(2) 4-6 Illustrated by Michelle Mee Nutter. Being a big sister can be frustrating, and this middle-grade graphic novel comically encapsulates the joy and angst of life in a family of seven children. All budding artist Avery Lee, eleven, wants is her own space and privacy. Instead, as the oldest sister, she's constantly surrounded by her very attached younger siblings, while firstborn Theo rarely babysits and gets his own room. Over the summer, Avery fundraises for a basement bedroom while dealing with friendship struggles. She is also upset that the Lees might relocate from Maryland to Oregon if her mother gets a new job. Lloyd and Nutter (Allergic) realistically portray Avery's complex emotions in many colorful scenes in which she is visually upstaged by her younger siblings (at school and at home, at the skate park, in the minivan), followed by tender moments of the kids and parents bonding over family meals, conversations, games, and milestones (e.g., when the baby begins to crawl). A warm, heartfelt, relatable comic that shines a light on a "squished" sibling as Avery tries to become more independent and weather life's changes while still finding her own place at home.

Reviewer: Michelle Lee | Horn Book Magazine Issue: May, 2023

(2) K-3 Illustrated by Marjolaine Perreten. Pauvre Pauline! The eldest of three (soon to be four) children in a lively bilingual (French/English) household, she needs a reprieve from the family chaos. Cozy setting details such as family photos and comfy, rounded forms make her home feel like a loving one in Perreten's busy paneled cartoon-style ink drawings, but Pauline longs for a place that's "just mine." She finds sanctuary in a closet under the stairs. "Here, I have my cushions, my books by the ­Countess of Ségur, my cacti, my glass marble, and above all...silence!" Inspired by her books, she imagines fantastic adventures but grows lonesome and worries that no one realizes where she is. Instead of immediately joining her noisy family, Pauline concocts a plan to hop aboard a ship to visit her grandmother in France. Before she can stow away, however, her mother invites her to work in the garden. The flowers will bloom in the hues of the French tricolor, but it's her mother's undivided attention that truly entices Pauline to feel that she's in the right place after all.

Reviewer: Megan Dowd Lambert | Horn Book Magazine Issue: November, 2022

(1) PS As the book opens, a nondescript-looking man walks away from his home office, having just affixed an "off-limits" sign to its door. Around the corner (and from the edge of the title page) peeks a pigtailed girl, and we follow her as she opens the door to view her father's neatly ­organized office, all drab grays and browns. "I'm just looking. There's nothing wrong with just looking...and I don't think anyone would miss one piece of tape. Just one little teeny-tiny piece." We can guess what happens next. The girl begins taping up everything in sight, adding paper clips and binder clips...and then--dramatic pause--she finds the Post-it Notes. "Hello!" From here the pages become a whirlwind of exuberant color and swirled patterns and pure unadulterated joy. The office now festooned to the max, the girl comes down to earth from her creative jag and realizes that she's in a lot of trouble. "Uh-oh." She sneaks back to her bedroom and opens the door to find--"Daddy!"--that the chaos there matches that of the office, with toys in a huge pile and her father wearing a tutu and dress-up wings. All ends happily with a colorful father-daughter tea party, dullness and drabness banished. Yoon (Ball & Balloon, rev. 9/19) uses the drama of the page-turn beautifully, typography is employed creatively, and the book is perfectly paced. The girl's bliss as her office-supply art creation grows shines through in both text and mixed-media art, and her curiosity and mischievousness are so very relatable. Open the door to this spectacular book and go right in.

Reviewer: Martha V. Parravano | Horn Book Magazine Issue: November, 2021

(3) 4-6 Digital Citizens series. Illustrated by Diego Vaisberg. This nonfiction series presents a balanced, practical view of how to manage one's online presence in the (increasingly pervasive) digital world, addressing responsible behaviors and dangerous/emotionally damaging situations. Appealing blocky graphics and illustrations draw inspiration from Minecraft, evoking popular online interactions. Websites. Glos., ind. Review covers these Digital Citizens titles: My Digital Community and Media, My Digital Future, My Digital Health and Wellness, My Digital Rights and Rules, My Digital Safety and Security and My Digital World

Reviewer: Dorrie Karlin

(4) 4-6 STEM Trailblazer Bios series. Each volume details the life of a significant person in a STEM-related field. Emphasis is placed on the individual's childhood, education, and development of a specific interest, as well as notable contributions. The prose is stilted but informative, and many photographs are included alongside sidebars of related information and "Tech Talk" quotes by the featured trailblazer. Reading list, timeline, websites. Glos., ind. Review covers these STEM Trailblazer Bios titles: Google Cybersecurity Expert Parisa Tabriz, Astronaut and Physicist Sally Ride, Code-Breaker and Mathematician Alan Turing, NASA Astronomer Nancy Grace Roman, Science Educator and Advocate Bill Nye, and Environmental Activist Wangari Maathai.

Reviewer: Danielle J. Ford

(4) 4-6 News Literacy series. In these brief, textbook-like overviews of media literacy, coverage is largely anodyne. Still, the topics have become increasingly important, and this series offers a good jumping-off point for upper-elementary students to think critically about what they read and see in the news, advertisements, and on social media. Each text includes well-considered assignments for further research, thought, and discussion. Reading list. Glos., ind. Review covers these News Literacy titles: Advertising Overload, The Fake News Phenomenon, How Journalists Work, Uncovering Bias in the News, Why News Matters, and Your Personalized Internet.

Reviewer: Katrina Hedeen

(3) YA When nude photos of a teacher are posted anonymously online, it becomes clear that three students in her senior law seminar--whose project topic is ironically about online privacy--each has his or her own motivation for publishing the (deceitfully obtained) pictures. Lo's novel effectively traces each student's personal history and raises complex ethical questions on its way to the truth.

Reviewer: Norah Piehl

(3) YA Grace is the consummate fangirl, living to follow the boy band that she posts about incessantly. But when an encounter with singer Jes results in a paparazzo photo and endless online speculation about her identity, Grace is drawn into the band's real-life orbit and discovers the illusion of their public persona. Music-loving readers will likely relate strongly to Grace's fandom, and her eventual maturity is hard-won.

Reviewer: Norah Piehl

(3) 4-6 Allie has been away at CodeGirls summer camp, successfully developing an app aimed at helping people develop friendships based on shared interests. But testing her app in the real world puts her school classmates' privacy, and their friendships, at risk. The characters ring true and the timely lessons are subtle, keeping readers engaged and perhaps inspiring them to try the appended coding activities.

Reviewer: Renée Wheeler

(2) YA Muslim Bangladeshi immigrant Naeem has fallen in with a reckless high-school crowd. He lands in police custody and is presented with an unsavory choice: pay the price for his crimes and break his parents' hearts, or spy on his own neighbors and thus betray his community. Budhos thoughtfully explores the complex and sometimes conflicting intricacies of a bicultural identity in this slow-boil tale.

Reviewer: Anastasia M. Collins | Horn Book Magazine Issue: November, 2016

(3) YA Essential Library of the Information Age series. Who owns and can regulate the internet? How has social networking affected privacy? How can kids evaluate the legitimacy of what they read? These questions and more are examined in this series that addresses weighty issues raised by internet technologies of our information age. Color photos and informative sidebars complement the straightforward and balanced narratives. Reading list, websites. Bib., glos., ind. Review covers the following Essential Library of the Information Age titles: Big Data and Privacy Rights, Net Neutrality, Content Ownership and Copyright, Book Banning and Other Forms of Censorship, Information Literacy in the Digital Age, and Online Identity.

Reviewer: Katrina Hedeen

(4) YA Digital Issues series. Although the surveys, statistics, and other data will soon be dated, this series is a thorough look at serious concerns of our digital world, from hacking to violent video games to overreliance on social media. Many of the topics overlap and are covered by more than one title. Text boxes, quotations, and stock photos help to break up the dense texts. Reading list, websites. Ind. Review covers these Digital Issues titles: Online Predators, Online Security, Online Addiction, Online Entertainment, Online Privacy, and Social Media.

Reviewer: Cyrisse Jaffee

(3) K-3 The star of Ben Rides On loves to draw, including not-always-flattering likenesses of his classmates. Unfortunately, his private sketchbook falls into their hands, but Davies cleverly subverts reader expectations of Ben's doom. There's a universality to Ben's plight: what grade-schooler isn't afraid that something private will be made public? The illustrations are artfully exaggerated, making Ben's caricatures all the funnier.

Reviewer: Nell Beram

(3) YA Privacy doesn't really exist, profit motives spur businesses to cull information wherever they can find it, and government agencies analyze and share gigabytes of data constantly. Cautionary chapters describe vulnerabilities lurking in cyberspace. Anecdotes are a reality check for teen users who may not be aware of eroding privacy. Reading list, websites. Bib., glos., ind.

Reviewer: Paula M. Cairo

(3) 4-6 Illustrated by Jennifer Kalis. In her eighteenth outing, ten-year-old Mallory's curiosity gets the best of her as she wonders what her older brother and his girlfriend are up to--and why they never want Mallory around; her snooping soon gets her into trouble. Well-presented lessons about privacy, growing up, and feeling excluded are leavened by the genial tone and illustrations.

Reviewer: Norah Piehl

(4) YA Issues in the Digital Age series. From research and entertainment to communication and consumerism, this series explores the continuing development, variety, and impact of online resources and usage, including the challenges and dangers that accompany instant access to people and information. Sidebars and photographs provide additional facts and commentary but fail to enliven the dry (but instructive) text. Websites. Bib., ind. Review covers these Issues in the Digital Age titles: Online Privacy, Online Gaming and Entertainment, Online Information and Research, Online Predators, Online Security, and Online Communication and Social Networking.

Reviewer: Tamara DePasquale

(3) YA Kuhn explores the legal and personal issues surrounding present-day privacy rights. She describes the challenges to privacy posed both by technological advances and fear of terrorism and outlines significant Supreme Court cases dealing with privacy concerns. The solidly written though dense text will serve as a good starting place for research. Some well-captioned photographs break up the pages. Reading list, timeline, websites. Bib., glos., ind.

Reviewer: Maeve Visser Knoth

(3) 4-6 Bill of Rights series. The Bill of Rights provides an overview of the subject, history, and the document's relationship to the framers of the Constitution. Each of the other volumes focuses on a particular amendment and its interpretation by the courts. The writing is clear (chatty at times), accessible, and interesting. The books are illustrated with well-chosen photographs and archival art and include better than average glossaries. Ind. Review covers these Bill of Rights titles: The Bill of Rights, Fifth Amendment, First Amendment, Fourth Amendment, Second and Third Amendments, and Sixth Amendment.

Reviewer: Barbara Barstow

(4) YA Constitution of the United States series. Each volume offers a detailed overview of the title topic, including historical highlights and Supreme Court cases. The authors do a solid job of presenting the history, importance, and future implications of each amendment. Illustrations include historical images and distracting website screen shots. The featured sites are accessible through the publisher's website. Reading list, timeline. Glos., ind. Review covers these Constitution of the United States titles: A Look at the Fourth Amendment, A Look at the Second Amendment, A Look at the Bill of Rights, and A Look at the Eighteenth and Twenty-First Amendments.

Reviewer: Beth L. Meister

(4) YA What Do You Think? series. These books clarify terms, quote some research and opinions on both sides, suggest critical thinking and evaluation skills, and coach readers in debate techniques. Though it's not nuanced or deep, the material reasonably introduces the subjects for beginning debaters. Photographs, charts, sidebars, and numerous headings make pages look busy. Terrorists includes a reading list. Websites. Glos., ind. Review covers these What Do You Think? titles: Should We Ever Negotiate with Terrorists? and Do We Have a Right to Privacy?

Reviewer: Frieda F. Bostian