It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? #IMWAYR 1/31/22

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?
Sharing Picture Books, Early Readers, Middle Grade Books, and Young Adult Books for All Ages!

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? is a weekly blog hop co-hosted by Unleashing Readers and Teach Mentor Texts which focuses on sharing books marketed for children and young adults. It offers opportunities to share and recommend books with each other.

The original IMWAYR, with an adult literature focus, was started by Sheila at Book Journeys and is now hosted by Kathryn at The Book Date.

We encourage you to write your own post sharing what you’re reading, link up below, leave a comment, and support other IMWAYR bloggers by visiting and commenting on at least three of the other linked blogs.

Happy reading!

 

Tuesday: Tidesong by Wendy Xu

Saturday: Sofia’s Kids’ Corner: Keeper of the Lost Cities series by Shannon Messenger

Sunday: Guest Post from Punam V. Saxena, Author of Parent Power: Navigate School and Beyond

**Click on any picture/link to view the post**

Kellee

Happy to be back! I haven’t updated since January 3rd, so sorry for the long post!

• • Shine On, Luz Véliz! by Rebecca Balcárcel: I loved this story! So much! I cannot wait for it to be out, so I can recommend it to readers! I mean the book is all about overcoming a loss of a passion, redefining family, second language acquisition and conversing beyond languages, and STEM! So much girl power STEM! And all of this with a wonderful, fast-paces story!
  • Penguin & Tiny Shrimp Don’t Do Bedtime by Cate Berry, illustrated by Charles Santoso & A Loud Winter’s Nap by Katy Hudson were both bedtime rereads for Trent. Since it is the beginning of the year, I mark that we read them again so they show up on my 2022 shelf in Goodreads. Any book that Trent chooses to reread is a compliment to that book!
  • Cat’s Cradle: The Golden Twine by Jo Rioux: An intense fantasy-adventure graphic novel! It is reminiscent of fairy tales, filled with monsters, magic, and a monster hunter. But on top of all of that it has a bold protagonist who you’ll root for and love and cute cats and dogs. Cannot wait for the second book.
  • Slip by Marika McCoola, illustrated by Aatmaja Pandya: This art and mental health focused graphic novel will really touch all who read it. Please note though that this is a more mature graphic novel than it looks because it deals with suicide but does so in a very thoughtful way.

• Black Boy Joy edited by Kwame Mbalia: I can see why everyone that reads this book loves it! It is full of 17 wonderful stories from 17 different authors which share us the joys of Black boyhood.
• I reviewed Tidesong by Wendy Xu last week!
• Bruce’s Big Storm and Norman Didn’t Do It! both by Ryan T. Higgins were more bedtime stories for Trent.

• Mooncakes Collector’s Edition by Suzanne Walker, illustrated by Wendy Xu: What a beautiful queer magical graphic novel romance with fabulous representation of deafness, diverse sexualities, and diverse identities. All in a magical story around a witch, a werewolf, and an evil spirit.
• Millions of Maxes by Meg Wolitzer, illustrated by Micah Player: Maxes is a new picture book, just published in January, with such a cute premise: Max, who believes he is the one and only, finds out he isn’t the only Max and is just celebrated by his parents as the best. I am a fan of the story but am even more of a fan of the illustrations.
• I reviewed Playing with Lanterns by Wang Yage, illustrated by Zhu Chengliang earlier in January.
• Facts vs. Opinions vs. Robots by Michael Rex was my first read aloud for my UCF Children’s Literature class!
• A Song Below Water by Bethany C. Morrow: What a beautiful extended metaphor of Black women as sirens thus being hunted because of their song. Take that and add in a story of two found sisters figuring out their place in the world.

• There’s a Ghost in this House by Oliver Jeffers: Oliver Jeffers is a genius. I loved the clever illustrations in this book–it is interactive in a way differently than others. And Trent and I loved that it was a little creepy but also a little silly.
• Gladys the Magic Chicken by Adam Rubin, Illustrated by Adam Rex: This picture book is literally an epic journey, taking place in ancient times, and focused on a magical chicken and the idea of things coming full circle when they need to. Quite a silly story with cartoonish illustrations, all which worked together wonderfully for the book.
• I Don’t Want to Read this Book by Max Greenfield, illustrated by Mike Lowery: Love when books break the fourth wall, and I’m a fan of Mike Lowery’s illustrations, so this book was a win for me! Trent laughed out loud, too, so that is a big compliment.
• Cheer Up!: Love and Pompoms by Crystal Frasier, illustrated by Val Wise: This book was not what I expected at all, and that is a good thing because I loved this story of finding your found-family and figuring out how to be happy, even if it isn’t where you assumed it would be. It also shows what happens when a place becomes inclusive and how it can change lives.
• Goodnight, Butterfly by Ross Burach: In the 3rd book in the Impatient Caterpillar series, our butterfly is trying to sleep when he is woken up and insomnia takes over then ridiculousness ensues. Another great book in the series.

• My Brother’s Husband: Volume 2 & Volume 3 by Gengoroh Tagame, translated by Anne Ishii: This manga series is everything you want in a story. Watching Yaichi grow as a person, Kana love Mike unconditionally, and Mike mourn Ryoji filled my heart, and I adored reading their story. I want more.
• Amethyst: Princess of Gemworld by Shannon & Dean Hale, illustrated by Asiah Fulmore: Gemworld and Amethyst are new members of the DC Comics world to me, so it was great learning about this new world and story. It is definitely a fun and fantastical read.
• The Goose Egg by Liz Wong was the second read aloud for my UCF class, and Trent was our guest reader.
• Negative Cat by Sophie Blackall is a book that any cat loving person is going to enjoy reading. It shows the strong personalities of cats, the fierce bond between cat and owner, and how what seems like a negative thing can become positive.

• Nimona by Noelle Stevenson: This was a reread for me, but I wanted to remind myself why Nimona was one of the best graphic novels, and I did. If you haven’t read this brilliant villainous epic of a graphic novel, you should fix that.
• Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale by Mo Willems was my third read aloud to my UCF class because we were discussing illustrations and Knuffle Bunny was used as an example in the textbook.
• Linked by Gordon Korman: I can definitely see why Linked was honored with the Sydney Taylor Book Award. It deals with the topics of the Holocaust, hate, religion, and acceptance in a different way than I’ve ever read before. And in an engaging, just as you’d expect from Gordon Korman. Also, it was a great multi-cast audiobook!
• My Bindi by Gita Varadarajan, illustrated by Archana Sreenivasan: This is a great example of a book being a window for a reader. Trent did not know what a bindi was before we read this book, and it was such a perfect introduction as Divya begins wearing bindis to school. I also loved learning more about the meaning behind a bindi.
• Téo’s Tutu by Maryann Jacob Macias, illustrated by Alea Marley: Téo knows what he loves. He loves to dance and he loves flowy outfits. It doesn’t matter if that doesn’t fit what is expected of him because he knows what he loves. And his parents support him. What a beautiful book.

To learn more about any of these books, check out my 2022 Goodreads Challenge page  or my read bookshelf on Goodreads.

Ricki

I am taking the week off, and I’ll see you next week! 😀

Kellee

Reading: The Rumor Game by Dhonielle Clayton and Sona Charaipotra

Listening: The Daily Show with Trevor Noah Ears Edition

Saturday: Sofia’s Kids’ Corner: Best Nerds Forever by James Patterson and Chris Grabenstein

Link up below and go check out what everyone else is reading. Please support other bloggers by viewing and commenting on at least 3 other blogs. If you tweet about your Monday post, tag the tweet with #IMWAYR!

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