One Came Home

ONE CAME HOME by Amy Timberlake. Knopf, 2013.

Agatha, dead? No
Georgia is convinced that's false
And so off she goes.


When her old sister, Agatha, disappears and is presumed dead, 13 year old Georgia sets off convinced her sister is still alive. Newbery Honor winner.

Splendid Splendors

SPLENDORS AND GLOOMS by Laura Amy Schlitz. Candlewick Press, 2012.

Gaspare Grisini and his two assistants, Lizzie Rose and Parsefall, are called to the home of Clara Wintermute to perform a puppet show for her birthday. Lizzie Beth and Parsefall are about the same age as Clara, and the three spend some time together before the show begins. It is Gaspare who returns after the show, ostensibly for a watch he left behind. Then, Clara goes missing, perhaps kidnapped. Scholitz ha fashioned a gothic mystery with elements of dark magic certain to compel the turning of page after page.

Catching up with more winning titles

National Book Award winner and Newbery Honor Medal winner INSIDE OUT AND BACK AGAIN by Thanhha Lai (Harper 2011) is the story of ten year old Ha who must leave her beloved Saigon for America. It is no longer safe to live in the place of her birth, so the family is just one of thousands who flee Vietnam and come to America. This novel in verse tells of Ha experiences in America, especially in her neighborhood and school, two places where Ha and her family are truly considered "foreign." The story is fast moving and powerful. <141>

One note: is it not interesting that all 3 Newbery books are historical fiction this year?