The Iron Thorn by Caitlin Kittredge

Aoife (pronounced Eefa) is just a few weeks shy of her sixteenth birthday. Unlike most teens, this is an event she’s dreading. At age sixteen Aoife’s mother, Nerissa, and her brother, Conrad, went mad, and the necrovirus that ate away at their logic and reason lies dormant in Aoife’s blood. Aoife, now a ward of the city of Lovecraft, expects that she, too, will go mad on her birthday. Until then she applies herself to the thing she loves – engineering. She’s always had a knack for working with machines, and she studies hard at the School of Engines. Perhaps the numbers, figures and pure science running through her mind will keep the madness at bay.

Then Conrad makes contact via a stained letter slipped under Aoife’s dormroom door. The ghost ink yields a strange and frightening message:

“The ink of the HELP lifted off the page, suspended in the smoke, corpse-pale. As the smoke dissipated, the ink stretched and re-formed, spelling a new phrase in its ghostly hand, the encoded message the ghost ink had kept hidden.

Go to Graystone

Find the witch’s alphabet

Save yourself”

With these words Aoife’s life changes and expands in ways she could never have imagined. Along with her best friend, Cal, Aoife hires the handsome guide Dean Harrison to sneak them out of the city to her father’s house in Arkham. Aoife thought that getting out of Lovecraft would be the difficult part, but more hazards lie ahead than behind. Once at Arkham the trio will find long-buried family secrets, dangerous creatures and maybe even romance…if they survive.

This novel was simply amazing. The author has invented an alternate reality where logic and reason dictate social norms, and those who believe otherwise, the heretics, are hunted down and punished by cowled, over-lording proctors. In the midst of this closed environment Aoife shines in her determination and stubborn refusal to be anything other than herself. Her personality is deftly drawn by Kittredge, and readers will find themselves cheering for her as she risks everything to find her brother. Personally, I can't wait for the second book in this new, exciting series, and I highly recommend it to fans of steampunk, fantasy and adventure.

Leaving Gee's Bend by Irene Latham

I really wasn't sure if I'd like this novel. Gee's Bend has never really interested me, and I wasn't sure if a white adult novelist would be able to convincingly tell a story as a ten-year-old poor black child. But everyone was raving about the book, and the author is from Alabama, so I gave it a go. And am I ever glad that I did!

Ludelphia Bennett is such a wonderful character. She jumped into my mind and heart and took over as I raced through her story. Secondary characters were just as developed, and Gee's Bend seemed to come to life in my mind. Not only am I now interested in the history of this amazing place, I find myself with the urge to quilt...

The Percy Jackson Countdown: Day Seven: The Gods of Manhattan

Look.

Now, look again.

What do you see?

Layered over our modern day New York is a spirit city, called Mannahatta, home to Munsee Native Americans, warrior cockroaches riding rat steeds, a papier-mache child. Built by history and legend, it's ruled by the Gods of Manhattan, famous men and women of New York like Zelda Fitzgerald, Alexander Hamilton and Babe Ruth. These gods amuse themselves by playing dangerous power games, including wrongfully imprisoning the Munsees's spirits in Central Park. And now someone is assassinating these immortal gods, which should be impossible.

13-year-old Rory and his 9-year-old sister Bridget live in present-day New York City unaware that these ghosts, monsters and oddities coexist alongside them. Rory has a gift for seeing this other world, Mannahatta, but has repressed this ability until the day he wakes up and notices things which should not exist in the middle of a metropolis…or anywhere else, for that matter. Rory learns that he is the Light, the only one able to see past reality into this spirit world. Unfortunately for Rory, a Light also is the only one who can defeat the forces of evil at work in Mannahatta, which is why all the others have been killed. With the help of his little sister and a small but fearless Battle Roach named Fritz, Rory begins an exciting, occasionally terrifying journey through this intriguing world. His quest will be both difficult and dangerous, because while he’s searching for a way to free the Munsees, evil assassins are racing to find him-the boy who can change the destiny of New York.

The Gods of Manhattan by Scott Mebus

Book 1: The Gods of Manhattan

Book 2: Spirits in the Park

The Percy Jackson Countdown: Day Five: The Ranger's Apprentice

In a medieval land called Arulen lives a fifteen-year-old orphan named Will. He dreams of becoming a knight, and longs to be apprenticed into battle school. His small, wiry size makes him a poor choice for his dream, but his quick thinking, honesty, and castle-scaling abilities make him the perfect candidate to be Halt’s hardworking apprentice. Halt is a Ranger, and the Rangers, with their dark cloaks and shadowy ways, have always made people nervous. The villagers believe the Rangers practice magic that makes them invisible to ordinary people. What no one realizes is that the Rangers are the secretive protectors of the kingdom. Highly trained in the skills of battle, surveillance, woodcraft and archery, they fight the battles before the battles reach the people. And as Will is about to learn, there is a large battle brewing. The exiled Morgarath, Lord of the Mountains of Rain and Night, is gathering his forces for an attack on the kingdom. He has sent two kalkera, brutish bear/apes, to assassinate Aruluen’s most prominent war leaders and weaken the fighting forces. This time, he will not be denied . . .

Ranger’s Apprentice series by John Flanagan

Book 1: The Ruins of Gorlan

Book 2: The Burning Bridge

Book 3: The Icebound Land

Book 4: The Battle for Skandia

Book 5: The Sorcerer in the North

Book 6: The Siege of Macindaw

Book 7: Erak’s Ransom

 

The Percy Jackson Countdown Day Three (slightly less belated): The Stoneheart Trilogy

The Stoneheart Trilogy, by Charlie Fletcher, is a book of magic and adventure...and being in the wrong place at the right time.

A city has many lives and layers. London has more than most. Not all the layers are underground, and not all the lives belong to the living. George Chapman is about to find this out the hard way. On a school trip he's punished for something he didn't do. In a tiny act of rebellion, he lashes out at a small carving on the wall--unexpectedly breaking it off. And then something horrible does happen: a stone Pterodactyl unpeels from the wall and starts chasing him. George is already running before his mind starts trying to tell him this is impossible.Chased through the streets of London, George only survives because the statue of a soldier, Gunner, comes to life and assists him. It seems that the soulless statues of London are angry at George for his act of rebellion, and he will not be able to escape them until he finds something called the Stone Heart and repairs what he has broken. But Walker, a man cursed to walk the Earth forever, wants George and his new friends Gunner and Edie to find the Stone Heart for more sinister reason...

The Stone Heart Trilogy by Charlie Fletcher
Book 1: Stoneheart
Book 2: Ironhand
Book 3: Silvertongue

The Percy Jackson Countdown Day One: Septimus Heap

Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief is a fabulous book by Rick Riordan. It's also coming to movie theaters on February 12th and the trailer looks amazing (you can see it for yourself at http://www.percyjacksonthemovie.com/).

Many of you have already read (& reread) the Percy Jackson & the Olympians series, or are reading it now, or will be clamoring for the titles once you've seen the movie (or the trailer). So instead of talking about that series, I'm going to take the next ten days to tell you about other series that you might enjoy, if you enjoy(ed) Percy Jackson.

Today we start with Septimus Heap:
"The seventh son of the seventh son, aptly named Septimus Heap, is stolen the night he is born by a midwife who pronounces him dead. That same night, the baby's father, Silas Heap, comes across a bundle in the snow containing a new born girl with violet eyes. The Heaps take this helpless newborn into their home, name her Jenna, & raise her as their own. But who is this mysterious baby girl, & what really happened to their beloved son Septimus?" This series is about a young man with the wrong name, a lost princess who is not as lost as people assume, magic & adventure. There are villains to fight and wrongs to right, epic quests and grand adventures. For more info, check out http://www.septimusheap.com/


The Septimus Heap series, by Angie Sage
Book 1: Magyk
Book 2: Flyte
Book 3: Physik
Book 4: Queste
Book 5: Syren

Hoot by Carl Hiaasen

Hoot was a great book! It was about these kids who are basically all outcasts & are trying to save a little bit of nature — some little, harmless owls that are going extinct & need protection against construction workers tearing up their homes! It was an amazing book about helping out nature, that also had an underlying plot about one of the kids & his mom sending him off to military school.

I love this book!

~Becky Thielman, age 13

Book Description: Roy, who is new to his small Florida community, becomes involved in another boy's attempt to save a colony of burrowing owls from a proposed construction site.

Bones of Faerie by Janni Lee Simner

15-year-old Liza has grown up in a world destroyed by war. She knows that Before there were things called Airplanes that flew through the sky; that Cars carried people over Roads; and that trees and plants didn't thirst for human blood. But the war with Faerie changed everything. Faeries turned nature against humans, and, though humans won, the world would never be the same. There are three rules that everyone must abide by in order to stay safe in this new, treacherous world:

Don't touch any stones that glow with faerie light, 

or that light will burn you fiercer than any fire.

Don't venture out alone into the dark, 

or the darkness will swallow you whole.

And cast out the magic born among you, 

before it can turn on it's parents.

When Liza's sister Rebecca is born with skin so light it is almost translucent, eyes silver as moonlight off the river bed, and faerie-pale hair, Father takes her to the hillside and leaves her to die. Soon after, Liza's mother leaves in the night. Now Liza is seeing flashes of vision, and runs away before Father can kill her, too,for being born with magic. Her journey will take her to the Outside, where she will find new friends, learn a different way of living, and undertake a dangerous quest to Faerie to find her mother.

This excellent book is a refreshing new kind of Faerie tale. One that takes the best parts of traditional fairy tales - the adventure, mystery and sense of danger - and gives it an entirely new twist. I highly recommend this book to any teen (or adult) who enjoys adventure, tales of quests, and stories that give us new insight into ourselves and the world around us.