Trials of the Trash ~ Review

Trials of the Trash
Janitors School of Garbage #2

By Tyler Whitesides

Landon Murphy and Jade Shu are in the middle of their parents' wedding ceremony when a couple of Thingamajunks crash and trash the event. Yikes! Now, this twosome must protect their loved ones and battle anew against the force of evil garabage.

This is the second book in the Janitors School of Garbage series. While this magical world of garbage and garbage monsters isn't my normal cup of tea, it is a delightful adventure for its target audience: middle-school readers. I mean, what self-respecting tween, who craves adventure, wouldn't want to battle the evil forces of garbage. Force intent on crashing important events.

This is a war with garbage when the evil Locksmith forces the Thingamajunks into these acts of destruction. Landon and Jade must join forces with their friends and mentors if they hope to win.

Despite revolving around a world of trash, this is a clean read. No naughty language or parental disrespect just adventurous fun in this middle-grade fantasy.

I was provided a complimentary copy of thid book with no expectations but that I provide my honest opinion, All thoughts expressed are my own. 

About the Book:

Three young garbologists must defend the world from new magical trash creations.

Landon Murphy never imagined he would spend his summer battling the animated trash monster known as the Megalajunk, and he is eager to continue studying from the wizard-like janitors at the School of Garbage. He’ll need to improve his skills with magical pushbrooms and plungers now that the Thingamajunks have gone rogue.

When two Thingamajunks show up at Landon’s mother’s wedding, Landon is desperate to save his family. Using the lock he kept after defeating the Megalajunk, Landon accidentally triggers his own temporary transformation into the trash leviathan.

Now, he and his stepsister, Jade Shu, must team up again with Sabra, Dr. Bernard Weizmann, and Daisy Gates to figure out why the Thingamajunks are popping up to ruin parties, weddings, concerts, and other celebrations. Landon suspects the Locksmith is behind the attacks, but information about the mysterious figure is scarce.

The questions continue to pile up, but one thing is certain: War is coming to the landfill, and Landon, Jade, and Sabra will need all their courage, creativity, and focus to lay a trap for the Thingamajunks—before it’s too late.

The Paper Daughters of Chinatown: Adapted for Young Readers ~ Review

The Paper Daughters of Chinatown

Adapted for Young Readers

By Heather B. Moore

 and Allison Hong Merrill

This is a story of survival and even triumph. Tai Choi was supposed to live a life of privilege, but instead, she was treated little better than an unwanted piece of livestock to be bartered off to the highest bidder when no longer needed. For all intents, she was a slave in a land that had abolished slavery. But for Tai Choi, and hundreds if not thousands, slavery was very much alive in America. 

The Paper Daughters of Chinatown is written for young readers, so more graphic content is removed but eluded to. This is based on true-life events and is handled sensitively in an age-appropriate manner. Yet the underlying feeling is left intact - helplessness and being at the mercy of those who care little for you beyond the work required. 

Tai Choi was sold by her father for gambling debts and forced to assume a new identity - Tien Fu Wu, and, worse, warned away from the very people who sought to help her. When she escaped this life she had to learn to trust those who had aided her. With time, she and Dolly Cameron would forge a friendship and take on the work together of helping to rescue others caught in the life that had stolen so much from Tien Fu Wu. It wasn't an easy life, but it was a worthy one born from experience and caring, and on the friendship forged between two very different women.

This is a look at American history that is little known to most. A dirty little secret that has been swept away like a pile of dust hidden beneath a rug. The author expertly crafted this story for children to experience this travesty while only alluding to the darker parts. Historical fact-based fiction isn't always pretty, but this is a story of triumph and overcoming evil. I would recommend this for those looking for a historical fiction title for a book report. This is a title for middle-grade readers and up.

I was provided a complimentary copy of this book with no expectations but that I provide my honest opinion. All thoughts expressed are my own.

About the Book:

Based on the true story of two friends who unite to help rescue immigrant 

women and girls in San Francisco’s Chinatown in the late 1890s.

When Tai Choi leaves her home in the Zhejiang province of China, she believes it’s to visit her grandmother. But despite her mother’s opposition, her father has sold her to pay his gambling debts. Alone and afraid, Tai Choi is put on a ship headed for “Gold Mountain” (San Francisco). When she arrives, she’s forced to go by the name on her forged papers: Tien Fu Wu.

Her new life as a servant is hard. She is told to stay hidden, stay silent, and perform an endless list of chores, or she will be punished or sold again. If she is to survive, Tien Fu must persevere, and learn who to trust. Her life changes when she’s rescued by the women at the Occidental Mission Home for Girls.

When Dolly Cameron arrives in San Francisco to teach sewing at the mission home, she meets Tien Fu, who is willful, defiant, and unwilling to trust anyone. Dolly quickly learns that all the girls at the home were freed from servitude and maltreatment, and enthusiastically accepts a role in rescuing more.

Despite challenges, Dolly and Tien Fu forge a powerful friendship as they mentor and help those in the mission home and work to win the freedom of enslaved immigrant women and girls.

Graysen Foxx and the Treasure of Principal Redbeard ~ Review

Graysen Foxx and the Treasure of Principal Redbeard

Grayson Foxx #1

By J. Scott Savage

First off let me say that this book is written for Middle Grade readers but adults will enjoy references to their growing up years. This book is just too funny in places - at one point in his archeological endeavors Gray comes across an old form of writing that may be hieroglyphics, a series of squiggles and swirles that upon closer inspection was cursive writing. 

This isn't a book of bathroom humor to entertain kids but honest to goodness funny situations all set in elementary school with a flair of the dramatic as Gray and his friends search out lost treasures that may be found on the school's grounds. And the greatest treasure is that of Principal Redbeard who confiscated toys and whatnot from students years, and years, ago and at an abrupt dismissal never returned the items to the students.

Everything isn't totally fun and games as Grey has to deal with bullies, but there are lessons to be had as his kindness, care, and concern of his fellow students help them overcome together. 

I highly recommend this book as clean reading fun that also offers a few valuable insights into life at the same time. I have no qualms or concerns in doing so. Yes, some of this situations in regards to the treasure hunting are highly unlikely but they are just catalysts to the adventure portion of the story. 

I was provided a complimentary copy of this book with no expectations but that I provide my honest opinion. All thoughts expressed are my own.

About the Book:

Join Graysen Foxx on a wild, treasure-hunting adventure!

Ordinary Elementary is anything but ordinary. Below the classrooms are winding, abandoned, underground passages filled with lost treasures. Fifth-grader Graysen Foxx, aka The Gray Fox—finder of secrets, solver of mysteries, and explorer of the unknown—is hot on the trail of the legendary treasure of Principal Redbeard, which includes decades of confiscated gadgets, rare comic books, first-edition Pokémon trading cards, an original Rubik’s Cube, and a retro handheld video game.

Graysen is determined to find the treasure and share it with his fellow students. His nemesis, Raven Ransom—nicknamed “Red Raven”—plans to stop him and claim the prizes for herself, just like she did with the game-winning home run kickball everyone thought was lost on the roof of the school.

Wearing his adventurer-iconic fedora, journaling in his field notebook, and wielding his elastic stretchy hand, Graysen is ready for action. But can he avoid the second-grade spy network working for Raven? Could the third-grade twins, Maya and Jack, give him an advantage? Can he avoid the ruthless sixth graders while trying to protect the innocent first graders? And who is the mysterious Midnight Moth who is leaving cryptic notes and riddles?

It's a battle between courage and cunning, smarts and shrewdness, charity and cheating. With the treasure on the line, can Graysen trust his rival—or is it just another one of her traps? May the best treasure hunter win!

The Oasis King ~ Review

The Oasis King

The Oasis Chronicles #1

By Mark David Pullen

The Oasis King is an interesting book that should appeal to middle-grade readers. Dylan, Jack, and Tripp are cousins who are about to have an adventure that takes them to a new and unknown world. But what they discover is something they never imagined - a lost world with strange and unfamiliar creatures. There are dangers they must confront, and a stranger who has dogs with him offers the cousins protection.

This is the first book in a new series that has fantastical elements to it that are best explored first-hand as a reader. What Dylan, Jack, and Tripp experience takes place over several days, and some of their "adventures" will boggle the mind. There are elements of danger and excitement but nothing too scary. Like all good Fantasy Adventures, there are a few fights for survival that will appeal to younger readers. While parents will appreciate the lack of graphic violence. 

This is one vacation that won't be forgotten anytime soon. Now the cousins just need to find a way home, if there is one to find. Get ready to explore the Oasis while you can. 

In my opinion, this book would be of greatest appeal to fourth to sixth-graders who enjoy survival-type adventure books. Would also be a good-read-aloud family story-time book.

I was provided a complimentary copy of this book with no expectations, but that I provide my honest opinion. All thoughts expressed are my own.

About the Book:

Dylan, Jack, and Tripp are looking for adventure, but when they find an entryway into a magical land, plagued by the malevolent Stranger, the cost of their new, exciting journey might prove to be too much.

While on vacation at their grandmother’s farm, cousins Dylan, Jack, and Tripp learn of a long kept family secret and the power of wishing on a star. The boys are swept away to the Valley of the Oasis—a strange, primal paradise where monsters and danger lurk around every turn. They find refuge with a lone hunter and his dogs, who have lost track of time and appear trapped in this magical land.

But the hunter and his dogs cannot rest for long. He is pursued by the Stranger, a strange green-skinned being from another time and place who also seeks to escape the Valley of the Oasis. As they narrowly escape the Stranger’s attacks, the boys worry that they, too, are trapped with no way home. Will the hunter protect the boys and send them home in time before the Stranger closes in once and for all?

The Oasis King is the first in a series of action-adventure tales for younger readers who seek new lands, heart-racing challenges, and unexpected twists.

160 pages, Paperback 
Published February 28, 2022