A Look Back at 2018

WOW! 2019 will be my 9th year blogging at The Children's War and I have to be honest, I didn't think it would last so long. I've had lots of fun over the last 9 years, reading and participating in different bookish events. And each year, I am surprised at the number of new books published for young readers about WWI and WWII. This year, for the first time, I've picked 10 of my 2018 favorites, chosen because each offers a unique window into little known events and/or a great story:

Here are the links to my reviews of each book:

The Book of Pearl by Timothée de Fombelle

Jazz Owls: A Novel about the Zoot Suit Riots by Margarita Engle

The Prisoner in the Castle (Maggie Hope Mystery #8) by Susan Elia MacNeal

Skylark and Wallcreeper by Anne O'Brien Carelli

Thirty Minutes Over Oregon: A Japanese Pilot's World War II Story by Marc Tyler Nobleman

Lifeboat 12 by Susan Hood

Island War by Patricia Reilly Giff

A Kingdom Falls (Book Three of the Ravenmaster Trilogy) by John Owen Theobald

The Faithful Spy: Dietrich Bonhoeffer and the Plot to Kill Hitler by John Hendrix

Skyward: The Story of Female Pilots in World War II by Sally Deng



My Kiddo has been home since Thanksgiving Day for an extended visit and it has been so much fun having her here. She's just waiting for her visa now and then she's going back to China to teach sometime this month. Meanwhile, we've been doing lots of things together, which is one of the reasons I haven't been around so much lately (but I have been reading):

At Rockefeller Center to see the Christmas Tree

I've also been the Cybils category chair for Middle Grade Fiction this year, and, as you can see, our wonderful, hard-reading Round 1 panelists have come up with seven award contenders for Round 2 judges to read and deciding a winner will not be an easy task:

I also completed by Goodreads challenge 9 books over my goal, so that was satisfying. Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi was my largest book and it was also by far my favorite Speculation Fiction book of 2018.

This year, my goal is still 250 books, but subject to change.



Now, I am really looking forward to what 2019 will bring.