Kathleen

This is a read I would highly recommend to both boys & girls. Tennyson & Bronte are teenage twins whose parents happen to be literature professors. Tennyson is not pleased that his sister has recently started dating Brewster (aka Bruiser), the boy voted "most likely to get the death penalty." Bruiser lives with his mean, alcoholic uncle and his 8 year old brother, Cody. The family is perceived as "no good" and pretty much keeps to themselves.

I purchased this book in the spring and it was on my "to read" shelf for months. Then, someone in my book club suggested the title and it was chosen for our October book selection. I don't know why I didn't start reading it sooner! I LOVED it! Loving Frank is a historical fiction novel based on real events. It tells the story of world-famous architect, Frank Lloyd Wright, and his affair with one of his clients, the also married Mamah Borthwick Cheney. The unique perspective of this book is that it is told from Mamah's point-of-view. Wright is a larger than life character.

An airplane full of teen beauty queens, on their way to the Miss Teen Dream pageant (sponsored by The Corporation), crash lands on a remote tropical island. Many of them, of course, do not survive, but never fear...Miss Texas, Taylor Rene Krystal Hawkins (don't you love it?), is there to assume the leadership role! She promptly divides the girls into two groups. The Lost Girls trek into the jungle to check out their new surroundings, while the Sparkle Ponies stay on the beach and salvage what they can from the wrecked plane.

This book was sitting on my shelf at home for quite a while after I picked it up at a book sale somewhere. I quite literally had to dust it off in order to read it! I am sorry I didn't pick it up sooner because I really enjoyed it. Amy and Isabelle are a teen daughter and her single mother living in a small town in rural Maine in the 1960s. As typical mother-daughter relationships go at this age, the two cannot relate to one another at all.

A hilarious take on a 7th grade boy's life from the pen of Tim Carvell, head writer at The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. The book is in diary format and follows Tad on various adventures & life lessons throughout the year.

If you listen to NPR on Friday mornings, you may be familiar with the interviews from David Isay’s StoryCorps Project.  Shortly after 9/11, David Isay decided he wanted to record an oral history of America.  Not just any history, mind you, he set out to capture the lives of everyday Americans --- your average John & Jane Doe, not the elite upper-crust celebrities that traditionally dominate the media.  He set up a recording booth in Grand Central Station in New York City where family members and friends can record interviews with each other.  It became so popular tha