Tag Archive | relationships

Smile, by Raina Telgemeier (book review) – braces, school, yikes!

May13

book cover of Smile by Raina Telegemeier published by ScholasticBraces!
Junior high!
More braces!
High school!

I’ll bet that Raina felt like lots of her days as a teen were Friday the thirteenths, as this autobiographical graphic novel shows. I’ve met her at conferences, and she’s funny and cool and excited about new projects.

And her husband, Dave Roman, is a cartoonist/author, too! He proposed to her using a webcomic!
**kmm

Book info: Smile / by Raina Telgemeier. Graphix (Scholastic), 2010. [author’s website] [publisher site]

My Book Talk: A graphic novel about friends, family, boys, girls, and major dental drama! Autobiography in comic style – with braces! When Raina knocks out her 2 front teeth in sixth grade, getting braces doesn’t seem so bad. But her teeth won’t reset right, so it’s on to root canal surgery and a retainer with false front teeth and headgear to wear at night! Getting her ears pierced for her birthday makes things a little better; having a bratty little sister who teases her… well, Amara’s always like that.

Seventh grade gets interesting, with cute boys and the big San Francisco earthquake of 1989 and more dental surgery (braces and headgear – again!). Raina wonders why some friends don’t stay friendly and why some boys aren’t friendly enough. She decides to try out for the basketball team in eighth grade (teeth-moving still in progress), enjoys being a Girl Scout camp counselor in the summer, and worries about going to high school.

So what will life in high school be like, with new friends and old friends, new classes and old heartaches, and her still in braces? Raina illustrates her own story with humor and style, as we walk with her through junior high and high school, with the next orthodontist’s appointment always on her mom’s calendar. (one of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy  and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Sequins, Secrets, and Silver Linings, by Sophia Bennett (book review) – fashion, war, and world peace

May12

It’s tempting to be lighthearted about this British tween book and call it a cross between Project Runway and the Lost Boys, but that would diminish the passion for helping that these best friends discover as they try make a significant difference to children of war, using the best skills that they have.

Just imagine what Crow’s parents went through, sending her away from Uganda to safety in London, their son missing from the refugee camp and perhaps a child soldier now…

First in the series; hope the others cross the Pond from the UK soon!
**kmm

Book info: Sequins, Secrets, and Silver Linings / by Sophia Bennett. Chicken House (Scholastic), 2011. [author’s website] [publisher site]

My Book Talk: Three junior high BFFs with different dreams – fashion designer, diplomat, actress – move through life and London with only minor panic. But their classmate Crow, a refugee from Uganda, struggles in school, doodling fashion designs and praying that the teacher doesn’t call on her.

Crow does more than just doodle – she sews and knits her dreams into incredible creations in the tiny apartment she shares with her aunt. Her brother went missing in the refugee camp, so Crow’s family is terribly worried, afraid that he’s been captured to become a child soldier.

Edie puts information on her website about the Invisible Children like Crow’s brother, Nonie helps Crow improve her reading through fashion photo books, and Jenny gets hauled to press conferences and premieres for the movie she had a small part in (wishing she could stay in London and out of sight of her manipulative, pushy father).

A student fashion competition brings them all together, as Nonie’s grandmother lets Crow study her designer gowns, the three friends turn a spare room into a sewing studio for the budding designer, and Crow creates fabulous clothes that can’t be ignored.

But can little Crow keep up with school and the demands of the contest organizers? Can the three friends help her make dreams into reality, without sacrificing their own? Will Crow ever see her parents and siblings again?

First in a series, this book brings friends, fashion, and real life into true focus, without forgetting the fun! (one of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandhug.com) Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Blindsided, by Patricia Cummings (book review) – sight vanishing, can hope remain?

May9

book cover of Blindsided by Patricia Cummings published by Dutton BooksGoing blind! How could you handle that diagnosis, that reality? Having to leave her school and her family to learn how to truly cope as a blind person in the modern world… I think Natalie is stronger than I ever could be in that situation.

I recently visited with an old college friend who never let blindness stand in his way as he went to law school, practiced law for years, and is now finding great satisfaction promoting the National Federation for the Blind’s Newsline service, which offers over 300 newspapers and magazines read aloud by phone or online 24/7 for those with visual impairment.

If your grandparents, neighbors, or friends can’t see well enough to read print, help them get connected to Newsline for pop culture, science, health, news (gotta love modern technology!).
**kmm

Book info: Blindsided / by Priscilla Cummings. Dutton Children’s Books (Penguin), hardback 2010, paperback 2011. 240 pgs. [author’s site] [publisher site]

My Recommendation: The summer before 10th grade, Dr. Rose says that Natalie will go blind – completely and absolutely blind, maybe overnight, maybe before Christmas. So she transfers to the Baltimore Center for the Blind boarding school so she can learn Braille and learn how to cope.

With the little tunnel of sight she has left, Nat is sure that she’s not like the other kids there – the ones blind from birth or suddenly blind from an accident – and she just lives for the weekends at home with her parents and the goats, away from lessons about walking with a cane and making the bumps of Braille become letters in her mind. Dr. Rose could be wrong – miracles happen, right?

Bargaining for miracles doesn’t work in real life though. Nat has to decide if she’s going to get ready for her new life or hide forever on her parents’ farm.
Are her old friends starting to forget her?
Can her new friends and teachers help her prepare for a future she can’t envision?

The author’s academic year spent with blind teens and all their hopes, fears, and expectations makes this work of fiction read like real life. (one of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Zen & Xander Undone, by Amy Kathleen Ryan (book review) – sisters forever, grief binds them still

May8

Book cover of Zen and Xander Undone by Amy Kathleen Ryan published by Houghton Mifflin “Sisters, sisters, there were never such devoted sisters” (Irving Berlin)

– but this ain’t no White Christmas happy tale, as the death of their mother sends teen sisters Zen and Xander careening through a summer of bad choices.

Add the letters and packages that arrive from their mother (yes, still dead)… let’s hope they can hold each other up as they tackle a mystery that they really shouldn’t try to solve.
**kmm

Book info: Zen & Xander Undone / by Amy Kathleen Ryan. Houghton Mifflin, hardback 2010, paperback 2011. [author site] [publisher site]

My Recommendation: Mom’s death, Dad’s retreat into his office, big sister’s over-the-limit new behavior – the summer before Zen’s senior year is spiraling down, fast.

If Zen could just keep her brilliant big sister from getting too crazy, then Xander will keep her scholarships and head off to a prestigious university, away from the grief that their mother’s death from cancer has cloaked across their lives.

If she could just get Dad to come out of his study and into the daylight, maybe he would go back to being a noteworthy professor, instead of an unshaven zombie-dad.

And if she could just center herself, then Zen could concentrate on preparing for her next black belt karate level, rather than using her skills to kick out against the guys luring her sister down the wrong paths.

And these letters from their dead mom that arrive on special days and holidays… when Zen and Xander check her lawyer’s office for some answers, they open up questions from their mother’s past.

Can their family revive itself during the sisters’ last summer together?
Will searching through their mother’s past ruin their future or rebuild it?
Death ain’t easy, but does living have to be even harder? (one of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Trickster’s Girl, by Hilari Bell (book review) – nanotech, ley lines, unbalanced Earth

May7
book cover of Trickster's Girl by Hilari Bell published by Houghton Mifflin

Ley lines and legendary figures from Native American/First Peoples mythology.
Bioplague and a Gaia/Earth that can no longer heal itself.
Our potential future, Kelsa’s world, so much at stake.

Read this first book in the Raven Duet outside, under a real, living tree.
**kmm

Book info: Trickster’s Girl / Hilari Bell. Clarion/ Houghton Mifflin Books for Children, 2011. 268 pg [author’s site] [publisher site] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

My Recommendation: As Kelsa is burying Dad’s ashes in the scrap of forest left near the city, a young man with no ID chip approaches her, wondering why she doesn’t believe in magic. Ha! Her father just died of cancer, that curable everyday problem, worrying about the bioplague dropped by terrorists in the Amazon rainforest, the antidote that didn’t work, the deforestation of whole countries that followed. Magic in a world of aircars and compods and microchefs?

This isn’t hocus-pocus magic, Kelsa finds out, as Raven transforms himself into a fish, a bird, right before her eyes. He describes how humankind’s demands have blocked the ley lines of spirit, keeping the earth from healing itself. Now forests can’t fight off the bioplague and humans can’t fight off curable cancers and worse natural disasters loom ahead.

Kelsa has a flicker of magic in her soul, and Raven needs her help to unblock key nexus points on the ley lines from Utah to Alaska with a Native American artifact. But first they have to rob a museum to get it, then slip away from the police without worrying her mother.

Surviving in the wilderness as her dad taught her, escaping from agents of spirits who’d rather erase humanity and start earth anew, riding bikes and motorcycles over mountain trails toward nexus points, crossing boundaries without passports…
Can Kelsa really help the earth heal itself?
Is Raven the Trickster telling her the whole truth?

This is the first book of Bell’s new series based in a high-tech, high-security future United States whose only hope is the magic recounted in ancient folklore. (one of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandhug.com)

Why do we read, anyway?

May6

So, why? Why do we read fiction, specifically?

It’s easy to talk about all the reasons that we read informational texts – we need to know how to do something or where to get something or how we got to where we are now.

But fiction fills a different role in our lives. Sometimes we read fiction to affirm our own worldview, selecting authors and titles that we know that we’ll be comfortable with. Series and novels with predictable plots can be soothing, a stable place to escape for a while from an unpredictable real world.

Other times, we’re reading fiction that races in completely the opposite direction, taking us into the life of someone so unlike us that we simply must leave behind a preconception or two so that we can dive into their story as it carries us along. Or we’re suddenly in a place whose rules don’t correspond to what we understand as normal, regular, and routine.

You’ll probably find more of the latter than the former recommended on this blog. After all, don’t the bestsellers usually appeal to the masses? Oh, sometimes a novel from one of the BigName publishers will wander onto this list, but not because it satisfies the majority viewpoint, I promise!

And back to why we read fiction – research reported in Psychological Science notes that “When we read, we psychologically become part of the community described in the narrative—be they wizards or vampires. That mechanism satisfies the deeply human, evolutionarily crucial, need for belonging.” (Becoming a Vampire). (Hat tip to Barking Up the Wrong Tree)

So whether you read for information or escape or belonging, let’s get beyond the bestsellers to the really good stuff, shall we?
**kmm

Last Summer of the Death Warriors, by Francisco X. Stork (book review) – is growing up harder than dying young?

May5

book cover of Last Summer of the Death Warriors by Francisco X Stork published by Arthur A Levine BooksWhat does life mean when you know – without any doubt – that you are going to die way too young?

Is there even any sense in trying to live a good life when the specter of Death haunts your breakfast, lingers in the corners of your backpack, rustles the leaves of the tree you can no longer climb?

Two teenage guys try to find the balance – D.Q. knows he’s dying fast, Pancho might not care enough to make it through the summer himself…

Francisco X. Stork says on his blog that he concentrates first on being a good writer, then on being a good Latino writer. I’d say that he succeeds at both. Check out his Marcelo in the Real World, too.

Book info: The Last Summer of the Death Warriors / by Francisco X. Stork. Arthur A. Levine Books (Scholastic), 2010. 352 pgs. [author’s website] [publisher website]

My Recommendation: His sister dead just 3 months after their widowed father’s death – Pancho had promised to take care of Rosa, sweet Rosa, with her child’s mind in a young woman’s body. Why aren’t the police looking for the man who was with her when she died of “unidentified causes, no foul play”? At 17, Pancho is ready to find that man and make him pay for Rosa’s death.

But he’s not allowed to live alone at 17, gets kicked out of a foster home for fighting, and finds himself at St. Anthony’s orphanage, across town from his family’s trailer in the New Mexico desert where he watched the sunsets and worked with his father. Everyone works at St. Anthony’s; Pancho will help D.Q. whose cancer treatments have finally put him in a wheelchair.

D.Q.’s mother couldn’t handle his dad’s death several years ago and brought him to St. Anthony’s for the summer while she recovered. But summers and years went by with her hardly contacting him, until the cancer hit 6 months ago. Now she’s taking charge, ordering experimental treatments, but her son wants none of it.

Now D.Q. is writing the Death Warriors’ Manifesto, about how a true death warrior recognizes his someday-death and therefore lives every day till then in order to make a positive difference. Explaining that to everyday, non-philosophical Pancho is another way that D.Q. keeps going through the chemo treatments. Piecing together the clues leading to the man who was with Rosa is what keeps Pancho going. Seeing lovely, caring Marisol at Casa Esperanza during the chemo makes their lives more worthwhile.

Will Pancho find the man and avenge Rosa’s death?
Will D.Q.’s mother let him go back to St. Anthony’s after chemo?
Can both young men live like true death warriors?

A great story of friendships and choices, of really living versus just being alive. (one of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Across the Universe, by Beth Revis (book review) – space travel, lies, love

May4

book cover of Across the Univers by Beth Revis published by RazorbillCan the folks in charge really control every bit of what people learn and know?
Can history be rewritten so completely that the truth will never be discovered?

Take a little trip with this book that moves our fear of the different to a whole ‘nother level.

And “May the Fourth be with you” – it’s Star Wars Day!
**kmm

Book info: Across the Universe /Beth Revis. Razorbill (Penguin), 2011.  [author’s website] [publisher website] [book website] [book trailer]

My Recommendation: Frozen for the 300-year space journey to a new Earth with her scientist parents – what will it really be like, Amy wonders. Centuries pass on the spaceship Godspeed for the placid farmers on the Feeder level and stolid techs on the Shipper level, all 20 or 40 or 60 years old, each “gen” all born the same year following the Season of mating, same color skin, same color hair, same color eyes.

Elder was born a dozen years earlier than his gen, so that his training as their leader will be complete when he becomes Eldest. Because the Elder before him died early, he is trained by crotchety Eldest who should have already retired and dislikes the teenager’s questions. Life aboard ship requires harmony and working together and strong leadership and no individuality, says Eldest.

Why didn’t he tell Elder about the lower level below the Feeder farm blocks, a level filled with frozen people waiting to be reanimated when they reach Centauri-Earth? That level’s alarms sound as a Frozen’s cryo is turned off, and a pale-skinned, red-haired teenage girl wakes up. Amy is stunned to find that her parents aren’t awake, that the ship is decades away from landing, that she’s trapped in this tiny world with people who know only a sanitized version of Earth’s history, one that reinforces uniformity and follows a strong leader without questions.

Suddenly other cryos are turned off with no alarms sounding, and experts from the past are dead, sent through the hatch into the vacuum of space by Eldest like any other dead bodies.

Who is killing the cryos?
Are the crazy people in the hospital the only sane ones on Godspeed? Will Amy ever talk to her parents again?
Will the ship ever reach its destination?

A great space thriller, with plenty of questions about ethics, leadership, and humanity. (one of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.