children’s books couple to develop a friendship. Starting with their mutual love of constellations, the two ducks end up having lots in common. Chad and Theodora spend all their time together until one day, a comment from other ducks threatens their friendship. The comment? “Look at that odd duck!” Each thinks the comment is aimed at the other, causing a rift between them. It takes some serious soul-searching to allow these true friends to mend the split, understanding that they are both odd in their own ways. Readers who are struggling with friendships will be heartened that these ducks are able to deal with their differences. Kids with a quirky sense of humor will be drawn to the graphic elements but will stay for the endearing story. — ROBIN S MITH
Doll Bones By Holly Black
Margaret K. McElderry $16.99, 256 pages ISBN 9781416963981 Audio, eBook available Ages 10 and up
MIDDLE GRADE
30
Holly Black, co-author of the best-selling Spiderwick Chronicles and author of several fantasies for teens, aims her latest book, Doll Bones, squarely at the middle-grade audience. Zach, Poppy and Alice have just the right mix of hangingonto-childhood imaginations and coming-of-age interest in the world beyond make-believe. For several years, the three friends have been playing an ongoing game with their action figures, but real life is starting to get in the way. When Zach’s father intervenes and prevents Zach from continuing the game, the friendship is challenged and may not be reparable. The game they’ve been playing becomes more important, however, when Poppy reveals that her mother’s antique china doll—the “queen” of their story—has been haunting her dreams. Poppy steals the doll from the forbidden cabinet in her home, insisting that she and her friends go on a quest as mandated by the “queen,” and from then on,
reviews
their childlike make-believe starts to become disturbingly real. This is a spooky story, and the adventure the three embark on is thrilling, but the real drama is the underlying sense of these preteens letting go of childhood and moving into their grown-up selves. Conflicts at home, difficulties relating to each other and secret feelings all combine to make this a great book for those “in-betweeners.” Black’s prose is fluid and lyrical while maintaining its characters’ 13-year-old vocabulary, which will no doubt help the book find a delighted audience in middle-school readers everywhere. — JENNI F ER BRUER KITCHEL
on life are most appreciated. This forced immigration of Chinese workers to Southern plantations is a little-known fact in American history. Rhodes takes this glossed-over event and adds human faces to it. Sugar, Mister Wills, Beau and Master Liu are just a few of the many characters young readers will come to know and better understand. It is Sugar’s story, however, as a strong-willed, independent and tolerant child that will have the greatest impact. With compelling characters and suspenseful storytelling, this is well-crafted historical fiction that will appeal to anyone who loves a good story. —Kevin Delecki
Sugar
15 Days Without a Head
By Jewell Parker Rhodes
Little, Brown $16.99, 276 pages ISBN 9780316043052 Audio, eBook available Ages 8 to 12
—Deborah Hopkinson
The 5th Wave By Rick Yancey
Putnam $18.99, 480 pages ISBN 9780399162411 eBook available Ages 12 and up
teen
By Dave Cousins
Flux $9.99, 312 pages ISBN 9780738736426 Ages 12 and up
teen
middle grade
Having freedom in a legal sense doesn’t always mean you’re free. That statement was especially true for Southern slaves freed as a result of the Civil War. Although these men, women and children couldn’t be forced to work any longer, that didn’t keep plantation owners from paying wages, and then charging rent, food costs and other fees that kept the workers forever indebted. This is the reality of life for the characters in Sugar, the powerful new novel by Coretta Scott King Honor Book recipient Jewell Parker Rhodes. This group of men and women, including a 10-year-old orphan named Sugar, live and work on Louisiana’s River Road plantation, harvesting sugar cane and doing what they must to survive. Sugar isn’t content with this life, however. She longs to play with other children, meet new people and not work from sunup to sundown. Sugar doesn’t always follow the rules, either. She befriends the white plantation owner’s son, Billy, and escapes on adventures with him that break every rule and boundary set for them both. It is not until the plantation owner brings in Chinese laborers, though, that Sugar’s indomitable spirit and unique outlook
heavy-handed way. And even while Laurence is negotiating the complexities of the adult world, school and the authorities, he also makes tentative first steps in a relationship with a girl his own age named Mina. By the end, teen readers will pull for Laurence, his mum and little Jay to win that top prize: making it as a family.
Laurence Roach is a 15-year-old boy with a plan: save his family, no matter what it takes. You’d think that trying to win a radio trivia contest with a grand prize of a luxury holiday might be enough, but unfortunately, things don’t quite work out the way Laurence plans. Instead, one day his mother simply doesn’t come back from work. Saving himself and his little brother Jay from the long arms of social workers takes all of Laurence’s considerable talents. He employs everything from complex lies to investigative detection to, well, cross-dressing. But if that’s what it takes to keep his family together, Laurence is not about to give up, even when things get really bad: “Jay’s moaning that he’s hungry. He wants some breakfast. But there isn’t any food left and we’ve run out of money again.” Set in England and written by London author Dave Cousins (who began writing at age 10), 15 Days Without a Head manages to be gritty and heartbreakingly funny at the same time. The book examines serious issues of alcoholism, suicide, parenting, trust, honesty and responsibility, but never in a
“It wasn’t just the world that had changed with the coming of the Others. We changed. I changed,” 16-year-old Cassie writes in her diary, the book that shares space in her backpack with canned sardines, bottled water and her little brother’s teddy bear. Ever since the alien invasion’s first four “Waves” wiped out most of the human race, Bear has been Cassie’s only companion—not counting her M16 rifle, of course. Cassie’s on a mission to find her younger brother, who was stolen away along with other child residents of a supposedly safe refugee camp. But two other teens are on missions, too—missions that might help or hinder Cassie’s. Like all those who weren’t killed by power outages, floods, pestilence or roaming snipers, Cassie and her fellow survivors find themselves constantly wondering how anyone can hold onto hope in a world where human idealism is rapidly becoming the enemy’s best weapon. What shape will the upcoming 5th Wave take . . . and what new horrors will it bring? Set on a future Earth where aliens look human, humans look alien and no one can be trusted, Printz Honor-winning author Rick Yancey’s post-apocalyptic adventure story mixes high-energy action with sharp psychological tension. Narrative sections become shorter and fasterpaced as the dénouement looms, echoing the characters’ increasingly rapid choices as they navigate between individuality and conformity