Jennifer Hubert's Blog, page 31

The Sweet Life of Stella Madison by Lara M. Zeises

Let's be very clear–almost eighteen-year-old Stella Madison is NOT a foodie. She prefers Cheez Whiz to aged cheddar and her pastry fried, not puffed, thank you very much. But it's hard to maintain her junk food standards when she is the offspring of two hardcore gourmands. Her mother is a restaurant owner and her father [...]

Please Ignore Vera Dietz by A.S. King

Vera Dietz would just like everyone to leave her alone. She's spent most of her life keeping to herself so that no one will ever find out her most terrible secret, the one only her best friend Charlie knows: that her mom left when she was twelve and never came back—and that she supported herself [...]

Amelia Lost: The Life and Disappearance of Amelia Earhart by Candace Fleming

Yes, we think we know everything there is to know about Amelia Earhart, especially if you saw that movie with Hilary Swank. But since I skipped that film, I was actually surprised by how much I didn't know about this first lady of flight. For example, did you know that: She looked disturbingly like this [...]

Let It Snow!

Hey y'all, Reading Rants is taking a winter break until January 5. Thanks for a great year of feedback and favorite titles. I've already received several advanced review copies for 2011, and friends, the coming year looks GOOD as far as teen lit is concerned. So enjoy your eggnog, make some snow angels, and don't [...]

Delirium by Lauren Oliver

What if you lived in a world where love was classified as a disease? Known in seventeen-year-old Lena's futuristic society as "amor deliria nervosa," it is something to be feared more than anything else. To catch amor deliria is to lose control, to forget to eat, sleep or work. It even drives some people to [...]

2010 Top Ten

Please note that there has been absolutely no attempt to balance this list by age, gender or genre. These are just my "from-the-gut" favorites of the books I read this year. (While I love all my Top Ten books the same, I just might love BEFORE I FALL a tiny bit more:) Click on the [...]

The Big Crunch by Pete Hautman

Meet Jen and Wes. Jen's eyes are a bit too far apart and Wes's hair is always just this side of scruffy. They are not cheerleader and jock. They are not lead in the spring musical and band geek. Most importantly, they are not fallen angels or pretty vampires. They are just Jen and just [...]

The Good, the Bad and the Barbie: A Doll's History and Her Impact on Us by Tanya Lee Stone

Oh, Barbie. At least HALF of the people reading this post owned one, and probably EVERYONE reading it either played with or destroyed one. (My cousin used to set his sister's Barbies on fire in the driveway.) People either love Barbie or hate her, as author Tanya Lee Stone discovered when she was writing this [...]

Pink by Lili Wilkinson

"I never wore pink. Pink wasn't cool. Pink wasn't existential. Pink was for princesses and ballet shoes and glittery fairies." Serious, all-black-wearing Ava has a secret. She longs to be one of those "Girly girls who wore flavored lip gloss and read magazines and talked on the phone…girls who like boys." Because Ava likes girls. [...]

American Vampire by Scott Snyder, Rafael Albuquerque & Stephen King

I thought I was done with the played out vampire genre, and then this beastly little beauty walked into my life. Creator Scott Snyder and the legendaryStephen King have penned a new breed of vampire, one who can walk in the sun and was born to wreak havoc from the day he was "born" by [...]