Becky Avella > Recent Status Updates

“Reason is how we get to the truth, but imagination is how we find meaning.”

I love this series but this latest story was flat and disappointing.

Each book in this series gets deeper and more beautiful without losing it’s whimsical fun. The final line of this book took my breath away.

This installment is meatier. I like the depth it’s adding to the series a lot. I thought the series might just be all wittiness and everyone falling in love with Emma, but it’s turning out to be a lot more.

Just finishing the audiobook…now I’m completely hooked on the series. Sigh, do I spend all my Audible credits, or wait a million years for the library copy? Sigh again.

I really like the narrator of this audiobook. She’s great at the accents.

I’m enjoying this trip to the south of France. It reminds me a little of “The Enchanted April.”

Cozy fantasy? Yes, please!

Starting to feel like the never ending story…

I have a suspicion that this book is better as an audiobook because of Neil Patrick Harris’ voice. I think he makes Cliff so sympathetic.

This was a Prime First Read pick from Amazon and the premise sounds fun.

I hope this gets a little less tragic and depressing eventually. There’s got to be some hope coming, right?

Do you know of any good children's/middle grade books that begin with Q, X, Y, or Z? I'm working my way through the A-Z Middle Grade Reading Challenge, but I still need to plan for those letters. If the title begins with "A," "An," or "The," it's okay for the second word of the title to begin with the target letter. And X can be somewhere in the title. Thanks for your help! 😊💕

Captivated and annoyed at the same time…

Ahhh- finally! This is what I’ve been craving- immersive, unique, fun…I’ve only just begun, but I have a feeling this is going to be great.

I’m listening to this audiobook to get the Letter H for my middle grade reading challenge. It’s just okay - it definitely has a depressing view of death - I’m glad it’s fiction. 😂 My interest was in knowing more about Houdini, and the story does have interesting facts about him and his life.

This is well written - it’s just so dark I have to take a break for a while. I am really invested in the characters so I’ll come back to finish it, it’s just too heavy for me for right now.

SO enjoying this audiobook.

Southern magical realism novels might be my favorite genre.

I’m geeking out over this book. It’s not just a manual on learning math, but also how to be an excellent student. How best to learn in general. The nerd in me loves it.

I’m going to shelve this one for now. I’m just too into the Secrets of Ormdale series, and the City Spies series to stick with it. I always like to read the Newbery winner so I’ll be back later.

Checking out this year’s Newbery winner and getting letter “F” checked off for the challenge at the same time. Looks like I’ve got spies and time-travel going for themes so far. Reading kids books makes life more fun.

This is such a fun series, and I know you aren’t supposed to judge a book by its cover…but I LOVE the covers of this series, too.

Working on letter “C” for the middle grade challenge. I think this will be fun!

So far I really enjoyed Glitch by Laura Martin, an exciting time travel book. Rooftoppers had beautiful writing but was a little slow in the middle for me, and The Swifts: Dictionary of Scoundrels had so much potential as a quirky mystery with awesome characters, but the fun kids story was ruined by adult gender identity preaching.

dnf - I'll probably come back to this when I'm in the mood for it.

I’m really enjoying this, but I think I misunderstood - I don’t think it’s a middle grade novel after all. Oh well, it might not count for the challenge, but I think I’m going to love it.

Shooting for the “W” in the 2025 Great Middle Grade Reads A-Z Challenge.

Part 2 has been more interesting to me because it has practical solutions that are clicking in my mind- Chapter 7 “Making an Easier Problem” has been the most helpful so far. I’m still at the beginning of my quest to understand (and more importantly enjoy and see the beauty) in math, but I feel myself learning. I have two more books waiting for me to read that I think will really help.

This is my first book for the Great Middle Grade Reads A-Z Challenge for 2025. So far it’s been so entertaining, but I could do without the gender identity stuff added into an otherwise fun mystery with a great premise and a quirky cast.

This has more to do with math instruction/education (which I am also interested in) than fixing my math anxiety and holes in understanding - but I am learning useful things from it (and from the other things I’m trying). I’ve had quite a few ah-ha moments. I’ve discovered that part of my problem is that I never attached meaning to the math problems - just memorized steps - attempting that is really helping.