In My Mailbox/What's Coming Up in Historical Fiction this spring

This week I should be calling this meme, hosted by The Story Siren, In My Car, since that was how I lugged back a large number of terrific historical fiction for kids and teens ARCS from ALA in San Diego.  OK, some of them are going to blogging friends who couldn't make it to ALA, but the huge number of free books available seems to provoke some kind of weird book hoarding disease in me as I wander around saying to myself, I must have that one, and that one, and that one!  It seems to be a disease rampant among librarians, given the huge (and heavy) bags everyone was carrying around.  Personally, I prefer the "get a gigantic bag, fill it up to the brim, take it to the bag check, and start again" method.

I was able to get my hands on virtually all the upcoming children's and YA historical fiction books I had on my personal radar, plus some that I hadn't been aware of.  They are now sitting proudly on a special shelf reserved for books I am planning to blog about.  Then of course there's the ones I really want to read, but don't fit into my blog (usually I review those on Goodreads/Amazon), and that's another huge pile, and pile #3 is all the adult books I brought home that I thought would appeal either to my husband or that I wanted to try for myself.  I went to the Harper Collins adult release preview, and everything they talked about sounded so fantastic I could keep myself busy just on those titles alone!  I also attended their children's preview--I love attending these events because they manage to drum up such enthusiasm for each book that by the time they're done you can't wait to get your hands on them (the books, I mean, not the Harper Collins reps...)

In rough order of their release, here are the middle grade and YA historical fiction titles I picked up that are coming out soon and that I will be reviewing in the coming months, with links to their Goodreads blurbs:

The Vespertine by Saundra Mitchell
The Grave Robber's Secret, by Anna Myers
Fallen Grace, by Mary Hooper
Hurricane Dancers by Margarita Engle
Strings Attached by Judy Blundell
The Year We Were Famous, by Carole Estby Dagg
Okay for Now, by Gary D. Schmidt
The Fitzosbornes in Exile,  by Michelle Cooper
In the Shadow of the Lamp, by Susanne Dunlap
The Betrayal of Maggie Blair, by Elizabeth Laird
Dear America:  Cannons at Dawn (Valley Forge, 1779), by Kristiana Gregory
The Berlin Boxing Club, by Robert Sharenow
Belladonna by Mary Finn
The Revenant by Sonia Gensler
Lunch-Box Dream, by Tony Abbott
The Auslander, by Paul Dowswell
Sylvia & Aki, by Winifred Conkling

I was also able to pick up some upcoming or just published history-related non-fiction to review, including:

Lewis & Clark, by Nick Bertozzi (a graphic novel)
Amelia Lost, by Candace Fleming
How They Croaked:  The Awful Ends of the Awfully Famous, by Georgia Bragg
Nurse, Soldier, Spy, by Marissa Moss
Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, by Penny Colman
Me, Frida, by Amy Novesky
Play Ball, Jackie, by Stephen Krensky

Phew!  These will certainly keep me busy; I don't think I'll need to make any library runs for a while to supplement.  And that's not counting some additional titles I picked up that are already out but that I hadn't had a chance to review, such as When Molly Was a Harvey Girl and The Storm Before Atlanta, a new Civil War novel that was released at the end of 2010.

A gigantic thanks goes to all the publishers who so generously give out these review copies at ALA for librarians and bloggers to read and get excited about so we can talk them up to our patrons or in the blogosphere.

Are there any titles I mentioned that are on your 2011 to-read list?