Tag Archive | non-US author

Insanewiches, by Adrian Fiorino (book review) – super sandwiches, creative cooking fun

Aug26

Fun Friday and ready to make your lunchbox the envy of everyone at the table with Insanewiches, an amazing album of edible art that you can make at home.

Wildly inventive sandwich artist Fiorino brings us clear instructions on how to design and construct A+ sandwiches from teeny Cutecumber ‘Wich to gigantic Quadruple Down. Grab your edible ink markers and amaze your lunch buddies with your own Insanewich.

Equipment and tools needed? Cataloged.
Best breadstuffs for intricate cut-out shapes? Listed.
Hunger-inducing color photos for each Insanewich? Absolutely!

If anyone can make a better sandwich than the Cordless Mousewich with USB Cheesestick or popular Rubik’s Cubewich, it’ll be Fiorino!
Be sure to check the Insanewiches blog for new recipes, contests, and other funny stuff.
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Book info: Insanewiches / Adrian Fiorino. St. Martins Griffin, 2011 [author’s website] [publisher website] [book trailer] [Review copy and cover image courtesy of publisher]

My Book Talk: If the sandwiches in your life are boring, square, or blah, you need Insanewiches! No ho-hum PBJs in this collection of yummy toteables created for breakfast, party time, dessert, and even lunchboxes.

Try breakfast on a stick with Pancake Popwiches or open wide, wide, wider for the amazingly tall morning stack-up entitled The Breakfast Club (sandwich artist Fiorino advises that you eat no more than these per day – it’s that big!).

Take a “Don’t Eat Like a Bird” sandwich featuring a two-tone bread birdhouse shape in your lunchbox or assemble a sad, sad Flatbread Fred with delectable vegetable eyes and nose for a quick lunch at home.

Get adventurous with an East Meets Westdog (sushi + hotdog!) or the Cold Cut Cage Match (complete with wrestling arena on top!). King Me with the ham and cheese checkerboard, try to lift the Sumo Sandwich, or go all out with a Crazy Canuck Sandwich – dinner will never be the same again… Satisfy your sweet tooth with a dessert-worthy Banana Splitwich, a clever Coffee ‘n’ Cakewich, or The Curious Carrot Cake Sandwich.

With 101 ideas for amazing, crazy Insanewiches to choose from, you’ll always have the tastiest plate in town, plus well-explained food-assembly techniques for making your own sandwich dreams a reality.

Now is the Time for Running, by Michael Williams (fiction) – soccer, escape, survival

Aug24

book cover of Now Is The Time For Running by Michael Williams published by Little BrownWorld Wednesday, and time to see what’s happening right now, the reality that doesn’t always make news headlines.

School, soccer, and time with friends – that’s what Deo’s life in Zimbabwe should be like. But as in too many places in the world, powerful forces take away his teenage dreams, take away his family, take away his future.

It’s up to Deo to help his older brother survive, as they avoid soldiers, wild animals, brutal prejudice, and the gangs of the big city. South African author Michael Williams shows us how hope tries to survive in the face of dire adversity – you won’t want to miss this book!
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Book info: Now is the Time for Running / Michael Williams. Little Brown, 2011. [publisher site] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

My Book Talk: The soldiers didn’t care that the homemade soccer ball was Deo’s prized possession. They didn’t care that Deo’s village was hungry. They didn’t plan to leave anyone alive to complain…

Suddenly Deo and his older brother Innocent are on the run through the scrublands of Zimbabwe, fleeing the President’s soldiers – the President who fought for liberation from foreign rulers, like Grandfather did. It’s up to Deo to keep mentally disabled Innocent safe as they seek help from friends in Bikita, then trek onward toward the border, trying to find their father who was away when the soldiers came.

The dangers of crossing the river into South Africa, crossing the wild lands of the lions and hyenas, finding a place to hide in the city that wants no more refugees – how much can one teenager do?

Will Deo ever be able to just play soccer again? Or return to school? Or find a way out of the grim shanties and shadows to a place with soap and water so that Innocent can wash up and be happy again? Can he escape gangs and drugs and hatred all around him?

A compelling story based on the real lives of too many refugees in Africa, Now is the Time for Running starts in a faraway place and takes our hearts and minds even further.

Beyond our ken – paranormal favorites

Aug22

Mysterious, metaphysical Monday! Let’s look back at our summer reading shelf filled with outstanding paranormal fiction.

Being a psychic is more than just a summer job for Clarity – it’s her life. Murder and a sneaky big brother complicate things a bit…

Does Lena dare gaze into The Mermaid’s Mirror? Ever-drawn to the ocean despite her father’s warnings, she longs to surf and master the waves as he once did.

The City of Lights is no match for Kate’s depression, but mysterious strangers shake up her mourning as she witnesses unbelievable rescues in Paris – who would allow someone else to Die for Me?

Superheroes and robo-zombies leap out of Jack’s tattered comic book collection and into his dreary life at the orphanage. Suddenly, it’s up to The Accidental Hero to make things right in the ImagineNation and in the real world.

In an older time, another orphan makes a perilous bargain, bartering her shadow for the wish of her heart. As her shadow dwindles and evil stalks the river people, Plain Kate worries that her agreement may doom her land.

The River of Time series begins with Waterfall, as Gabi & Lia accidentally journey into the past, right into a 14th century battle and the chance for romance. Will they return to Castle Forelli in Cascade? And what new mysteries will we uncover in Torrent? The third book will be published on Sept. 1st = watch this space for an early review!!

An all-too-realistic future is Kyra’s home, where drought reigns and water-access is power. Can her newly-found talent release all these Dry Souls?

Hide your guinea pigs, then visit The Reformed Vampire Support Group in Australia. Yeah, everyone needs a support group to stay on the straight and narrow – or to help solve a murder.

And don’t miss Garth’s wild ride into Ghostopolis, where the living are forbidden to go (no matter how close to death they are) – a graphic novel with humor, darkness, and Skinny.

Lots more mysterious, metaphysical, paranormal books ahead on BooksYALove, as we uncover wonderful titles that you’d miss if you let the bestseller lists tell you what to read!
(and isn’t Venice lovely as the sun sets?)
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Almost True, by Keren David (fiction) – London gang searches for witness

Aug17

For Ty, the present-day is all a lie, as he tries to stay alive in the Witness Protection Programme long enough to testify in a London gangland murder trial. Only his childhood memories are real…maybe.

His mum Nicky has gotten herself into a slight complication, there’s a guy shot to death on the doorstep of their latest safe house, and even Ty’s memories don’t seem to be true anymore.

Bottling up his worry and anger, desperately yearning to reconnect with the one friend who understood him, Ty’s impulsive actions may be the undoing of all the careful preparations made by the police and lawyers to finally bring down the ruthless London crime family.

This stunning sequel to When I Was Joe brings the gritty realities of life for less-privileged London teens into sharp focus while faithfully taking us into the careening thoughts of a teen brain pushed to the brink. You must read these two books – World Wednesday standouts!
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Book info: Almost True / Keren David. Frances Lincoln Children’s Books, 2010. [author’s blog] [publisher site]

Recommendation: Finding a dying man on his doorstep, Ty knew that the London gang had found his latest “safe place” – so much for the Witness Protection Programme keeping him and his mum Nicky out of harm’s way until he could testify at the murder trial.

Ty’s aunt snatches him out of the hands of the police, telling no one – not even Nicky – where she’s hiding him. And suddenly, he’s in the large home of the grandparents that he doesn’t even remember – the parents of his dad, who left him and Nicky when Ty was very small. Nothing about this makes sense to him – why have his grandparents let him and Nicky live in near-poverty when they are rich? After all these years away, is his dad really coming to see him?

The trauma and stress of leaving the school that knew him as popular Joe, where he finally had friends and was succeeding on his own, where no one knew his past – it’s just too much for Ty, and the nightmares about the murder return.

Will Ty’s memories keep playing tricks on him? If he can’t contact anyone outside, how will Clare at school know that he’s okay? How did the crime family gang find him and his mum in their third hiding place? Is Nicky safe somewhere now?

A contemporary story that just won’t let you go, Almost True is the sequel to When I Was Joe – read them in order, and hang on, as Ty stays one step ahead of the killers… we hope! (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

When I Was Joe, by Keren David (fiction) – gang threats, witness protection, murder

Aug3
book cover of When I Was Joe by Keren David published by Frances Lincoln Childrens Books

Imagine leaving behind everything.

Just vanishing from your school and neighborhood without a word to anyone.

The only witness to a murder, a gang-related knife crime, one that could shut down one of the biggest crime rings in London.

So Ty and his mother must disappear into the Witness protection programme… far away from their multicultural London neighborhood.

Starting anew. Reinventing yourself. What teenage guy wouldn’t want that chance? But how can Ty balance the required secrecy and security with his need to help a new friend, a girl-type new friend?

For our World Wednesday, a brilliant first novel followed by the equally gripping Almost True.
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Book info: When I Was Joe / Keren David. Frances Lincoln Children’s Books, 2010. [author’s blog] [publisher site]

Recommendation: It was just a test, but the boy died – Arron’s gang initiation, but A’s knife went too deep. Ty is the only witness, his life in danger, his mum’s life in danger. Escaping from London by back roads, Ty and Nicki are transformed by Witness Protection agents – dyed hair, contact lenses, different clothes – and taken to a new city, a new school, a new life.

Suddenly, shy Ty is no longer Arron’s shadow, but “Joe”, the cute new guy with cool hair and a mysterious past. His new school specializes in sports (never an option at St. Saviour’s), and Joe finds a talent for running track, thanks to an observant student-teacher who’s a gifted para-athlete.

Not everyone is happy that Joe is a track star, and the bullying at school escalates. Joe’s nightmares about Arron and the knife get worse, Nicki/Mum is stuck at the new house with no job, and misunderstandings with new school friends get out of hand.

How long can Ty and Nicki keep up this charade? Will they have to uproot and move again and again, changing names and identities over and over? Can the detectives really keep the rest of their London family safe until Joe testifies at the murder trial?

A gritty and absorbing read that reflects all too well how fast young lives can change – or stop – with just the flick of a knife blade. Be sure to grab the sequel, Almost True, for the rest of the story! (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Reformed Vampire Support Group, by Catherine Jinks (fiction) – ethical vampires hunt a killer

Jul30

Sneak-in Saturday and another fun book that sneaked onto the bestseller lists before I could blog it for you.

Ahh, being a vampire must be exciting, right? Nah, can’t do much outdoors if bright light makes your eyes bleed. How to explain to the neighbors that you’re never getting any older? And if you just don’t believe that it’s ethically right to fang another human and turn them into a vampire without their consent?

Welcome to the small, but annoying world of the vampires in Australia, all of whom were changed by one vicious vampire. So for years, they’ve held regular Tuesday night support group meetings so they can stay “reformed” and keep their blood cravings under control. When one member is thoroughly and brutally snuffed out, it’s up to the Reformed Vampire Support Group to find the killer, even if they go into coma-like sleep the moment that the sun peeks over the horizon…

Lock up your guinea pigs when you read this funny take on the vampire mythos.
Followed by The Abused Werewolf Rescue Society.
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Book info: The Reformed Vampire Support Group / Catherine Jinks. Harcourt Children’s Books, 2009 (hardcover) [author’s website] [publisher site] [book trailer] Review copy & cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Recommendation: When a vampire is murdered, the other vampires have to find the killer, right? Especially reformed vampires who fang guinea pigs instead of humans. A stake through the heart and a silver bullet and exposing the vampire to sunlight – that’s overkill, even for the undead. A real vampire-hater has accessed doubly-dead Casimir’s online address book and is coming after the other vampires of Sydney!

After complaining for years in their weekly support group meetings that nothing happens when you’re asleep all day and lock yourself up every full moon, suddenly the group has too much to do. Relying on Father Ramon, the human priest who helps them stay reformed, forever-15 Nina (who writes vampire fiction to pay her mom’s rent) and friends travel in a dark, sealed van to the Outback, following clues from silver bullet sales records and online bulletin boards.

Trapping a vampire-killer, finding a werewolf, getting back to safety before their supply of guinea pigs runs out – who knew that being a vampire would suddenly be so complicated?

This story of the good-hearted undead battling a pack of heartless humans is a wild romp with unexpected twists. Dark glasses? Check. Guinea pig? Check. Barf bag? Ooof. Followed by The Abused Werewolf Rescue Group. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

Esty’s Gold, by Mary Arrigan (fiction) – from Irish famine to Australia’s goldfields

Jul27

Famine! How could your family survive?

That’s the life-changing question that 12-year-old Esther faces, as we go back to the Irish Potato Famine of 1845 on this World Wednesday.

As the blight makes potatoes rot when they’re dug up, poor Irish rental farmers and their families starve to death with their main food source gone. While having just one variety of potato planted all over Ireland contributed to the problem, the Famine was largely caused by the laws forbidding Irish Catholics from owning land.

When Esty’s father is killed trying to help starving farmers, she and her mother and granddad no longer have a home, and Esty must hire out as a servant. Emigration out of Ireland is offered – many travel to the United States, but Esty has carefully read the newspapers discarded by her employer and finds a way for her family to get to the goldfields of Australia.

The Mahers will face bandits, harsh weather, backbreaking toil, and outright prejudice as they dig for gold in Ballarat in this exciting story based on history.

If your local independent bookstore doesn’t have Etsy’s Gold, they’ll be glad to order it for you. Check your local library, too!
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Book info: Esty’s Gold / Mary Arrigan. Frances Lincoln Children’s Books, 2010. [author’s website] [publisher site]

Recommendation: Surely the potato blight won’t hurt Esty’s family, her papa being agent for the landowner, right? But the famine in 1840s Ireland cuts deep, and 12-year-old Esty finds herself hired out as a servant, with Mama and Grandpa sent from their big house to a tiny cottage.

As the large landowners continue evicting the tenants who can’t pay rent or feed their families because of the blight, more rebellion springs up. Esty reads the newspapers discarded by her employers and dreams of taking her family away from the famine, off to the goldfields of Australia.

Such a long journey, from Ireland to the other side of the world! And what perils along the way to the goldfields at Ballarat – thieves, wild weather and worse!

Can Esty really find a way to get her family all the way to Australia? Will they be tough enough to survive the pioneer conditions at the edge of the Outback? Can they find gold or will Ballarat be one more heartbreak for the Mahers?(One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Beyond the Mask

Jul24

Crossing the sea in a time before maps, searching for home using distant childhood memories…

Away from Grassland at last, Coriko’s group hopes to find Pippa’s family,
to find a good place to live, to perhaps find safety.

But the raiders of the Outside Lands have other ideas, and our young friends must help village folk and their priest survive the attacks. Can help from Grassland reach them in time?

You’ll want to meet Coriko and friends in book 1, Escape the Mask, and watch them grapple with new truths and new dangers in book 2, Beneath the Mask.

Then enjoy this thrilling conclusion of The Grassland Trilogy, filled with adventure and danger, from the days before written history when story taught about the past and perhaps about the future.

Book info: Beyond the Mask / David Ward. (Grassland Trilogy #3) Amulet, 2010. [author’s website] [publisher site]

Recommendation: Far north of Grassland, Pippa and her friends search for her home village, a place safe from the kidnapping and fighting life of the iron-masked Spears. The boys have been trained as warriors, but hope their skills are not needed on the journey.

At last, they find Pippa’s home and her father, but not a safe place, as raiders from the Outside Lands attack the village, again and again. How can a few young warriors help the villagers defend themselves? Could they get help from Maramuk and the Spears, across the sea in Grassland? Can the village priest’s wisdom and Tia’s leadership vision truly find a way to keep the Outsiders away from the north villages and Grassland for good?

This final book in The Grassland Trilogy is full of promise and peril, as Coriko, Pippa, Feelah, Thief, and Tia must struggle to find their places in a world much larger than they ever dreamed. (227 pages) (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

For the Win (fiction)

Jul20

Quick! Which of these is fictional (not real):
a) Online game playing as prison punishment?
b) online gamers forming a trade union?
c) Gold farming?

If you said (b), then you win! Cory Doctorow’s newest book delves into the world of gold farming, where some teens play online games to make a tiny bit of money to survive, not for fun. When they try to form a union so they can keep part of the “gold” that they win online instead of turning it all over to their bosses, both big business and their governments get angrily and mightily involved to protect their economic interests.

Make no mistake – in places where labor is cheaper than technology, real people are being forced into gold farming yet earning hardly anything, right this minute (like the Chinese prisoners noted above). And now scripted ‘bots can be set loose to play a low-level character on auto-pilot, earning a little gold, then repeating – lots of bots can equal a fair amount of pocket change, along with the risk of being discovered and banned from the game.

If you want to read the WHOLE book online, go here with Cory’s blessing. Yes, the author wants you to read his book online for FREE. That’s because Cory knows you’ll want to buy a copy so you can reread it, share it, and even remix it – yep, Creative Commons License. The guy is a genius! (seriously! I’ve read all his short stories and books online, then gone on to get the print books)

On World Wednesday, this fast-moving story takes you to China, India, Singapore, and the United States – who will really win?
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Book info: For the Win / Cory Doctorow. Tor Teen, 2010. [author’s website] [author interview] [publisher site] [book trailer]

Recommendation: Playing games online all day, every day sounds like fun, doesn’t it? But for young people packed into smoky internet cafes in Singapore, Shenzen, and Mumbai, it’s a matter of survival.

People have discovered how to turn online “gold coins” and “magic gems” into real money, so the biggest online game worlds have larger economies than many nations, and youngsters in less-developed countries are recruited as “gold farmers,” playing online in teams and turning over their winnings to the bosses who hold their return-home tickets.

But what if the gold farmers organized, banded together for better working conditions? How does a kid from LA wind up in China to help the gold farmers unionize? And what happens when the big businesses who own the big online worlds strike back?

Meet young teens in China, India, and Malaysia who work as gold farmers to feed their families, who face violence from police and rival bosses when they’d rather go to school, who risk their lives to make a difference. This page-turner looks big, but reads fast, a techno-thriller that could happen tomorrow or might be happening today! 480 pages (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Plain Kate, by Erin Bow (book review) – lose her shadow, lose her life?

Jul18

When your family is all you have, what can you do when they are gone?
How do you decide who you can trust?
What happens if you make the wrong decision?

On this Mysterious Metaphysical Monday, we find young Kate orphaned and alone in a superstitious world. Her fine woodcarving skills are ignored by the Guild, yet sought-after by the townsfolk who want charms against evil. But being different is more than just a bit dangerous here – it could be deadly.

Desperate to escape, Kate bargains with a mysterious stranger and finds herself on a perilous journey with a talking cat, a dwindling shadow, and frightening glimpses of the past that might be the future.

A haunting book that will have you checking your shadow now and again, it’s recently been released as Wood Angel in the United Kingdom.
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Book info: Plain Kate / Erin Bow. Arthur A. Levine Books, 2010. [author’s website] [publisher site] [book trailer] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Ny Book Talk: Skilled as a woodcarver, Plain Kate lost her place at the workshop when her father died, and the guild gave it to another. No mother, no kin, Kate was alone in the world at age 12, a world of superstitions and talismans and witches burned.

When mysterious Linay appears in the village, few trust the albino minstrel. He promises Kate “the wish of her heart” in exchange for her shadow, and when rumors swirl that her carving skills are witchcraft, she takes up Linay on his offer.

Suddenly, Kate has a talking cat as she travels up the river to escape the village. She and Taggle meet up with a clan of performing Roamers, with their bright wagons and acrobatic graces, and are allowed to travel with them until danger comes near and all are threatened.

As Kate’s shadow slowly disappears day by day, the fever which struck down her father and many others begins to make its way up the river, too.

Why did Linay need her shadow?
How can a talking cat be Kate’s dearest wish?
Will the Roamer clan and her friend Drina survive the fever and the witchburnings?
Are real witches darkening the daytime sky and sending frost across the summer day?

An exciting and suspenseful tale of yearnings and journeys, of superstitions and the supernatural! (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)