Memorial Day is a non-fiction picture book written to explain to children how the holiday came about and why we celebrate it, among other things. Although this is your typical thirty-two page picture book, its aim is for children who might be outgrowing picture books but who need to be eased into chapter books. Each chapter is about two to four pages long (including the full page illustrations).

There is a chapter on the Civil War, a chapter that includes information on The Tomb of the Unknowns, a chapter full of Memorial Day poems, and another full of Memorial Day songs.

This picture book shows how one can never be too old for them. I learned something new while reading it. There is a chapter on Decoration Day and I had never heard of it before. It was the early version of Memorial Day and it was celebrated every May 30. It did not become known as Memorial Day until the 1890s and it became a national holiday in 1971. Anyway, it was known as Decoration Day because it was the day people decorated the headstones with flowers. I am not sure if it is official, but my community still has a sort of Decoration Day. Every year on the Friday before Memorial Day, boy scouts and girl scouts place small American flags next to every headstone in the national cemetery behind my house (yup, backyard, then alley, then a stretch of grass, then the cemetery…I have a post here).

I enjoyed reading Memorial Day and I think other children and adults will as well. With its semi-realistic illustrations and small chapters to get young readers used to them, Memorial Day is a very informative and good knowledge base for everyone on this holiday. It even suggests various Memorial Day activities and includes a glossary and index.

When Henry VIII died on 28 January 1547, he left his nine-year-old son Edward to rule a kingdom broken by religious strife. Catholic England turned reformed Catholic England now turned Protestant England under Edward VI and his maternal uncle, Lord Protector Edward Seymour. But in 1553, Edward at fifteen years of age knew he was dying and he wanted to keep England out of the hands of his Catholic older sister Mary. Yet he did not want to leave his favorite sister, Elizabeth, in charge either so he changed his father’s will. He left the throne to his cousin Lady Jane Grey’s male children, but when he realized he was fading too quickly (and Jane was nowhere close to being pregnant), he updated the will to leave the throne to Lady Jane and her male heirs. A subtle, yet major change.

Her Highness, the Traitor begins in 1555, two years into Mary I’s reign, with reminisces of the past from Jane Dudley and Frances Grey. As the title implied (at least to me), I thought Susan Higginbotham’s latest historical fiction novel was about Jane Grey’s rise to the throne and her husband, Guildford Dudley, the children of the two women previously mentioned.

And it was, but not to the extent I imagined. Written in the first person, past tense and alternating points-of-view between Jane Dudley and Frances Grey, they reminisce about the past (starting in 1512 for Jane Dudley and 1547 for Frances Grey) and how it led to their present situations in 1555. I thought Her Highness, the Traitor would be from Jane Grey’s point-of-view, but instead Lady Jane’s story played out through the eyes of her mother and mother-in-law. While it threw me off at first, I quickly became accustomed to it and enjoyed learning these two womens’ views on their children’s rise and fall along with their own motivations and biases.

Just a bit of basic background on these two characters: Jane Dudley knew and grew up with her husband John because after his father was executed as a traitor by Henry VIII, Jane’s family took him in as a ward and Frances Grey was the daughter of Charles Brandon, the duke of Suffolk, and Mary Tudor, Henry VIII’s younger sister.

As previously stated, the story alternated between Jane Dudley and Frances Grey, as it moved forward in time, revealing the day-to-day and major events of both of their lives, including their children taking the throne and the later consequences.

I found it interesting to read a story I know from two different voices I had not heard before. I kept hoping things would work out for everyone involved, but if it had, history would not have progressed as it had. As historical fiction readers, I think sometimes we forget (at least I do) that these people were real, living, breathing people. Sometimes I am so caught up in a story that that gets away from me and I remind myself often -and then it makes my heart ache. Towards the end, tears came to my eyes over and over and eventually spilled. Have a box of tissues nearby.

Her Highness, the Traitor is definitely a journey of a book and a heartfelt one at that.

Recommended for historical fiction readers eighteen and up. The title is a bit misleading but the story is uniquely told by Jane Grey’s and Guildford Dudley’s mothers.

When Lady Cecily Burkhart loses her parents to a mysterious illness in 1527, she becomes Baroness Burkhart, but being only eight-years-old, she also becomes the ward to the Earl of Sumerton, Harold Pierce. The Pierce family - Lord Hal, Lady Grace, Mirabella, Brey, and Father Alec Cahill - all kindly welcome Cecily into their home and into their lives. Despite a dark secret or two of the family’s, Cecily has some happy years there and looks forward to her future.

But tragedy strikes the family twice over, and it alters Cecily’s future and Mirabella’s vocation is taken from her because of Henry VIII’s religious reforms. From then on, Cecily, growing into a young woman, tries to hold the family together while Mirabella does everything she can to destroy them.

The Sumerton Women took place in a time of Henry VIII’s reign that was rapidly growing more volatile. He uprooted England’s whole world by putting aside Catherine of Aragon in order to freely be with Anne Boleyn as he petitioned for a divorce that the pope would never grant. Anne had already brought with her some safe reformer reviews and Henry would do anything to have her and a legitimate male heir, so religious upheaval was not out of the question. He broke from Rome, made himself the head of his own church, made Thomas Cranmer the archbishop of Canterbury, and got the divorce he wanted. He also unleashed something that he had not foreseen; his actions opened the door for more fervent reformers to promote the New Learning. Besides the desired divorce, King Henry only wanted to be the head of his own reformed Catholic church. England’s first Protestant ruler was his son, Edward VI.

All of this is the backdrop for D.L. Bogdan’s larger story about Cecily and the Pierce family, who deal with the issue of religion as well as the more prominent themes of family and personal motivations.

Cecily vaguely remembered that her parents spoke of the New Learning with curiosity and her own mind was open. Mirabella, a few years older than Cecily, was a strict Catholic, except for the hate she harbored in her heart. Brey’s views were unknown, but he did not take after his sister. Their father, Hal, wore a hair shirt under his clothes to atone for his secret sin, but he enjoyed having fun and he was friendly and jovial. His wife Grace, however, resented the Catholic faith and tended to agree with the New Learning, but she was not religious enough to put any effort into either. Father Alec was cautious as he came to believe more in the New Learning. The household represented varying degrees of religious belief and was just a small sample of what was happening in Tudor England at the time.

Along with religion, themes of tragedy and renewal reappear throughout The Sumerton Women. Bogdan produced an action-packed and fast-paced historical fiction novel that readers can easily and happily lose themselves in. I definitely rode the waves of emotion and the trials of life throughout this whole novel and I cared about all of the characters, even Mirabella, despite how much I hated her for the majority of the novel because of all her horrible actions.

The Sumerton Women is a book of intertwined destinies, a book of joy, heartache, forbidden attraction, betrayal, and almost unbelievable secrets with some mentions and a cameo of Tudor England’s elite.

Recommended for historical fiction readers eighteen and up. There is nothing too controversial within these pages.

Josephine Angelini is back with her second Starcrossed novel, Dreamless!

Now that Helen Hamilton knows of her connection to Helen of Troy, her abilities, and her role as the Descender (the only Scion who can enter the Underworld), she must figure out how to control her nightmarish descents even as she grows weaker from each one. Ignoring her weakness and exhaustion, Helen continues to slip into the Underworld to find a way to stop the Furies from further encouraging Scions to eliminate each other.

But just as she starts figuring out the ins and outs of the Underworld, she meets another (extremely attractive) Scion who helps her and makes her feel comfortable. Only she feels like she is betraying Lucas even though they have to try their hardest to stay away from each other.

Danger lurks in the Underworld and above that will change the Scions’ world indefinitely.

Not much time has passed between the end of Starcrossed and the beginning of Dreamless; only about a week. As usual, I will not give anything away that is not written or implied in the synopsis. Which means, I cannot share with you some of my notes (unless you want them privately)! I can say that there are multiple points-of-view in Dreamless, including Lucas and Daphne (and someone else), but it is mostly from Helen’s perspective. I can tell you that there is a prologue in which a very minor character from the first book makes a very stupid and big mistake. I can share with you that the mysterious Scion Helen meets (and whose presence creates the love triangle) is very attractive and easy-going and although I still like Lucas, I think I now prefer this new Scion. And finally, I can let you know that there is an evil character who took my fear of ants to a whole new level.

Dreamless is intense. Actually, I described it as “holy shit!”. There were definitely moments when I wanted to reach into the book and that world to shake Helen and tell her to listen to what people were telling her, but I could not blame her too much because she was in really bad shape. Plenty of times throughout Dreamless, I felt simultaneously relieved and anxious (seriously…imagine how that feels!) because so many of Helen’s actions had both good and bad consequences, which you will understand when you read this book. I guarantee you will know those exact moments. 

For you Lucas lovers, there was not any talk in the book about his and Helen’s status. I still refuse to believe in the connection that came up in Starcrossed and all of the relationships mentioned in here had me trying to figure out the family tree because I am pretty sure a character said or called Helen his/her niece and someone else said something about their father and the father was not who I thought it was - I know. I even confused myself. Anyway, I guess maybe we will see in book 3 if I really saw something or not.

Dreamless is a book that I could not put down. I was reading so fast at times that I had to go back and read some things I missed. It is definitely an exciting and intense journey. I know my heart rate picked up lots of times (it is even doing it just writing about the book!) and I kept slapping my hand to my mouth at certain parts. With the exciting and foreboding but not a cliffhanger ending, Dreamless sets up the third book which promises to be EPIC.

Recommended for readers fourteen and up who enjoy young adult fantasy in the Greek mythology realm and of course, for readers who are already fans of the Starcrossed trilogy.

Sixteen-year-old Finley Jayne and her young but important and useful friends, Emily, Sam, and Griffin (the Duke of Greythorne) are back again in this follow-up to The Girl in the Steel Corset.

After surviving each other’s strong wills and the threat of The Machinist, Finley and crew have no time to rest since some sinister men came to haul Jasper the cowboy back to America. Jasper is charismatic and though his past is unknown, his English friends mostly trust him (except maybe for Sam). Finley, Emily, Sam, and Griffin thought the strong arm of the law had come to take Jasper off, but no matter the reason, they resolve to follow Jasper to America.

And that is where The Girl in the Clockwork Collar begins, with Finley and Griffin taking the air on Griffin’s personal steamship as they cross the Atlantic two weeks after the end of the previous book. Sam and Emily are there too, of course, and they all catch their first sights of New York City. The trip and the new setting are exciting, but they have more pressing matters at hand.

It turns out Jasper was taken hostage by his former employer and friend. At some point in the recent past, Jasper stole an important object from Reno Dalton and Dalton wants it back at the potential expense of Jasper’s former (and maybe soon to be rekindled) love, Mei. Dalton also holds Mei hostage, but in a far more dangerous way: she wears a heavy clockwork collar about her neck that will tighten and choke her if she tries to escape or if she disobeys Dalton…or, now, if Jasper fails to return what he has stolen.

Me oh my! And I thought this would be short because of if you know me, I consider what is not in the synopsis as spoilers and there is not much in the synopsis! And really, my opinion is going to be short because I can only gush so much without inadvertently revealing anything.

So.

Kady Cross wrote The Girl in the Clockwork Collar from both Finley’s and Jasper’s perspectives which I looooooved. Like I said above, Jasper is super charismatic. Not only that, but since he is an American cowboy, I imagine him with one of those draaaawls, you know, and after delving deeper into his mind and motivations in this book, I loved him even more. This just occurred to me: Ryan Gosling would be perfect as Jasper Renn. He can do that southern thing and he pulls off period clothes extremely well. Excuse me while I drool daydream for a moment. Suffice it to say, even though I immensely enjoy Griffin King, I think if it came down to it, I would totally be Jasper’s girl.

I also loved being in Finley’s head again. She grew a lot over the events in the first novel, but she grows even more in this one. I enjoyed her wit and her strength but most of all I enjoyed that she was beginning to allow herself to be vulnerable when it counted.

Sam was Sam. He was a bit more perceptive, but he has not changed too much. It has only been two weeks between novels after all. I felt like I got to see Emily more, though, and she is an awesome spitfire. It was almost as if she traded some of her vulnerability to Finley for some of Finley’s strength because of what happened to her in the first novel.

There was still romance in the novel. Nothing beyond a kiss (and I will not tell you between who, but various characters saw a bit of action). Usually if a romance is slow to start in a first novel, it will all of a sudden speed up in the second novel. Not so in The Girl with the Clockwork Collar, which was just fine by me. Not everything has to happen fast and besides! These characters are young. That is not unusual in young adult literature but the thing with these books is that I often forget that the characters are teenagers or very early twenties because they are all mature in many ways, shaped by their time and their experiences.

HA! Well, it looks like I have managed to draw this out more than I thought I could. I thought this was going to be short because the only notes I took while reading were that the book begins two weeks after the first and that it was basically amazing. I was too busy reading for more notes than that!

I loved all of the characters, especially Finley, Griffin, and Jasper. Although it was told from two points-of-view, The Girl in the Steel Corset was very much Finley’s story while The Girl in the Clockwork Collar is very much Jasper’s story. I wonder what that means for the next book? This book showcased Jasper and it was such a stressful book for him. Poor Jasper. Kady, I am available to comfort him.

The Girl in the Clockwork Collar is even more interesting than its predecessor and I urge steampunk readers to run out and buy it on May 22!

Recommended for fans of steampunk novels who are sixteen or older. If you read the first, you must read this one! JASPER!

One land. Seven kingdoms. Graced people.

Not everyone is Graced and those who are, are feared by all no matter his or her particular ability. Most are innocent enough, Graced with cooking or something else benign. But Katsa is Graced with killing. She can kill with her bare hands and any weapon. People fear her and her uncle, the king of the Middluns, uses her to strong arm his subjects. Every time Katsa’s conscience threatens to compromise a mission, she dismisses it because a killer like her can not feel or judge, but solely obey.

That is, until she meets Prince Po of Leinid, who is Graced with superior fighting skills. Knowing Po changes Katsa and she ends up leading a rescue mission that also brings with it self-discovery and the knowledge of a dangerous secret that could destroy all of the kingdoms.

I really do not have much to say about Graceling. I have very few notes on it. I was indifferent to it for the majority of the book. I liked Po and Raffin (Katsa’s cousin) well enough, but Katsa was really hard to relate to (though to be fair, it was probably intended that way).

I found the idea of Graces quite interesting. Graced people were physically marked by heterochromatic eyes and the various Graces were crosses between extreme talent and power. Some Graced people seemed to get the short end of the stick when it came to Graces though.

Graceling became way more exciting for me during the last one hundred and fifty pages or so and I finally felt connected during those pages. I just with it had been like that for the whole book.

Recommended for fantasy lovers fourteen and up who are patient enough to hold on until the good stuff happens.

Baby Owl claims he is not sleepy as he fights to keep his eyes open. The other animals stay awake all day and he wants to as well. In between arguing, he begins to doze.

I’m Not Sleepy! is a very short picture book but it is part of a popular series by Jon Allen. There is not much to say about this cute little owl book, but the pictures speak for themselves.

Recommended for children ages two to four.

The King’s Concubine is about King Edward III, Queen Philippa, and Alice Perrers, the king’s infamous mistress. The book follows Alice’s life from her time at Barking Abbey, her short, unconsummated marriage to Janyn Perrers, and her renewed time at the convent before Queen Philippa sees something in her and saves her from that life by making her one of her damsels. Alice sympathizes with the queen and becomes loyal to her, showing her various kindnesses because of her sense of right and the queen rewards her for it by raising her position.

The queen suffers from pain and swollen limbs and despite Edward’s love for her, she can no longer perform her wifely duties. That is where her plan for young Alice Perrers comes in. Even though it pains her, Philippa asks Alice to be with the king. She would rather have someone who is loyal to her and who she trusts and chooses to be with the king rather than some court lady who would gloat about her position. Philippa explains that she already told Edward to take a lover since she cannot withstand it anymore. All she has to do is get Alice to agree and place her in Edward’s way.

I really liked Alice’s strength and audacity. I admired how she kept her counsel in moments of great self-control and how she knew when the moment was right for her to speak her mind in a way that it would be to her benefit.

I have always heard of Alice Perrers and since she is a bit before my usual time period, I never learned more about her than the bare basics. I knew she was linked to King Edward and that she was one of the many despised mistresses throughout English history. That was about it. No one knows much about her early life and if Alice knew, she never let on to anyone. I must have heard bad things about her in the course of my education and reading, so I went into this thinking she was another upstart who wanted power. Of course, The King’s Concubine is ficiton and I do not know enough about this time period or of Alice Perrers to know what historians say about her or to form my own judgement based solely on facts, but I do believe that she enjoyed the power, but what she always wanted most out of life was security.

I was stunned when, in the book, Queen Philippa told her that she already urged Edward to take a lover and that she planned to put Alice in that position. It was a precarious position for Alice. The king desired her and she was the queen’s closest confidante, but everyone else thought she was a greedy nobody who was undermining the sweetest and most pious queen of the time, who was well-loved. Since there is a negative stigma attached to Alice Perrers, I am sure that if this fiction was true, the two parties who planned it kept their secrets so closely guarded that today we have no way of knowing. I think, by doing this, Anne O’Brien created an aura of mystery around Alice and the whole situation which just makes me want to read more about her and learn the facts and the inferences.

The King’s Concubine is very interesting, but it was a bit slow for me to read because of the extremely small print and the never-ending chapters. If I cannot read a book straight through (which is most of them), I prefer to take a break when I reach the next chapter and with this book, that next chapter never seemed to come. That was the only part that discouraged me a bit and made me keep putting down the book. But I did feel like I learned a lot about the Alice Perrers that O’Brien created and the one history remembers through the reactions of court, even though it was fiction.

Recommended for those who enjoy historical fiction and want to read a positive spin on Alice Perrers.

The Syrena need to ensure their survival and to do that they have sent their prince, Galen, to land to seek the rumored girl who can communicate with sea life. When Emma, that unaware and rumored girl, literally runs into Galen while on vacation at the beach in Florida, they immediately feel connected, but Galen’s twin sister, Rayna, ruins the mood. Rayna is not convinced Emma is the girl they are looking for but after a dangerous encounter with a shark and after that, wave after wave of incidents, Galen is convinced she is the one the Syrena need. He only has to make her believe.

Anna Banks wrote Of Poseidon from both Galen’s and Emma’s points-of-view. While I enjoyed being in both of their heads, the tenses threw me off. I cannot think of another book that I have read that did something like this. Emma’s point-of-view was in the first person present tense, which is common. But Galen’s point-of-view was in the third person present tense, which I found odd because usually the third person is paired with the past tense. I am not sure what Banks’ motives were for writing the characters this way, but I just found it hard to follow Galen’s parts…at first. More on that in a bit.

I cannot write much about the plot because the synopsis does not reveal much and I do not want to spoil it for anyone. I can say that one minor thing that bugged me was that over and over Galen and Rayna thought and/or talked about how much they hate humans, yet they interact closely with two humans and felt compassion for others, so I was not really convinced and found myself wondering why that was insisted upon when it did not seem to be true.

Alright, by now, a lot of you are probably thinking that I disliked this book. Not true! The hating humans thing was minor and yes, the tense thing was bigger because it slowed me down, but I really enjoyed the story! I regret that I have so many notes on Of Poseidon that I cannot share without spoiling things for you, because I think those would show you better how much I enjoyed it.

For the first few chapters, Galen’s unconventional point-of-view/tense thing distracted me from getting into the story, but after that I started to get used to it (or I was able to ignore it) and I was able to focus on the story properly.

Of Poseidon is really good and sucked me in to its pages. I almost felt like I was in the same places that the characters were, but as an invisible viewer. Even thinking about it now, my brain can call up the images of the sea and Galen’s house and the  experiences that made me feel like I was there.

I enjoyed the love story and the sleuthing because who does not love a good love story and while it was happening Galen and Emma were trying to find answers that would have satisfied everyone’s wants.

The ending completely threw me and shocked me because I followed the same false trails that the characters did. It gave me chills and goosebumps and I wanted to keep reading even though that was impossible because even this book is not officially out yet, so it will be even longer to wait for the second. Yes, there is a cliffhanger. A huge one! 

While the medium of Galen’s voice distracted me at first, the Of Poseidon’s story quickly overpowered all of that and drew me in deep. I am excited for book number two because I have to know what happens next!

Recommended for those fourteen and up who enjoy young adult fantasy having to do with mermaids Syrena and books with twists that crash over you like an unexpected wave. If cliffhangers are not your thing, you may want to wait until book two comes out, but that could be a looooong time since Of Poseidon releases in twelve days.

It has always been inevitable. The seasons change: summer into autumn, autumn into winter, winter into…

Winter into more winter, if Lady Winter has anything to do with it. She does not want Sister Spring to awaken because it would mean her beautiful white snow and ice crystals would melt and the silence that a fresh snow brings would be halted for months. No, better to leave things as they are now, to Lady Winter’s liking. And to do that, she must make sure that Sister Spring continues to slumber.

How Robin Saved Spring is about the changing of the seasons and how Lady Winter wants to stop the change. Lady Winter is close to getting her way but the animals start to understand what is happening and they try to wake and warn Sister Spring. The biggest and smallest creatures do not succeed but maybe Robin will be the one to make a difference.

It is full of whimsical illustrations. Beautiful illustrations.

How Robin Saved Spring is a very cute book about saving spring and how various animals and insects came to hibernate and/or bed down for the winter.

Recommended for older children because it is wordier than other picture books. I would say five to ten years of age.