Book picks similar to
The Mona Lisa Key by Liesl Shurtliff


middle-grade
fantasy
time-travel
adventure

The Infinite Lives of Maisie Day


Christopher Edge - 2018
    She's hoping for the things she needs to build her own nuclear reactor. But she wakes to an empty house and outside the front door is nothing but a terrifying, all-consuming blackness. Trapped in an ever-shifting reality, Maisie knows that she will have to use the laws of the universe and the love of her family to survive. And even that might not be enough...A mind-bending mystery for anyone who's ever asked questions. From the author of The Many Worlds of Albie Bright and The Jamie Drake Equation.

The Glass Town Game


Catherynne M. Valente - 2017
    This make-believe land helps the four escape from a harsh reality: Charlotte and Emily are being sent away to a dangerous boarding school, a school they might not return from. But on this Beastliest Day, the day Anne and Branwell walk their sisters to the train station, something incredible happens: the train whisks them all away to a real Glass Town, and the children trade the moors for a wonderland all their own.This is their Glass Town, exactly like they envisioned it…almost. They certainly never gave Napoleon a fire-breathing porcelain rooster instead of a horse. And their soldiers can die; wars are fought over the potion that raises the dead, a potion Anne would very much like to bring back to England. But when Anne and Branwell are kidnapped, Charlotte and Emily must find a way to save their siblings. Can two English girls stand against Napoleon’s armies, especially now that he has a new weapon from the real world? And if he escapes Glass Town, will England ever be safe again?Together the Brontë siblings must battle with a world of their own creation if they are to make it back to England alive in this magical celebration of authorship, creativity, and classic literature from award-winning author Catherynne M. Valente.

The Menagerie


Tui T. Sutherland - 2013
    Sutherland, and her sister, Kari Sutherland, comes the Menagerie series, perfect for fans of Brandon Mull’s Fablehaven series and The Spiderwick Chronicles.In the small town of Xanadu, Wyoming lies the Menagerie, a top secret facility filled with unicorns, dragons, phoenixes, and other fairy tale creatures. At least, it was a secret—until six griffin cubs escaped.If Logan and Zoe don’t get the cubs back fast, the entire Menagerie will be shut down. The race is on and the resulting adventure is only the beginning of a thrilling series that will leave readers wanting a magical menagerie of their very own.

Some Kind of Courage


Dan Gemeinhart - 2016
    Joseph Johnson has lost just about everyone he's ever loved. He lost his pa in an accident. He lost his ma and his little sister to sickness. And now, he's lost his pony--fast, fierce, beautiful Sarah, taken away by a man who had no right to take her.Joseph can sure enough get her back, though. The odds are stacked against him, but he isn't about to give up. He will face down deadly animals, dangerous men, and the fury of nature itself on his quest to be reunited with the only family he has left.Because Joseph Johnson may have lost just about everything; but he hasn't lost hope. And he hasn't lost the fire in his belly that says he's getting his Sarah back--no matter what.

The Wild Robot


Peter Brown - 2016
    She has no idea how she got there or what her purpose is--but she knows she needs to survive. After battling a violent storm and escaping a vicious bear attack, she realizes that her only hope for survival is to adapt to her surroundings and learn from the island's unwelcoming animal inhabitants.As Roz slowly befriends the animals, the island starts to feel like home--until, one day, the robot's mysterious past comes back to haunt her.From bestselling and award-winning author and illustrator Peter Brown comes a heartwarming and action-packed novel about what happens when nature and technology collide.

The Hypnotists


Gordon Korman - 2013
    He's excited to be accepted into a special program at the Sentia Institute -- but when he realizes he's in over his head, Jackson will have to find a way to use his powers to save his friends, his parents, and his government.

The Accidental Afterlife of Thomas Marsden


Emma Trevayne - 2015
    A bad business.And for Thomas Marsden, on what was an unremarkable spring night in London, it becomes a very spooky business. For lying in an unmarked grave and half covered with dirt is a boy the spitting image of Thomas himself.This is only the first clue that something very strange is happening. Others follow, but it is a fortune teller’s frightened screams that lead Thomas into a strange world of spiritualists, death and faery folk.Faery folk with whom Thomas’s life is bizarrely linked. Faery folk who need his help.Desperate to unearth the truth about himself and where he comes from, Thomas is about to discover magic, and ritual, and that sometimes, just sometimes, the things that make a boy ordinary are what make him extraordinary.

The Genius Experiment


James Patterson - 2018
    Twelve-year-old orphan Max Einstein (like Albert Einstein himself) is not your typical genius. Max hacks the computer system at NYU in order to attend college courses (even though she hates tests), builds homemade inventions to help the homeless, and plays speed chess in the park. Her not-so-normal life is crazy but predictable until...Max is recruited by a mysterious organization! Their mission: solve some of the world's toughest problems using science. She's helped by a diverse group of young geniuses from around the globe as they invent new ways to power the farthest reaches of the planet. But that's only if the sinister outfit known only as The Corporation doesn't get to her first...Max Einstein is a heroine for the modern age and will be looked up to by readers for generations to come.

Wishes and Wellingtons


Julie Berry - 2018
    It'll take all of her quick thinking and sass to set matters right.

Quintessence


Jess Redman - 2020
    Her panic attacks started a week later, and they haven’t stopped -- even though she told her parents that they did. Every day she feels less and less like herself. Then Alma meets the ShopKeeper in the town's junk shop, The Fifth Point. The ShopKeeper gives her a telescope and this message:​Find the Elements.Grow the Light. Save the Starling.​That night, Alma watches as a star—a star that looks like a child—falls from the sky and into her backyard. Alma knows what it’s like to be lost and afraid, to long for home, and with the help of some unlikely new friends from the Astronomy Club, she sets out on a quest that will take a little bit of astronomy, a little bit of alchemy, and her whole self. Quintessence is a stunning story of friendship, self-discovery, interconnectedness, and the inexplicable elements that make you you.

Cece Rios and the Desert of Souls


Kaela Rivera - 2021
    But Cecelia Rios has always believed there was more to the criaturas, much to her family’s disapproval. After all, only brujas—humans who capture and control criaturas—consort with the spirits, and brujeria is a terrible crime.When her older sister, Juana, is kidnapped by El Sombrerón, a powerful dark criatura, Cece is determined to bring Juana back. To get into Devil’s Alley, though, she’ll have to become a bruja herself—while hiding her quest from her parents, her town, and the other brujas. Thankfully, the legendary criatura Coyote has a soft spot for humans and agrees to help her on her journey.With him at her side, Cece sets out to reunite her family—and maybe even change what it means to be a bruja along the way.

The Fowl Twins


Eoin Colfer - 2019
    Beckett is blonde, messy and sulks whenever he has to wear clothes. Myles is fanatically neat, he has an IQ of 170, and he wears a fresh suit every day like his older brother, Artemis Fowl.Perhaps you have heard of the Fowl family and their adventures? This Fowl adventure is filled with the most unusual of individuals: an immortal duke, a miniature troll, a nunterrogator and a Police Specialist that's 42% elf. And of course, the Fowl twins - one a certified genius with a criminal leaning, and the other possessing an unusual talent that has not been fully explored... yet!Here begins the second documented cycle of Fowl Adventures.The first in a breath-taking new series from global superstar Eoin Colfer. Set in the multi-million bestselling world of ARTEMIS FOWL.

The Peculiar


Stefan Bachmann - 2012
    Bartholomew and Hettie are changelings--Peculiars--and neither faeries nor humans want anything to do with them.One day a mysterious lady in a plum-colored dress comes gliding down Old Crow Alley. Bartholomew watches her through his window. Who is she? What does she want? And when Bartholomew witnesses the lady whisking away, in a whirling ring of feathers, the boy who lives across the alley--Bartholomew forgets the rules and gets himself noticed.First he's noticed by the lady in plum herself, then by something darkly magical and mysterious, by Jack Box and the Raggedy Man, by the powerful Mr. Lickerish . . . and by Arthur Jelliby, a young man trying to slip through the world unnoticed, too, and who, against all odds, offers Bartholomew friendship and a way to belong.Part murder mystery, part gothic fantasy, part steampunk adventure, The Peculiar is Stefan Bachmann's riveting, inventive, and unforgettable debut novel.

The Riverman


Aaron Starmer - 2014
    So here's mine: My name is Fiona Loomis. I was born on August 11, 1977. I am recording this message on the morning of October 13, 1989. Today I am thirteen years old. Not a day older. Not a day younger."Fiona Loomis is Alice, back from Wonderland. She is Lucy, returned from Narnia. She is Coraline, home from the Other World. She is the girl we read about in storybooks, but here's the difference: She is real.Twelve-year-old Alistair Cleary is her neighbor in a town where everyone knows each other. One afternoon, Fiona shows up at Alistair's doorstep with a strange proposition. She wants him to write her biography. What begins as an odd vanity project gradually turns into a frightening glimpse into a clearly troubled mind. For Fiona tells Alistair a secret. In her basement there's a gateway and it leads to the magical world of Aquavania, the place where stories are born. In Aquavania, there's a creature called the Riverman and he's stealing the souls of children. Fiona's soul could be next.Alistair has a choice. He can believe her, or he can believe something else...something even more terrifying.

The Troubled Girls of Dragomir Academy


Anne Ursu - 2021
    And that's because of what everyone knows: that Luka is destined to become a sorcerer.The Lupus might be from a small village far from the capital city of Illyria, but that doesn't matter. Every young boy born in in the kingdom holds the potential for the rare ability to wield magic, to protect the country from the terrifying force known only as the Dread.For all the hopes the family has for Luka, no one has any for Marya, who can never seem to do anything right. But even so, no one is prepared for the day that the sorcerers finally arrive to test Luka for magical ability, and Marya makes a terrible mistake. Nor the day after, when the Lupus receive a letter from a place called Dragomir Academy--a mysterious school for wayward young girls. Girls like Marya.Soon she is a hundred miles from home, in a strange and unfamiliar place, surrounded by girls she's never met. Dragomir Academy promises Marya and her classmates a chance to make something of themselves in service to one of the country's powerful sorcerers. But as they learn how to fit into a world with no place for them, they begin to discover things about the magic the men of their country wield, as well as the Dread itself--things that threaten the precarious balance upon which Illyria is built.