Mark Buxton has been blogging at Buxton's Blog O' Books (which was named by his 6th grade students!) since 2009. He recently retired from teaching after 35 years, the last several of which he taught 6th grade language arts. He still volunteers and substitutes at school, helping in the library and coaching the Battle of the Books team.
I know all of this because we've been working in the same school for over ten years!
For his first time as a Middle Grade Fiction panelist, Mark is doing a great job reading lots of nominations. He had this to say about Josh Berk's Strike Three, You're Dead:
"Lenny, Mike, and Other Mike (that's what they call him!) love baseball
and the Phillies; actually, Other Mike is not as obsessed as Lenny and
Mike. Lenny wins a contest and gets to announce one inning of a
Phillies' game, but the game never lasts long enough for that to happen
when the 19-year-old pitcher dies on the mound. The boys, along with an
unlikely helper, are convinced the pitcher was murdered, so they set out
to find the killer. Unless the killer kills them first."
Read more of the review here.
Karen Yingling