The Candymakers

by Wendy Mass

Rating:***** (5 stars)
Age group: 10+
Type: Realistic fiction

Logan Sweet's father owns a candy company. His candy company is hosting 4 contestants in the Annual New Candy Contest, a contest where 32 contestants compete to make the best new candy. These 4 contestants are Logan Sweet, the candymaker's son, Miles O'Leary, an intellectual with many allergies, Daisy Carpenter, a cheerful and sunshiny girl, and Philip Ransford III, an obnoxious whiny grown-uppy boy who everyone hates. Immediately people start making friends. But Philip is left out. Nobody likes him. They tour the candy company, to prepare for the big competition. Logan's father has a secret ingredient that he uses to make his chocolate taste really good. Everybody wants to know what this ingredient is but nobody knows. And is everybody really who they appear to be?

Yes, this review is kind of all over the place, but the book is MUCH better. At first all the characters are on their own and then in the middle of the book 3 band up and 1 is left out and at the end... well I won't tell you the end. But this book is really great because all the characters change at least a little bit. This book is a mystery but is also just about candy, which mostly everybody loves. Also this book is really good because is has alternating viewpoints, so you could read about somebody doing something from, say, Logan's point of view and then get inside that person's head and find out why they did it in that person's point of view. It is also really good because each character ISN'T who they seem to be and if it really interesting once you find out who they actually are and why they act the way they act. 5 stars!!!
PARENTAL SECTION
Sexual parts: none
Violence: none
Fighting: see violence (e.g. none)
Pregnancy: no!!!!
Kissing/romance: mentioned in passing
Stealing: yes!
Vandalizing: no.

The Giver

by Lois Lowry
Rating: ***** (5 stars)
Age group: 10+
Type: Dystopian

Jonas lives in a perfect world: no poverty, no war, ultimate peace. Everyone who lives there is happy there. There is no death; when people in our world now would die, the people in Jonas' town are just sent on. When children reach certain ages, they receive certain things. For example, at Jonas' upcoming birthday, he will receive his future job. He will become apprentice to somebody who will train him for this job. At the ceremony, he discovers that he will be apprentice to the Giver. The Giver gives memories. He holds all the memories. So now Jonas must take the memories. The memories can be painful or happy. Jonas takes them all. But one particular memory makes him think deeply about his perfect world. At home, he is growing fond with a baby in a set of identical twins. Unfortunately, with identical twins, one must always be sent on. And this one is that one. Jonas isn't sure what happens when you are sent on. Fortunately the Giver has recorded access to all the ceremonies. Jonas is allowed to watch a recording of a sending-on.What he sees shocks him. So, he decides to save the baby. This book is REALLY sad, but it is really good. So good in fact that it deservingly won a Newbery medal. But it is sadder than any book I have ever read. If you are the sentimental type you may want tissues.
PARENTAL SECTION
Sexual parts: no
Violence: in the memories but none otherwise.
Fighting: see violence
Pregnancy: none
Kissing/romance: none
Stealing: kind of.
Vandalizing: none.

Wildwood

by Colin Meloy

Rating: ****(4 stars)
Age group: 10 1/2+
Type: Fantasy

Prue is out walking with her baby brother, Mac, when suddenly a murder of crows captures him and takes him into the Impassable Wilderness, a place where no person has ever dared to go. But Prue must rescue him so she ventures in. It turns out that her friend, Curtis, has followed her in. But an attack by talking wolves in soldiers' uniforms separates the two. Curtis ends up with Alexandra, the Dowager Governess, who seems actually pretty nice. Prue ends up with a postal officer. But they still have to find Mac, and then they have to escape from the animals of the Impassable Wilderness... who may or may not want to kill them. This book is really, really, really well written. However it is REALLY sad and actually it almost made me cry. There are also some parts that make it seem like a dead end. But still, it is VERY exciting.
PARENTAL SECTION 
Sexual parts: no
Violence: yes. There is a war and some bloody parts.
Fighting: yes; see violence.
Pregnancy: not really. Not actual pregnancy.
Kissing/romance: no.
Stealing: not really.
Vandalizing: not really.

Look Into My Eyes

by Lauren Child
a Ruby Redfort book

Rating:****(4 stars)
Age group: 10+
Type: spy mystery

Ruby Redfort is an extraordinary child who cracks codes and makes them and is very very very smart. She is just a normal kid, just MUCH above average in the smarts department. But suddenly a mysterious butler named Hitch shows up and Ruby becomes a member of a (good) spy organization, Chrome. She is assigned to do desk work on a death of one of the best agents Chrome had. But there is also a huge delivery of gold to the Twinford Bank and it seems to be attracting some unwanted attention from the criminals. Will Ruby end up solving the mystery? Or will the evil Count Von Viscount get there first? This is a very exciting read, especially if you like spy-thriller type things. You just HAVE to see what happens next. Plus it is by Lauren Child who is a really great author, in my opinion. This series was mentioned in the Clarice Bean series also by Lauren Child.
PARENTAL SECTION
Sexual parts: no
Violence: well, kind of. 
Fighting: kind of.
Pregnancy: no!!
Kissing/romance: no. Well, mentioned in passing. Not really important.
Stealing: yes! Ruby steals a gadget.
Vandalizing: no

The Search for WondLa

by Tony DiTerlizzi
Has a sequel: A Hero for WondLa

Rating: *****(5 stars)
Age group: 11+
Type: Dystopian science fiction

Eva Nine lives underground with a robot called Muthr and has never stepped foot on the actual ground in all of her 12 years of existence. In her safe house she has discovered a piece of paper saying "WondLa" and has a picture of a robot and a human on it. They are both smiling. Eva doesn't know why there are no other humans like her and decides to find out the meaning of "WondLa" and find others like her. But one day, somebody breaks into her underground home and she is forced to escape. She leaves Muthr behind but later she comes back and gets her. But on the outside, it is nothing like what she has been trained to think. She meets some aliens, Rovender Kitt and an alien who she calls Otto. They and Muthr help her. But she is still in danger, as the mysterious intruder who tried to break into her house is still on her trail. So now she must escape the intruder, find other humans, and find the hidden meaning of "WondLa."  This book is very gripping and very exciting and it is just really well-written. If you read it and like it, you should also read A Hero for WondLa, the sequel.
PARENTAL SECTION
Sexual parts: no
Violence: no
Fighting:not really. But kind of
Pregnancy: no
Kissing/romance: no
Stealing: yes. I will not tell you what though because that might spoil the story.
Vandalizing: no.
**NOTE: There are some intense bits because the evil intruder break-inner has a gun-like object called a Boom-rod that blows people up. He DOES use it. And at one point, Eva is trapped (literally) in a very bad situation and that is both intense and disgusting. Hint: it is in a taxidermist's lab. So yes, there is a lot of intensity.