For a reader, a favorite author coming out with a new book is cause for major celebration. Some of our very favorite authors from Girl & Grown-Up Book Club have released new books that you might like to check out.
If you missed these book club titles the first time around, members can get meeting guides with discussion questions by logging in to the toolkits page here. Not a member yet? Book Club is free! Sign up to get instant access to all of our free book club resources on our book club welcome page here.
Grades 2/3
Did you enjoy Upside-Down Magic? Author trio Emily Jenkins, Lauren Myracle, and Sarah Mlynowski have continued the amazing adventures of Nory and her classmates at magic school. The fifth book in the series – Weather or Not – focuses on Willa, whose anxiety exacerbates her tendency to create unpleasant weather. Catch up on the series so you’re ready for the sixth book, slated for release in September of 2019.
Grades 4/5
If you enjoyed Gabby Garcia’s Ultimate Playbook by Iva-Marie Palmer, make sure to check out the second book in the series, MVP Summer. Gabby thinks she has everything figured out, with an opportunity to play on a prestigious baseball time and attention from her crush. But, when her best friend Diego comes home, Gabby struggles to navigate their friendship. The third book about Gabby’s adventures on and off the baseball diamond came out this month!
For fantasy readers who loved The Serpent’s Secret by Sayantani DasGupta, make sure to check out the second book in the series, Game of Stars in which Kiran has to return to the Kingdom Beyond to battle the forces threatening her friends and the entire dimension. Kiran’s story will continue in the third book The Chaos Curse, out in March of 2020!
Grades 6/7/8
One of my very favorite authors, Renée Watson, author of book club choice Piecing Me Together, released two new books this year. The first, co-authored with Ellen Hagan, is Watch Us Rise, about New York City teenagers who decide to start a social justice club in their high school. When the Principal asks them to back down, they have to decide how far to go to stand up for their beliefs.
Watson’s other new novel is Some Places More than Others. Amara gets the chance to connect with history when she visits her father’s family in Harlem and she learns that places, like families, are more complicated than they seem.
Jacqueline Woodson’s book Brown Girl Dreaming is one of our most beloved book club titles (and we’re not alone – this memoir-in-verse won just about every award there is!). Woodson’s latest book Harbor Me tells the story of six teens who create space to share their various challenges, and come to rely on and support each other.
Teen Readers
Mitali Perkins’ chapter book Rickshaw Girl was one of the first books we chose for Girl & Grown-Up Book Club. Perkins has most recently published two novels for teens, You Bring the Distant Near and Forward Me Back to You, both of which deal with heavy topics such as immigration and human trafficking with Perkins’ sensitivity and beautiful writing.
Happy Reading!
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