Sunday, August 12, 2018

Genuine Fraud by E. Lockhart

This is one of the many novels that I enjoyed over summer break-great plot twist...

Imogen is a runaway heiress, an orphan, a cook, and a cheat.
Jule is a fighter, a social chameleon, and an athlete.
An intense friendship. A disappearance. A murder, or maybe two.
A bad romance, or maybe three.
Blunt objects, disguises, blood, and chocolate. The American dream, superheroes, spies, and villains.
A girl who refuses to give people what they want from her. 


A girl who refuses to be the person she once was.

Wednesday, June 6, 2018


Summer is the perfect time 
to catch up on reading!

Check out the Book Concierge  for a guide to great reads!

Orphan Train by Christina Baker





Really enjoyed this novel based on true accounts of children being rounded up fro NYC streets and sent o trains to the Midwest to be adopted by families needing free labor.

The author of Bird in Hand and The Way Life Should Be delivers her most ambitious and powerful novel to date: a captivating story of two very different women who build an unexpected friendship: a 91-year-old woman with a hidden past as an orphan-train rider and the teenage girl whose own troubled adolescence leads her to seek answers to questions no one has ever thought to ask.

Monday, March 12, 2018

Hello Universe by Erin Entrada Kelly


Just listened to the 2018 Newbery Award winner!
Great book, loved the snippets of Filipino culture included.  The main character is a Pinoy, just like my husband.



In one day, four lives weave together in unexpected ways. Virgil Salinas is shy and kindhearted and feels out of place in his loud and boisterous family. Valencia Somerset, who is deaf, is smart, brave, and secretly lonely, and loves everything about nature. Kaori Tanaka is a self-proclaimed psychic, whose little sister Gen is always following her around. And Chet Bullens wishes the weird kids would just act normal so that he can concentrate on basketball. They aren’t friends -- at least not until Chet pulls a prank that traps Virgil and his pet guinea pig at the bottom of a well. This disaster leads Kaori, Gen, and Valencia on an epic quest to find the missing Virgil. Through luck, smarts, bravery, and a little help from the universe, a rescue is performed, a bully is put in his place, and friendship blooms.

Wednesday, January 24, 2018

Edible Book Contest Feb 1-20 IHHS Media Center!


IHHS Media Center Edible Book Contest!

Create a loved, yummy book out of food!

  • Use at least 75% edible ingredients
  • Do not exceed 24 inches in any direction
  • Bring in your creations to the Media Center February 20th
  • Vote for your favorite
  • Receive a gift card if you're the winner!

Tuesday, January 9, 2018

The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate – Discoveries from a Secret World by Peter Wohlleben




Started reading this over break and have found it fascinating.  Perhaps I was a Druid in a previous life  😊 🌿🌳

In The Hidden Life of Trees, Peter Wohlleben shares his deep love of woods and forests and explains the amazing processes of life, death, and regeneration he has observed in the woodland and the amazing scientific processes behind the wonders of which we are blissfully unaware. Much like human families, tree parents live together with their children, communicate with them, and support them as they grow, sharing nutrients with those who are sick or struggling and creating an ecosystem that mitigates the impact of extremes of heat and cold for the whole group. As a result of such interactions, trees in a family or community are protected and can live to be very old. In contrast, solitary trees, like street kids, have a tough time of it and in most cases die much earlier than those in a group.

Drawing on groundbreaking new discoveries, Wohlleben presents the science behind the secret and previously unknown life of trees and their communication abilities; he describes how these discoveries have informed his own practices in the forest around him. As he says, a happy forest is a healthy forest, and he believes that eco-friendly practices not only are economically sustainable but also benefit the health of our planet and the mental and physical health of all who live on Earth.