Books – Page 16 – Out & About

Books read in March 2016

Ah picture books. Boosting the Number of Books Read (NBR) of readers around the world. If you are falling down on your reading goal, go find some picture books. Possibly even the ones I list here as it was a pretty good month for picture books. Also, my favorite Smart Smut author Amy Jo Cousins released two more books in her Bend or Break series. And she recommended another author who had a free book on Amazon and I got sucked into that one and the sequel and then the free bonus book. It was a great month of book reading, but I missed a few newspaper days.

Picture books: Jazz Day
Middle grade: The Turn of the Tide
Young adult: Exit, Pursued by a Bear
Young nonfiction: The Borden Murders
Grownup nonfiction: Basic Map and Compass Skills
Smart Smut: Hard Candy

Freedom in Congo Square
Weatherford
Read for librarian book group.
There was an entire page of introductory text and then the word choices in the book skewed to the complex. The art was good, but this is a book to be read to children, not for children to read.

The Secret Subway
Corey
Read for librarian book group.
I appreciated the unique form of illustration, while also not really liking the art itself. I was very interested in this secret subway as I am a fan of pneumatic tubes.

Emma & Julia Love Ballet
McClintock
Read for librarian book group.
Great illustrations. Cute story. A hell of a lot of pink.

Jazz Day
Orgill
Read for librarian book group.
I was all in, because I love that picture of “A Great Day in Harlem,” and I’m a sucker for behind-the-scenes information. And then the story was told in poetry! And it was good poetry! This is one of the books I would have spent a lot of time looking at as a child.

Ida, Always
Levis
Read for librarian book group.
Sweet story about loss, in this case, the loss of a polar bear companion. It made me teary, though, so perhaps a pre-read is in order before plunging into it with a child.

The Night Gardener
The Fan Brothers
Read for librarian book group
It was very fun to see what shapes the Night Gardener pruned the trees of the town into. And I also read this book with a growing sense of horror at what sort of permanent damage was caused by some random dude who came through town and hacked up the trees. Pruning like that takes follow-up and who is going to keep up the maintenance? Also, if someone turned my tree into an owl without asking me first, I would not be thrilled. However, most children will not have spent much time pruning trees, and will not be so unsettled.

(Early graphic novel-type picture book:)
The Great Pet Escape
Victoria Jamison
Read for librarian book group.
Many chuckles abounded.

The Turn of the Tide
Roseanne Parry
Read for librarian book group.
Yet another quality middle-grade fiction book! Set in Astoria, this is the story of a girl who longs to be a bar pilot and her cousin, who is spending the summer in Astoria after a Tsunami kills his grandparents and devastates his town. There is sailing, adventure and tough choices.

Bramblehart
Henry Cole
Read for librarian book group.
Talking animals aren’t usually my thing, and so it was for this novel. Also, an adversary suddenly became an ally with no explanation. How did that get by the people who are supposed to be putting out quality books?

The Boy in the Black Suit
Jason Reynolds
The is the second book by Reynolds I’ve read that completely disregards the adage that a YA story must be All About Plot. Unlike the knitting one, I did not get bored and enjoyed wandering through these character’s lives, and especially liked attending so many interesting funerals.

Unbecoming
Jenny Downham
Read for Librarian Book Group
I shall begin by discussing the thing that distracted me throughout the entire novel: the timeline. The grandmother gave birth to the mother in 1954. And the mother’s daughter is a contemporary teenager. Wait. What? Really? And there is also a younger brother? How old was she when she gave birth?

I can’t tell you how many times I counted forward from 1954 trying to make the timeline sensible. A sixteen-year-old today would have to have been born in 1999 or 2000 which would make her mother forty five? And forty seven when she had the younger brother? You could maybe subtract five years and have the story set in 2011–but probably not many more than that due to phone technology–but even being a forty-two-year-old first-time mother might bring up some commentary very early on during the book. For instance, would her daughter attribute the mother’s insistence on safety and sensible choices to the fact that she was so old* when she became a mother? If there had been just one sentence early on–“my mother was so much older than all the other mothers”–I could have stopped my endless counting. The age thing is finally addressed near the end of the book, but by then I’d exhausted myself with different decade permutations.

Setting aside the (rather large) issue of timeline, I loved the stories of these three women. The grandmother’s memory loss was terrifying to read about, but such a good way to tell her story. And the mother and the daughter’s stories were also compelling.

*Note that I realize there are women who are first-time mothers in their forties (though forty-five and forty-seven is unusual) and I don’t think forty itself is old.

Hour of the Bees
Lindsay Eager
Read for librarian book group.
After a while the story that grandfather was telling seemed like a ham-fisted respect-the-planet kind of environmental tale. This didn’t trouble me overly. It’s a first novel and it’s a long one and something has to get a little out of control. I thought the capture of emotions was very well done and it was kind of fun to see a bratty older teenager through the eyes of her younger sister. I feel like there isn’t enough of that in the fiction I come across. Probably because I mostly read books from the bratty older sister’s perspective.

Exit, Pursued by a Bear
E.K. Johnston
Read for librarian book group.
This has become top book of the year. Is there nothing E.K. Johnston can’t do? The repeated unfairness of the situation drove me crazy and kept me reading as things worked their way back to the new normal. As usual, the prose was excellent. Three quotes from the book have made their way to my quotes page.

I also greatly enjoyed the couple of pages of chatter about which Canadian University people were attending. Especially because I had no idea what was going on.

The Borden Murders
Sarah Miller
Read for librarian book group.
I have two main problems with this book. The first is that the author sets us up by saying that what we know about Lizzie Borden–for most of us gleaned from the rhyme–is wrong. Then she does nothing to prove that the rhyme is wrong. With the evidence Miller presents, I’m convinced that Lizzie Borden was the person giving the whacks.

Secondly, Lizzie Borden was thirty years old and unmarried at the time of the murder. Her spinster status must have been something people commented on, and regularly, yet Miller never unpacks anything about what it meant to be an unmarried woman at that time. I see this as a large oversight.

Though I was constantly irritated by the above two things, this was a very readable (though the prose was sometimes clunky) engrossing book. I enjoyed Miller’s inclusion of the way the three (three!) different Fall River newspapers covered the sensational event, as well as the coverage in the national press.

Basic Essentials: Map and Compass
Cliff Jacobsen
Read for librarian book group.
Exactly what the title says it is.

Love me like a rock
Amy Jo Cousins
We continue to work our way through the rowers of the Ivy League-like college. First there were Tom and Reese, then Tom’s friend Cash and after that came Cash’s cousin Denny, which lead us to Raffi and here we have Raffi’s roommate Austin. I could draw you a schema, but really you should just go read the series, because Ms. Cousins knows how to write good characters.

So Austin has this friends-with-benefits thing with roommate Vinne, and it’s working okay. But then, there’s a life drawing class and this very hirsute model named Sean catches Austin’s eye. Things progress from there. Unlike other books in the series, there isn’t much keeping Austin and Sean apart–Austin’s fairly trauma-free. But it’s fun to watch someone who has always been on the sidelines find himself front and center of someone’s attention. Plus, the Austin/Sean relationship upends things with Vinnie, which leads us right into the next book in the series, Hard Candy.

Hard Candy
Amy Jo Cousins
There’s something about watching an uptight person learn to chill out. And when Vinnie, Austin and Raffi’s uptight out-but-straight-and-narrow roommate, finds himself in the path of very flamboyant Bryan things get interesting.

I’m hoping we haven’t exhausted all our characters in this series, but aside from straight roommate Bob, there doesn’t seem to be anyone left. Which would be a shame, although I’m pretty sure I’ll enjoy whatever Amy Jo Cousins thinks up next.

The Year We Fell Down
Sarina Brown
Amy Jo Cousins recommended this author and the book was free via Kindle promotion, and thus I read it. I found the repeated references to the “hope fairy” (or whatever it was) really annoying and this was yet another M/F romance where the M is experienced and the F is not at all.

Aside from that, I found that both characters were dealing with new disabilities (one temporary, one permanent) interesting and not often a topic explored. And I couldn’t put it down, so that’s saying something.

The Year We Hid Away
Sarina Brown
Book Two brings us back to a secondary character from The Year We Fell Down–Bridger McCaulley, massive slut and good guy. He’s got a different plan this year, which is thrown asunder when he meets Scarlet Crowley, new freshman hiding from her father’s misdeeds. Good examination of the complexities of hiding things. Again we have a M/F romance with the very experienced M and the not at all experienced F.

Blonde Date
Sarina Brown
This novella was free when I subscribed to Sarina Brown’s newsletter. One of my favorite things about it was that it is the first in the series to have a M/F romance with the F having substantially more experience than the M. Finally!

HOWEVER. I think it’s important to state that if a person consents to a sex act, and doesn’t know the other person involved in the sex act has set it up so people could watch said sex act she has not consented and she should turn those motherfuckers in. The workaround solution in this book was all well and good, but it doesn’t take away from the fact she didn’t give consent. Which is creepy and gross and needs to be dealt with, possibly legally.

Books read in February 2016

The results are in from my first month working for the private sector: 11 books read. That seems like a lower number than usual, but I’m not actually going to check. This month I only read one book that was not for librarian book group. And I read no “grownup” books at all.

Picture: Swap!
Middle Grade: Pax (and not just because it was the only one)
YA: They were all really good in different ways. If I have to choose one I’ll go with The Unlikely Hero of Room 13B.

Into the Snow
Kaneko/Saito
Read for Librarian Book Group
The illustrations felt like being in the middle of a snow storm. This also meant that sometimes they weren’t very clear.

Be a Friend
Salina Yoon
Read for Librarian Book Group
I love mimes. And so I loved this book. One might take it as mime propaganda–get the kids while they are young!

Surf’s up!
Alexander/Miyares
Read for Librarian Book Group
Fun little tale of the terrible choice between surfing and reading.

Swap!
Steve Light
Read for Librarian Book Group
Very fun story of swapping items for other items and eventually getting what you need. The illustrations were grand and this book could possibly double as a coloring book for those with good fine motor skills.

Pax
Sara Pennypacker
Read for Librarian Book Group
Really great middle reader about a boy and the fox he rescued. For the first half of the book I kept trying to place the story in space and time. War was coming, and I couldn’t really figure out how that fit into the map of the real world. I eventually gave up on this quest and just slotted this into the kind-of-present-kind-of-future space.

Wonders of the Invisible World
Christopher Barzak
Read for librarian book group.
Manages to combine a solid love story with weird “seeing” elements. Like us, the main character has no idea what is going on until the best friend he can’t remember moves back to town after five years. Trying to puzzle things out kept me turning pages.

The Unlikely Hero of Room 13B
Teresa Toten
Read for librarian book group
A story of a boy with OCD, and his first love, Robyn. This story also includes the kids in his OCD therapy group, his counslor, his mother, father, stepmother and brother. There’s a lot to juggle here and Toten manages to keep track of everyone.

I particularly enjoyed the rich characterization. The many players are memorable and well developed. Unfortunately for me, reading about OCD was a slog–I spent the book tense and uncomfortable. Which means I think Toten did a great job accurately capturing the super bummer it must be to live with OCD. By the end I was glad I had read, but in the middle it was hard to keep going. I recommend this, because it’s good, but that doesn’t also mean it is an easy read.

Salt to the Sea
Ruta Septys
Read for Librarian Book Group
People who read Between Shades of Gray will particularly enjoy this WWII-era novel. Told from four different perspectives, it details the end-of-war fleeing of people toward the Baltic Sea. It’s a thick book and a quick read.

We Are the Ants
Shaun David Hutchinson
Read for Librarian Book Group
In Dennis Lehane’s book The Given Day, there is a marvelous bit of writing where a character is pushed off the roof and falls to his death. The author manages to play out this scene clearly and cleanly without once using the words “push” or “fall”.

So it is with this book about depression and bullying, which manages to weave an engaging tale for 455 pages, while rarely mentioning depression or bullying.

Open Road Summer
Emery Lord
Regan O’Neil–a rebel on the reform path–escapes her normal life for a summer on tour with her Taylor Swift-like best friend. I was constantly confused by the fact that this rebel wore heels and makeup, but perhaps southern rebellion looks different than western rebellion. Contains good stuff about friends, fame and finding out who you are when you aren’t a bad girl anymore.

I Hear a Pickle
Rachel Isadora
Read for Librarian Book Group
Oh good grief, this book seemed like it took forever to read. The repetitive structure had me bored by the time we got to the examination of the second sense. I was positively silently screaming by the fourth one. Cute illustrations though.

Books read in January 2015

13 books read in a month that included the tail end of winter break and two snow days. Will my reading fall off tremendously with the coming of the new job? Stay tuned.

Picture Books: Supertruck
Middle Grade: The Thing About Jellyfish
Young Adult: First and Then
Young Nonfiction: Sex is a Funny World
Grownup Nonfiction: Not Funny, Ha Ha

Supertruck
Stephen Savage
Read for Librarian book group.
Who was that truck? It was Supertruck!

The Thing About Jellyfish
Ali Benjamin
Read for Librarian Book Group
Really enjoyable story about getting over a friend’s death when you are in middle school and have even fewer skills than the average middle schooler. Not quite as moving as Rain Reign, but close.

I enjoyed it despite the fact that I read it through Multnomah County Library’s 3M app on my tablet, due to too many holds on the book copies. The app gave me HUGE TEXT that I couldn’t figure out how shrink. I shall have to ask an MCL employee for assistance.

Adventures with Waffles
Maria Parr
Read for Librarian Book Group.
Trille’s best friend Lena is a Norweigen offshoot of Pippi Longstocking and the two have many fun advetures in this episodic book.

Doing It
Melvin Burgess
I found it odd that the chapters jumped from first person to third person with no consistent rhythm. Sometimes the switch would come mid-chapter. Maybe if there had only been one person’s point of view, this would have worked, but with three characters–plus some other people weighing in now and then–I kept being jolted.

This feels like a fairly realistic book about what it is to be male and adolescent, which I ultimately found depressing because, dude, adolescent guys can be uber creeps. There was a long section where one main character liked a girl, but didn’t want to say he did because she was fat.

I guess there’s such a thing as being too realistic. Also, I totally felt for Ben, the kid trapped in a (n illeagal) relationship with his teacher.

The Promise of Amazing
Robin Constantine
Um. What was this book about? (It’s been a week.)
Ah yes. This was engaging when I was reading it. I enjoy a good story of a middle-of-the-road person. I liked the bad boy/good girl dynamic.

Apparently, though, it was fairly forgettable.

The Last Little Blue Envelope
Maureen Johnson
One of the things I think YA gets wrong is the feeling of completion when a couple gets together. They have found each other! They will love each other forever! Whereas in real life, we don’t tend to stay with the people we fall in love with in high school.

Maureen Johnson takes Ginny back to Europe, back to that guy she likes. But all is not the same. And there’s this problem with this other guy, who has all her envelopes.

Truly, Madly, Famously
Rebecca Serle
Let’s get the Portland details out of the way first. For most of the book I was thinking, “Thank god, the main character hasn’t been back to Portland, so there are no Portland details to get wrong.” But then, on 227, one teenager says to another: “We were going to do Nob Hill.”

And yes, I know what she’s talking about. But no Portlander talks about Nob Hill, we would say “Twenty-third Avenue.” Then, on the next page, “You have a protest in the Pearl in forty-five minutes…that community garden is not going to save itself.”

The protest in the Pearl wouldn’t be about a community garden! It would be about affordable housing! Seriously! Ms. Serle. Send me your drafts and I will fix these things for you. Or stop being so Portland specific if you aren’t going to get the details right.

Okay, now that we’ve got that out of the way, oh my god I loved this book. It’s not a Great Book, but it does what it does so well. Love triangle! Super awesome! I get grumpy in YA books when characters who would in real life be having sex, totally don’t. But there is no sex in this book and it seems totally reasonable. The kissing scenes are hot, the character arcs work and all is good.

I was thinking that there would be three books, one for each movie, but this book was feeling very finished with this book. So maybe we are done? [brief internet research interlude] Ah-ha! Goodeads has an untitled #3 book in its list. In the meantime, I’ll check out the author’s other titles.

First & Then
Emma Mills
I loved this book so much. There were weird characters, but they seemed like any normal weird character you might encounter in high school. I loved that Devon, the female lead, has a crush on her best (male) friend Cas and doesn’t know what to do with that. I love that she’s got this cousin living with her, and she’s having trouble not being an only child.

Devon loves Jane Austin and there are many Jane references sprinkled hither and yon. Probably more than I caught, because I mostly experience Ms. Austin through celluloid, not print.

Devon also has a friend Jordan, and I loved their friendship, which was that of opposite-sex peers who really like each other. In another universe, they’d probably be a scorching couple.* But in this one, they are admiring friends. I think this kind of relationship happens a lot in high school, but I don’t often see it in books set in high school.

Also, this book is funny, sometimes snortingly, sometimes in a way that makes you sound kind of crazy, because your laughter is echoing through an empty house.

This is my first favorite book of 2016

*Two points for anyone who caught the Cameron Crowe reference.

When you were mine
Rebecca Serle
Here’s the Romeo & Juliet story, but from the point of view of Rosalind. This was one of those books where I could tell who the ultimate hero was the minute he stepped on the page. I found the present-day setting okay, but the distribution of names odd. Rosalind, Rosalind, and Juliet was Juliet. But then Romeo was Rob? Overall, engaging story about wealthy teenagers.

A School for Brides
Patrice Kindl
I totally made fun of this for the tagline, but luckily my friendly librarian steered me toward this title. I read most of it while constantly referring to the list of characters in the front–there are a ton. This was an enjoyable frolic.

The Porcupine of Truth
Bill Konigsberg
Read for Librarian book group.
Let’s get my quibble out of the way from the get-go. Very near the end, there’s a scene in a dog park where a dog is in not the best situation. The dog exists briefly, and to make a larger point in the story, but as the poor creature walked off the page, I found myself worrying about him, probably to the point where I will think of this book as “that one with the poor dog.” I recognize this is not fair, but it was my reaction.

Poor dog aside, I really liked this story of a boy stuck in Billings for the summer with his estranged dying father. It’s a story of friendship and discovery and choices people make and choices that are made for them. It’s got a fabulous secondary character, too. Nicely done, Mr. Konigsberg. That makes two in a row.

Sex is a funny word
Silverberg/Smyth
Read for Librarian Book Group.
Learn about sex in comic book form. I loved the use of four different characters to explain things. I also really liked the careful choice of words. It is explained that some people have breasts, not that women have breasts. A nice intro of many things, without any identity baggage.

Not Funny Ha-Ha
Leah Hayes
A graphic novel about what happens when a woman has an abortion. It covers both surgical and prescription. To tell us the story it follows two different women who have chosen to end their pregnancies. It talks about the procedures, but also discusses the feelings, physical and mental, that might be encountered.

Very well done and fills a niche that has more-or-less gone unfilled. (Though if you know of any similar titles, do tell.)

2016 Mock Printz

It’s time for another Mock Printz!

The Mock Printz, for those who do not recall, is the annual workshop I attend where we read 9-10 young adult books, discuss them and choose the best book written for teens, based entirely on its literary merit. Above are the books we read this year. I read all but the Tightrope Walkers.

Here we are getting our usual history of the Printz award.

One of the fun parts about the workshop is that some groups get to go to the conference rooms upstairs. I love it when I’m in one of those groups. And I was this year! We had the gorgeous view.

My discussion group consisted of two actual teenagers, three librarians and myself. We had many spirited discussions, then voted in our small group.

After our small group discussion, we reassembled and reported out. You can see my group, Violetta, made a lot of the same choices as other groups did.
After the small groups reported out, we had a large group discussion. Cases were made for (and against) books. We voted one last time in our large groups.

And our winner was Steve Sheinkin’s Most Dangerous, followed by a tie for second. Bone Gap and Challenger Deep shared the honors.

The winners were announced two days later at the American Library Association’s Midwinter Conference. How did our voting stack up to the winners of the real 2016 Printz Award?

The 2016 winner:
Bone Gap,
by Laura Ruby
(You might remember that as our large-group, tied-for-second winner.)

2016 Honor Books:
The Ghosts of Heaven,
by Marcus Sedgwick,
and
Out of Darkness,
by Ashley Hope Perez.
(You might remember these books from the Hollywood Mock Printz post.)

Books read in December 2015

This was not a stellar month for reading good books. Which I guess makes recommending easy.

Picture Books: Flop to the Top
Middle Grade: none read this month. What?
Young Adult: Carry On
Young Nonfiction: The Book Itch
Grownup Nonfiction: Big Magic
Fiction: Eh, I guess you could read the Girl on the Train. Other people seem to really like it.

picture books

The Plan
Paul / Lehman
Read for Librarian Book Group
Bad title, I had to look this one up to remember what it was about. But I liked it! I liked how clever one change of letter made a new word that moved the story forward. I really loved the illustrations and how one could “read” the entire story by looking at the pictures.

Flop to the Top
Davis & Weing
Read for Librarian Book Group
I love kids books that make me laugh. And this story of a wanna-be it-girl (of the under-10 set) and her reaction to her dog’s sudden it-dog fame is hilarious.

Lenny and Lucy
Philip C & Erin E Stead
Read for Librarian Book Group
I really liked both story and illustrations of a new boy settling into a new place.

Written and Drawn by Henrietta
Liniers
Read for Librarian Book Group
I loved watching Henrietta’s process of writing and drawing her book. Very nicely done.

Drum Dream Girl
Lopez/Engle
Read for Librarian Book Group
I’m always a fan of girls being able to realize their dreams, despite the sexist restrictions of the societies in which they live. Good illustrations, too.

Big Bear Little Chair
Lizi/Boyo
Read for Librarian Book Group
Perfect for teaching concepts of size.

Salsa
Arqueta/Tonatiuh
Read for Librarian Book Group
Have fun learning how to make salsa in two languages. Enjoy Tonatiuh’s illustrations.

young adult

Kissing Ted Callahan
Amy Spaulding
Honestly? Not even one month later I have no idea what book this is. Let me go and look at the cover on Goodreads…

Ah yes. That book. A solid book with the subject of making not-so-great choices on the way to love. I started to read it because a certain someone alerted me it was about band. However, it was kids in A band, not IN band, a crucial difference.

But the main character was a female drummer, so that was cool. Also, I’m remembering that the main character was female and liked three guys at once and was kind of dating them all. That was interesting, as books featuring relationships usually have a direct path to love prescribed. Sometimes there’s a love triangle, but I don’t usually see female characters having to navigate through a bounty of options. We’re usually stuck in some form of the wallflower-at-the-dance narrative. Hmmm. In reflecting on this book, it just gained another star. Well done, Amy Spaulding.

Famous in Love
Rebecca Serle
This is one of those books where there’s an erudite Me sitting on my shoulder tisk tisking at how much I’m enjoying this book. First off, let me say that the Portland details are WRONG in a way that is annoying. Rebecca Serle, if you want me to beta read your next book, I’ll make sure your Portland details are correct.

However! I loved the concept of a love triangle developing between actors making a movie based on a best-selling teenage romance that has its own love triangle. (*cough*Twilight*cough) Genius! And despite the fact that I thought Ms. Serle should have done a better job making one of her characters be a certain way, and despite my irritation at the Portland details being wrong, I found myself putting off chores to finish reading it. I also recommended it to no less than three people as an excellent fluffy YA. It is for all of those reasons that I’m giving this four stars and not the two my erudite self would have bestowed.

The Rest of Us Just Live Here
Patrick Ness
Three pieces of advice I have read about writing books: You must have a good understanding of what the hell will happen in your plot in the first 500 words. Never have too many characters with the same first initial. For that matter, don’t have too many characters.

I had no idea what was going on in this book for the first three chapters. I had to keep looking back to piece things together. There were three siblings that all had the same first letter, plus there were nicknames that further muddied the waters. There was a friend group of four people, plus a younger sister and another guy. It wasn’t until page 34 (thirty four!) that I even realized the narrator was male, not female.

But guess what? I really liked this book. It was quirky in all the best ways, there was that parallel story told in the chapter headings, there were interesting friendship and relationship things and it was amusing.

If you can persist until you get it (or are possibly quicker to pick up on things than I am) this is an enjoyable read.

Calvin
Martine Leavitt
Read for Librarian Book Group
Hey! How about a second book about schizophrenia in one month!?! I found this to be much more accessible than Challenger Deep and thus much more successful. I admired that Leavitt could have so many action points in a story that mostly is just walking across a frozen lake. Overall, though I found myself impatient and irritated with the premise.

Carry On
Rainbow Rowell
Despite loving all of Rainbow Rowell’s previous books, I wasn’t looking forward to this one. It’s the story of Simon Snow, who was the Harry Potter-like wizard in Rowell’s book Fangirl, about which her main character, Cath wrote fanfiction. See? Already, in explaining who Simon Snow is, I have an awkwardly constructed sentence. Anyway, my main critique of Fangirl was that the Simon Snow parts were kind of boring and I skimmed through them. So why would I want to read a whole book about Simon Snow?

I forgot about Rowell’s magic touch. This book was awesome. In that way that means I stand in awe of it. It’s like reading the seventh book in a series, but not actually having to read the other six books! That’s kind of amazing. And Rowell is, as usual, firmly in control of her characters. Plus, there’s the fact that Rowell can write a love story. There was a whole plot about all this wizard stuff and it was good too. So overall, very well done.

Challenger Deep
Neil Shusterman
Read for Librarian Book Group
Ugh! The cynical part of me wonders if Mr. Shusterman didn’t get the National Book Award simply for the author’s note at the end.

I did not cotton to this book. I felt the disjointed nature (which yes, I understand the point) was difficult to wade through. I sent it back to the library twice before finishing it. And yes, it gets easier and more understandable as it goes along, but how many people are going to make it past the first 100 pages to get to the part that is easier to read, but still unsatisfying?

Also, I disliked the illustrations intensely, which is a statement equal to my opening one in it’s curmudgeonly cynicism. However, I felt the illustrations added nothing to the text and were actually quite distracting.

Young nonficiton

The Book Itch
Nelson/Christie
Read for Librarian Book Group
Stories like these are why I love studying history.* Short nonfiction story of an important bookstore. Great details, and the illustrations fit so well with the text.

*Or, in my case, dipping my nose into history now and then.

Big Magic
Elizabeth Gilbert
Gilbert is pretty rad, in a way that if she were a man she would be commanding, I don’t know, some large portion of the zeitgeist. However, she is a woman, and she writes about shit that women can relate to and because of that, a lot of people don’t like her so much, even though she’s a stellar writer, can tell a great story and is hilarious.

However, a lot of women DO like her and we buy her stuff and enjoy it. I’m one of those people. This is an easy-to-digest book about the importance of finding some creative outlet in your life. I found it great to read in small bits, which makes it perfect for that room where you do your reading that also has a sink and a shower. You don’t have to agree with everything Gilbert says, you don’t have to go for all the woo-woo stuff. But I bet you will find good stuff in here, regardless.

Thanks to Kelly for making sure I had my own copy of this book.

On Writing
Stephen King
You might have heard of this guy Stephen King? He’s written a book about how to write books. Apparently he thinks he’s qualified to write about this topic?

I will retain fond memories of this book, because of the book’s opening:

“I was stunned by Mary Karr’s memoir, The Liars’ Club. Not just by its ferocity, its beauty, and by her delightful grasp of the vernacular, but by it’s totality–she is a woman who remembers everything about her early years….

“Mary Karr presents her childhood in an almost unbroken panorama. Mine is a fogged-out landscape from which occasional memories appear like isolated trees…the kind that look as if they might grab and eat you.”

When I read this out loud to Matt he laughed and said, “Sweetheart, that’s like you and me!” And indeed, I am the person who remembers everything in 70mm UltraPanavision and Matt is the person whose recollections of the past are fuzzy, sparse, and almost always end in a shudder.

This isn’t a conventional book of writing advice. You get a section of the sixteen or so clear memories King has from growing up, which are not super relevant, but really interesting. Then there’s a rambly part about how he came to writing and how he writes things. It includes some good advice (First draft: door shut. Second draft: door open.) and some chatty observations.

There’s also a section where he writes about getting hit by the van that nearly killed him. This is also not super relevant, but really engrossing and interesting and also funny. After that comes some lists (I think I was reading the third edition) of books he really liked.

Overall, this was really enjoyable, and didn’t leave me with that feeling that writing advice books sometimes leave me with: that I’m doing Every Single Thing Wrong.

The Girl on the Train
Paula Hawkins
This was great at the beginning and I was impressed with the way Hawkins set out clues to pick up on our breadcrumb path to the finish. I also stood in awe of the vast quantities of alcohol the girl on the train consumed. I was less impressed with the ending, finding it convenient that both male characters were the same type of people.

Hollywood Mock Printz

I get to go to not one, but TWO Mock-Printz discussion groups this year. The Printz is the award given for exceptional YA literature. It’s like the Newberry or the Caldacot Medal.

Here is the summary and results:
https://multcolib.org/blog/20151226/hollywood-librarys-teen-2016-mock-printz

Books read in November 2015

Wow, it was a good month for reading.

Picture books: Leo, a Ghost Story
Middle readers: both I have listed below, but if you are going to go for one, go for The Nest.
Young Adult: Again, a really good selection. Either Dumplin, or All American Boys
Young Nonfiction: Again all are good. I’ll go with My Seneca Village
Smart Smut: Real World
Grownup Nonfiction: Between the World and Me (and not just because it’s the only one)
Grownup Fiction: Where’d You Go, Bernadette

Leo A Ghost Story
Barnett Robinson
Read for Librarian Book Group
I’m a sucker for these illustrations.

The Marvels
Brian Selznick
Read for Librarian Book Group
Beautifully illustrated and cleverly written.

The Nest
Kenneth Oppel
Read for Librarian Book Group
Super creepy in that delightful way. Is our main character a little crazy, or are angels talking to him? And what’s up with those wasps? This was a thrilling middle reader.

X: A Novel
Ilyasah Shabazz & Kelka Magoon (sp)
Read for Mock Printz
An earlier attempt to read the Autobiography of Malcolm X crashed and burned due to dry prose, so I was leery of this novel. But I need not have worried. This story of Malcom Little’s teenage years was engrossing and full of period detail. It was fascinating to watch the growth and changes from his mid-teens to his early twenties. I happened to be reading Ta-Nehisi Coates Between the World and Me at the same time and the two books were good companions to each other.

Dumplin’
Julie Murphy
Read for Librarian Book Group
Dumplin’ is a pleasure from start to finish, encompassing so many things about body identity and being overweight as a teenager. I loved this book.

Tonight the Streets are Ours
Leila Sales
I love Sales continued exploration of female friendships. This book also explores finding the truth behind the face that people are presenting to the pubic.

All American Boys
Reynolds/Kiely
Read for Librarian Book Group
Ah, so relevant, which is depressing given that you can’t really write and publish a book overnight. Told by two authors, from two points of view. We meet Rashad, a black artist and ROTC student, who due to random unfortunate circumstances that mostly have to do with him being Black, is severely beaten by a white police officer. The police officer is a big-brother figure to Quinn, a white kid from the neighborhood who witnesses the beating.

From there we travel with our main characters through a variety of feelings about race and loyalty and fair/unfairness. It’s a brutal book, a hopeful book, and an uncomfortable book. It’s a book I think you should read.

(The authors were featured on NPR in January 2016. You can find the link here.)

Funny Bones
Duncan Tonatiuh
Read for Librarian Book Group
I recognized the iconography, and it was fun to find out it was the work of one man. Excellent font usage and very good illustrations.

Voice of Freedom: Fannie Lou Hamer
CB Weatherford
Read for Librarian Book Group
Picture book story of Hamer, who I had not heard of. Brings up difficult important parts of her story with truth and in a way that young readers can understand. The illustrations complimented the text.

How to Swallow a Pig
Jenkins/Page
Read for Librarian Book Group
I’m the kind of person who loves to learn how to do things. Even things I’m never going to do. This book hit a sweet spot that few books can. I know now how to swallow a pig and so much more.

Rhythm Ride
Andrea Davis Pinkney
Read for Librarian Book Group
Sit back and go for a journey of Motown’s story with a velvet-voiced DJ. I loved the level of detail and there were so many small facts I delighted in. They layout was good, with ample pictures. The voice of the DJ totally worked for me. Certain things in Motown’s history were glossed-glossed-glossed over, but as this is more of an appreciation of Motown than a down-and-dirty history, I rolled with it.

I read this with my phone handy, so I could listen to the songs I wasn’t familiar with. I found them all on YouTube, most without commercials.

My Seneca Village
Marilyn Nelson
Read for Librarian Book Group
I loved both the concept and the execution of this book of short poems inspired by Nelson’s research about Seneca Village, which now is known as Central Park in New York City, but prior to the 1850s was a diverse community of free blacks, Irish immigrants and others.

Nelson’s poems are easily accessible for tweens and above. I would suggest reading the book in one sitting (completely doable) so as to best follow the through-line of the stories.

You can read more about Seneca Village here: http://www.npr.org/sections/theprotojournalist/2014/05/06/309727058/the-lost-village-in-new-york-city

Real World
Amy Jo Cousins
Cousins has stated that Tom and Reese are her two favorite characters and she wrote this book to give them their happily ever after. I’m also a fan of Tom and Reese and was happy to read their happily ever after. But I think Cousins’s love of Tom and Reese got in the way of dramatic tension in the book. It’s a pleasant ride, especially if you aren’t looking for any drama.

Between the World and Me
Ta-nehisi Coates
The entire time I was reading this book I wondered what I would write about it. A friend’s review “Read this book!” is spot-on. Coates got me to see the world differently.

Where’d You Go Bernadette?
Maria Semple
I always check out what’s available in the (many) Little Free Libraries I pass in my travels, but I rarely bring anything home. This was the exception as I’d heard good things and didn’t have a ton to read.

It was so good! Not in that National Book Award way, but in that way where you take comfort from the first page because you know the author is in control of the story and you know it’s going to be fun wherever she takes you.

Also, I love to hate Seattle,* so Bernadette and I got along great.

*Sorry Seattle. You just aren’t as cool as you think you are.

Books Read in October 2015

If you are only going to read one of my recommended books, go for Steve Sheinkin’s Most Dangerous as it is everything that good nonfiction should be. If you are going to read two of my recommended books, add Hired Girl to your list. I loved it!

Picture books: Red. A Crayon’s Story
Middle Grade: Orbiting Jupiter (and not just because it was the only middle grade I read).
Young Adult: The Hired Girl
Young Nonfiction: Most Dangerous

That’s (Not) Mine
Anna King
Read for Librarian Book Group
A fight over a chair in picture book form. Had I not spent my childhood in multiple iterations of this struggle, I probably would have enjoyed this more.

Red. A Crayon’s Story
Michael Hall
Read for Librarian Book Group
Enjoyable. It was fun to go back and see if the different colored crayons had different personalities.
This month I also read X: A Novel and the main character was called Red. Crossover appeal? 🙂

Fright Club
Ethan Long
Read for Librarian Book Group
Who are the really frightening monsters? I work in a school, I already know the answer.

Orbiting Jupiter
Gary D. Schmidt
Read for Librarian Book Group
This book was written with the clarity of a cold New England morning. I could feel the landscape around me and the unfairness ricocheted through me. Short, poignant story of a boy with a second chance. I adored nine-tenths of this book. I begrudgingly accept the author’s choice for the last tenth.

Infinite Inbetween
Carolyn Mackler
Read for Librarian Book Group
It’s kind of a massive undertaking to follow five characters through four years of high school. Hats off to Ms. Mackler for trying and for creating five such different characters. However, the result for me was a story a mile wide and an inch deep. I wanted to really dig into some part of this narrative, and everything felt very surface.

I Crawl Through It
A.S. King
Read for Librarian Book Group
I’m the last in line for surrealist anything, so this book was not made for me. I was not patient while I worked my way through it. I wanted things to be clearer (as in not-surrealist). For people who are into surrealism, this is a well-written book.

The Walls Around Us
Nova Ren Suma
Read for Mock Printz
What do a Julliard-bound ballet dancer and a convicted teenage murderer have in common? This book starts big, with a strange happenstance at a maximum security prison for adolescent girls. Then it keeps building. There were confusing moments of “what the heck?” followed by sudden understanding. I was gleefully delighted by the time the end came around.

Honor Girl
Maggie Thrash
Read for Librarian Book Group
The usual caveats about graphic novels not being my thing apply. The story itself was good, but I found I had trouble identifying characters based on how they were drawn. I feel like I read a ton of YA books set at summer camp when I was a YA, so it was fun to return to the (East Coast*) summer camp setting.

*Us kids in the west only went to summer camp for a week at a time, if we went at all.

The Hired Girl
Laura Amy Schultz
Read for Librarian Book Group
O! But I loved this book! I loved it the way I loved The Little Princess, for the tragic plot and plucky heroine. I loved the diary format the way I loved that YA book written in diary format with the boy who got lockjaw and died. I loved the many obstacles the hired girl managed to get through. I loved that I couldn’t stop reading it. This is my kind of book. Also, reading it, I felt like I should be putting a lot more effort into cleaning my house.

Most Dangerous
Steve Sheinkin
Read for Librarian Book Group
I was a history major in college, primarily because I love the stories. As an adult, I don’t read nonfiction books about history mostly because they are 1)too long and 2)incredibly dry. Enter Steve Sheinkin and the YA nonfiction history book. Man, this guy can make history come alive and manages to do so in less than 400 pages.

Ursula K LeGuin at Powell’s

Guess how many people came to see the grand dame of the Portland literary scene? Did you guess one million? You weren’t far off. Powell’s had to close the room. I was very thankful that my friend Carrie wandered upstairs early and grabbed the last two seats.

This guy is filming a documentary about Ms. LeGuin.

And here is Ursula K. LeGuin herself. She spoke briefly about her revised book Steering the Craft, then opened for questions. She also clued us into her experiment in teaching, Navigating the Ocean of Story.

The fifth summer of my summer reading

Superhero-themed shirts this year. In blue! As usual, I enjoyed handing out the prizes to the kids who read this summer. It was also a very nice two hours of reading in the library.