How to Be a Person humorously introduces middle-graders to life skills both practical and thoughtful. How to Be a Person: 65 Hugely Useful Super-Important Skills to Learn before You’re Grown by Catherine Newman, illustrated by Debbie Fong. Storey Publishing 2020, 159 pages. Reading Level: Middle Grades, ages 8-10 Recommended for: ages 8-12 Growing up used to be taken for granted: a natural process whereby a child gradually acquired sufficient “life skills” for independent living. Today, with 20-somethings signing up for “adulting” classes because they don’t know how to do laundry, books like How to Be a Person seem like an increasingly good idea. Even conscientious homeschool parents can let a…

The sensible way to plan a vacation would be to decide months in advance where you want to go and how you want to get there, make reservations, buy tickets, and put it on the calendar. But life doesn’t always go as planned, and sometimes you need a change of scenery anyway. Our family wanted to take a road trip this summer (now that the youngest is mostly potty trained), and agreed that the Southeast part of the United States was a viable option. But where should we go? What do I have in my hand? (Exodus 4:2a) I checked my shelves and found three fantastic resources.I asked my boys…

A Ceiling Made of Eggshells is popular author Gail Carson Levine’s tribute to her own Sephardic-Jewish heritage. A Ceiling Made of Eggshells by Gail Carson Levine. Harper, 2020, 317 pages. Reading Level: teen, ages 12-15 Recommended for: ages 12-16 Spain, ca 1490: As the daughter of a large and wealthy Jewish family protected within the boundaries of the juderia, Paloma (Loma) Cantala looks forward to a husband and family of her own while lovingly caring for her nieces and nephews. The Almighty appears to have another plan, however, when He decrees that Loma’s beloved grandmother should die in the plague. Her grandfather Don Joseph, patriarch of the family, then settles…

Daring Darleen, heroine of Saturday serials, stumbles into a real-life adventure in this clever saga from the early days of photoplays. Daring Darleen, Queen of the Screen by Anne Nesbet. Candlewick, 2020, 354 pages. Reading Level: Middle Grades, Ages 10-12 Recommended for: ages 10-14 By the age of 12, Darleen Darling has already starred in seven two-reeler cliffhangers for the family film business. Though she’s known and loved across the nation as “Daring Darleen,” Matchless Studios could use an income boost. That’s why Aunt Shirley, the business manager, talks Uncle Dan the cameraman and Uncle Charlie the director into a brazen publicity stunt. At the premiere of Darleen on the…

Adventure meets fairy tale in this delightful fantasy read for teens (and their parents!). The Arrow and the Crown by Emma Fox. Independently published, 2019. Reading Level: Young Adult, ages 12-15 Recommended For: Ages 12 and up A poor girl and her uncle, living on the outskirts of town, can’t afford to lose their trusty horse Tabbert… even if he was pursued by the Beast. Anna knows better, knows her uncle would never let her rescue Tabbert if it means heading into the Grünwald Forest. There’s more than a beast to fear if the stories are true; even the trees could be alive and watching. But Anna heads off in…

My Name is Tani is the hopeful true story of a young boy who finds a place and a passion in America. My Name Is Tani . . . and I Believe in Miracles by Tanitoluwa Adewumi with Craig Borlase (Young Reader Edition). Thomas Nelson, 2020, 195 pages. Reading Level: Middle Grades, 8-10 Recommended for: ages 8-14 “Miracles are all around us. All you have to do is look.” Tani Adewumi enjoyed a comfortable life in Abuja, Nigeria up until around the age of five. Then the trouble began. His father owned a print shop and his mother worked at a bank, so they were able to afford a nice…

Young children need Truth, and it’s never too early to begin. Board Books by Danielle Hitchen, illustrated by Jessica Blanchard. Baby Believer series. First Bible Basics: A counting primer An excellent God-centered, doctrinally solid, appealing introduction to the Bible and the Trinity. One God, two natures of Christ, three persons in the Trinity, four gospels…eight beatitudes, nine fruits of the spirit, and ten commandments. These are foundational truths that are worthy to be shared with little eyes who will enjoy the illustrations, ears that need to hear them, and hands that can be hard on regular paper. (Note: there is an illustration of Jesus and the apostles who wrote the…

The new graphic novel When Stars Are Scattered brings the refugee experience into sharp yet sympathetic focus. *When Stars Are Scattered by Victoria Jamieson and Omar Mohammed. Dial, 2020, 264 pages including author notes. Reading Level: Middle Grades, 8-10 Recommended for: ages 8-15 “For me, the first years are lost. Now, in a place as crowded as this, I’m afraid we’ll never be found.” The place is Dadaab Refugee Camp in Kenya, now overcrowded with Somalis after the civil wars of the mid-1990s. Omar barely remembers his birthplace, but some memories are the stuff of nightmares: mainly how his father was killed in an attack on their village and how…