Archives de catégorie : Middle Grade

SUEE AND THE SHADOW de Ginger Ly & Molly Park

The Zero Detective Club is back in this highly anticipated sequel to Suee and the Shadow!

SUEE AND THE SHADOW (Book 1)
SUEE AND THE STRANGE WHITE LIGHT (Book 2)
by Ginger Ly
illustrated by Molly Park
Abrams, September 2017 – May 2023
(via Writers House)

Suee and the Zero Detective Club are back and ready to unravel some mysteries! However, other than a bunch of missing cat cases, there really isn’t too much to solve . . . That is, until Smartie, Suee’s kid-nemesis from her old school, goes missing leaving only one clue: Central City.
Nemesis or not, it’s up to Suee and the rest of the Zero Detective Club members to find her. But Smartie’s disappearance isn’t the only weird thing going on in this part of town. There’s an army of workers in white uniforms installing strange devices, and all the adults have started acting bizarre and ignoring their kids. With all these odd occurrences, it’s up to the Zero Detective Club of Outskirtsville to find out what’s going on!
Author Ginger Ly and illustrator Molly Park return with fantastic energy and brilliant art for an incredible follow-up to Suee’s first adventure. This fast-paced and spooky tale will is sure to capture the hearts of readers young and old.

“Ly’s haunting story gains depth and texture from Park’s minimalist, thick-lined artwork. . . . the friendships Suee forms prove formidable against both supernatural threats and the twisty social politics of school.”
—Publishers Weekly

“Park’s bold, modish figures, largely in black and white with occasional bright pops of color, add to the eerie atmosphere . . . the stylish art is plenty eye-catching. . . a subtle undercurrent of emotional depth.”—Booklist

Ginger Ly worked as a designer before earning her master’s degree in filmmaking from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She lives in the suburbs of Seoul, South Korea.
Molly Park lives in Seoul, South Korea, with two black cats and a mouse, and they all get along very well. SUEE AND THE SHADOW is their debut graphic novel.

WEST OF THE SEA de Stephanie Willing

Sold in a heated auction, Stephanie Willing’s spellbinding debut is Tae Keller meets Tracey Baptiste, with the literary heart of The Higher Power of Lucky. In a tale of generational trauma, told with a cryptozoological twist, this outstanding new middle-grade novel seamlessly blends history and mythology with humor, big feelings, and even bigger questions.

WEST OF THE SEA
by Stephanie Willing
Viking, August 2023
(via Writers House)

When her mom disappears from their small Texas town, paleontology-loving Haven is determined to find her. But as she uncovers truths about her mom’s identity, Haven also uncovers a monstrous family secret. Her mom can take the shape of a human and, in the right environment, also turn into an amphibious creature known as a kitskara. And now that she’s growing up, Haven is discovering she has this ability, too. This newfound identity is her only clue to help her track her mother and bring her back home. And so she, her older sister Margie, and her new friend Rye set off on a road trip across Texas’s Gulf Coast to her late grandparents’ abandoned home, where they’re sure her mom has disappeared to. . . along with plenty of family secrets.
Infused with a deep love of fossils and Celtic mythology, WEST OF THE SEA is a lyrical, heart-filled coming-of-age story for fans of cryptozoology—and anyone who has struggled to find their place in the world when they feel different.

Stephanie Willing started writing stories and poetry when she was a little girl, and while she tried a lot of different kinds of art-making, reading and writing have always been her artistic home. Stories are at the heart of everything she does. As a dancer, she tells stories through movement. As an actor, she creates an emotional landscape through other people’s words. As an audiobook narrator, she gets to play all the parts at once and study how other authors craft their stories, while bringing it to life through audio. Stephanie has her MFA in Writing for Young People from Lesley University.

THE ADVENTURES OF INVISIBLE BOY de Doogie Horner

The first in a new middle-grade graphic novel series, featuring over-the-top action and excitement—and a superpower all kids dream of having.

THE ADVENTURES OF INVISIBLE BOY
by Doogie Horner
Putnam, Fall 2023
(via Writers House)

It’s the wind! It’s a ghost! No, it’s Invisible Boy! It’s Stanley’s first day at a new school and he is not looking forward to meeting a bunch of new kids. He wishes he could be invisible until he gets the lay of the land, and, due to a science project spill, it actually happens!
Turns out Stanley’s neighbor, Gene, is a pint-sized evil genius (with a secret science lair in his basement) and because that potion spill robbed him of first place in the science fair, he is determined to take his anger out on kids all over town. Good thing Stanley wants to use his invisible powers for good, even if it leads to an epic battle with tons of Gene’s outrageous inventions.

“On the first day of school, a new kid and an evil genius are about to collide. Our hero may be invisible—but THE ADVENTURES OF INVISIBLE BOY can’t be missed!” —Max Brallier, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Last Kids on Earth

Doogie Horner is the author of This Might Hurt a Bit, Some Very Interesting Cats Perhaps You Weren’t Aware of, Everything Explained Through Flowcharts, A Die Hard Christmas, and other books. His comedy album A Delicate Man was an AV Club staff pick. He won over a hostile NYC audience on America’s Got Talent and is a frequent guest on Doug Loves Movies.

THE BELLWOODS GAME de Celia Krampien

Perfect for fans of Small Spaces and Doll Bones, this spooky, highly illustrated middle-grade novel follows a girl who hopes to fix her outcast status through a game in the haunted woods, only to discover that some legends shouldn’t be played with.

THE BELLWOODS GAME
by Celia Krampien
Atheneum, Summer 2023
(via Writers House)

Everyone knows Fall Hollow is haunted. It has been ever since Abigail Snook went into the woods many years ago, never to be seen again. Since then, it’s tradition for the sixth graders at Beckett Elementary to play the Bellwoods Game on Halloween night. Three kids are chosen to go into the woods. Whoever rings the bell there wins the game and saves the town for another year, but if Abigail’s ghost captures the players first, the spirit is let loose to wreak havoc on Fall Hollow—or so the story goes.
Now that it’s Bailee’s year to play, she can finally find out what really happens. And legend has it the game’s winner gets a wish. Maybe, just maybe, if Bailee wins, she can go back to the way things used to be before her grandma got sick and everyone at school started hating her. But when the night begins, everything the kids thought they knew about the game—and each other—is challenged. One thing’s for sure: something sinister is at play…waiting for them all in the woods.

Celia Krampien grew up in a house in the woods in a small town near Owen Sound, Ontario, Canada. She studied illustration at Sheridan College and currently lives in St. Catharines, Ontario, with her partner, a mischievous cat, and a nosy beagle. She is the author of The Bellwoods Game.

FOX FIRES d’Emilia Ojala

A fantasy-adventure graphic novel addressing the relationship between humans and nature, friendships, family, self-growth, and Finnish folklore, told from an animal’s perspective.

FOX FIRES
by Emilia Ojala
Rocketship Entertainment, May 2022
(via JABberwocky)

“Fox Fires” refers to the Northern Lights; a literal translation from the Finnish word “revontulet.” (Revontulet = Repo’s fires.) The Fox Fires are a gate between this world and the land of the dead – it allows souls to visit their loved ones. But suddenly, the Fox Fires disappear. Our main character, a young raccoon dog named Raate, heads north to find what’s happened to Repo, the fire fox whose burning fur is said to make the Fox Fires appear in the sky. On her journey, Raate meets all kinds of interesting creatures, and also new friends. 

Emilia Ojala, also known as « Pipilia », hails from the small, cold country of Finland. A self-taught artist with a degree in graphic design, Emilia had always dreamed of writing and illustrating folk stories (while also owning many pets, of course!). Her passion for storytelling, art, and animation led her to develop her own stories at a very young age. Even back then her stories centered around animals, typically the adventures of her family pets. The small, Finnish towns she grew up in, with their close proximity to the fields and forests, provided Emilia with many opportunities to spend ample time in nature. These experiences have driven her creative process for tales about what might happen within nature when people aren’t around to see it. A fan of folklore and mythology, it was while Emilia was reading Finnish tales one afternoon she was inspired to create FOX FIRES. Since Finnish myths are somewhat lesser known she felt FOX FIRES could be a wonderful opportunity to open them up to the rest of the world.