Tag Archive | beliefs

B is for Battle Fatigue, by Mark Kurlansky (fiction) – Vietnam War battles come home

Apr2

Little-boy games turn into young men’s worries.
How can war injure someone without leaving a scratch or bruise?
Can history be right and current events still be terribly wrong?

Joel’s childhood memories – playing soldiers with his pals, cheering for the Brooklyn Dodgers to finally win before they move to LA, those blue numbers tattooed on the bakery lady’s wrist – form the backdrop to his anguished dilemma as his draft number comes up in the early days of the Vietnam War.

How can he reconcile becoming a Conscientious Objector with the sacrifices that his father and uncle made in World War II? How can he live with himself if he goes to fight a war that he deeply believes is wrong?

Noted nonfiction author and researcher Mark Kurlansky takes readers on a young man’s emotional journey in a work of fiction that rings truer than many biographies.
Look for Battle Fatigue at your local library or independent bookseller to discover where Joel lands.
**kmm

Book info: Battle Fatigue / Mark Kurlansky. Walker Books for Young Readers, 2011. [author’s website] [author interview video] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

My Recommendation: Joel knows he’ll grow up and go to war to keep America free, like his dad and uncle did. But when a teen neighbor returns from Vietnam physically unharmed and mentally shattered, he begins to question whether every war is right.

Born on the 7th anniversary of Pearl Harbor, grandson of European refugees, Joel Bloom plays kids’ games with his pals and the souvenirs that their dads brought back from WWII. During the Cuban Missile Crisis, he and his junior high classmates practice diving under their desks for A-bomb drills (sometimes a chance to hold hands with sweet Kathy). He tries to teach a German exchange student how to act more American, but local memories of relatives lost in the Holocaust prove stronger than Karl’s willingness to be shunned. How odd that Karl’s only friend in Haley is the first Jew he’s ever met.

In November 1963, Joel turns to his diary as he tries to make sense of JFK’s assassination. High school means varsity baseball, a newfound love of chemistry, and afterschool fights that someone else starts; even his little brother gets challenged to fights because Joel never loses. Everything changes when President Johnson announces on TV that the USA is now fighting in Southeast Asia… and Joel realizes that he and his pals will fight and die in this war.

Dickie from next door enlists in the Marines and leaves for the war proud and tall, returning broken and haunted. College will keep Joel from being sent to Vietnam for four years… but will it be long enough? He doesn’t want to go – not because he’s afraid, but because it’s not right. Will he become a Conscientious Objector or enlist anyway or head to Canada? Big questions from a troubled time in our nation’s history and one young man’s attempt to answer them for himself. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

Crossing Lines, by Paul Volponi (fiction) – A for Acceptance, not bullying

Apr1

A is for Adonis, the bigtime athlete,
and for Alan, the new guy who wears dresses to school.
Can A be for acceptance, too?

Life can be complex in high school for any kid. Adonis is trying to become a better football player, live up to his firefighter dad’s expectations, deal with little sister Jeannie being in the same high school. The macho attitudes he’s learned aren’t helping him stay cool when Jeannie brings Alan over for dinner.

For Alan, scorned by his Army colonel dad, it’s simple – accept him for who he is, Fashion Club president, cross-dressing, intelligent.

The author puts current news stories about bullying into perspective when he asks “how do you decide when to stand by and when to take a stand?” Big question, strong story.
**kmm

Book info: Crossing Lines / Paul Volponi. Viking Juvenile, 2011. [author’s website] [author interview video] [publisher site] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

My Recommendation: It’s simple – Adonis will be a great football player, little sister won’t embarrass him at school. Then cross-dressing new guy Alan is elected president of her fashion club. And Jeannie brings him home for dinner!

Adonis thinks Alan will be a pushover when they’re in the same group for an English project, but is surprised at his quick wit and intelligence. The rest of the football team isn’t – antigay slurs fill the air during practice and spill over into classes they reluctantly share with Alan. But Adonis’ mom and Jeannie and that cute Melody from fashion club won’t tolerate outright homophobic statements or even jokes – Adonis feels like he’s walking a tightrope all the time, trying to keep the team from grouping him with Alan, trying to keep Melody from labeling him a dumb, prejudiced jock.

Alan’s grandmother raised him until her recent death; now he gets moved from school to school because his dad is an Army recruiter. Has his dad thrown him out of the house? Is Alan gay? Why can’t he just be another guy instead of wanting to be called Alana?

As Alan determinedly forges his own path at school, wearing lipstick and dresses, the football guys get more uncomfortable and plan to teach him a lesson. Will Adonis participate in the dangerous plan? How far can bullies push someone before they snap?

Readers will see Adonis grow up, page by page, as he must decide for himself when to let things slide and when to take a stand. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

Always a Witch, by Carolyn MacCullough (book review) – Time travel, magic battle, prophecy

Feb27

book cover of Always a Witch by Carolyn MacCullough published by ClarionFace her sister’s wrath or buy the world’s most unflattering bridesmaid dress?
Stay here to be with true love Gabriel or travel back in time to save the world?
Why doesn’t Tam ever have any easy choices?

As the first book in MacCullough’s duet ended, high school senior Tamsin Greene learned that she does indeed have a witch Talent and is one of the few skilled at time Travel. Oh, and that somehow she is now keeper of the Domani, the magical object that keeps the malign Knight family of witches under control.

No wonder Alistair Knight goes back in time to help his ancestors keep the Greene family from creating the Domani… no wonder Tamsin time Travels to stop him.

Twisted witch souls, lust for power, a big magical battle – be sure to read Once a Witch (book 1 – my review) before you race through the conclusion of this exciting duet.
**kmm

Book info: Always a Witch / Carolyn MacCullough. Clarion HMH, 2011. [author’s website] [publisher site] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

My Recommendation: Tamsin can’t let evil Alistair Knight go back in time to wipe out her family! Yes, she knows that time Traveling is dangerous, but the fate of the Greenes – and of all unWitch humanity – hangs in the balance.

Few can Travel, and no one else can repel another witch’s Talent or take it away – finding her magic Talent late is better than never, Tam decides, even if she doesn’t want to be “most powerful of them all,” as her grandmother reads the prophecy from the past and future pages of the Greene family book.

Clues indicate that Alistair intends to contact his 19th century relatives with information they could use to ambush the Greenes and prevent them from creating the Domani which controls the powers that witches have over mere humans. So Tamsin decides to get into the Knight household before he can arrive in 1887. Surely Gabriel will be able to draw her back into the present before her sister Rowena’s wedding next weekend…

Posing as a lady’s maid, Tam finds that more than just modern conveniences are lacking in the huge house. The matriarch, La Spider, is using highly unconventional means to retain her youthful appearance and to control her grown son and daughter. And the son is experimenting with ways to use humans, such a bother when they are used up…

Blood and a dungeon, an uncanny stone statue, a stealthy war of magic power that bustling New York City cannot even see – will Alistair succeed in giving Liam Knight the key to defeating the Greenes? Can Tamsin stop the Knight family without stranding herself in the past? Why are the pages of her grandmother’s prophecy book blank past the day Tam left for 1887?

The prophecy heard in Once a Witch (my review here) echoes over and over through the closing book of the duet, as Tamsin strives to do what’s best for her family without destroying the world. One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

The Apothecary, by Maile Meloy (book review) – magic potions, Cold War spies

Feb8

book cover of The Apothecary by Maile Meloy published by GP Putnam SonsMoving is often difficult,
but having to leave your home because your own government is spying on you?

After World War II, the US government did not take the threat of Communism lightly, as the Cold War kept American and Soviet nuclear missiles always at the ready. So influential people who might be liberals or Communist sympathizers were watched, regardless of their fame. People in the entertainment industry with humanitarian ideals could find themselves on the Hollywood Blacklist and never allowed to work in movies again.

It’s no wonder that Janie’s parents decided they’d rather be in England than be forced to testify against their friends before the House Committee on UnAmerican Activities.

Against the threat of open nuclear warfare, what good is an old book of spells and potions? It’s the only hope that Benjamin and Janie have as they race to save the world.
**kmm

Book info: The Apothecary / Maile Meloy; illustrated by Ian Schoenherr. G.P.Putnam’s Sons Books for Young Readers, 2011. [author’s website] [illustrator’s blog] [publisher site] [book trailer] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

My Recommendation: Janie wasn’t happy about moving from Hollywood to England in the middle of 9th grade, but her family was being spied on – by US agents! Her parents were just movie script writers, believing that more people should have a chance at a better life, now that they all survived World War II.

As the Cold War deepened in 1952, anyone thought to have Communist ideas was suspect and could be “blacklisted” and kept from working, especially in the entertainment industry. So it’s off to London to work on a BBC television series under assumed names, away from orange trees and sunny beaches to gloomy skies and war-scarred city buildings.

Her new school is awful – uniforms and Latin and medieval history. Everyone huddles up with their friends except Benjamin, who lives with his father at the apothecary shop near her apartment and Sergei, whose father works at the Soviet Embassy.

When Benjamin’s father receives a note that a Chinese chemist has been captured, he scarcely has time to hide Benjamin and Janie and an old book in a secret room before the shop is invaded and he is kidnapped! Notes in the Pharmacopoeia lead them to a special herbal garden, to an old man who can read its Latin and Greek instructions for strange elixirs and warnings about risky transformations, like the tincture that allows a human to change into a bird and back again.

But the teens can’t stay in the garden – whoever took Benjamin’s father wants the Pharmacopoeia and won’t rest until they have it. On the run, arrested and questioned, Janie and Benjamin must escape again and again. Who can they trust? Their rich schoolmate Sarah? Mr. Danby, their Latin teacher and former prisoner-of-war? Sergei and his father?

Is it a foreign government that wants the Pharmacopoeia’s secrets? Someone wanting wealth or immortality or power? It will take all of Janie and Benjamin’s bravery and cleverness to keep this special knowledge out of the wrong hands. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

Personal Demons (fiction)

Feb6

book cover of Personal Demons by Lisa DesrochersExpelled from Catholic school,
missing her late brother Matt so much,
wondering why she just doesn’t feel comfortable as the middle sister…

Frannie could never dream that her soul was special enough to bring Luc and Gabe to Haden High, that Heaven and Hell would be locked in battle over it. Senior year is going to be a lot harder than she thought, if she has to choose between a demon‘s kisses and an angel‘s caresses, instead of just concentrating on her writing.

First volume in Desrochers’ Personal Demons Trilogy, followed by Original Sin (July 2011) and Last Rite (May 2012). And happy Mysterious Monday to you…
**kmm

Book info: Personal Demons / Lisa Desrochers. Tor Teen, 2010. [author’s website] [author’s blog] [publisher site] [book trailers: Frannie – Luc – Gabe] Review copy and cover art courtesy of the publisher.

My book Talk: Frannie’s new partner in English class is definitely easy on the eyes. So why does Luc make her so uneasy, like he’s looking into her soul? So sure of himself, but not cocky and arrogant like the other guys in her small New England town.

Still, it’s good to have someone new at Haden High, to make her senior year at bit less like being at Hades High. Frannie even lets Kate choose her outfit and do her makeup for the party – Luc could be there, right? When an ex-boyfriend gets too pushy, suddenly another new guy steps up to keep him in line. And somehow this Gabe and Luc seem to know each other…

Good versus evil isn’t just a philosophical discussion here – Hell and Heaven have both sent their best agents to tag Frannie’s unique and untainted soul. Lucifer and Gabriel renew their ages-old competition, battling for her affections so they can get close enough for her to promise her immortal soul to one side or the other.

If Luc can just get Frannie to sin… If Gabe can help her stay true to her own faith… Even when Frannie finds out that Luc is a demon, she can’t help swooning over him. But what about her feelings for Gabe?

As time ticks on with Frannie’s soul unclaimed, both dominions pick up the pace, sending other agents to Haden. Is this too big for Gabe and Luc to settle between themselves? Will the small town become a battlefield if their bosses have decided to end it now? And what’s so unique about Frannie’s soul that Heaven and Hell are willing to risk their best agents in the mortal world to get it?

First book in the Personal Demons trilogy.

Whose Internet is this, anyway? (reflective)

Jan18

If today (January 18, 2012) is “Internet Blackout Day” to protest SOPA/PIPA bills under consideration by the US Congress… then why am I still online? Why are you online, if you’re reading this post on the 18th?

Is it because we cannot go a single day or hour or minute without our entertainment and news and communication? Perhaps – but there are still movies and print newspapers and telephone calls that can fill those voids.

More likely, we’re online – now and any time – because we must share something. I mean that we are truly driven to share good news, bad news, cute kitten pictures, tidbits of information, and titles of books that someone else will just love; we are humans, and our culture of sharing is part of what makes us human.

To me, giving credit to the originator/creator/performer of a painting, a song, a book, a charming and witty sentence is a moral obligation, according to my upbringing and my education as a librarian. This was much easier when books and paintings were “one-off” and there was only one original with no easy way to copy it. Then along came the printing press, camera, tape recorder, photocopier and so on. Thank goodness for US copyright laws.

Yes, piracy of intellectual property is a real and growing problem. Yes, there do need to be legal ways to stop and punish intentional internet piracy. But I agree with many others that SOPA/PIPA is the wrong way to accomplish this.

This tweet today from Erin Bow (author of Plain Kate, which I recommend) puts it in perspective for me: “I’m an author; I make a living because of copyright, and piracy takes its toll. But SOPA would stop piracy by poisoning the ocean.” @ErinBowBooks

Google has started a petition to protest passage of SOPA (the House of Representatives version)/ PIPA (the Senate version); you can sign it here.

The bills are scheduled for Jan. 24th vote, so you have time to read them yourself (PIPA here, SOPA here) and contact your Representative and your Senators to help them understand that censoring the Internet through SOPA/PIPA will not stop piracy of intellectual property online.

If we do not speak out, how can we help our lawmakers decide?
**kmm

Payback (fiction)

Jan4

There are laws against forced marriage in England.
But if Halima returns to Pakistan with the family for her brother’s wedding…

On this World Wednesday, we see today’s England through the eyes of a young teen girl who emigrates to London from rural Pakistan with her family.

There, dusty roads and the rules of village elders. Here, motorcars and subways, small enclaves of immigrants clustered together against the big city, speaking their native languages in neighborhood shops.

There, all marriages are arranged by family. Here, young men and women meet people outside their clan, outside their region, outside their religion.

Halima is not trying to rebel for the sake of rebellion, but she does want the opportunity to choose a Muslim husband on her own, not be promised to someone far away as mere repayment of a debt.

Rosemary Wells’ excels at putting real-life situations at the heart of her books – grab Payback today at your local library or independent bookstore and read another story behind the headlines.
**kmm

Book info: Payback / Rosemary Hayes. Frances Lincoln Children’s Books, 2009. [author’s website] [publisher site]

Recommendation: When Halima’s father whisks their family from rural Pakistan to London, she worries – will he truly allow her to finish school there before arranging a marriage? In the village, he’s an important landowner who has worked overseas for years to send money back home; in London, he’s just another immigrant laborer who speaks English poorly and clings to old customs.

It’s difficult, going to middle school understanding so little English – if only Ammi had allowed Halima and her older sister to watch the village leader’s satellite television to hear the language! Their brothers had moved to London earlier with Baba, so they know the language and the subway and everything.

Thankfully, there are other Pakistani girls at her school and teachers who patiently help all the immigrating students learn English. Meeting boisterous red-headed Kate at high school helps Halima bloom, as the friends join the debate society and try to understand each other’s world.

But things aren’t smooth at home, as Baba continues to control his sons’ lives, as Ammi counts on her daughters as translators, as the parents begin to arrange marriages as if the family was still in Pakistan.

When Halima finds out that she was promised in marriage years ago by Baba to settle a debt, she decides that her future belongs to her. Can she really leave her family? Can she run far enough away to escape their control? How far will her Baba’s sense of family honor push him to find her?

Halima’s struggle to honor her Muslim heritage while continuing her education is based on a true story of forced marriage and kidnapping in England today. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Once a Witch, by Carolyn MacCullough (book review) – prophecy with no power?

Jan3

book cover of Once a Witch by Carolyn MacCullough published by ClarionGetting away from a bad situation always seems like a good idea… except when a bigger problem roars down from an unexpected quarter.

There’s always someone, somewhere, who is taller or has a better free throw average or solves the crossword puzzle faster than you – usually we find something else to focus on and things seem better.

But Tam’s birth prophecy said she would be “most powerful” and “a beacon to us all” – she’s not imagining her family’s disappointment as she grows up with no Talent at all. Her mom’s arguments about Tam leaving home made the weather storm and moan; her grandmother’s future-sight never shows whole pictures.

At least Gabriel is here now – his Talent for finding things might help Tam as she searches for the professor’s long-lost family heirloom. And a little time-Traveling with a cute guy…

Followed by Always a Witch which extends and completes the story of Tamsin and the Greenes as they struggle to keep the Knight family from gaining control over humankind.
**kmm

Book info: Once a Witch / Carolyn MacCullough. Graphia HMH, 2009. [author’s website] [book website] [publisher site] [book trailer] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Recommendation: Boarding school is a better place for Tamsin, unTalented among her family of powerful witches. There, she can almost forget the words of her seer grandmother – that Tamsin will be most powerful of them all. Ha!

At least her childhood pal Gabriel and his mother have moved back to Hedgerow, where the extended Greene family has lived quietly for many decades, more than content to stay out of public notice. He doesn’t yet know that Tam’s Talent never manifested, but someone will surely tell him soon.

When a professor visits the family bookstore and asks her help in tracing an heirloom, mistaking Tam for her very Talented sister, she agrees. A bit odd that McCallum finds them both in New York City soon after, as Rowena shops for her wedding dress…

Tam’s search for the missing clock takes her and Gabriel much further than she had imagined – back to 1899, in fact, thanks to Gabriel’s time-traveling Talent. But finding the clock triggers a new quest as Tam learns more about her family’s history and their past battles with another group of witches who’d rather rule over unTalented humans than avoid their notice.

Can Tam keep the clock away from the professor long enough to discover its secrets? Have she and Gabriel altered the path of time? How can she do anything to help her family when she has no Talent?

Tam tries to balance her personal world with the larger questions of good versus evil in this first book of a duet which is followed by Always a Witch. Surely Rowena will decide on a wedding dress before it’s all over… (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

Misfit (fiction)

Dec5

Never fitting in.
Moving all the time.
World’s grumpiest dad.
A long-lost uncle who’s a demon?

Jael had hoped for an old clunker car or even a cellphone for her 16th birthday, but her dad didn’t even leave her a birthday card on the breakfast table. Just a note, “Come home right after school. We have to talk.”

Who would ever imagine that she was half-demon? Or that someone on the faculty would attack her at their Catholic school? Or that a cute skateboarder guy would think she was worth talking to? Jael’s hair becomes her crowning glory – just like her mother Lilith’s was – and things get really complicated.

Flashbacks are written in the expected past tense, but the author has chosen to have Jael’s story lurch along completely in simple present tense – a bit odd, but soon the gripping pace of the story lets readers slide over this unconventional writing tic.
**kmm

Book info: Misfit / Jon Skovron. Amulet, 2011. [author’s website] [publisher site] [book trailer]

Recommendation: Jael’s dad is so strict that she’s never been on a date, never been kissed, never fit in at school. Her mom died when Jael was a baby, but is that any reason for her ex-priest father to keep dragging them from town to town? Always she’s enrolled in a Catholic school, but he forbids her to talk about angels or heaven or hell…

On her sixteenth birthday, he reluctantly gives her a pendant from her mother, but only because it was her deathbed wish. Suddenly, Jael’s dreams are filled with visions of mystical creatures, and she discovers that her mother was a demon – the infamous Lilith – who was killed because she tried to defect from the most ambitious duke of Hell.

Now her uncle-demon warns her that Belial can sense her through the pendant and is coming to exact his final revenge against her mother. Jael has a short time to learn what powers she may have as a half-demon and how to use them to defend herself and her father and her first-ever friends at school.

Can Jael’s uncle cram a lifetime of training into a few days? Will he be able warn her before Belial’s attack? Does Jael truly have the seductive beauty of her mother hidden under the frumpy clothes her father chooses? And Dad was really a demon-hunter?

Flashbacks to the past adventures and perils of Jael’s parents give the reader insights into the story that are later revealed to her. She never thought her life was easy, but now the fate of humanity may be at stake. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Zahra’s Paradise (fiction)

Nov30

Fraudulent elections.
Violence against protesters.
Hospitals invaded by the Revolutionary Guard.

World Wednesday takes us to Iran in the bloody days following the June 2009 elections which were manipulated by the powerful Supreme Guardian Council. Hundreds of thousands of students descended on Freedom Square in Tehran to demonstrate – many never returned home.

This unflinching graphic novel began as a webcomic about an anonymous Iranian blogger attempting to let the outside world know how Iranians felt about the election results. His family’s search for Mahdi represents all the missing students and the agonies suffered by their families while searching for them. Two chapters are still available on the book’s website with translations in ten languages.

Amir and Khalil also include information on the Omid Memorial, “hope” in Persian, which collects the names and stories of those who have perished in Iran while standing up for human rights since the 1979 Khomeini revolution.

Strong feelings, unfettered language, detailed black and white art – Zahra’s Paradise is not for the faint of heart, but is a call for human rights and freedom.
**kmm

Book info: Zahra’s Paradise / written by Amir; artwork by Khalil. First Second, 2011. [book website] [publisher site] [book trailer]

Recommendation: Iran, summer 2009 – students protest against rigged elections, and Alavi’s brother doesn’t come home. It makes no sense; Mehdi was studying for his final exams so he wasn’t out partying. As Alavi and his mother search Tehran’s hospitals in this graphic novel, their despair deepens – is Mehdi one the many who have disappeared into Evin Prison, that horror of abuse and degradation?

Alavi prints up missing person posters with Mehdi’s picture, meeting a sympathetic copy shop owner near the university and a beautiful woman who reminds him of well-respected Canadian photojournalist Zahra Kazemi. In 2003, Zahra was taken into Evin Prison for questioning and came out in a coffin. Chief Justice Mortazavi said she had tripped; an autopsy showed that she had been tortured and raped.

Swirling connections of corrupt officials and powerful politicians continue to block every avenue that the Alavis pursue in search of Mehdi. The few people who dare to help them are well aware of the risks involved, but what decent person wants another dead son dumped into an unmarked grave in Lot 309? Ah, Zahra’s Paradise, the cemetery named for the wife of the Prophet, has a growing hidden section that no one publicly mentions.

This intense graphic novel about struggle, power, and loss is a brutal testimony to the thousands of Iranians who asked for free elections and were silenced. The closing pages of the book contain their names, page after page in the smallest readable font, as part of the Omid Memorial, so that they may not be forgotten, even though their final resting places be unknown. It is no wonder that the author and artist published this compelling story using only fictitious first names.