Reviews written by Kim Baccellia, Staff Reviewer

What worked: Great way to make reading the classics more fun! I'm a huge fan of graphic novels. Manga Classics Hamlet uses this style to make the classics more accesible, especially for those who find them difficult to understand. The illustrations bring to life Hamlet's...

Eighteen-year-old Mila has just graduated from high school and aged out of the foster care program. So when a job prospect to teach on a farm comes up, she's quick to jump at it. Only thing is the farm is isolated and rumor has it that there are ghosts. Mila...

Magically mix of Greek sorority life with sisterhood. Told in two alternating POVs, this story takes place at the ultra-exclusive Kappa Rho Nu on Westerly College's Savannah, Georgia, campus. The sisters are called 'The Ravens'. The difference though is these sorority sisters are witches. The authors do a great job...

Endearing characters readers have loved are now in London during the Christmas break. Dash has just finished finals at Oxford, the college of his dreams. Or so he thought. Lily has decided to 'surprise' him and show up. Only things aren't so perfect as either character had hoped. ...

Maeve finds a pack of tarot cards while cleaning out a closet at her school. What starts off as curiosity, she soon finds she has a 'gift' to read cards for the girls at her school. One card though just shows up-the Housekeeper-one that gives Maeve an unsettling feeling. The...

Eighteen-year-old Juliette Cai is the heir to the powerful Shanghai gang the Scarlets. Their rivals are the Russian White Flowers. Her former lover Roma Montagov is behind a brutal betrayal that killed many of the Scarlets. Because of this, Juliette is sent away to America. Now she's back and wants...

Meteor, New Mexico is the site where a meteor crashed years ago. It's also the site of the Miss Meteor beauty pageant. For years only one 'type' of contestant wins-White, blonde, blue-eyed, and thin. Lita Perez wants to be the first Latina to win that title. She also has a...

After Jane's father sudden dies, Her mother, Ruth, ends up moving them across the country. They move into her mother's childhood home. But Jane senses something isn't quite right at the old house. There's also secrets and whispers about the house. Only when Jane pushes for the truth, does a...

Everyone thinks Margot is lucky. She's the sole survivor of a horrific car crash that killed her family. While at a group home, she keeps the other girls up by screaming all night. Then she's 'chosen' to be the companion of Agatha, a girl that lives at a remote estate....

In a near future US, all citizens are chipped and tracked. Those who are undocumented are singled out to an uncertain future. Sixteen-year-old Vali's mother's counterfeit chip goes off and she's rounded up by the Deportation Force. Now it's up to Vali and her young brother to make their way...

Majesty begins right after the King of America dies, leaving his oldest daughter Beatrice queen. She was in the process of telling her father that she wanted to abduct and run off with her guard Conner. That all changed when her father dies. Her younger...

What worked: There's so much to love about this contemporary diverse thriller that is bits Laurie Halse Anderson meets Sci-Fi/X-Files with a Latinx twist. Fast-paced story that has so much. Sia lost her undocumented mother three years previously after ICE deported her. Sia and her...

What worked: Intriguing plot of Chloe, a seventeen-year-old super-achiever, who ends up collapsing during her senior year in high school and gets a new heart. Takaoka nails the stress and pressure on some teens who go overboard with their high school academics in order to get into that 'right' university....

What worked: Fascination collection of essays that show the impact of the year 1789 in the world.In this anthology, twelve authors describe how 1789 was such a pivotal year. Rebellion and revolution were in the air not only in the United States, but other countries like France and the West...

What worked: Beautifully written tale where a girl performer breaks away from her cage and enters a competition of magicians that goes terribly wrong. Carnival meets Night Circus with a twist of Phantom of the Opera. The beginning of this novel pulled with in with...