Also Known as Harper Lee by Ann Haywood Leal

Also Known As Harper by Ann Haywood Leal


My rating: 5 of 5 stars
This is the book I have been waiting for this year! It is CLEAR that Leal used her background as teacher to craft this novel. From start to finish I could put names to the faces of the characters. Not the names that they are given in the novel, but the names of students I have encountered in my classroom over the last 11 years. It made me think more of those students and their lives. I smiled, laughed, and cried.

This book would be great for a literature circle or a situation where you could really sit and talk about it.


View all my reviews >>

Mr. Chickee's Messy Mission by Christopher Paul Curtis

I don't know what it is, maybe it is me, but another one of my very favorite authors of all time is letting me down slightly. Christopher Paul Curtis's book Mr. Chickee's Messy Mission is not my favorite. When I read the first book Mr. Chickee's Funny Money, I thought... Okay? I didn't love it and I didn't really understand it, but it was still humorous. Now I have read the second book, Mr. Chickee's Messy Mission and I am saying... NO, not that good! I very much love the humor Christopher Paul Curtis brings to his writing. I just do not understand the point of these two stories. This book in particular gets WAY OUT THERE. It is like Curtis is trying to write to a certain demographic and it is not his style. He seems to be trying to capture the demographic of kids who want to read fantasy. I just really feel like he is so much better at realistic and historical fiction.
By the way, I totally recommend the following books from Christopher Paul Curtis:
The Watson's Go to Birmingham-1963 (I read this EVERY single year!)
Bud, Not Buddy
Bucking the Sarge