by Mike Costanzo | Mar 24, 2009 | Picture Book
This is just so funny. What is it like to be a worm? Well, read through the entries in this worm’s diary, and you will know for sure. Imagine playing the Hokey-Pokey as a worm…. You put your foot in…hmmm. It’s one hilarious wormy situation...
by Mike Costanzo | Mar 24, 2009 | Suspense / Thriller / Horror
This is my absolute favorite suspense book for readers 9-12. Two boys are standing in the kitchen when the phone rings. One answers, and the voice on the other end confesses to having killed a woman and then shares that she is lying at his feet in a pool of blood....
by Mike Costanzo | Mar 24, 2009 | Fantasy
This is one of my absolute favorite fantasy books to hand to girls. Pindel, the wizard, is deathly ill and holds within him the last five wishes left in the world. As he is falling unconscious, he is helped by twelve-year-old Morwenna, a servant in the castle, and...
by Mike Costanzo | Mar 24, 2009 | Fiction
This is one of my favorite Avi books. It’s part of the Dimwood Chronicles which begin with the book Poppy. I have a hard time reading Poppy because my tender heart can’t bear the thought that the owl is maliciously eating the mice that he is sworn to...
by Mike Costanzo | Mar 24, 2009 | Historical Fiction
ALA says this book was the 12th most challenged book from 1990-2000 and continues to be censored because of mild profanity and for being unpatriotic. Towards the end of this heart wrenching novel, her nerves shot, the wife and mother, Suzannah Meeker, angrily responds...
by Mike Costanzo | Mar 24, 2009 | Realistic/Contemporary Fiction
Winner of the 1978 Newbery Medal Jess has run all summer long so he will earn the title of the fastest boy in the fifth grade when school begins. School starts and the race is on, but out of nowhere comes Leslie, a new girl in school, and she outruns Jess....
by Mike Costanzo | Mar 24, 2009 | Picture Book
This is such a great gift book when you need something for a confirmation or a baptism. At the beginning we meet three young trees with dreams of what they will become when they grow up. As life goes along, however, their dreams don’t seem to be coming true. In...
by Mike Costanzo | Mar 24, 2009 | Picture Book
This is such a tremendously powerful story, and it’s one of those picture books that is written for older children – say ages 8 and up. It’s set in the Civil War, and it’s the story of two young men; one is 15-year-old Say, who is white, and...
