
Dayven has passed the test he wanted most desperately to fail -- he's been proven to have the powers of a wizard.
He had promised never to become one of the deceitful, disloyal sorcerers who believe in nothing and alter people's true destinies -- but now he has no choice. Thrown into an apprenticeship with a roguish wizard, Dayven discovers that loyalty and trust are never simple, and wizards are more deceptive than he could ever imagine.
The path that was once clear -- his friendships, his future, his destiny -- is now shadowed with dangerous twists and turns, and the world he knows must change forever.

Inquisitive twelve-year-old Alexa Daley is spending another summer in the walled town of Bridewell. This year, she is set on solving the mystery of what lies beyond the walls. Legend says the walls were built to keep out an unnamed evil that lurks in the forests and The Dark Hills. But what exactly is it that the townspeople are so afraid of?
As Alexa begins to unravel the truth, pushing beyond the protective barrier she's lived behind all her life, she discovers a strange and ancient enchantment -- and exposes a danger that could destroy everything she holds dear.








Gypsy Prince was born small, the last foal of an of an old German war horse who had survived World War I. The stablemaster expected that because of his small size, the horse would end up pulling a beer wagon. But it was the late 1930s, and the Reich needed every horse for the conflict to come. And it needed all the expertise it could find to care for the horses, and so Gypsy Prince, and Hans the stable boy who had looked after the horse, ended up in the same unit of the German Army paired for the duration of the conflict. They go into battle on the Eastern Front as part of the invasion of the Soviet Union. Together they make it as far as Stalingrad, where with the Russians encircling the Germans, Gypsy Prince is turned loose rather than be turned into a stew for the hungry troops. With extraordinary luck, he makes it through enemy lines back to the German forces, where he is once again pressed into the war effort. This time he is shipped to the Western Front where he is taken and used by the French Resistance after the invasion at Normandy. Eventually, the horse finds himself loose and travels through France to German. He crosses the Rhine at Remagen just ahead of the American troops and continues to make his way across the countryside until he reaches the farm where he was born.
Through the eyes of the horse and the perspective of his interaction with humans-kind and unkind-Tom Townsend has provided a very basic and comprehensible history of the Second World War. This perspective is superb at allowing kids to see the values of the participants in the war without being didactic or preachy.



Jake's life is turned upside down when his father gets caught up in the Socialist fervor washing over their Finnish mining community in Minnesota. His father decides to move their family to a new, Finnish state inside the Soviet Union, a change that fills Jake with dread. Where his father dreams of creating a worker's paradise, Jake and his family find disappointment and hardship. The story culminates with a thrilling escape--on skis--from Russia to Finland.


John and Philippa Gaunt, two twelve-year-old not-very-identical twins, live a privileged life on the Upper East of Manhattan with their wealthy parents and two curiously-mannered Rottweilers named Alan and Neil. The twins realize there's something amiss with their world when a string of strange things begin to happen after their wisdom teeth are extracted--they dream the same dreams, become stronger, their zits clear up, and wishes wished in their presence inexplicably come true. And, when their estranged Uncle Nimrod asks them to come to England for the summer during one such shared dream, the discovery of their destiny is set in motion.
John and Phillippa discover that they are descended from a long line of Djinn, have great inherent powers. They must call on these powers a lot sooner than they anticipated, though, because the ancient Egyptian pharaoh Akhenaten is not as dead as history has so far declared and his legion of seventy magical djinn could tip the balance of power in the magical realm and affect the whole world order.
P.B. Kerr, under his given name Philip Kerr, is the author of several bestselling thrillers for adult readers. His debut novel for children is a slick, zeitgeisty fantasy adventure that is sure to win him a new raft of fans. The Blue Djinn of Babylon is next up for those who get hooked. (Age 10 and over) --John McLay

Animal justice: ruthless and swift. And totally satisfying.
A provocative, richly layered, and utterly compelling novel that asks the answerable: what is truth, and what does it mean to be human?
Niki and Emmet are siblings with a secret: their ability to change from human to animal, and back-their ability to transform-she to a cat, he to a hawk. Their mother is clueless, but how much does the elusive writer Slanger know? Is their classmate Doug as superficial as he seems? Is the psychiatrist a caretaker or an enemy? And what did she have to do with their father's disappearance?
Alternating 4 voices, paralleling the transformations of adolescence itself, this book is also about the transformative power of great literature, on the border between the darkest fantasy and our own reality.