Book Review: Spice Box

Spice Box by Grace Livingston Hill

Spice Box
by Grace Livingston Hill

4 out of 5 stars

Janice runs away from her evil alcoholic brother-in-law and ends up stranded in the middle of a snowstorm. Dr. Sterling finds her half-dead in a snowdrift, and takes her back to his hospital and nurses her back to health. She is terrified that her brother-in-law will find her, so she stays at the hospital to train as a nurse under a false name.
In another city, Martha Spicer has just received a large inheritance that has made her financially independent, but she is lonely in her big new house until she befriends a mischievous neighbor boy who encourages her to help those less fortunate.

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Book Review: Singer of All Songs

The Singer of All Songs by Kate Constable

The Singer of All Songs (The Chanters of Tremaris #1)
by Kate Constable

5 out of 5 stars

Calwyn has lived all her life in the cloister with the priestesses of ice, learning to sing the magical ice songs. Darrow sneaks into the cloister hoping to hide from his enemy that pursues him, and he warns Calwyn about his enemy who wants to learn every type of magic song and become the most powerful sorcerer and take over the entire land. Darrow himself is an iron chanter, and he knows magic songs that can control earth and metals. When Darrow escapes into the mountains, Calwyn goes with him, beginning an adventure that will take her to the very edge of civilization.

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Book Review: The Last Ever After

The Last Ever After by Soman Chainani

The Last Ever After (The School for Good and Evil, #3)
by Soman Chainani

Sophie and Agatha seem to have found their happy endings, but they are both dissatisfied with their results, and the truth is… they miss each other. How can they find a happy ending when they are apart? Agatha and Tedros fight their way back into the School for Good and Evil, hoping to rescue Sophie and find a new happy ending together, but Sophie has other plans with the evil Schoolmaster.

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Book Review: The Colossus Rises

The Colossus Rises by Peter Lerangis

The Colossus Rises (Seven Wonders, #1)
by Peter Lerangis, Torstein Norstrand (Illustrator), Mike Reagan (Illustrator)

3 out of 5 stars

Jack is kidnapped by a secret institution of doctors and scientists that claim he has a rare genetic marker from the heirs of Atlantis royalty. This genetic anomaly will kill him within a year if he doesn’t get special treatments, and in return the institution asks that he help a team of other teens with the gene to track down powerful artifacts from Atlantis hidden around the world. But Jack doesn’t know who to trust. Are the doctors telling the truth, or just manipulating him and the other teens so they are forced to hunt for the artifacts and unlock their power?

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Book Review: Diary of a Marine Biologist

Diary of a Marine Biologist by Anita Thomas

Diary of a Marine Biologist
by Anita Thomas, Sarah Wilkins (Illustrator)

We follow Emma, a marine biologist, through her week studying whales, nurturing clownfish babies in a nursery, diving in the ocean with giant cuttlefish, looking for sea snakes, and checking on the progress of a new oyster reef. She finishes up her week surfing with a friend.

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Book Review: Faster than a Jet, Bigger than a Whale

Faster than a Jet, Bigger than a Whale by Andrea Minoglio

Faster than a Jet, Bigger than a Whale: An Illustrated Guide to Measuring Our World
by Andrea Minoglio

Have you ever wondered how high the tallest mountain in the world is… if you measure from the seabed instead of from sea level? It’s not Mount Everest! In this book we learn about the highest, the fastest, the biggest, and the smallest things in our world. How far can animals jump? How big can trees get? How far across is the biggest desert? Which city has the biggest population? We learn it all in this book!

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Science and Nature Books from Ruby Tuesday Books

Beaver's Lodge (Home Sweet Amazing Home by Ruth Owen

Beaver’s Lodge (Home Sweet Amazing Home (Little Acorns))
by Ruth Owen

This picture book gives some basic facts about beavers, along with photos of real beavers building a dam, swimming, or gnawing on trees. We learn how beavers build a lodge to live in, how they care for their young kits, and how they warn each other of approaching danger.

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Book Review: Rose Daughter

Rose Daughter by Robin McKinley

Rose Daughter
by Robin McKinley

4 out of 5 stars

When her father loses all his money, Beauty and her sisters move with him to remote Rose Cottage, where Beauty learns to cultivate the beautiful roses in the garden. Her father gets lost in the forest and meets the terrifying Beast, who demands that Beauty must come to stay in his palace in payment for a stolen rose. Beauty thinks that if she could just get the Beast’s rose garden to bloom again, the curse on the palace would be broken and she would be free. But the magic is very cunning and tricksy. Time doesn’t flow in the same manner. The space around the palace is distorted, and even the furniture and decorations in the vast rooms keep changing. Beauty must find her own inner magic before she can defeat the evil sorcery that keeps them both prisoners.

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Book Review: Charlie Bone and the Invisible Boy

Charlie Bone and the Invisible Boy by Jenny Nimmo

Charlie Bone and the Invisible Boy (The Children of the Red King, #3)
by Jenny Nimmo

5 out of 5 stars

Charlie encounters an invisible boy, Ollie, and gets his friends to help figure out a way to rescue him from the dark attics of Bloor Academy. Ollie was made invisible by a magic blue boa snake, and imprisoned in the attics by the evil headmaster of the school. Meanwhile, Belle, a mysterious and beautiful new girl, has arrived at school. She seems to be very chummy with Charlie’s mean aunts, so Charlie knows she must be up to something evil. Charlie’s Uncle Paton leaves on a mysterious journey to “stop someone from coming”, but Charlie thinks that perhaps that someone is already among them.

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Book Review: City of Fire

City of Fire by Laurence Yep

City of Fire (City Trilogy, #1)
by Laurence Yep

2 out of 5 stars

Scirye vows revenge on the dragon that killed her sister, and she is joined in her quest for revenge by Leech, whose friend was also killed, and Bayang, a dragon disguised as a human. This unlikely crew start on the trail to find the evil dragon, Badik, and they end up as stowaways on a plane to Honolulu to track him down and retrieve the priceless artifacts he stole.

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