What's New? Stacking the Shelves

Stacking the Shelves is a weekly meme hosted by Tynga's Reviews. Hop on over there to ogle what other bloggers got this week.

Quiet week this week, which is good because I'm serving on jury duty and have some reading to do for upcoming blog tours.

For review:

Samurai Rising: the epic life of Minamoto Yoshitsune by Pamela S. Turner. Illustrated by Gareth Hinds. 236 p. Charlesbridge, February, 2016. 9781580895842.

Publisher synopsis: Minamoto Yoshitsune should not have been a samurai. But his story is legend in this real-life saga.

This epic warrior tale reads like a novel, but this is the true story of the greatest samurai in Japanese history.

When Yoshitsune was just a baby, his father went to war with a rival samurai family—and lost. His father was killed, his mother captured, and his surviving half-brother banished. Yoshitsune was sent away to live in a monastery. Skinny, small, and unskilled in the warrior arts, he nevertheless escaped and learned the ways of the samurai. When the time came for the Minamoto clan to rise up against their enemies, Yoshitsune answered the call. His daring feats and impossible bravery earned him immortality.

Purchased:

After by Morris Gleitzman. Unabridged audiobook on four compact discs. 4 hours, 20 minutes. Read by the author. Bolinda Audio, Sept. 2012. 9781743116883.

Publisher synopsis: A Holocaust survival story that combines hopeful melancholy with gentle humour.

Following a heartbreaking struggle to survive as a Jewish child in Germany, Felix faces perhaps his greatest challenge—to find hope when he's lost almost everything.

As Europe goes through the final agonizing stages of the war, Felix struggles to reconcile hatred and healing. He's helped by a new friend, but if he should lose her as well.…

I was totally blown away by Once, Then and Now. So are my students. A few weeks ago, a student who had read all three in a row asked if there were any more. When I looked it up, I found that After was written but the only incarnation of the book available in the U.S. was the audiobook. 

I'm a regular reader of audiobooks, but not many of my students check out the audiobooks in our collection. I can't even buy the books from Amazon Australia because there are no new copies available - only Kindle editions. Sigh. I did learn that there is yet another Felix and Zelda book out called Soon.

The Internet makes purchasing foreign books a tad easier when U.S. publishers decide not to continue publishing a series. It's an extra expense and one I usually take on myself since POs are generally not accepted. 

What's new with you?