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Gone-Away Lake. by Elizabeth Enright. 1957. Harcourt. 272 pages. ISBN:  9780152022723

 Portia is excited to spend the summer with her cousin, Julian, but she never expects that they will discover an abandoned lakeside community, or that they will make friends with a pair of elderly siblings who still inhabit two of the rundown houses. At Gone-Away Lake, as their friends Aunt Minnehaha and Uncle Pindar call it, Portia and Julian discover life as it was 50 years ago, while having their own summer of modern-day adventures they will never forget.

In this book, as in The Saturdays, Elizabeth Enright celebrates childhood independence. Whereas the Melendy kids explore New York City unsupervised, with just their allowance to pay their way, Portia and Julian are given free rein in the country, where they can enjoy the secret of a forgotten village, and make new friends without sharing them with their parents or with Portia's little brother, Foster. Especially interesting about this story are the connections Portia and Julian feel to Minnehaha and Pindar as children. They never tire of hearing about their friends' fights, friendships, and adventures, and they engage with those stories so fully that they are inspired to create a club of their own in the hopes of recapturing some of that fun and excitement.

Some things about this book bothered me. I couldn't quite buy into the notion that an entire group of fairly wealthy families would abandon not just their homes, but all the contents of those homes, and never return for them. I thought this might be explained at some point, but it never was, and I was distracted by the feeling that there should have been some big reveal of the "truth" about Gone-Away. I also couldn't help but feel that Minnehaha and Pindar  were living like Miss Havisham - waiting for the return of a day that would never be again. Perhaps this was intentional, as I think Portia and Julian breathe some fresh air into the lives of the two older people. Still, I wanted the characters in the story to feel disturbed as I did, and instead they were almost too accepting of the whole strange scenario.

That said, this is a well-written book full of interesting situations, well-described characters and settings, and everything a child wants in a summer story. I am not surprised that it was a Newbery Honor book in 1958, and I think, of the Newberys I've read, it's one of the older ones that still holds up well enough for contemporary audiences. It is similar in some ways to Miracles on Maple Hill - both books are even illustrated by the same artists, Joe and Beth Krush - and I think it also compares well to the Swallows and Amazons books, A Lemon and a Star, and The Railway Children. There is also a sequel, Return to Gone-Away, published in 1961.

I borrowed Gone-Away Lake from my local public library. 

For more about this book, visit Goodreads and Worldcat.

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A Lemon and a Star. by E.C. Spykman. 1955. Harcourt Brace. 214 pages. ISBN: : 9780152447137

A few weeks ago, after reading Miracles on Maple Hill, I realized that while I enjoy children's novels from the 1950s, I have read very few. This inspired a visit to my local library with the specific goal of choosing some Old School Sunday reading material published in the 50s. A Lemon and a Star was a particularly exciting discovery both because I had never heard of it before, and because it ended up being such a great story.

A Lemon and a Star is about the four Cares children - Theodore (Ted), Hubert, Jane, and Edith (Edie), who live with their widower father and his household staff in Summerton, Massachusetts in the early 1900s. Because they have no mother, and because they are each mischievous little people, the Cares kids run rampant around the countryside, getting into fights, falling into the reservoir, capturing foxes, wallowing in mud and even occasionally sneaking into the city by train. Much of their time is spent bribing each other into keeping information from their dad, and in trying to keep Edie happy so she doesn't spoil all their plans before they even get off the ground. They have their own codes of loyalty and friendship, and their own ideas about how the world works, and they employ these rules as they look after themselves and each other.

Like Swallows and Amazons and The Boxcar Children, this book is appealing because it shows kids on their own doing things for themselves. The Cares children are not as responsible as John and Susan Walker, or as Henry and Jessie Alden, but that just adds to the fun of the reading experience. Most kids - whether they grow up in the early 1900s, the mid 1950s, or the early 2010s - will never have the freedom given to the Cares kids, and it's a lot of fun to live vicariously through them as their adventures unfold. I also think kids like to be shocked by the bad behavior of other kids, even if it the behaviors are not something they would do themselves. My husband and I read this book within a few days of each other, and as we discussed it, we just kept laughing and saying, "They're so bad!" Our enjoyment of their behavior reminded me a lot of reading The Best Christmas Pageant Ever. Nobody wants to act like the Herdmans, but everyone wants to know what they'll do next. The same is true for Ted, Hubert, Jane, and Edie.

For a book about so much mischief, the writing is very beautiful. Images of the red house where the family lives, the reservoirs full of sparkling water, and Ted's black eye after a fight are just a few of the moments in this book that bring it fully to life and make it so easy to imagine really being in Summerton watching these kids playing. The personalities of the four kids come across very well. Ted is portrayed as the frustrated oldest child who is stubborn and annoyed by his younger siblings. Edie is the spoiled baby of the family who can be bought but not controlled. Hubert and Jane fall somewhere in the middle, trying to do the right thing and keep their father happy, but also endlessly fascinated by thir older brother and filled with concern for him when he is in danger. Every child reader can find a character to sympathize with in every scene.

Like many books for kids published in the 1950s, A Lemon and a Star is a great celebration of the adventures kids can have in their own backyards. It makes a nice read-alike for The Moffats, The Railway Children, and Swallows and Amazons, as well as for books by Carolyn Haywood and Beverly Cleary. Though I think they will be somewhat hard to find, I hope to track down and read the other three books in this series: The Wild Angel, Terrible, Horrible Edie and Edie on the Warpath, all of which sound wonderful.

I borrowed A Lemon and a Star from my local public library.

For more about this book, visit Goodreads and Worldcat.

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Anastasia Krupnik. by Lois Lowry. 1978. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. 128 pages. ISBN: 9780395286296

Anastasia Krupnik keeps an ever-changing list of things she likes and hates. Sometimes she hates her grandmother for losing her memory and not knowing who she is. Other times, she loves the opportunity to sit down and get to know her better. Sometimes she loves Washburn Cummings, an older boy in her neighborhood, and other times, he makes her so unhappy she adds him to the hate list. Her teacher, her parents, and even her soon-to-be-born baby brother all jump back and forth between the lists as Anastasia navigates life as a ten-year-old.

I remember the Anastasia books from childhood, but I couldn't swear that I've ever read one. As a kid, I tended to be turned  off by older books, and I think this series has always had an unfortunate set of covers that make the stories seem even older than they actually are. Reading it now, as an adult, this book was a surprise. I was surprised by the fresh writing and the main character's strong voice, and I was surprised by how quickly  the story moves, and how easy it was to get lost in it. There isn't much of a plot, really, but what makes the book stand out are all the great details Lowry uses to paint the Krupniks as real people. I loved learning about Anastasia's father, Myron, through the dedication pages in each of the poetry books he has written. I loved Anastasia's brief flirtation with the idea of becoming Catholic, and her impression of what that would mean. Anastasia's family life reminds me of many other families from middle grade series, including the Clementine,  Ramona Quimby, and Alice McKinley books. Somehow I've never thought of the Anastasia books as being in the same class with these "classics" - but I should have guessed that Lowry would write just as well in the realistic fiction genre  as she does in science fiction. 

Anastasia Krupnik will appeal to fans of the books I just mentioned, as well as to readers who like Johanna Hurwitz, Ann M. Martin, and Megan McDonald. It's tricky for me to promote books to kids when their covers look so old and strange, but it's worth giving them a great book talk - or even reading one aloud to a group in order to get kids excited about reading them once again. Very little stands between Anastasia and 21st century girls, and I'm not even sure anyone could tell just from the text that this book is older than I am! If you missed these in childhood, as I did, give them a try now - you won't be disappointed.


I borrowed Anastasia Krupnik from my local public library. 

For more about this book, visit Goodreads and Worldcat.  

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Iris and Walter. by Elissa Haden Guest. 2000. Harcourt Children's Books. 44 pages. ISBN: 9780152021221

When I arrived at my current library two years ago, the first question I received that stumped me was a request for the Iris and Walter books. I knew a lot of kids’ books, even then, but somehow none of the libraries I’d worked in prior to my current position had this series, so I had to admit to the nanny who asked for them that I didn’t know what they were. In the intervening two years, I have read a couple of the later books about this pair of best friends, and I have come to love Christine Davenier’s illustration style. Today, I’m spotlighting the very first Iris and Walter book, published in 2000.

Iris has just moved to the country, and she misses everything about her life in the big city. Her parents try to cheer her up by asking her to play all her favorite games, but Iris doesn’t feel like it. Her problem, she complains to her grandfather, is that the country doesn’t have any kids. Grandpa is sure this can’t be true, so he takes Iris on a walk around her neighborhood. Up a ladder, in a tree, behind the door of a little treehouse, Iris finds Walter, and suddenly life in the country is much, much better.

Lots of children’s books deal with moving to a new place and searching for friends, and the plot of this story doesn’t really add anything that previous books haven’t covered. What stands out about Iris and Walter is the way the story is written, and the specific details Guest uses to evoke Iris’s memories of the city, and her feelings about moving and meeting Walter. For example, Iris doesn’t just miss the city, she misses “playing baseball after supper until it was too dark to see the ball.” She’s not just nervous about the country, she thinks it’s “as lonely as Mars.” And when Iris and Walter finally meet and explore the country together, Guest even takes a few moments to reflect on the natural beauty of Iris’s new home, telling us of “red-tailed hawks and starry skies” and “pale roses” and “cool grass.”

The writing is descriptive and yet accessible for newly independent readers. The vocabulary is rich, but not overwhelming, and the story manages to be literature without being obscure or boring. Kids can relate to the happiness of finding a new friend and to the coziness of spending time with that friend day after day. Walter doesn’t have much to say in this book, so it’s not necessarily the most balanced introduction to a series that stars two characters, but as “how they met” stories go, it works nicely, and it sets us up for all the future fun Iris and Walter will have together.

Iris and Walter reminds me of the sweetness of the Frog and Toad books and the humor of Mr. Putter and Tabby or Henry and Mudge. Recommend it to kids who like the Freckleface Strawberry picture books, the Pinky and Rex series, and the George and Martha series. Learn more about the rest of the Iris and Walter books at the author’s website, http://www.elissahadenguest.com/

I borrowed Iris and Walter from my local public library. 

For more about this book, visit Goodreads and Worldcat.

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The Center of Everything. by Linda Urban. March 5, 2013. Harcourt Children's Books. 208 pages. ISBN: 9780547763484

Ruby Pepperdine lives in the small town of Bunning, New Hampshire, where everyone is obsessed with donuts. On Bunning Day, at the town parade, Ruby will be reading her essay about the history of Bunning, which was selected as the winner from among many submissions. This is a great honor, of course, but Ruby has bigger things on her mind - mainly, the fact that her grandmother, Gigi, died, and Ruby didn’t listen when she tried to give her a final important message. Ruby has used her birthday wish to ask for a way to make things right, and she has been looking for signs ever since, but if nothing happens before Bunning Day ends, Ruby can’t imagine how she will move on.

Like Linda Urban’s last book, Hound Dog True, this is a sensitive and introspective middle grade novel, this time about one girl’s struggle to find her place after losing someone close to her. The novel has an interesting structure, in that the entire story takes place on Bunning Day, but events taking place in the present are interspersed with flashbacks to the recent past that give context to Ruby’s actions on Bunning Day. It is in the flashback sequences that the reader gets to know Gigi, as well as Ruby’s best friend, Lucy and her new friend Nero Deniro. These flashbacks also reveal Ruby as a nervous girl who worries about appearances and the way things are “supposed to be.” She wants to mourn correctly, to do the right thing in all situations for all people, and when she doesn’t feel that she has lived up to these external expectations, she takes it very hard. She is a girl who believes that her world is infused with meaning, and that it’s up to her to decode the signs she is given and make sense of what her grandmother, or the universe might be trying to tell her.

I didn’t care very much for Hound Dog True, but The Center of Everything spoke to me much more clearly. I could relate to Ruby’s silent suffering at the loss of her grandmother, and to the burden of perfectionism that she places on her own shoulders. I became deeply engrossed in the small-town atmosphere, and the Bunning Day parade reminded me of so many parades I attended as a kid in my own small town. Ruby’s younger cousins’ interest in the candy being thrown from the parade floats brought back so many memories.

Though The Center of Everything won’t appeal to every reader, it is a special book that will undoubtedly speak volumes of truth to certain readers. Kids who have connected with Linda Urban’s books in the past will find more of the same humor and sensitivity in The Center of Everything. It is also a great read-alike for Criss-Cross by Lynn Rae Perkins, The Boy on Cinnamon Street by Phoebe Stone and One Day and One Amazing Morning on Orange Street by Joann Rocklin. Though it’s very early in the year to be considering next year’s potential Newbery contenders, this book looks like Newbery material to me - and several others on Goodreads have said the same. I highly recommend this slim, but powerful novel, to middle grade readers and their parents, librarians, and teachers.

I received a digital ARC of The Center of Everything from Harcourt Children's Books via NetGalley. The book will be published tomorrow, March 5, 2013.

For more about this book, visit Goodreads. 

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The Candy Smash. by Jacqueline Davies. 2013. Houghton Mifflin Books for Children. 240 pages. ISBN: 9780544022089
The Candy Smash is the fourth book in the Lemonade War series about Jessie and Evan Treski, siblings who are in the same fourth grade class. It is February and Valentine’s Day approaches. Inspired by his teacher’s presentation of a poem of the day, Evan starts writing love poems, first about his grandmother and later about Megan Moriarty, on whom he has a crush. In the meantime, Jessie works on her extra credit project, a class newspaper. She hopes to find out not only who is delivering secret forbidden candy to the whole class, but also who in her class has a crush on someone else and how her classmates think crushes should be revealed. As in the other books of the series, Jessie fails to understand basic social cues, while Evan loses patience with his sister when she violates his privacy.

So far, in this series, Jacqueline Davies has taught readers about economics, law, and maps. In The Candy Smash, she focuses on journalism and poetry. Each chapter opens with the definition of a term associated with either newspapers or creative writing, and through Jessie and Evan’s experiences, the reader learns the proper use of these terms. The educational aspect of the story is certainly subtle and does not overpower the plot, but there are lots of great opportunities for classroom teachers to connect this book to their curricula.

This is a largely character driven story, which provides a lot of insight into the personalities of both Jessie and Evan. Only Evan’s character truly seems to develop, though; I keep wondering with each new book when Jessie is going to begin to mature a little bit as well. True, she is a year younger than her classmates, but even so, there should be some changes happening in her worldview and relationships that I haven’t really seen yet. Davies does a great job of depicting Jessie’s innocence and lack of experience, but it’s becoming less believable as she gets older. I was also surprised by how little their grandmother appears in this story. After the events of The Bell Bandit, she has moved in with the Treskis, but we don’t see much of her, even though her presence looms large in Evan’s poetic mind. Also notable is Jessie and Evan’s teacher, who is invested in her students and dedicated to helping them improve as students and as possible. I love the way she uses her cat, Langston, as her class mascot and displays pictures of him around her classroom. I’d put her in the same category as Clementine’s wonderful teacher, Mr. D’Matz.

My favorite thing about this book, overall, is how well it handles the romance theme. Many books for younger middle grade readers introduce dating into their fourth grade characters’ lives as though it is a perfectly natural thing for nine-year-olds to pair off into couples. In my experiences with kids, they are not into dating at that young an age, and this book reflects reality much more closely than a lot of others of this same reading level and genre. Sure, the characters have crushes, but they are still figuring out what that means and how it will impact their friendships. I especially like the way Evan’s crush on Megan is resolved - sweetly, but without tons of adult commitments and middle school-esque drama.

The Candy Smash doesn’t really stand on its own, so I’d recommend starting with The Lemonade War and reading the books in order. Parents should feel comfortable giving this series to their second- and third-graders who are strong readers, and I think even fifth graders can still enjoy the stories. Budding journalists and poets will love the back matter showing the class newspaper and some of the poems the students have written. Though Valentine’s Day has passed for this year, there is lots in this book that’s worth reading any time!

I borrowed The Candy Smash from my local public library. 

For more about this book, visit Goodreads and Worldcat.

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Miracles on Maple Hill. by Virginia Sorenson. 1956. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. 180 pages. ISBN: 9780152545581

Miracles on Maple Hill was published in 1956, and it was the winner of the 1957 Newbery Medal. As the book opens, Marly and her family are headed to Maple Hill, a rural area of Pennsylvania where Marly’s mother spent her childhood summers. Though at first it appears to be a happy family vacation, the truth is that Marly’s father is suffering the psychological effects of the time he spent as a prisoner of war. At home in the city, he is angry and irritable, jumping at every little thing and sometimes even mistreating his children. The family is coming to Maple Hill in the hopes that the country lifestyle will help Marly’s dad start to heal. Over the next year, Marly gets to know wonderful people - Mr. and Mrs. Chris, Harry the Hermit, and Margie - and she experiences all the miracles Maple Hill can offer, from maple syrup and wildflowers to the slow recovery of her father’s mental strength.

In contemporary children’s books, there is a tendency to dwell more heavily on the darker side of life. Nowadays, for better or for worse, we trust kids to deal with the harsh truths of life - abuse, poverty, divorce, death - and many books describe these situations in detail, evoking empathy from readers and encouraging them to feel all the associated emotions, good and bad. This book handles the pain of Marly’s dad’s experiences in a more detached way, which I think is an interesting and effective approach.

Marly is about ten years old, and what we know of her dad’s condition is filtered through her point of view. It seems likely, given the personality of her mother, that Marly would be protected as much as possible from the darkness of her father’s experiences. Because of this, the reader is really only shown those few frightening moments of anger that Marly has actually witnessed. Throughout the book, both Marly and her brother react to their father nervously, with lots of concern over how he will respond to them, but the reader isn’t subjected to the experiences that made them feel that way. I can only assume this was a conscious decision on the part of the author, and my guess is that it was a decision made to protect young readers. Though some kids do certainly like to read the gory details, or maybe even need to read them to feel validated, other kids are more sheltered, like I was, and this book strikes a great compromise between perfect happiness and interesting storytelling.

The other remarkable thing about this book is its descriptions of country living. I borrowed this book from my urban library system, where kids don’t often run into wildflowers, wild mushrooms, or sap from maple trees. If they read this book, though, they will feel as though they have spent a year on Maple Hill right alongside Marly. The descriptions of everything Marly sees, feels, and tastes during her year of visits to Maple Hill are beautiful, and the author uses just the right details to transport the reader through the beauty of the different seasons. She ties all of this wonderful information about the natural world in with Marly’s relationship with her brother, Joe, and both kids’ relationships to their Maple Hill neighbors, and it is the combination of character and setting that drives the story forward.

This is very much of a book of the 1950s. There are lots of references to very rigidly defined gender roles, where Joe is permitted many freedoms, but Marly must stick close to home, and where it is surprising when Marly’s father learns to cook, or when her mother drives the family car. At one point, Marly’s mother actually apologizes to Marly’s teacher because Marly is more of a tomboy than the other girls at her one-room schoolhouse. These references are among the few moments in the story that make it seem more historical than contemporary. There are also a lot of references to Marly’s father’s time in World War II, which could date the book, but given that our country is also at war today, it is possible that contemporary kids could have a parent in a similar situation to Marly’s father and find some hope and meaning in his recovery.

I really enjoyed this book, though it’s probably best enjoyed when we think of it as “old” realistic fiction rather than historical fiction. The story reflects the values of the time, but they have not been filtered through contemporary thinking. Two very recent novels about similar subjects that might draw interesting comparisons are The Second Life of Abigail Walker by Frances O’Roark Dowell and The Bell Bandit by Jacqueline Davies.

I borrowed Miracles on Maple Hill from my local public library. 

For more about this book, visit Goodreads and Worldcat. 

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The Hundred Dresses. by Eleanor Estes. 1944. Harcourt Children's Books. 96 pages. ISBN:  9780152051709

The Hundred Dresses is a short realistic fiction novella by Eleanor Estes that received a Newbery Honor in 1945. It is a story, based in part on the author’s childhood, about the impact of bullies. Wanda Petronski is a poor Polish-American immigrant, who comes to school each day in the same clean but shabby blue dress. One day, when her classmates tease her for her unusual last name and style of dress, Wanda claims to have one hundred dresses all hanging in her closet From then on, Peggy and her best friend, Maddie, ask Wanda every day how many dresses she has, punishing with their taunting her for what they know must be a lie. It is only when Wanda’s family leaves town to escape the cruelty of their neighbors that Maddie - who is the story’s main character - feels a sense of remorse for what she has done.

Though some things make it clear that this story is not set in the present day, for the most part, I was amazed at how well this book holds up 67 years after it was first published. Entire lifetimes have come and gone since the book was first written, and yet kids still need to learn the same hard lessons. The relationship between Maddie and her best friend, Peggy, who leads most of the teasing, reminds me of so many friendships I have read about in children’s fiction. Peggy can be likened to Wendy, who makes whale jokes about Linda in Judy Blume’s Blubber, or even to Jennifer in E.L. Konigsburg’s Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth, who makes demands upon Elizabeth to prove their friendship. Today’s “mean girls,” who appear in practically every middle grade novel about female friendship, all seem to follow in the footsteps of Estes’s Peggy. I tend to think of bullying as a new phenomenon, because we talk about it more nowadays than ever before, but this book reminds everyone - kids and adults - that cruelty has been around for a long, long time.

Just after I finished reading The Hundred Dresses, I read on School Library Journal that the Open Circle Program at the Wellesley Centers for Women has named it the number one best book for Kids’ Social and Emotional Learning. I instantly understood why. Reading books helps kids become more empathetic - reading books about bullying helps kids step into the shoes of both bully and victim and hopefully gets them thinking about why they would not want to be cruel to a classmate. I certainly don’t think books alone will combat the problem of bullying, or provide a complete emotional and social education, but this book is a perfect choice for getting the conversation started and for getting kids to think critically about their behavior. By taking a kid’s eye view of a real-life bullying situation, it gets away from the preachy tone of well-meaning adults and instead give kids the power to make the right choices, and to make amends when they do the wrong thing.

I borrowed The Hundred Dresses from my local public library. 

For more about this book, visit Goodreads and Worldcat.

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The Year of the Book. by Andrea Cheng. May 22, 2012. 160 pages. ISBN: 9780547684635

Anna is in fourth grade, and lately, it seems like her only friends are Ray, the school crossing guard, and people she meets inside of books. She and her old best friend, Laura, are drifting apart, and though Camille, a girl in Anna’s Chinese class, seems really nice, Anna’s fear of new people keeps her at a distance. Over time, though, Anna starts to realize that life can’t be lived between the pages of even the very best book, and she begins to work on getting her nose out of the fictional world so she can make friends in the real one.

Though the writing is quite good, by far, what made me fall in love with The Year of the Book were Abigail Halpin’s illustrations. From the moment I laid eyes on the cover in the library, I was drawn to the many book covers which adorn the tree on the front of the book. I am amazed at how Halpin was able to create these teeny tiny reproductions of well-known covers that, even shrunk, are instantly recognizable. Before I even started reading, I enjoyed playing “Name that Children’s Book” and trying to see how many I had read.

Luckily, the story lives up to the promises of its cover. Anna reads lots of books, and I can think of several big readers right off the top of my head who would love her for that reason alone, regardless of her otherwise passive personality. I love the way author Andrea Cheng portrays the strained friendship between Anna and Laura. So many books simplify the shifts that happen in friendships as girls age, by absenting one friend or the other from the situation altogether. As I recall from my own experience, fourth grade was a pivotal year in which a girl who was my best friend one day could be my worst enemy the next. Cheng really understands that dynamic and all the emotions of hope, confusion, and disappointment it can create. I appreciated the push and pull in the girls’ friendship and Anna’s upset feelings over not knowing where she stands.

Cheng also does a nice job of balancing the theme of racial identity with everything else going on in the story. Anna’s Chinese heritage is important to her, but this is a book about Anna as a whole character, not just Anna as a Chinese-American character. As it should be. I want to see lots more books that understand that idea and treat characters as people, not issues!

The Year of the Book is a quiet story about a quiet girl, which means it might not appeal to readers who gravitate toward lots of adventure and excitement. Plenty of kids, though - bookworms especially - will be thankful for the friendship of a character like Anna who understands just what a fourth grade girl deals with on a daily basis.

Andrea Cheng has many other books. Read about them here. Abigail Halpin is also the illustrator for the adorable Cupcake Diaries, and she did the covers for Penny Dreadful and The Grand Plan to Fix Everything as well. Next to Julia Denos, she might just be my favorite chapter book illustrator! I can’t wait to see more from both Halpin and Cheng.

I borrowed The Year of the Book from my local public library. 

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The Lemonade Crime. by Jacqueline Davies. March 21, 2011. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. 160 pages. ISBN: 9780547279671

In this sequel to The Lemonade War, Jessie and Evan have begun school in the same class for the first time. Though they aren’t fighting anymore, they do still have one unresolved issue leftover from their end-of-summer war - they still haven’t gotten back their stolen money. Both Jessie and Evan are sure of who took it, but Jessie is the one who is truly determined to seek justice. She studies up on criminal law and turns the playground into a courtroom, complete with judge, lawyers, and jury. She assumes that her classmates will all be on the side of right - that is, her side - but finds that anything can happen in a court of law.

I liked this continuation of the story begun in The Lemonade War, but I don’t think it was quite as strong. What made the first book so enjoyable was the tension between the siblings, and because there is a third-party villain this time, some of that tension was necessarily missing from this book. What did work nicely was the relationship between Jessie and her older classmates and her obvious desire to win their affections even as she gets far too into the courtroom aspect. In keeping with the previous book’s format, The Lemonade Crime defines legal words at the opening of each chapter, and whereas math lessons abound in the first book, a lesson in criminal justice is the central focus this time. I also think the author handled Evan’s reaction to the alleged thief and his possible motives in a very believable way. The emotional conclusion of the book shows some especially good character development for Evan as he ultimately confronts the thief.

Kids who read the first book won’t want to miss this second volume, or the recently released third one, The Bell Bandit. Readers should start with the first book or the gravity of Jessie and Evan’s loss when the money is stolen might not be fully realized, but I think it is possible to get the gist of things and keep with this story without that first book. I would probably be most likely to give this book to kids in grades 3 and 4, and I think it would be a great one for kids who are interested in mysteries, or who express interest in becoming lawyers.

I borrowed The Lemonade Crime from my local public library. 

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Pilgrims Don't Wear Pink. Stephanie Kate Strohm. May 8, 2012. Graphia. 204 pages. ISBN: 9780547564593.

Pilgrims Don’t Wear Pink is a young adult novel for older teens about one girl’s summer job as a camp counselor at a living history museum. Though it shares a very similar setting to Leila Sales’s Past Perfect, this book takes the concept in an entirely different but equally enjoyable direction.

Seventeen-year-old Libby Kelting loves history, so she is really excited for her summer job teaching colonial cooking to elementary school-aged girls. She’s a little upset that she can’t use her cell phone and is thus separated from her best friend, Dev, who is doing an internship with an apparently evil fashion magazine, and she’s not crazy about her roommate, who insists upon conducting all conversations as her colonial alter ago, Susannah Fennyweather. Libby is soon distracted from these annoyances, however, by not one, but two romantic prospects. Cam is a devastatingly handsome twenty-one-year-old “squaddie” - that is, member of the schooner demonstration squad - and Garrett is a geeky journalist stationed on board a supposedly haunted ship, with whom Libby ends up sharing sleeping quarters. It’s clear from the outset whose affections Libby would prefer to attract, but things aren’t always what they seem, and the romantic conclusion of the story is as fun as the setting and Libby’s wonderful sense of humor.

This is a true feel-good romance, and will make wonderful beach reading this summer. Libby’s voice is very contemporary and real, and her relationships with each of the boys are by turns emotional, embarrassing, exasperating, and exciting. Parts of the story are predictable, but no more than any other romance novel, and the setting and minor characters really make the world of this story stand out as compared with others of this genre, including Past Perfect. The book does include more mature content than I was expecting - especially after reading another Graphia title, My Misadventures as a Teenage Rock Star which suits a younger audience - but the sexual references and language definitely make it a novel most appropriate for the high school level.

Pilgrims Don’t Wear Pink is Stephanie Kate Strohm’s first novel, but I really hope it’s not her last. Her fresh and unique approach to contemporary YA is a great addition to the field, and I will be excited to see what she comes up with next. Pilgrims Don’t Wear Pink will be published on May 8, 2012.

I received a digital ARC of Pilgrims Don't Wear Pink from Graphia via NetGalley.

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