It's Monday! What are you reading?

It's Monday! What are you reading? is a meme hosted by Sheila at Book Journeys. Jen Vincent over at Teach Mentor Texts and Kellee Moye from Unleashing Readers decided to put a children's and YA spin on it and they invite anyone with an interest to join in. You can participate by creating your post then visit one of their sites to add your site. Finally, visit at least three participant blogs and comment to spread the love.

If you want to know more about what I am reading, visit me at my Goodreads shelf. Images via Goodreads unless otherwise noted. 

The Past Week:

       

I read quite a few middle grade books this week. My favorites were Boys of Blur and The Return of Zita the Spacegirl. Boys of Blur was a page turner for me. I sped through it with all of the action. My sixth grade teacher read Beowulf out loud to us and so it has always been a favorite for me. Nelson managed to weave Beowulf into a realistic fiction setting and did it with style. Zita was simply fun. I also enjoyed the section at the back showing the evolution of the Zita graphic novel. The Missing Chancleta and The Mystery of the Mischievous Marker were both light mysteries that were fun to zip through. I will review them later this week if all goes according to plan. I read How to Train Your Dragon because it is one of our Battle of the Books selections this year. It was cute, but not my favorite fantasy.

With the events going on in Ferguson, these two books about peace caught my eye. The first one by Halperin is a collection of quotations about peace. I think I will post some of them around my library this year. Peace One Day is the story of World Peace Day and how it has come to be what it is now. I will likely use this or a part of it on or near September 21st (the official UN peace day) for our video announcements. For more titles that are related to social justice and activism in young adult lit, please visit my post at Rich in Color. There are also titles that have been tweeted with the hashtag #KidLit4Justice.

I finally finished I'm Chocolate, You're Vanilla. I appreciated a lot of the things she had to say and will use some of her advice at my school. It was eye opening to see that we may often be assigning adult meanings to some of the things that our very young students are saying about race. This was a good reminder that our youngest children aren't usually carrying around a lot of racial baggage. The adults and others around them toss that luggage their way as they age.

The Coming Week:

I'm reading Celebrating Writers: From Possibilities Through Publication. I had just decided not to do NaNoWriMo this year and now I am having second thoughts. Yikes! Anyway, I think I will be finishing this book soon. I will also read something to review for Rich in Color. I just started Kinda Like Brothers for a review too. I am listening to The Coldest Girl in Coldtown on CDs and Traveling with Pomegranates: A Mother-Daughter Story on Playaway. Other than that, I am not sure what I will be reading, but I will try to fit a few more books in during this last gasp of summer break. What are you reading?