The Sydney Taylor Shmooze

Grape, Again! by Gabriel Arquilevich Regal House Publishing, 2022 Category: Middle Grade Reviewer: Heather J. Matthews Buy at Bookshop.org Grape Borokovich is fresh off of a suspension for accidentally punching a teacher in the arm. During his suspension, Grape has wrestled with the “spiders in his brain,” or his impulses which drive many of his thoughts and actions. Grape, Again! picks up where Arquilevich’s Grape! , the first book of this series, ended. Set in 1976 in California, and styled as an epistolary novel, each chapter is a diary entry addressed to Grape’s friend Lou (who, in Grape! , moved to New York). In the same vein as the Joey Pigza series, Grape, Again! explores a young man’s life as he moves through school and adolescence, all while balancing his impulses towards undesirable behavior. With new friends, old friends, and bullies turned friends, Grape, Again! covers six months of Grape’s life, including the first three months of Grape’s first year in junior high school...

Ripped Away by Shirley Reva Vernick Regal House, 2022 Category: Middle Grade Reviewer: Leah Cypess Buy at Bookshop.org It's just an ordinary day for Abe Pearlman: he's leaving school, head down, "not exactly frowning but not looking delirious with life either." He's braced for his usual daily routine, the highlight of which is being ignored by his crush. Then, on a whim, he steps into a fortune teller's shop... and next thing he knows, he is waking up in the body of a Jewish boy in Victorian London, where Jack the Ripper's victims are being left in the streets. Thanks to the fortune teller's cryptic warning, Abe knows he has been sent to the past to save someone's life. But is it the life of one of the Ripper's victim? Or is it someone closer to home... like his neighbor, who has been arrested because of the public suspicion that Jack the Ripper is likely a Jewish shochet (ritual slaughterer)? Abe's engaging voice, and the author's deft...

Reeni's Turn by Carol Coven Grannick Category: Middle Grade Reviewer: Stacy Mozer Buy at Bookshop.org Reeni's Turn is a disturbing but important look at an eleven-year-old dancer's spiral into self-doubt and body shaming, which leads to a crippling eating disorder. Told in verse, readers enter Reeni's mind as she deals with important issues faced by pre-teens. Thanks to a good friend and her family, Reeni gets the help she needs to be able to see herself and her relationship with food differently in order to become the healthy, confident dancer she needs to be to get on stage and perform. The Jewish content in Reeni's Turn is woven into the story as part of Reeni's experience. So much of Judaism's celebration focuses on food so Shabbat dinners and Passover Seders are part of the backdrop of Reeni's thoughts about food and her own body. The book has literary merit and is appropriate for the intended grade level in style, vocabulary, format, and illustra...