This March brings us many new middle-grade books to pore over so stock up on your bookmarks and browse the collection below. You’re sure to find one that sparks your reading interest.
13 Ways to Say Goodbye by Kate Fussner. March 18. 304 pp. 
Nina always followed her older sister, Lily. But just before her thirteenth birthday, Lily died, leaving Nina behind forever.
In the three years since she lost her sister, Nina completed Lily’s secret “Before Birthday” lists to continue in her footsteps. But now Nina is catching up. When she flies to Paris, France, and completes tasks that Lily never finished, Nina finds herself magically transported inside of her own memories, face-to-face with the ghosts of her past.
With her birthday looming and the last list running out, Nina is torn between visiting her sister in her memories or adventuring in the present, including crushing hard on her art classmate, Sylvie. Should she follow Lily’s instructions or try something new? And what happens when she finishes the list?
Learn more about Paris, the city Nina visited, by clicking here.
Alice Éclair, Spy Extraordinaire: A Recipe for Trouble by Sarah Todd Taylor. March 18. 224 pp.
A fast-paced adventure full of daring action and delicious cakes! Alice Éclair, Spy Extraordinaire, will whisk you away on a glamorous and high-stakes adventure, full of daring action and delicious cakes!
Baker by day, spy by night — Alice Éclair leads an exciting double life!
A mysterious message sends her on a mission aboard France’s most glamorous train, the Sapphire Express. Alice must sneak on board posing as a pastry chef and discover which passenger is an enemy agent before they reach their final stop. But everyone on the train seems to be hiding something. Armed with her whisk, her wits, and her will to succeed, Alice has a spy to catch.
Curious about what a pastry chef does? Click here.
Cincinnati Lee, Curse Breaker by Heidi Heilig. March 25. 304 pp. 
Cincinnati Lee’s great great (great?) grandfather is famous. His adventures discovering ancient artifacts have been made into movies, and museums around the world respect his work. The thing is, in that line of work, you’re bound to get cursed. And that leaves your great great (great?) granddaughter to break the curse by returning the artifacts you “preserved.”
Cincinnati’s own adventure begins in the Cosmopolitan Museum in New York City, where her mom works. Soon she learns about the ancient Spear of Destiny and its potential to right all the wrongs in her family’s past or … bring about the end of the world. It all depends on whose hands it falls into. Cincinnati must beat two relic hunters to the spear, and her quest will take her to surprising locations throughout the city and even across the Atlantic Ocean. Along the way, she’ll make a new friend (which is not the easiest thing to do), make some enemies (surprisingly easy to do), and ultimately learn what makes the world worth saving.
The City of Lost Cats by Tanya Lloyd Kyi .March 4. 288 pp.
When a stubborn young girl named Fiona stumbles upon an abandoned mansion down by the harbor, she discovers the house is full of stray cats and two chaotic parakeets. Fiona feels sympathetic toward the animals; she understands what it’s like to need a safe home. Ever since her parents died, she’s been struggling to adjust to the tiny apartment where she and her Aunt Tanis now live. And Aunt Tanis has little time to spare for Fiona, between her job at The Municipal Hall and her horrible, hair-gelled boyfriend.
When a demoliltion team threatens the mansion, Fiona’s determined to save it and its residents. But the cats have their own priorities. Cot has lived in the mansion for two years and is the self-proclaimed king. He’s convinced the demolition effort has been organized by the parakeets. Those birds have got to go!
As the demolition team begins tearing down the house next door, Fiona looks for any help she can find — at the library, the butcher shop, and even at The Municipal Hall. Can the efforts of one small girl and an assortment of animals stop a luxury condo development? And can they create something better in its place?
The Ghosts of Pandora Pickwick by Christina Wolff. March 4. 256 pp. 
Welcome to Pandora’s Antiques, with rarities for every occasion.
Summer vacation in London turns mysterious and exciting when Mia learns that her aunt’s antique shop is actually a ghost placement agency.
Nowhere does Mia feel so at home as in her Aunt Harriet’s antique shop. How wonderful that she can spend her summer vacation there! But something is wrong in the store. Things disappear as if by magic, just cleaned furniture dusts up again in seconds, and there’s an eerie number of clatters at night. However, her aunt acts as if this is completely normal. Mia, on the other hand, suspects that Harriet is hiding something from her—just like the question of who her birth parents are.
The Girl and the Robot by Oz Rodriguez. March 25. 320 pp.
Mimi Perez fixes things. Phones, tablets, speakers, printers. She gets it from helping her dad at the family e-repair shop, one of Mimi’s favorite things to do. But ever since Papi was deported, there’s a lot more than electronics that need fixing in Mimi’s world. Things too big for any twelve-year-old to handle on her own.
Mimi hustles around her Brooklyn neighborhood trying to earn enough money to finally fix her family. There’s no time for school or friends, but Mimi knows it will all be worth it the day Papi comes home. Then her ex-friends approach her with a proposition: enter a robotics competition with them and they could win $50,000. This could be her chance.
Then, a mysterious robot, scared, alone, and broken, crashes to earth from space. When federal agents search for it, Mimi does what any street-smart electronics repair person would do: she takes the robot home, fixes her up, and in the process, gains a friend.
Suddenly, Mimi is anything but alone. She’s part of a robotics team. She’s sheltering a robot. She’s dodging federal agents. And keeping all of it a secret from her mom.
Are you interested in robots like Mimi? Build one at this website.
Last Chance Academy: A Study in Secrets by Debbi Michiko Florence. March 11. 304 pp. 
Ever since her mom passed away, twelve-year-old Megumi “Meg” Mizuno has been spiraling. After too many low grades and cut classes, she’s been expelled from school. Her dad secures her a spot at the prestigious Leland Chase Academy, a boarding school in the middle-of-nowhere New York. If Meg can’t make it work there, she’ll be forced to live with her horrible aunt.
At first, Leland Chase seems like an average, although strict, boarding school, and Meg tentatively warms up to her roommate and some classmates. Then, one night, a mysterious envelope appears under her door, inviting Meg and her roommate to participate in a scavenger hunt. The only rules? Don’t get caught by faculty or staff and no cheating. The grand prize? A luxury stay at a fancy resort in California. And after learning her dad has plans to sell their family home—with all its memories of Mom—Meg knows she has to win the competition and use the trip to convince Dad to stay.
Thanks to her mom, who taught her how to solve ciphers, Meg has a knack for puzzles. She gets ahead in the hunt but quickly learns that her classmates, having their own sets of skills, are tough competitors. And as they get deeper into the game, Meg and her fellow competitors realize the anonymous creator has their own agenda … and LCA isn’t quite what it seems.
Plan your own scavenger hunt here.
The Many Hauntings of the Manning Family by Lorien Lawrence. March 18. 288 pp.
Thirteen-year-old twins Gabby and Trent Manning are Connecticut’s youngest paranormal investigators. They both inherited “the gift” from their grandparents whose legendary ghost hunts inspired several books and movies, but whose names have been nearly forgotten since their untimely deaths years ago.
Armed with EMF machines, flashlights, and recording equipment, the twins’ mom drags them all over New England in an attempt to bring their family back into the limelight. Never mind that Gabby is tired of being known as a Ghost Twin, and Trent finds most of the haunts to be pretty frightening. Their mom thinks their latest destination—the abandoned Majestic Theater, site of the late Mannings’ infamous failed exorcism—is exactly what the family needs to go viral.
However, nothing about this investigation goes according to plan. After a terrifying séance-gone-wrong, their mother goes missing, and it’s clear that a powerful demon is haunting the theater. Will the twins be able live up to their grandparents’ legacy and vanquish the demon before it’s too late?
The Peach Thief by Linda Joan Smith. March 4. 384 pp. 
One night, workhouse orphan Scilla Brown, climbs the Earl of Havermore’s garden wall. She wants only to steal a peach—the best thing she’s ever tasted in her hard, hungry life. But when the earl’s gardener catchers her and mistakes her for a boy, she finds something better: a temporary job scrubbing flowerpots. If she can just keep up her deception, she’ll have a soft bed and food beyond her wildest dreams . . . maybe even peaches.
She soon falls in with Phin, a garden apprentice who sneaks her into the steamy, fruit-filled greenhouses, calls her “Brownie,” and makes her skin prickle. At the same time, the gruff gardener teaches Scilla how to make things grow, and her hope begins to grow with every seed she plants. But as the seasons unfurl, her loyalties become divided, and her secret is harder to keep. How far will Scilla go to have a home at last?
Click here to grow a garden like Scilla.
Octopus Moon by Bobbie Pyron. March 25. 336 pp.
Pearl loves watching the majestic loggerhead turtles and octopuses glide through the water at the aquarium. She especially identifies with the octopuses, who have millions of touch receptors all over their bodies. They feel everything. But sometimes, Pearl wishes she was more like a turtle, with a hard outer shell—it hurts too much to feel everything.
And the changes at the start of fifth grade don’t feel good to Pearl at all. New teachers, lockers, and being in different classes than her friends is unsettling. Pearl tries her best to pretend she’s fine, but she’s struggling with things that used to come easy, like schoolwork, laughing and skateboarding with her best friend Rosie, running, and even sleeping.
After a disastrous parent-teacher conference, her parents decide to bring Pearl to Dr. Jill, who diagnoses her with depression. At first Pearl is resistant to Dr. Jill’s help; she doesn’t like feeling different, but she also doesn’t want to continue feeling so bad all the time. When Dr. Jill asks Pearl to try one Impossible Thing each day, like running, skateboarding, or walking her dog Tuck, she decides to try. For each impossible thing she attempts, Pearl puts a bead on a string. Bead by bead, and with the support of family and friends, Pearl finds her way back to herself. She discovers that just like the moon is always there in the sky, even if it isn’t full, she’ll always be herself even when she doesn’t feel whole.
Once for Yes by Allie Millington. March 25. 272 pp. 
The Odenburgh, an old apartment building made of brick and blunt opinions, is the last of its kind in a swiftly changing neighborhood. After years of putting up with people and their many problems, the Odenburgh knows there’s no point in getting attached. They all just leave eventually. A truth that comes all too soon when the building is sold and marked for demolition, giving tenants a month to move out.
No one is more troubled by the news than eleven-year-old Prue, who refuses to leave her family’s apartment. Not when it was the last place she lived with her sister Lina, before she lost Lina forever. When Prue launches a plan to save their home, the Odenburgh joins in―flickering lights, jamming elevators, triggering fire alarms―all to try and bring a building full of bickering residents together. In the process, Prue meets Lewis, an eccentric boy who lives across the street―and the only one who can help her discover the missing elements of her sister’s story.
One Wrong Step by Jennifer A. Nielsen. March 4. 336 pp.
Twelve-year-old Atlas Wade strives to forget the memory of his mother, who died when he was nine, by climbing mountains. When his father signs them up for an expedition group hoping to be the first to ever summit the unconquerable Mount Everest, Atlas has a chance to prove himself to his father, and maybe finally leave his mother’s memory behind him on the mountain.
But this time, Atlas is the one left behind, along with a young girl named Maddie and their sturdy yet injured Sherpa, Chodak. When news breaks out that Europe is at war again, and that Nazis are attempting their own summit dangerously nearby, Atlas and Maddie plead with the expedition to come back down. Unfortunately, their warnings come too late. When an avalanche occurs and they receive no word from the group, Maddie and Chodak join Atlas to begin a dangerous journey up the mountain in the hopes of finding survivors.
Atlas, Maddie, and Chodak will have to rely not just on their own wits for survival, but on each other as well, and Atlas will have to learn how to let go if he wants any chance of finding his father and fixing the rift between them before it’s too late.
Read some fun facts about Mount Everest here.
Starry, Starry Heist by Karen Briner. March 18. 304 pp.
Sixth-grader Max has it rough—between tormentors at school and his sick mom at home. But then DZ, a strange, tuxedoed man with one shoe, appears to Max from the future and divulges that Max’s mother’s fate is somehow entwined with that of Vincent van Gogh’s The Starry Night. It’s suddenly clear to Max that any problems he already had on his plate have just gotten bigger.
DZ explains to Max that someone is after The Starry Night. . . and the thief is not bound by the usual laws of time and space. DZ can’t offer too many specifics, but he does provide Max with a cryptic to-do list:
Read The Future Time Traveler’s Guide to the Past. Consider the puffins. Beware the Wretch with obsidian eyes. Befriend Vincent van Gogh.
Max is skeptical but tries his very best. After all, he’ll do anything to help his mom. But he soon discovers that The Future Time Traveler’s Guide to the Past has never been published. And he’s not exactly sure where he’s going to find puffins in LA. He has no idea what a Wretch is. And befriend Vincent van Gogh who’s been dead for over a hundred years? That’s impossible.
Then, one afternoon at the library, Max spots her: Turquoise-haired Maybe Wells, dressed in blue from head to toe, spattered in paint, carrying a skateboard, and sporting a beautiful tattoo of puffins on her right shoulder. Suddenly, achieving the impossible doesn’t seem so farfetched anymore.
Learn more about the artist Vincent van Gogh and view some of his paintings here.
Ticket to Ride: An Unexpected Journey by Adrienne Kress. March 11. 208 pp.
To say twelve-year-old Teddy loves trains is an understatement. It’s his obsession. He knows everything there is to know about them, has the most amazing model train setup in the basement, and he carries around a classic caboose, a small model of a 19th century steam engine caboose that he received as a birthday gift. It’s his good luck charm!
So when Teddy wins a Ticket To Ride the Excelsior Express, he can’t wait to go. The Excelsior Express is modeled to look like it’s from the 1920’s but is outfitted with a high-tech locomotive system. This will be the train’s flagship journey, and it’s a dream come true for Teddy. Plus, he’ll get to see his grandparents in Los Angeles, and travel all across North America from his hometown of Toronto, Canada.
But his dream come true becomes a nightmare when the train gets rerouted and, what’s worse, his lucky caboose goes missing. As it turns out, this ticket to ride takes Teddy, his new friend Olivia, a woman always dressed in yellow named Mina, two traveling musicians named Allie and Dex, and their fellow passengers on an unexpected journey and through some pretty hefty corporate corruption.
Are you interested in trains, too? Here’s a great video on the history of trains.
The Trouble With Sunshine by Yamile Saied Méndez. March 4. 272 pp. 
Dorani’s mom, Isa, taught her to be bold and challenge the rules if they don’t seem fair. People are more important than rules. But she never taught Dorani how to do it all without her. So, when Isa dies on the way to speak with the principal about Dori’s latest revolution, Dori loses her voice. Her grief and guilt become the loudest parts of her.
Moving from vibrant Miami to quiet, middle-of-nowhere Wyoming with her aunt feels like the punishment she deserves. She spends most of her time with their newest horse, Sunshine. An accident left Sunshine skittish and hard to care for. Tia Ivette knows her behavior comes from fear, and she is trying everything to make Sunshine brave again. But Dori knows grief can feel like fear… and grief is just love with no place to go.
Speaking up for Sunshine reminds Dori that the very best parts of her mother live on through her, and so when she starts to notice that the rules at her new school unfairly target specific students, she knows just what her mother would do.
Read a discussion with the author here.
Vanya and the Wild Hunt by Sangu Mandanna. March 11. 288 pp.
Eleven-year-old Vanya Vallen has always felt like she doesn’t fit in. She’s British-Indian in a mostly white town in England and she has ADHD.
Oh, and she talks to books. More importantly, the books talk back.
When a monster she believed only existed in fairytales attacks her family, Vanya discovers that her parents have secrets, and that there are a lot more monsters out there. Overnight, her parents whisk her off to the enchanted library and school of Auramere, where she joins the ranks of archwitches and archivists.
Life at Auramere is unexpected, exciting and wonderful. But even here, there’s no escaping monsters. The mysterious, powerful Wild Hunt is on the prowl, and Vanya will need all her creativity and courage to unmask its leader and stop them before they destroy the only place she’s ever truly belonged.
When Sally O’Malley Discovered the Sea by Karen Cushman. March 25. 240 pp. 
Sally O’Malley is an orphan working at a mineral spring hotel in the woods of central Oregon—that is, until they chuck her out like chewed-on chicken bones, due entirely to an unfortunate incident with a pig and some church ladies.
And so Sally decides to head west to the sea. She’s heard it’s glorious. She’s heard it’s fierce. Why not see for herself? Before long Sally encounters a dangerous bobcat—and that’s just the first day! Safe in the knowledge that she’s fearless, she continues on her journey with no place to belong and no one to depend on. And that’s just fine with her.
Then a lady called Major, an old donkey, a loyal dog, and an abominable brat show Sally that she’s not quite as brave as she thinks. It turns out that counting on someone else is the scariest thing of all.
Learn more about the author Karen Cushman here.
March is a prolific month this year for New Releases. If none of the above are drawing you in, try one from the bookshelf.
All the Blues in the Sky by Renée Watson, Bloomsbury
Like All the Blues in the sky, Safe Harbor by Padma Venkatraman is a novel-in-verse. This one is about a girl reeling from the divorce of her parants and a move from India to California. But on the beach in her new home she finds and injured harbor seal and a new friend. Together they inspire their community to join in beach clean up. Fans of Lindsay Moore’s Yoshi and the Ocean or A Whale of the Wild will enjoy this tale of forging a bond with the wilderness and the healing power of friendship.
Romance novels are gradually making their way into the middle grade space, and here is a sweet one for young teens just experiencing their first love. As You Wish by Nashae Jones is a charming friend-to-sweetheart story with a dash of magic from the West African Anansi tradition. The trickster grants a wish that backfires in all the most embarrassing ways–great fun! This is a second novel for Nashae Jones.
And finally, I’m thrilled to be doing a book event with Waka Brown this week to celebrate her new book Rick Kotani’s 400 Million Dollar Summer. This one struck a chord with me even though my kids were dancers rather than athletes. A move to a small town for the summer throws Japanese-American Rick into the sphere of a high stakes youth baseball team where winning is the centerpiece. The coach ruthlessly organizes his practices and game strategies around the win and not the development of each player’s talents, even coming at the expense of player safety. I think the professionalization of youth sports plays a role in the rise of anxiety among children. I hope this book spurs conversation and change in the family culture that surrounds the ultra competitive sports scene.
