Ms Rush Reads

copyright date: January 5, 2021 primarily marketed for: Middle Grades Unplugged  by Gordon Korman overflows with humor, action, and heart. If you are a Korman fan, this is a perfect addition to your collection. If you are new to Korman, this will be the perfect gateway book. Jett Baranov is the son of a Silicon Valley tech genius. To call him spoiled would be a massive understatement. After a particularly risky stunt, from which his dad had to bail him out, Jett has been sent to spend a rehabilitative summer at the Oasis with his father's right hand man as a caretaker.  At the Oasis, Jett is forced to exist completely unplugged from the devices, social media, and entertainment he has come to rely on. Instead, he is invited to meditate, eat healthy, and relax in natural hot springs.  Of course, Jett is much more interested in finding a way out of the Oasis than he is in participating in any wellness activities. However, as the summer unfolds, Jett becomes entangled in a de...

copyright date: January 1, 2021 primarily marketed for: middle grades The Greatest Superpower  by Alex Sanchez is a gem. I was in a bit of a reading slump until I picked up this book, thanks to NetGalley .  This middle grades book is about comic book loving Jorge who is navigating his parents' divorce and his first crush on a girl. Jorge's parents not only announce they are getting divorced, but his father also reveals to Jorge and his twin brother Cesar that she is transgender and wishes to live as her true self.  Although this announcement is a confusing surprise to Jorge, his love for his father ultimately trumps all. Cesar, however, is angry at their dad and works to prevent Jorge from sharing the truth with his friends.  In the midst of the changes in Jorge's family life, he and his friends are trying to invent a new superhero for a comic book contest. When Jorge blurts out the idea of the superpower to gender-shift, his friends jump on board.  Conversatio...

copyright date: October 2015 primarily marketed for: young adults (6th grade and up) The Beast of Cretacea by Todd Strasser is just the book the world needed.   Strasser’s futuristic retelling of Herman Melville’s classic, Moby Dick, is a dystopian adventure story that is filled with heart.   The story opens with protagonist, Ishmael, waking up on a ship on Cretacea after being transported from Earth, which is covered by the Shroud and becoming a less and less viable home for humans.   Ishmael hopes to earn enough money hunting sea creatures called terrafins to pay the way for his foster parents and brother to join him.   Readers get details about Ishmael’s past in chapters that flashback to his life on Earth.   These chapters develop Ishmael’s relationship with his foster family and solidify our understanding of his motivation to be successful aboard the ship.   However, there is much more to Ishmael than his past.   He f...

copyright date: March 2014 primarily marketed for: middle grades (4 th -7 th ) I didn’t expect to fall in love with this book.   I was hoping it would be worthy of recommendation to some of the less enthusiastic readers in my classroom.   I guess I did not expect much beyond an engaging basketball story and a fast-paced poetic rhythm.   Not only does The Crossover by Kwame Alexander deliver on all aforementioned accounts, but it is also a beautiful story of the bond between a father and son, the power of cultural history to shape a person, and the evolution of brotherly love as young men come of age.   It is the story of 8 th grader Josh Bell and his twin brother Jordan, who have inherited their father’s talent for basketball.   On the court, they are a lethal combination, teaming up to lead their team to the championship.   Off the court, Josh struggles with growing distance between his brother and him since a gi...

copyright date: February 2014 primarily marketed for: young adults (high school) Reading Grasshopper Jungle by Andrew Smith felt like being let in on a secret.   The flap copy had me completely baffled as to why I wanted to read a book about an unstoppable army of hungry, horny, giant praying mantis creatures.   However, after reading Winger , I was sure Smith’s writing would be brilliant, and the buzz amongst my social media connections was that the book kept people thinking long after they finished reading.   There was no way to know for myself other than to jump right in and start reading, to hear the secret firsthand.   From the very start I was equally shocked, amused, and charmed by Austin Szerba and his friend Robby Brees. They are pretty typical teenage boys living in a small town in Iowa.   Austin is struggling with typical teenage boy things, like confusion over his feelings for his girlfriend and his best frie...

  copyright date: May 2013 primarily marketed for: Young Adults (high school) Have you ever read Looking for Alaska by John Green?   I never thought I would ever read another book that I could recommend as being just as good as Looking for Alaska .   Until I read Winger by Andrew Smith .   I laughed audibly at fictional characters while reading this book.   My heart ached for fictional characters while reading this book.   I had tears streaming down my face over fictional characters while reading this book.   It is a good book.   Great book.   Incredible book.   It is about a brilliant fourteen-year-old kid at a boarding school with sixteen-year-olds.   After getting into some cell-phone trouble, this self-proclaimed runt is thrust into living in Opportunity Hall, the dorm for troubled students.   The kind of troubled students who would love to squash a fourteen-year-old boy.  ...

copyright date: September 2013 primarily marketed for: young adults (7 th grade and up) Steelheart by Brandon Sanderson is not the kind of book you would typically find in my stack of books to be read.   However, something about it called to me.   And boy am I glad it did!   I am eagerly awaiting the sequel, promised to be released this fall. The story begins with a gripping prologue that takes place years before the action of the rest of the book.   It is the story of a young boy named David witnessing his father’s death at the hands of Steelheart, a sort of superhuman called an Epic.   Although David is in awe of Steelheart’s power to turn anything that is not living to steel, he is even more amazed to witness Steelheart reveal a weakness.   David is the only human who knows the truth about what happened during that attack and survived. Years later, when David is eighteen, he has finally caught up with a group of ...

copyright date: 2011 primarily marketed for: young adults (teens) The Berlin Boxing Club by Robert Sharenow opens with this quote: “There is one kind of sport which should be especially encouraged, although many people . . . consider it brutal and vulgar, and that is boxing . . . There is no other sport which equals this in developing the militant spirit, none that demands such a power of rapid decision or which gives the bod the flexibility of good steel . . . But, above all, a healthy youth has to learn to endure hard knocks.” -Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf As an opening, it is a perfect representation of Sharenow’s ability to craft a story that is at once rooted in history and grounded in contemporary relevance.   Karl Stern is a young boy growing up in Germany during Hitler’s rise to power.   He is Jewish by descent, though his family does not identify with or practice Jewish religion or culture.   His Jewish identity serves as t...

copyright date: 1991 primarily marketed for: young adults (8 th grade up) If you like A Child Called It by Dave Pelzer and think What Daddy Did by Neal Shusterman is going to be another true story to indulge your desire to read about the human spirit’s will to endure, think again.    What Daddy Did is so much more.   So much bigger. I started reading it one night before falling asleep.   Two hours later I still hadn’t closed the book and I don’t remember having taken a breath.   I awoke the next morning still within the powerful grip of this story. What Daddy Did is the fictionalized true story of young boy who Shusterman calls Preston Scott.   When Preston was only eleven years old, his Mom was shot in the back of the head and murdered by his father after marital struggles tore their family apart.   Although the book tells about the events leading up to the murder as well as the moments during which the news un...

copyright date: 1991 primarily marketed for: young adults (7 th grade up) In preparation for our author re-visit, I tried to read every Neal Shusterman book that has been sitting in my pile of books to read.   Every time I read his work I am blown away. Speeding Bullet is typical of Shusterman’s work in the sense that there is a supernatural element in the story, but it is so realistically told that as a reader, I completely suspend my disbelief.     Nick Herrera is an average teenager with below average intelligence.   He is constantly told by teachers he sees as completely unreliable that if he simply believed in himself more, he would achieve greater success in school.   It is not until a chance encounter with fate at a New York subway stop that Nick’s self-image begins to change.   After saving a young girl’s life and defying death himself in the face of a speeding train, Nick notices that luck is consis...

copyright date: September 2012 primarily marketed for: young adults I love a good murder mystery.   Confessions of a Murder Suspect by James Patterson and Maxine Paetro is just that. Although the writing will not amaze you with literary quality, the story is well structured and manages to wrap itself up satisfactorily while still leaving loose ends enough to leave readers yearning for the next in what is sure to become a series. Tandy, short for Tandoori, Angel is one of four children left behind after her parents, the wealthy and well-known Malcolm and Maud Angel, are murdered.   There are no signs of forced entry and nobody heard any noise.   The factual evidence leaves only Tandy, her three brothers, and her mother’s live-in assistant as suspects.   The story is told in Tandy’s voice, including chapters titled ‘Confession’ that seem to let readers deeper into her story by revealing background.   Throughout the book...

copyright date: October 2011 primarily marketed for: young adults (high school) The books I love the most are the ones I find myself most compelled to write about.   I am woefully behind on posting about the books I’ve read this school year, yet here I am making time to share another incredible story. I find it is most difficult to share the books I love.   Something about my connection with a story like this makes it seem almost as if nobody else could possibly enjoy it as deeply as I have—surely it was tailor-made to fit my heart and stick to my ribs—how could anyone else find it as perfect a fit?   I don’t know the answer to that, but I sure hope you try this one on because part of me suspects it might fit you just right, too. Since I closed the covers of Maggie Stiefvater ’s The Scorpio Races early this morning, I have been haunted by the rhythm of the story.   The magic of sea still beats in my chest.   Puck’s connectio...

copyright date: August 2012 primarily marketed for: young adults (12 and up) Although there are still a few days until UnWholly by Neal Shusterman is released on August 28 th , I managed to get my hands on an Advanced Readers’ Copy, thanks to Mrs. Foreman (formerly Miss England).   This book confirms what I have believed for years: Neal Shusterman is brilliant.   Why he isn’t winning awards left and right is beyond me.   If you haven’t read the first book in this series, Unwind , you have to start there.   The basis of the story is that it takes place in the near future, after the fictional Third World War, which was fought over the issue of abortion.   In an effort to end the fighting and reach an agreement, both sides compromised, banning abortion as we know it, and sanctioning the retroactive abortion (through a process called unwinding) of teenagers whose parents okay it.   But that doesn’t even begin to scrat...

copyright date: April 2012 primarily marketed for: young adults (14 and up) Dying to Know You by Aidan Chambers was a book I couldn’t wait to read because of what I’d read about it.   Negative reviews said things about it being narrated by the voice of an older man, an eccentric author.   They said teens wouldn’t be able to relate to his voice.   I was sure that wouldn’t be true.   Positive reviews said things about what a powerful story the book told.   Having read the book, I have determined that it is definitely not the kind of story everyone would enjoy.   It is a very philosophical story.   If you are not an intellectual sort of reader, this would not be the book for you.   However, if you are the kind of person who wonders about his place in the world, about why people act the way they do, about his purpose in life, then the is most definitely the book for you.   You will be as charmed by Karl as I was...

copyright date: February 2012 primarily marketed for: young adults (14 and up) I started Dead to You by Lisa McMann one night before I went to sleep.   I also finished   Dead to You by Lisa McMann before I went to sleep that night.   I just couldn’t close the book without knowing the end. Dead to You is the story of Ethan, who was abducted when he was only seven-years-old, returning to his family as a teenager.   As he tries to adjust to his current life at home as a teenager with his younger brother Blake and new younger sister Gracie, Ethan struggles to make sense of his past.   Blake pushes him to find out why he got into that car with strangers and challenges Ethan’s memory every chance he gets.   Gracie is too young to understand who Ethan really is, since she grew up in their family without him.   Ethan fights to remember the family he left behind and struggles to understand his need to protect Ellen, ...

copyright date: March 2012 primarily marketed for: young adults (12 and up) Despite the fact that the teacher in me sees so many lesson possibilities in Kevin C. Pyle’s graphic novel Take What You Can Carry , you should read it simply for the grace of its stories.   The artwork is as striking as the stories it tells.   Using artwork in two different colors and styles, Pyle tells the stories of two teenage boys living years and miles apart.   And yet, he communicates the universality in their experiences.   One boy is a Japanese American forced to move into an internment camp during WWII.   His family struggles to maintain their dignity and sense of peace under unbearable conditions. The other is a rebellious boy with an attitude whose reckless behavior causes him to wind up in trouble with the law.   To make amends, he finds himself completing community service hours in the most unlikely place.   I found my...

copyright date: April 2012 primarily marketed for: young adults (high school) I’m just going to put this out there:  I like books about death.  I didn’t know this about myself as a reader until my students this year pointed out how many of the books I booktalk (basically all of them) involve someone who died or someone who is dying. I am not sure if that is just a me thing, or if that is a common thread in books since it is such a major part of life and conflict.  I’d like to think it is the latter. At any rate, I Hunt Killers by Barry Lyga , is obviously my kind of book—it is quality literature with sophisticated vocabulary, and it is about death.  Jasper Dent, known as Jazz, is a teenager who is struggling to overcome the odds, to say the least.  His father, Billy Cornelius Dent, is the most infamous serial killer, with victims totaling triple digits.  Since his father’s arrest, Jazz has had to care for his grandmother ...

copyright date: November 2011 primarily marketed for:   young adults (12 and up) I finally, reluctantly picked this book up after hearing lots of talk about how awesome it is.  I have to admit, I just couldn’t believe that ANOTHER post-apocalyptic-book-for-the-fans-of- Hunger-Games could really be that good.  Well, let me tell you, Legend by Marie Lu is really that good.  I think I might even like this one a little bit better than Divergent by Veronica Roth. Legend is told in alternating viewpoints and follows two protagonists: June and Day. June is one of the elite.  She is following in the footsteps of her esteemed older brother Metias by working her way up the military ranks with the speed only a prodigy could manage.  She is fully determined to do whatever it takes to defend the Republic’s honor.  Day is the Republic’s most wanted criminal.  He is a devious mastermind, but is driven by a love for his family and ...