Hi! My name is Bailey. Welcome to my book blog.

If you’re looking for good books to recommend to your young reader then you’ve come to the right place!

Stories can be powerful and reading a truly good story is more powerful still. Unfortunately, all books are not created equal and we end up reading many books that are mediocre or downright bad. It takes time, research, and reading to find good books for yourself, much less for your kids, and that’s why I’m glad you’re here! I have put in the time, done the research, and read a whole lot of books to bring you this: a blog completely devoted to good books for young adult and middle grade readers.

Most book blogs have reviews of every book the blogger reads, good or bad. Here you’ll find only the good (to see the qualities that I believe make a good book check out my Review Criteria). With my book lists and reviews I hope to help you find the next good book or series for your young readers (or you!) and I hope to encourage reading in you and your kids’ lives.

People know that I love to read and I have been asked many times by parents if I knew of any good books to recommend for their kids. Yes, I do! Thus the idea for this blog was born. I scoured the internet for anything like this blog and found a few things but nothing that told parents what their kids should read and why. I believe the why is very important.

And so is the who. There are many book reviews out there either throwing a book into the fire or proclaiming it the greatest book of all time. After tossing what I thought was going to be a good book out in disgust AGAIN, I wondered why I was believing the words of random reviewers. I’ve been misled enough times to learn that knowing the reviewer is crucial to the legitimacy of the recommendation. So, without further ado, here’s a bit about me so you can know the who behind these reviews and recommendations.

I grew up in a “Christian” home, participated in the usual church activities, and gave my best effort to be a good girl. It wasn’t until my parents divorced in my early teens that I developed a great hunger for truth, stability, and something to satisfy the needs of my deeply confused and hurting soul. I needed a Savior. Through the verse-by-verse teaching of my church and listening to cassette tapes of The Lamb by John R. Cross, I heard the gospel of grace, believed it, and became a born again Christian. Now I am learning how to walk by faith through life as I enjoy getting to know my Savior better. For more information about what I believe, go here.

One of the best things I get to do in this life is be a teammate to my husband. Mark and I met at college (an engineer and English major), got to know each other at church, dated, didn’t date, dated again, and were married February 2015. He is the steadiest man I have ever met and we joke that he’s the safety bar to my roller coaster. Oh, do I love this man!

Both my husband and I like to try new things—specifically, new hobbies. I’ve dabbled in beading, scrapbooking, acrylic painting, graphic design, photography, home design, bullet journaling, drawing, journalism, gaming, writing fiction, watercolor, organizing, floral arranging, cake decorating, from-scratch cooking, blogging, hand lettering, dip pen calligraphy, and most recently, website design. These days, my main endeavors are running my small art business, Lane 3 Studio, and building up this blog.

From my dabbling list you should be able to tell that I love flexing my creative muscles! Beyond that, I love the idea of making something good and beautiful and putting it into the world. When asked what we want our life to look like, one of the answers my husband and I will give is we desire a life of creating, not just consuming. I consume a lot of stories—through books, audiobooks, movies, TV series. By running this blog and sharing the good books I find with you, I feel I’m contributing, creating, and giving back.

 

I sincerely hope you find something good, beautiful, and worthwhile here.

All my best, Bailey