Tag Archive | growing up

Pieces of Me, by Charlotte Gingras (fiction) – seeking friendship, hiding Mom’s illness

Jul14

Being a teenager is difficult. Coping with a parent’s mental illness can make it unbearable. And it’s just Mira and her mom, in that basement apartment.

How can you be anyone’s friend if your mother has your walk home from school timed to the second? Who wouldn’t have a crush on the only teacher who ever encouraged you?

Originally published in French as La Liberté. Connais pas… this slim, lyrical story won a 1999 Governor General’s Literary Award from the Canada Council for the Arts. Susan Ouriou’s translation is flowing and true, bringing us Mira’s story from the chilly Quebec streets.

Find this gem at your local library or independent bookstore to hear Mira’s tale.
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Book info: Pieces of Me / Charlotte Gingras; translated by Susan Ouriou. Kids Can Press, 2009. [author biography in French] [publisher site]

Recommendation: At 14, Mirabelle feels separated from real life – trapped in the basement apartment by her divorced mother who knows to the minute how long it takes Mira to walk home from school, reading in the school library so she doesn’t have to talk to anyone at lunch, hiding behind her long golden hair so no one sees her sketches.

Then Catherine arrives at school, and Mira’s life moves out of its dark cloud, bit by bit. They invent a club so that they can meet after school in the café once a week. Cath brings Mira to a table of friends at lunch. And they both work hard at the challenging assignments in art class.

Cath gets a boyfriend and drifts away, just a little, as Mira’s admiration of her art teacher becomes infatuation, and life becomes more complicated. Her wildlife biologist father returns to the city, asking about her plans for college – a startling idea for Mira, who isn’t sure how her mother would survive without her.

Discerning older teen readers will remember Mira’s love of color, her worries about her first kiss, and her dreams of escaping the basement apartment long after they close this slim volume, lyrically translated from the French by Susan Ouriou. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Annexed (fiction)

Jul13

Anne Frank and the Annex – so many have read her story through her diary. Radio messages from the Dutch officials exiled in London during World War II reminded those who remained in the Netherlands that their diaries and memoirs would be testaments to the Nazis’ atrocities. Anne knew this as she wrote, always striving to be “a writer” and telling the tales of hope and deprivation and worry that circled and recircled in the Annex.

So hearing Peter’s voice brings more to the story, like looking at a familiar statue from another angle gives us a different perspective. Not everyone has been pleased with this alternate view of the Annex, but Dogar’s comments on the controversy reveal that she wrote Annexed because she and her daughter wondered what happened after the Diary ended, not to rewrite Anne’s history.

A gripping story well worth reading (with hankie in hand).
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Book info: Annexed / Sharon Dogar. Houghton Mifflin, 2010. [author interview] [publisher site] [book trailer]

Recommendation: Peter walks slowly, savoring the sun and wind before he enters the Annex. Who knows how long the Franks and his family will stay there, Jews escaping the Nazis in Holland by going into hiding?

Yes, those Franks. This is Peter’s side of the struggle for survival chronicled in The Diary of Anne Frank, as the young man gives up his first romance, his training, his future, just trying to stay alive day by day. Oh, the story was whispered in Amsterdam that both families had fled, far from the ominous army trucks which loaded up in Jewish neighborhoods and returned to the city – empty.

Peter longs for his woodworking tools, not the books that Anne and Margot seem to live in. How appropriate that a bookcase covers the hidden door into the Annex! How difficult it must have been for others to bring food to those in the Annex when there was little to find.

As time passes, books become more appealing to Peter… as does Anne, who is no longer the child who entered the Annex. Anne – who writes to tell the truth, who writes as a testimony against the cruelty of the Nazis.

We know that this saga does not end well. Peter’s tale continues on the horrific train journey out of the city, to the brutalities of the prison camp called Auschwitz. Annexed is a powerful story for mature readers, no less real because it uses the voice of fiction. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Positively (fiction)

Jul12

How can anyone else understand what Emmy is going through?
Born HIV-positive, losing her mother to AIDS, struggling to make it through school and the move to her dad and stepmom‘s house…

Thankfully, there really are places like Camp Positive where young people like Emmy can learn to cope with HIV, as well as camps for kids with asthma or diabetes. The author is donating proceeds from sales of Positively to the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation.

Come to Camp Positive with Emmy – you’ll be glad you did!
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Book info: Positively / Courtney Sheinmel. Simon & Schuster, 2009. [author’s website] [publisher site] [book trailer]

Recommendation: AIDS took her mother, leaving 13 year-old Emmy alone and HIV-positive. Well, her father and stepmother wanted her, but did she really want to live with them? Especially with a new baby on the way?

After Mom’s funeral, being at junior high with Nicole was mostly the same, but it was really hard at Dad and Meg’s house with different rules and someone else’s favorite foods. Who wouldn’t get mad and lash out?

Emmy wasn’t happy when they sent her to Camp Positive for girls living with HIV – a whole summer away from her friends, and off in the woods! How will Mom’s spirit know that she’s away from their hometown? Can Emmy get used to sleeping in a cabin with other people? How many summers will she have in her life, even with all the new medications?

Explore the woods and worries with Emmy and the Camp Positive crew, learning to live well every day and be positive in more ways than they ever dreamed. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Beastly, by Alex Flinn (book review) – yesterday’s bully, tomorrow’s Beast?

Jul9

book cover of Beastly by Alex Flinn published by Harper CollinsShhh… it’s Sneak-In Saturday, so I’m bringing you a book that swooped onto the bestseller and award lists before I could get it to you!

And darned if they didn’t go and make a movie of it, too… The book is much better, of course, as your mind’s eye visualizes Kyle’s transformation into a hairy beast and his sudden downfall from Mr. Popular to freakish recluse.

This modern retelling of Beauty and the Beast includes chatroom transcripts of a support group for the “unfortunately transformed” and roses in its symbolism.

Alex Flinn has updated other classic tales and also writes completely ‘contemporary’ teen fiction – check her website for full list. And don’t be Beastly to anyone, okay?
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Book info: Beastly / Alex Flinn. HarperCollins, 2007. [author’s website] [author interview] [publisher site] Review copy and cover art courtesy of the publisher.

My Book Talk: Kyle’s on the ballot for Prom King – no surprise since he’s the best-looking guy at school. But someone looks past the handsome surface to see his shallow, uncaring soul, and is going to make him pay for every insult.

When Kendra (the new girl with crooked teeth and the ugly non-designer clothes) protests about electing “royalty” just based on appearances and calls him a beast, Kyle tunes her out. Why should he worry about that loser when he’s taking the hottest girl at Tuttle to the prom? His dad, the television news star, says that no one should have to look at ugly people anyway.

Just for laughs, Kyle pretends to ask Kendra to the prom, knowing that he’ll dump her at the door as his friends mock her. Limo for his real date? On dad’s credit card, like the orchid corsage that the maid will get for him. But it’s a white rose waiting when Kyle’s ready to pick up Sloane, and she throws a fit about it, as he knew she would. The scholarship girl taking tickets admires the rose so he gives it to her – easier than walking over to the trashcan. As he and Sloane are crowned Prom King and Queen, Kendra arrives in her outdated dress and is snubbed by the popular crowd. Prom night, Sloane’s parents are away, Kyle gets home just before sunrise – to find Kendra in his room!

She puts a spell on him – his outside appearance will mirror his beastly inner nature, unless he finds someone who’ll kiss him for love of his true self. If he doesn’t find true love in two years, he’ll be a beast forever.

After medical experts can’t cure him, Kyle is dumped by his dad in a house on the other side of New York City, given a tutor and the maid to stay with him. He tries to find answers online, in books, anywhere but in his own heart.

Will Kyle ever find a girl who will even look at him, let alone love him? Is he doomed to live alone with the rose garden that he and his tutor create? A clever retelling of Beauty and the Beast with modern twists, be sure to read it before you see the movie! (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

Cate of the Lost Colony, by Lisa Klein (book review) – favored by the Queen, banished to Roanoke Colony

Jul6
book cover of Cate of the Lost Colony by Lisa Klein published by Bloomsbury

This World Wednesday takes us from England to Roanoke colony, a voyage that ends in silence among whispering grasses on the sea dunes of the New World.

Orphaned young Lady Catherine was naturally enthralled by the dashing Sir Walter Raleigh and his tales about the bountiful new world, waiting across the sea for the rule and law of his gracious Queen Elizabeth I.

But Cate didn’t realize that showing even slight interest in the Queen’s favorite could be the end of her time at court. Being banished from such a hostile place – a death sentence or a blessing?

Enjoy this tale of the early English colony whose mysterious disappearance continues to intrigue us.
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Book info: Cate of the Lost Colony / Lisa Klein. Bloomsbury, 2010. [author’s website] [publisher site] [book trailer]

My Book Talk (no spoilers): Seeing Indians in Queen Elizabeth’s court, young Lady Catherine Archer is enthralled by Sir Walter Raleigh’s reports of his New World colony and by Sir Walter himself. But when poems from Sir Walter are found in her room, the orphaned Cate is sent away from the court by the jealous Queen, who keeps Raleigh close by her, not allowing him to even visit the colony that he raised money to establish.

Locked in the Tower of London, Cate worries that she will die alone and forgotten. But after weeks in prison, her fate is announced – she has been banished to Roanoke Colony in Virginia, never to return to England! For a 14 year old girl, raised to be a gentle lady, the long sea voyage (where pirates or the enemy Spanish are sure to attack the English ship) and the primitive conditions of the Colony are more likely a death sentence than any mercy from the Queen.

Cate is determined to see for herself the wonders of the New World that Raleigh’s captains reported, as she completes the voyage which brings the first women colonists from England to Roanoke. But they find the fort’s walls destroyed, the planted crops withered away, and the Roanoke soldiers dead or missing…

Will the colonists be able to survive with only the supplies in their ship?
Did the friendly Indians kill the soldiers or are there other enemies beyond the trees?
Will the Queen let Sir Walter visit his colony at last?
And will city girl Cate let go of her dreams of Raleigh and find a happy ending in this wilderness?
(One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy and cover image 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!
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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!
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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.

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?
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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)

Four Seasons (fiction)

Jun23

Today is “Let It Go Day”, as Wellcat.com urges folks “Whatever it is that’s been grabbing your gut or your psyche, let it go. Just let it go. It’ll be a better day afterwards.”

Ally is having an awful time letting things go. After all, piano is her whole life. Except that perhaps it isn’t – maybe a little time with friends or an occasional sleepover would also be good for a 13 year old who happens to play piano like an angel.

Thankfully, Ally doesn’t have “helicopter parents” or “stage-manager parents” always hovering over her, pushing her to practice-practice-practice, win-win-win. Her parents are both talented musicians and know the dedication that it takes to succeed in such a competitive field, yet they somehow miss the signs that Ally could crumble under the strain.

A fascinating look into the demanding world of classical pianists, into the psyche of super-talented youth, into the gaping void of “what now?”
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Book info: Four Seasons / Jane Breskin Zalban. Knopf Books for Young Readers, 2011. [author’s website] [publisher site]

Recommendation: As a piano student at Julliard, Allegra must practice 6 hours every day and attend music classes all day Saturday. But the pressure is so intense that Ally wonders if she could stop. Just stop playing the piano, her chosen instrument since age 4.

Child of two wonderful musicians, Ally has a true gift for the piano, yet still wants what normal 13 year olds have – friends, sleepovers, time to relax. Her famous piano teacher is demanding and stern, quick to remind her about the 7 year olds at the school who have already won international piano competitions.

When she finally has time to talk to a nice guy from her regular school, Ally starts thinking about whether playing the piano competitively is worth it. After a disastrous summer music camp festival, who is more surprised at the choices she begins to make: her best friend? Her parents? Her piano teacher? Ally?

Much like her beloved Vivaldi concerto, Ally’s story has four distinct sections. Can the tension of these four seasons turn life into joy? (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

Journey of Dreams (fiction)

Jun22

Let’s go to Central America for World Wednesday, where the designs of Guatemalan huipiles tell stories, woven into the cloth, strand by strand, using a backstrap loom. It would take many weeks for Tomasa or her mother to weave enough cloth for an entire skirt or blouse.

Tomasa tells her story as she would weave a huipil, strand by strand, row by row, along the jungle paths and strange city streets of their journey. Guatemala’s long civil war was at its height in 1984, when thousands of Native Mayan families like hers fled from their land as soldiers destroyed their villages. Many thousands more were killed in the government’s “scorched earth” campaign – it was a bitter time.

Questions about refugees or immigrants often have no easy answers, but hearing the stories of others’ lives can help us understand how their world is different and perhaps show us ways to make life better for others.
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Book info: Journey of Dreams / Marge Pellegrino. Frances Lincoln Children’s Books, 2009. [author’s website] [publisher site]

Recommendation: As she and her mother weave, Tomasa hears the helicopters carrying soldiers. As they wash clothes at the river, she worries aloud about the planes spraying poisons, trying to force people from their small farms. Stones are thrown at their house, wrapped with notes threatening them to keep quiet about the planes and the pesticides.

Maybe tomorrow, maybe tonight, the army will come for the older schoolboys, like her brother Carlos, to make them soldiers against the rebels who are trying to save their land, to make them shoot at their neighbors.

Mama and Carlos slip away one night, escaping to the north. Soon, Papa decides it is too dangerous for the rest of the family to stay, and they flee in the darkness, just ahead of the soldiers who burn the crops, bulldoze down the houses, try to erase their village from the map of Guatemala.

Tomasa helps Papa lead her little brother and baby sister through the jungle, across rivers, and even into cities, looking for Mama and Carlos. When sanctuary workers locate them in the United States, the journey becomes even longer and more perilous.

Can the family get through Mexico to find Mama and Carlos? Will they die crossing the borders, as so many refugees have? Who can hear Tomasa’s dreams of running, of friends left behind in the ruined village?

Tomasa weaves into her huipiles many symbols from the Qui’che legends that Papa retells, the faith of the Church, and the love of her family in this compelling look at the Central American refugee experience, as seen through a 12 year old’s eyes. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.