OZ: Young Adult Fiction – Lemuria Books

Category: OZ: Young Adult Fiction (Page 1 of 15)

Interview by Jana Hoops. Special to the Clarion-Ledger Sunday print edition (September 22)

Brittney Morris’s hot debut novel presents a relevant and hard-hitting YA tale of a black teen game developer–17-year-old Kiera Johnson–who created the secret multiplayer role-playing game called Slay.

When things begin to spin out of control and the secret world of the game is threatened, Kiera and her online players face a dilemma that lands squarely in the lap of the young game developer, as she explores the ramifications of racism and the importance of exposing the truth.

Morris earned a bachelor’s degree in economics from Boston University, where she was the founder and former president of the school’s Creative Writing Club.

A video game player herself, Morris now lives in Seattle with her husband.

Please share how the story in Slay was shaped by your own personal experiences.

Brittney Morris

Growing up, I was one of the only black kids in my small town. I felt like I was expected to be the black culture expert at my school. I was supposed to know a bunch of musical references, movie references, etc. that just weren’t part of my life. I felt too black to fit in with my white classmates and too “white” to fit in with my black friends, so I grew up in a racial limbo.

Writing Kiera’s story felt quite cathartic because it so closely mirrors mine. Moving between majority white and majority black spaces felt like stepping into alternate universes, one in which I could be myself–I just didn’t know it yet–and one in which I was expected to be “on” so as not to offend or ostracize white people. Kiera learns, like I did, exactly what Blackness means to her and just how diverse, beautiful, and complex it is.

Tell me about the idea of taking on many social topics that are currently relevant to young people today through the medium of video games, and how it resonates with their generation.

Video games–especially indie games–have been tackling tough topics for years: depression, suicide, immigration, chronic illness, self-harm, cyberbullying, and childhood trauma, just to name a few off the top of my head. I have game recommendations for each of those topics if anyone’s interested. Just tweet at me. Anyway, I didn’t see why racism, exploration of racial identity, and “reverse-racism” couldn’t fit in with that list.

And as for Gen-Z specifically, I love seeing them on Twitter. You think we Millennials are skeptical of everything and tired of the status quo? Just you wait. Gen-Z is not here to take no mess, and it gives me so much hope for our future as a species. Video games have been an underutilized immersive and fun educational medium for decades, and I don’t think there’s a better or more innovative group to take it on than today’s teens.

Slay is your debut novel. Tell me about the bidding war for the rights to your book–the immediate interest it garnered from major publishers, and the fact that it is already being considered for movie rights. Were you surprised by this instant response to your work?

I had a great feeling the whole time I was drafting Slay. I knew the concept was commercial, easy to pitch, and full of heavy themes and high stakes. But you never know for sure if something will resonate in publishing. So, I guess when my agent and I began pitching to editors, I was hoping it would resonate, but prepared for the worst. Luckily, we had 13 editors from eight different houses–I think–it’s been awhile – interested!

The bidding war for Slay was wild. It lasted two days and involved lots of conversations with my amazing agent who coordinated the whole process like a wizard. I wasn’t surprised by the response, because I went into this expecting anything to happen. But I am grateful, and eternally honored that I get to share this book with so many people. It’s a lifelong dream come true.

Ultimately, what is your hope for what you would like to accomplish through this book, and the message you want to send?

I was inspired to write Slay after seeing Black Panther. It was the first time I walked into a room full of Black people and felt like I belonged, 100 percent, without having to know any specific pop culture knowledge. You can blame my lone-Black-kid-in-a-hugely-white-town childhood for my complicated relationship with Blackness. It was enough to cross my arms and say “Wakanda forever.”

I want that total unconditional love and acceptance for every single Black person on the planet, especially the ones on the outskirts who feel like they’ve always been “different,” for whom major stereotypes don’t necessarily resonate, like me. I want everyone who reads Slay to walk away believing their identity is what they make it, and that no one has the right to tell them what their identity means or what stereotypes that means they have to fit.

Your publishing agreement includes a second book. Can you tell us yet what ideas you are considering for your sophomore offering?

It does, and I can! It’s about two teen black boys. One can see into the past, and one can see the future. The book is about living with the pressure of knowing what your ancestors went through to get you where you are today, the threat of violence, brutality, and incarceration in your future, and navigating the present under the weight of toxic masculinity.

Slay was a love letter to black people worldwide. My next book sits at the corner of Blackness and masculinity, and it is meant to be a love letter to black men specifically.

Brittney Morris will at Lemuria on Tuesday, September 24, at 5:00 p.m. to sign and discuss Slay. At 5:30, she will be in conversation with Ebony Lumumba.

‘On the Come Up’ cements Angie Thomas’s powerful voice

By Former Lemurians

On April 15, 2019

In African-American, OZ: Young Adult Fiction

By Andrew Hedglin. Special to the Clarion-Ledger Sunday print edition (April 14)

Angie Thomas created a cultural phenomenon from Jackson to Hollywood two years ago with her debut, The Hate U Give, a young-adult novel about the aftermath of a police shooting of an unarmed black teenager. However, the book contains so much more than that, from the coming-of-age tale of protagonist Starr Carter, to its beautiful, real depictions of life in a black community.

Thomas returns to the fictional Garden Heights community of The Hate U Give in her follow-up novel, On the Come Up. In this book, 16-year-old Bri Jackson overcomes other people’s expectations for her to find her voice and use her talent for hip-hop to communicate her place in the world. From the “ring battles” in a local boxing gym to the SoundCloud-inspired accounts of the internet, Bri always goes forth boldly to remind the world that “when you say brilliant that you’re also saying Bri.”

Part of those expectations are from people in her community expecting her to carry the mantle of her father, the underground hip-hop legend Lawless, who was tragically murdered when Bri was a child. Bri is proud of her father’s legacy, but she has her own unique experiences to share.

The other side of the expectations is weighted with racial anxiety. Bri attends an arts-based magnet school in the posh Midtown neighborhood, bused there every day with her friends Sonny, anxious about grades and his online crush on a neighborhood boy, and Malik, her other best friend, her secret crush, and a budding political activist.

When Bri is stopped by security guards while smuggling contraband snacks into school, an ugly incident takes place in which she is forcefully pinned to the ground by security guards with a history of racial profiling. The cell phone videos of the incident have the power to reveal the truth of what happened, but they also have the power to distort. The image imparted partially depends on what the viewer wants, or expects, to see in the first place.

So it is with the lyrics to the song that Bri records in response to the incident, called “On the Come Up.” Students use the song in a school protest that goes wrong. A local DJ baits Bri in a radio interview, because Bri, while talented and thoughtful, is often prone to emotional, hot-headed responses. Bri laces her song with plenty of irony and nuance, yet those meanings are sometimes hard to convey in a song that’s also catchy enough to become a viral hit.

Meanwhile, Bri has to make important decisions, including her choice of manager. Should she stick with her beloved Aunt Pooh, a gangsta with a heart of gold and amateur to the business? Or should she side with Supreme, her father’s old shark-like manager with opaque motivations?

Bri is vulnerable to being sorely tempted to temper her image to achieve success. Self-expression is fine for what it’s worth, but real financial pressures await at home when her single mother is laid off from her job as a church secretary in the aftermath of the riots from The Hate U Give.

Her mother Jay and her brother Trey tell her not to worry, that she shouldn’t make long-term decisions based on immediate financial circumstances, but Trey has already put grad school on hold, and Jay has a history of not always being there for them, including a long stretch of drug addiction after their father and her husband was murdered in front of her.

In addition to this mesmerizing world-building, Thomas carries her spirited first-person narration into this new tale. Thomas does a very fine job balancing the personal and the political. Her style and solid writing will appeal not just to young fans who see themselves represented, but to older fans as well who wish to peek into the world a young, vibrant world populated with strong, three-dimensional black characters.

Andrew Hedglin is a bookseller at Lemuria Books, a graduate of Belhaven University, and a lifelong Jackson resident.

Signed copies of Angie Thomas’s books are available at Lemuria and on its web store.

Leaving Never Hurts as Much as Being Left Behind: Jeff Zentner’s ‘Rayne & Delilah’s Midnite Matinee’

By Former Lemurians

On March 19, 2019

In OZ: Young Adult Fiction

by Andrew Hedglin

As a 32 year-old man, I realize that I’m probably not the person who’s supposed to be writing this post about this delightful new YA book by Jeff Zentner. I am certainly not the intended primary audience. But sometimes a person wants to read about people who are not exactly like himself, and I was young, once, giving me as good a frame of reference as required. And I was the person who encountered this book. So I shall tell about it.

Rayne and Delilah’s Midnite Matinee is about two teenage girls, Delia Wilkes and Josie Howard, who are trying to navigate the end of their high school while hosting a horror-movie-of-the-week TV show on a public access channel in Jackson, Tennessee.

Delia and her mother, both struggling with depression, were abandoned ten years earlier by Delia’s father, who left behind only an extensive collection of cheesy horror tapes in his wake. Delia loves the movies for two reasons: first, they remind her of him. Second, Delia keeps the flame for all the mediocre people of the world, “the ones who try their hardest to make something beautiful, something great, something that someone will remember and talk about when they’re gone–and they come up short. And not by a little bit. By a lot.” Delia, an average student, feels a great kinship with these people.

She does create one thing, though, by force of will–Midnite Matinee–in the hopes that her father will see it while flipping channels one day and be proud of her, or regret leaving, or…something.

Delia’s co-host, best friend, and general partner-in-crime is Josie Howard. Josie has dreamed of a career in television since as long as she could remember. She seems, to most people, to shine just a little bit brighter than Delia. She’s headed to four-year university instead of community college, and attracts all the boys she and Delia meet together, including one Lawson Vargas, a MMA fighter who goes to a different school, and turns out to be deeper than at initial glance. Josie is extremely loyal to Delia, but her parents are pressuring her to pursue an internship at the Food Network in Knoxville if she is serious about her TV dreams.

But Delia has a plan. The hosts of Midnite Matinee have been invited to ShiverCon in Orlando, and have a chance to meet the influential Jack Divine, who’s as famous in the horror-hosting world as a person can be. Maybe if Divine can help Midnite Matinee reach a certain level of success, Josie wouldn’t have to leave Jackson to become famous on TV. Furthermore, Delia has hired a private detective to track down her missing father, who just happens to live in Boca Raton, a few hours south of Orlando. Can Delia possibly confront both her past, through her father, and her future, in Jack Divine, in one trip?

Delia, Josie, and Lawson are extremely vivid, charming characters with clear motivations facing real change in a pivotal time in their lives. Delia and Josie’s sassy humor gives welcome levity to the big decisions they have to face. Their stakes never feel forced (although there is one somewhat cartoonish episode during the Florida part of the adventure), and their reactions feel perfectly natural. Like Delia and Josie themselves, mostly I wished that their story together wouldn’t end.

If you want to take that journey with Delia and Josie, we here at Lemuria have two great ways for you to do it. First, we still have some signed first editions available at our online store.

Second, if you’re like me, you like to listen to audiobooks in addition to reading, because then you have twice the time available for books. But boxed audiobooks are inconvenient and expensive, so you’ve probably been paying for digital audiobooks an Audible subscription, right?

Well, how about supporting your local independent bookstore instead? With libro.fm, now you can do both. Click the banner below to begin. By selecting Lemuria as your home store, every audiobook you purchase helps support us, your local bookstore, instead of a huge corporate monolith. We sure would appreciate it. And if you’re thinking about listening to Rayne and Delilah’s Midnite Matinee, narrators Phoebe Strole as Delia and Sophie Amoss as Josie make a great book even better.

Such Sweet Sorrow: ‘Lovely War’ by Julie Berry

By Former Lemurians

On March 15, 2019

In Historical Fiction, OZ: Young Adult Fiction

by Trianne Harabedian

The Nightingale. All The Light We Cannot See. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. I loved them, you loved them. If we’re being honest, there’s just something about a beautifully written World War II novel, with intrigue and tragedy and a little romance, that’s like literary catnip. We can’t get enough.

So I absolutely have to tell you about another book that you are going to love: Lovely War by Julie Berry. It’s a little different from the others. It’s got the intrigue, the tragedy, and more than a little romance. But… it’s set during World War I. Gasp! How can such a novel exist without Nazis, the brazenness of women in the forties, the preexisting tragedy of a world that had not yet recovered from the Great War? I promise that not only can it work, but it can work so beautifully that you’re not going to be able to put this novel down.

It’s 1942. The goddess Aphrodite is in a hotel room with her lover, Ares, when her husband, Hephaestus ensnares them in a net. As they argue about love, Aphrodite offers to illustrate her points by telling the story of four mortals living during World War I. As she weaves her tale, the other gods help by telling their perspectives on certain events. Aphrodite covers the romance, Apollo the music, Ares the war, and Hades the death.

The story begins with Hazel, a sheltered girl who lives in London and plays piano. On this particular evening, she is playing at a war benefit when she notices a young man standing to the side. Their eyes meet, Aphrodite gives them a nudge, and that’s it. Suddenly they’re sneaking out of their homes to meet for coffee, attending the symphony, and falling in love while knowing James will leave in a week for the war front. Unfortunately, their time is cut short when he is summoned to training a few days early. Their romance continues to blossom via letters, and Hazel decides that she needs to help with the war effort. To her parents’ dismay, she moves to Saint-Nazarie, France, as an entertainment volunteer for the troops.

This is where Aphrodite introduces us to our second couple. Colette is an orphan from Belgium, her life ravaged by the war, who seeks solace in volunteering for others. She and Hazel become fast friends at the YMCA where they are stationed. They bond over their love of music and their frustration over the segregation among the soldiers. The girls are shocked that they are not even allowed to enter the colored camp, as Colette is a foreigner and Hazel comes from a very accepting family. But they soon find a way to get around the rule.

Aubrey is a jazz prodigy who has been dragged into a military band. When he hears Hazel playing piano one evening, he can’t help but sneak into the building, introduce himself, and sit down to play. And when Colette steps out of her room in nothing but a scandalous nightgown, everything is over for Aubrey. He returns night after night, after the girls’ supervisor has gone to bed, to play piano and win Colette’s heart. He has nearly succeeded when, after a horrifying incident with some Americans from another camp, he is forced to unexpectedly go on tour with the band. Because of the incident, he doesn’t feel that he can write to Colette, and she is left aching at his sudden disappearance.

With both couples separated, the novel twists and turns. The mortals are given small tastes of love as Aphrodite schemes to allow them to meet for a few days here and there. But the war breaks them all. No one escapes the pain of violence, racial oppression, and death. No one is left mentally, physically, or emotionally unscathed. But their love for each other, both romantically and as four friends, remains steadfast.

I laughed, I cried, and I read this book far too quickly. Then, for days afterward, I didn’t want to read anything else. It’s the next beautiful war novel that we’re going to recommend to all our friends and talk about for years. It’s the novel I didn’t know I was waiting for.

Hip-Hop Encore: ‘On the Come Up’ by Angie Thomas

By Former Lemurians

On February 5, 2019

In African-American, OZ: Young Adult Fiction

by Andrew Hedglin

Jackson native and best-selling young adult phenomenon Angie Thomas returns with the publication of her second novel, On the Come Up, today. It comes with a lot of expectations after the acclaim, success, and movie adaptation of her debut, The Hate U Give. I imagine that a lot of fans are torn about what they want: more of what they liked about her first book, but not the EXACT same thing. It’s a classic dilemma.

On the Come Up returns to Garden Heights, the same neighborhood from The Hate U Give. This story is set on the the other side of the neighborhood, however. The effects of the climax of the last book are still being felt. Khalil’s death awakens political sensibilities, but these characters didn’t know him personally.

The hero of the story is Bri Jackson, an aspiring rapper guided by her gangta Aunt Pooh, who fosters her dreams and ambitions, but has worries of her own. While biding her time to making it big, Bri buses to a creative arts magnet school in the tony Midtown neighborhood with her best friends, Malik, a budding activist, and Sonny, an excellent student torn between focusing on ACT prep and pursuing a mysterious but intriguing online relationship. Bri carries the mantle of her father, underground rap legend Lawless, who was murdered when she was a child. She lives with her mother Jayda, a recovering drug addict, and brother Trey, a snarky, egghead going through a post-graduate slump to help support the family.

One of the things that Thomas is so great at, both here and in her last book, is how she populates her books with believable, unique characters which make her communities seem real. I haven’t mentioned all the characters here (including one of my favorites), but they all contribute to the world-building Thomas excels at.

It’s good writing, period, but especially heartening for one of Thomas’s missions: for young black and people of color readers, it helps them see themselves reflected in media, and for white readers, it helps them see the very human side of a world they may only be familiar with from the news.

But Thomas can do more than just characters, she can set up a plot as well. Here, Bri recognizes the power of her prodigious hip-hop abilities, but the problem is, she isn’t sure what she wants with it. She wants to express herself and her world, but she is also chasing commercial success, because her family is facing real financial distress, the kind where the fridge is empty and the lights go off. When events keep casting her image as something different than what she is, she struggles to decide whether to lean in to it, or whether to break free.

There’s more to talk about, but I don’t think I need to go with the hard-sell here. Some people might like The Hate U Give more, but plenty of readers will find On the Come Up even better. If you liked the first book, you’ll like this one, too. I encourage you to experience On the Come Up for yourself.

Signed copies of On the Come Up are available from Lemuria online or in-store right now. Angie Thomas will be in Jackson on Thursday, February 28, at Belhaven University’s Center for the Arts for a ticketed event. Call Lemuria at 601-366-7619 or visit in store for details.

Southern secrets haunt ‘The Good Demon’ by Jimmy Cajoleas

By Former Lemurians

On September 18, 2018

In OZ: Young Adult Fiction

By Clara Martin. Special to the Clarion-Ledger Sunday print edition (September 16)

“And, soft as a moth wing, out slipped a torn scrap of paper that fluttered to the floor.
I picked it up. Scribbled in Her handwriting, all bubbly and little-girly, the way She made my hand move whenever She wanted to write something:

Be nice to him

June 20

Remember the stories.”

This is the first clue left behind by Clare’s demon in The Good Demon by Jimmy Cajoleas (Amulet Books). In an unnamed Southern town, Clare has been delivered from her demon by a preacher and his son. One month later, she finds messages hidden in old books she doesn’t remember taking to Uncle Mike’s Used and Collectible, the thrift shop in her town. Clare’s demon was her friend, and she’s doing anything she can to get Her back, even if it means befriending Roy, the boy who separated Clare from her demon in the first place. Their friendship will lead them to uncover other mysteries in their town, specifically regarding Uncle Mike’s missing daughter, Clea, and a wooden box filled with secrets worth $1000.

A spooky psychological thriller and mystery, Jimmy Cajoleas’ young adult novel debut will have readers on the edge of their seat. In The Good Demon, there is no doubt that Cajoleas is a powerhouse of a writer in this atmospheric novel with an undercurrent of fear and faith. Featuring three-dimensional characters who keep generations of secrets from each other, the reader isn’t quite sure who to trust. If you like to be scared in broad daylight, if you want original writing and the kind of quirky and complex characters who occupy the nooks and crannies of the South, then The Good Demon is for you.

Jimmy Cajoleas is originally from Jackson, Mississippi and graduated with an MFA from the University of Mississippi and now lives in New York. He will signing and reading The Good Demon at Lemuria on Wednesday, September 19 at 5 p.m.

Children’s Panel Preview for the 2018 Mississippi Book Festival

By Former Lemurians

On August 15, 2018

In Mississippi Book Festival, Oz: Children's Books, Oz: Middle Grade, OZ: Young Adult Fiction

On Saturday, August 18, 2018, don’t miss the Mississippi Book Festival downtown at the State Capitol. From fantastic picture books to young adult blockbusters, there are panels with authors who have written books for kids of all ages.

Here’s the roundup:

9:30 AM a.m. – Angie Thomas: Kidnote: Galloway Sanctuary
Presented by the Phil Hardin Foundation, the de Grummond Collection and the Fay B. Kaigler Children’s Book Festival

Angie Thomas, New York Times Bestselling author of the Black Lives Matter young adult novel The Hate U Give, will be speaking in the Galloway Sanctuary. The Hate U Give has been made into a film directed by George Tillman Jr., and is set to release October 19, 2018. Just three years ago in 2015, Angie Thomas announced at the first Mississippi Book Festival that she had just signed with her literary agent. For Thomas, so much has happened since then, and don’t miss the chance to hear one of the brightest literary stars speak right in her hometown of Jackson, Mississippi.

10:45 a.m. – Hope (Nation) and Other Four-Letter Words: Galloway Sanctuary
Presented by the James and Madeleine McMullan Family Foundation

Following Kidnote, this is a powerhouse panel filled with some of the biggest names in Young Adult Literature. Dr. Rose Brock, one of the founders of the North Texas Teen Book Festival, and editor of the collection of Young Adult short stories in the book Hope Nation will moderate.

Becky Albertalli: (Leah on the Offbeat) Albertalli is also the author of Simon and the Homosapiens Agenda, which you may know by the recent film, Love, Simon. Leah, Simon’s best friend, gets her own story.
Angie Thomas: (The Hate U Give) *see Kidnote!
Nicola Yoon: (The Sun is Also a Star) A love story that takes place in 24 hours, with two teens in New York City: one is doing everything she can to keep her family from being deported and other is about to have an interview for Yale to fulfill his family’s expectations. Yoon is also the author of Everything, Everything with a film by the same name.
Nic Stone: (Dear Martin) Following the lines between being black and white, Dear Martin is an incredible story of race, education, and the story of one Justyce McAllister, an honors student who gets put in handcuffs because he’s black, and who keeps a journal writing to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Julie Murphy: (Puddin’) The sequel to Murphy’s first novel, Dumplin’, which is so hilarious that I laughed hard enough to cry while reading it. The sequel does not disappoint.

12:00 p.m. – Picture This!: STATE CAPITOL ROOM 201 A
Presented by Sara and Bill Ray

Led by Ellen Ruffin, curator of the de Grummond Collection at the University of Southern Mississippi, this collection of children’s authors and illustrators celebrate the vital, enduring and delightful Picture Book – the gateway to literacy for all ages.

Picture books are NOT just books with pictures. They are interactive stories, histories, and an intricately interwoven book that must combine a visual and auditory form of reading—and keep the attention of small children!

This picture panel features THREE illustrators (Charles Waters, Don Tate, Sarah Jane Wright) and two collaborative projects. The first of the collaborative projects, Can I Touch Your Hair? Poems of Race, Mistakes, and Friendship is by Irene Latham and Charles Waters, who write letters back and forth between their fifth grade selves is a powerful look at race and friendship. In Lola Dutch, newcomers and husband and wife team Kenneth and Sarah Jane Wright, whose lively little girl character Lola Dutch (who is just TOO much) may just be the next Eloise (by Kay Thompson) or Madeline (by Ludwig Bemelmans). Then there are three phenomenal non-fiction picture books including two biographies, beginning with A Child’s Introduction to African American History by Jabari Asim to Alabama Spitfire: The Story of Harper Lee and To Kill a Mockingbird, by Bethany Hegedus, and Strong as Sandow: How Eugen Sandow Became the Strongest Man on Earth, by Don Tate (who also illustrated this biography!)

Jabari Asim: (A Child’s Introduction to African American History)
Bethany Hegedus: (Alabama Spitfire: The Story of Harper Lee and To Kill a Mockingbird)
Irene Latham and Charles Waters: (Can I Touch Your Hair? Poems of Race, Mistakes, and Friendship)
Don Tate: (Strong as Sandow: How Eugen Sandow Became the Strongest Man on Earth)
Kenneth and Sarah Jane Wright: (Lola Dutch)

1:30 p.m. – Meet Me in the Middle: STATE CAPITOL ROOM 201 A
Presented by the de Grummond Collection and the Fay B. Kaigler Children’s Book Festival

Moderated by yours truly, I’m excited to present some of the best middle grade books (for kids ages 8-12) published this year.

Lions and Liars is the funniest, laugh-out-loud story I’ve read for kids in a long time—think Holes meets summer camp gone wrong. The Parker Inheritance, is a mystery involving race, family, and the South that takes place over the course of several generations, culminating in present day Lambert, South Carolina. If Candice and the boy across the street can solve this mystery, they may be able to right an injustice done a long time ago. The Night Diary is a remarkable work of literary historical fiction featuring the 1947 partition of India and Pakistan where 12-year-old Nisha is half-Muslim and half-Hindu, and trying to find out where she belongs as her family flees the only home they’ve ever known. Charlotte Jones Voiklis is the granddaughter of Madeleine L’Engle (author of A Wrinkle in Time) and Voiklis’ biography of her grandmother, Becoming Madeleine, is truly a labor of love and a fascinating look at the young life of L’Engle, one of the first female science and fantasy writers for young readers, who left a huge legacy in children’s literature. In Ernestine, Catastrophe Queen, young Ernestine Montgomery is obsessed with the apocalypse, but instead of fighting off zombies, she uncovers a murder mystery in a grave-yard—think Harriet the Spy meets Coraline.

Kate Beasley: (Lions and Liars)
Varian Johnson: (The Parker Inheritance)
Veera Hiranandani: (The Night Diary)
Charlotte Jones Voiklis: (Becoming Madeleine: A Biography of the Author of A Wrinkle in Time by Her Granddaughters)
Merrill Wyatt: (Ernestine, Catastrophe Queen)

2:45 p.m. – Mississippi in the Middle: STATE CAPITOL ROOM 201 A
Presented by the de Grummond Collection and the Fay B. Kaigler Children’s Book Festival and University of Mississippi MFA Program

Augusta Scattergood, author of Glory Be, The Way to Stay in Destiny, and Making Friends with Billy Wong, will moderate this panel with authors who have Mississippi roots!

There’s a plethora of stories for kids set in the South, from Southern Gothic fairy tale (Goldeline) to a South Mississippi Electric Ghost Town and Walter Anderson-esque art mystery (Smack Dab in the Middle of Maybe), and in A Long Line of Cakes, Wiles returns to Aurora County—the setting of books by Wiles including Love, Ruby Lavender and Each Little Bird that Sings—where the Cakes are a rambunctious family who travel from town to town setting up bakeries until it is time to move again—until they move to Aurora County, where Emma Lane Cake meets Ruby Lavender who teaches her something about friendship. An in Jackson’s A Sky Full of Stars, readers will return to the same 1950s Mississippi found in Midnight Without a Moon, where Rose wrestles with her decision to stay in Mississippi, even after the murder of Emmett Till.

Jimmy Cajoleas: (Goldeline)
Jo Hackl: (Smack Dab in the Middle of Maybe)
Deborah Wiles: (A Long Line of Cakes)
Linda Williams Jackson: (A Sky Full of Stars)

An incredible literary event right here in the heart of Mississippi, don’t miss this year’s Mississippi Book Festival! Find out more information at msbookfestival.com

Author Q & A with Lauren Hill

By Former Lemurians

On June 11, 2018

In OZ: Young Adult Fiction

Lauren Hill was born in Jackson, Mississippi. She is sixteen years old and currently resides with her parents and older brother in Pearl, Mississippi.

Lauren Hill

Lauren enjoys creative writing including fictional short stories with inspirational outcomes, meaningful poetry, and beautiful essays. Lauren enjoys writing about important issues present in the world today. One of her stories has been published in mississippimatters.info

She wrote a collection of short stories called Standing Up with the Well Writers Guild, started by Joe Maxwell. To learn more about young writers publishing their own stories with the Well Writers Guild, Joe and Lauren signed books at Lemuria on June 11 and talked about their experience publishing together.

Joe Maxwell explains about the Guild: “The Well Writers Guild identifies talented young writers in the Jackson area and helps them advance their creative skills while enjoying peer interaction and experiencing the thrill of being published. Other youth have their “select” groups commensurate with with their high level of talent; young writers deserve this too.”

Maxwell continues, “Right now we’re mentoring 16 young people at my offices and in groups formed at the request of the Madison Public Library. After one year, our growth is truly humbling.”

Angie Thomas, author of The New York Times-bestselling young adult novel The Hate U Give, says “I wish I had had the chance to be a part of a group such as The Well Writers Guild! …. Joe Maxwell taught me in college writing classes and gave me great encouragement to pursue my goals. I still lean on Joe for advice and encouragement, and I am excited to support The Well Writers Guild on several levels.”

Tell me a little bit about your collection of short stories, called Standing Up.

Well, there are five short stories, all centered around important themes. The first story, “Standing Up,” is about bullying; the second story, “It’s All About Faith,” is about believing and having faith during difficult times, and the third story, “Every Step of the Way,” is focused on friendship and teenagers struggling to do the right thing, despite peer pressure. The fourth story is a personal memoir of mine, and it is about learning to resist fitting in if it means hurting others. The last story is centered around online safety and the consequences of making bad choices online.

You write about bullying, faith, changes in friendship, and making tough decisions at the risk of losing friends. What do you hope your readers will take-away from these kinds of stories?

Each story has its distinct theme that I want readers to be able to extract from them. However, the main point I really want to communicate is that doing what is right is the best choice to make in any situation.

What would you say to other young writers like yourself?

Never doubt yourself. With enough hard work and determination, you can accomplish anything, no matter how hard you may think the task is. You can do anything you put your mind to.

Make summer reading fun again

By Former Lemurians

On May 22, 2018

In Oz: Children's Books, Oz: Middle Grade, OZ: Young Adult Fiction, Reading

By Clara Martin. Special to the Clarion-Ledger Sunday print edition (May 20)

School’s out! But you’ve got a long summer reading list.

This summer, what’s the best thing you can let your child do? Let them read whatever they want to (within reason, of course–I’m not advocating that you let your child read Crime and Punishment or anything that’s not age-appropriate).

So, let me say it again. Let them read whatever they want to.

I can already hear you.

“Oh, but he won’t read that. It’s too many pages.”

“She only likes horse books.”

“But does it have AR points?”

“I want her to stop reading graphic novels.”

“I tired of Captain Underpants.”

Let me stop you right there.

The other thing you say is, “I just want my child to be a better reader,” or “I just want my child to love reading.”

Make summer reading fun again by letting your child choose what they want to read. When they choose what they read, reading becomes a normal part of your child’s day, so when they have to read a book required for school, it isn’t so much a chore.

A study by Scholastic shows 61 percent of students aged 15-17 do not read a book of their choice during school. Further, the study says the majority of kids ages 6-17 agree “it is very important for their future to be a good reader” (86 percent) and about six in 10 kids love or like reading books for fun (58 percent), a steady percentage since 2010.”

And in the same study, here’s what Scholastic discovered about the percentage of children who have trouble finding books they like to read:

“Parents underestimate the degree to which children have trouble books they like. Only 29 percent of parents agree ‘my child has trouble finding books he/she likes,” whereas 41 percent of kids agree that is a challenge–this percentage of kids increases to 57 percent among infrequent readers vs. 26 percent of frequent readers.”

childrens reading graph

From all of this information, we can see that:

It’s hard for children to find time to read a book of their choice independently during the school year.
Making time to read a book of choice is even more difficult the older the child gets.
About half of children have trouble finding books they like. This can lead to negative attitudes towards reading. Or, the child will just stop reading entirely, except when they are required to read for school.

So, how do we help a child find what they like to read? By giving them choices, and not limiting those choices. After all, there is no such thing as “too much reading.” If there is a graphic novel series with 100 books in the series, let them read the entire series. You can’t buy the entire series? There are libraries made for that specific purpose. Get a library card with your child this summer, and make it an adventure.

If the book is a non-fiction sports’ facts book with a lot of glossy pictures, such as Scholastic Year in Sports 2018, let them read that book. If your child will only sit down with magazines, then get them more magazines to read.

And if the book does not have horses? By talking to your librarian or bookseller, chances are, they can recommend similar books. That’s what they’re trained to do.

This summer, I’m encouraging you: forget about the points, forget about whether is is “on reading level,” and don’t worry if it looks like the only thing your child will read for the rest of his life are comic books. Maybe that’s all they’ll read for the rest of the summer, but guess what? It will set them on the path to being a reader for the rest of their life.

Oh, and as for Captain Underpants? The author of that series, Dav Pilkey, donated more than 3,000 books to children in the Hattiesburg school district in conjunction with the Fay B. Kaigler Children’s Book Festival. As Pilkey says, “Reading Gives You Superpowers,” and I couldn’t agree more.

Visit www.scholastic.com or www.readbrightly.com for more book suggestions for your child and resources for parents. Visit your local bookstore or library for suggestions and let librarians and booksellers help your child find a book they want to read this summer.

Clara Martin is the manager of the children’s book section (Oz Books) at Lemuria.

Cozy Books for a Cold Winter

By Former Lemurians

On January 15, 2018

In Fiction, OZ: Young Adult Fiction

by Trianne Harabedian

There are a lot of reasons for which I say that I’m blessed. But the most important reason is that when Jackson’s weather reached literal freezing temperatures a few weeks ago, I was in California visiting my family. Mid -70s, people. I know: you’re jealous. Anyway, even though Jackson weather has warmed up, it’s still pretty cold outside. So I’m sharing a few of my favorite cozy, wintertime, bundle-up-with-hot chocolate-and-a-quilt books!

olaf sun

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society
by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows

I’m not usually a fan of novels told through letters, but this book was surprisingly amazing. It’s the story of Juliet Ashton, a writer in search of her next topic, and her love affair with the island of Guernsey. Set in the years just after World War II, Juliet begins by corresponding with the island’s inhabitants and eventually comes to love them so much that she decides to visit. It’s one of those books that needs to be accompanied by a fireplace and a cup of tea–just make sure you can put the cup down while you laugh!

Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine
by Gail Honeyman

This is a more recent book, which came out in the middle of last year. Eleanor Oliphant lives a very structured, solitary life until she accidentally becomes friends with a coworker. As the book progresses, you realize Eleanor’s dry wit and attachment to routine stem from an inability to process tragedy. The sweet characters and gentle ways Honeyman deals with brokenness make this novel the perfect balance of cozy and serious.

The Hazel Wood
by Melissa Albert

This YA novel is coming out on January 30, but I got to read an advanced copy and loved it! A girl who cannot remember her past, a collection of twisted fairy tales authored by her grandmother, and an unpredictable adventure, this story goes a step beyond magical realism while staying grounded in a contemporary mindset. The old-world fairy tales and slightly dark storytelling style made me want to curl up in bed and just keep reading.

I Capture the Castle
by Dodie Smith

Written in the 1940s, this YA classic came recommended by a friend a few years ago, and I was instantly in love. Cassandra is a young girl whose family lives in relative poverty in a renovated castle. There’s her unproductive–novelist father, her flamboyant and nature-loving step-mother, her romantic sister, her logical brother, and the sentimental boy who has always lived with them. Add to the mix two handsome brothers–their new landlords–and you have a novel in which anything can happen. I reread this one over Christmas break and its delightful, old-fashioned nature was perfect for nights spent reading.

Category: OZ: Young Adult Fiction (Page 1 of 15)

Author Q & A with Brittney Morris

‘On the Come Up’ cements Angie Thomas’s powerful voice

Leaving Never Hurts as Much as Being Left Behind: Jeff Zentner’s ‘Rayne & Delilah’s Midnite Matinee’

Such Sweet Sorrow: ‘Lovely War’ by Julie Berry

Hip-Hop Encore: ‘On the Come Up’ by Angie Thomas

Southern secrets haunt ‘The Good Demon’ by Jimmy Cajoleas

Children’s Panel Preview for the 2018 Mississippi Book Festival

Author Q & A with Lauren Hill

Make summer reading fun again

Cozy Books for a Cold Winter

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