Parents Books - Page 2

Crank

Ellen Hopkins

Amazon Price: $9.99 List Price: $9.99 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Simon Pulse Amazon Marketplace: 68 new & used starting at $4.85

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 108 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Ellen Hopkins's semi-autobiographical verse novel, Crank, reads like a Go Ask Alice for the 21st century. In it, she chronicles the turbulent and often disturbing relationship between Kristina, a character based on her own daughter, and the "monster," the highly addictive drug crystal meth, or "crank." Kristina is introduced to the drug while visiting her largely absent and ne'er-do-well father. While under the influence of the monster, Kristina discovers her sexy alter-ego, Bree: "there is no perfect daughter, / no gifted high school junior, / no Kristina Georgia Snow. / There is only Bree." Bree will do all the things good girl Kristina won't, including attracting the attention of dangerous boys who can provide her with a steady flow of crank. Soon, her grades plummet, her relationships with family and friends deteriorate, and she needs more and more of the monster just to get through the day. Kristina hits her lowest point when she is raped by one of her drug dealers and becomes pregnant as a result. Her decision to keep the baby slows her drug use, but doesn't stop it, and the author leaves the reader with the distinct impression that Kristina/Bree may never be free from her addiction. In the author's note, Hopkins warns "nothing in this story is impossible," but when Kristina's controlled, high-powered mother allows her teenage daughter to visit her biological father (a nearly homeless known drug user), the story feels unbelievable. Still, the descriptions of crystal meth use and its consequences are powerful, and will horrify and transfix older teenage readers, just as Alice did over 20 years ago. --Jennifer Hubert

Impulse

Ellen Hopkins

Amazon Price: $9.99 List Price: $9.99 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Simon Pulse Amazon Marketplace: 43 new & used starting at $5.96

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 44 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Impulse is a hit! 4 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

I just love reading Ellen Hopkins books. Although Crank and Glass are my favorites, Impulse is a very close third. I love that we get three perspectives in this novel. The way that Ellen is able to reach teenage audiences impresses me every time. I will continue to buy and recommend all her books to my high school students. Thanks Ellen!!

Editorial Review:

Sometimes you don't wake up. But if you happen to, you know things will never be the same.

Three lives, three different paths to the same destination: Aspen Springs, a psychiatric hospital for those who have attempted the ultimate act -- suicide.

Vanessa is beautiful and smart, but her secrets keep her answering the call of the blade.

Tony, after suffering a painful childhood, can only find peace through pills.

And Conner, outwardly, has the perfect life. But dig a little deeper and find a boy who is in constant battle with his parents, his life, himself.

In one instant each of these young people decided enough was enough. They grabbed the blade, the bottle, the gun -- and tried to end it all. Now they have a second chance, and just maybe, with each other's help, they can find their way to a better life -- but only if they're strong and can fight the demons that brought them here in the first place.

No Talking

Andrew Clements

Amazon Price: $10.87 List Price: $15.99 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing Amazon Marketplace: 54 new & used starting at $8.49

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 16 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

"You have the right to remain silent." However...

The fifth-grade girls and the fifth-grade boys at Laketon Elementary don't get along very well. But the real problem is that these kids are loud and disorderly. That's why the principal uses her red plastic bullhorn. A lot.

Then one day Dave Packer, a certified loudmouth, bumps into an idea -- a big one that makes him try to keep quiet for a whole day. But what does Dave hear during lunch? A girl, Lynsey Burgess, jabbering away. So Dave breaks his silence and lobs an insult. And those words spark a contest: Which team can say the fewest words during two whole days? And it's the boys against the girls.

How do the teachers react to the silence? What happens when the principal feels she's losing control? And will Dave and Lynsey plunge the whole school into chaos?

This funny and surprising book is about language and thought, about words unspoken, words spoken in anger, and especially about the power of words spoken in kindness...with or without a bullhorn. It's Andrew Clements at his best -- thought-provoking, true-to-life, and very entertaining.

Burned

Ellen Hopkins

Amazon Price: $9.99 List Price: $9.99 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Simon Pulse Amazon Marketplace: 43 new & used starting at $5.56

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 50 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

disturbing yet beautiful 5 out of 5 stars.
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If you are a religious person, and you can't believe how Pattyn's father treats her, or how their pastor thinks, you may cringe a bit. I know I did. Even though it is fiction. I couldn't believe some of the things. I loved it despite it was disturbing. I loved the relationship between Pattyn and Ethan. I'm glad she found someone. I wish that Pattyn would've put up a fuss, and demanded she stayed with her Aunt, when it was time for her to go home. I love Mrs. Hopkins work. I am anxiously awaiting "Identical" which is due out August 26th.

Editorial Review:

Raised in a religious -- yet abusive -- family, Pattyn Von Stratten starts asking questions -- about God, a woman's role, sex, love. She experiences the first stirrings of passion, but when her father catches her in a compromising position, events spiral out of control. Pattyn is sent to live with an aunt in the wilds of Nevada to find salvation and redemption. What she finds instead is love and acceptance -- until she realizes that her old demons will not let her go.

Owl Moon

Jane Yolen

Amazon Price: $11.55 List Price: $16.99 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Philomel Amazon Marketplace: 88 new & used starting at $6.14

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 57 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Lasts and Lasts 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

I read to my children every night, religiously. This is one of a very few books that we are happy to pick up and re-read. They enjoyed it when they were 3 and 5, and they still enjoy it when they're now 7 and 9.

As an added bonus for fathers, the theme is about little things we might share with our children that leave a lifelong impression. My dream is that I am creating one or more lasting legacies with my children.

Beautiful story 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

I used this book in my classroom as an example for my students to write thier own story. My 3rd and 4th graders loved the story and it worked great for the lesson I was teaching.

Editorial Review:

Among the greatest charms of children is their ability to view a simple activity as a magical adventure. Such as a walk in the woods late at night. Jane Yolen captures this wonderment in a book whose charm rises from its simplicity. "It was late one winter night, long past my bedtime, when Pa and I went owling." The two walked through the woods with nothing but hope and each other in a journey that will fascinate many a child. John Schoenherr's illustrations help bring richness to the countryside adventure. The book won the 1988 Caldecott Medal.

Are You My Mother?

P.D. Eastman

Amazon Price: $8.99 List Price: $8.99 Usually ships in 24 hours By: BIGTOFFICE - Model: ING0394800184 Amazon Marketplace: 631 new & used starting at $0.01

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Features:

• CHILDRENS BOOKS & MUSIC
• Childrens Books
• Language Arts

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 101 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Two boys' review: It is just a bedtime book, not a social message 4 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

The years haven't been kind to this book. The illustrations are somewhat dated and, judging by the other reviews here on Amazon, there's an angry contingent of parents with abandonment issues who would rather you skip this book for a guide to raise Indigo Children.

I'm just here to review a bedtime book for my two sons.

More than with most books, I really have to act as I read this book to keep their attention. I'm the cow with a nasally Blue Blood voice, I'm the dog with a droopy drawl, and I'm the snort...SNORT!

My boys like this book and we read it regularly at bedtime. Their bookshelf holds roughly 80-100 books and P.D. Eastman occupies two titles in our collection -- A Fish Out of Water and Are You My Mother?

Adoptive Daughter loves it 5 out of 5 stars.
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We adopted a little girl from abroad. She is still a toddler and too young to discuss adoption. We got her this book to see how she would react. It has become her favorite that she MUST have read to her every night. We feel it is helping resolve issues she might have with being adopted. She especially likes that she can take control of the little bird herself and move it through the scenes to its mother.

Editorial Review:

A newborn bird's identity crisis takes him on a quest to find his real mother.

Someday

Alison McGhee

Amazon Price: $10.19 List Price: $14.99 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Atheneum Amazon Marketplace: 62 new & used starting at $5.77

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 102 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

A bit of a tear-jerker 5 out of 5 stars.
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Delightful story perfect for a Mom to give her daughter while she is pregnant. It reminded me of "I'll Love You Forever", but geared towards someone with a Baby girl.

Very Sweet 4 out of 5 stars.
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This simple book is best read when you're feeling sentimental. The message will leave you teary-eyed. If you're not in the right mood, it will seem kinda sappy and even a little manipulative, at the end. No regrets buying it - I think it's very sweet, especially if you have a daughter.

Amazon Bargain Book-warning 2 out of 5 stars.
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I purchased the "bargain book" version of this book for $6.79. I hoped to give it to a pregnant friend. Amazon does disclose that the book may have a sticker on the back stating that it is a bargain book, which I didn't mind (although it is not the kind of sticker that just peels off). Unfortunately I could not gift the book as it is defective; printed unside-down and backwards. The book as about 7" x 7" and about 1/3" thick, including the cover. Actually seems over-priced for a small book that's defective. I did give it 2 starts as it is a sweet story. I somewhat agree with the other reviewer, though, as it is sad at the end, in a bitter-sweet sort-of-way.

Editorial Review:

A mother's love leads to a mother's dream -- every mother's dream -- for her child to live life to its fullest.

A deceptively simple, powerful ode to the potential of love and the potential in life, Someday is the book you'll want to share with someone else...today. The perfect gift for Mother's Day, Graduation Day or Any Day - share a copy with every special person in your life.

Inkspell

Cornelia Funke

Amazon Price: $13.59 List Price: $19.99 Usually ships in 24 hours By: The Chicken House Amazon Marketplace: 67 new & used starting at $6.99

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 222 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Just a few chapters into Inkspell, Mo (a.k.a. "Silvertongue") sagely says to his daughter, "Stories never really end, Meggie, even if the books like to pretend they do. Stories always go on. They don't end on the last page, any more than they begin on the first page." A fitting meta-observation for this, the unplanned second installment in Cornelia Funke's beloved now-trilogy.

Of course, it's that sort of earnest, almost gushing veneration of books and book-loving that made the absorbing suspense-fantasy Inkheart so wonderful in the first place, with that lit-affection getting woven integrally into the plot (Inkheart being both Funke's first book in the series, and the fictitious book within that book, authored by the frustrated Fenoglio, now trapped within the book, er, within the book. Fenoglio, perhaps not surprisingly, self-referentially wishes in Inkspell that he had written a sequel to Inkheart.) Inkspell should serve as a special treat for fans of the first book, as characters from Inkheart who have found themselves in the "real world" (if there is such a thing) find themselves read back into their own mythic, word-spun world--along with some of our favorite "real-world" characters. As with the previous book, Funke's greatest accomplishment here is telling such a rich and involving (and fun!) story, while still managing sweet, subtle commentary on the nature of words and meaning. Expect a tantalizing finale, too--as Funke says, "No reader will forgive me the ending, though, without a part three." (Ages 8 and up) --Paul Hughes

The Willoughbys

Lois Lowry

Amazon Price: $10.88 List Price: $16.00 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Houghton Mifflin/Walter Lorraine Books Amazon Marketplace: 51 new & used starting at $7.00

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 23 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

I quirky fun story! 5 out of 5 stars.
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I throughly enjoyed this little book. I thought it was quite charming. It kind of reminded me of the series of unfortunate events. Mainly because of the way it's written. I'm glad it ended happily and thought it was whimsical and silly. I think this would be a great story to read as a family.

Editorial Review:

Abandoned by their ill-humored parents to the care of an odious nanny, Tim, the twins, Barnaby A and Barnaby B, and their sister, Jane, attempt to fulfill their roles as good oldfashioned children. Following the models set in lauded tales from A Christmas Carol to Mary Poppins, the four Willoughbys hope to attain their proscribed happy ending too, or at least a satisfyingly maudlin one. However, it is an unquestionably ruthless act that sets in motion the transformations that lead to their salvation and to happy endings for not only the four children, but their nanny, an abandoned baby, a candy magnate, and his long-lost son too. Replete with a tongue-in-cheek glossary and bibliography, this hilarious and decidedly old-fashioned parody pays playful homage to classic works of children's literature.

Is Your Mama a Llama?

Deborah Guarino

Amazon Price: $6.99 List Price: $6.99 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Scholastic Amazon Marketplace: 50 new & used starting at $0.01

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 53 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Cute and fun, better for the under 2 1/2s 3 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

It bores my son after a couple of weeks and he's not yet three. At first though, he did really like it. Cute rhymes that are easy to remember, and he loved screaming the responses at first.

Editorial Review:

The board book version of this popular recitation of animal characteristics is equally as delightful as other editions, with one key improvement: it's inedible. This robust reissue follows lovable Lloyd the llama on his quest to find out what percentage of the baby animal population has llamas for mamas. The rhymes are original and infectious, and the riddles are sure to have children shouting out the answers in anticipation of turning the page.

Youngsters often exhibit an insatiable appetite for adorable baby animals, and Is Your Mama a Llama provides plenty of fodder for fawning. Illustrator Steven Kellogg, however, manages to keep the pictures sweet without being saccharine. And rest assured, no matter how often your little one is compelled to kiss the critters, the sturdy board-book format will stand the test of time (and of course, slobber). (Ages 0 to 4)