I’m pretty sure I’ll never run out of stuff to read since my bedside stacks are always toppling over.

Lucky me…

So, as always, I read a lot this summer and nothing was more fun than the books written by friends…

Here were some of my faves:

Eternal is Cynthia Leitich Smith’s second gothic fantasy novel (the first was Tantalize). It tells the tale of a teenager moving into the realm of Dracul and, subsequently, her own power. And, at the same time, we’re introduced to the girl’s love-struck and slightly bumbling guardian angel. Whoa, boy, this is one to rip through!

I’ve always been such a stodg with my "I like realistic fiction"  hoo-ha, but I’m thinking of changing my tune because this was some seriously gruesome fun. I love the cover, I love the alternating viewpoints, and I love being totally shocked at the end of a good book!

P.J. Hoover’s The Emerald Tablet  puts the final nail in my "only realistic fiction" coffin. Mercy, gals, you can create some crazy worlds! Love the tele-this and tele-that used by our hero to get stuff done, love the Hogwartsian school setting and love the fact that this is just number one in a trilogy! Bring it on!!

The Day-Glo Brothers is just the first of many impeccably researched biographies Chris Barton is going to bring to young readers some day. And thank goodness for that, because this book is so interesting and so charming and so gosh-darn poppy-hipster looking that it just made me wish I could hang out with Bob and Joe Switzer — the guys who invented Day-Glo. And I think that’s what a good biography’s supposed to do. Since I can’t, I’m just awfully grateful I get to occasionally hang out with Chris!

I really, really, really loved Linda Urban’s first novel, A Crooked Kind of Perfect, and dang if I didn’t love her first picture book just as much. I loved it because the text is so lyrical and so funny at the same time, I loved it because Henry Cole’s art is clean and simple but sooooo expressive, and I loved it because the message to kids is so spot-on. But I mostly loved it because Mouse reminds me eversomuch of my very own Small One, in looks and sensibility, and it’s good to see her getting her day in the sun. So to speak.

Me with You is Kristy Dempsey’s first picture book but there are more on the way and it’s no wonder. That girl can rhyme, I tell you. This is just exactly the kind of book I read to my girls over and over and over again in the rocking chair when they were wee. And the only thing that makes me mad about it is that it wasn’t available then! The lyrics, dreamy… the message, dreamy… and that bear pair? Dreamy, dreamy, dreamy…

What an abundance of riches!
More tomorrow, ya’ll…