Into the Firestorm: A Novel of San Francisco, 1906 by Deborah Hopkinson (200 pages)
Eleven-year-old Nicholas Dray has run away from the county poor farm orphanage in Texas and has traveled all the way to San Francisco, California. While wandering the streets looking for work, he meets Mr. Pat Patterson who owns a stationery store. Mr. Pat agrees to let Nick work for him, but is called away for business only a few days after Nick begins. He asks Nick to watch the store and care for his dog, Shake, while he is away. Nick takes his job very seriously and when he awakens to a massive earthquake, he does everything he can to save Shake and the valuables in the store. Unfortunately, after the earthquake, fire ravages the city and threatens to burn the entire area to the ground. Nick, Shake, and some neighbors manage to escape the fire, but what will become of the store Nick swore to protect?
Miss Simer's Rating: ***
Twilight - Book One - 498 pages - Miss Simer's Rating: ***1/2
New Moon - Book Two - 563 pages - Miss Simer's Rating: ***1/2
Eclipse - Book Three - 629 pages - Miss Simer's Rating: ***
Breaking Dawn - Book Four - 756 pages - Miss Simer's Rating: ***1/2
Sally Harrison lives with her mother, father, and younger brother on a plantation in south Georgia. Her master and his wife have been kind to their slaves, but the master's brother gets ill and he promises to send five slaves to live on his brother's plantation. Sally and her brother are two of the five chosen to go. When Sally's father gets wind of this plan, he decides that it is time for their family to try to escape to freedom. He has heard of the Indians in the Florida swamp who let slaves live with them as free men, so the Harrisons leave in search of these Indians. With several close calls and a gator attack that leaves one of the family members dead, the Harrisons make it to Seminole territory and adopt Indian ways. I recommend this book to those of you who are not quite old enough to handle the super-gritty reality of slavery as portrayed in Copper Sun.
Shy, quiet, but studious Patrice lives with her Aunt Mae in the grim inner city of Chicago. Maneuvering the halls of her apartment building and the halls of her school is always a challenge as the local gang members are eager to hurt and harass her. When the opportunity to win a scholarship to the top African-American boarding school in the country arises, Patrice recognizes it as her chance to escape ghetto life. Luckily, she has a friend in Monty, a gang leader who falls for her because she is the one beautiful thing "growing amongst the trash." With his protection from the bullies and his support as she applies for the boarding school, this story has Patrice beating the odds. 
Avi's five short stories are quick and fun to read. He opens with "Bored Tom" and the reader meets Tom, a boy who wants nothing more than to be able to sleep all day and watch TV all night. A cat approaches him and offers to switch bodies with him so he can get his wish. The next story is "Babette the Beautiful" in which the queen wants her daughter to be born without flaws, but a side effect of her wish is that her daughter is invisible. In "Curious" the reader discovers the secret truth behind all sports mascots. In "The Shoemaker and Old Scratch," a shoemaker makes a bargain with a cat to split half his income if the cat takes care of all the mice in his shop. He doesn't uphold his bargain and has some pretty rough consequences. Finally, in "Simon" the reader learns about what can happen to a person if all they do is take, take, and take.
Case One in the Sherlock Holmes and the Baker Street Irregulars Series
Joe "Stosh" Stoshack and his friend, comic book store owner Flip Valentini, have a debate about who was the fastest pitcher in baseball history. The problem is that radar guns weren't invented until the 1970s and pitching speed couldn't be accurately measured before then. The two decide to use Stosh's secret time-traveling power to go back to 1942 with a radar gun and clock the speed of the great Satchel Paige's pitches. Not only do the two get acquainted with Satch's amazing pitching talents, but they also get to see what a fast-talkin', fast-livin' kind of guy Satch was. Filled with true facts from some of baseball's forgotten great games, this novel is sure to hit a home run with baseball fans.
Beginning his life in the loving hands of owner Bob, this tiny border collie puppy was surrounded with love from his mom, dad, and siblings. When a fire destroy's Bob's farm, he is forced to sell the pups. The pup then goes through a series of owners. Some are kind to him, some whip and chain him. Through all his owners, the dog has one thing on his mind: find some sheep! His instincts tell him he is supposed to be a working farm dog and he wants to find some sheep before he gets too old. Although he also dreams of returning to Bob's farm and being reunited with his parents, the dog ultimately knows that is unlikely. This is a cute story that reminded me of Ann Martin's book A Dog's Life: The Autobiography of a Stray.
Three fourteen-year-old girls, newly friends, tell their parents they are going to see a movie, but in actuality they are at a party with eighteen-year-old boys. When one of their parents goes to the same movie they were supposed to be seeing and discovers they aren't there, the girls begin to get panicked phone calls from their parents. Where are they? Instead of telling their parents the truth, the girls concoct a lie about being attacked by a man in the park by the river. The girls think that their parents will be so happy that they're safe that they won't be forced to report this "crime" to the police. But they are wrong. Soon, the girls have told the lie to the police and they are treated with honor and respect for their bravery. The lie grows and soon is completely out of control. When will the girls tell the truth? When an innocent man is arrested? When a little girl goes missing? Never?
In New York, 1967, Holling Hoodhood (yes, that's his real name) is convinced his English teacher Mrs. Baker hates him. While all the other kids are gone to Hebrew school or Catholic Catechism on Wednesday afternoons, Presbyterian Holling must stay with Mrs. Baker, alone. At first she has him do menial chores such as cleaning erasers or washing the blackboards, but soon she decides their time would be better spent reading Shakespeare. "Why does Mrs. Baker live to torture me?" Holling wonders. However, Holling becomes swept up in the language of Shakespeare's plays, and he often quotes them - especially the curses. But, this story is really about a boy coming of age in a time where the Vietnam war is raging on, young soldiers are being kidnapped or killed, and a little Shakespeare is just what a boy needs to get his mind off the issues of the world.
