#middle grade reader

My nephew is 10 and I have been trying to supply him non-Harry Potter books. I have already mentioned on this blog that I got him into Percy Jackson.

But this Christmas I got him Gregor the Overlander boxed set and this weekend he told me he finished them all. So this has by far been my biggest accomplishment of the week.

But now I need to think of another MG series for him. Am considering something about knights, like "Once and Future King" or Tamora Pierce--though he does tend to identify more with boy characters than girls which I need to work on.

As a musician, Janet Nichols Lynch has a keen interest in musicians, especially women musicians. Her biography Clara Schumann, Pianist and Composer  for middle grade readers takes a fresh look at a gifted and remarkable woman who deserves to stand on her own, out of the shadow of her husband Robert Schumann.

Clara Wieck Schumann had the longest concert career of any woman in the nineteenth century. She was named Royal and Imperial Virtuosa and created a new style of piano playing, instilling deep feeling into all the music she performed. She was the wife of Robert Schumann, the mother of eight children, and the best friend of Johannes Brahms. She worked as a piano teacher and editor of her husband’s music. As a composer, she wrote some fine works, including piano pieces, songs, and Piano Trio in G Minor.

Janet Nichols Lynch’s aim in writing a biography of Elizabeth Warren for middle grade reader is not just to recount Warren’s remarkable life, but to focus on what it takes to run for president in her book, Elizabeth Warren, And What it Takes to Run for President.

Elizabeth Warren always wanted to be a teacher. She fulfilled that dream and so much more–becoming a lawyer, a law school professor, the first woman senator from Massachusetts, and showing that she has what it takes to run for president.

Scene 2 … SOMETHING’S COOKING

After lying on his stomach in a puddle of water with his face turned sideways for two hours, Johnny regained consciousness. The storm had passed but the night continued on. It was around 10:00pm when Johnny stood up and stretched his arms and legs. He was expecting to feel lots of aches and pains but he had none of that. He checked his hands and knees for scrapes and bruises but they were fine,…

Scene 1…FLASH BANG

On the city streets of Megalopolis, a lone runner huffed and puffed, struggling to reach the finish line that had finally come into view after three hours of running. His name was Johnny Crumb. A young man who had dreamed of fighting crime since the earliest days of his childhood. He was near the end of the Police Department’s running course; the last part of the test for becoming a rookie Police…