A Book Review and a Book Festival

My daughter came home with an ARC that she'd gotten from a friend. She didn't pull her nose out of it until she was finished. And then she insisted that I read it. I'm so glad I did. What an amazing story! From the award-winning author of IDA B, this new novel will please fans and earn her plenty more.

If you want to read my review, you can visit my Goodreads page. But today, I'm going to give you a link to my daughter's blog. She'd love to have you read her review. Maybe she'll even convince you to pick up this book when it comes out on May 15 :)

We spent most of Saturday at the L.A. Times Festival of Books at USC. What a blast! With hundreds of booths, nine stages and 

Andrew Smith, Shannon Messenger, Me, Ally Condie

attendance in the thousands, it was an overwhelming experience for us small town book lovers. But it was also a chance to meet up with internet friends like Catherine Linka from Flintridge Bookstore and Coffeehouse and MMGM founder Shannon Whitney Messenger.  Yeah, that's us between Andrew Smith and Ally Condie and omigosh, Ally Condie knew who I was! How cool is that? Just one more reason to love blogging :)

In addition to getting books signed, listening to fabulous author panels and trying not to get lost as we sought out specific booths, we also scored a bunch of cool free stuff: a Judy Moody movie t-shirt, a Narnia DVD, Ben & Jerry's ice cream (Yes! Free Ben & Jerry's!), bookmarks and pencils galore, airbrush tattoos and these awesome glasses that my son immediately had to wear. There was so much to see, we didn't even get to half of it. At least now that we know what to expect, we'll be better prepared for next year.

My daughter was most excited about getting her book, Aloha, Kanani, signed by Lisa Yee. Yes, lucky Lisa Yee has written two books for the current American Girl doll of the year. And she scored a trip to Hawaii for research. That's my kind of research! Can I have her job? My daughter is especially proud of this doll because she saved up her own money to buy it. (And the lovely person at the American Girl doll store didn't even complain as she dumped the money out of the jar to pay for it!)

The YA panel of (left to right) Gennifer Choldenko,  Robin Benway, Gayle Forman and Allen Zadoff was moderated by author Cecil Castellucci. They talked about finding inspiration for stories, choosing character names and balancing magic and reality in their writing. Halfway through the talk, my son turned to me and said, "Listening to this makes me want to go home and write."

Yeah. My sentiments exactly.

Looking for more Marvelous Middle Grade Books? Check out these bloggers:
Shannon Whitney Messenger
Shannon O'Donnell
Ben Langhinrichs
Joanne Fritz
Brooke Favero
Myrna Foster
Barbara Watson
Natalie Aguirre
Anita Laydon Miller