Divergent, by Veronica Roth

 

 

Divergent: This is the story of Beatrice Prior, and her dystopian world. There are four factions that are all based off of virtues: the Amity (Kindess/Peace), the Dauntless (bravery and strength), Candor (honesty), and Abnegation (selflessness). These four factions help provide for each other in the city, living up to their virtues.

Then there is the Choosing Ceremony. All 16 year olds must choose what faction that they will live in, and dedicate the rest of their lives to it. Before that, there is a test, that determines what faction they will do best in.

Tris goes to the test, and the tester Tori tells her that she is Candor, Abnegation, and Dauntless, in other words, Divergent.

Tori tells Beatrice that being Divergent is very dangerous, and Tori deletes the results. Beatrice has no clue what Divergent is, but she must keep it a secret if she wants to survive.

At the Ceremony, she chooses Dauntless, and chooses a new name. Tris. 

In the world of the Dauntless, she must train in hand to hand combat, gun shooting, and to be a Dauntless. There she suffers taunts, injuries, and almost even gets killed.

I'm not spoiling it anymore. ;)

This book is one of my all time favorite series, and Veronica Roth has done an excellent job with this story. Though, there are a few innapropriate parts, so if you can't read that stuff, don't read it. But if you are a huge fan of the Hunger Games, then you'll love this! You'll love it as much as I do if you read it. And don't forget to catch Insurgent, the second book in the Divergent series!

Bye!!

Heart of a Samurai, by Margi Preus

Heart of a Samuraii:

 This story is about a young Japanese boy and his friends. They are fishing on a boat, when a bad storm wrecks them upon Segull Island, with no food or water.

 Then they are rescued by Americans, the boys believing to be monsters, with strange food, foreign language and strange boats.

    The sailors take the boys to the island of Hawaii where they learn to work, and feed themselves. Instead, the boy is fascinated by the Americans rather than frightend.

    Soon, he chooses to live with the Americans instead of going back to Japan.

    This story is about bravery, trust, and exploring new things. I recomend this book, it's a Newberry Honor, and I think this is a great book, so take the time to sit down and enjoy this amazing story!

Schooled: Gordon Korman

Schooled
This book is about a guy named Capricorn (Cap) Anderson who is a hippie, growing up on an isolated farm, homeschooled by his hippie grandmother Rain.
But when Rain falls out of a tree, picking plums, she breaks her hip and Cap has to live with a guidance counselor and her cranky daughter, and go to the crazy snake pitt of middle school.
As a hippie, in a middle school, he's a freak.
And in Claverage (C Average)  Middle School, it's a "tradition" that the biggest dork in the school is nominated to run for Student President. So when Cap comes along, he's perfect.
As the story goes along, he goes from socially challenged, to socially awesome.
I like this book, so read this! It's great!

Fly Girl



FlyGirl
This fun book takes place in the time of World War II and it's about a girl named Ida Mae Jones.
All Ida has ever wanted to do was fly. When her father was alive, he went to flying school and came back to the strawberry farm with a Curtis JN-4 plane, or "Jenny". That day he took everyone up into the sky. Ida was the last. When she went up into the blue vault of the sky, she never wanted to come back down.
Now in World War II, Jackie Cochran has agreed to help the U.S. Army train women to become pilots and help with the war overseas.
Ida sees this as a big chance to use her light skin to pass as a white girl, and so she joins the Woman Airforce Service Pilots, or WASP.
But later she learns the dangers, ridicule and trials to fullfilling her dream, not to mention she must deny being part of her family.
This book is a great book, heartwarming and fun. You should read this book, and it'll become a favorite book on your list.
Now, READ IT!! ;)

Drama: Raina Telgemier

Drama: Raina Telgemier
This is a book about a teenager named Callie who loves theater. This year she is in charge of set design and she's going to try to make a Broadway worthy show with the high school budget. But then there's the drama to deal with NOT onstage. Snotty girlfriends, a confetti cannon to fix, and when to cute twin brothers enter the picture things get even crazier!
Drama is a great book, and I like it, but if you don't like kissing and all that, then I suggest you don't read it. But it's a great book, and BTW it's a graphic novel, NOT comic book.
I love this book, and I recomend Miss Telgmier's first novel Smile. It's a story about the author, and I think it's also good.
So read this book because it's really great! Bye!

The Reinvention of Moxie Roosevelt: Elizabeth Cody Kimmel

The Reinvention of Moxie Roosevelt is the story about a girl named Moxie who starts going to a fancy boarding school.
Moxie sees this as an opportunity to reinvent herself, to become someone worthy of the name Moxie.
There's a number of options on what to be, but what? Moxie decides to try them all out, recording everything she does with her different personalities in a notebook called her Personality Log.
But when an enemy gets its hands on her Personality Log, things go awry.
This book is cute and funny, and even thought it doesn't have any awards it's still a great book.
So if you at least take a moment to sit down and read this, you won't regret it. Byyyyyeee!

Eragon: Christopher Paolini

Eragon
This book is about a young boy named Eragon.
He lives in the hidden village Carvahall, hidden by a long range of mountains known as the Spine, hidden from the eye of the land's evil ruler Galbatorix.
Eragon is out hunting in the Spine, when he comes across a mysterious blue stone. But later that night, the egg hatches to become a beautiful blue dragon named Saphira.
As the story goes along, two creatures named the Ra'zac come to Carvahall, in search of the egg. Then, while Eragon was gone in the woods where he was hiding Saphira, the Ra'zac come to the farm where he lives, and burns it down, killing his uncle Garrow.
As the story goes along, Eragon comes to be a feared person known as a Dragon Rider.
I won't spoil it anymore.
I LOVE this series and I'm currently reading book three Brisingr.
READ IT!!

Moon Over Manifest: Clare Vanderpool

Moon Over Manifest is about a girl named Abilene Tucker and how her father gets a job working on the railroad, sending her to the town where he grew up, Manifest, Kansas.
After hearing her father's stories of Manifest, Abilene is disappointed to find Manifest a dusty, beaten-up town.
But soon her excitement sparks up when she finds a hidden cigar box full of memos, trinkets and letters.
Some of the letters talk about a mysterious spy called the Rattler. (Cue evil music.) These letters send Abilene and her friends on a spy hunt.
But when Abilene ignores the warning and goes down the Path to Perdition, she breaks one of a diviner's pots and has to repay a debt to the Hungarian Diviner, Miss Sadie.
Miss Sadie tells stories each time Abilene visits, and soon Abilene feels closer to the town her father grew up in, and finds out who he was.

Moon Over Manifest is a great book, and a Newbery Honor Book, and it's really good. I say that about every book I review!

Turtle in Paradise: Jennifer L. Holm

Turtle in Paradise is about a young girl named Turtle, who has an unknown father, and a mother who is always out of a job thanks to kids.
Her mother, Sadiebelle is a housekeeper, and her clients' kids are always getting Turtle into trouble, which leads to her mother being fired.
Then Turtle's mom gets a job working for a lady who hates kids. So Turtle leaves to Key West, Florida to live with an aunt she never met, along with rotten boy cousins.
Everyone there seems to know Turtle, saying she is the spitting image of her mother (she really isn't). There's Mercury hot weather, a Weeping Ghost, and even Black Caesar's mysterious buried treasure!
Turtle in Paradise is a Newbery Honor, and it is a favorite of mine.
I'm a very big fan of Newbery Honor books.
Turtle in Paradise is a great book, I love it, and YOU should too.
So read it!! ;)

One Crazy Summer: Rita Williams-Garcia

One Crazy Summer  is about three African-American girls named, Delphine, Vonetta, and Fern, and how they take a plane from their home to Oakland, California, to meet their long-lost mother who left when Fern was barely born. 
Their mother Cecile is a poet, who lives in a green stucco house. 
As the story goes on, the girls go to a summer camp, created by a group of African-American people called The Black Panthers, who protest about African-American's unfair rights. 
Soon, their mother is arrested for no reason. 
One Crazy Summer is a fun story about sisterhood, motherhood, and sticking together.
I personally think it's a great book, and that you should definitely read it. 
It has at least fifteen awards, and I'll only list a few. 
The Scott O'Dell Award, Newbery Honor, Coretta Scott King Award, and National Book Award Finalist.  
It's a great book! 
So sit down for at least an hour and read this! Bye!

The Grimm Legacy

The Grimm Legacy, by Polly Shulman.
If you guys out there LOVE fantasy, adventure and all of those sorts of books, then you'll definitely love this.
This story is about a girl named Elizabeth, and how she gets a part-time job at a library, where instead of checking out books, you can check out objects and all sorts of doohickeys.
There she is a page (a  page is hard to explain but it's a person who works there and is like a slave for whoever comes into the library... they get them what they want) with other people who later on become her friends.
And then, there is this one collection called the Grimm Collection, a HUGE collection of magical items from the Grimm fairy tales!
Soon, the objects go missing, and Elizabeth along with her friends, Marc, Anjali, and Aaron are sent on an adventure to find the thief.
It may sound a bit boring because I'm making it sound that way, but it's really awesome! I didn't explain too much because I didn't want to spoil the ending.
In fact, this book is personal favorite of mine.

On a scale of 1-10, I give it a 9.5