#MarvelousMiddleGrade May Reading Challenge SignUp

Hello everyone and welcome to the sign up for Middle Grade May reading challenge  (#middlegrademay).

As many of you know, I love middle grade and have had the pleasure of reading many great books over the years. Even better, a good chunk of my career has been about sharing those books with the kids the authors write for. Most recently it has also become about sharing those good reads with fellow writers of middle grade.

And so...

I have a wonderfully massive to read pile to get through and a wonderfully massive to get list once I have made it through that pile (actually it is a few bookshelves worth of reading).

And so...

This May I am devoting my reading time to really putting a dent in that list and that "pile".

I would like to invite all of you to join me.

Whether you read MG all the time and have a pile to get through or you have always meant to try a middle grade or two (as an adult)  but haven't...

why not join me?

Read a couple of books, read a few, read ten-it is entirely up to you.

What?

Prizes?

Of course!

Here is how that will work:

Read One Middle Grade Book 

Sign up with Mr. Linky (below) or by commenting on this post. Read  and share which book you read for this reading challenge on a Monday check-in post or the final Friday Round Up Post (May 31). It is not required but you can also leave a link to a post of your own.  You will be  entered to win a 25 dollar gift certificate  from a book location of your choice.

Read Two to Five Middle Grade Books 

Sign up with Mr. Linky (below) or by commenting on this post. Read  and share which books you have read on a Monday check-in post or the final Friday Round Up Post (May 31).   It is not required but you can also leave a link to a post of your own. You will be entered to win a 40 dollar gift certificate from a book location of your choice.

Read Six or More Middle Grade Books:

Sign up with Mr. Linky (below) or by commenting on this post.  Read  and share which books you have read on a Monday check-in post  or the final Friday Round Up Post (May 31) It is not required but you can also leave a link to a post of your own.You will be entered to win a 60 dollar gift certificate of from a book location of your choice AND I will also send you a middle grade six pack. That six pack will include the first three of Arthur Slade's The Hunchback Assignments, oh yes, yes it will.

The Check-Ins

Each Monday in May I will have a check in post. On that post you can leave a comment about which middle grade book/s you read and if you like share what you thought of it.  If you've written a blog post leave a link.  NOTE: you can comment on a Monday check-in post anytime during the week. 

We start May 1 and finish up end of May and I will be making draws for prizes the first week in June. Hope you can join in!

If you can and have the room on your blog (if you have one that is) I would love for you to link to this post using our Middle Grade May icon, created for us by the wonderful Akoss!

If you have any questions, please do ask, this is pretty last minute so I realize that things may not be very clear.

Happy Reading!

Marvelous Middle Grade Monday-Twerp by Mark Goldblatt

Greetings and Happy Marvelous Middle Grade Monday all! Hope this last week has treated you all well and has been filled with some wonderful reads. I'm here this morning to tell you about a book a literally sank into. Told in first person by a boy named Julian it is a book filled with a cast of living breathing characters who I hope we get to meet in another book. Loved this like I loved Wednesday Wars, Okay for Now, Neil Armstrong is My Uncle and Other Lies Muscle Man McGinty Told Me. Highly recommend you get on out there and get yourself a copy for your shelves and take a step back in time to the sixties to meet a boy and his group of friends who today's kids could totally relate to. Plus, kudos to the author for taking what could be a viewed as typical-teacher makes student write in journal-and gives it a fresh and unique spin because it is completely and utterly character driven and therefore could not have been written any other way.

From Goodreads:

It's not like I meant for Danley to get hurt. . . .

Julian Twerski isn't a bully. He's just made a big mistake. So when he returns to school after a weeklong suspension, his English teacher offers him a deal: if he keeps a journal and writes about the terrible incident that got him and his friends suspended, he can get out of writing a report on Shakespeare. Julian jumps at the chance. And so begins his account of life in sixth grade--blowing up homemade fireworks, writing a love letter for his best friend (with disastrous results), and worrying whether he's still the fastest kid in school. Lurking in the background, though, is the one story he can't bring himself to tell, the one story his teacher most wants to hear.


Do head on back to Shannon Messenger's for more MMGM wonderfulness! 

Tuesday Tales-Master of all Masters

SORRY on the quality...I tried to make it all fancy, but...you see what happened.

This is the book I signed out from the library all those years ago. It was loads of fun to tell this story then hold up the book and say to kids they too could go the library and find this book and others like it filled with great stories!

Um, not the actual actual book I should say this is what it looked like. I did return my copy, lol!






Master of all Masters-original and alternate re-tellings

Master of All Masters-Joseph Jacobs
The Master of All Masters
Master of All Masters audio recording from LibriVox.

Suggestions for learning and re-telling:

-remember the basics. don't try and memorize the story, just the bones. the maid and the man meet at the market because she is looking for a job as a housemaid. the man hires her, they go back to his house. he has special name for himself, for his bed, for his pants, his cat, the fire, the water, his house. you can learn what they are OR make up your own. this is a fun writing activity btw! in the end she wakes him up to tell him to get out of bed and put on his pants because the cat has a spark of fire on her and if they don't get some water on it the whole house will be on fire!

-as an activity for kids, create the characters for them. you need a man, a maid, pants, bed, cat, fireplace, water in a bucket, house. these can be put in an envelope or on sticks or make finger puppets out of them. on the back they can put the names for the things as the man described them or put their own made up names. great and fun way to remember and re-tell. Thanks for joining me on this adventure. I imagine my vlogging and how I do this series and other booktalks (see my first vlog here) will change over time. And yep...thinking a few less scarves and possibly not quite so close to my face when telling a story! Any other thoughts, tips, story requests, please let me know!

Marvelous Middle Grade Monday-Ivy in the Shadows by Chris Woodworth

Morning Middle Grade Monday peeps! I hope that April is treating you all well and you've been finding some good reading in your middle grade book pile! I know I have. One of those reads is Ivy in the Shadows  by Chris Woodworth and I will begin telling you about it by saying...voice, voice, voice...voice. From page one Ivy begins telling you her story in a compelling and pull you in kind of way. You feel the quiet pain that she is carrying with her and you feel it build from being mad to being angry. She has a lot going on in her young life. Her step dad left, not that he was much of a presence in her life, he pretty much ignored her. Her best friend seems to be leaving her because is more interested in boys and makeup and hanging out at the mall and shopping. Her mother spends a whole lot of time on the phone with her best friend Maureen and when she gets a job Ivy sees less and less of her. Some might say it's a good thing because Ivy and her mom spend a lot of time fighting. But it's not a good thing. It means she has to take over the care of her little brother, along with this really weird boy named Caleb who is their new boarder. Then there are the things she has heard when her Mom is on the phone. Can you imagine all that happening to you? I'd be pulling my hair out, screaming, stomping, acting out and yet Ivy keeps it pretty cool as she tells you her story. There were points  I wanted to reach in and shake some of the people in Ivy's life. Okay, maybe even shake Ivy a little and say it's okay just let it out. Then I realized that Ivy would have to do that herself--she really is the one who needs to step out of the shadows, shake it up and speak her mind. This is an author who knows how to tell a story that the middle grader on the cusp of becoming a teen would love to read and I would say I would give this to ten and up, in fact. Even as I read I could think of a few young readers I would give this to and thank goodness Chris Woodworth has a few more titles 'cause I am sure they'd be back for more because of how well the author paints the middle grade life and how she is not afraid to show the realities Ivy's life when she is suddenly the one trying to take over the care of her little brother.

From Good Reads:

After Ivy's stepfather disappears, Ivy's mama begins waitressing at Dining Divinely to make ends meet. She also takes in a boarder—twelve-year-old Caleb, who's the same age as Ivy and is the weirdest guy she's ever met. With Mama working full-time, Ivy has to babysit her little brother, JJ. She also has to fend off the nosy Pastor Harold; stop Caleb from filling JJ's head with lies; and keep her best friend, Ellen, from knowing anything about her embarrassing situation at home. 
 
Ivy has always found out all she needs to know by lurking in the shadows (some might call it "eavesdropping"). But as things at home become more complicated, she learns to step into the light and not only listen but speak up


Enjoy the day and don't forget to head back to Shannon Messenger's for some more MMGM love!

Marvelous Middle Grade Monday-Keeper of the Lost Cities by Shannon Messenger

Greetings and Happy First Day of April! Hope those of you playing some April Fooling are having fun, fun. I have a vlog for you all--hope you survive it! I am highly self critical, was totally not going to do it cause I think I look like such a nut on camera and the review/talk isn't quite right (Sophie really not typical in a typical kind of way) BUT-it is something I have always wanted to try. So here it is, my first ever and let me give you a heads up-it is unedited, unrehearsed. In other words I am sharing a first draft. But it for a good cause. One of my favorite reads from last year was KEEPER OF THE LOST CITIES by Shannon Messenger. A book that I kept thinking, I can't wait to get to some kids with this-fantasty lovers will love it, kids who think they may not like fantasy will give it a try and possibly have their minds changed (the MC deals with the pretty down to earth kid typical issue of trying to find your place and figure out who you are). Boils down to me thinking this one will have huge appeal to a wide range of readers. And it was all I could do to keep myself from chasing down random kids in the street and booktalking it. Kay. I have yacked enough-here's the vid/vlog/thing.

From the publisher:
Twelve-year-old Sophie has never quite fit into her life. She’s skipped multiple grades and doesn’t really connect with the older kids at school, but she’s not comfortable with her family, either. And Sophie has a secret—she’s a Telepath, someone who can read minds. But the day Sophie meets Fitz, a mysterious (and adorable) boy, she learns she’s not alone. He’s a Telepath too, and it turns out the reason she has never felt at home is that, well…she isn’t. Fitz opens Sophie’s eyes to a shocking truth, and almost instantly she is forced to leave behind her family for a new life in a place that is vastly different from what she has ever known.


 But Sophie still has secrets, and they’re buried deep in her memory for good reason: The answers are dangerous and in high-demand. What is her true identity, and why was she hidden among humans? The truth could mean life or death—and time is running out.


Reviews:

Kirkus

Alice Marvels (this blog is new to me, looking forward to checking it out some more)

The Book Trailer:

Happy Monday all and be sure to head back to the MMGM linkies!

First Day of April and Back to Blogging.

Well, I have discovered something. I can't stay away from the blogging. I love talking books for children and sometimes for teens too much. And I have so many recent reads that I want to share. Plus, those reads from my Cybils judging for 2012! In other words I do believe I am about to burst with all the book love I have in me.

It was a great month of taking a step back though. Gives you a good sense of what your fingers are itching to write on.

Looking forward to getting back into the blog of things on the first day of April....no foolin'!

Decisions

My plate has been full to overflowing these last few months and just now I am coming upon a quiet time. That will last a few weeks and them school will start up again. That will be added to working and programme planning full time. These will take up the most of my time. Here is where the priorities have to be put in place. Because of my work I need time for reading and choosing picture books and other materials for the classroom and because of my proposed middle grade and possibly teen book clubs I need the time to read the books I want to share with them. And I write. Need time for that. Needless to say the time left is limited and so enters making social media decisions for my time online. This is my blog. It is difficult to say goodbye if only for another month or even two. Especially difficult because I do love being a part of Marvelous Middle Grade Monday and I love sharing some of my favourite reads.

But.

Goodbye it is for another little while. To me blogging that is. I am going to be carving out some time to read all of your blogs...you keep me on my reading and writing toes!