Escape From Mr. Lemoncello's Library by Chris Grabenstein

This book is about Kyle Keeley and how he and his friends escape from Mr. Lemoncello's library. One day on the bus Akimi (Kyle's best friend) tells him about how the new library is having a lock-in. She also tells him you have to write an essay to get in. So Kyle writes a single sentence and hands it in at school. The next day they find out who the winners are and one of them is Kyle. To the kids it's just a normal lock-in thinking they are going there to spend the night and go home the next day.  But Mr. Lemoncello (one of the most famous toy designers ever and the one who owns the library) had a trick up his sleeve, he was going to have all of the kids stay overnight and try and solve the mystery of how to escape the library. Kyle teams up with his friends to escape the mysteries of the library.

          I'd suggest this book to kids who have a huge imagination, complex mind, and love to tinker and invent things.  Chris Grabenstien did a wonderful job in creating this book and many others. It was really fun to read this book because he used so many descriptive words, it felt like I was there. 

By Laurel, 4th grade reader

The Dark Lady J Adl

It seems that we just can’t get enough of Sherlock Holmes.  

His adventures fascinate us and yet we know very little about his early years.  What was Sherlock like as a boy?

A new series entitled “Sherlock, Lupin and Me” sets out to answer that question by imagining Sherlock’s childhood.  Narrated by his friend Irene Adler, the first book “The Dark Lady” follows Sherlock, Irene, and loyal friend Arsene Lupin as they investigate the mysterious death of a man who washes ashore on the beach.  

The three friends slyly move through the French seaside town of Saint-Malo, picking up clues from unsuspecting adults and sneaking into forbidden places.  It’s all great fun, although the story moves a little too slowly in places.

What is more interesting, however, is the idea behind the series – each of the friends is a famous character in an adult book.

Arsene, known later in life as “the Gentleman Thief” was the star of a series of detective stories published around the same time as the Sherlock Holmes tales.  Arsene’s path did not cross with Sherlock’s in the original stories, but Irene’s certainly did.  Although she only appears in one Sherlock story, Irene is “the woman”, the great intrique of his life.  Clever and resourceful, Irene is the only person to ever outwit Sherlock.  

In this first book, she doesn’t outwit Sherlock, but who knows what will happen in the next book …