The last of today's new books.
When fourteen year old Alice falls off a merry-go-round, she wakes up to find that she is seven years old again and has been given a chance to rewrite her wretched life. Alice is determined to prevent her parents from divorcing. At school, it's payback time for her worst enemy, Sasha. How much can she change? And what will she think of the results when she returns to the present? That is, if she can figure out how.
Overweight Wrenn Scott desperately wants to be popular and snag a hot boyfriend. Living with her single mom and younger sister, Karly, she lands a lead role in the high school musical, her voice for once overshadowing her weight. Pushing to get thinner by opening night, Wrenn's waistline shrinks as she learns all the wrong ways to lose weight from a new "it-girl" friend in the show. Meanwhile, her mom is falling for Phil, "a balding Channel 8 News-nerd"; her sister is wrapped up in her own share of middle school drama, and Wrenn's best friend has fallen for a guy she met online-but hasn't even seen yet! Topping it off, geeky stage manager Steven has a crush on her. But Wrenn doesn't want to be seen with him- she's holding out for a trophy boyfriend whom everyone will envy.
Throughout World War II, in the conflict fought against Japan, Navajo code talkers were a crucial part of the U.S. effort, sending messages back and forth in an unbreakable code that used their native language. They braved some of the heaviest fighting of the war, and with their code, they saved countless American lives. Yet their story remained classified for more than twenty years.
But now Joseph Bruchac brings their stories to life for young adults through the riveting fictional tale of Ned Begay, a sixteen-year-old Navajo boy who becomes a code talker. His grueling journey is eye-opening and inspiring.
Upon his parents' 1981 divorce, Cal Burton goes from being a popular, comfortable Spokane basketball all-star to a resident of a Ute Indian reservation in Utah, where apathy, poor living conditions, racism, and bitterness over a decades-old family tragedy change his life. Cal, Doran, and their younger sister move with their mother from Spokane, WA, to "the res"-Fort Duchesne in Eastern Utah. Older brother Cal is unhappy with the move, while Doran, a "contented soul," is willing to make the best of it. They move in with their grandfather, a tribal elder, and begin to experience their Indian heritage.
Life hasn't been easy for Jace Adams, a mixed-race teen whose mom moves them from one place to another so often that sometimes he's been in four schools in a single year. To cope with all that instability, Jace has vowed to never let himself get attached to anyone or anything, other than his beloved cello. But when his mom takes them to Seattle, where they're living with tough, sassy Aunt Bernice, Jace wonders if this time things might really change. Because money is tight, Jace plays his cello on the street in downtown Seattle, and one evening, someone throws a folded $100 bill with a business card attached into Jace's open cello case while he's serenading. That card changes everything; it's from a famous cello instructor who offers to take him on, giving Jace a shot at winning a scholarship to a prestigious music school. Will he make the grade?
And after May 3rd, look for this one!
In Beatrice Prior's dystopian Chicago, society is divided into five factions, each dedicated to the cultivation of a particular virtue-Candor (the honest), Abnegation (the selfless), Dauntless (the brave), Amity (the peaceful), and Erudite (the intelligent). On an appointed day of every year, all sixteen-year-olds must select the faction to which they will devote the rest of their lives. For Beatrice, the decision is between staying with her family and being who she really is-she can't have both. So she makes a choice that surprises everyone, including herself.
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