disgruntled customer, Freddy, the middle child, lies about whether a pie is available for purchase on their food truck menu.
The youngest son Herb wants to use some of his souvenir money to buy a lottery ticket. At first, Mr. Peach refuses to let him, saying that lottery tickets were wasteful, but eventually concedes at the end of the book.
While recording the odd behavior of some of the day's patrons in his journal, Freddy notes, "big guy flirts with Dad." Normally, any LGBTQ+ sounding inclusion would land a book in the "Parents, Be Aware" section of a Biblio-files list. However, I was encouraged to see that the author portrayed Mr. Peach as heterosexual and in love with his wife throughout the book, and described the "flirting" as unwelcome or unflattering without being mean-spirited or hateful, by simply adding it to a lengthy list of other abnormal customer behaviors.
Parents, Be Aware
A Poor Excuse for a Dragon
by Geoffrey Hayes
When Fred is old enough to venture out on his own, his mom and dad give him a checklist titled "How to be a Good Dragon." The list tells him he must do five things: run amok, eat people, roar, breathe fire, and act scary. Though Fred wants to make his parents proud, none of these spooky tasks come naturally to him. He ends up making a horrible mess of the list until he finally gets help from a supportive shepherd, giant, and witch who help him be the kind of dragon he was meant to be--one that is quiet, useful, and eats waffles.
Things to know: When the dragon first meets the witch, she is casting spells.
The Brooklyn Nine
by Alan Gratz
This is the story of the fictional Schneider family who immigrated from Germany to Brooklyn in 1845 and whose lives are deeply shaped by family bonds, American history, and a generational passion for baseball.
Each "inning" consists of three chapters, mirroring the three-out rule of the beloved game. In addition to telling the story of the Schneiders, spanning from 1845 to 2002, the book also introduces readers to key moments in American history, including the Civil War, WWII, segregation, and the Cold War.
Things to know: A boy serving in the Union Army during the Civil War lies about his allegiance to the North to protect himself against a camp of Confederates.
One character says, "In God's name." A Jewish-born character is called a kike.
Additionally, a famous baseball player gets drunk, a police officer turns a blind eye to his daughter, who is taking money for an illegal betting operation in a speakeasy, and another character admits to not knowing who his father is.
A bully makes a comment about a young boy's mother "doinking a rabbi."
Just for you, Mom
The Summer of You and Me
by Denise Hunter
Maggie’s husband, Ethan, died overseas in a military explosion. Now, five years later, just before the anniversary of his passing, Maggie decides to spend the summer at Seabrook—the beach town where the two met as children—to finally find closure, scatter his ashes, and prepare herself to get back into the dating scene again. Unbeknownst to Maggie, Ethan’s brother, Josh, has been secretly in love with her since they were teenagers. Now that she is ready to move on with her life, Josh plans to finally confess his feelings to her. But before Josh can say anything, Maggie spots a man at a local carnival who looks exactly like her dead husband. The man vanishes into the crowd, leaving behind so many unanswered questions.
Best in Show
A Long Road on a Short Day
by Eugene Yelchin
Early one winter morning, Samuel and his father set out on foot with a treasured Barlow knife in hand. Mama needs a milk cow to feed the baby. Papa says they'll use the knife as payment. But how can one lone knife buy a cow? At the first farm they come to, Papa promises the knife in exchange for two tin lanterns. At the next house, he trades the lanterns for a book of poetry. And so it goes--all day, Papa trades for larger and more valuable items.
Fans of The Ox-Cart Man will appreciate the premise of this delightful story. I especially like how the father acknowledges the son's contributions and allows the boy to make the final trade of the day. When given a choice to keep a prized pony and cart all to himself, he selflessly remembers the needs of his mother and baby sister and barters for a milk cow instead.
A Night Divided
by Jennifer Nielsen
On August 13, 1961, twelve-year-old Gerta wakes up to find that a giant wall of barbed wire and concrete has been erected in the middle of Berlin, dividing not just the town, but the people. Sadly, her father and her brother Dominic had traveled to the west side the day before in search of work. And now, she, her eldest brother Fritz, and their mother face a life of communism alone. Should they risk their lives and make a run for the West? But what of the friends and extended family they'd be leaving behind?
This historical fiction details the postwar years of East Germany. While it is absolutely free from language and sexual agenda, it does contain scenes of communistic cruelty that could be troubling to some young readers.
Please be aware that the publisher has pegged it for 10-12-year-olds, which is on the upper end of the middle-grade ranking.