The middle grade years are ones of transition, during which kids are faced with many important questions like what is important to them, and who they will be when they grow up (as well as more mundane yet still important things like what the significance of deodorant is!). The following six middle grade books emphasize […]
Is there anything more exciting than the promise of a crop of fantastic new writers that comes with a new debut class each year? You may already know the answer is a resounding “No,” but what you might not be aware of is that this year’s debuts are frighteningly fantastic. Ask anyone who gets their […]
As a young adult in the nineties, my YA options weren’t anything like they are now. I read every Sweet Valley book a million times (the Senior Year series was totally underrated, by the way; it actually still holds up pretty well), devoured every Judy Blume book I could get my hands on, and…that was […]
It’s no surprise that Rainbow Rowell chose the 1980s as the setting for Eleanor & Park, her first YA novel. After all, the 1980s were arguably the Golden Age of the teen movie (see The Breakfast Club, Pretty in Pink, Say Anything, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Footloose), and Rowell’s novel is an homage to […]
Haunted houses strike fear into our hearts because they turn a place that’s meant to represent safety and comfort into a sinister trap to be outwitted and escaped under terrifying circumstances. And while most horror fans turn to the movies for their haunted house fix, fiction has dealt with its fair share of spiritually compromised […]