Poetry, Ghosts, Storytelling, and a Mystery!

   I wanted to share some of my favorite books from when I was younger with you guys. The first is three different books but all by the same author. Shel Silverstein. I loved his poems then and looking back at some of them now, they are a lot more deep then I understood. I guess that's why everyone loves his poetry. They have a little something for everyone.

     The second book I want to share with you is Time for Andrew by Mary Downing Hahn. It's a ghost story about a boy named Andrew who meets a ghost that looks identical from him but is from long ago. I do not know how I came upon this book but I can still remember the story so vividly. It is one of my favorite books - now if I could only get my hands on a copy of my own!

     The third book I read in the summer between 7th and 8th grade. I'm going to share what Goodreads says about this book "As Sal entertains her grandparents with Phoebe's outrageous story, her own story begins to unfold — the story of a thirteen-year-old girl whose only wish is to be reunited with her missing mother.

    In her own award-winning style, Sharon Creech intricately weaves together two tales, one funny, one bittersweet, to create a heartwarming, compelling, and utterly moving story of love, loss, and the complexity of human emotion. "

    The fourth book I want to show you is a series. I started it when I was in middle school and about half way through high school I stopped reading the series for some reason or another. When I went to college I tried to find the rest of the series. I just had 5 or 6 more books to read but I couldn't find them anywhere. So I wrote the author and told her how I started the series in middle school and I couldn't get it off my mind. I needed to finish it. I told her I've looked in all my local bookstores in my college town and my hometown and couldn't find them. I wanted to know if she could point me in the right direction. I figured the author has to know where they were being sold right? Let me point out that amazon wasn't as huge then and I couldn't find more then one book on there. I figured nothing would come of the letter. However, two or three months later I got a package from her publisher with the rest of the series!! I jumped up and down and freaked out. Everyone thought I was completely insane. Here I was in college studying to become a social worker and freaking out over middle grade books. Needless to say I didn't have a lot of bookworm friends in college. Thank goodness I got the books on a Thursday because I only had to get through one more day of classes and I could BINGE. Which I did. Anyway, I've done nothing but gush about this series without telling you what it is, Replica by Marilyn Kaye, and what it is about. It is about 12 year old girl named Amy. Her life seems perfectly normal until one day she all of a sudden has a crescent shaped birth mark, someone is following her and taking pictures, and her mom starts acting weird. To top it off she starts getting anonymous letters telling her to keep all her talents a secret. I can't say much more then that but I love the series!

     I've read a ton of books over the years but these were my favorites going in to college. Share with me your favorite childhood book or books below!