Author Archives: designpointaaron

AUTHOR: Holly Goldberg Sloan

GENRE: Fiction

SUMMARY: Always considered short for her age, Julia is used to being picked last for sports teams in school, even by her closest friends, and is self-conscious enough of her height that she never uses the dreaded S-word. Her outlook changes, however, when her mother forces her to audition for the local university’s summer-theater production of The Wizard of Oz, in which she is cast as the lead Munchkin dancer. Chance friendships with her neighbor Mrs. Chang, a costuming genius, and Olive, an adult cast mate who is her exact size, help transform Julia’s summer from one of grudging obligation into an inspirational experience that enables her to put her own insecurities into perspective. Sloan combines Julia’s interior monologue with events in real time to create a winning portrait of an inquisitive white adolescent girl whose shrewd observations of family members and cast mates reveal a keen mind and a delightfully quirky sense of humor. Her musings about the play also serve as a well-crafted introduction to theater terminology and convey drama’s ability to open participants up to new experiences.

AUTHOR: William Péne du Bois

GENRE: Fiction

SUMMARY: In this story, a sixty-six-year-old retired arithmetic teacher decides to take a hot-air balloon trip around the world in an effort to get away from everyone. Halfway around the globe, however, he becomes stranded on a volcanic island that is about to experience a massive eruption. The fantasy of The Twenty-One Balloons is built around an actual historic event—the massive volcanic eruption that destroyed the Pacific island of Krakatoa in 1883. But there the connection with history ends. The Professor discovers that the inhabitants of the island have established a unique, Utopian society, which he seeks to understand. Threatened with destruction, the Professor and the inhabitants must cooperate and discover a way to escape the island before the final explosion.

AUTHOR: Adriana Brad Schanen

GENRE: Fiction

SUMMARY: When eight-year-old Quinny Bumble and her family move from New York City to “middle of nowhere” Whisper Valley, she hits the town like a tornado, rushing in to find action the second they pull into the driveway. Hopper Grey, Quinny’s shy neighbor, is frequently picked on by his two older brothers and happiest alone in his room building models. As rambunctious, talkative Quinny introduces Hopper to the joys of spraying his older brothers with the hose and trying to save a stray chicken named Freya, he discovers that life beyond his bedroom can be pretty great. When school approaches, Hopper fears Quinny will discover he’s a friendless loser, but it’s Quinny who struggles as third grade begins, while Hopper begins to come into his own.

AUTHOR: P.L. Travers

GENRE: Fantasy

SUMMARY: Pulled down from the clouds at the end of a kite string, Mary Poppins is back. In Mary’s care, the Banks children meet the King of the Castle and the Dirty Rascal, visit the upside-down world of Mr. Turvy and his bride, Miss Topsy, and spend a breathless afternoon above the park, dangling from a clutch of balloons.

AUTHOR: Deron Hicks

GENRE: Mystery

SUMMARY:

Two kids race around a city on a wintry night, tangling with elite operatives and foiling a crime they don’t understand. In contemporary Washington, D.C., an unidentified man tries to evade goons in a parking garage. A roughly-12-year-old boy sits on a bench in the National Gallery of Art, alone, struck with amnesia. (This amnesia’s a plot device, not psychological realism.) Art—his name?—knows nothing about himself but everything about art history. Criminal mastermind Dorchek Palmer and his highly skilled covert criminal operatives will do anything to protect their sale of a forged van Gogh, including hacking and erasing security footage across the city—and kidnapping Art and 10-year-old Camille, Art’s friend from emergency-placement foster care.

AUTHOR: Nehemiah

GENRE: Religious Text

SUMMARY: After 70 years in exile, the Jews had returned home and rebuilt the temple in Jerusalem. They were able to worship God in their own land, but the city still lay in ruins. The once-great capital of the promised land was a depressing rubble heap exposed to her enemies. When Nehemiah hears this, he sets out to restore the city walls.

The book of Nehemiah is his story in his own words. It is about reestablishing God’s people both physically and spiritually.

In the first part of the book, Nehemiah restores Jerusalem in a physical sense. When Nehemiah hears that “the wall of Jerusalem is broken down and its gates are burned with fire,” he gets permission from Persian King Artaxerxes to rebuild the city. The governors of surrounding territories viciously oppose Nehemiah’s efforts, but the wall is finished in just 52 days. Nehemiah also restores economic justice in the land, admonishing the wealthy for taking advantage of their less fortunate brothers.

In the second section, Nehemiah and Ezra bring spiritual revival to Jerusalem. Ezra reads the law of Moses aloud to the people, and the nation rededicates to obeying God. Later on, Nehemiah works diligently to point people back to the law of Moses.

Nehemiah’s story is peppered with personal commentary—sometimes it reads like a historical account, and sometimes it reads like Nehemiah’s journal. We know when he is afraid. We know when he is angry. We even see him break his own narrative with prayers to God. This book gives us a look into the mind of an Old Testament man of God, giving us examples of how to lead, pray, and deal with discouragement.

AUTHOR: Gloria Whelan

GENRE: Historical Fiction

SUMMARY: Africa is the only home Rachel Sheridan has ever known. But when her missionary parents are struck with influenza, she is left vulnerable to her family’s malicious neighbors. Surrounded by greed and lies, Rachel is entangled in a criminal scheme and sent to England, where she’s forced into a life of deception. Like the lion, she must be patient and strong, awaiting the moment when she can take control of her own fate — and find her way home again at last.

AUTHOR: Yona Zeldis McDonough

GENRE: Non-Fiction

SUMMARY: No one knows where the term Underground Railroad came from — there were no trains or tracks, only “conductors” who helped escaping slaves to freedom. Including real stories about “passengers” on the “Railroad,” this book chronicles slaves’ close calls with bounty hunters, exhausting struggles on the road, and what they sacrificed for freedom.