Never Fall Down by Patricia McCormick Balzer & Bray, $17.99 What does it take to survive when you’re only nine years old and you’re separated from the rest of your family by a violent regime? In the abstract, we can…
Author: annangel
Celebrating Roots and Blues as only Arnold Adoff can
Roots and Blues: A Celebration by Arnold Adoff. Clarion Books, $17.99 If you’re a follower of Arnold Adoff’s work, you know that his poetry celebrates life and diversity and culture. This celebration of blues is no different in that it captures…
More thoughts on books, bullying and standing up
The last time I posted on this blog, I said I’d gone into a fifth grade and discussed Cynthia Levinson’s book We’ve Got a Job and we all talked about how it takes courage to face…
The Girl in the Mirror faces grief and abandonment
The Girl in the Mirror by Meg Kearney Persea Books (April 19, 2012) 978-089255853 $15 On the same day adoptee and aspiring poet Lizzie McLaine receives non-identifying information about her birth mother, her father dies of a heart attack setting…
We can learn about ways to stop bullying from teens in the civil rights movement
My daughter Amanda — her fifth graders call her Ms Angel — recently told me about issues with name calling on the school playground and she wondered aloud how to turn this into a lesson that would make her class recognize they have…
Can a book on bullying be humorous? A.S. King thought so and she has written a brilliant book
Everybody Sees the Ants by A.S. King Little, Brown and Company ISBN: 978-0-316-12928-2 $17.99 Lucky Linderman knows what it’s like to be bullied. He knows what it’s like to live in fear while adults, caught up in their own…
Exploring synesthesia — a gift or disability?
What some perceive as a gift, others might perceive as a disability. This premise is explored in R.J. Anderson’s Ultraviolet, a novel exploring sixteen -year old Alison’s hidden synesthetic abilities. Synesthesia, for those who are unaware of this sensory…
Beyond the Battlefront: The War Between Brothers
Schroder, Monika. My Brother’s Shadow. Farrar, Straus & Giroux: $17.99 ISBN-13: 978-0374351229 War stories often focus on the battlefront or the soldier’s journey. But the realities of war are that they are often fought inside families. Monika Schroder’s My Brother’s…
Be Bold! Thoughts on Self-censors and Publishing Censors
Penny Blubaugh, a teen librarian, describes herself as “the author of two sort-of-hard-to categorize teen novels. Serendipity Market is a retelling of fairy tales set in an off-kilter world that gets pulled back on track by the power of…
Project Girl educates adolescents to recognize advertising manipulation
“I give everything to the creative process. I write and paint to create a character, express a thought or make a connection. I am not concerned about adhering to a specific style, medium or format. This allows me to be…