Parenthetical

Jazz runs a business in Berkeley with Steve, her best friend and longtime pine-object. (They sell personalized postcard photos of local landmarks to ex-hippies, which I think is hilarious.) She’s psyched to spend the summer growing their business and doing some more quality pining over Steve. Until her mom, do-gooder extraordinaire, announces that she has [...]

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Callie Tate lives on a wealthy farm of pecan trees and too many brothers in turn-of-the-century Texas. One day she gathers the courage to ask her intimidating grandfather about the two different kinds of grasshoppers she sees in the fields, and he tells her to figure it out herself. From her eureka moment — they’re [...]

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Remember when I asked you for summer reading list suggestions? I finished the list a long time ago, of course, but it’s finally on our website. (That link will open a PDF.) The middle school section at the beginning is the part you helped with. (And those yellow highlighted books, by the way? Are links [...]

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Naomi and her little brother Owen are content living with their great-grandmother in a trailer park — Naomi carves soap into animal shapes, hangs out with the (clearly flaming, even though the text doesn’t say so explicitly) librarian at school, and watches Wheel of Fortune every night with Gram and her best friend Fabiola. But [...]

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First, a signal-boost for my friend Tahnan‘s brilliant idea: I pledge to donate $10 to a safe drinking water charity for every day of Boston’s boil-water order. Will you join me, with whatever you can afford? The reservoir water coming out of my tap right now is a) clear and tasty, b) far safer than [...]

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