bookshelves of doom

Tillmon County Fire -- Pamela Ehrenberg

From the prologue:

I can look at this page, this news about the trial and all the background noise around it, and I can say that this is my life, and also the life of a lot of other young and old and church-going and non-church-going and hard-working and not-so-hard-working people who live in Tillmon County and places just like it.  It's my life, but it's their life too.  We're in this together, however we might feel about each other at any particular moment.  And remembering that makes me think, at least for a little while, that maybe I've found the point.

Tillmon County Fire is a collection of connected stories that describe, one after the other and in many voices, the lead up to and the aftermath of a fire in the community. 

The narrators of each story -- a young man who finds God at summer camp; a 17-year-old who doesn't think much of his non-interest in his girlfriend until he sets eyes on the new guy from New York; the girlfriend, who has troubles and dreams she's never shared with her distracted boyfriend; the new guy from New York; a trumpet player; his autistic twin brother; a pregnant girl who works in the hardware store, among others -- speak in clear, distinct voices (and different fonts) that, while separate and individual, form a chorus, even though they don't realize it themselves.

I loved the format, and I felt that the different fonts worked -- in some cases, it would have felt gimmicky, but not here.  The writing was too strong for that.  I always enjoy seeing the same setting and the same event from different perspectives, and Tillmon County Fire not only achieved that, but made it feel real. 

I did think that the Postscript detracted from the book.  It felt tacked-on and unnecessary.  I didn't feel that I needed the story of Aiden's early life, as his story and his actions during the trial made it very clear that, like everyone else, he's a complicated person:  not evil, not perfect.  The Postscript made it feel too easy, too pat -- that suddenly every bad decision he made could be somehow traced back to that event.  I felt like it lessened him somehow.

Overall, though, I enjoyed it very much -- I'll be looking for more from Pamela Ehrenberg, and I hope specifically that there's more short fiction in her writing future.

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Book source:  Cybils nominee; review copy from the publisher.

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Crossposted at Guys Lit Wire.

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I'm part of the Amazon Affiliate program.  Which I'd assume would be apparent by the ad in the sidebar, but assuming that you're bright enough to understand that is not enough for the FTC.  So, I will spell it out:  if you click through to Amazon and buy something, I get money.  Why, you ask?  Well, gosh.  How else will I ever buy an Oompa-Loompa?

Catching up: The Season, by Sarah MacLean

While my TBR piles are still towering over me, the To Be Written About piles are starting to give 'em a run for their money.  So I'm going to do some short responses -- I need to return a pile of them to the library before my co-worker calls me a deadbeat again.

The Season, by Sarah MacLean

This one and I didn't get along.  I was so very excited about it, because:  Regency era!  Romance!  Murder!  Mystery!

But...

I found that the only aspect of the book that suggested that it wasn't set in the modern day to me (other than the descriptions of the clothes and the settings) was that the characters spoke slightly formally.  The main character slouched on a couch (while wearing the dress for her debut), she rolled her eyes at her mother, the banter she exchanged with the menfolk was more akin to stuff I hear from the kids in the library than anything I'd imagine actually coming out of the mouth of a Regency Miss, and while I've read and enjoyed many-a-book starring a Young Lady Who Can Think Of One Million Things She'd Rather Do Than Get Married and read and enjoyed many-a-book starring a Young Lady Who Is More Modern Minded Than Her Times, I just couldn't believe in Lady Alexandra Stafford.  Let alone like her.  And the other characters felt like props.

It is extremely possible that I didn't give this one enough of a chance.  I didn't finish it, because my annoyance level was so very high.  But I am aware that many others loved it, so maybe my inherent crank is causing trouble again.

Huh.  At this rate, I'll be through my pile in no time.

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Book source:  ILLed from my local library.

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I'm part of the Amazon Affiliate program.  Which I'd assume would be apparent by the ad in the sidebar, but assuming that you're bright enough to understand that is not enough for the FTC.  So, I will spell it out:  if you click through to Amazon and buy something, I get money.  Why, you ask? Well, gosh.  How else will I ever fill my swimming pool with gold doubloons?

I called it!

Two years ago, when I read Adam Selzer's How to Get Suspended and Influence People, I said that I wouldn't be surprised to see it get challenged.

Thank you, lady in Idaho, for making me right.

NBA finalists.

As I was on blog-world hiatus when the National Book Award finalists were announced, I wasn't sure if I was alone in thinking that the inclusion of David Small's Stitches on the Young People's list was surprising and a little bit annoying*.

So it was nice to see this blog post at NPR.

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*Not because there's anything remotely wrong with Stitches, of course.  But as it is on the YPL list, that means that a book that was actually published for Young People was cut to make room for it.  Which doesn't seem right.

Gentlemen -- Michael Northrop

Until I saw this book cover up close, I thought the kid was wearing a hoodie.

But... nope.  It's a body bag.  Yowza.  Big points to the designer.  [Later:  Just found this post about the process behind creating the cover.  They definitely made the right call in changing it.]

Since I loved his voice so very much, I'll let Micheal introduce himself (this is from page two):

I started out in 9A, in case you're wondering, one down from honors.  I'd done OK on the test they made us all take back at the end of eighth grade.  Better than OK, but the classes didn't work out.  They said I wasn't "applying myself," and that's fair enough.  Then I threw Oscar Tully a serious beating for saying something he shouldn't've, and that was that, down to general in the middle of the third marking period.  I had no idea what was going on in G, and I didn't really feel like trying to figure it out.  Sophomore year started and I found myself in 10R.

Fine with me, that's where someone like me belongs--someone of my "pedigree," if you read me.  This should clue you in:  My first name is spelled wrong.  It's Micheal instead of Michael.  Mom or Dad, one of them dropped the ball on that one, probably Dad, in the hospital or wherever it is you fill out that paperwork.  Not that it matters; everyone calls me Mike.  Still, it's a bad way to start things out.

Micheal, Mixer, Tommy and Bones have been friends for a long time.  They know each other well.  So, when Tommy doesn't show up in his afternoon classes after throwing a desk in math, the others don't think much of it.  After all, it's likely that he's been suspended.

But then he doesn't show up the next day.  And he doesn't answer his phone.  And his mother doesn't know where he is.

That's when the three remaining boys start to think about what went on in English class that day.  And about what may have really happened to Tommy.

Short version:  Gentlemen gets a Hulk-sized double thumbs-up from me.  I'm totally in love with it and you really should run to your local library and snag it immediately.

Longer-but-still short version:  What, you don't believe me?  See above.  Yeesh.  Really.  Micheal is very bright, very perceptive and always believable.  His voice is fresh and distinct, clever in a way that feels new, gritty and hard-boiled in a way that feels true to his age, and darkly funny in a way that never comes off as flip or downplays the situation.  He spun the story out in a way that kept me guessing until he himself realized what had happened and what was going to happen, and I'm just totally in love.  Even after finishing the book, I find that I'm thinking of him as a real person.

It's an outstanding, excellent book, and I very much hope that Michael Northrup will have more to come for the YA audience.

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Book source:  ILLed from my local library.

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I read this book for the 2009 Cybils.  (It had been on my TBR list for a zillion years as well -- the nomination just got my rear in gear.)

Angry Management -- Chris Crutcher

I hate the cover art on this one.  I've been sitting here, looking at it, trying to come up with a less harsh way of saying that, but... no.  There isn't a less harsh way of saying it.  I.  Hate.  The.  Cover.  It looks to me like someone slapped it together in seven minutes, and I don't understand if the kid on the front is angry or dancing.  Or doing an angry dance. 

Not that an angry dance is a bad thing.

Anyway.  Don't judge a book, etc., etc.

Angry Management is a trio of novellas about characters from Chris Crutcher's previous books.  Some you'll remember (Sarah Byrnes), and some you very likely won't (Matt Miller, who literally got one line in Deadline). 

The stories are tied together loosely -- all of the characters are in Mr. Nak's (from Ironman) Anger Management group.  Each story begins with Mr. Nak's first impressions of the students:  Sarah Byrnes and Angus Bethune; Montana West and Trey Chase; Matt Miller and Marcus James.

I love Chris Crutcher.  I love Chris Crutcher's books.

I did not love Angry Management.

And I was surprised and disappointed at just how much I did not love Angry Management.

I felt, in the first story, that Angus and Sarah were defined by their pasts.  While I understand that to a great extent, Who You Are is something that is Formed By Your Past, I felt that I never got a sense of either of them OTHER THAN what was in their past.  A good amount of their dialogue felt stilted and unreal -- something very unusual in a Crutcher book -- and the getting-to-know-you portion of their conversation felt like a big infodump.  Because of all that, they both -- Sarah especially -- felt two-dimensional.  The story as a whole felt hurried and like a shallow treatment of characters who deserved better.

The second story felt like a retread of material in other books.  When I wrote about Deadline, I said that readers would recognize themes and character types, but that it felt right and comfortable and like a revisit.  And I said that while the author had previously written about those themes, he still found new ways of looking at them and new aspects to explore.  There is a difference between a retread and a revisit.  Chris Crutcher has told this story before, and he's told it better.  Again, the characters felt two-dimensional and the dialogue didn't feel real.  The antagonist wasn't just two-dimensional, he was one-dimensional.  And it felt preachy.  Which is a hard thing for me to take, even when I agree with what is being preached.

In the third story, pretty much everything I've already said applies, except, in addition, I never saw Marcus James as a person.  I saw him as a symbol.  And that didn't sit right with me.  Even more than in the previous story, I felt that this one came off as extremely preachy:  by the end of the story, I felt that none of the narrators were speaking in their own voices -- they were speaking in Chris Crutcher's.

I very much appreciate the idea that, as in real life, the stories and the realities of these characters haven't ended.  I just didn't feel that these stories did the characters, the author -- or that idea -- justice.

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Book source:  My local library.

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I read this book for the 2009 Cybils.  (Though, of course, I would have gotten to it eventually anyway.)

How much food do you have stockpiled?

Because today is the day that NASA will bomb the moon!  You can follow their progress at the NASA website.

Hell.  We have practically no canned goods.

At least we have a lot of firewood.

If you've read the Pfeffer books, you understand my fears.  GAH!!

If you haven't read Life As We Knew It or The Dead & The Gone, you probably think I've gone bananas.  (You should read them.  Then you can go bananas with the rest of us.)

[Sidenote:  I like typing the word 'bananas'.]

Lookalikes.

Flipping through the new S&S catalog, I spotted this cover:

Which reminded me of this cover:

So I Googled around and found that even with the change, my brain was right in making the connection.

More vulgarity discovered at the Leesburg Public Library.

The two mothers who so disliked The Bermudez Triangle and the Gossip Girl series have found many, many more books to be concerned about.

Due to the uproar over titles like John Green's Looking for Alaska and Louise Rennison's Startled by His Furry Shorts, Garret Freymann-Weyr's My Heartbeat and Sonya Sones' One of Those Hideous Books Where the Mother Dies, the city commissioners of Leesburg voted 4-1 to (if I'm understanding the article correctly) split the young adult collection into a "high school"  young adult collection and an-unnamed-but-again-I-assume "younger" young adult collection.

John Green = Not Pleased.

I think it's odd that this is all going on during Banned Books Week and yet the story doesn't seem to have made it into the more mainstream news -- especially when it seems that there are some who are calling for the books in question to not just be moved, but pulled from the library altogether:

But Art Ayris, executive pastor at First Baptist Church of Leesburg, and Fechtel contend that moving all the high-school books is overkill and doesn't address the problem.

"If they move all the books, the indecent ones are still in with the decent ones and that's not accomplishing anything," Fechtel said.

So MOVING the books in question is overkill, but REMOVING the books in question is not?  I guess not, because the books that would be removed are indecent, at least according to the standards of the people raising the challenge.  So obviously everyone else in town must have those same standards.

I think that's what is being suggested here. 

[A few minutes later: 

But then this article makes it all even more complicated:  It sounds like the group isn't asking for the books to be removed altogether, but for them to be marked with a "Mature Audiences" sticker.  While the library seems comfortable enough with the Two YA Sections Compromise, they are not comfortable with a "MA" section:  because a split by age range wouldn't pass judgment on the content, while a "MA" section would. 

Conversely, the group of challengers wants a "MA" section for exactly that reason (I think), so that everything they deem to be vulgar would be found in one place*, and they also want to create a committee which would, going forward, decide what books would be relegated to the "MA" section.  WHEW.  I think I have it straight now.]

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*Which, one assumes (judging by my father's stories about using his childhood church's LIST OF MOVIES GOOD CATHOLICS MUST NEVER, EVER WATCH as a list of recommended viewing), would quickly become THE MOST POPULAR SECTION EVER.

More amazing Twilight merchandise.

I give you:

 

handpainted sneakers at Etsy!

(I've got to hand it to the artist -- she goes all out on these, decorating the boxes and including sparkly shoelaces and everything.  Holy cow.)

(via Beth)

The Exquisite Corpse Adventure.

Working for the Library of Congress/Center of the Book has got to be the most geektastically mindblowingly awesome job there is: 

They have just introduced the Exquisite Corpse Adventure*, in which Jon Scieszka will write an installment and then pass it on to Katherine Paterson, who will write another  installment, and then it will be passed on to (among many others and no, I don't know the actual order other than the first two) M.T. Anderson and Shannon Hale and Daniel Handler and SUSAN FREAKING COOPER (plus there'll be a new illustration each time) and on and on every two weeks, and will finally finish a year from now.

Also, being the brainiacs that they are, they've set it up with an RSS feed, so we don't even have to remember to check the LOC website every two weeks.

HOW RAD IS THAT?

(via Tor)

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*An ECA is that game where one person begins a story and then gives it to the next person, who writes more and then folds the paper over so that the third person can only see what the second person wrote and so on...  You know what I mean.

Couple of movie deals.

Stephenie Meyer's The Host (still haven't read it) and Melissa Marr's Wicked Lovely (ADORE).

Film world lingo is as impossible to understand as cricket vocabulary.  What is a "U-based shingle"? 

And no fair looking it up.

Liar -- Justine Larbalestier

Well then.  This one isn't going to be easy to write about.

Because it's rather hard to say anything at all without giving something important away.

As the title indicates, Micah is a Liar.  Now, after the violent death of her boyfriend, she's determined to tell you, the reader, the truth.  No matter how many times she has to back up and start again.

Here's the not-even-vague-spoilers deal:  The hype is accurate.  Liar is a fantastic book.  Quite often, the more something is lauded, the less I end up liking it, because my expectations end up getting heightened, heightened, heightened to nearly impossible-to-achieve levels.  This was one of those rare cases in which, for me, the praise has all been completely justified.  I loved it.  I thought it was outstanding, outstanding, outstanding.  The writing, the plotting, the characterization, the pacing, the format, the newness of it.  Lately I've been feeling a little bit burnt on the YA, but this one has rejuvenated me.  No exaggerations.

So.  If you tend to like the same books as I do, skip the rest of this post, put it on hold at your library or local bookstore or wherever, and make the time to read it when it's officially released next Tuesday.  And then come back here and read the rest of the post and tell me what you think in the comments.  If you want or need to read more, or if you aren't worried about even vague spoilers, feel free to keep reading.

I loved Liar.  That is not to say that everyone will love Liar.  As I said, though, what I say next may verge on spoilery, however nebulous, so PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE SKIP THE REST OF THIS POST (INCLUDING THE COMMENTS, BECAUSE I SUSPECT THERE WILL BE CONVERSATION) IF YOU DON'T WANT SPOILERS.  I don't want to ruin anything for anyone.

Note that these issues are in no way mine -- I just think that others may have them. 

Possible Issue #1:  I think that some people will not like the huge twist.  The cover flap and the cover art don't hint at it, not even remotely.  And sometimes that sort of thing upsets people.  I mean, of course, neither is going to give it away totally -- but this is such a serious total blindside of a twist that there's no way that everyone will be happy with it. 

That said, it isn't that Micah doesn't prepare the reader for it in her own way.  While I didn't literally think, "Oh, I know what's going on here", there were moments before the Big Reveal in which Micah revealed what seemed likemore than she meant to.  And I had a vague notion.  Not anything specific, but a vibe.  What I'm saying is that if it's a blindside of a twist, it's because of the perceptions of the reader, not because of any cheating on the author's part.  There are the mysteries in which the author gives you all of the clues you need, and there are the mysteries in which the author makes it impossible by holding everything vital back -- Justine Larbalestier and Micah give you the clues you need to put it together before Part Two begins.  It'll be an excellent re-read, the same way that The Sixth Sensewas an excellent re-watch.  (And, NO, I'm not saying that Micah sees dead people.  Yeesh.)

Possible Issue #2:  The ending.  With a title like Liarand a narrator like Micah, there's no way I would expect any sort of wrapped-up-with-a-bow, 'kay-guys-this-is-the-truth-for-reals-FOR-REALS sort of ending.  But I think that many readers would like that and will want that and who mayhold that against the book.  But, guess what?  It's Justine Larbalestier's book, and it's Micah's story, and that's just the way it is.  For me, the ending worked, and worked well.  I thought it was in keeping with the rest of the book, and that it felt right.

AGAIN:  IF YOU DON'T WANT SPOILERS, DON'T READ THE COMMENTS.

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Previously:

Magic or Madness
How to Ditch Your Fairy
First Kiss (Then Tell)

On the cover:

JL on the Liar cover.
Bloomsbury has announced new cover for Liar.

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Book source:  Review copy from the publisher.

This will not be a popular opinion.

The only thing?

That could make?

A Sweet Valley High movie more annoying?

Making Diablo Cody the boss of it.

...

...

Yes, I was one of the four people on the planet who didn't like Juno.

(news via @ecwpress)

Cover Yecch.

So I was just leafing through the new Bloomsbury catalog, and I noticed that they changed the Ten Cents a Dance cover from this:

to this:

Now, I was never all that attached to the first cover.  BUT.  At least it evoked the era.  And I felt that the model's profile suggested Ruby's strength of will.

The new one is so generic.  And modern looking.  And it makes it look way more romance-y than the book is, and the palette is so beige.

I vote FAIL.  (But the book is a total WIN.)

You?

In the Garden of Iden: The Company, #1 -- Kage Baker

I'm hugely irritated that I can't remember who recommended this to me or where it caught my eye.  Because Big Thanks are in order.

In the Garden of Iden begins:

I am a botanist.  I will write down the story of my life as an exercise, to provide the illusion of conversation in this place where I am now alone.  It will be a long story, because it was a long road that brought me here, and it led through blazing Spain and green, green England and ever so many centuries of Time.  But you'll understand it best if I begin by telling you what I learned in school.

For me, that was that.  For the next 300 pages, I belonged to Mendoza.  Because, with that first paragraph, I believed in her and she made me want to know everything, everything, everything.

Fast forward to the distant-ish future: 

Dr. Zeus, Inc. semi-successfully figures out immortality.  There are enough drawbacks -- a major one being that it only really works well on children, rather than on "middle-aged millionaires" -- that it isn't a marketable process, but still.

Dr. Zeus, Inc. also figures out time travel.  It isn't particularly marketable, either, because it is only possible to travel to your own past and back again.  And because history cannot be changed.

BUT.  That bit -- the bit about history?  It only applies to recorded history.

Which opens up some serious windows of opportunity.

And now back to 1541-ish, where Mendoza's story begins:

As a nameless, friendless child, she is rescued from the dungeons of the Spanish Inquisition by an agent of The Company.  She is swept away to a secret location in Australia, where she is taught and trained and physically altered:

It wasn't all that different from any particularly demanding boarding school, except that of course nobody ever went home for the holidays and we had a lot of brain surgery. (45)

For the rest of her life -- which will be forever, as she's now immortal -- she will work behind the scenes of history, collecting and preserving plant life for use in the future.

This book is the story of her first mission and of her first love.

Sorry about the ridiculously long description.  I guess I could have just said that it's a SF novel that reads in some ways like historical fiction and in other ways like a coming-of-age story:

"Characterization is very important in the field.  I don't think you've exactly got a handle on that, yet."

"I have too," I said hotly.  "I think I'm portraying a late medieval Spanish adolescent very well."

"No.  You are a late medieval Spanish adolescent.  It's not a role for you, not yet." (145)

And instead of blathering on, I could just have said that it brought Jasper Fforde's Thursday Nextbooks to mind -- not at all in tone or style, mind you -- because it deals with a group of people who work behind the scenes of our world, manipulating things while the majority of us just swan on through our lives, unaware.  I could have just said that it's one of those books in which I loved the ideas and the worldbuilding just as much as the narrative voice and the characters -- and I loved Mendoza's voice and the other characters very much indeed.  (Actually, I did just say all that.)  But I went on and on about the set-up because I just think it's so dang cool. 

So, yes.  Love love love.  Full of heart and full of brains and full of spunk and full of emotion.  (Though I did think that the last fifth-or-so felt really rushed and it very suddenly got way heavy, which made me suspect that some of the Heavy Stuff was a Way of Setting Up Our Heroine's Tragic Past and to give her A Reason to Question Her Situation in Future Installments, but I could be wrong.)  Do not, do not, do not let the atrocious cover (that comes nowhere near suggesting the storyline, let alone the tone of the book) scare you off.

Every time I hear about the rediscovery of a species previously thought long-extinct, I will think of The Company.  And I will wonder.

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Book souce:  ILLed from another library.  Because my library has NO books by Kage Baker.  NONE.  Needless to say, I've put in a request in for the second one.

A bit more on the Ellen Hopkins challenge.

According to this article, the parent "requested an official review" of Glass.  Which I assume means that the book has been officially challenged.

So the superintendent felt that as the book was under review, it wasn't appropriate for the visit to continue.  As per district policy, the books will remain in the school library until a decision is made.

I rather think he should have treated her visit the same way -- until a decision is made, the book stays on the shelves, so it follows (in my mind) that her visit should have continued as planned as well, and according to him, the district policy states that parents can exclude their children from events, so it isn't like there wasn't already an out for the parents who are uncomfortable with the book -- but it's always easy to be a backseat driver in situations like this.

Anyway, I'm glad that Karin Perry (the librarian) was able to schedule an off-campus event -- regardless of what happens at the school, Ellen Hopkins will speak at the Hillsboro Free Baptist College at 7:30 tonight.

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Previously:

Just in time for Banned Books Week...

Just in time for Banned Books Week...

...Ellen Hopkins' planned visit to an OK middle school has been canceled due to a complaint from one parent.

Oh, and also?  Her books were pulled from the school library.

From her LiveJournal:

Because the school superintendent not only pulled the books for review, he CANCELED my author visit. Wouldn't even allow me to move to the high school. Seriously? What did that parent and he expect me to do? Go in with a live demonstration? Use the f-word? Talk about sex? I mean, you've got to be kidding. I've done hundreds of school visits. Pretty positive I've never corrupted a student. In fact, my talks inspire them. Arm them. Inform them.

(via LISNews)

A celebration of International YA Bloggers...

...at Persnickety Snark.

I hope my Google reader can handle more feeds.

Booktrust Teenage prize shortlist.

And the titles are:

Auslander by Paul Dowswell
The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
Ostrich Boys by Keith Gray
The Ant Colony by Jenny Valentine
The Vanishing of Katharina Linden by Helen Grant
The Ask and the Answer by Patrick Ness

Sigh.  I am so behind this year.  I've read one of the titles.  One.

And it's the one that everyone else has read.

After reading the descriptions at Booktrust, I kind of want to read all of them.  Especially... oh.  I just realized that I especially want to read all of them.  Minus the Ness, but that's only because I still need to read the first one.  And minus the Gaiman, because I've already read it.  But all of the others. 

I'm seeing an Amazon UK order in my near future.

Meridian -- Amber Kizer

Meridian Sozu has always been unhealthy.  Her color is bad, she's lived most of her life in pain, and she's much too small for her age.

And there are the dead things.  They started small -- dead flies collected in her crib, a toad died next to her bed -- but as Meridian aged, the animals got bigger and their numbers grew.  Her backyard is a cemetery.

The situation has not gone unnoticed by her peers, and so Meridian Sozu is an outcast.  They call her "Reaper, Grave Digger, Witch".

Just after her sixteenth birthday she learned the truth.  She is a Fenestra: a half-angel, half-human being whose purpose is to transition souls to the afterlife.  Now that she is sixteen, she must learn to transition humans through, or she will die.

There are those who will help her, but there are those who do not want to see her survive.

Bloggers have been all over this one, it has strong reader reviews at Amazon, and I'm sure it'll be quite popular with the rapidly growing fanbase of romantic paranormal YA.  And really, I wouldn't be surprised to see it get adapted into a television show.

Personally, though, overall, I thought it was... okay.  I had a hard time believing in Meridian, because I didn't find her voice particularly believeable.  The writing, overall, felt uneven -- sometimes it was funny (if tv-ish):

"Don't tell me the 'go to the light' thing someone always says to dying people in movies is accurate."  I was trapped in a Lifetime special.

but sometimes it was... well:

I packed everything I think you'll want.  Please forgive me if I overlooked a beloved token of your childhood.  I did my best.  Your father sends his love.  Sam will miss you more than the rest of us combined, I fear.  You are one of the Chosen, Meridian.  For that I am both grateful and sorrowful.

Beloved token; I fear; grateful and sorrowful.  I have a difficult time imagining anyone actually using that language in this century. 

I had a hard accepting the idea that her parents knew what she was but withheld that knowledge, even though they knew she was miserable and hurting.  I understand denial, but that was too much for me to believe -- that they moved around the country to avoid trouble, but they treated her somewhat crappily and didn't prepare her for the future, all because they wanted her to have a "normal childhood". 

And Meridian was unfortunately one of those smart-but-dense types.  I spotted the villain immediately, and while it didn't take her all that long to catch up, it still took her too long.  For that matter, Auntie or Tens should have picked up on it ages before Meridian even came to town.

I did like how the villain used religion to gain followers.  Unlike the first few House of Night books, the book didn't feel offensively anti-Christian.  There was a sense of history that made me imagine the Aternocti using the same methods for centuries -- but the Big Bad ended up being so two-dimensional that he wasn't even remotely frightening.  When someone evil is trying to convince you to join his side, it seems like he'd use an argument a tad stronger than, "We're the winning team".  Especially after he'd been portrayed as so silver-tongued that he'd easily convinced an entire town to follow his Evil Lead.

Part of my problem was certainly my own -- due to chatter in the blogosphere, I expected something different.  Loads of people have been saying that this book is NEW and DIFFERENT, but I didn't see it that way.  I've seen Buffy.  Many times through.  And I've read a lot -- A LOT -- of books.  I'm very familiar with the Girl-With-A-Responsibility-To-The-World-Who-Doesn't-Really-Want-The-Responsibility-To-The-World-Because-Guess-What-She's-Sixteen storyline.  And then (kind of hilariously, but in a good way) right at the very end, Meridian morphed from Buffy into Supernatural.  (Which actually made me decide that, despite my reservations, I'll probably pick the next one out when it's released.  Lesson here?  Familiarity can go either way, depending on the whim of the reader.)  While I can't hold my expectations against the book, I can't say that they didn't color my reading of it.

So.  As I said.  I can't imagine that this one won't be popular with many of the Usual Suspects, as long as the issues mentioned don't drive them bananas.

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I read this book for the R.I.P. IV challenge.

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Book source:  Review copy from the publisher.

Here's one to look forward to...

...Maureen Johnson's new series, which involves modern-day Jack the Ripper killings and a British paranormal police force.

Aaaand the first one is due out mid 2011.

Rats.

Not even an attempt at a pun?

"'Twilight' fans can get happily get lost in corn"

It seems like the Deseret News could have come up with something. 

...

...

Nope, other than wanting to wish Bella away to the cornfield, I've got nothing.  So I guess I shouldn't give them a hard time.

...

...

What, you want to see a picture of said corn maze?

Here it is, in all of its New Moon-y glory:

Any idea what that little guy on the right is up to?  Is he part of the New Moon mazes?  What is he holding?  A microphone?  A lollipop?

(Photo via here, link via Misty -- thanks, Misty!)

Summer of Fear -- Lois Duncan

Things are good for Rachel Bryant.  She's almost sixteen, she's dating her shaggily handsome next-door neighbor, she and her best friend are tight as tight can be -- and it's lovely, lovely summertime.

Until the accident.  Her aunt and uncle die, and suddenly, a grieving cousin from the other side of the United States -- a girl Rachel hasn't ever even met -- is moving in.  For good.  Into Rachel's room.

At first, Rachel is determined to make the best of it -- to welcome Julia into the family, to console her, to become her almost-sister. 

But there's something not right about Julia.  Something... evil.

This being a Lois Duncan book, that's 'evil' with a capital 'E' and an additional pile of lowercase 'e's:  Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeevil.

I hadn't read this one since I was in middle school.  It holds up in some respects, not so much in others.  The majority of the book -- the Summer of Fear itself -- is a flashback.  The first few and last few pages are set in the misty future, where Rachel says things like:  "For too long now I've dwelt upon the past."  The tone of those sections reminded me very much of Flowers in the Attic, actually.  Which, I guess, given the fact that FitA was published three years later, isn't all that surprising.

Some of the dialogue is pretty unbelievable ("Do you recall the name of the village nearest to where they lived?" (16)), as is Rae's voice ("There I received another shock, for the ugly red splotches were not confined to my face." (79)), but... I didn't care.  I think because the book is so very 1970s (the flared pants, going to Dustin Hoffman movies, etc.), because the emotions underneath the stilted writing feel genuine and right, because Rae's almost-overnight estrangement from everyone she loves adds to the horror of the situation, AND because everyone's refusal to believe -- let alone try to understand -- her is something that I know I identified with when I read it Back in the Day.  Oh, and of course, Julia is super-ultra creepy, so together, somehow, it all works. 

That isn't to say that I didn't groan occasionally.  Or that I didn't find the fact that nobody took issue with Peter immediately developed the Serious Hots for his cousin -- Serious Hots equaling, in this case, talking about marriage -- strange.  Or that I didn't think it was hilarious that the friendly professor who lived down the street just so happened to be an expert on witches and also a believer in the occult.  Or that I didn't think of Poison Ivy once or twice or thrice.

I did all of those things, and more.  But Lois Duncan still works for me.  She still manages to creep me out and she still keeps me entertained.  And sometimes that's all I'm looking for.

Ok, WOW.  I had no idea that there is a movie based on this book.  Directed by Wes Craven and starring Linda Blair, no less!  It looks terrible, in the best possible way.  I'm totally adding that one to the Netflix queue, and bumping it right the hell up.  (Josh is going to be so mad!  BONUS!)

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Book source:  My personal library.  (I have no idea when I bought it.  Or if.  It may have just appeared.  I've started to suspect that my books are secretly reproducing.)

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I read this for the R.I.P. IV challenge.

The Cybils 2009 Season is approaching fast!

So start thinking about possible nominations.

(And check out their new header.  Vair nice.)

The Morgue and Me -- John C. Ford

The Morgue and Me begins:

When you're eighteen years old and you shoot somebody in a public place at two in the morning, of course you expect some attention.  Especially when it's the person I shot, and especially when you're found right there on the scene with that person at your feet, gasping away in a pool of blood that seeps around your shoes.  Still, I find it really embarrassing.

The summer before his freshman year of college, photography enthusiast and aspiring spy Christopher Newell gets a summer job at the morgue.  He was supposed to work at the NWMU astronomy department, but that fell through when... well, it's a long story.

Anyway, the morgue.  While snooping (there's really no other word for it) in the coroner's office, he finds $15,000 in cash.  Which is weird.  But then when he realizes that the coroner falsified his most recent report... well, Christopher Newell is pretty good at math.

He teams up with Tina, a Trans Am driving, fishnet wearing, drinking, smoking, big mouthed (and extremely attractive) young journalist -- he wants to solve the mystery, she wants a big break -- and before the two of them know it, they're up to their ears in an investigation that seems to involve every single powerful person in their Michigan town.

And powerful people do not usually take kindly to being investigated: especially when that investigation is conducted by a couple of nobodies and involves corruption, blackmail and murder.

Christopher's narration definitely brings to mind a hard-boiled detective -- not because he is one (or acts like one), mind you, but because he wants to be one -- and it especially comes out in some of his descriptions of people:

I've heard that lots of movie stars have huge heads.  I don't know about his acting skills, but Corbett was qualified in the head department.  His giant helmet of black hair was gelled so thick I could almost see a reflection of the clouds in it.  On his feet he wore tiny black loafers, equally shiny.  In between, there was lots of tailored clothing.

His relationship with Tina is especially well done.  He has to remind himself to stop drooling every time he looks at her even though he knows it is SO not going to happen -- and that attraction persists throughout the book, even as their working relationship develops into a genuine friendship.  And, very importantly, they're rather hilarious:

"See?"  Tina said.  "You lurk a little, you get your answers."

"I'm not sure it was the lurking.  I think it was more the asking."

"Whatever.  We're lurking till I finish this drink."

And while Tina easily could have become a two-dimensional stock character (because it isn't like we haven't met the brash and brassy type many, many times before), she didn't.  As the book progressed, as she and Christopher got to know each other, she became more and more real.  By the end of the book, I felt like she was as much a main character as he was.

Big thumbs up here -- it's a strong mystery (minus one plot point that felt really, really wrong) that feels both classic and contemporary.  It was suspenseful and twisty and funny with strong secondary characters and just good all around.  I know I always say it when I find one, but here I go again:  I'm so glad that we're starting to see more noir-ish crime novels written for and marketed to the teen audience. 

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Book source:  My local library.

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Cross-posted at Guys Lit Wire.

Leviathan trailer.

Oh, wow.

This book has Josh written all over it:

But I thought...

...that Edward Cullen DIDN'T like Wuthering Heights.

Why am I even thinking about this?

Prophecy of the Sisters -- Michelle Zink

New York State, 1890.  Lia is aware that she and her twin sister, Alice, have never been particularly close.  But it isn't until after being orphaned by the sudden death of their father that Lia realizes their relationship is actually less complicated than that:  they are enemies.

Because of a centuries-old prophecy, they will stand on opposite sides of a battle for the world itself -- if, that is, Lia is able to figure out what the prophecy of the sisters actually entails, and what part she is supposed to play in it...

From Prophecy of the Sisters:

...I have reasons of my own for wanting to know more.

It cannot be chance alone that Father was found dead on the floor of the Dark Room, or that shortly thereafter I discovered the mark, observed my sister in her eerie ritual, and was given this strange, lost book.  I cannot be sure what it all means or how these events work in concert, but I'm certain they do.

To put it simply, I found this book frustrating. 

To expand on that:  On the one hand, I very much enjoyed the setting -- while the year, 1890, placed us at the tail end of the Victorian Era (like many other paranormal historicals), the author set this one in the United States, which made it feel fresh.  There were some really genuinely classic Gothic creepy moments, a wonderfully thrilling and suspenseful showdown scene at the riverfront, and, while the idea of an Object of Evil Returning Again and Again Despite the Heroine's Attempts to Rid Herself Of It is not a new one, Lia's experiences with the medallion were, I thought, very effective.  And, though Alice didn't get much screen time, on occasion, small details about her behavior gave me the screaming willies:

"Miss Gray would not approve."  Alice's voice greets me as I close the door, but it is not the new, hard Alice I have come to watch with guarded eyes.  Her voice is playful, her figure a dim outline on the stairs.  She sits carelessly on the steps, leaning her body back to rest on her elbows.

It's the image in my mind of this supposedly proper Gilded Age rich girl lolling on the steps -- it seems wrong in every way, and so, to me, suggested that Alice might be losing her humanity.  (It's possible that I read far too much into that passage, but that's where I went with it!)

My frustrations lay in a few places.  While I understand that Lia's search for the truth of her situation and her investigation into the prophecy were both major elements of the plotting and necessitated a decent amount of explanation, I did feel that the characters spent an inordinate amount of time discussing said subjects.  And that that many of the conversations in which Lia and the others try unravel the mysteries often felt unrealistic and like they were supposed to be informing the reader, rather than like they were actually talking to each other.  (Does that make sense?  Basically, I felt like there was a lot of expository dialogue.)

I also felt, maybe because of my problems with the dialogue, that I never got to know the characters, and that I was told things about them, rather than shown:

Sonia rises, holding her fingertips to her brow in frustration.  "Even if we have all the keys, we do not know how to end the prophecy."

I meet Luisa's gaze from across the room.  We are accustomed to Sonia's calm demeanor.  Neither of us knows what to say in the face of her unexpected despair.

I used that passage to illustrate the tell/show issue, because, well, if Lia hadn't told me that Sonia was despairing, there's no way I'd have picked up on it.

There was also a plot point that hinged on an "old Druid text" that happens to be located in the local library's hidden collection on sorcery -- and, totally overlooking the mostly-unknown three-story collection of books on sorcery in a random upper New York State library -- I was always under the impression that the Druids were an oral culture.  But I don't know much about the subject, and I certainly could be wrong.  It just jumped out at me as sounding off.  But hey, maybe I'm the one who's off.

I did feel, right towards the end -- due to the showdown I mentioned, and to the increased number of interactions between Lia and Alice -- more invested in the story.  But then, when I realized that I was going to get no satisfaction -- that this is the first in a series -- I literally shrieked.

So.  While there were certainly some positives, for me, they didn't counteract my frustrations.  I do think that if you're a fan of the Libba Bray's Gemma Doyle trilogy, you should definitely give this one a try at some point -- while I'm all issue-ridden, Prophecy of the Sisters did get a starred review from Booklist and rave reviews all over the blogosphere.

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Book source:  My local library.

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I read this for the R.I.P. IV challenge.

Look For Me By Moonlight -- Mary Downing Hahn

Due to her mother's recent move to Italy, 16-year-old Cynda is on the Maine coast to spend the next six months with her father, her stepmother, and her 5-year-old half-brother Todd.  The family owns the Underhill Inn, an isolated old stone house that the locals say is haunted. 

Cynda's father scoffs at the idea of the supernatural, but she is more inclined to believe.  She settles into the household, though she longs for a closer relationship with her father, is uncomfortable with her young (read: home-wrecker) stepmother and is annoyed by her attention hog of a brother.

Although guests are unusual in January, a guest arrives.  He's about thirty, mysterious, handsomer-than-handsome, a poet, sensitive, charming, and intelligent.  Cynda is drawn to him -- and it seems that he is drawn to her, too.  He is everything her family is not, and it seems that he offers what they do not -- he is attentive to her, he understands her...

But Vincent Morthanos is more than he appears, and while falling under his spell is all too easy, escaping it may be impossible.

I started Look For Me By Moonlight last night and woke up early this morning to finish it -- I got so into it that there was much yelling at the book and to Josh while reading the second half.  (He was drinking coffee in the living room and, I suspect, only half listening.)

Some excerpts (of my yelling, not from the book -- and while I'm trying to avoid major spoilers, some can't be avoided):

Me:  What the hell!?  The father just said there are only two seasons in Maine, 11 months of winter and one month of summer!  God.
Josh:  A lot of people say that!
Me:  But he left out mud season, blackfly season, tourist season...  Then again, he isn't FROM here.  He just moved here, like, ten years ago.  So it's not like he's local.

I got over my Maine issues pretty early on, by the way -- once I realized that it was really only set here so it could be isolated and cold and could just have easily be set in Cornwall or Colorado (minus the coastal thing), I relaxed.  Onward.

Me:  This guy's name is Vincent Morthanos!  If he's Death, I'll give him a pass for the name, but if he's a vampire, that totally means that he chose it for himself, and so he's a complete a-hole!
Josh:  Man, why are you reading this book?
Me:  What do you mean?  It's awesome.

I mean, really.  How ridiculous is that name?  MORT?  THANOS?

Me:  EEEeeeeeeeeew!  Ha ha ha.  I LOVE THIS BOOK!  Totally perfect for showing the utter creepiness of Edward Cullen.  When the centuries-old guy looks thirty instead of seventeen, it's WAY GROSS instead of pretendy romantic.  Yecch!  I love it.
Josh:  ... ... ...
Me:  I mean, it's hilarious that this book is on, like, every Twilight readalike list out there, because it's pretty much the polar opposite.  Oh man, I'm going to make all of the Twihards at the library read it.  Heh heh heh.
Josh:  ... ... ...

So OBVIOUSLY I enjoyed it.  Hugely.  I found Cynda hard to like at times -- selfish, self-absorbed and annoying, but I also felt like she felt like a real person, so that isn't a complaint -- if anything, it was nice to read about a heroine who was far from perfect.  At first I had a hard time with her brother -- during the first half of the book, his dialogue reads like something out of a soap opera -- but due to the second half, I ultimately gave him higher-than-passing marks.  I don't want to give away the reason.  Her father was a jackass, and a bit of a stock character -- self-involved writer, frustrated by his melodramatic teenaged daughter -- but he works.

I think part of the reason the book worked for me so well, oddly, is that Cynda is rather melodramatic and prone to cheesy romantic fantasy:

I always had trouble making friends, especially boyfriends.  I'd been in love dozens of times, but it was always the unrequited kind.  I'd fall for a boy because his eyes were the color of fog or his smile was as warm as candlelight or his laugh reminded me of sleighbells at Christmas.  I'd worship him from across the library or the football field and then watch him fall in love with somebody else--a cheerleader or a gymnast or the star of the class play.

I'm not sure how Hahn made that rather shockingly ridiculous passage work, but she did.  I think it's because Cynda's voice was spot-on -- I believed that Cynda would describe someone like that.  I could easily imagine her writing really, really terrible fan fiction.

Anyway.  I thought it was a hugely entertaining book, and an excellent -- for those who want or need one -- antidote to Twilight.

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Book source:  My local library.

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I read this for the R.I.P. IV Challenge.

Seattle YA.

There's a great list of (duh) YA authors from the Seattle area over at the Seattle Examiner.

I like the idea of regional author lists.

Of course, I, like Anastasia Krupnik, like lists in general.

YALSA Teens' Top Ten.

Voting is now open (if, you know, you happen to be a teen).

If you aren't (or, heck, if you are -- I'm not going to discriminate here), how many books on the shortlist have you read and which ones would you vote for?

I've only read eleven of them -- a bunch more are on my TBR pile(s) -- but of the ones I've read, my favorites were Graceling, Frankie Landau-Banks, and... I might have to flip a coin to choose between Paper Towns and The Hunger Games.  Loved 'em both, but in such different ways!  I still haven't read the Patrick Ness, the Nancy Werlin, Flygirl or a pile of others.  Once I've read those, my picks might change.

Children's books too bleak, blah blah blah.

It seems that every couple of years, someone starts a round of realism-in-literature-is-too-much-for-children-to-handle.

This time, it's Anne Fine*.  Which I think is interesting, because, like the author of the essay I just linked to, I think of Fine as an author who does deal with some pretty tough stuff, and does it realistically.

Anyway.  The Guardian also has some thoughts on rewrites for a bunch of children's books to make them cheerier.  I'm sure that someone could "improve" The Chocolate Warby adding in some Rocky-esque training scenes which would lead to an ending that doesn't make the reader want to stab herself.

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*Actually, hasn't she gone off about this before?  Oh, wait.  I'm thinking of her blistering review of Melvin Burgess' Doing It.  Which I really liked.  The book, I mean.  It was amazingly raunchy, yes, especially towards the beginning, but I remember the character development being very strong and I also remember feeling that a whole lot of the book was in line with what I remembered from high school.  But that brings us back to the children's-literature-shouldn't-be-TOO-realistic argument.  Which, in case you're wondering, I don't buy.  I'm not saying that all books should be gritty and rough -- but I don't see why, with the bazillions of books out there, noneof them should be.  Yeesh.

Brett McCarthy: Work in Progress -- Maria Padian

Brett McCarthy: Work in Progress begins:

I've been obsessed lately with trying to pinpoint the exact moment when I got redefined.

That's one of my grandmother's favorite words.  It basically means defined again.  Define means to make clear; mark the limits of; identify the essential qualities or meaning of.  Before my life changed from fairly decent to really bad, my self-definition was pretty straightforward.

Brett McCarthy: Only Child; Only Granddaughter; Best Eighth-Grade Corner Kicker in Maine; Diane's Best Friend.

Then came the redefinition.

Brett McCarthy:  Deadest Meat in Maine and Possibly the Planet; Practically Friendless; Violent; Suspended.

Can you blame me for wanting to sort this out?

First off, while the cover of the paperback is somewhat generic, it's a huge improvement on the cover of the hardback:

Yecch.  I do appreciate the designer's inclusion of the dictionary -- Brett's family is big on poetry and she loves expanding her vocabulary, titling each chapter with a word that she defines in that chapter -- but that is in no way a cover that screams, "PICK ME UP!"

Anyway.  It's a readable, funny and poignant coming-of-age story about a bright girl with a big mouth who is going through a serious rough patch:  having one of her best friends grow out of their friendship, having another of her best friends start to look at their relationship differently, and suddenly realizing that her beloved grandmother is... not going to be around forever.  There were a few moments when I felt that Brett's cluelessness was a little bit unbelievable -- I bought it that she didn't care about clothes, but for her to not recognize the name Abercrombie & Fitch didn't ring true to me -- but overall, as a narrator, I really enjoyed her, even when she made me slap my forehead, and say, "Oh, Brett, PLEASE DON'T SAY/DO WHAT I THINK YOU'RE ABOUT TO SAY/DO."

So I had mostly positive feelings about the book, even though when it comes to my home state, I get quite a bit pickier than usual.  On occasion, the references to Maine Stuff (like Gifford's Ice Cream) felt a little bit forced and awkward, but over all, I thought it really worked.  I liked that there were a lot of French last names (like LaVoie and Pelletier); I liked that her while her town, Mescataqua, isn't an actual town in Maine, I had to look it up to be sure because the name sounds like a town in Maine; I liked that she used capital letters when referring to The County, as is proper; and I liked that she used the correct term for people from away -- although I don't think that any self-respecting Mainer would have put it in quotation marks. 

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Book source:  My local library. 

More Twilight Merchandise, or My Eyes, MY EYES!

You know those middle-of-the-night bathroom runs that result in a stand-off with a scary axe-wielding serial killer that turns out to be an innocent coat rack when you finally work up the courage to turn on the light?  Well, the first item might cause some problems along those lines. 

The second item is just glittery wrongness -- especially as the makers suggest putting it in the fridge "for that authentic experience".  Of course, it's also hilarious.  And R-rated*.  So click through at your own risk.

(via Chrissy)

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*Or is it NC-17?  The ratings board seems to make up their own rules.  Have you seen this documentary, by the way?  (This trailer was not approved for all audiences -- not at all safe for work.)

Mary Katherine Blackwood is coming to the big screen.

We Have Always Lived in the Castle has the potential to be a fantastic movie.

If it doesn't suck.

Oh god, oh god, oh god, I'm already wringing my hands and worrying.

Elizabeth Scott's Living Dead Girl challenged in IL.

I'm actually surprised that this is the first time I've seen news about a formal challenge to Living Dead Girl. 

Happily, the article is all about how the Helen Matthes Library does not plan to remove the book from the library or move it out of the teen section.  Good on them.

The Secret Life of Prince Charming -- Deb Caletti

This book is the reason I didn't post yesterday.

I started it the night before, liked it well enough to want to finish it, but didn't get so hooked that I needed to stay up late to read the whole thing.  It was when I picked it up the next morning that I ran into trouble -- that was when I hit the 100-page mark, and suddenly a book about a girl who's desperate for her father's love and approval yet very cautious about guys partly because of her father's past behavior turned into a sisterly-bonding-through-burglary-with-exploration-into-family-history-and-romantic-roadtrip story.  So obviously I had to read the rest of it in one go, posting be damned.

Every woman in Quinn's family, from her grandmother on down, has lived through some serious heartbreak.  Men have done them wrong, again and again and again.  So it makes sense that Quinn has always done the right thing, made the careful, right choices.  Taken the right classes, dated the right, nice guy, regardless of the lack of toe-curling passion.  She loves math.  But then two things happen in quick succession -- she realizes that some of her father's most prized possessions may not actually belong to him, and her sure-thing (boring) nice guy boyfriend turns out to be not so much of a sure-thing (and not so much of a nice guy).

So, one thing leads to another, and 17-year-old Quinn and her 11-year-old sister Sprout (who I didn't really buy as an 11-year-old, but I loved nonetheless) team up with their practically-a-stranger older half-sister on a secret whirlwind roadtrip to return those possessions to their rightful owners and, in doing so, to understand their father, his past, and their own family history.

I don't really understand what the cover of the book has to do with the story, but whatever.  I mean, they were at a beach at one point...  I guess...  But there was none of that back pocket standing, and I don't know who that girl is, but she's certainly not Quinn.  Quinn wouldn't stand like that.  ANYWAY.

In general, I recommend that fans of Sarah Dessen and Elizabeth Scott and Joan Bauer try Deb Caletti.  While I loved it, The Secret Life of Prince Charming isn't going to be for everyone.  The action doesn't really kick in until a third of the way through the book, there are a LOT of characters to keep straight, and monologues about past relationships are interspersed throughout the narrative.  (Kind of like the interviews in When Harry Met Sally.)  At first, I tried to keep the speakers straigh, but after a while I just concentrated on what the women were saying, rather than who was saying what.  Which I think was the right way to go.

It was a book that made me grateful that the men in my life -- my husband and our families and my friends and old boyfriends and roommates and co-workers -- have been, for the most part, good guys.  That, while I've certainly witnessed a whole lot of jackassery (which, considering some of what I've witnessed, is a very flip way of putting it), I haven't been on the receiving end of much of it. 

I was glad that while Quinn's father may have been the King Hell Selfish Jackass, and that while there were certainly other men in the book who didn't look much better, there were plenty of truly good guy male characters with integrity and decency (and humor, brains and HELLO, PURE ANIMAL MAGNETISM) to balance that out.

It's one, I think, that will be a good crossover for adult readers, and it's one that would be worth reading a few times at different ages, and might work well in a mother-daughter book group.  Because while I think it was realistic in its acceptance that some people are the way they are and that's that, and it could be used as a manual of What To Avoid in relationships (it could be paired with A Bad Boy Can Be Good For a Girl for that), it's also ultimately a hopeful book.  By the end of the book, I was confident that Quinn and Charlotte and Frances Lee will all make it through whatever they needed to make it through -- at the very least of it all, they had each other.  And when it comes to sisters, there's nothing little about "at the very least".

OH MY GOD, I'M TURNING INTO A HUGE SAP.  WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME?

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Previously:

Honey, Baby, Sweetheart
Wild Roses

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Book source:  My local library.

Should I be losing faith in NPR's book coverage?

Because isn't this exactly like that Cathy's Book series?  With the pocket of stuff and the website and phone numbers?

That, in addition to that the fact that I'm 91 pages into The Magicians, which is enjoyable but certainly not exciting or ground-breaking in a way that makes me want to hand out copies on the corner, has me thinking that the answer to my first question is a resounding YES.

Not that I'll stop following it, mind you.

Carter Finally Gets It -- Brent Crawford

Will Carter:  High school freshman.  Owner of the laziest nickname ever, despite all his efforts to get a new one.  Prone to distraction, due to his ADD.  Second string right guard on the football team, but with dreams of being the kicker -- that way, he wouldn't have to go to practice.  Unable to attain coherent thought or speech around the ladies, especially if they're showing any skin.  Virgin.

Related to that last fact, from Carter himself:

Homecoming is in three days, and since I don't have a date and may never get a girlfriend, I've decided to invest in a porno.  Nutt's brother, Bart, sold it to me for thirty-five dollars.  It's at least twenty years old, and it's a copy of a copy of a poor-quality videotape.  There's no sound and it's stuck on fast-forward, but you can make out that people are definitely doing the nasty on it really, really fast.  Nutt calls it a "research tape."  I watch it in the basement because that's where we have the old VCR, and nobody goes down there.  The last thing I need is for my dad to stroll in and see me abusing myself to lightning-fast pornographic images.  Military school will become a reality faster than those people are doing it.

Carter Finally Gets It doesn't have the usual plot-plot-plot-climax-wind-down arc.  It reads more as a year-in-the-life-of-Carter -- complete with romance, serious loss of blood, cops, football, the theater and a stolen bicycle*.

I'm going to be really, really sad if there isn't a follow-up to this one.  Because, wow.  I loved Carter, I loved his family, and I loved this book.  Carter is raunchy and hilarious**, but also sweet, real, surprising, fresh and believable***.

Sorry that this is so short, but sometimes it's hard to go on and on and on about something when I love everything about it.  I wish we had WonkaVision.  Then I could just hand the book over.  Because that's what I'd like to do.

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*Just thinking about the stolen bicycle has me giggling all over again.

**The scene where he's on a movie date and battling a massive Taco Bell fart?  Way gross and yet made me stop reading because I was laughing so hard.

***Looking back at the first few pages, I dimly remember doubting some things about his voice at first, but clearly that changed.  Because I didn't ever remember feeling like that until I flipped back to the beginning.

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Book source:  My local library.

Some reading lists.

Lesley Blume picks Must-Read Classic Children's Books at NPR.

Will Davis picks his Top Ten Literary Teens at the Guardian.

Free stuff.

The entirety of Scott Westerfeld's Uglies.

And a 40 pages of Kristin Cashore's Fire.

Malice -- Chris Wooding

For ages now, there have been rumors about Malice.  Supposedly, it's a hard-to-find-horror-comic-that-isn't-just-a-horror-comic.  Because, supposedly, if you collect the right ingredients, combine them in just the right order and say just the right words, Tall Jake will come and take you away.

Into Malice.

Supposedly, after kids disappear into Malice, you can read about them in later issues.  For as long as they survive, anyway.

Seth and Kady don't buy it.  They think it's just an urban legend, like the Candyman or Bloody Mary or that one about the haunted VHS tape.  But then one of their friends disappears.  And they discover that Malice is very, very real.

Okay, when I first took this one out of the box, I was concerned.  Because as visually cool as the molded plastic on the front cover was, I knew that it was going to be a pain-and-a-half to shelve.  But then I realized that the molded plastic was just affixed with something rubber cement-ish and was easily removed.  And that the cover art was printed on the book under the plastic thingie.  So I was able to actually concentrate on the book and stop worrying about library deployment.

And the book was fun.  In other hands, I think the switches in format -- from text to comic and back again, as well as some playing with font size and text placement -- could have felt gimmicky and annoying, but because of the storyline and because Chris Wooding can write, it all worked.  There are some genuinely creepy parts, and I felt some actual suspense -- as kids were getting killed right and left, I didn't assume that any of the main characters would make it.  

So, while I didn't think that the writing was as strong as in The Haunting of Alaizabel Cray -- there wasn't much in the way of character development, and though some of the characters were American and some were British, they all sort of sounded the same (and there was that one plot point that I had a hard time buying, unless it pops up in a later installment, so I'll wait and see) -- and while I found that the comic sections actually detracted from the suspense because the pictures were much less scary than what I came up with in my head, it'll definitely be a good pick for the younger YA horror crowd. 

An easy, quick pick for fans of Cirque du Freak et al, as well as fans of Skullduggery Pleasant.

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Book source: Review copy from the publisher.

Incompatible.

That's the only word to describe my relationship with Heathcliff and Cathy*.  Regardless of the setting, era or their names, I think I'll always want to punch them both in the face.

So, due to nothing other than my own issues, I've decided to stop reading The Heights, Brian James' contemporary re-imagining of Wuthering Heights.  Because otherwise I might get more violent than I already am.

But someone else with a higher tolerance for their assiness should read it to let me know how it is. 

Because I am curious.  And I'd like to know if I should just get over myself and keep reading.

Maybe I'll talk my long-suffering co-worker into taking it home.

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*Oh, except for Heathcliff in Wuthering High.  But he was funny in that one.  And he was played for laughs in at least one of the Jasper Fforde books, too.

Bloomsbury has announced new cover for Liar.

In a move that will please many, many people, Bloomsbury has announced that they will trash the original US cover.

From PW:

 “We regret that our original creative direction for Liar—which was intended to symbolically reflect the narrator’s complex psychological makeup—has been interpreted by some as a calculated decision to mask the character’s ethnicity,” Bloomsbury officials said in a statement to PW. “In response to this concern, and in support of the author’s vision for the novel, Bloomsbury has decided to re-jacket the hardcover edition with a new look in time for its publication in October. It is our hope that the important discussions about race and its representation in teen literature continue. As the publisher of Liar, we also hope that nothing further distracts from the quality of the author’s nuanced and accomplished story, and that a new cover will allow this novel’s many advocates to celebrate its U.S. publication without reservation.”

The old cover:

And the new:

A bit more at Justine Larbalestier's blog.

Linda Buckley-Archer just racked up some serious points*.

In her list of Top Ten Time-Travel Stories, Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency comes in at #4, just after H.G. Wells, Mark Twain and Virginia Woolf.  I can live with that.

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*So many points, in fact, that I will give Gideon the Cutpurse another try -- I started it ages ago, but got distracted by something else.

Ooo! Ooo! Look!

Salon lurrrves Hannah Friedman's Everything Sucks!

Want to know how to tell that they really, really love it?  That it's really super fantastic?

Because it's not like THAT OTHER YA:

Not only is Friedman's writing striking for its blunt, unromantic realism; her prose also displays a self-aware wit that is all too rare in the genre.

Her refusal to moralize or provide an easy resolution sets "Everything Sucks" apart from YA literature's preponderance of breezy, formulaic narratives.

Because a memoir marketed to YAs is exactly the same thing as a series novel marketed to YAs, or a SF novel marketed to YAs, or a historical fiction novel marketed to YAs, or a thriller marketed to YAs, or a romance marketed to YAs, or literary fiction marketed to YAs. 

I mean, heck, that's how we look at books marketed to adults, right?  When talking about whatever new memoir is taking the adult literary world by storm, it would be totally acceptable to say it was better than the majority of adult literature by comparing it to books by James Patterson, right?  Because not only does it make sense to compare a memoir to series fiction, it totally makes sense to take potshots at popular fiction while we're at it?

I am so over this garbage. 

(link via LizB who got it via Omnivoracious)

The nominees for the 2009 World Fantasy Awards...

...have been announced.

Free Lisa McMann short.

For all fans of Wake and Fade, there's a short story about Cabel available here.

What I Saw and How I Lied -- Judy Blundell

So, hideously late -- months and months after everyone else, I'm sure -- I finally got around to reading What I Saw and How I Lied, the 2008 National Book Award Winner for Young People's Literature.

From the second chapter:

It was 1947, and the war was over.  Now there was music on every radio, and everybody wanted a new car.  Nobody had a new car during the war -- they weren't even making them -- and nobody took pictures, because there wasn't any film.  One thing about a war?  You never have new.

But now our fathers and brothers and cousins were home, and our Victory Gardens had been turned back into lawns, because now we could buy not only want we needed but what we wanted, vegetables and coffee and creamy butter.  Cameras and cars, and brand-new washing machines, even.  Appliances were the reason my stepfather was getting rich.

We were lucky enough to live in Queens, where you could put a nickel in a turnstile and ride the subway to Manhattan, the place where everybody in the world wanted to be.  They left the lights burning in the skyscrapers all night long, because now they could.

I hadn't meant to quote quite that much, but Evie Spooner's voice has a way of doing that -- you start reading and just don't want to -- can't -- stop.  And I had to include that last paragraph -- even though very little of the book actually takes place in New York, those few pages read like a love letter to the city.  I'm very much a rural lady, but this book made me itch to drive a few hours south, if only for a weekend.  The scenes in Florida felt different.  No less real, but in my mind's eye movie (don't you get those when you read?), the two settings had entirely different lenses and filters.  I think it'll take a re-read to figure that one out.

Evie Spooner's story is a coming-of-age story.  Like a lot of coming-of-age stories, there is a tragedy.  Like a lot of coming-of-age stories, there is a first love.  Like a lot of coming-of-age stories, our heroine learns that the adults in her life are not the shining stars she has always believed them to be.  There are lies, there is betrayal, there is injustice, and Evie sees it all.  Heck, as the title suggests, she participates in some of it. 

I'm deliberately being vague -- the story itself is a simple one, and an old one, but I think it's better to get it from Evie.  Because it's her voice that makes this book a special one. 

It isn't the only thing that's special.  The book -- and Evie -- evoke the romance of the era, but also the ugliness of it.  It's a hard thing to reconcile.

The strange thing?  I never connected emotionally with the book.  It may have been the noir feel, it may have been that Evie kept me at arm's length, it may have been a combination of the two along with something else I haven't identified.  The even stranger thing?  It wasn't an issue.  I never wanted to put it down, I never felt frustrated with the distance, the characters never felt unreal to me.  Somehow, the emotional distance felt right. 

It allowed me to wonder.  It allowed me to wonder about how much Evie was keeping back.  About when she actually knew things, whether she was ready to admit them or not.  Unanswered questions can be frustrating, sure, but in this case, they made the book feel bigger, richer, more real.  And those unanswered questions would allow for a great discussion in a book group.  If I ever get around to starting a Teen Books for Adult Readers book group at the library, this'll be on the shortlist.

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Book source:  My local library.