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Geeks and the Holy Grail (Camelot Code #2), by Mari Mancusi, for Timeslip Tuesday

The first book in the Camelot Code series, The Once and Future Geek , mixed time travel between the medieval world of King Arthur and our own, and it is a very entertaining book.  The second book in the series, Geeks and Holy Grail (Hyperion, October 2019), is also entertaining (though not quite as funny; King Arthur as a modern day high school student is hard to beat....). When Morgana, sworn enemy of King Arthur, attacks the druids of Avalon, Nimue, the youngest of them, takes the Holy Grail and runs with it.  King Arthur is dying, and only the Grail can save him.  Desperate to keep it from falling into Morgana's hands, she stumbles into Merlin's Crystal Cave.  But instead of Merlin there to help her (he's on vacation in Los Vegas, in our time), there's only his very inexperienced apprentice, Emrys.  His attempt to hide the grail works, in a sense--as a small, flatulent dragon, it sure doesn't look much like a grail.  But it isn't much use to Arthur as a...
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The Secret

The Secret

The Obsidian Compass (Time Castaways #2), by Liesl Shurtliff, for Time Slip Tuesday

The Obsidian Compass, by Liesl Shurtliff (middle grade, Katherine Tegan Books, Oct 2019) continues the time travelling adventures of three siblings adventuring through time that began with The Mona Lisa Key (link goes to my review).  That first book ended with Mateo, Ruby, and Corey getting home again safely, after many dangerous and difficulties aboard a time travelling ship captained by a ruthless man who was trying to use Matteo, in particular, for his own selfish purposes. But getting home safe wasn't to be the end of their time travelling.  Mateo needs to find his friend, Jia, one of Captain Vincent's crew, who was in danger of being dumped somewhere in time by the captain after she crossed him to help Mateo and his siblings.  Captain Vincent still has the obsidian compass that allows him to time travel, so Mateo decides to try to make his own, and against all odds, he succeeds.  But when he starts using it, he gets his family snarled anew in danger.

As they journey through time and space (in an old VW minibus), Mat realizes that saving Jia isn't enough; Captain Vincent needs to be stripped of his power in order for Matt's family to be safe.  Family secrets are revealed that make Matt question his relationship with his mother in particular--she once controlled the obsidian compass, with Vincent as her partner, and before she even adopted him, she knew a Mateo would play a role in the quest for something even more valuable than time travel--the promise of eternal life....

Parents are often missing in middle grade fantasy, so it's a change that both of Matt's parents are along for the adventure, and care deeply about keeping him and his siblings safe.  The twist about his mother's past, though, keeps her from smothering her son's adventures...instead, the reader, and Matt himself, aren't always sure about her motivations.....

There's not as much wild time travel bouncing from place to place here as there was in the first book--the plot hones in much more sharply on Matt's journey of discovery, and the choices he has to make.  There's still plenty of excitement, though, and an entertaining cast of supporting characters helps make the pages turn quickly.  The final third of the book, especially, is fast reading!

Unanswered questions remain, leaving readers anxious for book three!

short answer--not entirely my cup of tea, but I enjoyed this one more than the first book--I liked that there was more focus on character, and less galivanting....

I'm counting this one as a diverse fantasy--Mateo is adopted from Columbia.


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Dead Voices, by Katherine Arden

Dead Voices , by Katherine Arden (middle grade, G.P. Putnam's Sons, August 2019), is a delightfully spooky sequel to Small Spaces , perfect for a chilling read as winter draws closer! Ollie, Coco, and Brian became close friends under somewhat trying circumstances last fall--the evil Smiling Man trying to turn them into scarecrows--and now winter has come, they're on their way to a fun weekend at a new ski lodge with Ollie's dad and Coco's mom.  They almost don't make it through the intense snowstorm, and when they arrive, they find themselves the only visitors.  The snow keeps falling, trapping them inside, and the power goes out.  And there are ghosts. The day after they arrive another visiter makes it through the snow, a young reporter for a ghost hunting magazine.  The owners of the hotel aren't sure that publicity about the hotel's previous incarnation of an orphanage with a dark, sad, history is what they want, but the young man is keen to get ghost hun...
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Premeditated

I'm going to start with the blurb from the back cover of this book, because it does a remarkable job of introducing the story in very few words: A week ago, Dinah’s cousin Claire cut her wrists. Five days ago, Dinah found Claire’s diary and discovered why. Three days ago, Dinah stopped crying and came up with a plan. Two days ago, she ditched her piercings and bleached the black dye from her hair. Yesterday, knee socks and uniform plaid became a predator’s camouflage. Today, she’ll find the boy who broke Claire. By tomorrow, he’ll wish he were dead. Claire and Dinah are cousins who are incredibly close, close enough that when Claire ends up in a coma in the hospital from a failed suicide attempt, Dinah knows where to look to find Claire's diary (or the computerized version of one, anyway). Dinah figures out what drove Claire to the point of suicide--a boy from the private school that Claire was supposed to attend that fall. Dinah enrolls at the school herself, determined to get...
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Storm

By: D.J. MacHale This is the sequel to SYLO where a small island off the coast of Maine was invaded by the US Navy (the US navy is called SYLO).  The main characters, Tucker, Kent, Olivia, and Tori escaped from Pemberwick and got to Portland, Maine.  In Storm they pick up another character, Jon, a doctor from a Portland hospital.  As it turns out the US Navy is at war with the US Airforce.  Over three fourths of the worlds population is dead.  Tucker, Tori, Kent, Olivia, and, Jon are trying to get to Nevada where a radio signal they picked up said to come if they wanted to fight back.  There is a lot of action and the plot moves along at a good pace.  One thing that was different from the first book was how much you found out about their relationships.  Kent is with Olivia and Tucker is with Tori.  It sort of bothered me that they were so into who was with who when they were trying to figure out why most of the world's population was killed. ...
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