Alison Reads

This book attempts to describe what goes on in the brain while music is being performed or listened to. Examples are given from classical and pop repertoire so that the reader will be familiar with at least some of the examples. Two memorable quotes from the book: “The research on the development of the first […]

It’s time to vote for the 2007 Young Reader’s Choice Award. My picks are: For grades 4-6, usually the slimmest book wins. If that holds true, then HEARTBEAT will win. My favorite is PETER AND THE STARCATCHERS, which is a rollicking good adventure tale with strong male and female characters. For grades 7-9, the field […]

Twelve-year-old Lily discovers that her dad’s boss, Larry, is a human-whale hybrid bent on taking over the world using robotic whales with laser eyes which walk on hydraulic stilts. It’s up to Lily and her friends Jasper and Katie to stop them. A spoof of books such as Goosebumps and turn-of-the-century boy wonder books, this […]

The latest Richard Jury mystery. Jury and his friend Melrose Plant investigate the murder of a wealthy young man at a hotel. He had been living in Henry James’ house and there’s a lot about James in this book. The mystery was OK — not her best effort — but for maximum enjoyment it’s necessary […]

Seventeen-year-old Zoe finally gives up caring for her alcoholic mother and moves into a rented room across town. She is constantly short of money and fighting with her controlling disfunctional family members. This book left a bad taste in my mouth. It’s full of four-letter words and sleazy sex. I found this book profoundly depressing, […]

Wow! Action, adventure, shipwreck, exploration, extreme suffering and rescue–and it’s all true. In 1914, Perce Blackborow stowed away about the Endurance to be part of Ernest Shackleton’s polar expedition. As most of us know, the ship was caught in pack ice and crushed. The crew had to abandon ship and set out with sleds and […]

New York high school student Mitty Blake has to write a paper about an infectious disease and he has to use four books as sources, so he opens an old medical book he finds at his house and discovers an envelope containing scabs from the Boston smallpox epidemic of 1902. He crumbles one and inhales […]

In 1917, 16-year-old Hattie inherits her uncle’s land claim in eastern Montana. She moves there and lives alone in a shack working to prove up her claim by planting 40 acres of flax and wheat and fencing in her 320 acres of land. She writes letters to a boy friend who is fighting in France, […]

This is the third book in a series about Alice, who lives in a small town in the interior of British Columbia. In this book, Alice is 16 and it is the summer before her senior year of high school. Her hippy mother has to spend the summer in jail because of an environmental protest, […]

Somewhere in Italy, sometime in the past, a scarecrow is hit by a bolt of lightning and comes to life. A boy named Jack becomes his servant and together they go in search of fame and fortune and the scarecrow’s home, Spring Valley. They battle brigands, get shipwrecked on a desert island, and the scarecrow […]