In My Mailbox - 6/27/09

Credit goes to The Story Siren for thinking up the In My Mailbox feature.

I bought and received a few books this week that I am looking forward to reading:

A Faraway Island by Annika Thor

It's the summer of 1939. Two Jewish sisters from Vienna—12-year-old Stephie Steiner and 8-year-old Nellie—are sent to Sweden to escape the Nazis. They expect to stay there six months, until their parents can flee to Amsterdam; then all four will go to America. But as the world war intensifies, the girls remain, each with her own host family, on a rugged island off the western coast of Sweden.
Nellie quickly settles in to her new surroundings. She’s happy with her foster family and soon favors the Swedish language over her native German. Not so for Stephie, who finds it hard to adapt; she feels stranded at the end of the world, with a foster mother who’s as cold and unforgiving as the island itself. Her main worry, though, is her parents—and whether she will ever see them again.


Oathbreaker: Assassin's Apprentice by S.R. Vaught and J.B. Redmond

In a world where two moons barely light up the sky, we meet Aron, a farm boy with frightening powers. Apprenticed to Stormbreaker—a trained assassin who steals Aron from his home— the two soon find that the fragile peace in their land of Eyrie has begun to unravel, and violently. Stormbreaker and Aron are joined by Dari, a mysterious beauty with powers of her own, and Nic, a prince long given up for dead. As Eyrie enters a civil war, each character must make choices that threaten to tear them from their own promises and fates.This first episode in an incredible epic fantasy unfolds in layers of detail, romance and intrigue that will leavereaders clamoring for more.


My Story: Sophie's Secret War by Jill Atkins

In 1939 at the start of the war, Sophie becomes a messenger for a resistance group in Northern France. But as the German invaders overwhelm the British forces on the French coast, she finds herself more deeply involved with the Resistance - in a dangerous plan to save a young Scottish soldier.


My Story: The Mine's Afire by Susan Battye

Based around the Brunner Mine Disaster of 1896, the biggest industrial accident in New Zealand's history. In this story, Thomas has been sent a journal from his grandmother back in England, with the request that he fill it in over the following 12 months and then send it back to her so that she will get to know the grandson she has never met.


Princess of Pushkar: In the Shadow of the Palace by Judith Simpson

Mid-13th century India.
Princess Rani's marriage to a prince from Kashi is imminent, even though she has only lived thirteen rainy seasons. But the princess and her sisters are kidnapped by a rival kingdom before the marriage can take place. With no sign of rescue in sight, Rani takes matters into her own hands, going undercover as a trainee soldier in her captor's army. She must embrace her new identity and leave her high-handed ways behind her.
But time is running out.
Will Rani be able to rescue her sisters from an unwanted marriage to a dying prince? Will the princesses ever see their home and family again?


Once a Witch by Carolyn MacCullough

Tamsin Greene comes from a long line of witches, and she was supposed to be one of the most Talented among them. But Tamsin's magic never showed up. Now seventeen, Tamsin attends boarding school in Manhattan, far from her family. But when a handsome young professor mistakes her for her very Talented sister, Tamsin agrees to find a lost family heirloom for him. The search—and the stranger—will prove to be more sinister than they first appeared, ultimately sending Tamsin on a treasure hunt through time that will unlock the secret of her true identity, unearth the sins of her family, and unleash a power so vengeful that it could destroy them all. This is a spellbinding display of storytelling that will exhilarate, enthrall, and thoroughly enchant.