Check out these new kid's books!

The Flint Heart by Katherine Paterson & John Paterson

Long ago, in the land of Dartmoor, a magic man created

an enchanted charm that granted its possessor incredible power-

at the cost of the wearer's own tenderness and compassion.  After

merciless Flint Heart causes much destruction, it is lost among

the reeds and rocks of the moor, where a kindly farmer discovers

it thousands of years later.  With the Flint Heart in his possession, the

once adoring father Billy Jago is transformed into a cruel and 

merciless brute.  Young Charles is determined to win back his father's

true nature, and with his sister Unity and a dog, Ship, he sets off into

an enchanted world where animals talk, fairies hold elaborate banquets, 

and magical mischief must be resolved to bring Dartmoor and

Merripit Farm back to rights again.

The Absolute Value of Mike by Kathryn Erskine

So Dad has shipped me off to relatives I don't

even know because he wants me to work on this

engineering project and become a genius, like him. Well,

guess what? I have math learning disabilities! Besides, what 

engineering project? Poppy (my great uncle) is frozen to his

chair and communicates only by throwing slippers.  And Moo

(his wife) feeds a cat clock and watches imaginary movies in 

her car, "Tyrone," which she's too blind to be driving anyway.

And then there's Gladys...she's this amazing, cool, super-gorgeous

punk rocker with stag fright..um..where was I?

Oh, right.  I know all Dad cares about is the engineering

project, but everyone in town is working on a much more important

project: adopting an orphan from Romania.  Now that's my kind

of project.  I've got to whip this town into shape and raise like

$40,000 in three weeks! Yup, that means getting Gladys to sing,

Poppy to move, and Moo to give up Tyrone.

Just don't tell Dad! I'll have to deal with him later.

The Bridge to Never Land by  Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson

Aiden and Sarah Cooper have no idea what 

they're getting into one afternoon when they discover a 

mysterious coded document in a secret compartment of an

antique English desk their father recently bought at an auction.

something about the document seems familiar to Sarah, and that night 

she realizes what it is: the document seems to be referring to some 

books she has read - the Starcatchers series, about the origin

of Peter Pan.  But how could that be?  The document seems far older

than the books.  And of course, the books are just stories...

Curious, Sarah and Aidan begin to decipher the mysterious document.

At first it's a game - unraveling the mystery piece by piece, each piece

leading them to a new, deeper puzzle.

But soon the game turns strange - and scary.  They discover that the

"stories" are real, and that what they thought was a fictional battle

between good and evil is still going on.  And the scariest part is: they

have become a part of it.

Pursued by a being that can take any form and will stop at nothing to

get what it wants from the, Aidan and Sarah embark on a desperate,

thrilling quest for help - a quest that leads them to some unforgettable

people in some unlikely places, including one that's not supposed to

exit at all.  At each step they must solve new puzzles and escape new

dangers, all the while knowing that if they fail, the evil they are

fleeing will be let loose on an unsuspecting world.

The Wizard of Dark Street by Shawn Tomas Odyssey

Oona Crate was born to be the Wizard's apprentice,

but she has another destiny in mind.

Despite possessing the rare gift of Natural Magic, Oona

wants to be a detective.  Eager for a case, she is determined

to prove that logic is as powerful as wizardry.  But when

someone attacks her uncle-the Wizard of Dark Street-Oona

is forced to delve into the world of magic.

Full of odd characters, evil henchmen, and a street

where nothing is normal, The Wizard of Dark Street

will have you guessing to the very end.

Celebrate Martin Luther King day with these kid's biographies

My Brother Martin by Christine King Farris

Long before he became a world-famous dreamer, Martin Luther King Jr. was

a little boy who played jokes and practiced the piano and made

friends without considering race.  But growing up in the segregated South of

the 1930's forced a very young Martin to learn a bitter lesson-little white

children and little black children were not to play with one another.

Martin decided then and there that something had to be done.  And as a

seven-year-old, he embarked on a journey that would change

the course of American history.

A Nation's Hope: the story of boxing legend Joe Lewis  by Matt De La Pena

Once a boyhood dream, now a people's hope.

The weight of history hangs on Joe's shoulders.

On the eve of World War II, African American

boxer Joe Louis fought German Max Schmeling in a

bout that had more at stake than just the world heavyweight

title; for much of America their fight came to represent the

country's war with Germany.

Mandela by Floyd Cooper

Few figures have inspired as much respect or loyalty

as Nelson Mandela.  From his boyhood days in the South

African countryside, to his time as a leader of the African

National Congress, to his twenty-seven years in prison, Mandela

would come to rail against the system of apartheid - and would

eventually help abolish it, becoming the first black

president in South Africa's history.

His is a story of courage and persistence, a story of hope and belief.  

It is the story of how the son of a tribal chief rose to become one

of the most prominent political figures of our time.

Rosa by Nikki Giovanni

Rosa Parks is one of the most famous figures in American

history.  On December 1, 1955, she got on a Montgomery, Alabama, city 

bus after work and refused to give up her seat to a white man, an act that

sparked a revolution.  Suddenly, Mrs. Parks became the center of one

of the most important events in the battle for civil rights.  This is

the story of that event, and of a woman whose quiet determination

changed our history.

Baby it's cold outside! Books with ideas to keep kids busy when the temperature drops.

Cool Stamps by Pam Price

Kids love to collect stuff! This fun series, Cool 

Collections, introduces young readers to cool collections

in an easy-to-read format.  Each book contains facts about

collecting that will inspire the reader to start his or her own collection.

Kids Knitting by Melanie Falick

Think you're too young?  Think you're too old? Through

15 easy projects, from bouncy bean bags to a rolled-edge sweater,

author Melanie Falick teaches kids of all ages how to knit.  Using

straightforward language, step-by-step instructions, and candy-colored

illustrations, beginners learn the basics, including finger-knitting, casting on and

binding off, the knit, purl, and stockinette stitches, knitting in the round, and

shaping.  

Knitting occupies idle hands.  Knitting broadens attention spans. You can knit

when you sit or when you stand.  You can knit in a car or in a van.  Knitting's 

not hard-anyone can.  So cast on and bind off for adventures in kids knitting!

Bake it Up! by Rose Dunnington

Kids rule int he kitchen...when it comes to baking these delicious

recipes for breakfasts, lunches, dinners, desserts, and more.  Get

the lowdown on a few simple cooking basics and then take your

pick from treats like biscuits that pull apart into layers of yummy goodness;

brownies loaded with rich chocolate flavor; chicken fingers that are healthier

than the fast food kind because they're baked; and a pie filled with luscious

ice cream and topped with whipped cream and cherries.  Everyone will

want to try one of your delectable creations!

The Jumbo Book of Magic Tricks by Bob Longe

Hundreds of amazing, unbelievable tricks include all the 

secrets that a magician can pull out of a hat.  And what a variety!  Coins,

cards, mind reading, dice, and more: they're all here and with patter included.

Even perform fascinating examples of "hypnotism."  Most of the tricks

are impromptu, and those that aren't require very little preparation.

Best of all: every one of them is within your grasp.

Curl up on a cold day with one of these new children's fiction books!

Mistress of the Storm by M.L. Welsh

A wind-swept, salt-sprayed novel that will whisk you away...

Verity Gallant knows she'll never be as pretty and popular

as Poppy, her perfect little sister - she doesn't quite fit in.

But when a mysterious stranger hands her an ancient

red book, everything changes.

Verity becomes embroiled in a tale of dark magic and intrigue; she

uncovers old rivalries and discovers new friends.  Together, she, Henry,

and Martha explore the secrets stirring in the ancient harbour town of Wellow.

But what will it take to stop a powerful witch hell-bent on revenge?

True Blue by Jane Smiley

True Blue is a beauty, a dapple gray, and when

Abby Lovitt gets to take him to her family's ranch,

she can hardly believe her luck.  The horse needs a 

home:his owner - a woman brand-new to the riding

stable - was tragically killed in a car crash, and no one

has claimed him.  Daddy is wary, as always.  But Abby is

smitten.  True Blue is a sweetheart, and whenever Abby calls out

"Blue, Blue, how are you?" He whinnies back.

But sometimes True Blue seems...spooked.  He paces, and

always seems to be looking form something.  Or someone.  Abby

starts to wonder about True Blue's owner.  What was she like?  What

did she look like?  And what are the strange whispers Abby sometimes

hears when she's with True Blue?

Maggie & Oliver or a Bone of One's Own by Valerie Hobbs

Maggie is always full of questions.  But a young

maid in a fine house isn't supposed to wonder so much, 

and one day Maggie is thrown out into the street with only

a tiny heart-shaped locket for a keepsake.  Who is 

the lady in the locket?

A little dog named Oliver is pushing his nose along an

icy sidewalk searching for his lost mistress, or at least

something to eat.  No matter how hard he looks, he can't find

either one, but he does see a girl with round blue eyes and a golden locket.

The girl calls him Lucky.

And perhaps Lucky is the right name after all, for the little dog

helps Maggie find a warm, wonderful home of her own-and one for him, too.

R My Name is Rachel by Patricia Reilly Giff

It's 1936, and twelve-year-old Rachel's family doesn't

have two nickels to rub together.

Rachel lives in the city with Pop and her younger

brother and sister, Joey and Cassie.  Rachel's mother

died long ago, but the family had a special friend in Miss 

Mitzi at the flower shop, and they know everyone on their block.

Pop needs a job.  His search for work lands the family on a farm

upstate, in North Lake.  But times are hard there, too- the school

and the library are closed.  Their isolated house is falling

apart.  Still, Rachel loves the farm.

Miss Mitzi and Rachel write to each other constantly, exchanging

letters that sustain Rachel as the three city kids adjust to life

in the country.  When Pop's job takes him away from home for

a while, Rachel is determined that she and Joey and Cassie will do just fine on the farm.

New picture books that are fun for adults and kids alike!

Children Make Terrible Pets by Peter Brown

Meet Lucy. (a bear)  Meet Lucy's pet. (a boy)

She calls him Squeaker.  Lucy and Squeaker have the

best day ever.  Until things start to go wrong...

Do children make terrible pets? What do you think?

An Annoying ABC by Barbara Bottner

When Adelaide annoys Bailey, she sets off a chain reaction

of bad behavior among her classmates.  Soon Flora is fuming,

Kirby is kicking, Petunia is pestering, Todd is tumbling,

and Winthrop is weeping!

What will it take to fix this ABC catastrophe?  Readers will be

amazed to see what happens when Adelaide...apologizes.

Samantha on a Roll by Linda Ashman

"No Samantha. Not today. Please go put those skates away.

You're still too small. You don't know how! I can't help you-not right now."

But Samantha can't wait to try her brand-new roller skates.  While

Mama tends to other things, Sammy straps them on. First, she glides down

the hallway.  Then she tries the sidewalk.  Next she ventures a bit farther

down the street. She's doing great.  But when she finds herself cresting

Hawthorn Hill, it's too late to stop-in fact, she can't! Samantha is on a roll.

M.O.M. (Mom operating Manual) by Doreen Cronin

Mom/mam, mem/n. (homosabius momius)

1. a. a female parent; b. a lady of authority; c. utterer of "because I say so"

2. a complex machine who runs full speed on little fuel and almost no sleep whatsoever

also Wonder Woman.

Take care of Mom and she'll take care of you.

Celebrate the season with these kid's holiday books

Celebrate Hanukkah by Deborah Heiligman

Families gather to sing songs, exchange fits, and remember

miracles that happened long ago.

Hanukkah is one of the most joyous holidays on the Jewish calendar, 

in in this book readers find out why.

Author Deborah Heiligman looks at how Jews from the

United States to Israel to Africa and India celebrate the

"Festival of Lights."

The Shortest Day by Wendy Pfeffer

Winter begins on the shortest day of the year, on or about 

December 21.  On short winter days, children walking home

from school drag long shadow behind them.  On long

winter nights, families eat dinner while it's dark outside.

Long agao, people grew afraid when each day had fewer

hours of sunshine than the day before.  Over time, they

realized that one day each year the sun seemed to stop

moving away and then started moving back toward them.

They celebrated this day by exchanging presents and decorating

their houses with evergreens.  Today people still celebrate the

winter solstice, not because they worry that the sun will disappear,

but because they know the days will get longer again.  They

celebrate because it's a new beginning.

Christmas Remembered by Tomie  dePaola

In this wonderful Christmas memoir, Tomie dePaola shares

his love of the season in fifteen vivid memories spanning six

decades filled with delightful twists and turns.

In the thirties at age three, Tomie watched his Irish-Italian family

and their friends prepare for and joyously celebrate the holidays.

It was no wonder that Christmas became his favorite time of the year.

Wherever he lived - as a teenager in Meriden, Connecticut, an art

student in Brooklyn, a novice monk at Weston Priory in Vermont, an

artist and professor San Francisco, or an artist and author in New

Hampshire - Tomie's enthusiasm for the Christmas season was

constant and infectious.

The Family Read-Aloud Christmas Treasury selected by Alice Low

Rejoice! Here is an irresistible celebration of the 

glory of Christmas, filled with all the sights, sounds, and

smells that make this holiday so special.  Well-loved poets

Jack Prelutsky, David McCord, A.A. Milne, E.E. Cummings, and

John Updike bring to life the quiet cheer of snowy days, the joys

of a brand new sled, the thrill of choosing and decorating the perfect

Christmas tree, the mysterious arrival of Santa Claus and his elves, and

of course, the delicious aromas of freshly baked Christmas cakes, apple

pies, and plum puddings. Families can join in their favorite carols and

songs, from "Away in a Manger" to "The Twelve Days of Christmas,"

and read aloud from more than fifty poems and stories, such as

Clement Clarke Moore's timeless "A Visit from St. Nicholas" and

the Christmas pageant from Beverly Cleary's popular Ramona and her Father.

Celebrate this unseasonable weather with new books about the seashore for kids!

Looking for Seabirds by Sophie Webb

To human eyes, the remote Aleutian Islands of Alaska

look barren and rocky.  The waters seem cold, the high winds intolerable,

and the seas rolling. Yet to seabirds of the northern hemisphere, these

waters are idyllic, a mosaic of habitats teeming with underwater food and

alive with currents of wind for soaring.

Joan Sophie Webb on a voyage in search of seabirds. Just as she did with 

her ward winning My Season with Penguins, she once again inspires our

curiosity.  As she watches for, writes about, and paints the

graceful Mottled Petrel, the huge Black-footed Albatross, or the clownish Tufted

Puffin, she makes tangible the delicacy yet hardiness of these seabirds -

creatures that have been on the earth much longer than humans yet remain vulnerable to

disturbances in the health of the ocean.

The Whales Scientists by Fran Hodgkins

They began as land creatures.  Then, for more plentiful

food, or so scientists believe, whales made the water their

home and evolved into the colossal, majestic creatures of the

sea that we know today - the same majestic creatures that man

learned to hunt and kill:first for food, then for oil, soap, candles, furniture, and

even wasp-waist corsets.  Rich in meat, blubber, bone, and baleen, the 

whale served so many purposes for humans that its stranding was seen as a gift

from the sea.

But now, with their numbers diminished worldwide, whales have become

the subject of scientific study.  Now humans hunt instead for a deeper

understanding of cetaceans. Now scientists are trying to solve the

mystery of whale strandings. 

Edward hopper Summer at the Seashore 

Edward hopper created not only some of the most

iconic images of American life in the city but also painted

many landscapes and works inspired by the seaside.  

Edward Hopper: Summer at the Seashore takes readers on

a trip along the coast of New England, where he spent the

summer months painting sailboats, lighthouses, seascapes, and

white clapboard houses.  This book brings together a selection

of Hopper's most memorable and appealing paintings, watercolors and drawings.

Far from Shore by Sophie Webb

From a boat over extremely deep waters, the vast sea appears

empty. But as the naturalist and artist Sophie Webb shows us, it is full of 

fascinating - yet difficult-to-study - life.  In a little corner of the

ship's lab, with her water jar duct-taped to the counter, Sophie Webb sits

and paints and journals, even when the ship bounces and rocks from winds 

and waves.  She chronicles all the strange life that she studies and

marvels at in these waters - the tropical Bryde's (broodas) whale, the leaping

manta rays, a frigatebird with a sea snake.

Sophie and her shipmates also count and collect samples of life in these

deep waters, from seabirds to dolphins, from winged fish to whales. Only their

long term monitoring can ultimately help scientists determine the health

of the remarkable creatures who need the clean deep ocean to survive.