Middle School Students Argue About Books

This week our panel of students, Dhruv, Nicolas, and Ella, argue about what's hot, and what's not, in the world of middle school literature. Which books are no longer popular that once were? Which books are super popular now, but we think they'll be out in 10 years? Which books do we think will stand the test of time?

Ever read a book that just annoyed you for some reason, but you couldn't quite put your finger on it? Well it might have been the way that author's often write their characters, and especially their secondary characters, as stereotypes -- not fully fleshed out people, more like one dimensional representations of a certain type, whether it's the dumb blonde, the nerdy asian kid, or the tragic but beautiful heroine. In this episode, our new podcast team, including Summer, Ella, Angelina, and Mrs. Collins, dive into some of the stereotypes that really bug us, as well as some of the books that do a great job of turning those stereotypes on their heads.

In this, our second to last episode of the season, tune in to get some great book recommendations that you almost definitely haven't heard of from our student panel of Tove, Abi, and Sean, and of course Mrs. Collins, your friendly school librarian.

In this episode our student panel of Asha, Abi, Angelina, and Sean chat with Mrs. Collins about reading in quarantine in general, what we are reading, and more!

On today's episode our student panel of Abi, Angelina, Sean, Tove, and Elise are joined by Stacey Lee, author of such fabulous young adult fiction titles as Under a Painted Sky, Outrun the Moon, The Downstairs Girl, and The Secret of a Heart Note to discuss one of the most common sources of contention between middle school students and their parents and teachers -- controversial or difficult issues in middle school books. Specifically, should middle school students be allowed to, or even encouraged to, read books that include violence, profanity, sex, drugs and alcohol, or other difficult topics? What value, if any, is there in reading books that include these topics?

This week our student panel of Abi, Angelina, and Tove dive into movie adaptations. Fair warning, as book nerds, we all pretty much think the book was ALWAYS better, but we do have a few good things to say about some movie adaptations...

This week Angelina, Elise, Abi, and Mrs. Collins geek out on one of our favorite genre argument -- which is better: realistic fiction or fantasy? It's officially spring break for us this week, so extra thanks to the students who showed up to argue today!

This week we will be pitting old against new and arguing about which is better, the new generation of realistic fiction graphic novels (think Raina Telgemeier, Svetlana Chmakova, Vera Brosgol), or more traditional superhero/superpower comics a la DC, Marvel and others. Our student panel of Angelina, Tove, and Ben will be joined this week by young adult graphic novelist Gene Luen Yang, author of American Born Chinese, Boxers/Saints, the Secret Coders series, the Avatar: the last airbender series, and more recently, Superman Smashes the Klan.

Gennifer Choldenko, author of the hit historical fiction series for middle grade readers Al Capone does my Shirts, as well as the very timely historical fiction book Chasing Secrets, which tells the story of the outbreak of Bubonic Plague in San Francisco in 1900, joins us this week to argue about historical fiction, and whether or not middle school readers should read it! Our student panel this week is Asha and Elise, both of whom are avid historical fiction readers, and Angelina, who pretty much only reads fantasy and science fiction.

In this episode, Ruth, Simone, Sean, Asha and Mrs. Collins get into it about Harry Potter. Fair warning, this isn't much of an argument -- we have a LOT of HP fans in the club and it was hard to find anyone who wasn't an immediate yes, but it was a fun discussion nonetheless! Notes: In answer to our debate about whether it has sold the most copies, I did some research. According to Wikipedia, who probably copied it from somewhere else, "Having sold more than 500 million copies worldwide, Harry Potter by J. K. Rowling is the best-selling book series in history. The first novel in the series, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, has sold in excess of 120 million copies, making it one of the best-selling books of all time."

In this very brief first podcast, the A-Team, Angelina, Allisyn, Asha, and Abbie, argue about whether or not Marie Lu, popular author of the best-selling young adult series Legend, The Young Elites, and Warcross, is a God among authors, or just really mean.