Novels in Verse

Happy Monday, everyone!

Our Spotlight of the Month for January is Novels in Verse.

"But Librarian Chelimsky," I hear you ask, "what on earth is a novel in verse?!"

An excellent question! Most novels are written in "prose," which means that it's written more or less how people speak. When a novel is written in verse, that means that it's written as poetry. In essence, novels in verse are stories which are told through a series of poems.

Some examples of Novels in Verse that are available in the library are:

• Caminar by Skila Brown - "A novel in verse inspired by actual events during Guatemala's civil war, this is the moving story of a boy who loses nearly everything before discovering who he really is."
• Serafina's Promise by Ann E. Burg - "In a poor village outside of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Serafina works hard to help her family, but dreams of going to school and becoming a doctor--then the earthquake hits and Serafina must summon all her courage to find her father and still get medicine for her sick baby brother as she promised."
• House Arrest by K.A. Holt - "Timothy, sentenced to house arrest for stealing, keeps a journal into which he documents his fears and frustrations."
• Planet Middle School by Nikki Grimes - "A series of poems describes all the baffling changes at home and at school in twelve-year-old Joylin's transition from tomboy basketball player to not-quite-girly girl."
• A Time to Dance by Padma Venkatraman - "In India, a girl who excels at Bharatanatyam dance refuses to give up after losing a leg in an accident."
• All the Broken Pieces by Ann E. Burg - "Two years after being airlifted out of Vietnam in 1975, Matt Pin is haunted by the terrible secret he left behind and, now, in a loving adoptive home in the United States, a series of profound events forces him to confront his past."
• Wicked girls : a novel of the Salem witch trials by Stephanie Hemphill - "A fictionalized account, told in verse, of the Salem witch trials, told from the perspective of three young women living in Salem in 1692--Mercy Lewis, Margaret Walcott, and Ann Putnam, Jr."

For those and other Novels in Verse, pop by the library!