Our middle grade book spotlight this week is is on some of our favorite staff pick reads!!! To help us kick off these summer months filled with reading, we are sharing some of our favorite books so you can have some amazing titles to help you get started or to help you get out of a reading slump if that is where you find yourself. We have a great mixture of nonfiction, realistic, historical and more so there is something for everyone or maybe something to read outside of your book comfort zone! These books and more can be found by searching the catalog using the search tag #youthstaffpicks as well as on Libby and Hoopla. Check back next week for a new middle grade book spotlight and if you have any book suggestions, please let us know!!
Born to Fly by Steve Sheinkin--Tells the story of the women who made the 1929 Air Derby--the first women's air race across the United States--possible, including Amelia Earhart, Marvel Crosson, Louise Thaden, and Elinor Smith, each of whom made significant contributions to early flight.
The Remarkable Journey of Coyote Sunrise by Dan Gemeinhart--Twelve-year-old Coyote and her father, Rodeo, live an itinerant life as they travel the U.S. in an old school bus. Along the way, she hears that the park near her old home in Washington State is getting demolished--the park where she and her now-deceased mother and sisters buried a memory box. Coyote must then trick her father to travel back to Washington from Florida, picking up eclectic travelers along the way.
Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson--The life of a ten-year-old boy in rural Virginia expands when he becomes friends with a newcomer who subsequently meets an untimely death trying to reach their hideaway, Terabithia, during a storm.
We Dream of Space by Erin Entrada Kelly--In 1986, Cash, Fitch, and Bird Thomas are in seventh grade. Cash loves basketball, but just broke his wrist and is in danger of failing seventh grade for the second time. Fitch spends every afternoon at the local arcade and deals with an explosive temper. His twin sister, Birdie, dreams of being NASA's first female shuttle commander, but feels like she's disappearing. They all exist in their own little orbits in their tense home, with little in common. But after the disastrous launch of the Space Shuttle Challenger, their lives change in unexpected ways.
Race to the Bottom of the Earth by Rebecca E.F. Barone--Filled with suspense and unwavering accounts of determination, this nonfiction account presents history-making treks to the South Pole by competing teams more than 100 years apart. In 1910, Captain Robert Scott prepared a team to be the first to reach the South Pole. Unbeknownst to him, Roald Amundsen was also preparing to be the first to reach the South Pole, leading both expeditions to race to be the first ones there. By 2018, no one had yet made a solo journey across Antarctica, but two men were hoping to change that, Captain Louis Rudd and elite athlete Colin O'Brady, resulting in another epic race.
Small Spaces by Katherine Arden--Eleven-year-old Ollie comes across a weeping woman next to a river, holding a book and threatening to throw it into the water. Ollie is impulsive, so she plucks the book from the woman's hand and runs off with it. The book is "Small Spaces," and tells a haunting story of a girl, two boys in love with her, and a farm from hundreds of years ago, and a deal with the sinister specter called the Smiling Man, who grants wishes for the ultimate price. Now, Ollie finds herself on a school trip to a local farm with a haunted history.