What Are You Reading Monday

It's Monday! What are you Reading? is a meme hosted by Sheila at Book Journeys. It is a great way to recap what you read and/or reviewed the previous week and to plan out your reading and reviews for the upcoming week. It's also a great chance to see what others are reading right now… who knows, you might discover that next “must read” book!

Our Kid Lit to YA version is hosted by Teach Mentor Texts.
GREAT IDEA! Check out all of the What Are You Reading? participants for title ideas.



Let's Go for a Drive! by Mo Willems
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Dear Mo,
I was not a big fan of Goldilocks and the Three Dinosaurs. Maybe it was over my head, I don't know. Anyway ... I LOVE this Piggie and Elephant adventure. They are like me. Get all excited about an idea, get the "extras" ready ... and then realize they are missing one main component. Their eyes ... Piggie and Gerald say so much with their eyes. Also the Pigeon cameo is awesome! So you are forgiven. Later.

Giants Beware! by Jorge Aguirre
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Love the colorful illustrations. And I enjoyed the story as well, even if Claudette was a little annoying in her persistance of adventure.



Fancy Nancy: Nancy Clancy, Super Sleuth by Jane O'Connor
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

For girls that have been reading Fancy Nancy books these will be a perfect step up.




How Things Work: In The Yard by Lisa Campbell Ernst
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Love the collage illustrations. And it was interesting.
Just ... it felt a little discombobulated to me. Like some of the items were just thrown in there. And the descriptions were not very detailed. This is surface level how things work. But I still love the illustrations. ;]


The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Will be looking forward to book #2. Interesting characters, premise, and location ( I follow the author on her blog and I remember she went to Wales to do some research a while back ... loads of cool pics! Now we need pics of the actual Virginia location! Even though it was described pretty well). I especially liked Blue and her mom and aunts!

That said ... I wasn't quite convinced by Gansey's obsession with an ancient Welsh king and the reasoning behind Virginia as the setting. That got a litte confusing. Maybe a couple prequel chapters explaining the story would have helped? All the Raven boys were so angry.

And there was some language in there that was just not necessary. I mean, obscene language is rarely necessary (Please don't start on the "This is how people talk" ... so that makes it necessary? No, it does not and in writing or reading a book we have the advantage of time to come up with a better way to explain ourselves) but it seemed even more just thrown in there than the usual.

So almost four stars. Ever ever ever so close to four stars.

Article 5 by Kristen Simmons
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I did like the characters ... but there wasn't much "new" here and it was a bit confusing at times understanding some of their motivations.

So ... I will give it one more try. Book #2, when it comes out. Then we'll see.


View all my reviews


Coming Up

Well ... still working on my professional books. Or, perhaps better said, claiming I am though I'm not really picking them up. I want to! And then fiction books that I've purchased. I want to read them but keep thinking "oh, I can read that whenever." All the library books are sitting there falling off of the shelf and I get distracted. New goal: Do Not Put Anything Else on Hold at the Library for at least a Month. Maybe more.