Spies and PIs - A Book List (Part I)

I"m not talking about Nancy Drew or The Hardy Boys.  Teen detectives (and other investigative types) have made the jump into the 21st Century. 

Following are a few of my favorites.  Please feel free to add your own in the comments.
I realize this list is somewhat female-centric; tomorrow's list will have  detective stories about teenaged boys.

The Gallagher Girls by Ally Carter.

The Gallagher Academy for Exceptional Young Women is not your typical private school.  Students take classes in advanced martial arts, chemical warfare, and codebreaking.  Protagonist Cammie Morgan is a student there, and despite (or perhaps because of) the fact that her mother is the headmistress, she always manages to get in trouble.
The five-book series includes:  I'd Tell You I Love You, But Then I'd Have to Kill You; Cross My Heart and Hope to Spy; Don't Judge a Girl By Her Cover; Only the Good Spy Young; Out of Sight, Out of Time.

Extras:  Check out the Gallagher Academy website, where you can apply for admission to become a Gallagher Girl.



Don't Turn Around (The Persefone series) by Michelle Gagnon. 

So far, only the first book has been published in this series about Noa, a sixteen-year-old orphan who is living "off the grid".  She's a computer expert, and is able to make enough to support herself and stay out of trouble. But one day, she wakes up in a warehouse with an IV sticking out of her arm and no memory of how she got there.
Luckily, she's able to escape, and eventually find an ally.  Peter Gregory, is a  rich kid who's the leader of an alliance of hackers.  Together they discover that the group who took Noa is more powerful and corrupt than they could have imagined.

Extras:  A free prequel novella called No Escape.


The Girl is Murder & The Girl is Trouble by Kathryn Miller Haines.

Since fifteen-year-old Iris Anderson's mother died and her father returned from Pearl Harbor missing a leg, her whole life has changed.  They have to move to the Lower East Side of New York City, and Iris has to leave her private girls' school for a public one.  Not only is she a fish out of water at PS 110, she doesn't know how to deal with her father, since he'd been overseas most of her life.
Knowing that it's difficult for him to do his job (he is a private detective) with his bad leg, she decides that she must convince him to let her help. 

Extras:  There's a fantastic glossary of period slang at the end of the first book, as well as an interview with the author.


The Hailey Tarbell series by Sophie Littlefield. 

Sixteen-year-old Hailey lives with her creepy grandmother in Gypsum, Missouri, also known as "Trashtown".  Her life is pretty bleak, except for her four-year-old foster brother, Chub.  She loves him more than anything, and plans to take him and leave as soon as she's eighteen.
Then a classmate is injured in gym class, and Hailey discovers that she's a healer.  This is not something she ever wanted, and though she tries to keep it quiet, word gets out, and suddenly armed strangers turn up at Gram's house in the middle of the night and try to kidnap her.
Who are they, and what do they want with her?

The two-book series includes Banished and  Unforsaken.

Extras:  Sophie Littlefield has a fantastic website, which includes interviews, tour info and more.

Covers v. Content

Pilgrims Don't Wear Pink by Stephanie Kate Strohm.

It's not that the cover of this book belies the content, although, technically Eighteenth-Century women wore stays rather than corsets.   The protagonist, Minnesotan Libby Kelting is blonde, and she does sneak her cellphone into the bra she defiantly wears.  

But besides being a humorous romance, this is also a mystery (is there really a ghost?) that teaches the reader a great deal about Colonial history.  Libby, a sixteen-year-old Austen-loving history buff,  whose best friend is a fashion-obsessed boy, has landed a summer job at a living history museum in the town of Camden Harbor, Maine.  Dev takes pride in having taught the geeky Libby how to dress and wear makeup, and Libby has definitely taken it to heart.

She has trouble cramming all the clothes she wants (including a pair of shoes to match every outfit) into her pink suitcase.  And when she arrives at the interns' dorm in Camden Harbor, she discovers to her horror that when she's on the grounds, she must either wear khakis and a polo bearing the park's logo, or  period garb.

Yes, this is reminiscent of Legally Blonde; Libby even compares herself to Elle Woods.  Like Elle, she has hidden depths.  She knows enough about the period that she's able to teach the 8-year-old girls in the group she leads as "Education and Interpretation Intern" how to bake gingerbread over a fire, make lemonade from scratch, and embroider. 

But Libby is still a sixteen-year-old girl, and thus prone to making mistakes like trusting the wrong people, a lesson she learns the hard way.

But, as the cover implies (this isn't really a spoiler!), the story does have a happy ending.  And the book will have a sequel:  Confederates Don't Wear Couture (June 2013), in which Libby joins a group of Civil War re-enactors. 



FTC Full Disclosure:  I borrowed this book from my local library.

Teen Read Week News, Notes and Stuff To Do

• 2012 Teens' Top Ten Books Announced  here.
• The Long Beach Public Library invites teens to post for a READ poster.  Visit Main, Burnett, El Dorado, Bret Harte, Mark Twain, or North Library on Saturday, October 20 to be a star!
• Attend an author event at one of the Los Angeles Public Library's branches during the week, or their YAy for YA! event on Saturday.
• Attend one of the many events at a branch of the County of Los Angeles Public Library.
• Follow Teen Read Week 2012 on Twitter:  #TRW12, or tag yourself at an event!

ETA:

• Vote online to choose next year’s Teen Read Week theme: www.surveymonkey.com/s/TRWtheme13.


• On October 17, join the Twitter conversation about teen reading and young adult literature (#TRW12)!

Book List - Time Travel

I've always loved time travel books, and it's a popular subject for young adult authors.  I've included some recent publications that I've enjoyed, but many of my favorites were published decades ago, and are no longer available.  I have included a couple that were re-issued in recent years.


A String in the Harp - Nancy Bond
(Newbery Honor Book 1977, re-published in 2006)

When fifteen-year-old Jen Morgan flies to Wales to spend Christmas with her family, she's not expecting much from the holiday. A year after her mother's sudden death, her father seems preoccupied by the teaching job that has brought him and Jen's younger siblings to Wales for the year. Her brother, Peter, is alternately hostile and sullen,and her sister, Becky, misses Jen terribly.

Then Peter tells Jen he's found a strange artifact, a harp key that shows him pictures from the life of Taliesin, the great bard whose life in sixth-century Wales has been immortalized in legend. At first Jen doesn't believe him, but when the key's existence -- and its strange properties -- become known to the wider world, the Morgans must act together against a threat to the key...and to their family.


Revolution - Jennifer Donnelly (2010)

BROOKLYN: Andi Alpers is on the edge. She’s angry at her father for leaving, angry at her mother for not being able to cope, and heartbroken by the loss of her younger brother, Truman. Rage and grief are destroying her. And she’s about to be expelled from Brooklyn Heights’ most prestigious private school when her father intervenes. Now Andi must accompany him to Paris for winter break.

PARIS: Alexandrine Paradis lived over two centuries ago. She dreamed of making her mark on the Paris stage, but a fateful encounter with a doomed prince of France cast her in a tragic role she didn’t want—and couldn’t escape.

Two girls, two centuries apart. One never knowing the other. But when Andi finds Alexandrine’s diary, she recognizes something in her words and is moved to the point of obsession. There’s comfort and distraction for Andi in the journal’s antique pages—until, on a midnight journey through the catacombs of Paris, Alexandrine’s words transcend paper and time, and the past becomes suddenly, terrifyingly present.
 

Prada and Prejudice - Mandy Hubbard (2009)

To impress the popular girls on a high school trip to London, klutzy Callie buys real Prada heels. But trying them on, she trips...conks her head...and wakes up in the year 1815!

There Callie meets Emily, who takes her in, mistaking her for a long-lost friend. As she spends time with Emily's family, Callie warms to them - particularly to Emily's cousin Alex, a hottie and a duke, if a tad arrogant.

But can Callie save Emily from a dire engagement, and win Alex's heart, before her time in the past is up?


Kissing Shakespeare - Pamela Mingle (2012)

Miranda has Shakespeare in her blood: she hopes one day to become a Shakespearean actor like her famous parents. At least, she does until her disastrous performance in her school's staging of The Taming of the Shrew. Humiliated, Miranda skips the opening-night party. All she wants to do is hide.

Fellow cast member Stephen Langford has other plans for Miranda. When he steps out of the backstage shadows and asks if she'd like to meet Shakespeare, Miranda thinks he's a total nutcase. But before she can object, Stephen whisks her back to 16th century England—the world Stephen's really from. He wants Miranda to use her acting talents and modern-day charms on the young Will Shakespeare. Without her help, Stephen claims, the world will lost its greatest playwright.

Miranda isn't convinced she's the girl for the job. Why would Shakespeare care about her? And just who is this infuriating time traveler, Stephen Langford? Reluctantly, she agrees to help, knowing that it's her only chance of getting back to the present and her "real" life. What Miranda doesn't bargain for is finding true love . . . with no acting required.


Playing Beatie Bow - Ruth Park (orig. pub. date 1984; audiobook released 2012)

The game is called Beatie Bow, and the kids play it for the thrill of giving themselves a scare. It's Beatie Bow, risen from the dead!

When Abigail is drawn in, the game quickly changes from a harmless little scare to an extraordinary adventure, as she is transported to a place that is strangely familiar....

And in a Sydney she barely recognises, she'll meet the real Beatie Bow and the family that will change her life.