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Young Hoosier Book Award2014-2015 Intermediate Books
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First begun in 1974, the Young Hoosier Book Award encourages Indiana students to read for fun. Since 1992, the Award has been divided into three categories based on grade level: Kindergarten-3rd grade (picture books), 4th-6th grade (intermediate), and 6th-8th grade (middle grade).
Each year, teachers, students, parents and media specialists submit suggestions to the Young Hoosier Book Award committee, who nominate twenty books in each category. Students read the books on the list and vote for their favorites. Votes are then tallied and the winning illustrator and authors are presented the award in the spring of the following year.
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Smile
by Raina Telgemeier
In this coming-of-age true story, Raina just wants to be a normal sixth grader, but one night after Girl Scouts she trips and falls, severely injuring her two front teeth, and what follows is a long and frustrating journey with on-again, off-again braces, surgery, embarrassing headgear and even a retainer with fake teeth attached--on top of all that, there's a major earthquake, boy confusion and friends who turn out to be not so friendly.
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Snakes
by Nic Bishop
The award-winning naturalist and photographer of such books as Nic Bishop Lizards combines comprehensive, basic information about snake behaviors, appearances and abilities with sumptuous images, in a volume complemented by an index, a glossary and author's research notes.
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Chuck Close: Face Book
by Chuck Close
An interactive autobiography about the author's artistic life describes some of the creative processes he uses in the studio and his struggles with challenging disabilities, providing a mix-and-match self-portrait section that encourages readers to combine Close's techniques and images.
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The Trouble with Chickens: A J.J. Tully Mystery
by Doreen Cronin
Mystery. Retired search-and-rescue dog J.J. Tully just wants to live a quiet life in the country now that his years of hard work are over. But instead of enjoying a peaceful retirement, J.J. agrees to investigate a case for a worried mother hen whose chicks are missing. This easy-to-read yet suspenseful story is a great choice for fans of tough detectives, funny characters, and mysteries that give you enough clues to solve the case as you read. If you enjoy this 1st book in the J.J. Tully mystery series, you might also want to give John Erickson's Hank the Cowdog series a try.
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Wild Life
by Cynthia C DeFelice
After 12-year-old Eric's parents are deployed to Iraq, he is sent to live in North Dakota with grandparents he hardly knows, but when his grandfather's hostility and the threat of losing the dog he has rescued become overwhelming, Eric runs away, embarking on an adventure that will challenge his survival skills and teach him many lessons about life, love and loss.
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Arlington: The Story of our Nation's Cemetery
by Chris L. Demarest
A carefully researched portrait of one of our nation's greatest monuments, Arlington National Cemetery, documents the history of this final resting place for thousands of America's servicemen and women, from the beginnings of our nation to the present day.
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The Second Life of Abigail Walker
by Frances O'Roark Dowell
Fiction. Although Abby Walker is sort of friends with Kristen and the other popular girls, they've started being really mean to her. In a brave moment, Abby stands up to them -- and "that's that," no more friends. But while Kristen and her group try to punish her for speaking up, Abby makes new friends and starts figuring out how to live according to her own rules, not the mean girls'. Readers who like realistic, emotional stories that focus on friendships and family, like James Howe's Addie on the Inside, will want to read about Abby and what she's going through.
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The Vengekeep Prophecies
by Brian Farrey
Fantasy. Twelve-year-old Jaxter Grimjinx comes from a family of thieves, but he's yet to perfect his own skills at the family business. When Jaxter's botched first burglary attempt results in the rest of his family being jailed -- and a bizarre series of strange and dangerous events begins -- the lad must leave his home in order to search for a way to save it. Fans of action-packed adventures that are filled with twists, turns, just enough danger to be a little scary, and plenty of humor will love The Vengekeep Prophecies.
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Sophie Simon Solves Them All
by Lisa Graff
Third-grader Sophie Simon is smart about many things except when it comes to friendship, until she uses her high IQ to help some of her classmates with their parental problems. By the author of Umbrella Summer.
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Guinea Dog
by Patrick Jennings
When his mother brings home a guinea pig instead of the dog he has always wanted, fifth-grader Rufus is not happy--until the rodent starts acting exactly like a dog
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Louisa May's Battle: How the Civil War Led to Little Women
by Kathleen Krull
Explores the classic author's Civil War experiences as a nurse and the published letters home that marked Alcott's first successes as a writer, explaining how her volunteer work inspired realism in her stories and helped her discover and develop her writing style.
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Kindred Souls
by Patricia MacLachlan
Sharing wonderful nature walks on the prairie with his beloved grandfather, young Jake initially resists and then considers his grandfather's request, made when the old man falls seriously ill, to rebuild the little sod house where he grew up. By the Newbery Medal-winning author of Sarah, Plain and Tall.
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Buffalo Bird Girl: A Hidatsa Story
by S. D. Nelson
Traces the childhood, friendships and dangers experienced by Buffalo Bird Woman, a Hidatsa Indian born in 1839, whose community along the Missouri River in the Dakotas transitioned from hunting to agriculture. By the award-winning author of Black Elk's Vision.
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Plunked
by Michael Northrop
Sports Fiction. Sixth-grader Jack Mogens is psyched for an exciting season of Little League baseball, especially since he may have a chance at a prime fielding position. But after he gets knocked out by a powerful stray pitch during his team's first game, Jack realizes that he has more to recover from than just the physical injury -- he's gotten skittish and now avoids any inside pitches when he's at bat. This realistic novel has plenty of on-the-field action to please baseball nuts, but any fan of well-drawn characters and captivating, funny narrators (like those in Jordan Sonnenblick's Curveball) will enjoy it, too.
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The Spindlers
by Lauren Oliver
Fantasy. After evil, spider-like spindlers steal her younger brother Patrick's soul, Liza Elston -- accompanied by an eccentric, makeup-wearing, human-sized rat -- embarks on a perilous quest through an underground realm to save him. Readers who enjoy fantasy quests through strange and dangerous lands filled with outlandish creatures, perplexing riddles, and wonders galore will love The Spindlers (but may want to keep plenty of lights on while reading it, as it gets pretty scary) and may also want to check out Catherynne M. Valente's The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making or Colin Meloy's Wildwood.
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Wonder
by R. J. Palacio
Fiction. Auggie Pullman was born with what the doctors called "facial anomalies" -- a strangely shaped head, skin that looks like it's melting -- and even though he's been homeschooled, he hasn't escaped other kids' cruel nicknames like Freddy Krueger and Freak. Now Auggie is going mainstream: he's starting the fifth grade in a private middle school. In this affecting and triumphant novel told from multiple perspectives (Auggie's, his sister's, his friends', and other characters'), readers see how Auggie's entry into the wider world affects not only him, but everyone around him.
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Summer of the Gypsy Moths
by Sara Pennypacker
Fiction. Twelve-year-old Stella has a happy life on Cape Cod with her great-aunt Louise, although she isn't too fond of Angel, the foster kid Louise has taken in. But then something terrible happens, and Stella and Angel are forced to become a team -- or else they'll both be uprooted and sent away. Intense, deeply emotional, and yet at times surprisingly funny, this story of friendship and survival is one that fans of Kathi Appelt's more fantastical but still mostly realistic book Keeper are bound to enjoy.
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May B.: A Novel
by Caroline Starr Rose
Historical Fiction. When a failed wheat crop nearly bankrupts the Betterly family, Pa pulls twelve-year-old May from school and hires her out to a couple new to the Kansas frontier. She wants to contribute, but it's hard to be separated from her family by 15 long, unfamiliar miles. Then the unthinkable happens: May is abandoned. Trapped in a tiny snow-covered sod house, isolated from family and neighbors, May must prepare for the oncoming winter. While fighting to survive, May's memories of her struggles with reading at school come back to haunt her. But she's determined to find her way home again. Caroline Starr Rose's fast-paced novel, written in beautiful and riveting verse, gives readers a strong new heroine to love.
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Cardboard
by Doug TenNapel
After Cam's down-and-out father gives him a cardboard box for his birthday, they fashion it into a man that magically comes to life, but things spin wildly out of control when the neighborhood bully steals a scrap of the cardboard to create creatures that promptly disobey his orders and multiply into an unruly army.
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Breaking Stalin's Nose
by Eugene Yelchin
In the Stalinist era of the Soviet Union, 10-year-old Sasha idolizes his father, a devoted Communist, but when police take his father away and leave Sasha homeless, he is forced to examine his own perceptions, values and beliefs.
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Michigan City Public Library
100 E. 4th Street
Michigan City, Indiana 46360
219-873-3044
http://mclib.org/
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