Reviews written by CJ Redwine, Site and Staff Manager

Araby Worth spends her life trying to forget the loss of her twin brother, the preoccupation of her parents, and most of all, trying to forget herself. Together with her friend April, she dresses up, avoids the plague-ridden areas of the crumbling city as much as possible, and does whatever...

Oh, this book. THIS BOOK. Demonglass left us with such a cliffhanger! And left me unsure if I was Team Archer or Team Cal, because let's face it. They are both amazing in their own ways. But Spell Bound more than lived up to the promise...

VESPER is immediately captivating as we see Emily exhibiting strange behavior on the heels of another Emily's murder. I give kudos to the author for making both "Daytime Emily" and "Nighttime Emily" fascinating and relatable to the reader. I also enjoyed the (somewhat dysfunctional) relationship between Emily and her best...

I feel like I keep seeing the two star-crossed lovers doomed to repeat their near romance again and again. While this story doesn't breath fresh life into that idea, the characters are compelling and the setting is interesting. It took a while for me to really feel hooked by the...

This book is as full of drama, heartbreak, warmth, and detailed horse life as the first. I loved that we get a setting as exotic as Arabia where the culture surrounding horses is rich with lore, tradition, and danger. A worthy sequel to The Black Stallion, sure to please those...

This is the story of Black Beauty, a gorgeous colt with so much promise, he is the apple of his owner's eye until something happens and Black Beauty must be sold. Thus begins the sometimes exhilarating, sometimes scary and often sad journey of Black Beauty through the world. He changes...

I adored the Black Stallion series as a girl. It's clear the author knows, understands, and loves horses. Reading The Black Stallion is like having a front row seat to a life most of us will never have. Horses, stables, race tracks, training regimes ... all the ins and outs...

I've loved Grimms fairy tales since I was a little girl. I used to check out at least one of the Grimms books every time I went to the library. It didn't matter that I'd read them all before. They were magical. This collection recalls that magic....

I went into this book with zero expectations. I'd heard nothing about it, and I'm not particularly drawn to the cover. So, I was completely surprised to become so quickly addicted to reading this story. Even more amazing to me is that Kai Meyer is a German writer, but this...

One of my very favorite Dr. Suess books! The rhymes are so much fun, and kids love the adventure of convincing the main character to just TRY green eggs and ham. What a fun way to talk about taking risks on new things. :)

I'm a fan of Mark Twain, and I enjoyed Huckleberry Finn. I loved Huck in Tom Sawyer, and was pleased he got to have a book of his own. This is a rather wild adventure down the Mississippi River, full of Twain's trademark humor, heart, and keen sense of the...

I cut my reading teeth on Nancy Drew, and this book was one of my favorites. I love that Nancy and her friends remain calm in every crisis, and that all of the ND books are a fine example of a pretty girl using her brain to solve problems. This...

The point of this story is to take a hard look at what humans become when we are stripped of shelter, food, society, structure, and accountability and instead are reduced to animals. The author successfully deconstructs his characters into their basic essence, where fear and a pack mentality win out...

If Dean Koontz wrote a YA, I imagine it would be something like UNRAVELING. This book is a thrilling, grab-you-by-the-throat ride from the first chapter to the unbelievable finish. The writing is polished, the pacing is superb, and the romance is woven in around heart-stopping drama with an expert touch....

Loved the continuing saga of the Ingalls family as they make their home in a sod house on the prairie. This was one of my favorites in the entire series as a girl because it fascinated me to think about living in a house carved out of dirt. What an...