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Middle Grade
A selection of middle grade fiction titles featured on ALU’s Kids’ Litspace.
All Books in this Collection
Showing 49–64 of 67 results
Sins of the Daughter
Sins of the Daughter
Some Unfinished Business
Some Unfinished Business
Standing on Neptune
Standing on Neptune
Stir of Shadows
$16.99Marigold has never felt like she truly belonged with her family. And neither has Frederick. When a phoenix feather brings the young teens together for the first time, they finally understand why: they are twins, separated as children.
The two soon learn they have other siblings, and that if they successfully reunite with their brother and sister before the feather bursts into flame, they will all fulfill otherworldly destinies. What they don’t know is that their mysterious sister is a villainous witch who has been trapped in the cover of a grimoire to keep the world safe from her murderous scorn.
Meanwhile, Teagan finds herself in a hopeless situation and faces losing her tail forever. Time’s running out, and it’s up to Asher and Ariana to save her… if only they knew she was in danger.
Will Asher and Ariana save Teagan in time?Will Marigold and Frederick risk releasing the witch to make their dreams come true? And if they do, will the land of Rhyme ever be the same?
Stormstruck
$9.95This historical time-travel novel, for children ten and up, is the third volume in Cathy Beveridge’s ongoing series on Canadian disasters. Once again we meet Jolene and her twin brother Michael, this time in an RV on the shores of the Great Lakes, where her father and grandfather are conducting research into the Great Storm of 1913.
Away from home, twelve-year-old Jolene feels fragile and lost, lacking a sure sense of direction in her life. When Grandpa discovers a time crease that enables them to step back into 1913, Jolene embraces the opportunity, feeling that she may find some help for her self-doubts in witnessing an earlier time.
At first, however, the past offers no answers. Jolene’s high-spirited new friend Em is a total mystery, and her ardent support of the suffragettes reinforces Jolene’s self-doubts. Then Em inadvertently leads the twins onto the Regina as the ship sails onto Lake Huron and into the Great Storm. When the order to abandon the sinking ship comes, they manage to escape and spend a night clinging to a raft in frigid waters. With her twin brother injured, Jolene is forced to draw on all her resources to allow the threesome to survive. In the process, she discovers her inner strength and a new passion for life.
Submarine Outlaw
$11.95Submarine Outlaw takes young adult readers on a unique journey when Alfred, a young boy who wants to be an explorer – not a fisherman, as his family demands – teams up with a junkyard genius to build a submarine that he sails around the Maritimes. The book takes the reader through the hands-on process of submarine construction into the world of real ocean navigation, replete with a high-seas chase, daring rescue and treasure hunting. Children will identify with Alfred’s desire for an adventurous life and the sense of empowerment that comes with building his own submarine and operating it independently. They will also love the unusual crew – a rescued dog and a quirky seagull. The First Prize Winner of the Atlantic Writers Competition, Submarine Outlaw shows how any great goal in life takes a good deal of patience, determination and hard work. But also how hard work on one’s dream becomes an act of joy.
“Philip Roy’s Submarine Outlaw is a wildly imaginative story of adventure full of surprises and fast paced, yet there is also wisdom and insight to be found here.” – Lesley Choyce
“Submarine Outlaw and its sequels have firmly established themselves as a riveting adventure series that has gathered a significant following who are anxiously awaiting this next installment. And they will not be disappointed! This personal quest and the internal struggles that it evokes for Alfred give this book a new dimension and allow his character to be more fully developed. . . . Roy continues to keep this series fresh and engaging. We will all join Alfred in anticipating his next voyage.” – Atlantic Books Today
“A truly riveting adventure story, Submarine Outlaw will likely capture the heart and minds of all who have longed to escape the confines of their everyday world and try something exciting and even dangerous.” – janeonbooks.edublogs.org
“A refreshing Canadian novel about following a dream.” – Resource Links
“A terrific and uniquely imaginative premise for an Atlantic Canada novel for kids.” – The Chronicle Herald
“Submarine Outlaw is so well written it is totally believable. Dramatic and touching. Highly recommended!” – Hi-Rise Newspaper
“Submarine Outlaw is a fast-paced, adventure novel that leaves you wanting more. . . . I would definitely recommend it to anyone looking for a great read.” – What If? Magazine
Survivor’s Leave
$10.95It’s 1944, and two young Canadian able seamen, Glen Cassley and Arthur “Ding Dong” Bell, find their ship sinking beneath them after a German submarine unleashes an acoustic torpedo. Miraculously, everyone on board survives, and Glen shouts out triumphantly:
“You know what this means, Ding? Survivor’s Leave. We qualify for Survivor’s Leave!”
With fun and adventure on their minds, Glen and Ding set off for London. But there is no rest from battle, for the Germans have begun dropping a new kind of bomb, the horrific V-1s, or doodlebugs. When a neighbour and her baby are trapped under their collapsed and burning home, an injured Glen is on the frontlines.
Glen and Ding then accept an offer to travel to Cornwall where they are to stay in a rundown manor house, Penraven. Their stay turns out to be more exciting than the boys could have imagined. Built atop a cave-riddled cliff, Penraven has been the home of smuggling, murder, dungeons and ghosts. To add to the excitement, the boys meet two young English girls who turn out to be charming company!
But the young seamen soon discover that sinister forces have an interest in what lies hidden below Penraven, for the Nazis have hatched an unprecedented scheme involving biological warfare, and it seems the caves are the perfect place from which to set the destruction in motion.
Swept Away
Swept Away
Tenth Pupil, The
$8.95The Tenth Pupil, for readers eight to fourteen, is set in a small logging camp on Vancouver Island in 1934. Eleven-year-old Trudy Paige enjoys her life in Mellor’s Camp. She has a loving family, a shaggy dog, friends, a swimming hole, a fishing stream, books to read, wild animals to lend a touch of danger, and a friend in Vancouver to visit. She especially enjoys school, until the government threatens to close the school because there are only nine children, and ten are legally required if the government is to fund the school.
Unexpectedly, Shigi, a Japanese boy, becomes the tenth pupil. Trudy is delighted, but other people in the camp are not pleased and Trudy discovers a dark side to life. Over the school year, she witnesses several incidents of prejudice against the Japanese, including a frightening riot in Little Tokyo in Vancouver. Trudy is faced with a dilemma: should she succumb to the prejudice in the camp in order to fit in or should she defy them all and continue to be Shigi’s friend?
This historical novel for young adults offers a taste of logging camp life just at the time when railway logging was giving way to truck logging, and when children were still used to beat out the sparks from the locomotives. Horne offers an insightful account of racism in the pre-WWII period, but does so while giving both the Japanese-Canadian and Euro-Canadian points of view.
The Compassionate Imagination
The Compassionate Imagination
The Dead Kid Detective Agency
$9.95Thirteen-year-old October Schwartz is new in town, short on friends, and the child of a clinically depressed science teacher. Naturally, she spends most of her time in the Sticksville Cemetery, which just happens to border her backyard. And that backyard just happens to be the home of five dead teenagers, each from a different era of the past: there’s the dead United Empire Loyalist! The dead escaped slave who made her way north via the Underground Railroad! The dead quintuplet!Soon, October befriends the five dead kids. Together — using October’s smarts and the dead kids’ abilities to walk through walls and get around undetected and stuff — they form The Dead Kid Detective Agency, committed to solving Sticksville’s most mysterious mysteries. October’s like Nancy Drew, if she’d hung out with corpses.When Sticksville Central High School’s beloved French teacher dies in a suspicious car accident, it provides the agency with its first bona fide case. Soon October and her five dead friends find themselves in the midst of a nefarious murder plot, thick with car chases, cafeteria fights, sociopathic math teachers, real estate appointments, and a wacky adventure that might uncover the truth about a bomb that exploded almost 40 years ago.
The Girl Who Loved the Birds
$15.95A story for children by Kwantlen storyteller and award-winning poet Joseph Dandurand.The Girl Who Loved the Birds is the third in a series of Kwantlen legends by award-winning author Joseph Dandurand, following The Sasquatch, the Fire and the Cedar Baskets and A Magical Sturgeon.Accompanied by beautiful gouache illustrations by Kwantlen artist Elinor Atkins, this tender children’s story follows a young Kwantlen girl who shares her life with the birds of the island she calls home. Collecting piles of sticks and moss for the builders of nests, sharing meals with the eagles and owls, the girl forms a lifelong bond with her feathered friends, and soon they begin to return her kindness.Written with Dandurand’s familiar simplicity and grace, The Girl Who Loved the Birds is a striking story of kinship and connection.
The Hills Are Shadows
$12.95It was supposed to be a homecoming and reunion, but when Anne Tennyson Miller (Tenn to her friends and family) returns to Driftwood Bay with her new friend Una, they find a ghost town.
Something has gone terribly wrong in the world. The sea is rising fast, and everyone – almost everyone – has fled to the hills. Danger and treachery lurk on a highway littered with abandoned cars and possessions, and the girls, along with two young strangers who conceal a mystery of their own, head across country. They climb through the wilderness in hopes of finding the Miller family and safety, perhaps, from the relentless tide. But their adventures have only begun . . .
“Givner’s characters are so real that the reader will have no problem identifying with them” – CM Magazine.
“Her writing is crisp and clear, while her ability to wrap up the story, and prepare for a sequel is absolutely wonderful.” – Erika Sorocco, reviewer
“The several threads of the story weave together without fanfare but with a calm assurance that creates a sturdy sense of character and believability” – Kirkus reviews
The Patron Saint of Stanley Park
$16.95Siblings Josh and Jennifer are coping with the loss of their father, who disappeared in a float plane accident on Christmas Eve one year ago. While Josh scours the Internet for proof that his father is still alive, Jennifer rebels against his denial and their mother Marcia’s efforts to return the family to normalcy. When Marcia insists that Josh and Jennifer spend Christmas Eve with relatives, the children instead set out for Stanley Park to honour their father’s memory. Trapped by a catastrophic storm, the children are rescued by Skookum Pete, a strange vagabond who takes them to a fantastical bunker beneath the Prospect Point café, where they experience wondrous visions that help them understand the truth about their father and the healing power of love.
The Street Belongs to Us
$14.95A sweet middle-grade chapter book about two best friends who transform their torn-up street into a world where imaginations can run wild.
In 1984 Los Angeles, Alex is a tomboy who would rather wear her hair short and her older brother’s hand-me-downs, and Wolf is a troubled kid who’s been wearing the same soldier’s uniform ever since his mom died. They temporarily set their worries aside when their street is torn up by digging machines and transformed into a muddy wonderland with endless possibilities. To pass the hot summer days, the two best friends seize the opportunity to turn Muscatel Avenue into a battleground and launch a gleeful street war against the rival neighbourhood kids.
But when Alex and Wolf make their headquarters inside a deep trench, Alex’s grandmother warns them that some buried things want to be found and some want to stay hidden and forgotten. Although she has the wisdom of someone who has survived the Mexican Revolution, the Spanish Flu, and immigration to a new country, the kids ignore her warning, unearthing more than they bargained for.
The exuberant and expressive line drawings by Gabriela Godoy perfectly capture the summers of youth, when anything feels possible and an adventure is always around the corner. Bursting with life and feeling, both the people and the land come alive in a tale interwoven with Mexican-American identity, experience, and history. The Street Belongs to Us is a story of family, friendship, and unconditional acceptance, even when it breaks your heart.
Ages 8 to 12.
Torn from Troy
$11.95Two-and-a half millennia after it was created, Homer’s Odyssey remains one of humanity’s most memorable adventure stories. In this re-creation of Homer’s classic as a young adult novel, we see the aftermath of the Trojan War through the eyes of Alexi, a fifteen-year-old Trojan boy. Orphaned by the war and enslaved by Odysseus himself, Alexi has a very different view of the conquering heroes of legend.
Despite a simmering anger towards his captors, Alexi gradually develops a grudging respect for them. As the Greeks fight off the angry Cicones, weather a storm that pushes them far beyond charted waters, and nearly succumb to the blandishments of the bewitching Lotus-eaters, he realizes that they are not the demons they were said to be, but people like himself.
At the same time, Alexi’s quick thinking, bravery, and the healing skills that he learned from his father prove to his captors that he is no ordinary slave. His key role in their escape from the Cyclops earns the respect of his master, Odysseus, and a striking discovery during their escape gives his life a newfound purpose.
Straddling the boundary between historical fiction and mythology, Torn from Troy is written in a hard, realistic style and brings to life the travails of a bronze-age slave of the Greeks in a form that will appeal especially to teen boys. While this book is the first volume of the author’s Odyssey of a Slave trilogy, it is a compelling and fully-realized work on its own.