It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

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Before the Winter Break I told my Newbery Book club that I would read ONE MORE book over the break in anticipation of the ALA awards on Jan 11. A Handful of Stars was it. It was a sweet book. Not riveting, not stressful, but one I would really have liked as a kid.

Genre: Realistic

AR level: 4.4

Grade appropriate: 3rd and up

RATING BREAKDOWN:

Overall: 4/5--

Creativity: 4/5-- a girl growing up with her grandparents in Maine after her mother dies in a car accident. She makes friends with a girl who is a migrant worker in Maine for the blueberry harvest.

Characters: 5/5-- Sweet characters. All of them.

Engrossing: 3/5-- I think this was the one drawback to this book. It was short so I could make myself go back to it knowing that I would finish soon, but I was also reading Tony Abbott’s Copernicus Legacy series and coming off of the adventure and adrenaline of those a Handful of Stars was less than demanding my attention.

Writing: 5/5

Appeal to kids: 5/5-- Perfect for  the girls who love sweet friendship stories.

Appropriate length to tell the story: 5/5

CONTENT:

Language: none

Sexuality: none

Violence: none

Drugs/Alcohol: none