The Wish Giver, by Bill Brittain, is one of those books that I had known about and seen over and over again but never read.
It was a very quick read (I read it in just a few hours) but a good story. Four people go to the Coven Tree Church Social, which is an annual carnival-like event. They all agree to pay 50 cents for a chance to have one wish come true. Each is convinced that the promise was false and that he/she had been cheated, but soon after the Social the first three people want something so badly they decide to try making the wish anyway. All three wishes come true, just not in the way the wishers had intended. Whatever mysterious force that is in charge of granting the wishes seems to be very literal-minded. The results are sometimes funny, sometimes sad, but always entertaining.
Two of Elizabeth George Speare's books won the Newbery Medal. Since I had already read The Witch of Blackbird Pond, I decided to read The Bronze Bow as well.
Speare really is an incredible storyteller. The Bronze Bow is set in the time of Jesus, and the main character is an 18-year-old Galilean man named Daniel bar Jamin. As the story opens, we learn that he has seen his father crucified to death, and he is nursing an all-consuming hatred for the Romans who were responsible. He had run away from the blacksmith to whom he had been apprenticed five years previously, and in that time has been living in the mountains near his village with a band of outlaws. Throughout the novel, Daniel's hatred for the Romans consumes him and seems to direct almost everything he does.
Daniel's grandmother dies, leaving him to care for his younger sister, Leah, who appears to be suffering from some sort of mental illness and has not left the house for years. Daniel is forced to delay his plans for taking revenge against the Romans. Meanwhile, Jesus is developing a tremendous following, but his preaching does not sit well with Daniel's plans. The question of whether Daniel can ever overcome the hatred that has ruled his life for so many years drives the narrative to a most satisfying conclusion. I really liked this book!
After reading The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, I wanted to re-read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. 
Twain is such a great humorist! I especially enjoyed the last part, with Tom Sawyer insisting that Jim and Huck go along with his elaborate plans for making an adventure out of freeing Jim. Oh, and the king and the duke are just too funny!
It's such a shame that this book has been so controversial. It seems to me that Twain, speaking through Huck's wise beyond his years, no-nonsense point of view, could not have made it clearer that Jim is a much better human being than just about anyone else in the book. Huck, too, sees beyond people's false fronts to their true character -- he quickly and easily sees the "king" and the "duke" for the frauds they really are. I think this is one of the best stories ever written.
Monkey Town: the Summer of the Scopes Trial, by Ronald Kidd, took me by surprise in how good it was. It is a fictional account of the famous Scopes Trial held in Dayton, Tennessee in 1925. 
At this time, Tennessee had recently passed legislation making it illegal to teach the theory of evolution in public schools. High school teacher John Scopes was put on trial for breaking this law. Dayton earned the name "Monkey Town" because people thought evolution was the idea that humans descended from monkeys.
Kidd researched the book in part by talking with people who were involved with the real trial, and he used Frances Robinson, who was 8 years old at the time and knew John Scopes, as the narrator for his story (she is 15 years old in the book). Other famous people who are characters in this story include H. L. Mencken, Clarence Darrow, and William Jennings Bryan. This is a fast moving yet thoughtful and challenging story about a topic that is every bit as controversial today as in 1925, and I highly recommend it!
In The Hideout, by Peg Kehret, 13-year-old Jeremy Holland's parents have recently died, and his grandmother sends him to live with his rich uncle in Chicago. Understandably, Jeremy is in a pretty rough emotional state.
Before he reaches his new home, his train crashes and he is left alone in the wilderness. Instead of waiting for help to arrive at the crash site, Jeremy decides to try living on his own in an abandoned cabin he finds. Jeremy has some money with him, so he goes to a small store near the cabin to buy supplies. At the store he meets and befriends Bonnie, a girl his age who lives nearby. One night when he is alone at the cabin, Jeremy hears gunshots, and later he discovers the body of a bear that was killed by poachers. Jeremy is afraid that if he reports the crime, his planned summer alone at the cabin will be ruined, so he asks Bonnie to help him. The two kids are soon over their heads trying to deal with the poachers on their own. Although the story's lessons could have been more subtly conveyed, I enjoyed this fast moving and exciting story.
