Two new reads for November

I recently read two new YA books that will appeal to several middle schoolers.

Veronica Goldbach's debut novel Deep in the Heart of High School combines realism and romance to produce something most middle schoolers will identify with. Although I wouldn't consider it "chick-lit," the three main characters are girls (and the cover photograph, focusing on a girl's pink tee shirt, isn't going to attract many male readers, either). Three girls from very different families in San Antonio come together in the high school band and deal with their family and boy troubles together. Vanna is a recent transplant from Plano, and is dealing with meeting new friends and her parent's recent divorce. She has a very difficult relationship with her father, who left the family for another woman. Olivia is dealing with her father's death and tries to be the perfect daughter and sister, a task that isn't always easy, to make life better and easier for her mom. Fatima, my favorite character, tries to be the peacekeeper in her large family. Her sister has left home and is now a single mom, causing a huge split in the family, and Fatima is dealing with weight issues. She is in love with Carlos, but soon realizes that her best friend from childhood, Alex, may be more than a friend. A great portrait of the melting pot that is San Antonio and of the complexities and issues of high school, middle school readers (especially females) will find something to like in this novel.



Veteran mystery writer Caroline Cooney's latest mystery, If the Witness Lied, follows the lives of four siblings who are dealing with the tremendous loss of their parents. As the story unfolds, the reader finds out through flashbacks why teenager Jack is taking care of three year old brother Tris, why sisters Smithy and Madison are living away from home, and why the four children have no parents. When their mother decided to choose carrying her fourth pregnancy (Tris) to term instead of taking treatment for cancer, the media got involved and the family found itself in the middle of a media controversy. After their mother died, their father was killed in a freak accident in which Tris is blamed for releasing the brake of his father's Jeep, which in turn hit and killed him. The kids' aunt moves in with them, and when she gets a reality television show deal, focusing on Tris who is to blame for both parents' deaths, the siblings come together to fight back. In the process, they find out what really happened to their father. The book is a pageturner and any Cooney fan won't be disappointed.