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To Sweet Beginnings In Sycamore Hill by Stacey Weeks
Coming Home To Sweet Beginnings In Sycamore Hill by Stacey Weeks is a most delightful contemporary Christian novella and 0.5 in the Sycamore Hill series which is charming. The reader is introduced to some of the residents of Sycamore Hill. Everyone has a story. They are all unique and they are all searching for a […]
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Never Never by Colleen Hoover And Tarryn Fisher
Coming 28th Feb Read the first chapter now: 1 Charlie A crash. Books fall to the speckled linoleum floor. They skid a few feet, whirling in circles, and stop near feet. My feet. I don’t recognize the black sandals, or the red toenails, but they move when I tell them to, so they must be […]
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Love in the Library by Maggie Tokuda-Hall
Love in the Library offers a tender picture of humanity and the miracle of love, and hope in the midst of a Japanese internment camp. Love in the Library by Maggie Tokuda-Hall, illustrated by Yas Imamura. Candlewick, 2022. 32 pages. Reading Level: Picture Books, ages 4-8 Recommended For: Ages 4-8 Tama is one of many Japanese Americans who is incarcerated in an internment camp. Because she loves books, she tends the library where she finds escape through stories–but not enough to relieve the constant fear and anxiety. Thankfully, there is another constant. George brings back a stack of books every day, along with his broad smile. Eventually Tama realizes that…
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The British Are Coming (Young Reader Ed.) by Rick Atkinson
The British Are Coming recounts the first 4 years of the American Revolution in an engaging style, capturing substance and detail. The British Are Coming (Young Reader Edition) by Rick Atkinson. Godwin Books (Henry Holt), 2022, 189 pages plus appendices Reading Level: Teen, ages 12-15 Recommended for: ages 12-up “I am very much hurt,” wrote King George III in response to a report of his American subjects dumping a shipment of tea into Boston Harbor. The king’s displeasure resulting inclosing the harbor, whereupon all the colonies from Massachusetts to Georgia rose in solidarity to support their Boston brethren. Events moved swiftly from there: a military governor appointed for Massachusetts, a…
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Mr. Lincoln Sits for His Portrait by Leonard S. Marcus
Mr. Lincoln Sits for His Portrait is an unusual and touching look at our nation’s 16th president through the then-new medium of photography. Mr. Lincoln Sits for His Portrait: The Story of a Photograph That Became an American Icon by Leonard S. Marcus. Farrar Straus Giroux, 2023, 95 pages plus notes, bibliography, and index. Reading Level: Middle Grades, ages 10-12 Recommended for: ages 10-up “If I had another face, would I be wearing this one?” That was Abraham Lincoln’s famous rejoinder to his opponent suggesting he was two-faced. But for a man universally regarded as homely, Lincoln understood the power of photography better than most of his generation. He sat…
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The Shape Of Your Heart by Debbie Howells
Grab Life – And Live! The Shape Of Your Heart by Debbie Howells is a charming contemporary novel that follows a character on a journey through grief. Grief is not a linear route, there are ups and downs, good days and bad days. No one person’s journey is the same as anyone else. The journey […]
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An Island In The Sun by Kate Frost
Escaping A Grey Winter’s Day An Island In The Sun by Kate Frost is a charming contemporary novel that will add warmth and brightness to the gloomy grey days of winter as we escape to sun and heat. The Mediterranean climate comes alive under Kate Frost’s pen as we can almost ‘see’ the heat shimmer. […]
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Finding Refuge In Bellbird Bay by Maggie Christensen
Coming Home Finding Refuge In Bellbird Bay by Maggie Christensen is the most charming contemporary novel and the fifth book in the Bellbird Bay series. It can be read as a stand-alone. I thoroughly enjoyed my return visit to Bellbird Bay. Bellbird Bay is the most delightful seaside town where hurting lives can heal. The […]
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Too Small Tola and the Three Fine Girls by Atinuke
“Too Small Tola” returns in a second volume of this warm-hearted series of Nigerian family life. Too Small Tola and the Three Fine Girls by Atinuke, illustrated by Onyinye Iwu. Candlewick, 2022, 96 pages. Reading Level: Chapter Book, ages 7-9 Recommended for: ages 4-8 as a read-aloud, 7-10 for independent readers. Tola is the youngest (and smallest) of three siblings, but like her little grandmommy she has a tall will and spirit. She is growing up in “a run-down block of apartments in the megacity of Lagos,” Nigeria. Sister Moji is studying to become a doctor and brother Dapo is working on his soccer-star moves, so Tola is often overlooked…
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Love and Laughter Book List
A Valentine’s Day list of books that celebrate family love and wholesome romance. It’s the season of hearts and flowers and chocolate. Valentine’s Day is a shameless commercial opportunity, but a holiday that celebrates love (the original meaning of St. Valentine) is a pretty neat idea, actually. And it’s nice that it takes place in the middle of February, which is typically a gloomy month. Commercially, the holiday has come to focus almost exclusively on L’amour! to the exclusion of familial, fraternal, and friendship love, so this month’s book list celebrates love, starting with the place most of us experience it first—in the family. Love and Laughter Book List Book…
