Title recommendations March 2026 by Saleena

 

I kind of felt obliged to read this as it won several awards, and boy am I glad I did.  The story is told in verse and is from the viewpoint of a young man in high school being raised by his grandfather due to his mother's mental illness.  He struggles because he likes poetry and watching birds but also loves working in the car shop with his grandfather.  He hates all the racism around him and is being bullied but his love for birds and poetry keeps him sane.  This book was so beautiful.  






Secret Astronomers is a story told entirely is post-it notes and pictures/words written over the text of an astronomy book from the 1800's.  The two main characters are both struggling in their senior year of high school for very different reasons.  One is trying to get out of her very small town and go to college for Physics (she is very smart) and the other has been recently transplanted from California into West Virginia due to the death of her mother.  She is stuck living with her grandparents and very unhappy for lots of reasons.  The connections the two girls make and bringing in the history of the grieving girl's mom (who was from this town but went away to college to become a SETI scientist) is just lovely to watch and actually felt like I was reading from a secretly defaced book.  (Please don't actually do that...lol)

Highly recommended, really interesting read.



This book wasn't exactly what I expected it to be, but was entertaining nonetheless. I can't go into too many details or I'll ruin the twist ending; but the main character was in a fatal car crash and has been given leniency due to his father's political connections.  He heads into a cave for a family tradition of "surviving the weekend" but isn't sure he deserves to survive.  Then he is caught in a cave-in and spooky things begin to happen.

Definitely check it out and let me know what you think of the twist at the end.

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