Music Theory for Ukulele

Written by: David Shipway

First line: Hello and welcome to Music Theory for Ukulele.

Why you should read this book: This book is absolutely perfect if you play the ukulele and want to understand why music is the way it is. After 10 years of playing the ukulele, it turned out I had already intuited some of the information here, but this book really put together everything a beginning or intermediate student would want to know about music theory for ukulele. Chords, keys, triads, progressions, and mini quizzes to test your knowlege, it's all in here, plus 5 appendices with extremely useful charts and tables.

Why you shouldn't read this book: If you're not really musically gifted, it's kind of like studying a foreign language; I think I understood most of this book, but I didn't assimilate all of it.

Speak Up!

Written by: Rebecca Burgess

First line: A new day, a new planet to explore.

Why you should read this book: Mia has autism, and she's struggling with bullies and sensory issues at school, and only her best friend, Charlie (who goes to a different school) knows her secret: that she is the singer and songwriter for the internet sensation, Elle-Q. Mia's mom is desperate for her to learn how to "fit in" by making prolonged eye contact, while Charlie is pushing Mia to take Elle-Q to the next level (a live performance for all their virtual fans), both of which feel impossible to Mia. Hardly anyone seems to realize all the thoughts Mia has inside her; saying them out loud is hard, but if she can't figure out how to express herself, nobody will ever know.

Why you shouldn't read this book: I personally found it very difficult to read the mom's recommendations, which sound exactly like something you'd read in a pop psychology book for parents of autistic children, written by neurotypical people who torture autistic children for a living. 

The Wicked + The Divine: The Faust Act

Written by: Kieron Gillen and Jamie McKelvie

First line: And once again, we return to this.

Why you should read this book: Here's a world that almost exactly like ours, except that every ninety years, a pantheon of god come back, taking young people for their avatars, becoming music sensations who are both worshiped and despised, possessing the power to drive their audiences to ecstasy, and other powers as well, and then dying two years later. Above-average teen and superfan Laura has an interesting encounter with Lucifer ("You can call me Luci.") after an Amaterasu concert and finds herself immersed in the surprising and dangerous world of these powerful, short-lived gods. As Lucifer becomes reckless and erratic, Laura becomes desperate to save her from the world of men, but Lucifer may have different plans for herself...and her protégé. 

Why you shouldn't read this book: You get the sense that the actual story doesn't really start until the next book.

Penny and Her Song

Written by: Kevin Henkes

First line: Penny came home from school with a song.

Why you should read this book: Penny, a school-aged mouse girl, wants to share her song with her family, but her mother is afraid that singing will wake the babies, and doesn't allow singing at the dinner table, and the song must stay unsung. However, Penny is patient and persistent and eventually finds a time when it is appropriate to sing her song, to the great enjoyment of her entire family. Penny's song spreads joy and delight and shows the importance of self-expression, especially at the right time, in the right place, for the right audience.

Why you shouldn't read this book: You don't see why you should have to wait your turn and you don't care about the babies.

Scout Is Not a Band Kid

Written by: Jade Armstrong

First line: No longer am I that girl from before

Why you should read this book: Scout wants nothing more in life than to cosplay at AlmonteFest where her favorite author, Pristine Wong, will be doing meet and greets, but her father refuses to drive that far, and all seems hopeless until she realizes that her middle school band will be playing the festival. All she has to do to get that ride is spend the rest of the school year pretending to play the trombone, but Merrin, the band's first trombonist is onto her, and Scout ends up spending the entire year actually learning to play trombone under Merrin's intense and critical tutelage. In the process, Scout learns more about friendship and music than she ever cared to learn, and becomes a better version of herself with a different future than she could have imagine on her own.

Why you shouldn't read this book: If you don't start woodshedding, you're going to get kicked out of the band.

Buy Scout Is Not a Band Kid here!

All My Friends

Written by: Hope Larson

First line: Turn it down, Kesi.

Why you should read this book: Once again, I have inadvertently read the third book in a trilogy without even knowing that the first two books existed, so I might be missing some stuff here. Young teens Bina, Lara, and Kesi have started a band called Fancy Pink and worked hard enough to get their first gig. Even though it doesn't go anywhere near as well as planned, it still leads to more opportunities, including one of their songs being licensed to appear in a hot new TV show! But their ticket to the top is complicated by boys, haters, their parents' take on the music industry, and their own lack of funds. 

Why you shouldn't read this book: Your parents never let you do anything either.

So You Want to Be a Rock Star

Written by: Audrey Vernick and Kirstie Edmunds

First line: You want to be a rock star?

Why you should read this book: A fun but silly read aloud story that discusses children's make believe as if it is the actual thing. You don't need an instrument if you can play air guitar and sneer effectively! While yelling into their fists (because they don't have a microphone) and wearing "awesome-crazy clothes," the kids in this book imagine themselves living the dream while performing for an audience of enthusiastic family members and fantasizing about the perks of success. 

Why you shouldn't read this book: You probably don't actually want your kids acting like rock stars, or, at the very least, you want them to practice the guitar first.

Piper

Written by: Jay Asher, Jessica Freeburg, and Jeff Stokely

First line: People in my village think I cannot understand what they say because I cannot hear.

Why you should read this book: The Pied Piper legend, which seems to have some root in historical fact, has been given the modern treatment as much as (or more than) any other fairy tale, and although it's a simple story, it's weird enough that there is plenty of room for speculation, romance, and embellishment of the basic narrative. In this version, Maggie, an deaf orphan girl raised by the kindly Agathe, develops a friendship with the mysterious musician who vows that he can rid Hameln of the plague of vicious rats that make life nearly unbearable even for the village's elite. But Maggie, being unable to hear the piper's music, is the only person in Hameln that he can't control, and when Maggie discovers that she has the power to control him, she must choose between a village that has never respected her and a man she can never trust. 

Why you shouldn't read this book: You don't pay your debts

Auggie and Me: Three Wonder Stories

Written by: RJ Palacio

First line: Okay, okay, okay.

Why you should read this book: A companion to the popular novel Wonder, this books tells the parallel stories of Julian, Christopher, and Charlotte, three kids whose lives were impacted by Auggie's. We learn that Auggie's bully, Julian, suffers from nightmares, and that his response to Auggie is born of shame and fear; Christopher learns the importance of sticking by friends through his own relationship with Auggie; and Charlotte learns to see the world and the idea of popularity through a new lens.Written with wisdom and compassion, Palacio's stories show kids' real inner worlds.

Why you shouldn't read this book: Although these stories all stand alone, it probably makes more sense to read the first book first. 

Amina's Voice

Written by: Hena Khan 

First line: Something sharp pokes me in the rib. 

Why you should read this book: Amina is terrified of singing (or speaking) in public, even though she has a beautiful voice, and when her best friend Soojin wants to hang out with a popular white girl, Amina doesn't know what to say (and when she does say something, it turns out to be the exact wrong thing). Now she's afraid her best friend hates her, while at home she's terrified of upsetting her uncle and being pressured to participate in a Koran-recitation contest. Singing in public is the scariest thing she can imagine, until something that truly rocks the community gives Amina the courage to use her voice. 

Why you shouldn't read this book: You've never been afraid to speak up.

Blended

Written by: Sharon Draper

First line: Plunk. Plink. Ripple. Rumble. Tinkle. Twinkle Boomble.

Why you should read this book: Isabella is a biracial girl with a great musical talent and a problem: after getting used to having her parents divorced and living in different states, her father and his new family are moving back to town. Suddenly her life is upended, punctuated by fraught custody swaps and the sense that no place is really home anymore; half her life is always somewhere else. Isabella will have to come to terms with her own place in the world, racism, and the reality of remarriage, all while finding time to practice the piano.

Why you shouldn't read this book: I found its disparate parts enjoyable story, but at times those parts seemed disjointed in relation to each other.

The Are More Beautiful Things Than Beyoncé

Written by: Morgan Parker

First line: I am free with the following conditions.

Why you should read this book: This poetry is powerful and confrontational, forcing the reader to consider the world, and specifically race and sexuality, from multiple unrelenting points of view. Up-to-the-minute modern and uncompromisingly feminist, the book tightly corrals language into beautiful and acrobatic formations to demonstrate joy, pain, frustration, rage, hope, determination, and, over and over again, the place of Beyoncé in American culture. I don't read a lot of poetry and can't really critique it the way I can prose, but I can say that the way the words are strung together in this collection is intense and evocative, creating strong and meaningful images and allowing the reader a new window on the world.

Why you shouldn't read this book: You're not impressed with Beyoncé.

Dig If You Will the Picture: Funk, Sex, God, & Genius in the Music of Prince

Written by: Ben Greenman

First line: The phrase is stuck in my head.

Why you should read this book: Arranged by subject rather than chronologically, this book is part biography, part musicology, part history, part analysis, and mostly every thought the author ever had about his subject matter between discovering Prince in 1982 and turning the manuscript into his publisher in 2017. The chapters are short and sweet, peppered with anecdotes, quotes, descriptions of songs, philosophy, and personal reflection, written in an astonishing voice that tosses off stunning metaphors, name drops, and digs deep for comparisons to others artists, other art, and other types of thinking. The author doesn't pull his punches, never allowing his great admiration for Prince to overwhelm the reality of his research: that Prince was both a rock god and very human, capable of ascending to great heights while still remaining prey to the foibles of being a man.

Why you shouldn't read this book: You've never been inspired by Prince.

The First Rule of Punk

Written by: Celia C. Pérez

First line: Dad says punk rock only comes in one volume: loud.

Why you should read this book: Malú's mother always wants her to take pride in her Mexican heritage and be lovely little senorita, but Malú's dad has taught her that punk rock is everything (she can barely imagine how they were ever married and she's certainly not surprised that they're divorced), so when she learns that she and her mother are moving to Chicago for two years and leaving her dad behind, she's devastated. She's not Mexican enough for the kids in her new school, or even for the principal, and just expressing her punk rock heritage is enough to get her in trouble. When she starts her own punk band, Malú finds her voice, inspires her friends, and creates a new path where there wasn't one before.

Why you shouldn't read this book: You don't get why anyone would color their hair and you think all popular music is noise.

The Hate U Give

Written by: Angie Thomas

First line: I shouldn't have come to this party.

Why you should read this book: This is the YA novel of 2017, a heart-wrenching, complex, and real story of a black teenage girl trying to navigate a world that can't even pretend to offer fairness or equality. After witnessing the death of her best friend in a drive by shooting, Starr is sent to a fancy suburban prep school, but not even her belief that she's now the Fresh Princess of Bel-Aire can protect her when she witnesses another friend murdered by the police. Starr wants justice for Khalil, but speaking out is scary, and now it feels like the cops, a gang lord, and even her white friends will turn against her no matter how hard she tries to do the right thing.

Why you shouldn't read this book: You've recently seen a child murdered by a police officer during a routine traffic stop.

Carter Family: Don't Forget This Song

Written by: Frank M. Young and David Lasky

First line: Alvin Pleasant Carter! You git away from that fiddle! That's th' devil's instr'ment!

Why you should read this book: With straightforward illustrations and simple dialect, this graphic novel tells the life of Pleasant Carter, patriarch of the musical Carter family. As a young man, music meant more to him than anything else, and collecting the old songs was more important to him than any job he ever had. Eventually, with the help of his family, he is able to make a living with his music (the book comes with a CD of the family's music, but someone seems to have stolen it from the library copy I checked out).

Why you shouldn't read this book: Johnny Cash only appears on the last page.

The Ghosts Go Scaring

Written by: Chrissy Bozik and Patricia Storms

First line: The ghosts go scaring one by one, hurrah! hurrah!

Why you should read this book: A silly ghost counting book based on the tune, "The Ants Go Marching One by One." Kids can easily pick up the chant and will enjoy singing along. Good for Halloween read-alouds.

Why you shouldn't read this book: You are extremely susceptible to earworms.

Sing-Along Song

Written by: JoAnn Early Macken Lellyen Pham

First line: Robin greets the morning from the sycamore tree, Chirpin' to the risin' sun, her babies, and me.

Why you should read this book: A little boy experiences joy as he hears the special song of all the people and animals he encounters in his day. Everything he does is accompanied by its own music, inspiring the child to sing along. Written in rhyme and warmly illustrated with happy and loving scenes.

Why you shouldn't read this book: You hate music, children, and animals.

Black Canary Volume 1: Kicking and Screaming

Written by: Brenden Fletcher, Annie Wu, Pia Guerra, Sandy Jarrell

First line: We got 'em! We got 'em!!

Why you should read this book: It's a different kind of superhero story, featuring a talented fighter with a decent superpower trying to leave the lifestyle behind to pursue a career in music, even though she's not really into music and she can't stop fighting. There are some nice, crazy details and some special appearances from surprise characters. Also, aliens, which always liven things up.

Why you shouldn't read this book: You're all about the music.

 

Jazz Baby

Written by: Lisa Wheeler and R Gregory Christie

First line: Brother's hands tap.

Why you should read this book: It's a rhyming book that creates the rhythmic sense of jazz music with bouncing text. A large extended family of especially musical individuals enjoy singing and dancing while jazz baby plays along, adding the occasional, "Go, man, go!" to the mix. A great crowd-pleasure among the young set, who will appreciate baby's antics even if they've never heard jazz music.

Why you shouldn't read this book: Your upstairs neighbors are always stomping around in combat boots.