New Releases by Jaclyn Moriarty

In this epistolary novel, three Aussie private school girls enter a pen pal program that leads to friendship, love, mischief, mystery, and revenge. The Ashbury-Brookfield pen pal program is designed to bring together the two rival schools in a spirit of harmony and “the Joy of the Envelope.” But when Cassie, Lydia, and Emily send their first letters to Matthew, Charlie, and Sebastian, things don’t go quite as planned. What starts out as a simple letter exchange soon leads to secret missions, false alarms, lock picking, mistaken identities, and an all-out war between the schools—not to mention some really excellent kissing. Praise for The Year of Secret Assignments “Who can resist Moriarty’s biting humor?” —Kirkus Reviews “This energetic novel reveals the author’s keen understanding of teen dynamics and invites audience members to read between the lines to discover what makes each character tick. Containing elements of mystery, espionage, romance and revenge, Moriarty’s story will likely satisfy hearty appetites for suspense and fun.” —Publishers Weekly

A fairytale, a mystery, a history of hot-air ballooning, and a romance . . . A novel so brilliant, moving, zingy -- and Zingy -- that it could only have come from Jaclyn Moriarty.The Zing family lives in a world of misguided spell books, singular poetry, and state-of-the-art surveillance equipment. They use these things to protect the Zing Family Secret -- one so huge it draws the family to the garden shed for meetings every Friday night. Into their world comes socially isolated middle grader Listen Taylor, whose father is dating a Zing. Enter Cath Murphy, a young teacher at the elementary school that Cassie Zing attends, suffering from a broken heart. How will the worlds of these two young woman connect? Only the reader can know!

Bindy Mackenzie is the smartest and kindest girl at Ashbury High. She likes to share her knowledge of common teen anxieties and offers lunchtime advisory sessions in the locker room. But when Bindy discovers that, despite all her hard work, nobody likes her, benevolent Bindy is banished - ruthless Bindy is about to be unleashed.

The Zing family lives in a misguided world of spell books, flying beach umbrellas, and state-of-the-art covert surveillance equipment. There''s a slippery Zing, a graceful Zing, and a Zing who runs as fast as a bus. But most significant of all, there''s the Zing Family Secret: so immense that it draws the family to the garden shed for meetings every Friday night.I Have a Bed Made of Buttermilk Pancakes is an entirely new universe unto itself. The story passes among five female characters -- Fancy, Marbie, Cassie, Listen, and Cath -- all of whom are closely connected, as they -- and we -- come to discover. The two youngest heroines, Listen and Cassie, shoulder the biggest role in piecing together the mystery that saves everyone in the end.

An epistolary novel uses letters written between teenage friends, refrigerator notes from a crazy mother, and epistles that express the narrator''s own internal feelings of self-doubt to weave this bittersweet coming of age story.