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Sam Levenson

Siblings: children of the same parents, each of whom is perfectly normal until they get together.

Attribution

Sam Levenson

Sir Winston Churchill

One ought never to turn one's back on a threatened danger and try to run away from it. If you do that, you will double the danger. But if you meet it promptly and without flinching, you will reduce the danger by half.

Attribution

Sir Winston Churchill

Los Angeles Times Book Prizes 2015

The 36th annual Los Angeles Times Book Prizes were awarded on Saturday, April 9, 2016, in a public ceremony at USC’s Bovard Auditorium. The best books of 2015 were recognized in 10 categories, along with the winners of the Innovator’s and Robert Kirsch awards.

April 8, 2016

I'm back from an all-too-quick trip to Denver, where I thoroughly enjoyed presenting our Book Group Survey to an engaged crowd of librarians at the Public Library Association Conference, along with suggestions on how libraries and book groups can work better together. After sharing the stats, I interviewed Ariel Lawhon about her book, FLIGHT OF DREAMS, which was a perfect book to chat about as historical fiction is trending so strongly with book groups. Confession: Until I read this book, I did not know that anyone survived the Hindenburg disaster, which is the subject of Ariel’s book. Where was I in history class? Clearly I would have flunked Trivial Pursuit on this topic. The book is written from five points of view, which enhanced the reading experience. You can see a picture of the two of us above.

Editorial Content for Golden Boys

Contributors

Reviewer (text)

Grace P., Teen Board Member

Sonya Hartnett is the critically acclaimed Australian author of many books for children, young adults, and adults; GOLDEN BOYS is her newest book. She has been awarded many prizes for her work and has been published in not only Australia and the USA, but many other countries as well.
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Teaser

Colt Jenson and his younger brother, Bastian, have moved to a new, working-class suburb. The Jensons are different. Their father, Rex, showers them with gifts --- toys, bikes, all that glitters most --- and makes them the envy of the neighborhood. To the local kids, the Jensons are a family out of a movie, and Rex a hero --- successful, attentive, attractive, always there to lend a hand. But to Colt, he's an impossible figure: unbearable, suffocating. Has Colt got Rex wrong, or has he seen something in his father that will destroy their fragile new lives?

Promo

Colt Jenson and his younger brother, Bastian, have moved to a new, working-class suburb. The Jensons are different. Their father, Rex, showers them with gifts --- toys, bikes, all that glitters most --- and makes them the envy of the neighborhood. To the local kids, the Jensons are a family out of a movie, and Rex a hero --- successful, attentive, attractive, always there to lend a hand. But to Colt, he's an impossible figure: unbearable, suffocating. Has Colt got Rex wrong, or has he seen something in his father that will destroy their fragile new lives?

About the Book

With masterful nuance and vividly drawn characters, Sonya Hartnett’s novel visits a suburban neighborhood where psychological menace lurks below the surface.

Colt Jenson and his younger brother, Bastian, have moved to a new, working-class suburb. The Jensons are different. Their father, Rex, showers them with gifts --- toys, bikes, all that glitters most --- and makes them the envy of the neighborhood. To the local kids, the Jensons are a family out of a movie, and Rex a hero --- successful, attentive, attractive, always there to lend a hand. But to Colt, he's an impossible figure: unbearable, suffocating. Has Colt got Rex wrong, or has he seen something in his father that will destroy their fragile new lives? This brilliant and unflinching new novel reveals internationally acclaimed author Sonya Hartnett at her most intriguing and psychologically complex.

Editorial Content for The Wild Robot

Contributors

Reviewer (text)

Norah Piehl

In his middle-grade debut, award-winning picture book author and illustrator Peter Brown proves that he can effectively tell a story over more than 32 pages.
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Teaser

When robot Roz opens her eyes for the first time, she discovers that she is alone on a remote, wild island. Why is she there? Where did she come from? And, most important, how will she survive in her harsh surroundings? Roz's only hope is to learn from the island's hostile animal inhabitants. When she tries to care for an orphaned gosling, the other animals finally decide to help, and the island starts to feel like home. Until one day, the robot's mysterious past comes back to haunt her....

Promo

When robot Roz opens her eyes for the first time, she discovers that she is alone on a remote, wild island. Why is she there? Where did she come from? And, most important, how will she survive in her harsh surroundings? Roz's only hope is to learn from the island's hostile animal inhabitants. When she tries to care for an orphaned gosling, the other animals finally decide to help, and the island starts to feel like home. Until one day, the robot's mysterious past comes back to haunt her....

About the Book

When robot Roz opens her eyes for the first time, she discovers that she is alone on a remote, wild island. Why is she there? Where did she come from? And, most important, how will she survive in her harsh surroundings? Roz's only hope is to learn from the island's hostile animal inhabitants. When she tries to care for an orphaned gosling, the other animals finally decide to help, and the island starts to feel like home. Until one day, the robot's mysterious past comes back to haunt her....

Heartwarming and full of action, Peter Brown's middle-grade debut raises thought-provoking questions about the environment, the role technology plays in our world, and what it means to be alive.

J. R. R. Tolkien, author of The Story of Kullervo

Brought up in the homestead of the dark magician Untamo, who killed his father, kidnapped his mother and tried three times to kill him when he was still a boy, Kullervo is alone save for the love of his twin sister, Wanona, and the magical powers of the black dog Musti, who guards him. When Kullervo is sold into slavery, he swears revenge on the magician. But he will learn that even at the point of vengeance, there is no escape from the cruelest of fates. Published here for the first time with J.R.R.

Martha Hall Kelly, author of Lilac Girls

New York socialite Caroline Ferriday's world is forever changed when Hitler’s army invades Poland in September 1939 --- and then sets its sights on France. Kasia Kuzmerick, a Polish teenager, is drawn deeper into her role as courier for the underground resistance movement. For the ambitious young German doctor, Herta Oberheuser, an ad for a government medical position seems her ticket out of a desolate life. Once hired, though, she finds herself trapped in a male-dominated realm of Nazi secrets and power.

Steve Berry, author of The 14th Colony

Ex-Justice Department agent Cotton Malone is forced into a fight for survival against Aleksandr Zorin, a man whose loyalty to the former Soviet Union has festered for decades into an intense hatred of the United States. Armed with a weapon left over from the Cold War, Zorin plans to attack. He’s aided by a shocking secret hidden in America’s oldest fraternal organization --- the Society of Cincinnati --- a group that once lent out its military savvy to presidents, including helping to formulate three invasion plans of what was intended to be America’s 14th colony: Canada.

Editorial Content for The Gangster: An Isaac Bell Adventure

Contributors

Reviewer (text)

Judy Gigstad

Clive Cussler and Justin Scott bring 1906 to life in vivid technicolor descriptions in THE GANGSTER. Detective Isaac Bell, star employee of the Van Dorn Agency, is charged with rooting out a vicious crime organization known as the Black Hand. In New York, a Sicilian building contractor’s daughter is kidnapped by them. Bell locates 12-year-old Maria Vella, frees her after a bloody struggle and returns her to her distraught family. Read More

Teaser

It is 1906, and in New York City, the Italian crime group known as the Black Hand is on a spree: kidnapping, extortion, arson. Detective Isaac Bell of the Van Dorn Agency is hired to form a special “Black Hand Squad,” but the gangsters appear to be everywhere --- so much so that Bell begins to wonder if there are imitators, criminals using the name for the terror effect. And then the murders begin, each one of a man more powerful than the last. As Bell discovers, to his dismay, the ultimate target may be the most powerful man of all.

Promo

It is 1906, and in New York City, the Italian crime group known as the Black Hand is on a spree: kidnapping, extortion, arson. Detective Isaac Bell of the Van Dorn Agency is hired to form a special “Black Hand Squad,” but the gangsters appear to be everywhere --- so much so that Bell begins to wonder if there are imitators, criminals using the name for the terror effect. And then the murders begin, each one of a man more powerful than the last. As Bell discovers, to his dismay, the ultimate target may be the most powerful man of all.

About the Book

Turn-of-the-century Detective Isaac Bell takes on the upstart leader of a vicious crime organization in this novel in the #1 New York Times bestselling series.
 
It is 1906, and in New York City, the Italian crime group known as the Black Hand is on a spree: kidnapping, extortion, arson. They like to take the oldest tricks and add dynamite. When a coalition of the Black Hand’s victims hire out the Van Dorn agency to protect their businesses, their reputations and their families, Detective Isaac Bell forms a crack squad and begins scouring the city for clues. And then he spots a familiar face.

The stakes grow ever-higher, with the Black Hand becoming more ambitious, and their targets more political. If Bell can’t determine the role played by the face from his past, the next life lost could be one of the most powerful men in the nation.

Audiobook available, narrated by Scott Brick