It’s Monday What are You Reading 1/23/17

 

This weekly meme is hosted by teachmentortexts.com and unleashingreaders.com. A collection of about 30 bloggers will share their weekly reading and give you a great selection to add to your TBR towers.

This week was the first week I read more books that were outside of my #MustReadin2017 list. The reading distractions have already begun!

This was the first book I finished this week. I checked it out at my public library where it was on display. Many bloggers and reviewers have said great things about it. This book features a gardener who arrives during the night to create wonderful creatures. Its a far more desirable gardener to run into compared to Jonathan Auxier’s (but I love that book too). I think I did not want to read a book with the exact same title as a book I really enjoyed, so I did not search this book out right away, but it found me the other day. I loved the idea of the anonymous guy creating a piece of art for a community to enjoy the next day. The artwork is really engaging, too.

This book is due to arrive in stores on January 31. It was in the January Scholastic book order though, and they shipped it as soon as we ordered it. We hosted Jennifer Nielsen in the fall, so even though this is a third book in the series, my class ordered five copies (the price was excellent for a new hardcover). I will have two students to chat with about this book by Monday morning. We will discuss what I found to be a very satisfying end to this series which started with The Mark of the Thief, and continued with The Rise of the Wolf. Our friend Nicolas Calva continually finds himself in great danger and struggles to figure out how to earn his freedom when there are many who want him to do his bidding. This ends up being a story that is about some of the most important things in life: family, love, forgiveness and freedom.
Nic has to learn about the first three before he is able to earn his freedom. In her trademark style, Jennifer Nielsen’s characters really have to puzzle together who to trust and when to trust them in order to think their way out of their perilous predicaments. Whether thinking along side Nic or racing through many action packed scenes along the way, MG readers will enjoy Wrath of the Storm and the end of Nic’s journey in this series.

I enjoyed the first book in this series a couple of weeks ago and decided to read the second in order to fulfill my loosely arranged personal goal of reading an early chapter book each week. I enjoy the humour in this series as Roscoe works through a number of challenges, often by making some poor choices that he can reflect on and learn from.

Currently Reading:

I was fortunate to receive a copy of Last Day on Mars from author Kevin Emerson via Twitter. We got the copy at the school and I agreed that I would read it, have some students read it and provide some feedback. I am really enjoying the book. The back states that in this first of a series, humanity is looking for a new home after Earth becomes inhospitable and the temporary home on Mars also has the clock ticking. The book has an engaging premise. I don’t read a lot of sci-fi for MG readers, but parts of this remind me of The Martian and Seveneves, some sci-fi for adults I read last year. There have been some interesting parts about the differences in the way that the adults experience these events and the kids. I am looking forward to finishing this over the rest of the week.

Ollie’s Odyssey by William Joyce is our family read aloud and I am looking forward to finding out how this one ends late in the week. It is a very imaginative story, as I guess I would have expected having read a few of his picture books. Without giving too much away there are some really neat perspectives of toys and great world building too.

The third Harry Potter book is a read aloud between me and my six year old. She is crazy for it and I never have enough time to read that to her.

Later in the week I hope to get back to The Seventh Wish, I was planning to start it after school one night last week and then Last Day on Mars arrived in the mail (its out on Feb. 17) and my students who were going to read it were all engaged in long books, so I thought I would read that first so I could lend it to them. I am still really eager to start The Seventh Wish in a couple days. Then it will be The Inquisitor’s Tale or Scar Island by Dan Gemeinhart. I am also re-reading Gemeinhart’s The Honest Truth for our district Battle of the Books in May. We use a quiz show style format using books that intermediate classes throughout the district use in literature circles or library book clubs. I am writing questions from this book which was one of my favourite reads last year. I have yet to select an early chapter book, but am leaning to Dory Fantasmagory. Happy reading everyone!