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Disunited States of America, by Harry Turtledove (book review) – alternate history with no USA!

Jul5

book cover of Disunited States of America by Harry Turtledove published by Tor TeenYesterday was a day for fireworks, picnics, and patriotic celebrations. At least, it was in this timeline for the USA… but what if the Constitution were never ratified? What if the states never united?

Welcome to “alt hist” – the alternative histories produced by wondering “what if” some key event of history had happened differently, then writing in great and grand detail about the results of that new path through time.

Turtledove is an acknowledged master of alternative history (his Guns of the South and WorldWar series are epic), and this trip with Crosstime Traffic to an alternate timestream is as thought-provoking as it is dangerous for Beckie (native to that timestream) and Justin (visiting with his mom on a trading mission).

Biological terrorism launched before the antidote is ready? Rampant racism and unrest? Remember, this is an alternate history, right?

Among all the freedoms that we celebrate today, be sure to exercise your freedom to read!
**kmm

Book info: The Disunited States of America (Crosstime Traffic #4) / Harry Turtledove. Tor Teen, 2011. [author’s website] [publisher site] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

My Book Talk: War between Ohio and Virginia? In Beckie’s world, it could happen any day. Justin’s seen enough alternate timelines to know that, as a Time Trader traveling through the many realities of how Earth’s history could have turned out.

Justin and his mom travel to Beckie’s alternate to make sure that researchers there hadn’t discovered Crosstime secrets and to help improve race relations. That North America is a crazy-quilt of big and little countries, and there are certainly no equal rights. If you weren’t white and male, you were powerless (except in Mississippi…strange, strange Mississippi).

This alternate never saw the states become united under the Constitution, so Beckie and her grandmother must have passports and visas and permission-to-travel letters for every border crossing between the civilized nation of California and Grandma’s hometown in rural Virginia. The “cousin” who gives them a ride across the bridge from Ohio gives her the creeps…the big guns hidden in his car give her the chills.

Beckie is glad to meet someone her own age when Justin visits the aunt and uncle she’s staying with. Justin is careful to speak like the locals, trying to blend in. Soon, they’re both glad that they met.

Suddenly, people in border towns start dying of a mysterious fever and Ohio is blamed for it. As Virginia soldiers roll in and bombing begins, Beckie and her ever-grumbling grandma search for a safe place, Justin is separated from his mom with communication lines cut, and the fever is confirmed as the plague. Plague! Who has a cure for the plague?

Will Beckie ever get home to California?
Will Justin and his mom find their way through time to their world?
Can Justin tell Beckie where he’s really from without poking holes in the fabric of time?

Turtledove is the master of alternate history, and his “Time Traders” series takes readers to fascinating timelines that truly make you wonder… what if? (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

Mermaid’s Mirror (fiction)

Jul4

Happy Independence Day on this Metaphysical Monday!

Poor Lena – drawn to the Pacific Ocean‘s waves, forbidden by her father to learn to surf, longing for her own independence. How often she finds herself walking on the beach at night, sleepwalking to the shore…

And drawn to find something at her home, something left by her dead mother? Lena’s searching is more than just the normal separation-of-self experienced by most teenagers – this is primal and frightening to her and her dad and her stepmother.

What does a mermaid want with Lena? What does a mermaid’s mirror show? More than usual teen vs. parent fireworks in this one!
**kmm

Book info: Mermaid’s Mirror / L.K. Madigan. Houghton Mifflin, 2010. [author’s website] [author interview] [publisher site] [book trailer]

Recommendation: Ever drawn to the ocean, Lena wants to learn to surf with her friends. But her father forbids it, reminding her of his near-drowning as a championship surfer years ago, and her stepmom agrees with him. If only her mother were still alive to take Lena’s side in this argument…

Walking on the beach is comforting, something Lena does every day, sometimes every night, watching for otters and seals in the waves. Hmm… that’s not a seal – it’s a woman, far out in the cove, but she’s swimming just fine (at midnight?).

As her sixteenth birthday approaches, Lena is sure that she’s strong enough to master the board and begins surfing lessons in secret. And again in the waves she sees the woman, the mermaid, and the lure of the sea becomes irresistible to Lena, who must be in the saltwater more and more each day.

Is the mermaid calling to Lena? What’s Dad hiding about his surfing accident? Why is Gran suddenly worried about getting Lena’s blood tested? Why does Lena feel compelled to surf the monster waves at Magic Crescent Cove, where Dad crashed and Mom disappeared?

A fascinating tale of the everyday and the paranormal, of the unbreakable bonds between sea and shore, of discovering who you are. 308 pages (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Luck of the Buttons, by Anne Ylvisaker (fiction) – small-town mystery, big excitement in 1920s

Jul3

Independence Day!
Pie-eating contests!
Patriotic essay competitions!
Three-legged races!

Is bad luck something you’re born with or something that you can rise above? Are bullies part of every school and neighborhood? Does the world look different when seen through your camera’s lens?

This is a great summer story as Tugs investigates a mystery that the grown-ups in town just can’t seem to see. Wishing you plenty of pie, family, and fireworks this holiday weekend!
**kmm

Book info: The Luck of the Buttons / Anne Ylvisaker. Candlewick, 2011 [author’s website] [publisher site]

Recommendation: Tugs is good at reading and good at running, which keeps her ahead of the Rowdies gang in their small Iowa town in 1929. Independence Day is next week, so she writes a patriotic essay, like every other 12 year old in town, and practices with Aggie for the 3-legged race. Thank goodness, she doesn’t have to run with her short, tubby cousin Ned this year. And she has some tickets for the raffle of a Brownie camera, too! Of course, no one in the Button family is lucky at all, so she’s not getting her hopes up about anything.

Uh-oh, it’s time to worry when Mama has a pie ready for lunch (Buttons always have pie when something bad happens). Granny is moving in, taking her bedroom! Well, at least Tugs can escape to the cool quiet of the library, browsing through the dictionary and reading old newspapers. This newcomer Harvey Moore is so busy collecting money to start a newspaper in Goodhue that he isn’t really starting it at all, so Tugs starts investigating.

On the fourth of July, it’s time for the 3-legged race, the raffle drawing, and the essay contest announcement. Will it be time for pie at the Button family table again? Can Tugs stay ahead of the Rowdies? Does the world look different through a camera lens? And how did Tugs get her first name anyway?

The summer of 1929, surrounded by cornfields and caring, is a great place to be with Tugs and her pie-baking family, as she wonders about luck and persistence in this easy-reading story. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Little Brother, by Cory Doctorow (book review) – future USA Homeland insecurity

Jul2
book cover of Little Brother by Cory Doctorow published by Tor Teen

Another Sneak-In Saturday, with one of my favorite books which has crept onto bestseller lists before I could get my recommendation to you!

This chilling near-future USA tale has won numerous awards, including 2009 John W. Campbell Science Fiction Novel of the Year, and is included on many best books lists for young adults.

Through 6 July 2011, you can download the mp3 audiobook of Little Brother FREE at SYNC’s site (2 free YA audiobooks each week all summer – yay!) with free Overdrive listening service, no DRM restrictions.

Or you can have Little Brother delivered free by e-mail (the whole book, in 139 chunks) through the fabulous Daily Lit service on the schedule you select (stop and start as you wish, have the next chunk delivered now, etc.)!

And any time you can download a text-readable version of Little Brother FREE here, with the author’s permission and blessing. Yes, really! Cory has found out that folks read his books and short stories online/on screen, then go buy the print books or eBooks (he’s right – that’s what I did).

Of course, you can pop down to your local library or indie bookstore to get it, too!
Don’t miss Little Brother! Stay free!
**kmm

Book info: Little Brother / Cory Doctorow. Tor Teen, 2008. [author’s website] [publisher site] [book trailers one and two]

MY Recommendation: When terror attacks strike San Francisco, Marcus and his friends were skipping school to play a high-tech search game. Getting past the school’s ever-present cameras and snooper-computers had just been a game, too, but the authorities think those technogeek talents may connect the teens to the attacks. Although Darrell was stabbed during the panic following the bombings, Homeland Security detains them for days without their parents’ knowledge.

When the friends are released, but Darrell is nowhere to be found, Marcus vows to use his technical talents to strike back against intrusive security surveillance in every neighborhood, constant wiretapping, and increasing loss of citizens’ personal liberties. Hundreds of others join him online to fight against the “Big Brother” tactics being used to monitor everyone in the city.

But the pressure is on – Why is his social studies teacher replaced with someone who lectures that the Bill of Rights only applies sometimes?
Why don’t the US newspapers report about the chaos in San Francisco?
Will Marcus be able to keep up the fight for freedom of speech while staying a jump ahead of the authorities and still keep his friends safe?

A cautionary tale with a techno-twist. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Fun Friday!

Jul1

Welcome to Funny Friday, kicking off a long holiday weekend in the USA and the Ultimate Blog Challenge (31 posts in 31 days!) all in one fell swoop!

Sneak peak at titles rumored to be on board for future Fun Fridays: The Red Blazer Girls in The Ring of Rocamadour and also The Vanishing Violin, crafty fun At Home With Handmade Books, and a little undead versus living battle in graphic novel Ghostopolis.

Be sure that you’ve asked your local library or indie bookstore for these recent BooksYALove fun favorites (click title for full recommendation):

Astronaut Academy: Zero Gravity, by Dave Roman – school in space, dinosaur racing, spies = a graphic novel series with a great future!

I Love Him to Pieces (My Boyfriend is a Monster #1), by Evonne Tsang; art by Janina Gorrissen – Baseball, egg-babies, flirting, and a zombie plague! This graphic novel is set in St. Petersburg (be careful on your way to the beach this weekend!) and is first in a series.

Smile, by Raina Telgemeier – yes, you can live through braces, junior high, and high school to come out smiling on the other side! Autobiographical graphic novel with heart.

Cinderella: Ninja Warrior, by Maureen McGowan – choose-your-own-adventure meets fairy tale in this kicking twist on the classic (ninjas! magic! secrets! the worst evil stepmother ever!); first in series.

Kat, Incorrigible, by Stephanie Burgis – mix the straightlaced traditions of Regency England with some irrepressible magic and you’ll find Kat in the middle of it, trying to ‘save’ her siblings from their unhappy futures. Spunky Kat also has to deal with a stick-tight magic mirror, a too-proper stepmother, and a daring bandit on the woods road…

Fish, by Gregory Mone – Pirates, treasure-hunters stealing from pirates, maps and puzzles, and a pirate-to-be who refuses to fight anyone! Such a cast of characters, such a prize – if they can keep it!

Have a fun Friday, and happy reading!
**kmm

Time Quake (Gideon Trilogy #3) (fiction)

Jun30

Time travel meets alternate history in the final volume of the Gideon Trilogy, and it’s a doozy!

So we have the fabric of time tearing apart while Lord Luxon (that rat!) tries to manipulate history in his own favor.

But what’s happening to Kate and Peter? Where’s Gideon now? And the Tar Man? If the time quakes don’t stop, the world that we know may shatter!

Be sure to read Time Travelers (#1 recommended here) and Time Thief (#2 recommended here) before you start this roller-coaster tale of time ripples so you can enjoy every bit of the wild ride!
**kmm

Book info: The Time Quake / Linda Buckley-Archer. Simon & Schuster, 2010.
[author’s website] [author interview] [publisher site] [book trailer]

Recommendation:Returning to 18th century England on a duplicate time machine, Kate and Peter try to unravel the snarl of events that their unintended time travel has caused. Kate’s hold on the present (whatever year she’s in) grows more and more tenuous as the multiplicity of universes created by each time travel event start to collide. Their search for the Tar Man and Lord Luxon takes a dangerous turn and may separate the friends forever!

When the original time machine fell into Lord Luxon’s amoral hands, he all too quickly saw its potential for exploitation. Taking “undiscovered” 18th century masterpiece paintings into the 20th century brings wealth, but the Tar Man’s employer is looking for power so he travels to New York City to try his hand at changing history…

Could Lord Luxon’s purposeful damage to key events in the American Revolution truly change history? Can Peter and Gideon keep Kate from fading away entirely? Will anyone ever get back to their home time?

Time quakes muddle past and present, hurtling the friends toward the possible end of our universe as the trilogy races toward its heart-stopping conclusion (443 pages in paperback). (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Time Thief (Gideon Trilogy #2) (fiction)

Jun29

For world Wednesday, let’s travel to England and to two different centuries!
Traveling into the future might be quite fascinating – if one were prepared. As 21st century folks, we have some guesses about the technological marvels that future times may have. But what of a vicious rogue transported from the 1760s right into the heart of modern London? From public hangings to cellphones and police helicopters?

And where’s Peter? Kate moves heaven, earth, and stubborn grownups as she tries to rescue her friend. Gravitational time dilation, time warps…whatever you call the aftershocks of people transported out of their own time, things are getting really messy in our space-time continuum!

Noted scientist Stephen Hawking thinks that time travel to the future is indeed possible, so “never say never!” This is the 2nd volume of The Gideon Trilogy, which began with The Time Travelers (yesterday’s feature book) and ends with The Time Quake (tomorrow’s feature).
**kmm

Book info: The Time Thief / Linda Buckley-Archer. Simon & Schuster, 2008.
[author’s website] [author interview] [publisher site] [book trailer]

Recommendation:Two people cling to the time machine, roaring into the 20th century. But one is a notorious 18th century villain who pushed Peter away from his chance to return home! Kate is furious and refuses to let her friend be left in 1763, despite their families’ efforts to keep her safe.

Now the Tar Man is loose in modern London, trying to wrap his horse-and-buggy experience around the concepts of automobiles and traffic lights. Of course, policemen are always the same in any century, despite changes in uniform and chase techniques (flying machines? how can that be possible?), and the Tar Man finds ways to elude them as he worms his way into the criminal underworld.

The time machine inventors are trying to create another one while other authorities hunt for the original to destroy it. Kate and her scientist father rush to rescue Peter before it’s too late, but the wrong setting sends them to the wrong year!

Can Kate find Peter in 1792? Will their 18th century friend Gideon be able to help? Is there any way to get the Tar Man out of their time and Peter back into it?

Second volume of the brilliant trilogy, The Time Thief races down the interconnected paths of an 18th century villain and 2 teens from modern England. If the snarl of time loops is cut, what will happen to them all? Stay tuned for volume 3, The Time Quake! (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Time Travelers, by Linda Buckley- Archer (book review) – zapped into 1763, but home is today!

Jun28

Time travel…what if it were possible? Of course, there are rules which every time travel tale must follow, or the world as we know it would go poof!

This is the first book in a trilogy known in the UK as Gideon the Cutpurse (as you’ll see in the UK booktrailer), so named for the friendly, ahem, liberator of excess worldly possessions who helps out Kate and Peter when they are whisked into the 1700s by a rogue antigravity machine.

Quite the adventure for our two present-day teens, thrown back into a world where electricity is an experimental novelty, and death by disease, misadventure, or sheer bad luck is just an everyday occurrence.

Will they get back to our time? Let’s check on The Time Thief (Gideon Trilogy #2) tomorrow, shall we?
**kmm

Book info: The Time Travelers / Linda Buckley-Archer. Simon & Schuster, 2007. [author’s website] [author interview] [publisher site] [UK book trailer] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

My Book Talk: Peter would not have been transported back in time if his father hadn’t chosen business over their trip together — again! Who knew that his visit to the English countryside in the 21st century would wind up in the 18th century?

Kate and her family are nice, their farm with the sheep and horses is very country, but it’s not the same as a day spent with his dad as Peter’s mom continues her work far away in the U.S.A. Even the research lab where Kate’s dad works is a bit interesting, like the antigravity machine they use to search for “dark matter”.

When Kate’s dog gets spooked, Peter and Kate chase her through the lab…and into nothingness! They awake in 1763 to see a ferocious man trying to carry off their machine on his cart — then he comes after them! They escape from the Tar Man through the woods and meet Gideon Seymour, who may be able to help them retrieve the machine and make their way through 18th century England without letting anyone else know that they came from the future.

In the meantime, the police and their parents are searching for the pair in 20th centure Derbyshire, with few clues and dwindling hope. A phantom image of Kate in old-fashioned clothes appears at her school — she has partially returned as she slept! Now the race is on to recreate the antigravity machine’s effects in the 20th century.

Bandits and horses, corsets and three-cornered hats, hanging and royalty — Peter and Kate must cope with everyday life in the 18th century as they try to get the Tar Man to give back their only way home while keeping thir friend Gideon out of his evil clutches.

First in a brilliant trilogy, The Time Travelers takes you with them into 18th century England — can everyone get home again? Followed by Time Thief and Time Quake. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

Infinite Days (fiction)

Jun27

No sparkly, baseball-playing vampires in this book which hearkens back to the original vampire tradition with bloodlust and cruelty. But there’s a price to be paid for this blood-transmitted immortality, as these vampires lose their sense of touch over time, rather like being encased in glass (not the usual vampiric super-senses).

So Lenah becomes human and rejoices in the life and loveliness of the mortal world, until… You knew there had to be an “until…” to make the story work, right? Conflict, struggle for power = some things never seem to change, whatever world you’re in, so hang on for a wild ride as Lenah starts living as a modern teenager and trying to stay alive, too.

Release date for the sequel, Stolen Nights, has been pushed back to June 1, 2012. Maizel notes on her blog “As my editor says, second books are always the most difficult. And she is 100% right.” Hmmm…wonder how early you can pre-order a book?
**kmm

Book info: Infinite Days / Rebecca Maizel. (Vampire Queen, Book 1) St. Martin’s Griffin, 2010. 336 pg paperback [author’s website] [author’s blog] [publisher site] [book trailer] [Italian book trailer]

Recommendation: Vampires lose sense of touch over time. Lenah, a 500-year old Vampire Queen, longs to be human again and to truly feel, after centuries of ruthless hunting and feeding, viciously cruel hunting and feeding.

But the ritual for returning her humanity is hidden and difficult, involving true sacrifice by another vampire, the most selfish of all creatures. Even more difficult would be hiding her new mortal status from the vampires she created, who will then view her as new prey, rather than their leader. So she starts a 100 year hibernation, while Rhode, who made her a vampire and loves her for eternity, finds the ritual’s instructions and steals her body from the English crypt in the 99th year.

Waking up on a New England morning, Lenah sees sunlight for the first time in almost 600 years and realizes that Rhode has helped her become human again, even as he dies in the daylight. Now she must cope with the technology which developed as she slept, along with all the teen tensions of a private high school. Finding friends and relationships, realizing that machines now can capture music, enjoying food and breezes and the sea, Lenah learns about life and new love, even as she tries to ignore the calendar days moving toward her supposed awakening from hibernation.

Will the other vampires find her here? Are her friends at school in danger of losing their lives? Their mortal souls? Did Rhode’s sacrifice buy her time to truly live or merely months before her doom? First in a new series. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

Boys, Bears, and a Serious Pair of Hiking Boots, by Abby McDonald (book review) – city girl in Canadian mountain town

Jun24

book cover of Boys, Bears, and a Serious Pair of Hiking Boots by Abby McDonaldFor Fun Friday, we’re heading north of the border. I can see why Jenna would rather spend her summer with the godmother she hasn’t seen in years, instead of sweltering in a Florida retirement community with her grandma – it’s been ridiculously hot in C.Florida this summer already and there’s only so much bingo that a teen wants to deal with…

But how could she be prepared for a small community in the Canadian forest, where hunting and fishing are essential parts of life, a one-horse town where everyone has known everyone forever?

Oh, I did laugh out loud when Jenna, the kayak, and the beaver lodge had a sudden meeting, but Jenna’s summer looks like an uphill climb, doesn’t it? And what about the bear, and the moose, and the mountain biking? Well, you’ll just have to read this funny book to find out, eh?
**kmm

Book info: Boys, Bears, and a Serious Pair of Hiking Boots / Abby McDonald. Candlewick, 2010. [author’s website] [publisher site] [book trailer] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

My Book Talk: Jenna is a Green Teen for environmental awareness at her high school, so when she can choose between spending the summer in the Canadian woods with her godmother Susie or snoozing through card games at her grandmother’s Florida retirement village, she jumps at the chance to head north.

But the teens of tiny Stillwater, British Columbia, have known each other forever and don’t exactly welcome Jenna. Ethan, Grady, and Reeve play practical jokes on her from the moment they meet. Fiona hates everything, especially her stepmother, Susie, who works frantically with her new husband to transform a huge old house into a bed-and-breakfast resort before the first guests arrive in a few weeks. And Jenna’s best friend doesn’t get much cellphone signal at her summer camp job back home… what else could go wrong?

How about crashing through a beaver dam with her kayak or accidentally catching a trout? “I left the cork on the hook! I didn’t think anything would actually bite!” screams vegetarian Jenna.

The five teens start to get along as they create a website (complete with videos of Jenna’s rookie attempts at rock climbing and dirt bikes) so the inn can compete with the new luxury spa hotel across the valley, but secrets and misunderstood kisses may end the whole summer with a crash!

Does everything have to be eco-friendly or else? What makes a true friend? Why do guys have to be so complicated? (and watch out for the bear, Jenna, and the moose, too!)(One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)