Category Archives: Middle Grade 8-12

Review: Horse Trouble by Kristin Varner

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Horse Trouble by Kristin Varner

Horse Trouble
Kristin Varner
First Second
Published October 26, 2021

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About Horse Trouble

An American Library Association 2021 Best Graphic Novel for Children

Twelve-year-old Kate is laser-focused on her one true horseback riding. But try as she might, she can’t hide from life’s problems in the stable.

There’s nothing Kate loves more than being around horses. But her best friend is allergic to them, so Kate has to take riding lessons without her. Kate’s forced to navigate some of life’s hardships―like the mean girls at the stable who tease her and her body insecurities―all on her own. To make matters worse, Kate is continually falling off her horse. To Kate, her tween years feel like one unfair punishment after another. Can she get over it all…and get back on her horse?

Horse Trouble, the debut graphic novel from children’s book artist Kristin Varner, is an oh-so-relatable graphic novel with humor and heart.

My Review

After reading Dog Trouble, I immediately looked online to see if Kristin Varner had other books, and I was overjoyed to learn she does! Yay! One of the things I really enjoyed about Dog Trouble is the chapter openers that would introduce a specific dog or breed of dog and tell some things about it. There are also sidebars throughout the story in which the author would define terms specific to the story, which helped make the book more accessible to readers who don’t have experience in the story’s main activity.

Varner does something similar in Horse Trouble, though it’s slightly less well-developed than the other book. (Which makes sense, since she wrote this one first.) I love the idea and the fact that I could read a book about competitive horseback riding and follow the story easily, learning terminology along the way.

I loved Kate as a narrator and main character. She’s such a great kid and takes such good care of the horses she’s responsible for. I enjoyed this one a whole lot, and I will absolutely read more work by Kristin Varner.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 8 to 12.

Representation
Kate is a plus-sized girl.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
No profanity. Kate endures some mean comments about her body.

Romance/Sexual Content
None.

Spiritual Content
None.

Violent Content
Others say mean comments about Kate’s weight.

Drug Content
None.

Note: This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use but help support this blog. All opinions are my own.

10 Best Books I Read in 2024

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10 Best Books I Read in 2024

I’m finally catching up on some stats and information on my reading life in 2024, and that process reminded me that I haven’t shared my top 10 best books I read in 2024 yet!

Since I review mainly young adult and middle grade books here on The Story Sanctuary, the list will center on books for those age groups. In the past, I’ve made a separate list for each age group, but this year, I’m just making one list and including both. As a bonus, I ranked them.

Note: This post contains affiliate links that do not cost you anything to use but help support this blog. Thanks for using them to do your shopping.

10 Best Books I Read in 2024

10. The Loudest Silence by Sydney Langford

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My thoughts: Platonic love, music, disability, nuanced identities, and an incredible cast of characters fill this sweet story. The Loudest Silence explores Deaf-Hard of Hearing experiences and family expectations. This one is unforgettable.

Published July 30, 2024 | My Review

9. The Judgment of Yoyo Gold by Isaac Blum

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My thoughts: I love that this book examines hypocrisy and harm within a highly controlled religious community without disregarding the positive experiences or beauty that faith brings to practitioners’ lives. This book is messy and raw, but it’s also bold and full of love.

Published October 15, 2024 | My Review

8. Shark Teeth by Sherri Winston

Amazon | Bookshop | Goodreads

My thoughts: An older sister desperately tries to keep her family together but wonders if that’s the best thing for her and her siblings. This one has memorable characters and incredible depth of feeling. It hit me deep.

Published January 16, 2024 | My Review

7. The No-Girlfriend Rule by Christen Randall

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My thoughts: Finding the right book at the right time is just as important as finding the right people to play tabletop games with. The No-Girlfriend Rule celebrates the friendships, jokes, and how a game can take on a life of its own. If you like DnD, you want this on your reading list.

Published March 5, 2024 | My Review

6. Puzzleheart by Jenn Reese

Amazon | Bookshop | Goodreads

My thoughts: It’s not easy to craft a text-based story filled with puzzles that are engaging and easy to visualize and balance that with compelling characters in a story that makes you want to cozy up with a cup of hot cocoa. This one does it. I had such a great time reading it.

Published May 14, 2024 | My Review

5. Dragonfruit by Makiia Lucier

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My thoughts: Inspired by Pacific Island mythology and packed with danger, sea dragons, and a chance at redemption. I loved the intricate magic and the unforgettable characters.

Published April 9, 2024 | My Review

4. Wolfpack: How Young People Will Find Their Voice, Unite Their Pack, and Change the World by Abby Wambach

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My thoughts: This 100-page book by famed soccer star Abby Wambach encourages leaders who lift one another up and work together rather than seeing others as rivals. It’s filled with simple but profound counsel from a woman who learned many of these lessons through blood, sweat, and tears. I am not usually into motivational books, but this one blew me away.

Published October 6, 2020 | My Review

3. Don’t Let the Forest In by C. G. Drews

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My thoughts: If you like dark, creepy forests, dangerous monsters, and boys who might only find the courage to love one another when it’s too late– stop reading this and go buy Don’t Let the Forest In right now. It’s so good.

Published October 29, 2024 | My Review

2. The Tenth Mistake of Hank Hooperman by Gennifer Choldenko

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My thoughts: This book has so much heart. I can’t stop talking about it. The sweet relationship between siblings. The trauma and struggle of a family in crisis. It’s heartbreaking and healing at once.

Published June 11, 2024 | My Review

1. A Magic Fierce and Bright by Hemant Nayat

Amazon | Bookshop | Goodreads

My thoughts: I cannot stop raving about this book. I love the magic system. (Adya can magic machines.) It’s a story about sisters. There’s a helpful (hilarious) sentient motorcycle that I can’t get enough of. The plot was a wild ride from start to finish. I love it so much.

Published July 9, 2024 | My Review

What were the best books you read in 2024?

What books topped your list of favorites from 2024? Please leave a comment and let me know what your number one favorite is. Let me know if you read and enjoyed any of the titles on my list, too!

Review: Sylvia Doe and the 100-Year Flood by Robert Beatty

Book Review and Content, Fantasy, Magical Realism, Middle Grade 8-12, , , , , , , , , ,

Sylvia Doe and the 100-Year Flood
Robert Beatty
Disney Hyperion
Published October 8, 2024

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About Sylvia Doe and the 100-Year Flood

Sylvia Doe doesn’t know where she was born or the people she came from. She doesn’t even know her real last name. Sylvia has lived at the Highground Home for Children in the mountains of North Carolina for as long as she can remember. Whenever the administrators place her with a foster family in the city, she runs away, back to her horse Kitty Hawk—her best friend—and the other horses in the herd, the only place she feels like she belongs.

When Hurricane Jessamine causes the remote mountain valley where she lives to flood, Sylvia must rescue her beloved horses. But she begins to encounter strange and wondrous things floating down the river. Glittering gemstones and wild animals that don’t belong — everything’s out of place. Then she spots an unconscious boy floating in the water. As she drags him onto the shore and their adventure together begins, Sylvia wonders who he is and where he came from. And why does she feel such a strong connection to this mysterious boy?

SYLVIA DOE has earned the prestigious STARRED REVIEW from both Kirkus Reviews and Publisher’s Weekly. The award-winning author Kwame Alexander praised the story, saying “Magical realism at its best!”

My Review

This book came out right around the time when Hurricane Helene devastated western North Carolina with rain and flooding. It took me a while to circle back to read the story, but I’d heard so many amazing things about it that I didn’t want to miss it.

Robert Beatty has an incredible ability to write about difficult or intense things in what feels like this very gentle way. Sylvia Doe and the 100-year Flood has some high-energy scenes in which the characters face situations of peril as they’re swept away by floodwater or desperately searching for storm survivors. Yet the tone of the story remains gentle. I love that.

The story includes a little bit of romance between Sylvia and another character. It stays very sweet, with some blushing and attraction. I think there’s a scene where the two snuggle together and another where they kiss each other. I like that their feelings for one another don’t overtake the story and that the disaster situations remain the focus despite their shifting emotions.

Sylvia has been in foster care since she was found alone in the wilderness. She recognizes that the foster care system, and in particular, her social worker, is trying to do good things. The story doesn’t demonize the system or highlight its many challenges or places it can cause harm. But it does present a story in which the system, even as it functions the way it should, isn’t a good fit for Sylvia as a child. She needs something the foster care system can’t provide for her.

The strong connections Sylvia feels to animals, especially horses and birds, will make this one a great fit for animal-loving readers. The magical realism elements add an otherworldly feel that makes Sylvia Doe and the 100-year Flood appealing to readers looking for something beyond the reality in which we live.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 8 to 12.

Representation
Sylvia has light brown skin tones. She has grown up in foster care.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
None.

Romance/Sexual Content
Brief kissing between boy and girl.

Spiritual Content
Some unseen force has pulled animals and other things from other times and places into a flooded North Carolina river.

Violent Content
Situations of peril. Reference to flash flooding and hurricane damage. Sylvia spots a group of dead sandhill cranes, apparently killed in the hurricane. Three children die (off-scene) due to the hurricane and flood conditions.

Drug Content
None.

Note: This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use but help support this blog. I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own.

Review: Boy vs. Shark by Paul Gilligan

Book Review and Content, Graphic Novel or Adaptation, Historical, Memoir, Middle Grade 8-12, Nonfiction, , , , ,

Boy vs. Shark
Paul Gilligan
Tundra Books
Published October 15, 2024

Amazon | Bookshop | Goodreads

About Boy vs. Shark

A hilarious middle-grade graphic memoir about boyhood, toxic masculinity and a shark named Jaws. For fans of Guts and New Kid.

In the summer of 1975, 10-year-old Paul Gilligan doesn’t have a whole lot to worry about other than keeping his comic books untarnished, getting tennis balls off roofs and keeping up with the increasingly bold stunts of his best friend, David.

And then Jaws comes to town.

Suddenly everyone is obsessing over this movie about a shark ripping people to pieces. And if you haven’t seen it, not only are you missing out, you’re also kind of a wimp.

Needless to say, Jaws leaves young Paul a cowering mess, and underlines the growing gap between him and David as well as the distance between where he stands and the world’s expectations of a boy’s “manliness.”

And when Jaws himself becomes a kind of macho Jiminy Cricket for Paul, what is a scared and overwhelmed boy to do?

My Review

I really like the way that the author handled references to the movie Jaws in the text. Some of the characters verbally reference different scenes. After Paul watches the movie, he relates what happens in some of the scenes with balloon animals as characters. The absurdity of the images helps keep the content from being scary and overwhelming. I thought that was a really nice touch.

I also appreciated the complexity of the relationships in the novel, especially Paul’s relationship with his dad. Paul’s dad embraces some toxic ideas about who Paul should be as a young man, which causes Paul a lot of stress. At the same time, though, his dad imparts a strong ethic of personal responsibility, which helps guide Paul through a difficult situation.

It’s always great to see three-dimensional parent characters in Kidlit, and in this instance, the fact that the ideals Paul’s dad holds up as masculine are not all good or all bad makes it easier to understand Paul’s feelings of confusion and hurt when he doesn’t perfectly fit his father’s ideals.

I really enjoyed this graphic memoir. The use of the movie worked really well to illustrate the theme, and Gilligan creates a compelling balance of humor and heart in his exploration of masculine values and growing up.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 10 to 12.

Representation
Paul’s best friends are an Asian American boy and a Black boy.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
None.

Romance/Sexual Content
None.

Spiritual Content
None.

Violent Content
References to plot points from the movie Jaws. Some bullying in which an older boy makes comments about a younger kid. A boy manipulates others into stealing something from a store.

Drug Content
In one scene, a boy has a bottle of wine under his shirt, which he drops.

Note: This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use but help support this blog. I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own.

Review: The Wild Robot by Peter Brown

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The Wild Robot (The Wild Robot #1)
Peter Brown
Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Published April 5, 2016

Amazon | Bookshop | Goodreads

About The Wild Robot

When robot Roz opens her eyes for the first time, she discovers that she is all alone on a remote, wild island. She has no idea how she got there or what her purpose is—but she knows she needs to survive. After battling a violent storm and escaping a vicious bear attack, she realizes that her only hope for survival is to adapt to her surroundings and learn from the island’s unwelcoming animal inhabitants.

As Roz slowly befriends the animals, the island starts to feel like home—until, one day, the robot’s mysterious past comes back to haunt her.

From bestselling and award-winning author and illustrator Peter Brown comes a heartwarming and action-packed novel about what happens when nature and technology collide.

My Review

Okay, so I’m probably one of the last people to read this book, especially now that it’s been made into a movie. The good news is that making something into a movie usually helps to motivate me to read the book if I haven’t already. I like to read the book first so that my first experience with the story is in the author’s words.

I picked up a copy of The Wild Robot while shopping for my birthday last year. Near Christmas, I found myself in a pretty fierce reading slump, and an illustrated book with short chapters seemed very appealing to me at that moment, so I started reading.

And from the first few chapters, I was hooked on the story. Really, once we got to the animals and their reactions to Roz, I began to deeply invest in what was happening. I love the way that the simple illustrations convey emotion. My heart squeezed at the image of the robot standing at the top of a tree. The robot holding a gosling while he fell asleep was so sweet.

I love the way the book balances an open look at natural order with a more anthropomorphic one about the value of community, familial love, and relationships. The animal characters include predators and prey, and while nobody gets eaten on scene, it’s referenced around the story’s edges. Roz adopts a gosling and raises him until he can join the other geese. She explores what it means to be a mother and what it means to raise someone well.

I enjoyed the different characters and the way they pull together when faced with an unknown threat or pull together to help one of their own community members. This is a sweet story and a pretty quick read. If you haven’t read it yet, definitely check out The Wild Robot.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 8 to 12.

Representation
The main character is Roz, a robot. Most other characters are animals.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
None.

Romance/Sexual Content
None.

Spiritual Content
None.

Violent Content
A hurricane sinks a ship carrying boxes of robots. Some robots get destroyed before they reach the island. Roz accidentally kills a family of geese. The story references predator animals eating other animals. At one point, robots fight the island’s inhabitants. One uses a gun to subdue others.

Drug Content
None.

Note: This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use but help support this blog. All opinions are my own.

Review: Show Me a Sign by Ann Clare LeZotte

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Show Me a Sign
Ann Clare LeZotte
Scholastic Press
Published March 3, 2020

Amazon | Bookshop | Goodreads

About Show Me a Sign

Deaf author and librarian Ann Clare LeZotte weaves an Own Voices story inspired by the true history of a thriving deaf community on Martha’s Vineyard in the early 19th century.
Mary Lambert has always felt safe and protected on her beloved island of Martha’s Vineyard. Her great-grandfather was an early English settler and the first deaf islander. Now, over a hundred years later, many people there – including Mary – are deaf, and nearly everyone can communicate in sign language. Mary has never felt isolated. She is proud of her lineage.

But recent events have delivered winds of change. Mary’s brother died, leaving her family shattered. Tensions over land disputes are mounting between English settlers and the Wampanoag people. And a cunning young scientist has arrived, hoping to discover the origin of the island’s prevalent deafness. His maniacal drive to find answers soon renders Mary a “live specimen” in a cruel experiment. Her struggle to save herself is at the core of this novel.

My Review

I’ve read the other two books in this series, and both reference back to the trauma Mary endures in this book. All three stories are powerfully told. Mary is a compelling character. She’s strong and determined, confident in what she knows is right.

Each book in the series explores different aspects of how the Deaf were treated during the early 19th century while centering Deaf voices and experiences. Now that I’ve read all three books, I feel like I have a better understanding of why the second and third books went in certain directions, and I can’t help but appreciate them even more than I did when I first read them.

The setting and time period felt so real to me, from the descriptions of Mary’s home and daily life to the values and beliefs her family held. I love Mary’s relationship with Ezra Brewer and her best friend, Nancy. Both of those relationships taught her things and offered support in sometimes unexpected ways.

I think readers who enjoy historical novels, especially those set in the northeast United States, will love this first book in the series by Ann Clare LeZotte.

Content Notes for Show Me a Sign

Recommended for Ages 8 to 12.

Representation
Mary and many of her community members are Deaf.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
References to racist language, but Mary doesn’t state the words. Some characters make their prejudice against indigenous or black people clear.

Romance/Sexual Content
Mary is embarrassed/uncomfortable when a doctor examines her spine from her neck to her bottom and her throat to her breast.

Spiritual Content
Mary and her family attend church and pray. She and her best friend make up a ritual they hope will help lay to rest the spirit of Mary’s brother, who died before the story begins. Mary speaks to a person who works for her father and lives with and is part of the Wampanoag tribe. They compare spiritual beliefs and beliefs about the land and whether the land can be divided into parcels and owned.

Violent Content
References to Mary’s brother’s death. He was trampled by a horse and carriage in an accident. References to a man beating a child to punish her for her behavior.

Someone kidnaps a girl, imprisoning her against her will. Some scenes show or reference physical abuse and neglect. (A woman hits a girl’s ears. The girl has bruises in other places. She doesn’t receive enough to eat and is forced to labor all day and locked in a room at night.) A man performs medical exams (not sexual) on a girl without her consent.

Drug Content
References to alcoholism and adults drinking alcohol.

Note: This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use but help support this blog. I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own.