Catching Up/ Blather

It is true that I have read every fiction book in my middle school
collection. The problem is that it doesn't stay read for long. After finishing in 2011, I've tried to read everything before I buy it (Really. No joke.), except for books in really popular series. Those I have to snag and read over the summer. A disproportionate number of these are fantasy books.


I read very quickly, and have been reading between 2 and 5 novels this summer every day. In order to write reviews, I often have to take notes. When I am reading book five in a series, I often have very little memory about details, characters' names, or things that have occurred. I read so that I can recommend books. I need to know a one to two sentence summary, and know to whom I would give the book. It gets a bit difficult to write series reviews, but I have to read the books so that I can maintain my domination over my collection!

Earlier this month, I had my main bathroom completely gutted and redone. Almost everything in the room was original to the house, which was built the same year I was born-- 1965! When the contractor comes in and says "Wow. We don't see many of these gold starburst counter tops anymore!", you know it's time. Also, when there is no hot water in either sink, no shower, and the toilet has to be stopped from running all the time, things must happen.

Loud things. Violent things I didn't want to watch, like the entire cast iron tub being broken up into smaller pieces and carried down the stairs, pipes being sawed. The dog didn't like this, and it was hard to concentrate. BUT! I did get caught up on a few things.

And now the bathroom is be-a-YOOOO-tiful.





Gutman, Dan. License to Thrill. (Genius Files #5)
January 27th 2015 by HarperCollins

Love Gutman. Man's a god. Not fond of this series, where the main characters are named Coke and Pepsi, and they travel around having improbably adventures. My students, however, were fighting over these a lot this year, and someone lost book three and I had to replace it.

From Goodreads.com: "When we last left our heroes, twins Coke and Pepsi McDonald were in Roswell, New Mexico, and they had just seen a strange beam of light. Now their cross-country road trip is about to take a detour that's out of this world--literally!"



McMann, Lisa M. Island of Shipwrecks. (Unwanteds #5)
February 3rd 2015 by Aladdin

There is a fifth grade teacher who reads the first one of these to her classes, so there has been a lot of demand. Lots of improbable things happen (Look! A magic tube on this weird island!), there are tons of different characters... beyond me. But the students love them. (Two more are in the works.)

From Goodreads.com: "Alex and his friends from Artimé are stranded on a newly discovered island after barely surviving a storm that destroys their ship. And it turns out they’re not alone…

Back in Quill, Aaron’s power base grows as he aligns himself with an unlikely ally. Together, the two enact a drastic, risky plan to finally conquer Artimé—a plan that could ultimately leave everyone in both Artimé andQuill in far more danger than Aaron realizes."

Flanagan, John. Scorpion Mountain (Brotherband #5)

December 2nd 2014 by Yearling (first published November 3rd 2014)

Lydia and Evanlyn have coffee and cakes. The men have hummus and tabouleh. The rooms have carved chairs with comfy cushions. There are war like people doing war like things. Duncan's face gets red with anger a lot. They invent glasses. There's a dog named Kloof.

And... that's what I take from books when I am NOT writing notes and focusing on plotting, character development and the nearly impossible task of writing a gripping tag line.

Enjoy these tremendously; just don't remember them after I read them!

From Goodreads.com: "Hal, his Brotherband crew, and the Ranger Gilan have freed the twelve Araluens sold into slavery. Returning to Araluen, Gilan is given a new mission by King Duncan: protect his daughter’s life. Princess Cassandra has survived one attempt on her life already, and now whispers of a second attempt have reached the kingdom. A deadly sect known as the Scorpion Cult is thought to be behind the assassination threat."