Marvelous Middle Grade Monday
Sylvia Doe and the 100-Year Flood (Disney/Hyperion, 2024) by Robert Beatty is a mysterious story.
Thirteen-year-old Sylvia Doe tries to stay with her foster families. But the only place she feels she belongs is Highland Home for Children, with it’s caretaker, and the horses. Sylvia always finds her way back. “Caught in a nook here, and a cranny there, she was the one little pebble that the river could never seem to push downstream.” Once “home” a powerful storm causes the river to flood and Sylvia finds strange things that don’t belong, and even rescues an odd boy, who doesn’t seem to be from her time.
Watch the book trailer on this page.
Read about the bestselling author here and check out his Serafina and Willow series here.
Fuzzy Mud (Delacorte Books for Young Readers, 2015) by Louis Sacher is creepily good! Or should I say, even though it’s creepy, it’s very good. Of course, what would you expect from the author of Holes, but a good story?
Under the Egg (Dial Books for Young Readers, 2014 ) by Laura Marx Fitzgerald is an eggstraordinary story. Theo, now that her grandfather Jack is gone, is in charge of their 200-year-old family home and her eccentric mother. When dying, Jack told her to look “under the egg” and she’s afraid what she’s found is not only going to ruin his reputation, but that she’ll find out he’s not who she thought he was.
Three Times Lucky (Dial Books for Young Readers/Penguin, 2012) by Sheila Turnage is a murder mystery that won a Newbery Honor. I love how it opens: “Trouble cruised into Tupelo Landing at exactly seven minutes past noon on Wednesday, the third of June, flashing a gold badge and driving a Chevy Impala the color of dirt.” 11-year-old Mo and her best friend Dale don’t know it, but they’re going to get mixed up good in the trouble that has come to town.