Kindle Deals for February 10, 2020
Today's Best Book Deals for Your Homeschool
(Prices are correct as of the time of writing, but y'all know sales move fast — check before you click the buy button! These are Amazon links — read more about how we use affiliate links to help support some of the costs of the HSL blog here.)
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And Still I Rise: Black America Since MLK, by Henry L. Gates and Kevin M. Burke, $2.99. Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates considers the highs and lows of Black History in the last 50 years. This book is a companion to a compelling PBS series and is full of engaging pictures.
100 Birds and How They Got Their Names, by Diana Wells, $1.99. It’s amazing how much you can learn from a name! This lovely book about birds explains the discovery, naming, and folklore of birds around the world. Did you know that Birds of Paradise are so named because their namers thought they didn’t have feet and just hovered?
Meet Cute, by various authors, $2.99. A “meet cute” is the first time a couple meets in a romance novel. This story anthology is a collection of meet cute stories from some of the biggest names in YA fiction. You’ll love the broad diversity of characters’ racial, gender, and sexual identies. Everyone deserves a good love story.
STILL ON SALE
The Cooking Gene: A Journey Through African American Culinary History in the Old South, by Michael W. Twitty, $1.99. Whether you love Southern cooking or know nothing about it, you will definitely be interested what Twitty has to say. As he tells the story of how traditional cuisine developed, he takes on slavery, racism, class, and religion.
A Weird and Wild Beauty: The Story of Yellowstone, The World’s First National Park, by Erin Peabody, $1.99. Yellowstone is a place like few others in the world, and this book traces its fascinating history. This book, aimed at teens to adults, covers the park’s discovery, the protection act that created the first national park, and the science and nature that make Yellowstone so unique. Copious historical and current photos enhance the reading experience.
Lintang and the Pirate Queen, by Tamara Moss, $2.99. This middle-grade fantasy novel is perhaps better known in Australia, where it was initially published. I love all the strong female characters. Here’s how the publisher describes it: “Lintang is an island girl who longs for daring and danger. When she meets the feared pirate Captain Shafira and her all-female crew, Lintang is determined to join them. Secrets within secrets, life-or-death battles with spectacular monsters, and hair’s breadth escapes keep readers turning the pages of a story populated by women of color who are fighters, adventurers, and leaders.”
How to Read Poetry Like a Professor: A Quippy and Sonorous Guide to Verse, by Thomas C. Foster, $1.99. Poetry doesn’t have to be intimidating. This guide to understanding the meanings of poems will help teens and adults find the beauty in verse. Along the way, Foster introduces and explains all the language scholars use to talk about poetry — meter, figurative language, rhyme structure, and more.
The Name of the Rose, by Umberto Eco, $2.99. This is one of my favorite novels. The movie version of the book, starring Sean Connery, is in our Medieval History movie list, but the book is even better. This is an incredibly faithful and richly detailed tale of monastic life that is also full of page-turning intrigue and mystery.
Josephine: The Dazzling Life of Josephine Baker, by Patricia Hruby Powell and Christian Robinson, $1.99. This lovely children’s biography of Josephine Baker covers both her performance career and her civil rights work. It is written in a jazz-style poetry that calls to mind the 1920s. The simple, vivid illustrations won the Coretta Scott King Honor distinction.
Science in Seconds: 200 Key Concepts Explained in an Instant, by Hazel Muir, $1.99. This illustrated guide to scientific concepts explains everything from thermodynamics to the Doppler effect. It’s an excellent resource for when you need a refresher or a way to answer a homework question.
Wonders of the Solar System, by Brian Cox and Andrew Cohen, $2.99. This book companion to the impressive BBC series is full of amazing images. Brian Cox is very much like Carl Sagan — his science is rigorous but filled with lyricism and wonder.
In Progress: Seeing Inside a Lettering Artist’s Sketchbook and Process, from Pencil to Vector, by Jessica Hische, $2.99. I love to learn about how things are made, and this peek into a lettering artist’s work process is really fascinating to me. This is a great introduction to the terminology, tools, and business of lettering. You’ll enjoy this look behind the scenes even if you, like me, have no talent for fancy handwriting.
Super Graphic: A Visual Guide to the Comic Book Universe, by Tim Leong, $1.99. If you love comic books, this is the book for you. If you know very little about superheroes but enjoy infographics, this is also the book for you. Tim Leong breaks down the world of superheroes and supervillians by color, geographic area, height, weight, and more.
Binti, by Nnedi Okorafor, $1.99. This sci-fi novella introduces an exciting new universe. Binti, a Himba tribeswoman, is the first of her people to gain admission to a galactic university. Against her family’s wishes, she leaves her desert home to pursue higher education. A disaster on her transport ship has profound impacts on Binti’s future. This book is beautifully written and a whirlwind of activity. It’s short, but it packs a punch.
We Have Always Lived in the Castle, by Shirley Jackson, $1.99. From our Spooky (and Not-So-Spooky) Book guide: “After the rest of their family dies suspiciously of arsenic poisoning, Merricat and Constance live an isolated life in their family's grand old house. Jackson manages her usual balance of macabre humor and growing unease in this story that slowly grows more and more un-put-down-able as you read.”
How to Draw Fantasy Art and RPG Maps: Step by Step Cartography for Gamers and Fans, by Jared Blando, $4.99. I’m a big fan of meeting kids where they are to sneak in some meaningful learning. In creating a fantasy world and building an accurate map, budding cartographers will have a crash course in geography. The book offers good starting points for discussion of geographic features, cities and transportation, political history, and heraldry. The excellent and varied illustrations break the complex process into manageable steps.
Enlightenment Now, by Steven Pinker, $1.99. This is a great deal on a massive, informative book, so snap it up! It is very easy to get stuck in thinking about all of the problems and disasters facing the modern world. Pinker uses meticulous sociological research to show that human conditions have been steadily improving since the Enlightenment. Far from resting on laurels, Pinker encourages readers to continue embracing reason and science to defend the world against the ever-encroaching tribalism, demagoguery, and fatalism that also seem to be a persistent part of human nature.
Paperback Crush, by Gabrielle Moss, $2.99. Calling all women in their thirties and forties! Did you go through a horse book phase in middle school? Did you morbidly rubberneck the doomed romances of terminally ill teens? This book is a love letter to the mass market teen paperbacks of the 1980s and 1990s. Revisit the extremely specific genres of books you loved but have probably forgotten.
Physics of the Impossible: A Scientific Exploration into the World of Phasers, Force Fields, Teleportation, and Time Travel, by Michio Kaku, $2.99. Renowned physicist Michio Kaku takes on science fiction to determine which fictional technologies are possible and which violate our current understanding of the laws of physics. This could be a good book to get a sci-fi fan more interested in the science aspects of popular TV and movies.
A Crazy-Much Love, by Joy Jordan-Lake, $1.99. This sweet picture book tells the story of an international adoption and many milestones that follow in a young girl’s family.
George, by Alex Gino, $3.99. George may look like a boy, but she knows she is really a girl. Determined to win the role of Charlotte in her school play of Charlotte’s Web, she sets out to make sure everyone else can see her the way she sees herself. Books that address the experiences of transgender tweens are rare, and this one does it well, so snag it for your middle-grade reader.
Challenge Accepted! 253 Steps to Becoming an Anti-It Girl, by Celeste Barber, $1.99. You may have seen Australian actor and comedian Celeste Barber’s hilarious Instagram photos attempting to copy ridiculous celebrity poses. If you’re interested in her take on childbirth, what it’s like to share so much of her life on the internet, body image, and more, this book is a breezy, laugh-out-loud read. Note: If you are squeamish about crude language, this may not be the book for you.
The Blue Sword, by Robin McKinley, $1.99. From our Adventure and Suspense reading list: Orphaned girl Harry Crewe is living a perfectly ordinary life — until the day she is kidnapped by the king of the Hillfolk to fulfill a destiny she never imagined. Is Harry really a true warrior who can wield the legendary blue sword? And even if she is, will she believe in herself enough to seize her fate?
Waiting, by Kevin Henkes, $1.99. This sweet picture book captures the emotional essence of childhood. Five toys sit by a window, each waiting for something different to happen. Simple, but resonant text and warm illustrations make this a delightful read.
The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human Nature, by Steven Pinker, $4.99. This book is fascinating and long. I bought it when I couldn’t finish my library copy in time (and I wanted to be able to refer to it again). Word nerds and anthropology fans will love this genre mashup. Find out what the words people use for swearing, humor, and metaphor say about us as human beings.
Year of Yes: How to Dance it Out, Stand in the Sun, and Be Your Own Person, by Shonda Rimes, $2.99. Shonda Rimes is the mega-successful producer of Grey’s Anatomy, Scandal, and other popular shows. She also is extremely introverted and struggles with anxiety. This is the memoir of the year she spent saying “YES!” to all the things that scared her.
From the Corner of the Oval, by Beck Dorey-Stein, $4.99. This dishy political memoir describes the Obama White House from an unusual perspective, that of one of his twenty-something stenographers. Dorey-Stein came to the job with no political experience and got thrown into the deep end. The New York Times called this “Bridget Jones goes to the White House” — how can you pass that up?
Inside Out and Back Again, by Thanhha Lai, $1.99. From our big immigration stories reading list (winter 2017): “When Hà’s family flees Vietnam to escape the war there, she finds it difficult to adjust to a very different kind of life in Alabama. Told in spare, simple verse, this book packs an emotional wallop and allows kids to slip inside the first person experience of being a stranger in a strange land.”
This Book is Grey, by Lindsay Ward, $1.99. The other colors aren’t always friendly to Grey, and he just wants to fit in. He decides to make his own book of awesome things that are grey (hippos, clouds, kittens, etc.), but the other colors are not so enthusiastic. This is a story about fitting in, being true to yourself, and a little bit of color theory.