Tag Archive | survival

Amid the pandemic’s first autumn, THERE IS A DOOR IN THIS DARKNESS, if she can find it! by Kristin Cashore (YA fiction)

Jun24
Book cover of There Is a Door in This Darkness, by Kristin Cashore. A maze with several entrances encloses and surrounds the words of the title on a background of streaky cloudy sky.

Seven people, one apartment,
one pandemic, college deferred –
who is she anymore?

Wilhelmina’s best friends and their families are in a Covid-pod together without her, and the Boston teen misses them enormously. She can always sense where people are in a building, and text messages just aren’t the same.

Her gap year has turned into running all the errands and trying to keep her younger siblings at bay while Mom and Dad work from home; her Aunts (actually great-aunts) are now here too, missing late Aunt Frankie as much as Wilhelmina does.

Tomorrow “your doughnut will be stale!” a fortune-teller tells her from 6 feet away. “Trust Wil-helm-ina” sparkles the message she sees parachuting from the snowy sky while walking in the cemetery for solitude; well-masked classmate James saw a white owl drop it!

The next day, she chooses just-fried doughnut from James’ Italian-Chinese-American family’s bakery – somehow, it is stale…

She sees James in the cemetery again, and he’s glowing at the edges. The Temperance tarot card that Frankie gave her long ago changes to “Trust Ray” in sparkles. Huh?!

What if the aunts’ mail ballots don’t arrive from Pennsylvania in time?
Could she really drive them home as the pinched nerves in her neck and arm flare with pain?
Why is James now in her recurring Aunt Frankie dream?

Chapters for each day of her pivotal week in November 2020 alternate with those filled with wonderful memories of childhood and teen summers spent with the Aunts at their lovely rural Pennsylvania home.

These strands of past and present story weave together satisfyingly and realistically and a bit magically as Wilhelmina navigates the current crisis to find herself at last.

This contemporary work of magical realism by the author of the Graceling fantasy epics is now available in paperback and definitely deserves your reading attention.

Where were you during November 2020, before the vaccines were available?
**kmm

Book info: There Is A Door In This Darkness / Kristin Cashore. Dutton Books /Penguin, hardcover 2024, paperback 2025. [author site https://kristincashore.com/books/there-is-a-door-in-this-darkness/] [publisher site https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/313481/there-is-a-door-in-this-darkness-by-kristin-cashore/] Review copy checked out from my local public library; cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Ice caps vanished, father not returned – her only hope against TERRA ELECTRICA: THE GUARDIANS OF THE NORTH! by Antonia Maxwell (MG fiction)

Jun18
Book cover of Terra Electrica: The Guardians of the North, by Antonia Maxwell. Atop a hill, a girl in summer clothes shoots magenta-colored lightning from her hands. Standing with her are a howling wolf and gigantic polar bear roaring at the Northern Lights above them. Two ravens fly to them through the magenta night sky, forest and high mountains in the distance.

Only she and her father survived the electrical sickness that killed everyone in their far-north village, where snow never ever comes now, Arctic animals long gone, polar ice caps melted away.

When he doesn’t return from weeks of hunting, 12-year-old Mani decides to search for her father, urged onward by the Polar animal spirits she meets after donning her late mother’s ancestral wooden mask.

The science man Leo is still alive, but his eyes show the Terra Electrica sickness. Somehow, Mani’s touch when holding a flashlight cures him!

Leo says they must travel north to The Ark where the other scientists are, to see if her father is there and figure out why Mani isn’t affected by the Terra Electrica. Maybe they can save the rest of humankind…

Their journey is long and dangerous, dragging their sled of supplies across muck that used to be iced-over, making a raft from driftwood and plastic bottles to cross a bay, encountering people who don’t trust Ark scientists or anyone coming from the Terra Electrica-affected zones.

Whenever she can, Mani goes back into the world of the mask, to hear wisdom from Ooshaka the polar bear and Crow and Eagle and Wolf, to seek her ancestors in the old land of ice, to listen for her mother’s spirit…

Oh! This large group also heading for The Ark says they have things to trade… things like weapons!?

Is her father really at The Ark?
What caused the Terra Electrica?
Can Ooshaka’s advice help Mani survive?

Mani’s perils due to extreme climate change remind us of the power we have in our present time to prevent future disaster.

How far north have you gone?
**kmm

Book info: Terra Electrica: The Guardians of the North / Antonia Maxwell. Neem Tree Press, 2024. [author site https://www.antoniamaxwell.com/about] [publisher site https://neemtreepress.com/book/terra-electrica-the-guardians-of-the-north/] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Adventure! Villains! Hugs! INSCRUTABLE DOCTOR BAER & THE CASE OF THE TWO-HEADED STATUE, by Jerzy Drozd (graphic novel)

Jun17
Book cover of The Inscrutable Doctor Baer and the Case of the Two-Headed Monster, graphic novel by Jerzy Drozd. A suit-attired bear with a complex magic staff and book races to escape a huge malevolent creature spewing crimson gore, followed by a piglet in a hooded cloak and a giant tortoise.

Cursed objects,
their histories carefully chronicled,
their spirits welcome to stay safely here!

Pickles the pig and Taft the gigantic tortoise are sure that seeing the many strange and scary curiosities in Doctor Baer’s collection will prepare them for dangers they’ll face later as aspiring adventurers.

Magic protects all entrances to the Doctor’s always-night mansion, so when Taft gets stuck in the doorway, evil sorcerer Gallus rushes through the gap to steal the powerful Stone Guardian statue!

Pickles and Taft fight against the sorceror’s battlesteed Wilhemina, toppling the statue which breaks in four pieces, each snatched by an again-cursed being that flees the mansion with its prize!

The four wisps of elemental magic released from the Guardian attach themselves to Doctor Baer’s staff and assist the crew of adventurers as they race against Gallus and Wilhemina to find all four artefacts.

Can the map in Doctor Baer’s painstakingly curated volume of daemon knowledge locate the pieces?
Do a tiny pig, a gigantic tortoise, and a professorial bear have any chance against evil Gallus and powerful Wilhemina?
Will the world ever be safe if Gallus can reassemble the Stone Guardian?

A graphic novel filled with the power of friendship and magic (especially hug magic), more adventure than Doctor Baer ever imagined, and darn cute characters trying to overcome obstacles to help others!

Full disclosure: I backed this graphic novel on Kickstarter and liked the PDF so well that I purchased a print copy from Bookshop.org!

Who is your favorite comic critter?
**kmm

Book info: The Inscrutable Doctor Baer and the Case of the Two-Headed Monster / Jerzy Drozd, with color assistance from Aaron Polk, Sarah Pagliaro, Chloe Cordero, Steve Hamaker, Daniel Connor. Iron Circus Comics, 2024. [author site https://jdrozd.com/doctorbaer/] [publisher site https://store.ironcircus.com/products/the-inscrutable-doctor-baer-and-the-case-of-the-two-faced-statue] Personal copy; cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Under the sea or stay on the land? THE SELKIE’S DAUGHTER is torn, by Linda Crotta Brennan (MG fiction)

Jun11
Book cover of The Selkie's Daughter, by Linda Crotta Brennan. A half-transformed selkie, currently part-girl and part-seal, sits on a rock at the mouth of a sea-cave with her seal-tail in the water, gazing out at the ocean.

Life is good on Finn’s Point, with Da’s music and Mum’s stories and little brother Willie, away from their isolated Nova Scotia fishing village.

If only Brigit didn’t have webbing between her fingers, proof of Mum’s selkie heritage, like the sealskin that Mum occasionally dons to transform herself into a seal in order to visit with her kinfolk in the sea.

The tween has long endured school bullies and town gossip that Mum came out of the sea, that Da’s nets must be enchanted to catch so many fish, but now they say that the new priest’s nephew is his son!

Truly, Peter is Father Angus’s sister’s son, seeing the sea for the first time after losing both parents to illness in Manitoba on their prairie farm. The schoolboy studies things scientifically so he can become a doctor and help others survive.

Oh! Someone is killing baby seals for their skins, when everyone knows it’s forbidden. Brigit sees visions of the seal families’ terror and anger when her selkie cousins venture into the secret cove near Finn’s Point.

Diphtheria sweeps through town, killing folks old and young, and people say the selkies are to blame!

As unseasonable storms blast town and endanger the fishing fleet, Brigit knows that she must try to convince the Great Selkie to relent and lift the bane.

Peter and her cousin Margaret help her plan for the difficult trip, with Peter lighting a candle in his uncle’s church before they go, “God made the rules of science and the sea. Wouldn’t hurt to have Him on our side.” (pg. 129)

Will the Great Selkie listen to Brigit?
Are her parents safe out on the storm-lashed sea?
Can a fishing town survive if there are no fish to catch?

This tale of family, friendship, and perseverance is woven throughout with Celtic mythology and seacoast lore – just released in paperback.

What do you know of selkies?
**kmm

Book info: The Selkie’s Daughter / Linda Crotta Brennan. Holiday House, hardcover 2024; Candlewick, paperback 2025. [author site https://www.lindacrottabrennan.com/] [publisher site https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/738000/the-selkies-daughter-by-linda-crotta-brennan/] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Who caused THE LOSS OF THE BURYING GROUND treaty ship at sea? by J. Anderson Coats (YA fiction)

Jun10
Book cover of The Loss of the Burying Ground, by J. Anderson Coats. Teen girls stand back-to-back, one looking upward defiantly, the other looking down in sorrow. The large sailing ship called Burying Ground is in front of them, surrounded by enormous waves.

Cora boards the ship with her mother and father, the newspaper man who’s documenting the peace treaty with those dastardly Ariminthians and its evil royal family.

Vivienne boards the ship as lady-in-waiting to the princess, whose father will sign the peace treaty with those dreadful Durans who train from childhood to wage war.

Every person, parcel, package, and pocket inspected by the other nation’s guards before being allowed onto the Burying Ground, and yet it blasts apart in neutral waters!

The two young women are its lone survivors, stranded on an island far from shipping lanes – Vivienne unwilling to outlive her princess, Cora determined to leave and get revenge.

Pirates come to their island! The girls work together to outwit them and escape, only to find that their rescue may enflame the war that the treaty was meant to stop!

How can Vivienne get her vital secret to the Royal Mother?
How can Cora avoid being scapegoated for the ship’s sinking?
Will the anti-war underground network help them?

This story of resourcefulness is told in alternating chapters by Cora and Vivienne, as each struggles against lifelong prejudices poured into them by propaganda and the powerful.

By the author of historical fiction set in pasts not always our own, like The Night Ride (recommended here https://booksyalove.com/?p=13684) and R For Rebel (https://booksyalove.com/?p=9958), who offered advance copies of this book on BlueSky – of course, I said yes!

What “everyone knows this about those people” have you learned was actually untrue?
**kmm

Book info: The Loss of the Burying Ground / J. Anderson Coats. Candlewick Press, 2024. [author site https://www.jandersoncoats.com/the-loss-of-the-burying-ground] [publisher site https://www.candlewick.com/9781536244434/the-loss-of-the-burying-ground/] Review copy via author and publisher; cover image courtesy of the publisher.

FISH FARTS and Other Amazing Ways Animals Adapt, by Joanne Settel and Natasha Donovan (kids’ Nonfiction)

Jun4
Book cover of Fish Farts and Other Amazing Ways Animals Adapt, by Joanne Settel; illustrated by Natasha Donovan. A large shiny fish swims between the title words, with bubbles trailing behind it.

Animals change over time to cope with their environment, to survive, to thrive.

Meet dozens of fascinating animals in these adaptation categories: curious communications, all-purpose poop, escaping the enemy, super strange insides, and creepy connections.

Hide and stink! Young Komodo dragons survive by rolling in pig poop so they aren’t eaten by huge adult Komodos who smell the air with their tongues as they hunt.

Escape! Green iguanas and other lizards can let their tail snap off when grabbed by a predator, then grow a new tail later.

Move along! Hummingbird flower mites hitch a ride to new nectar sources by jumping onto a hummingbird’s long beak at one flower, hiding out in its nostril, then leaping off when they sense the correct type of flower to find a new mate and avoid enemies.

Elephantnose fish use electricity to navigate through night waters in Africa and communicate with each other, one of 400 species of electric fish who’ve adapted to cloudy or muddy freshwater.

However, elephants communicate and are alerted to danger by sensing ground vibrations through their toes! Only in recent decades have scientists registered these sounds with frequencies too low for humans to hear.

Cooking the Enemy, Whale Poop for Lunch, Ant Shampoo! The chapter titles alone make it worth your while to pick up this book from your local library (https://search.worldcat.org/libraries) or favorite independent bookstore (https://www.indiebound.org/indie-store-finder).

This accurately and artistically illustrated 42 page book is better for browsing than for research since it has no bibliography or index. Words in color within the information-packed text point to its glossary at the end.

What’s your favorite unusual animal fact?
**kmm

Book info: Fish Farts and Other Amazing Ways Animals Adapt / Joanne Settel; illustrated by Natasha Donovan. Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 2024. [author site https://www.joannesettel.com/] [illustrator site https://www.natashadonovan.com/] [publisher site https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Fish-Farts/Joanne-Settel/9781665918831] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

She was SWINGING INTO HISTORY! Toni Stone: Big-League Baseball’s First Woman Player, by Karen L. Swanson & Laura Freeman (nonfiction picturebook)

May28
Book cover of Swinging Into History: Toni Stone: Big-League Baseball's First Woman Player, by Karen L. Swanson; illustrated by Laura Freeman. Against backdrop of a large baseball among scattered stars, a Black woman wearing a Clowns team baseball uniform reaches up to catch a baseball in mitt on her left hand.

Oh, how she loves baseball!
But her parents keep saying no…
how will she make it to the Major Leagues?

Tomboy longed to play baseball, but her parents tried to keep the tween busy at their Black hair salon instead. Thankfully, their parish priest convinced them to let her play on the church team in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Persistence got her into a summer baseball camp into where good coaching polished her skills. An excellent fielder, accurate thrower, and astounding batter, Tomboy began trying out for semi-pro teams at 15!

Moving to California, changing her name to Toni, and playing several years in front of scouts for pro teams, she was finally signed to the New Orleans Creoles of the Negro minor leagues.

But playing in the 1950s Jim Crow southern states was doubly hard for Toni, always forced to enter stadiums through the “colored” door and often harassed for being a woman in a man’s game.

Finally, she got called-up to the Indianapolis Clowns of the Negro American League – the first woman to play for any Major League Baseball team!

“Worked hard for my dream, gave up a lot, but my dream came true: playing baseball with the big boys,” Toni said – big boys like Satchel Paige and Willie Mays.

Toni lived to see the her name listed among the 75 Negro Leagues players honored at the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1991, where a baseball field is dedicated to her memory.

Includes a timeline of the Negro Leagues, civil rights history, and Toni’s career, a bibliography, and extensive author’s notes about the racism and gender discrimination that Toni endured while playing ball.

Which women athletes are you watching today?
**kmm

Book info: Swinging Into History: Toni Stone: Big-League Baseball’s First Woman Player / Karen L. Swanson; illustrated by Laura Freeman. Calkins Creek, 2024. [author site https://www.karenlswanson.com/] [illustrator site https://www.lfreemanart.com/] [publisher site https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/742890/swinging-into-history-by-karen-l-swanson-illustrated-by-laura-freeman/] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Philosophy can help you become SERIOUSLY HAPPY, by Ben Aldridge (YA nonfiction)

May13
Book cover of Seriously Happy: 10 Life-Changing Philosophy Lessons From Stoicism to Zen to Supercharge Your Mindset, by Ben Aldridge. "The Thinker" statue wearing athletic socks, sneakers, and sunglasses rests his chin on fist and looks down at happy-face ball in his other hand.

Are you happy right now?
What about your happiness level for the week?
How can you live a better life?

“In the modern world, we have a big problem – a lot of us aren’t particularly happy,” (p.10) like this author who set out to shift his mindset into a happier mode by studying world philosophies.

First, you must define what happiness means to you, then uncover how living a good life is easier when you gain mental and emotional skills to weather its ups and downs.

At the heart of this book for teens are big lessons from ten philosophies: Zen, the Cynics, the Socratic School, Taoism, the Stoics, Aristotle, Buddhism, Epicurus, the Stoics again, and other ancient philosophers.

You can grow your resilience by studying the tenets of Buddhism, become seriously confident with advice from the Cynics, and power up your focus by studying Zen.

The author discusses each philosophy’s strengths in relation to living a good and balanced life, weaving in his experiences and reflections on seeking out different philosophical paths.

Each chapter ends with a set of challenges so you can interact more fully with that philosophy – walk a banana down the street (the Cynics), learn a challenging skill (the Stoics), get into the great outdoors (Taoism) – and see what its tenets might bring to your life.

When are you seriously happy and why?
**kmm

Book info: Seriously Happy: 10 Life-Changing Philosophy Lessons From Stoicism to Zen to Supercharge Your Mindset / Ben Aldridge. Quarto Publishing/Holler, 2024. [author site https://www.benaldridge.com/book] [publisher site https://quarto.com/books/9780711297807/seriously-happy] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

X is unknown: KEPLER26: THE INVITATION to abandoned brothers – to a safe place? by Parvela, Sortland, Pitkanen, and Witesman (MG Fiction) #AtoZ

Apr28
Book cover of Kepler62: The Invitation, by/ Timo Parvela & Bjorn Sortland; art by Pasi Pitkanen; translated by Owen Witesman. Shows a short Black boy and a taller white tween boy with sticking-up hair, half-brothers who hold hands as they walk into a dark hangar. Through the open hangar doors emblazoned with a fierce bird, is a large passenger jet plane taking off into a vivid red and orange sky.

Too many people, too much pollution,
not enough work or food,
a computer game offers escape and a secret…

With Mom always gone, 13-year-old Ari shoplifts to feed little half-brother Joni. The hoopla about the upcoming space expedition to find another habitable planet doesn’t fill an empty stomach.

“A lady” gives Joni the video game that everyone is talking about: Kepler62, rumored to have a secret ending if you master all the levels.

Two days, two nights – the game starts with easy quests, then gets much harder. Online gamer forums say no one has solved level 99 yet.

As they try yet again, Joni insists that Ari choose an unconventional weapon, and onward they go in the dark tunnel… success!

Then things the boys have never ever seen appear on-screen – mountains and trees and a meadow where a tall pale boy runs with a kite as a young dark boy follows… is that them?

Joni wakes up with a fever, so they go to the health center where a very young girl with implanted medical knowledge prescribes a medication that triggers alarms when they accept it. The lady who gave Joni the game helps them escape, but the men in grey suits are fast!

Why did the government just now discover the boys’ mother hasn’t been home in a while?
Oh, those men’s eyes have that glint like the girl doctor – have their brains been altered, too?
Joni is sure there’s something else in the game – can the brothers find it?

This first book in the Kepler62 illustrated novel series (https://www.simonandschuster.com/series/Kepler62) was simultaneously released in Finnish and Norwegian, then translated into English.

What’s your favorite reality-escape video game?
**kmm

Book info: Kepler62: The Invitation / Timo Parvela & Bjorn Sortland; art by Pasi Pitkanen; translated by Owen Witesman. Arctis Books, 2023. [Timo’s site https://www.timoparvela.fi/en] [Bjorn’s site https://bjornsortland.no/boker.html] [Pasi’s site https://www.instagram.com/pp_pitkanen/] [Owen’s site https://www.suomitranslation.com/about/] [publisher site https://www.arctis-books.com/books/the-invitation] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

S is for A SORCERESS COMES TO CALL, bringing her daughter, danger, and doom! by T. Kingfisher (YA fiction) #AtoZ

Apr22
Book cover of A Sorceress Comes to Call, by T. Kingfisher. Shows 2 curving, gnarled brown trees on either side of the title, on a dark background spangled with stars.

Isolated in a small house by Mother’s choice,
oft-ensorcelled, only a white horse as her friend,
daughter of a sorceress longs to escape!

Mother decides to find a new ‘benefactor’ in the city, and just-14 Cordelia suddenly finds herself in the magic-dazzled Squire Samuel’s mansion, tasked with posing as the 17-year-old debutante daughter of ‘Lady Evangeline’ to distract his sister.

However, Lady Hester immediately senses that Doom and her daughter have arrived – but which of them is planning to wed Samuel who’s avoided marriage so long?

Cordelia finds a friend in the middle-aged lady who teaches her embroidery and answers questions so kindly. If only she could keep Mother from controlling the minds of these nice people and using her horse-familiar to report all that happens outside the manor walls…

The Squire invites friends to visit so that Evangeline and Cordelia may stay longer at his estate, as polite society dictates. Now glamorous Mrs. Green is flirting with the Squire, and Mother is livid with rage.

What?! Mrs. Green is found with a murder weapon, Mother wants Cordelia to marry the mature Lord Evermore, and a huge ghostly beast is seen stalking the manor woods..

Can Hester save her besotted brother from evil Evangeline?
Can Cordelia’s new allies save her from her mother’s plans?
Can they save the very land and its people from the sorceress’s doom?

Another compelling and magical tale from the author of Nettle and Bone (recommended here https://booksyalove.com/?p=12858 ). Find it at your local library (worldcat.org/libraries) or independent bookstore (indiebound.org/indie-store-finder).

Have events ever made you wonder if magic was involved?
**kmm

Book info: A Sorceress Comes to Call / T. Kingfisher. Tor, 2024. [author site https://redwombatstudio.com/about-the-author/] [publisher site https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250244079/asorceresscomestocall/] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.