Miss Carol's Favorite Book Finds of 2015 -- Middle Grade Books

Every year at my library, I spend the last couple days of the year compiling my favorite book finds of the year.  They are not always new books.  Just books I discovered for the first time and really, really liked.

MIDDLE GRADE CHAPTER BOOK DISCOVERIES FOR 2015:

  

Book Scavenger by Jennifer Chambliss Bertman 
Just after twelve-year-old Emily and her family move to San Francisco, she teams up with new friend James to follow clues in an odd book they find, hoping to figure out its secrets before the men who attacked Emily's hero, publisher Garrison Griswold, solve the mystery or come after the friends.

Cleopatra in Space: Book 1. Target Practice by Mike Maihack 
When a young Cleopatra finds a mysterious tablet that zaps her to the far, REALLY far future, she learns of an ancient prophecy that says she is destined to save the galaxy from the tyrannical rule of the evil Xaius Octavian.  This book was also highly praised by my non-reader 9 year old son! Don't forget to also check out Book 2: The Thief and the Sword.

Goblins on the Prowl by Bruce Coville 
When an accidental spell brings a mysterious stone toad to life, and it hops away with her human friend William between its jaws, Fauna must use her magic and her wits to save him, embarking on a journey through dangerous lands filled with fearsome giants, talking bears, and packs of rogue goblins.

 

Pieces and Players by Blue Balliett 
When thirteen high-value pieces of art are stolen from a secret museum, Calder, Petra, and Tommy are grouped with two new companions to solve puzzles that are complicated by the clever Mrs. Sharpe.

Princess Academy: The Forgotten Sisters by Shannon Hale 
Miri is eager to return to her beloved Mount Eskel after a year at the capital, but the king and queen ask her to first journey to a distant swamp and start her own miniature princess academy for three royal cousins, but once there she must solve a mystery before she can return home.

  

The Red Pencil by Andrea Davis Pinkney 
After her tribal village is attacked by militants, Amira, a young Sudanese girl, must flee to safety at a refugee camp, where she finds hope and the chance to pursue an education in the form of a single red pencil and the friendship and encouragement of a wise elder.

The Scandalous Sisterhood of Prickwillow Place by Julie Berry 
Seven very proper Victorian young ladies conspire to hide a murder from the authorities at their boarding school. 

The Zoo at the Edge of the World by Eric Kahn Gale 
Marlin, a stutterer, can talk smoothly and freely with the jungle animals that populate his father's zoo in South America--until a mysterious man-eating black jaguar that his father catches and brings back home talks back.