Reading Roundup: September 2013

By the Numbers
Teen: 13
Tween: 6
Children: 6

Sources
Review Copies: 13
Purchased: 2
Library: 8

Standouts
Teen: Rose Under Fire by Elizabeth Wein (link leads to my review)
The companion novel (not sequel!) to Code Name Verity delivers all the same grit and darkness of wartime. I've seen some reviews that say it's darker but I think it's a different quality here.
Tween: The Real Boy by Anne Ursu
This is a standout pick because of Oscar, who is shy and bewildered by anybody who is not a plant or a cat. Ursu's deft, honest narration brings you right into that place with him.
Children: Year of the Jungle by Suzanne Collins
So . . . this is the story Collins chose to tell after finishing The Hunger Games trilogy. It's about being a child touched by war, and slowly coming to understand how much it can take away from you. I predict we'll see it in a lot of military libraries and homes because it's honest and doesn't sugar-coat fear, yet there is a positive ending.

Because I Want To Awards
I, Um, Actually Wanted More Football: Wild Cards by Simone Elkeles
Okay, I Do Not Like football and a football book usually has to promise some real good stuff to get me to read it. That being said, this first in Elkeles' new swoony romantic trilogy didn't have quite enough football to suit me. It was very important to both characters, yet I felt as if we saw very little of it. Hmm. Strange reaction on my part.
Gothic and Sexy and Did You Expect Anything Else?: The Coldest Girl in Coldtown by Holly Black
Black took a short story she wrote under the same title from an anthology and spun it out into this captivating, dark novel. Does pretty much what it says the tin.
All of the Firsts, All at Once: Mira in the Present Tense by Sita Brahmachari
As her beloved grandmother is dying, Mira is encountering any number of other firsts in this quietly reflective novel - first period, first crush, first dawning awareness of how desperately unfair, and beautiful, life really is.