Chocolate River Rescue by
"Get off of there, Craig!" shouted Shawn. "I can't! I'm slipping!" wailed Craig. Shawn leaped back onto the ice. He took a breath and jumped over the widening crack, grabbing his little brother by the coat as he flew through the air. Both boys fell heavily to the ice on the other side. The boys stared in horror as the crack widened to reveal an eddy of churning, foaming brown water. Tony, Craig, and Shawn are trapped on an ice floe on the Petitcodiac River in the dead of winter, and the rapid current is pulling them toward the ocean. Twelve-year-old Petra arrives and the boys think they're saved, but their dangerous journey is only just beginning. The boys and Petra face peril at every twist and turn of the river in Chocolate River Rescue, an exhilarating adventure based on true events. They also learn that a river of chocolate is far better served warm, over ice cream, than cold on an ice floe!
Eye of the Crow by
Sherlock Holmes, just thirteen, is a misfit. His highborn mother is the daughter of an aristocratic family, his father a poor Jew. Their marriage flouts tradition and makes them social pariahs in the London of the 1860s; and their son, Sherlock, bears the burden of their rebellion. Friendless, bullied at school, he belongs nowhere and has only his wits to help him make his way. But what wits they are! His keen powers of observation are already apparent, though he is still a boy. He loves to amuse himself by constructing histories from the smallest detail for everyone he meets. Partly for fun, he focuses his attention on a sensational murder to see if he can solve it. But his game turns deadly serious when he finds himself the accused -- and in London, they hang boys of thirteen. Shane Peacock has created a boy who bears all the seeds of the character who has mesmerized millions: the relentless eye, the sense of justice, and the complex ego. The boy Sherlock Holmes is a fascinating character who is sure to become a fast favorite with young readers everywhere.
The Moon Children by
Saskatchewan Book Awards Shortlist - Children's Books, 2007 Staring across the street the day after his alcoholic father disappears, eleven-year-old Billy Ray is startled to see one of his schoolmates, an adopted Romanian girl, gazing at the sky and then writing in a notebook. She is keeping a Moon Journal, cataloguing the phases of the moon to keep alive a secret memory that, eventually, Billy is the first to discover. Although he has Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder and struggles with many things that typical kids take for granted, Billy's curiosity and warmth intrigue Natasha, and the two children develop a friendship that gives them the strength and courage to reveal their deepest secrets and to reach for their dreams. One of Billy's dreams is to enter a talent contest at the local park. He has been practicing yo-yo tricks over and over again, hoping to impress his father. Things don't turn out as planned, but under unfair circumstances that would make other children give up, Billy proves himself to be a steadfast example of the way hope elicits the power to carry on.
Newton Time Machine by
Having saved the Kingdom of Merriwarts and united his giant friends Queen Gertrude and King Herbert in blissful (if smelly) marriage, 10-year-old genius Newton is in need of a new project. For a boy fascinated by dinosaurs, there's only one thing to do: build a time machine so he can go back and see them! But when the test voyage of the time machine--with Herbert and Gertrude on board--ends in a smoky explosion and a missing time machine (not to mention missing giants!), Newton finds himself with new problems to solve. With the help of his friend Max, talking toy soldier Commander Joe and the repulsive but friendly Witch Hazel, Newton is able to trace his time machine to the hidden kingdom of the leprechauns, the world's greatest thieves. Whether he'll be able to get it back, along with Herbert and Gertrude, is another story--one complicated by the police arrest of a real giant, the soccer tryouts of his sports-crazy quadruplet brothers and the arrival of Gertrude's good-for-nothing brother, Prince Raphael, in the Kingdom of Merriwarts. With the same deft sense of children's humour that made his debut novel an award-winning bestseller, Michael McGowan's Newton and the Time Machine strikes the perfect balance between wackiness and authenticity. Kids will love Newton's crazy adventures as he and Max track down their friends and learn a lesson in confidence along the way.
Peril at Pier Nine by
Fourteen-year-old Jack is a daring, impulsive boy, who lives to sail, have adventures and get into trouble. When the Noronic docks at Ward Island, he and his friends gather to admire it. But you need an invitation from one of the passengers to board the ship. So when Jack meets Henry, a lonely 13-year-old passenger from Boston, he talks Henry into inviting Jack's group on a tour of the ship. In the course of the tour, Jack and Henry become friends. But that night, when Jack wakes up and looks out at Pier Nine and the Noronic, he sees, to his horror, that the ship is on fire and sinking. He races down to the harbour and takes out the island's only motorboat, hoping to help passengers. People are stuck on the upper deck because the only way off the ship, three decks below, is already engulfed in flames. Jack spots Henry and calls to him just as Henry's dad helps him jump into the water. Jack is able to rescue Henry and many others, although Henry's dad is lost. Jack is a hero to many, but not everyone agrees. Peril at Pier Nineis based on a true story. On September 14, 1949, the cruise ship Noronic, caught fire with 524 passengers and 171 crew members on board. Between 118 and 139 people died. The cause of the fire was never determined.
Reading the Bones by
Short-listed for the 2009 Silver Birch Award, commended for the 2009 Best Books for Kids & Teens Due to circumstances beyond her control, 12-year-old Peggy Henderson has to move to the quiet town of Crescent Beach, British Columbia, to live with her aunt and uncle. Without a father and separated from her mother, who's looking for work, Peggy feels her unhappiness increasing until the day she and her uncle start digging a pond in the backyard and she realizes the rock she's been trying to pry from the ground is really a human skull. Peggy eventually learns that her home and the entire seaside town were built on top of a 5000-year-old Coast Salish fishing village. With the help of an elderly archaeologist, a woman named Eddy, Peggy comes to know the ancient storyteller buried in her yard in a way that few others can - by reading the bones. As life with her aunt becomes more and more unbearable, Peggy looks to the old Salish man from the past for help and answers.
The Royal Woods by
All it takes is one look -- one look for 12-year-old Sydney and her nine-year-old brother Turk to know that everything had changed. The farm where their Uncle Frank and Aunt Lily used to live was gone, and along with it, their dreams of a happy ever-after. Now what? With their mother dead and their father buried under his grief, Sydney and Turk decided to hop a freight train and go west. The farm was their destination, but in its place is a strange new subdivision: The Royal Woods. Rather than return home and admit defeat, Sydney and Turk embark on the adventure of a lifetime. With a homeless eccentric and an illegal immigrant as their only friends -- and some neighborhood bullies making things a little difficult -- the pair struggle to make a life for themselves in their odd new surroundings. The Royal Woods is an often fantastical, always engaging yarn that turns more than a few fairy tale conventions on their heads. Writing with a wink and a nod to Frank L. Baum's The Wizard of Oz and movies like Big Fish, Matt Duggan offers a smart, page-turning tale for young adult readers.
Sacred Leaf by
The people of Bolivia have grown coca for legitimate purposes for hundreds of years, but the demands of America's War on Drugs now threaten this way of life. Deborah Ellis's searing follow-up to the highly praised I Am a Taxi deals with this frank reality. After he manages to escape from virtual enslavement in an illegal cocaine operation, Diego is taken in by the Ricardo family. These poor coca farmers give Diego a safe haven where he recovers from his ordeal in the jungle. But the army soon moves in and destroys the family's coca crop -- their livelihood. So Diego joins the cocaleros as they protest the destruction of their crops and confront the army head-on by barricading the roads. While tension between the cocaleros and the army builds to a dramatic climax, Diego wonders whether he will ever find a way to return to his family. This compelling novel defies conventional wisdom on an important issue, and shows how people in one part of the world unknowingly create hardship for people in another.
Swindle by
Ocean's 11 . . . with 11-year-olds, in a super stand-alone heist caper from Gordon Korman! After a mean collector named Swindle cons him out of his valuable Babe Ruth baseball card, Griffin Bing must put together a band of misfits to break into Swindle's compound and recapture the card. There are many things standing in their way - a menacing guard dog, a high-tech security system, a very secret hiding place, and their general inability to drive - but Griffin and his team are going to get back what's rightfully his . . . This is Gordon Korman at his crowd-pleasing best, perfect for readers who like a hoot, a howl, and a heist.
The Third Eye by
2009 Silver Birch Award -- Winner 2009 Red Maple Award -- Shortlisted 2009 Best Books for Kids & Teens -- Commended 2008 CLA Book of the Year for Children Award -- Longlisted For Tara and her brother, Suraj, the year their mother and grandfather fled the village of Morni in the middle of the night has been a nightmare. Their new stepmother is cruel and deceptive, and the village itself is lacking a healer. What's more, men of the village have been disappearing, often returning in a strange, altered form. When a new healer, Zarku, a mysterious man with a third eye possessing strange power, suddenly appears in Morni, all are mesmerized by his magic - all except Tara, who sees through his evil disguise. With nothing but her own courage and wit, Tara tries to find her missing mother and grandfather, the true healer, in time to save her village. But along the way she must enlist the help of the god Ganesh and the lord of death, Yama, or she, like others before her, will fall victim to Zarku's third eye.
The Third Eye by
2009 Silver Birch Award -- Winner 2009 Red Maple Award -- Shortlisted 2009 Best Books for Kids & Teens -- Commended 2008 CLA Book of the Year for Children Award -- Longlisted For Tara and her brother, Suraj, the year their mother and grandfather fled the village of Morni in the middle of the night has been a nightmare. Their new stepmother is cruel and deceptive, and the village itself is lacking a healer. What's more, men of the village have been disappearing, often returning in a strange, altered form. When a new healer, Zarku, a mysterious man with a third eye possessing strange power, suddenly appears in Morni, all are mesmerized by his magic - all except Tara, who sees through his evil disguise. With nothing but her own courage and wit, Tara tries to find her missing mother and grandfather, the true healer, in time to save her village. But along the way she must enlist the help of the god Ganesh and the lord of death, Yama, or she, like others before her, will fall victim to Zarku's third eye.