Middle Reader Books
‘Read at Your Own Risk’ by Remy Lai
‘Read at Your Own Risk’ spine-chilling illustrated sketch diary of a girl who is being haunted after a game goes terribly wrong and an evil spirit starts conversing with her on the page – perfect for fans of R.L. Stine and Steven Seagle’s Camp Midnight.
Hannah and her friends were just having a bit of fun when they decided to play a game to communicate with spirits of the dead. Little did they know something would answer their call and crawl its way into the pages of Hannah’s journal. What started out as a game has turned into something much more evil. With dire, horrifying consequences.
Is there any way to escape the curse?
‘The Last Dragon on Mars’ by Scott Reintgen
Keep your eyes down and your feet moving, or this planet will rust you.
That’s what Lunar Jones tells the other kids at the relocation clinic. All of them were born on Mars, a planet that never wanted people in the first place. With resources scarce and hope even scarcer, it’s easy to get distracted looking up. After all, their ancestors descended from the stars.
Martian history always starts with Earth. The first astronauts discovered that space was already occupied. Not by little green men or flying saucers. It was full of dragons. One for every moon, every planet, every star. When humanity discovered that Earth’s dragon had sacrificed herself to make their home planet habitable, they set their sights on Mars. If one dead dragon could breathe life into a world, why not create another one? Mankind won the war that followed, but with one catch. As the dragon died, he whispered a curse over Mars. The first settlers found their crops wouldn’t grow. Animals hunted them. Storms raged endlessly. It took three generations to figure out the truth: Mars was doomed.
Lunar knows all the old stories about dragons and space, but no one up there’s planning to help him or his crew. Instead, he focuses on scrapping valuable gear that the storms uncover in the war zone. Until one day, a salvaging run goes wrong. Desperate to find shelter, Lunar goes underground in a restricted zone. What he finds there, buried in the Martian dust, might just be the only hope left for a dying planet.
‘Uprooted’ by Ruth Chan
‘Uprooted’ is a graphic memoir about one girl being uprooted when she moves to Hong Kong, a place where her family fits in but, for her, it’s nothing like home.
Ruth Chan loves her hometown in Toronto, hanging out with her best friends for life, and snacking on ketchup flavoured potato chips, which are the best. What Ruth doesn’t love is having to move to Hong Kong after her Dad gets a new job there.
Her Mum is excited to reunite with her family, but it’s not the same for Ruth. In Hong Kong, her classes are harder, her Cantonese isn’t good enough, and her parents are never around. Ruth feels lonely and completely uprooted.
But as Ruth’s Dad tells stories about her family, about how they relied on their strength, courage and each other to survive the most difficult times, Ruth realises that she too can be strong. Gradually, she puts down roots, knowing that home will always be where her heart is.
‘The Village Beyond the Mist’ by Sachiko Kashiwaba
Lina’s father had suggested she go “someplace different” for the summer, so she embarked on a solo train journey to spend the summer in a rural village. However, once she arrived, she began to wish she hadn’t listened. She could be at her Grandma’s house in Nagano now, instead of trudging through a forest in search of a town that might not even exist.
But when a gust of wind carries off her umbrella, it leads Lina down a secret path between the trees to a strange and incredible world. In the hidden village of Misty Valley, centaurs roam the cobblestone streets and gnomes visit shops stuffed with spellbooks and enchanted desserts. All magic has a dark side, though, and sometimes even sorcerers need a human’s helping hand. As Lina adapts to her new responsibilities around town, she learns more about friendship and herself than she previously thought possible.
This timeless and enduring Japanese classic from 1975 is available for the first time to English-speaking readers and is certain to delight all who open its pages to take a read.
‘My Strange Shrinking Parents’ by Zeno Sworder
It goes without saying that all children believe their parents to be strange. Mine were unusual for a different reason …
One boy’s parents travel from far-off lands to improve their son’s life. But what happens next is unexpected. What does it mean when your parents are different? What shape does love take? And what happens when your parents sacrifice a part of themselves for you?
In this heartbreaking and heartwarming story, Zeno Sworder reflects on his own migrant parents’ sacrifices to create a universal story about what it means to give to those you love. Drawing from the sacrifices his Chinese mother made to raise her young family in a small country town, Sworder’s drawings are full of beautiful detail and fairytale settings that explore his own journey from child to parent.
With humour and pathos, Sworder reflects on the strange nature of giving and receiving love and celebrates those parents who embrace a hard life for themselves in the hope of a better life for their children. Full of depth and generosity as well as insight and candour, Sworder brings this gorgeous fable to life.
‘The Mona Lisa Vanishes’ by Nicholas Day
This is the true story of how Leonardo da Vinci’s masterpiece, the Mona Lisa, became the most famous painting in the world after being stolen from the Louvre.
On a hot August day in Paris, just over a century ago, a desperate guard burst into the office of the director of the Louvre and shouted, “La Joconde, c’est partie!” (“The Mona Lisa, she’s gone!”)
No one knew who was behind the heist. Was it an international gang of thieves? Was it an art-hungry American millionaire? Was it the young Spanish painter Pablo Picasso, who was about to remake the very art of painting?
Travel back to an extraordinary period of revolutionary change: turn-of-the-century Paris. Walk its backstreets. Meet the infamous thieves – and detectives – of the era. And then slip back further in time and follow Leonardo da Vinci, painter of the Mona Lisa, through his dazzling, wondrously weird life. Discover the secret at the heart of the Mona Lisa … that the most famous painting in the world should never have existed at all.