Martha M's Book Reviews

Instructions for Dancing by Nicola Yoon

Instructions for Dancing by Nicola Yoon

A romance with a supernatural twist that Yoon uses to pose a critically important question to the reader. So just when you are having the most fun enjoying the story suddenly, a gut punch. How would you answer? Evie, a high school senior, is upset about her parents’ divorce and especially its cause, his father’s […]



Return of the Thief

Return of the Thief

Terrific denouement (#6 in the series) to the Queen’s Thief series! Megan Whalen Turner is one of the strongest writers in Youth fiction today and this one is a masterpiece, ending the series with power and joy. Pheris is an disabled child used as a pawn in the politics of Attolia, but the High King, […]


Brother’s Keeper

Brother’s Keeper

Intense, compelling story of a North Korean girl feeing to South Korea during the Korean War in 1950. Sora and her brother are separated from their parents early in their journey. Can she lead them to Busan while they face bombings, hunger,  cold, theives ,kidnappers, and a river of fellow refugees. Sora is looking for […]


Music for Tigers

Music for Tigers

Louisa, a passionate middle school violinist, is sent to the Tasmanian forest (from Canada) to live with her uncle, a naturalist. Despite the disruption to her practice schedule, she discovers the joy learning about new species and even makes a new friend. Species extinction and deforestation are the backdrop to Louisa’s participation in a family […]


The Story of More: How We Got to Climate Change and Where to Go from Here by Hope Jahren

The Story of More: How We Got to Climate Change and Where to Go from Here by Hope Jahren

Terrific simple introduction to climate change that explains clearly how we got to this point in various industries  — Food (agriculture, meat production, fishing), Energy, and Earth (melting ice, rising waters, warming air). Hope Jahren (Lab Girl) is a scientist/professor and this is the content of her most frequently taught class; it’s fact based, non […]


Eagle Huntress: The True Story of the Girl who Soared Beyond Expectations

Eagle Huntress: The True Story of the Girl who Soared Beyond Expectations

Aisholpan Nurgaiv’s triumph as the first female winner of the  Mongolian eagle hunting  competition in 2014 is shared with the world in an award winning movie called Eagle Huntress in 2016. Now she gets to tell her own story in her own words in this book! Aisholpan speaks in a simple yet powerful way. She […]


The Good Hawk

The Good Hawk

Thrilling debut novel of mythic, fantasy Scotland in the time of the Vikings that includes two very unlikely kids as the protagonists and heroes. Fierce, courageous Agatha is a Hawk, a watcher on the isle of Skye, born with a Down’s Syndrome- like condition. Timid, self-doubting Jaime is an Angler, but hates the sea. Both […]


Eat Like a Fish: My Adventures as a Fisherman Turned Restorative Ocean Farmer

Eat Like a Fish: My Adventures as a Fisherman Turned Restorative Ocean Farmer

A hopeful book about climate change: Bren Smith is a former fisherman and a failed (because of Hurricane Sandy) oysterman who invented a new kind of living from the sea, restorative ocean farmer. His crop of kelp and bivalves growing on ropes suspended in the water requires no inputs; it simultaneously draws down carbon, filters […]


Johnny’s Pheasant

Johnny’s Pheasant

Gorgeous picture book about that moment of contact with wildness that changes us and makes us stewards of the land. Celebrate Johnny’s epiphany and then go have your own. Bendigen (Come in) to the Ojibwe world of this book.  


Today a reader, tomorrow a leader.

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