Tundra Telegram: Books To Scope Out

Hello, and thanks for joining us at Tundra Telegram, the column where we sense topics ascending in popularity and exalt a constellation of star titles that are definitely worth a read.

One of the biggest films opening in theatres this weekend is Knights of the Zodiac, a live-action epic based on a popular anime that stars Famke Janssen, Sean Bean, and many others. When a goddess of war reincarnates into the body of a young girl, a street orphan named Seiya discovers that he is destined to protect her and – naturally – save the world. But he can only do that if he can face down his past demons and become a Knight … of the Zodiac.

We’ll be honest, we don’t know that much about Knights of the Zodiac (though we wish it only the best), but it seemed like as good an opportunity as any to recommend some books for young readers – one for each sign of the traditional western horoscope. This way, your reading nights (and days) can be filled with the zodiac.

PICTURE BOOKS

Before recommending books for the various astrological signs, we want to note there’s no better time to read about astrology than immediately after birth. That’s why the Baby Astrology series by Roxy Marj is so perfect. No matter whether you were born March 21 to April 19, or October 23 to November 21, there is a board book that shares gentle thoughts about the characteristics of a child born under each star sign.

Capricorn: For this sign, we have to recommend the G.O.A.T. of goat books: Sergeant Billy: The True Story of the Goat Who Went to War by Mireille Messier and Kass Reich. This is the true story of a goat adopted from the prairies by a World War I platoon – a goat who persevered, Capricorn-style, to become a bonafide war hero.

Aries: Speaking of hoofed mammals, Not All Sheep Are Boring by Bobby Moynihan and Julie Rowan-Zoch is a great pairing for Aries, the ram. A comedic book that fights back against the idea sheep will put you to sleep, it showcases a zany cast of the weirdest sheep you’ll ever see, riding jetpacks and prancing on the moon. (Since Aries are competitive, you know they want to stand out from the crowd!) This rollicking read is the antithesis of a bedtime book.

Taurus: As you might imagine from the title, Petal the Angry Cow by Maureen Evans and Olga Demidova features a cow (not a bull), but we’re no chauvinists here at Tundra Books. And while Taurus is often associated with calm and serenity, this bovine has a short temper, blowing up at the other barnyard animals for the slightest provocations. She has to learn a few unusual lessons from a swan (who sadly has no associated zodiac sign) to manage her rage.

Cancer: Crustaceans can rejoice at this interactive picture book intro to the hard-shelled arthropods, This Is Crab by Harriet Evans and Jacqui Lee. Like many Cancers, Crab is a shy creature, but with a little encouragement he takes readers on a journey through his underwater home, complete with flaps to lift and pieces to move.

CHAPTER BOOKS & MIDDLE GRADE

Gemini: Jose Pimienta’s Twin Cities, about twins growing up on the Mexico-U.S. border, is a wonderful pick for Gemini readers. Luis Fernando and twin sister Luisa Teresa have been close their entire lives, but when Luis goes to middle school in Mexico andLuisa crosses the border every day so she can go to a private school in California, their relationship gets messy (just like Geminis, am I right?).

Scorpio: The quantity of actual scorpions in Scorpion Mountain, the fifth book in the fantasy adventures The Brotherband Chronicles by John Flanagan, is minimal, but the image of the scorpion looms large. Ranger Gillan is given a mission: protect the princess Cassandra, prone to assassination attempts, since a deadly sect known as the Scorpion Cult (see?) wants her dead. Luckily, the Brotherband crew has his back – which is more than we can say for most Scorpios.

Leo: There are a lot of books for young readers about lions, but we’re going to do the unexpected and recommend The Lion of Mars by Jennifer L. Holm. A slice-of-life science fiction story, it follows Bell, a curious, cat-loving eleven-year-old who just happens to live in the Martian settlements when a strange virus breaks out. (Bell’s favorite animals are lions because the settlers’ small township reminds him of a lion’s pride – classic overly dramatic Leo in action.)

Libra: Likewise, there are a bunch of middle-grade novels about choosing that show the balance Libra represents, but we’re picking Flipping Forward Twisting Backward by Alma Fullerton. Not only must Claire find equilibrium between the demands of gymnastics, family life, and her difficulties at school with a new dyslexia diagnosis, she must also find literal equilibrium on balance beams and stuff like that.

YOUNG ADULT

Aquarius: Not only does Natasha Bowen’s Skin of the Sea feature an aquatic setting and mermaid (or, more accurately, Mami Wata) heroine, that heroine – Simi – demonstrates the most admirable humanitarian qualities of Aquarius, saving the life of a boy thrown overboard, and going against the laws of her people for the greater good. (And yes, we know Aquarius is an “air sign,” but it has “aqua” in its name!)

Sagittarius: You can probably think of a blockbuster YA series that would be a good fit with the archer sign, but we don’t publish those books. So instead, we recommend No Good Deed by Kara Connolly, a modern reimagining of the Robin Hood legend. Ellie Hudson is an Olympic archer hopeful who takes a wrong turn in the caverns under Nottingham Castle and ends up – in true adventurous Sagittarian fashion – in Medieval England.

Pisces: Intuitive and sensitive describes Tiến in graphic novel The Magic Fish by Trung Le Nguyen to a “T.” Typical of a Pisces, he keeps a secret from his immigrant Vietnamese family to protect them: he’s gay. And though he’s unable to find the words to speak to his parents, he navigates his troubles through the fairytales, largely fish-based ones, that his mother tells him.

Virgo: We recommend The Best Laid Plans by Cameron Lund as a Virgo pick, because (a) it’s a sex-positive story about a high school virgin determined to lose that virginity, and (b) like any good Virgo, main character Keeley Collins takes on the task practically and systematically.

Happy reading, friends!

Tuesdays with Tundra

Tuesdays with Tundra is an ongoing series featuring our new releases. These titles are now available in stores and online!

New in Paperback:

Scaredy Squirrel Gets a Surprise
By Melanie Watt
84 Pages | Ages 6-9 | Paperback
ISBN 9781774883334 | Tundra Books
In this second NUTTY ADVENTURE, Scaredy is in for a big surprise . . . and Scaredy does NOT like surprises. He is a squirrel who likes a schedule, predictability, nothing unexpected. So, what’s inside the mysterious crate? Turns out it’s a POOL! Scaredy imagines sharks, eels and algae! He prepares safety rules! Luckily his friends Ivy, Timber and newcomer Rash are happy to remind him of another important rule . . . having fun!

The Fabled Stables: Belly of the Beast
By Jonathan Auxier
Illustrated by Olga Demidova
96 Pages | Ages 6-9 | Paperback
ISBN 9780735267800 | Puffin Canada
On an island at the top of the world are the Fabled Stables, a one-of-a-kind place for one-of-a-kind creatures. Auggie is their caretaker, and it’s his job to strike out into the Wide World and save creatures from danger. This time, he and his friends are tasked with saving a new creature, the Shibboleth. They hop through the portal and find themselves in the evil Rooks’ lair! There, they meet a young girl named Veena and a monster . . . with a belly full of Rooks! It turns out, whenever anyone speaks to the Shibboleth, it gobbles them whole. Auggie puts on his gentlest voice to try to calm the beast, but he’s swallowed in one gulp. Soon, with some help from Veena and a magic book, Auggie discovers that the Shibboleth eats anyone who doesn’t call it by name. They save themselves and the creature with this simple act of kindness.

The Secret Diary of Mona Hasan
By Salma Hussain
296 Pages | Ages 10-14 | Paperback
ISBN 9780735271517 | Tundra Books
Mona Hasan is a young Muslim girl growing up in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, when the first Gulf War breaks out in 1991. The war isn’t what she expects – “We didn’t even get any days off school! Just my luck!” – especially when the ground offensive is over so quickly and her family peels the masking tape off their windows. Her parents, however, fear there is no peace in the region, and it sparks a major change in their lives. Over the course of one year, Mona falls in love, speaks up to protect her younger sister, loses her best friend to the new girl at school, has summer adventures with her cousins in Pakistan, immigrates to Canada, and pursues her ambition to be a feminist and a poet.

We can’t wait to see you reading these titles! If you share these books online, remember to use #ReadTundra in your hashtags so that we can re-post.

Tuesdays with Tundra

Tuesdays with Tundra

Tuesdays with Tundra is an ongoing series featuring our new releases. The following titles are now available in stores and online!

Ghostlight
By Kenneth Oppel
400 Pages | Ages 10+ | Hardcover
ISBN 9780735272330 | Puffin Canada
The story of the tragic death of sixteen-year-old Rebecca Strand and her lighthouse keeper father is just an elaborate tale Gabe tells tourists for his summer job on the Toronto Island. Or so he thought. When his ghost tours awaken Rebecca’s spirit, Gabe is drawn into a world far darker than any ghost story he’s ever heard. Rebecca reveals that she and her father were connected to The Order, a secret society devoted to protecting the world from “the wakeful and wicked dead”—malevolent spirits like Viker, the ghost responsible for their deaths. But now the Order has disappeared and Viker is growing even stronger, and he’ll stop at nothing to wreak chaos and destruction on the living. Gabe and his friends – both living and dead – must find a way to stop Viker before they all become lost souls.

New in Paperback:

Fairy ScienceFairy Science
By Ashley Spires
40 Pages | Ages 3-7 | Paperback
ISBN 9780735264618 | Tundra Books
Esther the fairy doesn’t believe in magic. But fairies are all about magic, despite Esther’s best efforts to reveal the science of their world. No matter how she and her bird, Albert, explain that rainbows are refracted light rather than a path to gold, or that mist is water evaporating rather than an evil omen, or the importance of the scientific method, her fairymates would rather just do magic. So when the other fairies’ solution to helping a dying tree is to do a mystical moonlight dance, Esther decides to take it upon herself to resuscitate the tree . . . with the scientific method, some hypothesizing, a few experiments and the heady conclusion that trees need sunlight to live! But while Esther manages to save the tree, she can’t quite change the minds of her misguided fairymates . . . or can she?

If I Had a Gryphon
By Vikki VanSickle
Illustrated by Cale Atkinson
32 Pages | Ages 3-7 | Paperback
ISBN 9781774880913 | Tundra Books
Sam just got a hamster for a pet. But the hamster is kind of boring . . . he just eats and sleeps and gets his shavings wet. Inspired by her book of mythological creatures, Sam longs for a more exciting pet. But she soon realizes that taking care of these magical beasts might not be as wonderful as she thought. Sasquatches are messy, unicorns are shy, hippogriffs scare the dogs at the dog park, and having a fire extinguisher handy at all times makes dragons seem like an awful lot of work. In the end, Sam realizes that her hamster is a pretty sweet and safe pet . . . or is he? If I Had a Gryphon is a raucous rhyming read-aloud about fantastical beasts in everyday situations – and the increasingly beleaguered heroine who has to deal with them.

The Fabled Stables: Trouble with Tattle-Tails
By Jonathan Auxier
Illustrated by Olga Demidova
96 Pages | Ages 6-9 | Paperback
ISBN 9780735267770 | Puffin Canada
Auggie was just like most other boys, except in one way. Auggie had a job. Auggie worked in the Fabled Stables – a magical place full of one-of-a-kind creatures. Sometimes the Fabled Stables changes to make room for a new beast. The whole place would shake, and then Auggie would find a new stall that led to a beast somewhere in the Wide World. It was Auggie’s job to go out and rescue that beast from danger. In this second installment, a new stall appears with a sign: Tattle-Tail. Although this doesn’t sound like a very friendly thing, Auggie knows it’s his job to help. Peering in the new stall, he can see a little village with a tall tower in the middle. The Tattle-Tail is somewhere in that village. Together with Willa the Wisp and Fen, the stick-in-the-mud, Auggie makes his way to the village, where he’s surprised to discover not one, but many Tattle-Tails – all of the villagers have a talking tail attached to them, tails that tattle on their humans, blabbing all their secrets out loud. Auggie and Willa try everything they can to get the tails off the villagers, but all they manage to do is get tails of their own!

We can’t wait to see you reading these titles! If you share these books online, remember to use #ReadTundra in your hashtags so that we can re-post.

Tuesdays with Tundra

Tuesdays with Tundra

Tuesdays with Tundra is an ongoing series featuring our new releases. The following titles are now available in stores and online!

The Stone Child: The Misewa Saga #3
By David A. Robertson
256 Pages | Ages 10+ | Hardcover
ISBN 9780735266162 | Puffin Canada
After discovering a near-lifeless Eli at the base of the Great Tree, Morgan knows she doesn’t have much time to save him. And it will mean asking for help – from friends old and new. Racing against the clock, and with Arik and Emily at her side, Morgan sets off to follow the trail away from the Great Tree to find Eli’s soul before it’s too late. As they journey deep into the northern woods, a place they’ve been warned never to enter, they face new challenges and life-threatening attacks from strange and horrifying creatures. But a surprise ally comes to their aid, and Morgan finds the strength to focus on what’s most important: saving her brother’s life. 

New in Paperback:

Shout Out for the Fitzgerald-Trouts
By Esta Spalding
Illustrated by Lee Gatlin
352 Pages | Ages 8-12 | Paperback
ISBN 9780735264533 | Tundra Books
The plucky Fitzgerald-Trout siblings (who live on a tropical island where the grown-ups are useless but the kids can drive) are back! After losing the boat that had become their home, oldest Fitzgerald-Trout, Kim, has put finding a home back on her to-do list. When her sixth-grade history assignment offers a clue about the ruins of a volcanic house built by an explorer on Mount Muldoon, she and her siblings set out to find it. The castle they discover surpasses their wildest dreams. But having a permanent home offers more challenges than the Fitzgerald-Trouts expect, especially when they begin to suspect their home is haunted. The siblings must figure out how to fix the cracks in their family foundation before one of them is lost for good.

The Great Bear: The Misewa Saga #2
By David A. Robertson
288 Pages | Ages 10+ | Paperback
ISBN 9780735266155 | Puffin Canada
Back at home after their first adventure in the Barren Grounds, Eli and Morgan each struggle with personal issues: Eli is being bullied at school, and tries to hide it from Morgan, while Morgan has to make an important decision about her birth mother. They turn to the place where they know they can learn the most, and make the journey to Misewa to visit their animal friends. This time they travel back in time and meet a young fisher that might just be their lost friend. But they discover that the village is once again in peril, and they must dig deep within themselves to find the strength to protect their beloved friends. Can they carry this strength back home to face their own challenges?

Willa and the Wisp: The Fabled Stables #1
By Jonathan Auxier
Illustrated by Olga Demidova
96 Pages | Ages 6-9 | Paperback
ISBN 9780735267749 | Puffin Canada
Auggie Pound is eight years old and has the greatest job of all time: he cares for all the animals in the Fabled Stables. The Fabled Stables house the rarest creatures in existence – all of them one-of-a-kind. Auggie’s job is to care for these creatures, as well as track down and safely capture endangered magical beasts in the wild. Some mornings, he arrives to find an empty stall with the name of a new creature to rescue. One day, the Stables rearrange themselves out of the blue, creating a new stall. The sign over the gate says, “Wisp.” But what is a wisp and where is it? All Auggie can see is a moonlit swamp stretching out before him. Then a hungry HOWLLLLLLL rings out in the darkness. It’s up to Auggie to go into the swamp to find the wisp before it’s too late.

We can’t wait to see you reading these titles! If you share these books online, remember to use #ReadTundra in your hashtags so that we can re-post.

Tundra Telegram: Books that Sit High in the Saddle

Hello, and thanks for joining us at Tundra Telegram, the column where we dig deep into the things that are wobblin’ all your jaws, and recommend some great books to spur further discussion.

Giddy-up, pardners! The Calgary Stampede opens July 8 with a rip-roarin’ Stampede Parade (led by none other than Dances with Wolves and Yellowstone star Kevin Costner), and is followed by over a week of rodeos, powwows, and country-western music. It’s an annual celebration of all things Western, and so we thought we’d put a bee in your bonnet to read up on the subject. We’ve got Westerns, we’ve got books about cowboys, cowgirls, broncs, and colts.

So, don’t be a bad egg or a yellow belly. Take some of our recommendations below of stories that are in apple pie order. Save a horse, read a cowboy!

PICTURE BOOKS

Even the toughest cowpoke needs their shut-eye. So, grab a bedroll, a lammy, and a copy of Good Night, Cowboys by Adam Gamble, Mark Jasper, and Joe Veno. Take in some horses, steer-roping, lassos, cowboy chow, ghost towns, cattle drives, square dancing, and more as you drift off to sleep.

Before he was known for “Montero” and “Industry Baby,” Lil Nas X was the man behind hit country-western single “Old Town Road.” He is also the writer of C Is for Country, illustrated by Theodore Taylor III, an alphabet book that equally celebrates the cowboy lifestyle (“B is for boots”) and being fabulous (“F is for feathers. And fringe. And fake fur.”).

In 2022, for the first time in its 110-year history, the Calgary Stampede will host a competitive powwow, as dancers from across North America will show off their talents – all thanks to one couple! Before you check it out, read Traci Sorell and Madelyn Goodnight’s Powwow Day, as River risks missing her powwow due to illness.

You can’t have the Stampede without horses, and author Kelly Cooper is an author who has a way with child-horse friendships. If a Horse Had Words, illustrated by Lucy Eldridge, is a story about the friendship between a boy and a horse, following their relationship from the day the horse is born, to when she is sent to auction, to the day she and the boy are reunited at a rodeo where she has become a bronc and he a cowboy. And in Midnight and Moon, illustrated by Daniel Miyares, a girl who doesn’t fit in befriends a blind horse who also struggles to find his place.

Cooper’s work is poetic, but The Horse’s Haiku by Michael J. Rose and Stan Fellows is literal poetry: it’s a series of haiku celebrating the beauty of horses whether they’re peacefully grazing or running full-tilt. (Tragically, no haiku devoted to a mustang making a cowboy chew gravel.)

Little Pinto and the Wild Horses of Mustang Canyon by Jonathan London and Daniel San Souci follows a young horse travelling with his family of rare wild mustangs for the first time. Can Little Pinto keep up with the band of horses?

And yes, the Stampede even has the dangerous and sometimes-controversial sport of bull riding. While those bulls may be angry, their rage pales to that seen in Petal the Angry Cow by Maureen Fergus and Olga Demidova. Petal is a thoughtful cow with a VERY big temper, and young readers will learn a few things as she attempts to manage her frustrations in this very funny book (which features absolutely no rodeo clowns).

CHAPTER BOOKS & MIDDLE GRADE

Hello, Horse by Vivian French and Catherine Rayner is an introduction to horse-riding – a combination of fiction and facts about horses . A boy is introduced to horses by his friend Catherine, who teaches him how to talk to a horse quietly, how to feed her carrots, how to lead her across a field. But is he really ready to climb up on the horse’s back and take a ride?

And Mean Girls meets Black Beauty in Horse Girl by Carrie Seim, a funny middle-grade novel about the awkward Wills who attempts to enter the stuck-up #HorseGirl world of the prestigious Oakwood Riding Academy.

Concrete Cowboy is maybe best known as the movie in which overly attractive actor Idris Elba plays a cowboy. But first it was the book Ghetto Cowboy by G. Neri and illustrated by Jesse Joshua Watson, in which a teen named Cole moves in with the dad he never knew and learns about the Cowboy Way and justice from his fellow Black urban riders of Philly. There’s also a sequel, Polo Cowboy, in which Cole starts working as a stable hand for the polo team at the very white George Washington Military Academy, and tries his hand at the sport.

YOUNG ADULT

Samantha is a Chinese girl in Missouri, 1849. Annamae has escaped slavery. The two meet at a crime scene they’re implicated in, and flee for the West, along the Oregon Trail in Stacey Lee’s Under a Painted Sky. And not unlike the computer game, the Trail is full of dangers, so the two disguise themselves as boys . . . until Samantha starts to fall in love with a cowboy. Under a Painted Sky is an Old West tale of love and friendship.

The setting isn’t the Old West in The Outlaws Scarlett and Browne by Jonathan Stroud – it’s a future England. But the book has bank robberies, shoot-outs, and renegades on the run, so we’re calling it a Future British take on the Western. Whatever you want to call it, it’s a rollicking series opener with varmints readers root for.

And The Perfect Horse by Elizabeth Letts is a true story about the lengths any cowboy would go to save a horse – but it takes place in World War II. A small American troop crosses enemy lines to save some of the world’s most treasured horses, kidnapped by Hitler and hidden in a secret Czechoslovakian breeding farm. It’s like The Horse Whisperer meets Saving Private Ryan.