Call It What You Want

Call It What You Want
by Brigid Kemmerer (Author)

Booktalk: When his dad is caught embezzling funds from half the town, Rob goes from popular lacrosse player to social pariah. Even worse, his father’s failed suicide attempt leaves Rob and his mother responsible for his care.

Everyone thinks of Maegan as a typical overachiever, but she has a secret of her own after the pressure got to her last year. And when her sister comes home from college pregnant, keeping it from her parents might be more than she can handle.

When Rob and Maegan are paired together for a calculus project, they’re both reluctant to let anyone through the walls they’ve built. But when Maegan learns of Rob’s plan to fix the damage caused by his father, it could ruin more than their fragile new friendship . . .

Snippet:
Rob

A year ago, I’d buy whatever I wanted for lunch. I didn’t even have to carry cash: I had an automatically reloading acount, so I could buy anything the cafeteria offered without even thinking about it.

Today, I’m debating whether I want to wasted a dollar twenty-five on a bottle of water, or if I should risk the germ-infested water fountain for the rest of the day. There’s a five-dollar biil in my wallet, but those don’t grow on trees anymore, and I hate taking money from Mom. I hate spending money where anyone can see me. Whether I earn it myself or get it from my mother, I always wonder if people are thinking I’m spending stolen cash.

Copyright © 2019 Anastasia Suen All Rights Reserved.

Born to Ride

Born to Ride: A Story About Bicycle Face
by Larissa Theule (Author) and Kelsey Garrity-Riley (Illustrator)

Booktalk: During the women’s suffrage movement, one girl sets out to prove that she can do everything the boys can do. Louise Belinda Bellflower lives in Rochester, New York, in 1896. She spends her days playing with her brother, Joe. But Joe gets to ride a bicycle, and Louise Belinda doesn’t. In fact, Joe issues a solemn warning: If girls ride bikes, their faces will get so scrunched up, eyes bulging from the effort of balancing, that they’ll get stuck that way FOREVER! Louise Belinda is appalled by this nonsense, so she strikes out to discover the truth about this so-called “bicycle face.”

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Copyright © 2019 Anastasia Suen All Rights Reserved.