CCBC Weekly Book Reviews
Beneath
Grandpa wants to talk about Finn’s “horrible mood,” but Finn declines, believing that Grandpa doesn’t understand how Finn is feeling. Finn agrees to a walk but insists on remaining cloaked in a blanket.
October 1, 2023
I’d Rather Burn Than Bloom
Marisol’s mom died following a car accident that happened after she and Marisol had a huge fight. Marisol, 16, blames herself and has been out of control ever since, fixated on her failures as a daughter, especially how she and her mom (Filipina) always fought and how she didn’t say goodbye to her mom as she lay dying at the hospital.
September 25, 2023
The Eyes & the Impossible
Johannes takes his job as the “eyes” of the seaside park where he’s lived in the wild since he was a puppy very seriously.
September 18, 2023
Henry, Like Always
In Classroom Ten, Mrs. Tanaka keeps a predictable schedule. To Henry’s satisfaction, the Big Calendar looks the same every week—except for this Monday, when Mrs. Tanaka makes an unexpected announcement. In lieu of Friday afternoon Share Time, the class will have a special parade.
September 11, 2023
What My Daddy Loves
“My daddy loves starting the day with me.” On each page spread, a simple first-person statement about what the daddy shown loves doing “with me” accompanies an illustration showing a different Black dad and his young child engaged in the activity the child names.
September 4, 2023
First-Year Orientation
A well-rounded anthology of loosely connected short stories explores the excitement, trepidation, and (sometimes literal) magic of first-year orientation at fictional Rolland College.
August 28, 2023
Stars in Their Eyes
Maisie and her mom are attending Maisie’s first fancon, where 14-year-old Maisie (brown-skinned) is looking forward to meeting her favorite actor on her favorite show, Midnight Girls. Like Maisie, Kara Bufano is an above-the-knee amputee with a prosthetic leg.
August 21, 2023
Ginny Off the Map
Eleven-year-old Ginny’s dad is an army doctor. Ginny (white) and her older sister, Allie, are blindsided when they learn his posting to Afghanistan in the new year has been changed; he leaves shortly after their expected move from North Carolina to Maryland at the end of the school year.
August 13, 2023
Mexikid: A Graphic Memoir
Pedro Martín’s exuberant graphic memoir about growing up the seventh of nine kids in a Mexican American family in the 1970s is full of teasing and love, poignancy and laugh-out-loud humor.
August 7, 2023
Night Owl Night
Sova’s mom is a scientist who studies saw whet owls. From the time she’s a little girl, Sova asks if she can come along when her mom monitors owl migration each October. Each time her mom explains, “A scientist must learn to wait.”
July 31, 2023
We Still Belong
Twelve-year-old Wesley Wilder (Upper Skagit) starts the day nervous but excited on two fronts. Her poem, “We Still Belong,” is in the school newspaper for Indigenous Peoples’ Day, and she plans to ask a boy named Ryan Thomas, whom she’s gotten to know through gaming club, to the upcoming school dance.
July 24, 2023
The In-Between
In this memoir in verse, the author recalls the period in her childhood when she, her two younger siblings, and their mother were evicted from their apartment.
July 17, 2023
My Baba’s Garden
Each day before school a young boy rides with his dad “past mountains that look like whale bellies” to his Baba’s. He finds his grandmother in the kitchen, “hidden in the steam of boiling potatoes, dancing between the sink, fridge, and stove.”
July 10, 2023
Dear Mothman
Noah’s best friend, Lewis, was killed in a car accident several months ago ... Noah has not only lost his best friend but the essential sense of being known, seen, and understood.
July 3, 2023
Nigeria Jones: A Novel
Sixteen -year-old Haitian American Nigeria Jones has been raised inside her father’s small, insular, radical Black Power Movement, which emphasizes self-actualization outside white systemic oppression.
June 26, 2023- More Books of the Week