Mason Deaver’s 2nd novel, The Ghosts We Keep, is a deeply emotional story of a non-binary high school student losing his older brother in an accident. Liam Cooper is already having trouble maintaining friendships at school and is struggling with his place in the world and what he wants to do after high school, and the death of his brother makes him almost suicidal. It’s a believable story, and it was born of the author’s own grappling with grief. It moves pretty slowly and the main character might drive you a bit crazy, but you’ll hang on to the end in order to find out how Liam matures and survives this tortuous time. Genre: Realistic Fiction

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
Reviewed by M. Losh, OHS Library Secretary

Alex is a visionary, literally. He can see the future of the things that he touches –every day things and things close to him. And it terrifies him, because not all futures are pretty. While the first few chapters set a groundwork, the rest of the novel is a groundswell of suspense. It takes diving deep into his past, and that of his family, to come to terms with how the future could play out. Brittney Morris asks readers to check themselves, and their preconceived notions, through Alex’s experiences. Shedding a tear or laughing alongside the characters, Morris gives us another look with a special-power twist into the life of a young Black American. A worthy addition because of the super-natural element as most black male protagonists that are being written are just realistic fiction tropes.

The illustrations are all in earth tones, very suited to the topic, as the text shares about a variety of animals that are skilled builders, from the Great Barrier Reef to a penguin’s pebble nest to a beaver’s dam, and so on. The examples provide a good mix of familiar and less common. Several pages are given to each example so that there is some depth of detail, including why the animals build what they do. A solid choice.

D and the other letters are a bit put out with Apostrofee for gobbling up so many letters and taking their places. It’s full of examples to show the purpose of an apostrophe.. It’s cute, but I think I’ve seen other books that do the job better. A lot of the examples in this one are not common uses and/or don’t follow the usual pattern, and yet no explanation is given (i.e. shan’t, d’ssert, s’pose, d’plorable). At first I wondered why they misspelled Apostrofee’s name, but then I noticed the author is from Quebec, so it could be a Canadian spelling.

I need to buy several copies to have on hand for baby shower gifts. It’s a beautiful book, best shared between parent and young child. The illustrations are gloriously beautiful and whimsical. The text is sentimental and full of hope and wonderings for the future. It’s full of comparisons of child and nature, opening with an acorn sleeping beneath a blanket of leaves until it begins to grow, just like the child tucked into a warm bed. The voice is that of the parent speaking directly to the child, offering a wide variety of possibilities and analogies. It makes my heart warm and fuzzy!

It’s a fun, simple, “sweet” read, with a devilish twist at the end that will appeal to the older elementary kids as well as the young ones. When Sloth and Lemur happen upon a rather lovely cake, they ponder having a party, but all the guests they consider inviting seem problematic in one way or another. They finally conclude there’s just no one left to eat it except themselves. As they lay about among the crumbs with full bellies, along comes Tiger, outraged that the lovely cake he’d made himself for his birthday is gone. Sloth apologizes, but Tiger tells them not to worry…(page turn)…he can still get it back…(page turn)… And the final page just shows the Tiger walking away with a satisfied expression from the plate of cake crumbs, with no Sloth or Lemur in sight. Draw your own conclusions. I like that it leaves it open to the readers’ interpretations — a good opportunity to talk about inference. It reminds me a bit of my favorite Jon Klassen books. My only critique is that it is told entirely in dialogue without any quotation marks or he said/she said (it uses different fonts to distinguish who says what), and it could have been helpful if the different fonts were a little more different to be really clear.

Well I pretty much love most things Melissa Stewart has written, and this one illustrated my another of my favorites, Steve Jenkins. The book shares details about fourteen different kind of monkeys that all live in the Manu National Park in Peru. It begins by pointing out that it is unusual for so many different kinds of monkeys to live in the same area, and that it is possible because they each live at different heights above the ground, behave in different ways, and eat different foods, meaning they don’t compete with each other for food or space. Each two-page spread is dedicated to a different kind of monkey, with a two line rhyming stanza in a large font for younger readers, and a more detailed paragraph for those seeking more information. Accompanying each illustration is a silhouette of a tree marking the height within the rainforest that that monkey occupies. In the back of the book a larger version of the same silhouette shows all the monkeys on one, and an illustration depicts all the monkey sizes in relative scale, alongside the shadow of an adult human for comparison purposes, and further statistics such as lifespan, scientific names, diets, and predators are listed for each monkey.

So I looked online at the professional reviews posted on the Titlewave website, and they were all more or less generally positive, but I’m just going to be honest and say I didn’t like it. I couldn’t find a plot or purpose to it. The illustrations depict a town made up of 51% vampires, and are suitably dark for such a setting, and yet are silly and cartoonish for a young audience. The reader is invited to come visit this town and is shown assorted scenes one might find looking down upon the town on a typical night. The text isn’t so much a narrative as a series of captions.

It’s a cute, simple story outlining the differences between rabbits and hares. Cartoon-like illustrations depict a conversation between a hare and a ground squirrel as they walk through the dessert. The hare takes objection to being called a rabbit by the ground squirrel, and in the process of arguing his point he gets so riled up that when the coyote that’s been stalking him throughout the book finally pounces with a, “Gotcha, Rabbit!” the hare punches him out with an, “I’m a hare! So there, Jackal!” The back of the book lists some other animals that are similar, but not the same, and outlines distinguishing differences; and also offers readers a Can-you-find-them list of other desert creatures that made appearances in the illustrations so they can go back and hunt.

I like the concept of the book, but I wish it made its point clear more consistently. It’s about the idea that size is relative and how something that may seem small to a person could seem huge to an insect. It tries to draw relative comparisons, such as pointing out that some fleas can jump up to 100 times their own height, and then declaring that would be like you being able to jump to the top of the Eiffel Tower. But then it says that the Eiffel Tower is 1063 feet tall, and since I don’t know any 10-foot tall people, that comparison doesn’t compute. And the comparison to “If your foot could grow as fast as a caterpillar can…” comes out as a bit awkward, because it’s not comparing to how a caterpillar’s foot grows, but the whole caterpillar, but for the person it’s got the foot growing independently of the rest of the human. It’s just a bit clunky.

In his wonderful debut title, Jimmie Allen, platinum-selling country music artist, encourages us to listen to the many voices around us but to also use our voices to trumpet our commitment to improving ourselves, our community, and our world. With rhythmic rhyming text, the book itself sounds like a anthem encouraging us to,

SAY NOT TO HATE 
by using this voice,
and ALWAYS CHOOSE LOVE—
a magical choice

Highly recommended for all elementary libraries.

Peggy the Pug’s family is not feeling very cheery this Christmas. Business is slow, Ruby doesn’t like her teacher, Chloe feels like she is losing her friend, and Finn has lost his bandmate. Peggy wants to help them be happy again. She decides that she needs to talk to Santa and to do that she needs to become a reindeer. She tries to give herself antlers, she eats carrots, and finally decides to talk to the reindeer at the school Christmas fair. Each thing that Peggy tries seems to make more work for her family at home.

This is short chapter book with sketched illustrations and is a part of an 8 book series. The book was originally published in Great Britain.

In Amberland, only recognized citizens have access to Amber, the naturally occurring liquid that when consumed daily, gives people both improved health and enhanced abilities. The borders are tightly sealed and the few non-citizens invited to live and work in Amberland are at a disadvantage and not allowed to partake in Amber. With Amber becoming increasingly scarce, there is an outcry by some to preserve the remaining Amber and limit newcomers.

Mira and her family must navigate her role as invited outsider while they wait for their citizenship request to be approved. How will Mira respond when faced with the many types of inequity she witnesses as both an outsider and finally a new citizen?

While the magical aspect of Amber place this book in the genre of fantasy, the complex social justice concepts provide a powerful opportunity to reflect and discuss the issues of privilege, discrimination, immigration, and equal rights.