38:120 Goofballs #2: The Startling Story of the Stolen Statue by Tony Abbott

The Goofballs' school is getting ready to celebrate it's 100th anniversary with an assembly, special gifts, speeches...and a statue of the school's first principal.  But when the current principal goes to inspect everything a few hours before the assembly, he discovers the statue is missing!  He calls the Goofballs in to let them know that he appreciates the work he has done to get everything ready but that he will have to cancel.  Of course the Goofballs immediately go on the case but even when they find clues what do a broken pencil, a missing book, a skateboard, and a wet piece of paper lead to?  They'll have to figure it out quick to save the day this time!

Another cute little tale.  Again, these are based on action and humor not character development but that's appropriate for the target audience which they seem to please incredibly well going by the reaction of my 7yr old and they aren't too onerous for the adults who are commanded to read them either.

Page count: 102p/9,576p ytd/153,996p lifetime

37:120 Never After by Hamilton, Galenorn, Lui, & Shinn

A collection of four tales of magic, love, and matrimony by four bestselling authors.

Can He Bake a Cherry Pie? by Laurell K. Hamilton - Elinore has been promised into matrimony by her father to a perverted old man and she has decided to do the one thing she could think of to get out of the marriage...Go on a quest to free the captured Prince.  She will either die in the trying as so many others have done or free him and become his bride and Queen.  Either one will grant her escape from her "intended".  As she sets on her quest, she faces many trials and at the end the biggest one is dealing with pompous prince once he is found but in the end, she gets her greatest wish....freedom.

The Shadow of Mist by Yasmine Galenorn - Siobhan, the selkie, finally has everything she ever dreamed of. She is pregnant by the man she loves with a daughter and planning their nuptials.  Then with one phone call, it all comes crashing down around her as the life she had fled over a century ago has caught up to her and is threatening to kill her love and unborn child.  With no one else to turn to, she calls the D'Artigo sisters and in the process she learns more about her past than she ever could have guessed.

The Tangleroot Palace by Marjorie M. Liu - Sally's father, the King, is having difficulties along his border and has decided to fix it the only way he can by promising her in marriage to a powerful warlord who has a reputation for cruelty beyond measure.  To keep this from happening, she runs to the Tangleroot Palace, a wood filled with magic and danger after an evil Witch was imprisoned there in her own magic.  Before she can enter it, she finds a group of traveling entertainers who look after her and travel with her for a bit.  One, Mikel, is enchanting beyond what he can do with sleight of hand but she knows that there can be nothing between them and her father would kill Mikel if he suspected anything so she runs from that towards The Tangleroot Palace again.  There she confronts the Witch and her heart.  Maybe the Warlord wouldn't have been so bad after all?

The Wrong Bridegroom by Sharon Shinn - Princess Olivia has been betrothed to Harwin since they were children but as the time grows nearer, she finds that she cannot stand the thought of being married to plain and stoic Harwin so she convinces her father to find her another suitor.  The King holds a competition but two manage to win their way through every event: Harwin and the traveler boy with magic she has become infatuated with, Darius.  She is allowed to choose and picks Darius and is given a month to get to know her betrothed better but once they hit the road, she finds that Darius may be too much of what he seems and Harwin is not as bad as she once thought.

I was honestly amazed at how wonderful all these tales were.  I had never read anything by the later two authors although I have some of Ms. Liu's books on my to-read pile but I think I need to find Sharon Shinn as well.  A truly fabulous set of fantasy tales.

Page count: 393p/9,474p ytd/153,894p lifetime

36:120 Goofballs #1: The Crazy Case of the Missing Thunder by Tony Abbott

The first in a series about a group of kids who form the Goofball Private Eyes.  Together the four of them look for clues and solve mysteries.  Yes, they do have a dog who sometimes sniffs things out although I haven't read of him talking or getting Scooby-snacks yet.  They have just come off their biggest case yet by solving the mystery of the missing pizza when they get a call from the richest person in town about a new case.  When they arrive, they find out that his pony went missing that morning and the Goofballs are on the case!

It's another cute book by Tony Abbott.  Lots of fast paced action with humor liberally thrown in for the 7-9yr old set.  My 7yr old has declared that this is his favorite author ever and he must read everything by him and by extension, so must I.

Page count: 101p/9,081p ytd/153,501p lifetime

35:120 Frost Burned by Patricia Briggs

The 7th in the Mercy Thompson series.  Mercy has finally recovered from her honeymoon and is trying to settle into her most demanding role, that of step-mother to Jesse.  To this end, she has actually agreed to do Black Friday shopping which is something she would normally avoid like the plague but when driving to another store, she is hit with a wave of pain and almost passes out and ends up in a car accident.  When she recovers, she heads back to her shop to figure out transportation and finds Ben, a pack wolf, there and injured who tells her that the entire pack has been captured and he had barely managed to escape.  Now Mercy must figure out who has her husband and their pack and why and how much danger they are in, not just the pack but her and Jesse as well.  Can Mercy find them in time and what sort of shape will they be in? And are these new assassins that are after her part of the same plot or a new threat altogether?

Another incredible book by Ms. Briggs.  It's been two years since the last Mercy Thompson book and while I've read some of her other books in the interim, I just love Mercy and have really missed her stories.  This is another can't miss in the Urban Fantasy field!

Page count: 343p/8,980p ytd/153,400p lifetime

34:120 The Girl Who Ruled Fairyland - For a Little While by Catherynne Valente

A prequel to The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making but one that really should be read after you read that book first.  In this book we find Mallow, a magician residing outside a small village in Fairyland.  She's a practical girl and does practical magic and while she would like to learn some other types of magic, that hasn't happened yet but she will trade with the villagers for interesting books.    It's the story of how this very practical girl ends up as Queen Mallow whom everyone loved.

A charming tale in a beautifully imaginative land.  I hope that there are more of these that tell us more about Mallow's time as Queen.

Page count: 33p/8,637p ytd/153,057p lifetime

33:120 Midnight Blue-Light Special by Seanan McGuire

The 2nd book in the Incryptid series.  Verity's sometime boyfriend and Covenant of St. George member, Dominic, has just informed her that more senior members of the Covenant are being sent to NY to check on his work and to determine if the city is right for a purging.  Verity must now place herself and her friends on the line in order to save the Cryptid population from complete and total destruction, all while being unsure which side of things Dominic comes down on.  To make matter more complicated, when the Covenant members show up, one is Verity's cousin from the branch of the family that stayed with the Covenant and considers the rest traitors.  With almost no family in town, can Verity keep those under her protection safe from harm or at least slow down the Covenant long enough to get them all to safety or has she finally been outgunned?

I really like Verity and the Aeslin Mice.  OMG!  The Aeslin Mice which are just too awesome for words.  I like the Price family in general.  The one thing I was sad to see what the lack of her dance career as that has now fallen by the wayside as her dedication to the Cryptid population has soared.  It was one of the things that made her truly unique both in her family and simply in the Urban Fantasy genre.  I understand the reasoning for it but I was still sad to see it go.  It will be interesting to see how things go with the next two books as those will be from Alex's POV although I'm hoping that just because they will focus on a different main character with a different voice doesn't mean that we won't still see Verity.

Page count: 353p/8,604p ytd/153,024p  lifetime

32:120 Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse

Kid book club.  A series of poems written by a young girl in Oklahoma during the Dust Bowl.  The family farm is failing due to the dust storms and then an accident kills her mother and unborn baby brother and leaves her hands so scarred that her only source of comfort, playing the piano, is lost to her as is her father after the tragedy.  It's her story of the aftermath and moving forward.

I can see why it won so many awards but the style didn't appeal to me and I found the entire thing bleak and depressing.  I've read books about Jews in Nazi Germany that were more lighthearted and hopeful than this one but I will admit that it captured the mood masterfully.

Page count: 227p/8,251p ytd/152,671p lifetime