Luckily for me, we got a cart full of new books a week before winter break so I had many interesting new titles to choose from. The first book I read was Red Thread Sisters. This is a book about two friends, who are more like sisters, that have grown up in a Chinese orphanage. They are both getting older and the chance of adoption is getting smaller. However, when Wen gets adopted by a wonderful family she promises Shu Ling that she will find a family for her in America. This is an interesting book about adoption and assimilation into American culture, but it is most importantly a beautiful book about friendship. 
The next book I read was The Raft by S.A. Bodeen (author of one of my favorites, The Compound). I don't want to give too much of this one away but this was a thrilling book about a girl who finds herself in a yellow inflatable raft after her plane crashes somewhere outside of the Pacific islands. Ms. Spiering, an already very nervous flyer, made the mistake of reading this one on a plane on her way to Denver. However, I loved this story and the ending will surprise you!
The last book I read was Fire in the Streets by Kekla Magoon. This book features Maxie, a passionate teenager who is fiercely loyal to the Civil Rights Movement. She desperately wants to be accepted by the Black Panthers that she has begun to work with, in the same way that her older brother has been. Her friends don't understand why it is so important to her and why she doesn't want to go to school and be a normal kid. This is excellent historical fiction and it really made me want to read Magoon's prior novel The Rock and the River (winner of the Coretta Scott King Award) that takes place during the same period.Needless to say, I read three really great books over break. (I read some that were not so great too, but it is my personal blog policy not to be too hard on books--they are not always for everyone!) You can find these books on the New Books shelf.
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