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Showing 1 - 11 of 11 items
By Catherine Egan. 2022
Men in Black meets middle school! A school project takes an alien turn when three kids uncover a secret society…
whose aim is to keep sneaks—mischievous interdimensional sprites—from slipping into our universe ! When Ben Harp sees his teacher's watch crawling across the hallway, he thinks he must be dreaming. But no, he’s just seen his first Sneak—an interdimensional mischief-maker that can borrow the form of any ordinary object. He figured this school year would be bad—his best friend moved away, the class bully is circling, and he’s stuck doing a group project with two similarly friendless girls, Charlotte and Akemi. Still, he wasn’t expecting aliens! And he certainly wasn’t expecting that the woman he and Charlotte and Akemi are assigned to interview for their “living local history” project would be a Sneak expert. Or that she’d foist an old book on them to keep safe . . . and then disappear. Now Ben, Charlotte, and Akemi are trying to understand a book that seems to contain a coded map while being pursued by violent clothes hangers, fire-spitting squirrels, and more. The Sneaks want that book! And they want something else, too: to pull a vastly more dangerous creature into the world with them. Can three misfit kids decode the book in time to stop an alien takeover? And if they do, will they get extra credit on their group project?By Xiran Jay Zhao. 2022
Percy Jackson meets Tristan Strong in this hilarious, action-packed middle grade contemporary fantasy that follows a young boy as he…
journeys across China to seal the underworld shut and save the mortal realm. Zachary Ying never had many opportunities to learn about his Chinese heritage. His single mom was busy enough making sure they got by, and his schools never taught anything except Western history and myths. So Zack is woefully unprepared when he discovers he was born to host the spirit of the First Emperor of China for a vital mission: sealing the leaking portal to the Chinese underworld before the upcoming Ghost Month blows it wide open. The mission takes an immediate wrong turn when the First Emperor botches his attempt to possess Zack's body and binds to Zack's AR gaming headset instead, leading to a battle where Zack's mom's soul gets taken by demons. Now, with one of history's most infamous tyrants yapping in his headset, Zack must journey across China to heist magical artifacts and defeat figures from history and myth, all while learning to wield the emperor's incredible water dragon powers. And if Zack can't finish the mission in time, the spirits of the underworld will flood into the mortal realm, and he could lose his mom foreverBy Terry Fan, Eric Fan. 2022
From the critically acclaimed, award-winning creators of Ocean Meets Sky and The Night Gardener comes a whimsical and sweet tale…
of a young girl who cares for her pet cloud as it grows.It’s a little out of fashion to buy a pet cloud, but Lizzy doesn’t mind. She’s not looking for a big one or a fancy one, just one that’s right for her. And she finds it in Milo. Soon, she’s taking Milo out on walks with her family, watering Milo right on schedule, and seeing Milo grow and grow. But what happens when her pet cloud gets too big for Lizzy to handle?By Linh S. Nguyen. 2023
Sweeping in scope and timeless in tone, No Place like Home is a middle-grade portal fantasy unlike any otherLan, a…
teenager who recently came to Canada from Vietnam, spends every day searching for a sense of belonging. Books are the only things that make her feel at ease. But it comes as a shock when a mysterious wind whisks her right into the pages of her latest fantasy read. More shocking still is the fact that she herself summoned this wind! Plunged into the magical world of Silva, Lan realizes she has much to offer protagonists Annabelle and Marlow. Once a homesick reader and bystander rooting for the very characters that now stand before her, Lan is a budding witch who suddenly has the power to help their quest. Somewhere inside her lies the ability to not only save Annabelle and Marlow’s home, but also to shape a familiar tale into something new.As Lan faces off against tree guardians, moving corn mazes, heart-eaters and thoughtless kings, she finds that Silva is not so different from Toronto: new homes can be messy. Now, torn between several places at once, Lan begins to confront an important question: how do you redefine a lost home?By Catherine Egan. 2022
Men in Black meets middle school! A school project takes an alien turn when three kids uncover a secret society…
whose aim is to keep sneaks--mischievous interdimensional sprites--from slipping into our universe!When Ben Harp sees his teacher's watch crawling across the hallway, he thinks he must be dreaming. But no, he’s just seen his first Sneak—an interdimensional mischief-maker that can borrow the form of any ordinary object. He figured this school year would be bad—his best friend moved away, the class bully is circling, and he’s stuck doing a group project with two similarly friendless girls, Charlotte and Akemi. Still, he wasn’t expecting aliens! And he certainly wasn’t expecting that the woman he and Charlotte and Akemi are assigned to interview for their “living local history” project would be a Sneak expert. Or that she’d foist an old book on them to keep safe . . . and then disappear. Now Ben, Charlotte, and Akemi are trying to understand a book that seems to contain a coded map while being pursued by violent clothes hangers, fire-spitting squirrels, and more. The Sneaks want that book! And they want something else, too: to pull a vastly more dangerous creature into the world with them. Can three misfit kids decode the book in time to stop an alien takeover? And if they do, will they get extra credit on their group project?By M. T. Khan, M. T. Khan. 2022
Aru Shah and the End of Time meets Studio Ghibli’s Spirited Away in this mesmerizing portal fantasy that takes readers…
into the little-known world of Jinn.Nura longs for the simple pleasure of many things—to wear a beautiful red dupatta or to bite into a sweet gulab. But with her mom hard at work in a run-down sweatshop and three younger siblings to feed, Nura must spend her days earning money by mica mining. But it’s not just the extra rupees in her pocket Nura is after. Local rumor says there’s buried treasure in the mine, and Nura knows that finding it could change the course of her family’s life forever.Her plan backfires when the mines collapse and four kids, including her best friend, Faisal, are claimed dead. Nura refuses to believe it and shovels her way through the dirt hoping to find him. Instead, she finds herself at the entrance to a strange world of purple skies and pink seas—a portal to the opulent realm of jinn, inhabited by the trickster creatures from her mother’s cautionary tales. Yet they aren’t nearly as treacherous as her mother made them out to be, because Nura is invited to a luxury jinn hotel, where she’s given everything she could ever imagine and more. But there’s a dark truth lurking beneath all that glitter and gold, and when Nura crosses the owner’s son and is banished to the working quarters, she realizes she isn’t the only human who’s ended up in the hotel’s clutches. Faisal and the other missing children are there, too, and if Nura can’t find a way to help them all escape, they’ll be bound to work for the hotel forever. Set in a rural industrial town in Pakistan and full of hope, heart, and humor, Nura and the Immortal Palace is inspired by M.T. Khan’s own Pakistani Muslim heritage.By Meaghan McIsaac. 2021
In a gritty medieval world where the ruling houses are based on the constellations, betrayal, intrigue, and a king's murder…
force the royal sisters of the Bear House on the run!Moody Aster and her spoiled sister Ursula are the daughters of Jasper Lourdes, Major of Bears and lord of all the realm. Rivals, both girls dream of becoming the Bear queen someday, although neither really deserve to, having no particular talent in... well, anything.But when their Uncle Bram murders their father in a bid for the crown, the girls are forced onto the run, along with lowly Dev the Bearkeeper and the Lourdes's half-grown grizzly Alcor, symbol of their house. As a bitter struggle for the throne consumes the kingdom in civil war, the sisters must rely on Dev, the bear cub, and each other to survive--and find wells of courage, cunning, and skill they never knew they had. A Junior Library Guild Gold Standard SelectionBy Catherine Egan. 2022
Men in Black meets middle school! A school project takes an alien turn when three kids uncover a secret society…
whose aim is to keep sneaks--mischievous interdimensional sprites--from slipping into our universe!When Ben Harp sees his teacher's watch crawling across the hallway, he thinks he must be dreaming. But no, he&’s just seen his first Sneak—an interdimensional mischief-maker that can borrow the form of any ordinary object. He figured this school year would be bad—his best friend moved away, the class bully is circling, and he&’s stuck doing a group project with two similarly friendless girls, Charlotte and Akemi. Still, he wasn&’t expecting aliens! And he certainly wasn&’t expecting that the woman he and Charlotte and Akemi are assigned to interview for their &“living local history&” project would be a Sneak expert. Or that she&’d foist an old book on them to keep safe . . . and then disappear. Now Ben, Charlotte, and Akemi are trying to understand a book that seems to contain a coded map while being pursued by violent clothes hangers, fire-spitting squirrels, and more. The Sneaks want that book! And they want something else, too: to pull a vastly more dangerous creature into the world with them. Can three misfit kids decode the book in time to stop an alien takeover? And if they do, will they get extra credit on their group project?By Xiran Jay Zhao. 2022
Percy Jackson meets Tristan Strong in this hilarious, action-packed middle grade contemporary fantasy that follows a young boy as he…
journeys across China to seal the underworld shut and save the mortal realm. Zachary Ying never had many opportunities to learn about his Chinese heritage. His single mom was busy enough making sure they got by, and his schools never taught anything except Western history and myths. So Zack is woefully unprepared when he discovers he was born to host the spirit of the First Emperor of China for a vital mission: sealing the leaking portal to the Chinese underworld before the upcoming Ghost Month blows it wide open. The mission takes an immediate wrong turn when the First Emperor botches his attempt to possess Zack’s body and binds to Zack’s AR gaming headset instead, leading to a battle where Zack’s mom’s soul gets taken by demons. Now, with one of history’s most infamous tyrants yapping in his headset, Zack must journey across China to heist magical artifacts and defeat figures from history and myth, all while learning to wield the emperor's incredible water dragon powers. And if Zack can’t finish the mission in time, the spirits of the underworld will flood into the mortal realm, and he could lose his mom forever. New York Times BestsellerBy Jean E. Pendziwol. 2022
When a child is asked to “Please, be quiet!” they sit silent … and their imagination sweeps them away on…
a breathtaking journey. Through the window, the child can hear the trees breathe and watches them sway back and forth as they begin to dance. Then bears join in, accompanied by the child on their drum, making so much noise they wake up a dragon! The dragon’s smoky breath fills the sky, and the wind forms a knight on a steed that gallops through the stars. The child’s adventure continues, as one wonderful flight of fancy leads to the next, from pirates to mermaids to whales, until they find themselves sitting silent once again among the trees. Jean E. Pendziwol has written a charming story-poem that looks at silence and stillness as an opportunity for the imagination and creativity to flourish. Carmen Mok’s magical illustrations flow from one spread to the next like animation, in a palette inspired by vintage printmaking. Key Text Features dialogue illustrations Correlates to the Common Core State Standards in English Language Arts: CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.K.3 With prompting and support, identify characters, settings, and major events in a story. CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.K.7 With prompting and support, describe the relationship between illustrations and the story in which they appear (e.g., what moment in a story an illustration depicts). CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.1.3 Describe characters, settings, and major events in a story, using key details. CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.1.7 Use illustrations and details in a story to describe its characters, setting, or events.By M. T. Khan. 2022
Aru Shah and the End of Time meets Studio Ghibli&’s Spirited Away in this mesmerizing portal fantasy that takes readers into the little-known…
world of Jinn.Nura longs for the simple pleasure of many things—to wear a beautiful red dupatta or to bite into a sweet gulab. But with her mom hard at work in a run-down sweatshop and three younger siblings to feed, Nura must spend her days earning money by mica mining. But it&’s not just the extra rupees in her pocket Nura is after. Local rumor says there&’s buried treasure in the mine, and Nura knows that finding it could change the course of her family&’s life forever.Her plan backfires when the mines collapse and four kids, including her best friend, Faisal, are claimed dead. Nura refuses to believe it and shovels her way through the dirt hoping to find him. Instead, she finds herself at the entrance to a strange world of purple skies and pink seas—a portal to the opulent realm of jinn, inhabited by the trickster creatures from her mother&’s cautionary tales. Yet they aren&’t nearly as treacherous as her mother made them out to be, because Nura is invited to a luxury jinn hotel, where she&’s given everything she could ever imagine and more. But there&’s a dark truth lurking beneath all that glitter and gold, and when Nura crosses the owner&’s son and is banished to the working quarters, she realizes she isn&’t the only human who&’s ended up in the hotel&’s clutches. Faisal and the other missing children are there, too, and if Nura can&’t find a way to help them all escape, they&’ll be bound to work for the hotel forever. Set in a rural industrial town in Pakistan and full of hope, heart, and humor, Nura and the Immortal Palace is inspired by M.T. Khan&’s own Pakistani Muslim heritage.