Fiction Books - Page 5

Gossip Girl Boxed Set

Cecily von Ziegesar

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 25 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

A delicious series that will definitely give you something to talk about! 5 out of 5 stars.
15 of 16 people found this review helpful.

The Upper East Side used to be overrun with plastic surgery happy society women, and spoiled tots torturing their high-priced nannies. But times have changed. While these people still occupy a small portion of the sidewalks, they have been pushed aside for a new generation of beautiful people. Teenagers brought up in the lap of luxury, who spend their days buying overpriced La Perla undergarments at Barney's, and indulging in frozen hot chocolate at Serendipity. But spending money isn't all that's on their mind. There's always...gossip.

GOSSIP GIRL: Ever since the flawless Serena van der Woodsen departed from New York City to take up residence at a boarding school in Connecticut, sixteen-year-old Blair Waldorf has ruled Constance Billard School for Girls. As the daughter of a prominent lawyer turned gay, Blair has always gotten her way. And, with Serena out of the picture, was able to snag the gorgeous, green-eyed Nate Archibald for herself. Unfortunately, as much as Blair would like to deny it, Nate has always had a thing for Serena. A secret passion for the blonde-haired, blue-eyed beauty. And now with Serena back in the picture, Blair doesn't know where their relationship will stand. So she has to take drastic measures...hand Nate her V card and he'll be hers forever. The only problem is that Nate is a stoner who has a very short attention span, and even sacrificing herself to Nate won't let him forget the passion he feels for Serena.

But he's not the only one. Dan Humphrey isn't your typical rich kid. For one, while he attends school with some of New York City's most privileged, he actually resides in an apartment on the Upper West Side with his chesty younger sister, Jenny, and his eccentric writer father, Rufus. Dan is a dark, brooding poet, whose penchant for cigarettes and Folgers coffee crystals leave much to be desired. But, like Nate, Dan is infatuated with Serena. The only difference is that he has never so much as spoken to her before, and she doesn't know he exists. Now that Serena's off the A-List, and treading outcast waters, however, the only thing he can hope is that she'll find her way to him and they can live happily ever after. In his dreams, of course. 5 stars.


YOU KNOW YOU LOVE ME: Everyone is in the midst of applying to Ivy League Colleges, but Blair Waldorf is planning a little something extra...her seventeenth birthday. Unfortunately, her mother has sprung a big announcement - she's getting married to Cyrus Rose, and the wedding will take place on Blair's birthday. So much for special days. Then there's Serena, who is being constantly pursued by Dan, a disturbed poet with intense affections. Sure, Serena is used to being pursued by guys of all ages, but Dan is slightly creepy with his morbid poetry. Of course, Serena is a girl, and what girl doesn't love having poems being written about her.
Although these teens are rich, obviously money can't buy you everything. At least it can't buy Blair Waldorf everything. For Blair's seventeenth birthday bash is coming up, and she knows that the only thing that she can possibly wish for is Nate Archibald, her troubled, yet gorgeous, boyfriend, of course. But little does she know that while she's sending out college applications, Nate is fooling around with Jenny Humphrey, a ninth-grader! Looks like Blair's birthday is destined to be a blowout of epic proportions. 5 stars.


ALL I WANT IS EVERYTHING:
Blair Waldorf is having the worst time of her life. She has just completely flubbed her Yale interview, even going so far as to kiss her interviewer; she must contend with a dreadlock-bearing new stepbrother named Aaron, who seems to have some ulterior motives up his sleeve; her mother is marrying a loser whom she has known for hardly no time at all; and, to top it all off, Nate has ditched her for a chesty ten-year-old - well, she looks ten. Luckily, she and Serena van der Woodsen are back on speaking terms, and living it up as BFF's once more. But who knows how long that will last.

The holidays are just around the corner, and with the Upper East Side absolutely freezing, everyone who's loaded is planning on ditching their Marc Jacobs coats, and slipping into their Missoni string bikinis for a Christmas in a tropical place. With Nate Archibald having called it quits with Blair in order to take up a romance with freshman Jenny Humphrey, Blair is anything but ready to say goodbye to the city, and head off to St. Bart's with Serena, where they can sunbathe topless, and, perhaps, have a winter fling. Unfortunately, Serena is being stalked by Flow, the hottest rock star on the planet - at least at the moment - and can't seem to shake him off, and Blair, armed with her iBook plans on holing up in the hotel room writing the essay for her Yale application. Looks like this vacation won't be as sizzling as originally planned. But with Blair's new stepbrother, Aaron, and his pal Miles in tow, you never know when the sparks will fly.

Back in the city, Nate and Jenny are having the time of their life. But with Blair's sudden appearances at every turn, Nate finds himself more and more drawn to the girl he has known and loved for so many years. But then there's Jenny. Sweet, innocent, voluptuous Jenny. Maybe if Nate spent less time being baked, and more time being straight, he'd be able to decide who he's truly lusting over.

Then there's Jenny's older brother, Dan. Since admitting their passion for one another, Dan and Vanessa have been having a whirlwind romance - albeit a dark one - filled with foreign films, cigarettes, strong instant coffee, and lots and lots of black. But since falling in love, Dan finds himself at a standstill regarding his poetry. Suddenly, he's experiencing writer's block firsthand, and it's not a pretty picture. But when Vanessa supposedly does something that betrays both him and Jenny, he wonders if this is the push he needs to get his writing back on track - and to get even. 5 stars.

Let's put it bluntly, Cecily von Ziegesar is a genius. She has taken the simple subject of rich, spoiled, troublemaking teens, and managed to produce a series that is both irresistible and infuriating. Each of the characters bring a sense of upper class to the table, along with a bit of scandal, and, dare I say it, trashiness. They have created a virtual playground of the Upper East Side, and dominate every hotel, club, or bar from Manhattan to Williamsburg. But they're oh so delicious. Serena is carefree and easygoing, however, she possesses a selfless and tragic air that makes her irresistible. Blair, on the other hand, is stuck-up and pretentious, but she knows how to let her hair down. Unfortunately, she usually lets her hair down at approximately the same time that her claws come out. Nate is a bad boy in good boy's clothing. His gorgeous looks make up for the fact that he has little between the ears due to how much of his time he spends high. Jenny and her older brother, Dan, on the other hand, are artistes who add a sweet touch to the series; and Vanessa manages to turn heads by brandishing her bald one. Each character converges together to weave an amazing story that leaves you on the edge of your seat from start to finish. A delicious series that will definitely give you something to talk about!

Erika Sorocco
Freelance Reviewer

Point Blanc (Spanish Edition)

Anthony Horowitz

List Price: $16.99 By: Edaf S.A. Amazon Marketplace: 3 new & used starting at $25.38

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 127 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Alex Rider 4 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

When i first read stormbreaker i read it in about half a day, i was addicted, i couldn't stop reading. When i finished i thought to myself that i probably wouldnt be gripped like that by a book in a long time to come. The next day, i bought Point Blanc and i found myself very mistaken. Point Blanc gripped me like a vice and i highly recommend it.
The book starts 2 weeks after Alex's first mission and to his surprise, M16 need him again, this time he is to go under cover to Point Blanc academy, an isolated bording school for rich rebel boys in the french Alps, to investigate two "accidental" deaths of rich men, both of whos son goes to Point Blanc academy. But can Alex figure out what's going on before it's too late?
Point Blanc is an excelent book that leaves you hanging and waiting for Alex's third adventure... it is a wonderful novel of action and suspense. Any reader waiting anxiously for the release of Vin Diesel's new movie, XXX, or the new James Bond film will definitely find a story in this book to meet the driving excitement in those properties.

Editorial Review:

When an investigation into a series of mysterious deaths leads agents to an elite prep school for rebellious kids, MI6 assigns Alex Rider to the case. Before he knows it, Alex is hanging out with the sons of the rich and powerful, and something feels wrong. These former juvenile delinquents have turned well-behaved, studious—and identical—overnight. It’s up to Alex to find out who is masterminding this nefarious plot, before they find him.

Magic Tree House #34: Season of the Sandstorms (A Stepping Stone Book(TM))

Mary Pope Osborne

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 11 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Goo's review 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

Season of the Sandstorms is a good book. They go to a desert and find people which help them on their journey to help save Camelot,but you need to read the rest of the book to find about their journey. I hope you injoy this book.

Smarty Pants 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 2 people found this review helpful.

Season of the Sandstorms is about Jack and Annie going on one of Merlin's Missions.This time they go to the golden age of Baghdad and are suppose to help the Caliph sread wisdom to the world.Your going to have to read the rest yourself.You'll also learn who the Caliph is!This was the best book I ever read!

Editorial Review:

Jack and Annie travel back in time to a desert in the Middle East at the behest of Merlin who has given them a rhyme to help on their mission. There they meet a Bedouin tribe and learn about the way that they live. From camel rides and oases to ancient writings and dangerous sandstorms, here’s another Magic Tree House filled with all the mystery, history, magic, and old-fashioned adventure that kids love to read about.


From the Hardcover edition.

The Watsons Go to Birmingham - 1963

Christopher Paul Curtis

By: Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group Amazon Marketplace: 11 new & used starting at $0.34

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 634 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

This book is the best! 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

When I read this book it was hard to put it down! From Kenny who is very talented for his age to Byron(By)who tries to act all cool to their little sister Joetta(Joey)who is very different for a young child things are very crazy sometimes. Their dad,Daniel, acts like a clown when he knows people are watching him. He is from Flint the town they now live in. Their mom,Wilona,is a very calm person when she wants to be and sometimes she is kind of a drama queen.She is originally from Birmingham. When they all go to Birmingham they listen to music on their recently bought record player and take adventures!
If you decide to get this book I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!

Editorial Review:

Enter the hilarious world of ten-year-old Kenny and his family, the Weird Watsons of Flint, Michigan. There's Momma, Dad, little sister Joetta, Kenny, and Byron, Kenny's older brother, who, at thirteen, is an "official juvenile delinquent."

When Momma and Dad decide it's time for a visit to Grandma, Dad comes home with the amazing Ultra-Glide, and the Watsons set out on a trip like no other. Heading South, they're going to Birmingham, Alabama, and toward one of the darkest moments in America's history.

By turns comic, tragic, and touching, this remarkable Newbery Honor work, delightfully performed by LeVar Burton in this unabridged production, will delight listeners young and old as they meet Christopher Paul Curtis, a storyteller of bold ambition and a true and original voice and his inimitable Watsons.

Peak

Roland Smith

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 21 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

What a thrill 4 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

This book is great! I teach middle school students where we do a One Book, One Community unit every year that the entire school gets involved with. I was very impressed with this book. It is a fast paced read that really intrigues the reader. I felt myself climbing Mt. Everest as I was reading. I feel honored that the author will be visiting our school later in the school year to meet with our staff and students.

Editorial Review:

After Peak Marcello is arrested for scaling a New York City skyscraper, he’s left with two choices: wither away in Juvenile Detention or to go live with his long-lost father, who runs a climbing company in Thailand. But Peak quickly learns that his father’s renewed interest in him has strings attached. Big strings. He wants Peak to be the youngest person to reach the Everest summit—and his motives are selfish at best. Even so, for a climbing addict like Peak, tackling Everest is the challenge of a lifetime. But it’s also one that could cost him his life.

        

The Bronze Bow

Elizabeth George Speare

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 96 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

planning to read it again 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

This is an interesting read for kids over the age of 10, and for adults as well. The main character depicts a Jewish teenager named Daniel living at the same time as Jesus. Daniel is very disturbed over the Roman occupation of Israel and the death of his parents. The book provides an excellent forum to teach children about religious tolerance and getting along with others. The characters are complex, allowing for deep literary analysis, and the historical context is educational, something that adolescents will associate with, given their background in world history. The story is both endearing and stimulating, with an active plot. My 11 year old is planning to read it again.

5 stars is not enough! 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

There are a great deal of "Young Adult Fiction" books that I didn't get around to reading at the "right age." The Bronze Bow is one such book. I didn't read it until I was out of college and had a better understanding of the Jewish faith and customs, and I wondered what had taken me so long. This book is wonderful! It presents an accurate picture of everyday life in early Christian Jerusalem and reveals how family tragedy can scar young lives. Daniel's hatred of the Romans is an obssessive passion; it consumes him to the extent that he cuts himself off from other people and future relationships that he could have. "It is Roman blood I want!" he says and he lives for the day when the last Roman is driven from the land. He sees his relationsips with others, his feelings for his girlfriend Thacia, his sister Leah, and his friend Sampson as his "weakness", something to hold him back from this goal he is trying to reach, and he continually shuts them out, though he is very lonely and unhappy when doing so. Only when he is alone and everyone is slipping away from him does he realize that hatred will not fill the emptiness in his heart.

I have always enjoyed Biblical fiction and am presently working on a book of my own. When I knew that this took place in early Christian times, I grabbed it right away! The unusual thing is that it ends before the
Crucifiction, leaving readers to wonder how the characters of this story will react to it. It beautifully illustrates Christian truths, the power of love over hatred and the power to do all things, even impossible things, with God's help. A treat for fans of Biblical and historical fiction!

Editorial Review:

Set in Galilee in the time of Jesus, this is the story of a young Jewish rebel who is won over to the gentle teachings of Jesus.

Elijah of Buxton

Christopher Paul Curtis

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 17 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Elijah of Buxton - Great Read Aloud 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

Christopher Paul Curtis is one of my favorite adolescent authors. I read Bub, Not Buddy to my 8th graders every year (Great Depression) and The Watson's Go To Birmingham: 1963 (during a Civil Rights Movement unit). This school year I discovered Elijah of Buxton and read it to my students during my unit on American Slavery. None of my students had read the book and we were all on the edge of our seats together. This book has great voice and I especially enjoyed the dialect. My students and I throughly enjoyed this book. I would highly recommend it to students to read, parents to read to their kids and teachers to read to their students! I cannot say enough good things about this book.

Editorial Review:

Eleven-year-old Elijah is the first child born into freedom in Buxton, Canada, a settlement of runaway slaves just over the border from Detroit. He’s best known in his hometown as the boy who made a memorable impression on Frederick Douglass. But things change when a former slave steals money from Elijah’s friend, who has been saving to buy his family out of captivity in the South. Elijah embarks on a dangerous journey to America in pursuit of the thief, and he discovers firsthand the unimaginable horrors of the life his parents fled—a life from which he’ll always be free, if he can find the courage to get back home.

First Book of Sushi (World Snacks)

Amy Wilson Sanger

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 36 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

not as great 3 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

We own the Dim Sum book by the same author, and the Sushi book is not as great. The pictures are still wonderful, but the words don't flow as easily, and the last line of the book ends on the back cover. That's a little confusing for my 22-month-old. With the Dim Sum book, there is a strong rhythm and an easy rhyme, which makes my child speak the last word on every page. Not so in the Sushi book.

Unfulfilled 3 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

I was excited to see a book about a topic like sushi available for the young set, and after reading the great reviews, I ordered it and looked forward to its arrival. But... I was underwhelmed. The artwork is interesting, but the cadence is very uneven. Three stars for a great, fun topic, but not four or five because it was less clever and less of a fluid read than I expected. Catchy idea more than catchy overall. That said, because it is unique and is fun to look at, and because there were one or two pages that were great fun, "Hot, hot, hot," I would purchase it again.

Editorial Review:

For the littlest fans of that favorite Japanese finger food comes a sturdy board book sure to inspire giggles (and even some growling stomachs!). Sanger’s textural, mixed media and cut paper collages form an ideal accompaniment to her bouncy rhyming text to captivate/fascinate even the most finicky eaters. Whether a temaki know-it-all or clueless about ebi, First Book of Sushi is a welcome side dish for nori experts and novices of all ages.

Native Son

Richard Wright

List Price: $16.40 By: Rebound by Sagebrush Amazon Marketplace: 3 new & used starting at $1.45

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 185 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

"Native Son": A Polemic On the Poverty of the Poor 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

Indeed, Richard Wright's "Native Son" is a polemic about what happens to the poor who are impovished by the psychic chain of economic poverty coupled with rascism and class discrimination. Often I am thinking about black life and I am reminded of Bigger's mantra, "I didn't want to kill." And yet he did and many have and, sadly enough, as Wright suggests, it is after the killings that the Biggers of the world find a piece of their own humanity.The question is, thus, this: Does a death compell one to be human? I wonder what Wright would say?In the Sanctuary of a South

Editorial Review:

Right from the start, Bigger Thomas had been headed for jail. It could have been for assault or petty larceny; by chance, it was for murder and rape. Native Son tells the story of this young black man caught in a downward spiral after he kills a young white woman in a brief moment of panic. Set in Chicago in the 1930s, Richard Wright's novel is just as powerful today as when it was written -- in its reflection of poverty and hopelessness, and what it means to be black in America.

This abridged edition includes an introduction, "How Bigger Was Born," by the author, as well as an afterword by John Reilly.

The Pet Dragon: A Story about Adventure, Friendship, and Chinese Characters

Christoph Niemann

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 4 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Well drawn and a clever teaching tool 4 out of 5 stars.
4 of 4 people found this review helpful.

I love this book! It is a large format so my son has a lot to look at and does not get as easily distracted as he does with smaller books. The pictures are also high contrast. I enjoy the illustration a great deal myself. And did I mention the clever integration of the Chinese characters into the illustration. I'm not sure yet how much my son has learned but it has taught me a lot. Great book!

Editorial Review:

Meet Lin and her pet dragon!

When the dragon mysteriously disappears, Lin sets off on a journey to find her best friend . . . and readers set off on a journey of learning and discovery.

By ingeniously integrating written Chinese characters into the illustrations as the story progresses, Christoph Niemann has created a book that is engrossing, unique, and memorable. The Pet Dragon is a playful introduction to the fascinating world of Chinese language and culture . . . and a terrific story to share with children everywhere.

You are invited to join Lin for an adventure you will not soon forget!