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Aerin Renning, fugitive from a slave planet, gets an unbelievable chance to attend Academy 7, “the most prestigious school in the universe.” Dane Madousin, son of the Alliance’s top military man, also scores high enough on his entrance exam to attend Academy 7. She is terrified and withdrawn; he has … Continue reading
Thanks to an actors’ strike, Disney World is desperate enough to hire a bunch of teenagers on an open casting call. For a summer, until the strike is settled, the park becomes an awkward summer camp for people who get paid to dress up as Goofy and Cinderella — and, … Continue reading
4 out of 5! When the king comes for a surprise visit to Evie’s tiny village, she gets the chance of a lifetime: to go to university in the capitol, where she can study to become a healer like her parents were. Her grandfather is devastated to lose her, but … Continue reading
In 1942 India, Vidya is primarily concerned with convincing her parents not to marry her off until she can go to college. Those hopes die when her father is seriously injured at an independence march and Vidya, her parents, and her brother move to Madras to live with her father’s … Continue reading
When Lucy was small, her mother went crazy and disappeared, leaving her in the care of her beloved foster parents. She doesn’t believe it, of course, when she finds pages from her mother’s diary claiming that the family has been under an Elfin Knight’s curse for centuries — each woman … Continue reading
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 … Continue reading
I’m madly reading Cybils finalists, which I’m not allowed to review until the winner is announced in February, because our judgely reviews might telegraph the result. So in the meantime… catching up on other reviews! This collection of short stories is subtitled “Twelve stories of identity,” and by identity we … Continue reading
Another conference speaker with whom I was unfamiliar. She’s also a jazz singer, and gave us a lovely impromptu a capella performance (just reinforcing the sense that I was at a folk festival). I’ll admit, I found her book tiresome. The prose is lovely, I guess, but it was a … Continue reading
Three three-dimensional best friends, families that genuinely love each other, disability and homosexuality just tossed in like the normal parts of life they are, and it’s even set in Boston! Sold. The plot is complicated — there’s a deaf kid, a theater production, a wacky road trip to New York … Continue reading
How did I escape my nerdy fantasy-loving adolescence without ever reading this book? I’m not sure, but I intend to correct the oversight in my Twilight-loving students. Beauty has all the creature-of-the-night broody romance of Edward and Bella, with a little more self-actualization. You know the story: Beauty’s dad gets … Continue reading
