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Win a signed copy of A&L Do Summer! Details at the end of this post.

“Just imagine it, Aspen.” Laurel walks beside me waving her arms. I feel like a football player dodging her flapping hands and the lunatics rushing to their lockers. “It’s Monday morning. Principal Hammond arrives at dawn with his briefcase in one hand and his thermos of coffee in the other–”

“I’m pretty sure Principal Hammond doesn’t drink coffee.” I clutch my notebook tighter against my chest to protect my advanced chemistry take-home final. After sweating bullets over it for three precious hours last night, I’m not about to risk losing it. “Once when I was picking up copies from the office, I overheard the secretary kidding him about being addicted to Mountain Dew.”

Excerpt © 2011 Jan Blazanin

About the Book:

After a year in rural Cottonwood Creek, Iowa, city girl Laurel is still adjusting to a place where parties take place in barns, guys ride around in pickup trucks, and a killer senior prank involves getting pigs into the principal’s office. Fortunately, she has her best friend Aspen on her side. The real problem is that neither the country girl nor the city slicker have boyfriends, nor any prospects for getting them. Clearly, they need to raise their profiles—and they have a summer to do it.

Release Date: May 10, 2011

About the Author:

Jan Blazanin, a former middle school teacher, grew up in a converted railroad depot near Des Moines, Iowa. Fairest of Them All, her first young adult novel about a beauty queen who develops alopecia, debuted in April 2009. Her upcoming novel, A & L Do Summer, will be available May 10, 2011. Jan received degrees from Grand View University, Iowa State, and Drake University. She studied writing at the Institute of Children’s Literature and the Iowa Summer Writing Festival and teaches creative writing for adults and teens. Jan currently lives on 11 acres in Waukee, Iowa, with her life partner Mike, her dogs and cat, and a flock of guinea fowl. When she’s not writing, you’ll find Jan reading, running, pulling weeds, walking the dogs, or chasing uninvited wildlife out of the house. For more information visit her at www.janblazanin.com.

Giveaway:

Jan has been kind enough to contribute a signed copy of A&L Do Summer for a giveaway!

To enter simply leave a comment on this post.

For extra entries:

-Be a follower of this site (just click “Join this site”) or a follower on Twitter [+1 entry each].

-Link to this contest on Twitter, Facebook, etc. [+1 entry per each link].

Please list your extra entries in the comments.

The contest is open in the US and Canada and ends on March 9th at midnight EST.

Good luck and happy reading!

Win signed Deadly bookmarks! Details at the end of this post.

September 7, 1906

I know that one day I won’t be on this earth anymore.  A world without the physical me – what will that look like?  I’ll seep down into the soil, become a plant, a tree; I’ll be falling leaves, yellow, crunching under a child’s feet until I am dust.  Nothing.  Gone.

Every September, the shivers come over me, thoughts of my brother’s terrifying death, and the questions – why did his short life end?  Why do people have to die?

I write here, trying to explain, each word a stepping stone.  These words illuminate my past; they bring me forward, to the future.  They help me remember.

Without my writing, I would suffer an emptiness worse than I feel now.”

Excerpt © 2011 Julie Chibbaro

About the book:

A mysterious outbreak of typhoid fever is sweeping turn-of-the-century New York.  Every week more people fall ill, and despite thorough investigation, there’s no cause in sight.  It’s not until the city’s most unlikely scientist – 16-year-old Prudence Galewski – takes a job as an assistant in a laboratory that the evidence begins to fall into place.  It seems one person has worked in every home the fever has ravaged:  Mary Mallon, an Irish immigrant dubbed “Typhoid Mary” by the press.  Strangely, though, Mary hasn’t been sick a day in her life.  Is the accusation against her an act of discrimination?  Or is she the first clue in a new discovery bound to change medical history?

What people are saying:

“Fever 1793 (Laurie Halse Anderson, 2000) meets Newes from the Dead (Mary Hooper, 2008) in this absorbing diary of a fictional teen who witnesses the epidemic unleashed on turn-of-the-20th-century New York by the infamous ‘Typhoid Mary.’” –Kirkus Reviews

“A deeply personal coming-of-age story set in an era of tumultuous social change, this is top-notch historical fiction that highlights the struggle between rational science and popular opinion as shaped by a sensational, reactionary press.” – School Library Journal, 2/11

“This is the kind of stuff that is forever facing us in terms of government and society, and what makes this particular believe-it-or-not story so interesting and relevant today.” — Richie’s Picks

“You guys.  I just finished Deadly by Julie Chibbaro and it is fabulous!  It gets an A+ on the Mattie Gokey Scale of General Awesomeness.”  — Abbythelibrarian.com.

Released: February 22, 2011

About the author:

Julie Chibbaro grew up in New York City wondering how so many people could live together without infecting each other with mortal diseases. She is also the author of Redemption, which won the 2005 American Book Award.

Giveaway:

Julie has been kind enough to contribute 5 signed Deadly bookmarks for a giveaway!

To enter simply leave a comment on this post.

For extra entries:

+1 for following Julie on Twitter @juliechibbaro

+1 for joining the Deadly by Julie Chibbaro Facebook page

Please list your extra entries in the comments.

The contest is open in the US and Canada and ends on March 7th at midnight EST.

Good luck and happy reading!

The pandas have tallied the entries and chosen a winner for our Nathaniel Fludd: Beastologist giveaway! And that winner is:

Sid Dunneback!

Thanks to everyone who entered. Happy reading!

The pandas were very excited about the Anya’s War prize packs (especially the chopsticks) and they couldn’t wait to pick two winners. Those winners are…

Bethany

and

Karen Einstein!

Thanks to everyone who entered. Happy reading!

Win a signed copy of Rival! Details at the end of this post.

KATHRYN

I saw an old commercial once where famous singers used their voices to shatter glass. So I looked into it last year for a project in physics class, and it didn’t take much of a Google search to find out the whole thing is pretty much a myth. Theoretically, the sound waves created by vibrating vocal chords could break a crystal goblet if they resonated long enough at just the right pitch, but finding and holding a note like that is incredibly difficult. The human voice, it turns out, just isn’t that strong.

Human hatred, on the other hand, is. Anybody who doubts that should stand where I am right now and feel the hate waves coming off of Brooke Dempsey.

We’re halfway through the second day of senior year, and both of us are in the back row of the Chamber Choir; me in the soprano section, Brooke nine spots over with the altos. Even with all those people between us, even with our folders up, our eyes on Maestro Anderson and our voices busy on a really hard Bach cantata, I feel a steady ping coming off of Brooke like the signal from a giant antenna. It’s like this every time we’re in the same room together; nothing has changed in the year since this whole mess started—she’s tracking me, I’m tracking her. The defense department would kill to have radar this good.

Excerpt © 2011 Sara Bennett Wealer

About the book:

Rival is a high-stakes duet between two seniors–once friends, now enemies–who are preparing to go up against each other in a major singing competition. To Brooke, winning means escaping the in-crowd for life as a professional musician. Kathryn, meanwhile, sees victory as the key to a much-needed college scholarship. As the big day nears, each girl must face her fears about the future, her scars from the past, and the fact that the person she hates most might just be the best friend she ever had.

What people are saying:

“This book gets it all exactly right—friendships, envy, and the fact that you can never truly know another person.”–Sara Zarr, author of STORY OF A GIRL and SWEETHEARTS

“Awesome, awesome and more awesome. Not one wrong note.”–New York Times Bestseller Lauren Myracle

“RIVAL is a must-have addition to school and public libraries collections alike.”–Voice of Youth Advocates

“Wealer has a talent for depicting the fragile moments on which friendships are made and broken.”–Publishers Weekly

“…like Mean Girls THE MUSICAL but BETTER. And the ending? PERFECT. True to life, true to the characters. I loved it. Fabulous debut.”–The Crooked Shelf: Memoirs of a YA Addict

Released: February 15, 2011

About the author:

Sara Bennett Wealer grew up in Manhattan, Kansas (the “Little Apple”), where she sang with the choir and wrote for her high school newspaper. She majored in vocal performance at the University of Kansas before deciding she had no business trying to make a career as an opera singer. She transferred to journalism school, where nobody cares if you can hit a high C or convincingly portray a Valkyrie. Sara now lives in Cincinnati with her husband and daughters, and she still sings when her schedule allows—most recently with the May Festival Chorus, the official choir of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. You can visit her at www.sarabennettwealer.com.

Giveaway:

Sara has been kind enough to contribute a signed copy of Rival for a giveaway!

To enter simply leave a comment on this post.

For extra entries:

-Be a follower of this site (just click “Join this site”) or a follower on Twitter [+1 entry each].

-Link to this contest on Twitter, Facebook, etc. [+1 entry per each link].

Please list your extra entries in the comments.

The contest is open in the US and Canada and ends on March 2nd at midnight EST.

Good luck and happy reading!

The pandas have counted the entries, and the winner of our The Trouble with Half a Moon giveaway winner is…

Sophia Chang!

Thanks to all who entered. Happy reading!

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 4
8:19 p.m.

This was Daniel’s deal. He’d taken the order, contacted a supplier, and set it all up. I was just the sucker he’d roped into driving him for the actual delivery. Which meant, technically, I was also the guy who had the police cruiser riding his ass through town.

Just like always.

“You know, Dick,” Daniel said, “I’m pretty sure you bring this cop bullshit on yourself.”

“Oh yeah?” I kept the steering wheel as steady as I could and stole another glance in the rearview. All I could make out in the dusky darkness were bright headlights and the outline of the light bar on the cruiser’s roof, which—so far— wasn’t flashing. “How do I bring it on myself? By hauling you around everywhere in my brother’s unlucky car?”

Excerpt © 2010 Mindi Scott

About the book:

What comes next for a teen who was the last person to see his best friend alive and the first to find him dead?

What people are saying:

“Highlighting the dark (and yet acutely relevant) side of high school today, Scott brings to the table heavy issues that are impacting teens with a storyline that reads as real as life itself. With characters that ring true and a journey that proves honest, Freefall is no doubt sure to be one of the best contemporary young adult books of the year.” –New York Journal of Books

“Scott does a remarkable job capturing her characters and making them come to life. The reader will feel the depth of the characters and care about what happens to them. The novel is well-written with a realistic storyline that stays focused on the characters and the events that bring them together.” 5Q/4P –VOYA

“Scott’s well-crafted debut reads like a John Hughes–style romantic comedy filtered through a study of teenage grieving… Seth’s slow discovery of his own potential keeps the story moving and entertaining.” -Publisher’s Weekly

“This is a realistic novel with compelling issues depicted as they are in life. With this first novel, Scott proves herself a formidable talent in the field of YA fiction.” -Booklist

“Seth’s character is fully realized, without the burden of too much introspection or weighty insight to bog down the pace of the narrative. This is a solid exploration of what you can and can’t do to help your friends, built on top of an engaging story of boy meets girl.” -Bulletin for Center of Children’s Books

Released: October 5, 2010

About the author:

Mindi Scott lives near Seattle, Washington, with her drummer husband in a house with a non-sound-proof basement. You can visit her at http://mindiscott.com.

You need something?

I can get it for you.

You have a problem?

I can solve it.

That’s why they come to me.  By they, I mean every kid in the school.  First graders up to eighth graders.  Everyone comes to me for help, and most of the time I’m happy to provide it.  For a small fee of course.

My office is located in the East Wing boys’ bathroom, fourth stall from the high window.  My office hours are during early recess, lunch, and afternoon recess.

Sometimes I do pro bono work.  I don’t know why free is called pro bono, but it is.  If your situation seems important enough I just may offer my services without the usual fees of money or favors.  But that doesn’t happen too often.  And when it does, it’s usually because Vince asks me to.

Vincent is my best friend and right-hand man.  He’s a good guy; in addition to being awesome with numbers he’s also the most book-smart kid I know, and the best business manager a guy could have.  I know you shouldn’t mix your business and personal life, but we ran a tight operation and had been friends since kindergarten.

We’d started this business together and although I might be the guy everyone comes to, it’s just as much Vince’s business as it is mine.  So when he gives me one of those looks that only I know, that says, Hey, Mac, you should cut this kid a break and do this one pro bono, I listen to him.  There are times that I trust his judgment more than my own, especially when it comes to money issues.

My real name is Christian Barrett, but everyone calls me Mac.  Mac is short for MacGyver.  This eighth grader, Billy Benson, called me that once, and it stuck.  Now it’s just Mac for short, because people are lazy.

Right now you might be wondering how a little, blue-eyed sixth grader with shaggy dark brown hair could end up with a business like this?  And I don’t blame you, I hardly believe it myself sometimes.  It’s actually a pretty long story that’s probably best left for later.  So for now let’s just say it involves an old trailer park playground, a vampire, and one angry fourth grader and we’ll leave it at that.

Excerpt © 2011 Chris Rylander

About the book:

Diary of a Wimpy Kid meets “The Sopranos.”

What people are saying:

“Here is an original – a story that really gets how guys are pals. It’s also a story about sixth grade wiseguys that is funny, mysterious, and true to the heart of what really matters when you are in middle school. Do yourself a favor. Read it. Now.”–Jon Scieszka (National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature and NYT Best-Selling author of The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs and The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales)

“Debut novelist Rylander mines a substantial amount of humor and heart from this combination hard-boiled crime novel and middle-grade character piece.”–Publishers Weekly

Released: February 8, 2011

About the author:

This is Chris Rylander’s first book for children. A lifelong Chicago Cubs fan, he lives in Fargo, North Dakota. You can visit him at www.chrisrylander.com.

Win the first three Beastologist books! Details at the end of this post.

September 26, 1928

There were times when Nathaniel Fludd wasn’t sure he’d survive living with Aunt Phil.

“Hold on!” she called over her shoulder. “The field’s a bit bumpy.”

Today was one of those times. With his feet resting on the weasels’ crate, Nate gripped the sides of the cockpit. He had no idea if all pilots were this bad at landings or if it was just Aunt Phil.

The nose of the plane dipped down. They were coming in a little fast, it seemed to Nate. And low, he thought, as they clipped a tree, shaving a good three feet off the top. Unable to stand it, he closed his eyes.

They landed with a jolt that sent his knees clacking into his chin. As they bounced and rolled to a stop, he tasted blood from where he’d bit his tongue. Once Aunt Phil cut the engine, Nate’s pet gremlin, Greasle, popped her head out of his rucksack. “Is she done with all her hopping and bopping?”

“If you’re wondering if we’ve landed, the answer is yes,” Nate said.

Excerpt © 2010 R.L. LaFevers

About the book:

Nathaniel Fludd never dreamed that mythical beasts were real. Or that he would be the one who was supposed to take care of them…

After tangling with the deadly basilisk, Nathaniel Fludd is glad to return to England with his Aunt Phil. But someone has ransacked their home, and their best suspect is the sinister man who’s been trying to steal the Book of Beasts.

Before Nate and Aunt Phil can find the culprit, they are called to Welsh countryside. The wyverns (giant dragons) are in an uproar. Could the same man who ransacked the Fludd house be behind the rift with the wyverns? And just what does he want with The Book of Beasts? But before Nate can solve that mystery, he must calm the dragons before it’s too late. It’s just another day at work for the world’s youngest beastologist!

What people are saying:

“A solid start to a new series. . . . A quick and enticing read that will appeal to a wide variety of children.” —School Library Journal

“A fastpaced story that successfully combines fantasy and history into an entertaining, believable world.” —Booklist

“Straightforward sentences, chronological narrative, short chapters, and Murphy’s plentiful black-and-white illustrations make this appropriate for middle-grade readers looking for a series to grow with.” —Kirkus Reviews

“LaFevers gets the Nathanial Fludd, Beastologist series off to a sprightly start with this wry story. . . [a] quick-paced adventure, which should entice kids to return for Nate’s next escapade.”—Publishers Weekly

Released: October 2010 from Houghton Mifflin

About the author:

R. L. LaFevers (Robin Lorraine when she’s in really big trouble) grew up surrounded by shelves of old dusty books, a passel of brothers, and a wide variety of pets, including a goat, chickens, chipmunks, a baby anteater, and, for a few short weeks, two bear cubs, who were very wild and untamed. She has also spent a large portion of her life being told she was making up things that weren’t there, which only proves she was destined to write fiction. She is the author of thirteen books for young readers. In addition to the Nathaniel Fludd, Beastologist books, she is also author of Theodosia and the Serpents of Chaos, (Houghton Mifflin, 2007). She lives in Southern California and although she no longer has any exotic pets, she does have raccoons who visit her back porch, coyotes who howl at her window, and hawks that soar high overhead.

Giveaway:

Robin has been kind enough to offer the first three books in the Nathaniel Fludd, Beastologist series (Flight of the Phoenix, The Basilisk’s Lair, and The Wyvern’s Treasure) for a giveaway!

To enter simply leave a comment on this post.

For extra entries:

-Be a follower of this site (just click “Join this site”) or a follower on Twitter [+1 entry each].

-Link to this contest on Twitter, Facebook, etc. [+1 entry per each link].

Please list your extra entries in the comments.

The contest is open in the US and Canada and ends on February 21st at midnight EST.

Good luck and happy reading!

Win a copy of Anya’s War and other prizes! Details at the end of this post.

Anya inspected the first black page of her Book of Moons where she’d affixed the last photo Papa snapped in Odessa: of Anya shivering next to Mama and Georgi in the cold, in front of their old linden tree. Last January, she was still polite Anya of Pushkin Street, a good girl who talked a little too much but knew when to keep her mouth shut. For example, when her grandmother Babushka’s dumplings weren’t as delicious as their cook, Valentina’s; or when the secret police was patrolling her neighborhood because spies had reported anti-communist activity; or in case Mama was eavesdropping outside her new bedroom in Shanghai and might overhear her nightly prayer to God: Help me tell my mother, former diva of the Odessa Opera, I am too afraid to sing onstage.

The two black corners holding the family photo were slightly crooked, the way she had left them before her birthday lunch this afternoon. She had constructed the booby trap so if Babushka was snooping again, Anya would catch her. Babushka couldn’t leave anything out of place. In her rage for order, she would have reset the corners — despite Anya’s warning on page one:

To You,

who wish to spy

on my fond memories and deepest thoughts,

Read at your own risk!

Anya Rosen

Excerpt © 2011 Andrea Alban

About the book:

It is the eve of World War II. Anya Rosen and her family have left their home in Odessa for Shanghai, believing that China will be a safe haven from Hitler’s forces. At first Anya’s life in Shanghai is privileged and relatively carefree: she has crushes on boys, fights with her mother, and longs to defy expectations just like her hero, Amelia Earhart. Then Anya finds a baby, a newborn abandoned on the street. Amelia Earhart goes missing. And it becomes dangerously clear that no place is safe—not for Jewish families like the Rosens, not for Shanghai’s poor, not for adventurous women pilots. Based on the author’s family history, ANYA’S WAR is about finding strength within, when the world spins out of control.

What people are saying:

“An important addition to the literature about WWII refugees.”—Booklist Magazine

“… Anya’s Shanghai is richly chaotic, polyglot and packed with refugees. Russian, Yiddish, Hebrew, Mandarin Chinese and Italian pepper the dialogue… A delightfully textured glimpse at a little-remembered period of Jewish history.”—Kirkus Reviews

“Anya’s War by Andrea Alban tells a timeless story of love and danger in the setting of Shanghai, where many Jews fled to take refuge…(an) inspiring first novel of courage under duress.”—Maxine Chernoff, Poet and Author, Winner of the 2009 PEN Translation Award for The Selected Works of Friedrich Hölderlin

“This work of historical fiction is rendered all the more compelling by the integration of the author’s family stories. A fascinating read, Anya’s War gave me an insider’s perspective about this little known time in history.”–Kristin McCloy, author of bestselling novels Velocity, Some Girls, and Hollywood Savage.

“Anya’s War is not just a terrific read but a loving act of cultural retrieval: the story of a Jewish girl and her family in Shanghai composed in spicy, effulgent, unforgettable prose and with vivid heartrending detail. A portrait of a bygone time and a forgotten exile, Andrea Alban is a major new voice.” —Alan Kaufman, author of Jew Boy

“Anya’s War is a powerful novel of cultures, adolescent emotions, aspiration, passion, fear and anticipation. Within it, we glimpse wartime China, its deep-seated traditions, structures, classes and beauty. (The book is)… rich with metaphor and reality, a powerful combination during an explosive era of world war and genocide. Alban’s writing style is structured, cogent and evocative.” —Charles Weinblatt, author of Jacob’s Courage, A Holocaust Love Story

Released: February 1, 2011 from Feiwel & Friends/Macmillan

About the author:

Andrea Alban’s debut novel Anya’s War was inspired by her Jewish father’s childhood in war-torn Shanghai, a little known passage in holocaust history.  She is also the co-creator with Lisa Burnett Bossi of nine books, greeting cards, and guided journals which draw on a love of family and nature’s wonders including The Happiness Tree (a Florida Children’s Book Award nominee), the bestseller, January’s Child: A Birthday Month Book, Ten Little Wishes, and Celebrating Motherhood.

A resident of San Francisco, Alban is a dynamic speaker at schools, museums, libraries and literary festivals throughout the Bay Area and beyond. Alban serves on the faculty of Book Passage and its annual Children’s Writer Conference, and coaches writers in the craft of fiction. You can visit her at www.andreaalban.com.

Giveaway:

Andrea and her publisher have been kind enough to contribute two sets of prizes for a giveaway! Each set will include a signed hardcover of Anya’s War, “double happiness” chopsticks, a recipe for Li Mei’s piroshki, and “Chopstick Rules, according to Anya.”

To enter simply leave a comment on this post.

For extra entries:

-Be a follower of this site (just click “Join this site”) or a follower on Twitter [+1 entry each].

-Link to this contest on Twitter, Facebook, etc. [+1 entry per each link].

Please list your extra entries in the comments.

The contest is open in the US and Canada and ends on February 16th at midnight EST.

Good luck and happy reading!