Middle-Grade Review: The Search for WondLa

 I had been eager to read the new middle-grade release from Tony Diterlizzi, co-author/creator of The Spiderwick Chronicles.  His latest is a middle-grade fantasy/sci-fi adventure called The Search for WondLa.  I ended up listening to the first half on audio and reading the second half on paper, with a rather mixed review of the two different approaches to telling this imaginative story.  Ultimately, I would recommend reading the book on paper but not listening to it on audio.

The story opens with 12-year old Eva Nine, a young girl who has grown up entirely isolated in an underground sanctuary with her robot mother (cleverly named Muthr, Multi-Utility Task Help Robot, a name I may adopt!).  Though Eva has been happy and well cared for, she sets off on a journey, eager to find others like herself.  Her only clue to help in her search is a scrap of torn paper that shows a girl like herself with a robot and an adult human with the torn words WondLa left.  The world she explores is filled with strange, wondrous, and sometimes frightening creatures.

I brought the audio on our California vacation this June, figuring it would be a perfect fit for our annual road trip, with all the elements my family usually enjoys: a young protagonist in a fantastical place on a fast-paced adventure.  We listened to about half of it before my kids finally said, “No more!” and my husband and I agreed.  Now granted, none of us are smack in the middle of the book’s intended audience of middle-grade readers (my sons are now 13 and 17 and their reading tastes have matured a bit), but all four of us felt that the audio production just wasn’t very good. 

The story was interesting, but the narrator (ironically a well-respected actress, Teri Hatcher of Desperate Housewives fame) just grated on us.  She read the main character, a twelve-year old girl, in a fake-sounding little girl voice.  My youngest son kept saying, “She just sounds too young!” And some of the other characters had similarly strange-sounding voices (granted, they are all strange, made-up sorts of beings).  It’s hard to describe, but we just found the overall effect annoying and finally gave up.

Upon returning home, I was determined to give it another try, this time on paper.  I finished reading the book and enjoyed it very much.  I think this is a case where the old-fashioned paper format is best, especially because Diterlizzi’s imaginative text is accompanied by lots and lots of his wonderful illustrations.  With so many unusual creatures and places in the story, the illustrations were additive, helping me to better imagine Eva’s adventures.  I found the rest of the book engrossing, loved the ending, and can’t wait for the next book in the planned trilogy!

NOTE:  The book and audio both have a unique feature.  You go to the WondLa website (where there is also a nice promo video of the story), click on the WondLa Vision icon, and follow the instructions to download special software (it took about 5 minutes).  Then, you hold up certain illustrations (3 different pages of the book or the pictures on the first 3 CDs) to your web cam, and up pops a 3-D map of Eva’s journey, each one adding to the last as the story unfolds.  It’s pretty cool.

473 pages, Simon & Schuster

 

It's Monday 8/15! What Are You Reading?

Wow, what a weekend!  We got together with my extended family - 14 of us! - in the Poconos for a weekend of swimming, kayaking, horseback riding, and lots of eating!  We laughed so hard Saturday night that my stomach muscles hurt.  Lots of fun, though not much time for quiet reading, as you can imagine.

Here's what we're reading this week:

• I finally finished The Passage by Justin Cronin and absolutely loved it, except for the very last sentence!  Though it seemed to be wrapping up nicely up until that last sentence, there is definitely a sequel coming, and he left me hanging.  It was excellent - highly recommended for fans of suspense, thrillers, paranormal, and post-apocalyptic plots.  Something for everyone.
• Next, I finished up The Search for Wondla by Tony Diterlizzi (co-author of The Spiderwick Chronicles), a middle-grade sci-fi novel.  We started the audio on vacation, but no one wanted to finish it because of the narrator.  So, I finished reading the paper novel and really enjoyed it.
• Now I am reading The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot.  I've been dying to read this after hearing so many wonderful things about it.  It's my neighborhood book group's pick for September, so I thought I'd get a head start and skip the last-minute panic!  It's fascinating so far.
• My husband, Ken, is still reading Tropic of Night by Michael Gruber and enjoying it.
• Jamie, 17 tomorrow!, finished reading Across the Great Barrier by Patricia Wrede and tells me I have to read this series!
• Next, Jamie read Num8ers and The Chaos by Rachel Ward, teen thrillers which I recommended to him.  He said they weren't his normal kind of book, but he enjoyed both and is looking forward to book 3.

Last week, I posted two new reviews: The Condition by Jennifer Haigh at Book By Book and Revolution by Jennifer Donnelly here.  I also posted lists of Top Ten Underrated Books and Top Ten Underrated Books for Kids and Teens.

What are you and your family reading this week?


(What are you reading Monday is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey.)

Teen/YA Review: Revolution

 I finally finished listening to the teen/YA novel Revolution by Jennifer Donnelly (I don’t get much alone audio time during the summer!), and I was absolutely entranced by this unique novel that takes place in two different time periods and blends modern teen drama with historical fiction.

Seventeen-year old Andi is close to being expelled from her prestigious private school in Brooklyn Heights.  Her younger brother died recently, driving both her and her mother into deep depressions that each is dealing with in her own way.  Andi is so mired in grief and despair that she doesn’t even care about school anymore, just her music, but her scientist father isn’t about to let her fail.  During winter break, he brings her along with him on a trip to Paris, hoping the change of scenery will help and she’ll have time to work on the thesis she needs to graduate.

Once in Paris, Andi discovers an old diary, written by a teen girl named Alexandrine two hundred years earlier, during the French Revolution.  Alex wanted to be an actress, but instead took on a job as nanny to the young prince in order to help her poor family.  At first, the diary is just an escape for Andi, a way to forget about her own troubles and immerse herself in someone else’s life, but it becomes increasingly compelling and real to her, until the past and the present mingle.

Donnelly has written a unique and gripping novel, weaving together the present and the distant past through the parallel lives of these two young women.  Both Andi and Alex play the guitar, and music has a central role in the novel, with lots of references to both modern and classical music.  Revolution tackles some serious issues, including grief, depression, and suicide, as well as a thorough immersion in the French Revolution.  I found it all fascinating, and the audio was very well done, with excellent voice actors for both Andi and Alex.  This was the first Jennifer Donnelly novel I’ve read or listened to; I will definitely read another.

NOTE: This novel is best for older teens and young adults (and up!) with lots of references to drugs, alcohol, plus some serious issues such as depression and suicide (not to mention a bit of gruesomeness).

Listening Library

Listen to an excerpt:

Top Ten Underrated Books for Kids and Teens

It's Top Ten Tuesday over at The Broke and the Bookish!  Today's topic is underrated books.  This took some thought.  I tried to focus on books that I loved that I didn't hear much buzz about - the kind of books I want to tell everyone about!  If you are interested in my list of underrated grown-up books, check out Book By Book.

Here is my Top Ten List of Underrated Books for Kids and Teens:

1. The Roman Mysteries by Caroline Lawrence – picture Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys in Ancient Rome – a great series, but I don’t hear much about it here in the U.S. They made it into a popular TV show in the U.K.
2. The Underland Chronicles by Suzanne Collins – obviously, everyone went totally crazy for her series The Hunger Games but this earlier middle-grade series seems to get overlooked.  Our whole family loved it (we read it aloud).
3. Three Little Words by Ashley Rhodes Courter – I always felt this stunning YA memoir about foster care didn’t get enough attention when it came out.
4. Lionboy trilogy by Zizou Corder – this amazing middle-grade series about a boy who can communicate with lions kept my whole family rapt, but I didn’t hear much buzz about it.
5. Things Not Seen and its sequels by Andrew Clements – Clements’ popular books for younger kids get lots of attention, but we also loved this foray into teen fiction about a boy who wakes up one morning to find himself invisible.
6. Alabama Moon by Watt Key – one of our family’s all-time favorite middle-grade read-alouds.  A local bookstore owner told my husband about it; otherwise, we hadn’t heard of it before or since.
7. The Cronus Chronicles by Anne Ursu – Percy Jackson gets all the attention, but Ursu’s fabulous middle-grade series about two teens who get caught up in the affairs of Greek gods are action-packed, exciting, and sprinkled with a great sense of humor.
8. The Mystery of the Third Lucretia by Susan Runholt – I loved this first book in a new mystery series with teen girl detectives tangled up with international art thieves.  Perfect for girls who love (or who’ve outgrown) Nancy Drew.
9. Icecore and Goldstrike by Matt Whyman – exciting, techno-thrillers for teens that my son, husband, and I all loved, but I didn’t hear much else about them.
10. Boom! By Mark Haddon – this hilarious British sci-fi adventure from the author of the adult novel The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time kept our whole family laughing through a very long day stuck in traffic.

So, those are my picks.  How about you?  What are your favorite underrated books for kids and teens?

It's Monday 8/8! What Are You Reading?

Happy Monday morning!  I always look forward to hearing what everyone is reading each week.  It makes Monday a day to look forward to!

We spent the weekend doing much-needed yard work, shopping for my son's birthday, and relaxing with some movies and TV shows (we enjoy catching up on TV shows on DVD during the summer, like Bones, The Mentalist, and Glee).  Our boys both had sleep-overs.  So, busy, busy!

Here's what we've been reading this week:

• Yes, I am STILL reading The Passage by Justin Cronin!  I only have about 50 pages to go.  It is a big book that has taken me three weeks to read, but it has been well worth it - an excellent, well-written novel with a unique plot and in-depth characters.
• My husband, Ken, finished his Jeffrey Deaver novel, The Burning Wire, and is now reading Tropic of Night by Michael Gruber which he picked up at Borders' clearance sale last week.  He enjoyed Gruber's other novel, The Book of Air and Shadows, which I got him for Christmas one year.
• I forgot to mention last week that he and I started a new audio book when we went to pick up our kids from their grandparents' house.  We're listening to Dying for Mercy, a mystery by Mary Jane Clark.  It's good so far - we listened to a bit more while birthday shopping yesterday - though it's hard to say when we'll next have time alone in the car.  This could be another 6-month long audio!
• Jamie, 16, is reading Across the Great Barrier by Patricia Wrede and loving it.  This is the second book in the Frontier Magic series that started with The Thirteenth Child.  Jamie says it is a great series.

I posted two new reviews last week.  At Book By Book, I reviewed the audio book The Bedwetter: Stories of Courage, Redemption and Pee, a funny and outrageous memoir by comedienne Sarah Silverman.   Here at Great Books for Kids and Teens, I posted a review of Amy & Roger's Epic Detour by Morgan Matson, a teen road trip novel that I absolutely loved.  And I posted a summary of what I read in July.


What are you and your family reading this week?


(What are you reading Monday is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey.)

Teen/YA Review: Amy & Roger’s Epic Detour

I always enjoy reading road trip books while we’re on a road trip, so I had saved Amy & Roger’s Epic Detour by Morgan Matson for our June trip through California.  I absolutely loved this warm, unique novel and even found myself reading passages aloud and showing pages to my two teen sons (who are not normally interested in a book with a picture of a girl and boy holding hands on its cover!).  In the classic tradition of all good road trip books, this one is not only about the physical journey but an emotional one as well.

Amy hasn’t been the same since her Dad died this past spring.  Her mom has decided to move them from California to Connecticut, and Amy is expected to join her on the East Coast as soon as she finishes her junior year of high school.  The problem is that Amy hasn’t driven since her dad’s death, so her mother enlists the help of the 19-year old son of a friend of hers to drive Amy to Connecticut.

Amy barely remembers Roger from when they were kids and is embarrassed by her inability to drive.  Though Roger seems like a well-adjusted guy, he is struggling with some issues of his own.  Together, they set out on their cross-country drive, following Amy’s mother’s planned route at first.  Soon, though, the pull of the open road entices them to make a detour that turns into…yes, an epic detour.  One of my favorite parts of the book was when they decided to visit Yosemite National Park, just as we were heading there ourselves, and I could follow along!

This is really two books in one – a scrapbook-style travelogue with photos, receipts, postcards, and other memorabilia interspersed with a novel describing how Amy and Roger both gradually open up to each other and face their own demons.  It could have turned out kind of gimmicky, but it’s not at all because it works so well on both levels.  It’s a well-written novel, warm and real, that is made even better by the travelogue. 

One of the highlights of the book for me was Roger’s Playlists, scattered throughout the book.  I do the same thing on our family road trips – make up custom CDs suited to wherever we are traveling – so I had a blast reading through Roger’s music choices and sharing the playlists with my sons.  In fact, now that I have the book back in my hands (we shipped a box of books back home after our trip), I can’t wait to look up some of Roger’s more obscure songs and listen to them myself.

Amy & Roger’s Epic Detour is a wonderful novel that addresses difficult topics in an accessible way.  The road trip is not merely background but an integral part of the journey.  It is described in wonderful detail that makes you feel as if you are riding along, discovering both the country and yourself along with Amy and Roger.

NOTE: for some extra fun, check out Roger's Playlist #1 on YouTube, a collection of 18 songs from Roger's first playlist in the book which someone has thoughtfully compiled

343 pages, Simon & Schuster

It's Monday 8/1! What Are You Reading?

August 1st already!  July seemed to go by quickly.  I had a very unusual week - my kids were gone all week, and my husband was gone half of the week, so I enjoyed some quiet solitude, a rarity around here in the summer!  I had planned to catch up on all the things I'm behind in and spend lots of time reading, but that never quite works out as I'd planned.  Instead, I watched a bunch of girl-centric movies in the evenings and spent a lot of time with a friend going through a difficult time.  So, not quite the productive week I'd foreseen but rewarding just the same.  The kids had a blast on their grandparents' sailboat, enjoying Block Island, R.I.

And here's what we all read last week:

• I am still reading The Passage by Justin Cronin.  I am finally about halfway through this hefty book!  It is really, really good - original, suspenseful, and compelling.
• My husband, Ken, is reading The Burning Wire by Jeffrey Deaver, one of his favorite thriller writers.  He had fun yesterday browsing though Borders' clearance sale and spending his last Borders gift card, but my son said the YA section was almost empty!
• Jamie, 16, loves to read books set on the water when he's on his grandparents' boat, so he started the week with Rip Tide by Kat Falls, sequel to Dark Life (which he loved) about a civilization deep under the ocean.
• Next, he re-read Pirate Curse, book one in The Wave Walkers series by Kai Meyer - he just has to read at least one pirate book when he's sailing!  He said it was pretty good but not great.  I don't think he's ever read the rest of the series.
• Then he left the water theme behind to read The Lost World by Michael Crichton, sequel to Jurassic Park which he read and loved a few weeks ago.  He loved the sequel, too!
• Now he is re-reading The Thirteenth Child by Patricia Wrede in preparation for reading its sequel in the Frontier Magic series, Across the Great Barrier, which was recently released.  Jamie says this is a great series - I really need to find time to read it.

I did manage to write some reviews last week, including The Story of Beautiful Girl by Rachel Simon on Book By Book, a wonderfully original love story, set against the backdrop of a mental institution in the 1960's.  I also posted a review here of D.J. MacHale's Morpheus Road: The Black, a fast-paced ghost story for teens.


In addition, I posted lists of Top Ten Books That Tackle Tough Issues, both at Book By Book (grown-up books) and here on Great Books for Kids and Teens (two different lists).  Finally, I posted an update on Borders' closing and my shopping expedition to their clearance sale and a sneak peek at the actors playing Gale and Peeta in The Hunger Games movie.


What are you and your family reading this week?


(What are you reading Monday is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey.)

Teen Fiction Review: The Black (Morpheus Road)

 If you’ve read this blog for any length of time, you know that D.J. MacHale’s Pendragon series is one of my all-time favorites for middle-grade and teen readers.  He’s following up that 10-book success with a new series for teens called Morpheus Road.  Last summer, my son and I read the first book, The Light, and a few weeks ago we both read Book 2, The Black.  It’s a scary, suspenseful story sure to please fans of supernatural thrillers.

Interestingly, Book 2 tells the same story as Book 1, but from a different character’s perspective.  That may sound repetitive, but it isn’t: it worked for Orson Scott Card with Ender’s Game and Ender’s Shadow, and it works here for D.J. MacHale.  Book 1, The Light, was written from Marshall Seaver’s perspective, about how his best friend, Cooper Foley, had mysteriously disappeared.  At the end of the book, Marshall found out what happened to Coop (and no, I’m not going to tell you!).

The Black takes place during the same timeline, but it is Coop’s own story of what was happening to him, as Marshall and Coop’s family searched for him.  It reminded me in some ways of Pendragon, with an ordinary teen boy at its center who suddenly finds himself responsible for the fate of the universe.  It is exciting and fast-paced like Pendragon, too, with plenty of plot twists.  The Morpheus Road series, though, deals with ghost stories, something D.J. MacHale knows well from his TV writing career.  I really don’t want to say much more about it because I don’t want to give away its many secrets and surprises, but if you like action-packed supernatural adventures, you’ll love Morpheus Road.

405 pages, Aladdin

First Look at Gale and Peeta in Hunger Games Movie

Entertainment Weekly is publishing a first peek at the actors playing Gale and Peeta:

They both look fairly close to how I imagined the characters, although I didn't picture Peeta quite so buff (he is, after all, a baker's son and specializes in decorating cakes).

What do you think?

Top Ten Kids/Teen Books That Tackle Tough Issues

It's Tuesday and that means Top Ten day over at The Broke and the Bookish.  Today's topic is Books That Tackle Tough Issues.  I love this one because I always enjoy thought-provoking books that teach me or make me think about something (I love the alliteration, too!).  In fact, I wrote my own Top Ten list a few years ago of Books That Taught Me Something, which is a bit similar.

For this week's list, I tried to stick to more recent books I've read that have tackled a wide variety of tough topics and to books written for kids/teens/YA (you can read my Top Ten list of grown-up books at Book By Book).

Top Ten Kids/Teen Books That Tackle Tough Topics:

1. Three Little Words (memoir) by Ashley Rhodes (foster care)
2. Go Ask Alice (drug addiction)
3. Waiting for Normal by Leslie Connor (divorce, unreliable parents, child neglect)
4. Thunder Over Kandahar by Sharon E. McKay (plight of girls/women in Afghanistan)
5. A Million Shades of Gray by Cynthia Kadohata (effects of war on children)
6. Half Brother by Kenneth Oppel (animal rights)
7. Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins (effect of war on society, citizens, and soldiers)
8. Anything But Typical by Nora Raleigh Baskin and Rules by Cynthia Lord (autism, treatment of people who are different)
9. Living Dead Girl by Elizabeth Scott (abduction, rape)
10. Nothing But the Truth by Justina Chen Headley (personal identity, mixed races, fitting in)

What are your favorite books that tackle tough issues?

It's Monday 7/25! What Are You Reading?

What's that sound??  Ah, it's silence. This weekend, my husband and I dropped off our two teen boys at their grandparents' house for their annual week of sailing with Gramie and Pop Pop.  They love this week - it's the highlight of the year for them (that's them with their cousin a few years ago on the Grandkids' Cruise).  And for me?  It's a well-deserved week of quiet solitude in the midst of a crazy-busy summer.  I hope to catch up on all the stuff (especially writing) that has been going undone all summer and, of course, fit in lots of reading (though I was a complete lazy bum last night and watched two movies in a row instead of reading my book!).  This is my week.

We kicked off our quiet week with a mini getaway this weekend.  My husband surprised me for my birthday Saturday with an overnight near New Hope, PA, a lovely little town along the Delaware River.  We had a fabulous dinner and enjoyed some much-overdue quiet time together.

So, last week was very busy, with my husband out of town on business, getting the boys ready for their trip, driving them to CT, and hosting two other teen boys to help out their mom (my friend).  Whew.  We did fit in a little reading, though:

• I am reading The Passage by Justin Cronin, part of my Summer of the Big Book effort to catch up on some hefty reads.  It's almost 800 pages, so I'm only about a quarter of the way through so far, but it is really, really good (though really creepy).
• My husband, Ken, finished Room by Emma Donoghue.  He liked it very much, and we even had time to discuss it over dinner this weekend!
• Ken is now reading The Burning Wire by Jeffrey Deaver, a Father's Day gift from us.  He says it's good so far.
• Jamie, 16, spent a lot of time with friends last week, so he had less reading time than usual.  He finished re-reading City of Ashes by Cassandra Clare.
• Jamie was thrilled when Rip Tide by Kat Falls showed up at our house last week.  It is the sequel to Dark Life which he loved last summer, so he re-read Dark Life and took the new sequel with him on the boat.  He loves to read water-centric books while on the boat, and these take place in a future community deep below the ocean.
• Craig, 13, took an old favorite on the boat with him.  He's decided to re-read the Charlie Bone books which were the first books to really grab his interest a few years ago.
• Ken and I finally finished an audio book this weekend that we started almost 9 months ago!  We rarely have time alone in the car together, so on our way home yesterday we finished Sarah Silverman's memoir, The Bedwetter: Stories of Courage, Redemption and Pee.  We weren't familiar with the comedienne before we listened to this, but I guess this was classic Silverman:  hilarious and outrageous, sometimes a bit uncomfortable, and sometimes suprisingly touching.

In addition to my post on the Summer of the Big Book last week at Book By Book (I could still use some advice on that one!), I also posted about The Demise of  Bookstores and was very sad to come home yesterday and hear that our own Borders is closing this week (I guess they are now closing ALL stores).  I will be stopping by their clearance sale this week to spend one last, remaining gift card.  So sad.

I did manage to post one measly review last week here on Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (book and movie).  I hope to use some of my writing time this week to catch up on reviews!

What are you and your family reading this week?

(What Are You Reading Monday is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey.)

Review: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, book and movie

Last week was Harry Potter week at our house (and probably in many other houses, too!).   I re-read Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows for the second time, and our whole family went to see the final movie at the theater on Sunday.  We don’t get out to the movie theater very often, but for years we have made sure to catch the annual Harry Potter movie, no matter what.  There’s not much I can say about the book or movie that hasn’t already been said, but I thought I’d just share some of my own thoughts on both.

If you haven’t read a Harry Potter book in a while (or…gasp…have never read one), I urge you to pick one up.  I had forgotten what an amazing writer J.K. Rowling is, how she has the ability to make her pretend world seem more real than your real world.  Her books are exciting and fast-paced, of course, but they are also imbibed with a wonderful, subtle sense of humor and plenty of warmth.  By this past weekend, I was at the point where I just could not put the book down (even though I’d read it before and knew how it ended!) – that sounds trite, but in reality, there are very few books that can really make me set aside my to-do list and just spend an entire day reading.

The movies have been remarkable also.  As any avid reader knows, the book is always better than the movie, and there is nothing worse than a poorly done movie adaptation of a favorite book.  My husband, older son, and I have all read all of the Harry Potter books, and we have all thoroughly enjoyed the movies as well.  Of course, as with any movie adaptation, especially of such long books, there are many small details missing and other details that need to be changed, but overall, the Harry Potter movies have stuck closely to the original books.  In this case, the movies have been additive, bringing our favorite characters and scenes to life in a way that pays homage to the books.

Harry Potter has been more than a story; it has defined a whole generation, creating a cultural phenomenon never before seen.  Before J.K. Rowling came along, could you even have imagined a book causing hundreds of thousands of fans to line up for hours?  Or bookstores staying open until midnight so that people could buy a book at the exact moment of its release?  Or kids willingly reading 800-page tomes?  Harry Potter caused all of that and more, paving the way for other mega-popular books and midnight release parties (Twilight comes to mind).

 

So, now it’s all over – the last book written, the last movie made.  Will my family ever go to the movies again?  Well, if we ever miss Harry Potter, we’ll find him alive and well on our bookshelves, in seven beautiful hardcover volumes, just waiting to take us back to the world of witchcraft and wizardry.

 

(NOTE:  I thought you might enjoy some more photos from my son’s 8^th birthday when we hosted a Harry Potter party:  there’s Professor Snape presiding over Potions class, Madam Trelawney in Divinations class, and all the kids ready for their Sorting Ceremony.  I also included a few photos on Monday’s post.)

 

It's Monday 7/18! What Are You Reading?

July 18...summer is already half over!  We had a very busy week here, filled with doctor's appointments, errands, and running the kids all over.  Whatever happened to the lazy days of summer?

We did find some time for reading, however, especially this weekend:

• I read Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (my second time) in preparation for the last movie which we went to see on Sunday.  Both the book and movie were fabulous!  I was glad I had re-read the book because there were a lot of details left out or changed in the movie, and I was reminded of just how wonderful J.K. Rowlings' books are - by this weekend, I was at the point where I didn't want to do anything but read, and I didn't care what was left undone!  I've included a few photos here of Jamie's 8th birthday when we put together a big Harry Potter party and transformed our entire house into Hogwarts.  We recruited some friends to help play the roles of the professors (you can see everyone at the table in the Great Hall below; I was Professor McGonagall, on the right in the photo with Dumbledore and Snape).  The kids all had a blast, as did the adults!
• Last night, I just started The Passage by Justin Cronin, a July birthday gift from my husband LAST summer that I have finally gotten around to reading.  I've just started it, but it seems intriguing so far.
• My husband, Ken, is reading Room by Emma Donoghue, based on my recommendation.
• Jamie, 16, is re-reading City of Ashes by Cassandra Clare, and he told me this morning which five books are next on his list!  He has it all planned out.

I finally started to catch up on my backlog of reviews last week, posting new reviews of Blood, Bones and Butter, a memoir by chef Gabrielle Hamilton, at Book By Book and  Deadly, a teen historical novel by Julie Chibarro.  I also posted my Top Ten Lists of Authors I'd Like to Meet and Kids'/Teen Authors I'd Like to Meet.

What are you and your family reading this week?

(What are you reading Monday is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey.)

Teen/YA Review: Deadly

I was intrigued by the subject of Deadly: How Do You Catch an Invisible Killer?, a new teen/YA novel by Julie Chibbaro.  It’s about how scientists unraveled the mystery of so-called Typhoid Mary, a cook who unwittingly spread typhoid fever throughout the NYC area in the early 1900’s.  In true historical fiction fashion, Chibbaro took this fascinating real-life event and wove an engaging fictional story around it.

Sixteen year-old Prudence is a turn-of-the-century young woman with big dreams.  Though most of her peers are finishing charm school and hoping to be married soon, Prudence is interested in more meaningful things: science, writing, and having some sort of positive impact on the world.  She’s seen her share of sorrow already, having lost both her father and her brother.  When she gets a job as an assistant at the Department of Health and Sanitation, she feels like her dreams are finally coming true.

Her boss is working on an important case, trying to figure out what is causing an outbreak of typhoid fever in the area.  They think they find a link between the affected homes, a young cook named Mary, but she has never had typhoid.  How can they prove that Mary is contagious and spreading this disease without knowing it?

The science and history here are fascinating, but so is Prudence’s own coming-of-age story, as she struggles with her own personal challenges, including grief, in this journal-like novel told in her own words.  I enjoyed it very much and would love to read another Chibbaro novel.

NOTE: There is nothing objectionable in this novel; it is appropriate for younger teens or preteens.

 

293 pages, Athenuem (Simon & Schuster) 


Where in the World Are You Reading? update: this novel takes place in NYC.

Top Ten Kids/Teen Authors I'd Love to Meet

It's Top Ten Tuesday over at The Broke and the Bookish!  Today's topic is an intriguing one - authors I'd like to meet.  I put some thought into this one and didn't just choose my favorite book authors (though many of them are) but ones I thought would be interesting to meet and talk with.

Here is my list of Top Ten Kids/Teen/YA Authors I'd Love to Meet:

1. J.K. Rowling – she seems to be on everyone’s list!  Specifically, I would like to ask her whether she now sees Daniel Radcliff in her mind when she thinks of Harry Potter or whether she still sees the character she first imagined.
2. Madeleine L’Engle – my favorite childhood author.
3. Laura Ingalls Wilder – another favorite from childhood, plus I’ve read biographies about her and she seems like she was such a kind, thoughtful, intelligent person.
4. D.J. MacHale – loved his Pendragon series – what a great imagination!
5. Orson Scott Card – he’s such an amazing writer – I’d love to talk with him about his novels and his writing.
6. Suzanne Collins – our family loved both her Gregor the Overlander series and The Hunger Games series – I’d love to talk to her about all the thought-provoking issues she brings up in her books.
7. Neal Schusterman – I’d like to talk to him about his ideas about the afterlife from his Everlost series.
8. Kate DiCamillo – her books are so warm and clever - she seems like she'd be a wonderful person to meet.
9. Dr. Seuss – I’ve seen him on lots of lists today – who wouldn’t want to meet the best children’s author ever?
10. Kathryn Kenny – I don’t even know if she’s a real author or a pseudonym for a bunch of them, like Carolyn Keene, but I wanted to be Trixie Belden when I was a kid!

If you're interested in the authors of grown-up books I'd like to meet, you can check out my list at Book By Book.

Which authors would YOU like to meet?

It's Monday 7/11! What Are You Reading?

Well, life is slowly returning to normal after our trip, though I am still way behind in blogging!  Re-entry to real life is always a challenge after a long vacation, but we have finished unpacking and laundry and taken care of the most urgent stuff waiting for us when we got home.

So, we haven't had as much reading time as we did while we were away, but we are still enjoying our books this week:

• I finished Morpheus Road 2: The Black, a teen thriller about the afterlife by D.J. MacHale and enjoyed it.  MacHale told the same basic story from Book 1, from the totally different perspective of a different main character, sort of like what Orson Scott Card did with Ender's Game and Ender's Shadow.  It was clever and suspenseful.
  
• I am now re-reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (book 7) in preparation for this week's movie release.  Fun!
• My husband, Ken, finished The Killing Hour by Lisa Gardner and enjoyed it.
• Ken is now reading Dark Life by Kat Falls, a middle-grade sci fi book that takes place under water that our son really enjoyed.  Ken says it's good, though he feels the technology is less believable than typical adult sci fi novels.
• Sixteen-year old Jamie finished Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton and loved it!
• Jamie is now re-reading City of Bones by Cassandra Clare, book 1 of Mortal Instruments because he enjoyed books 3 and 4 so much on vacation, as I mentioned on the vacation book summary I posted last week.

Didn't have a chance to post any reviews last week, but I did post a summary of the books I read in June.  I'm going to try to catch up on reviews by writing some mini reviews, starting this week, so stay tuned!


What are you and your family reading this week?


(What are you reading Monday is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey.)

Some of the Books Jamie Read on Vacation

As I mentioned in my Monday post, we just returned from a 3-week vacation, and my 16-year old son, Jamie, read about a dozen books in that time!  We had to ship a carton of books ahead of time to keep him stocked up, and the carton hasn't arrived back home yet, so I can't include a full list, but here are some of the books he read while we were away:

• Triss and Loamhedge by Brian Jacques, part of Jamie's effort to re-read the entire Redwall series (which he did!).
• The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, and The Amber Spyglass (His Dark Materials trilogy) by Philip Pullman - a re-read for Jamie.
• Books 3 and 4 (City of Glass and City of Fallen Angels) in The Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare (and he enjoyed those so much, he is now re-reading books 1 & 2!)
• The Dragon's Apprentice, Book 5 in The Chronicles of the Imaginarium Geographica series by James A. Owen, where H.G. Wells asks J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, and Charles Williams to be caretakers of an atlas of imaginary places, thus bringing into the stories the fictional locations of all of your favorite places from fantasy novels (a really wonderful series!)
• Fire by Kristin Cashore, the first novel either of us has read by this author.
• Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton, which Jamie had to borrow from my aunt because he'd run out of books for the flight home!  He was thrilled when I told him there were two sequels that we have at home.

So, that's just a portion of the books Jamie read while we were away.  As you can see, he is an avid book lover!  And, unlike his mother, he can read in the car without getting sick, so he spent all of our driving hours buried in fiction, lucky boy.

It's Monday 7/4! What Are You Reading?

Happy Fourth of July!  I didn't even remember it was Monday until just now...oops.

We just returned this weekend from a 3-week vacation in California and Oregon, so that's why I have been absent from the blogging world for so long.  Sorry I just sort of left without saying anything, but it didn't seem like a good idea to announce on the internet that we'd be away for 3 weeks!  We had a magnificent time and saw so many beautiful sites.  This photo was taken at Crater Lake National Park.  Yes, it was summer there, too, but they still have over 20 feet of snow!  It was mind-boggling, but the views were still gorgeous.  If you'd like to see more photos from our trip, you can check out our trip blog (if you scroll down to June 10, 2011, you can see the pictures in order).

So, what have we been reading?  That's a big question this week!  I'll try not to make this list too long:

• I started our trip reading Vanishing Acts by Jodi Picoult, wanting a fun, gripping read for the long flight.  It was classic Picoult, with alternating viewpoints and a few twists, and I enjoyed it.
• I love to read road trip books while on a road trip, so next I read Amy & Roger's Epic Detour, a teen book by Morgan Matson, about two young adults on a cross-country road trip that is also an emotional journey.  I loved this book, especially the playlists and scrapbook-style entries.  Best part: when the characters went to Yosemite right when we were headed there ourselves!
• Finally, I read Little Bee by Chris Cleave on the way home and absolutely loved it.  A very powerful story about hope and redemption and people coming together.
• I am now reading Morpheus Road: The Black, book 2 in the teen series by D.J. MacHale.  I always enjoy MacHale's books.
• My husband, Ken, read The Little Book by Selden Edwards, a novel he gave me for my birthday last year about an 80's rock star who goes back in time to 1890's Vienna.  We both enjoyed it.
• Ken is now reading The Killing Hour by Lisa Gardner, one of several suspense paperbacks I picked up for him at a library sale.  Neither of us had ever read Gardner before, but Ken says this novel is very good.
• Our 16-year old son, Jamie, read between 10 and 12 books during our 3-week trip!  We shipped a box of books out there ahead of time for him, he went through every single one and then had to borrow a book from my aunt for the trip home!  That box of books hasn't arrived back home yet, so I won't try to remember all the titles.
• After a couple days of complaining, we finally got our 13-year old son interested in a book.  Jamie had just re-read His Dark Materials Trilogy by Philip Pullman, so Craig started The Golden Compass (he had seen the movie but not read the book), and he actually got caught up in it and has been reading before bed at night.

So, it was a wonderful trip with lots of good reading along the way.  Unfortunately, the bronchitis I had before the trip came back with a vengeance while we were away, so I am still struggling with that.  Hopefully, I will start to get back to normal here soon.

I missed hearing about what all of you are reading, so please tell me what books you and your family are enjoying this week!

Middle-Grade Review: My So-Called Family

Courtney Sheinmel’s middle-grade novel, My So-Called Family, is definitely a 21^st-century type of story, about a girl who has a donor instead of a dad.  It’s a well-written book that takes a look at the meaning of family.

Thirteen-year old Leah Hoffman-Ross never really had a father; her mother chose a donor from a reproductive agency and had a baby on her own.  Although her mom is open about it and Leah now has a wonderful stepfather and brother whom she love, she still feels uncomfortable with her origins.  When they move to New York and Leah starts a new school, she feels like she has to keep the truth a secret from her new friends.  Here, one of them asks about her hyphenated last name:

“Oh, yeah.  Ross is my stepfather’s last name,” I said.  “He and my mom got married six years ago.”  I didn’t tell her Hoffman was my mother’s maiden name.  She could just assume the Hoffman part came from my biological father.  I could be like thousands of kids with a father and a stepfather.  That was my plan anyway.

“My mom’s remarried, too,” Callie said.  “I practically know my stepfather better than my real father.  Does your dad live nearby at least?”

“Oh, no.  He’s off in Europe somewhere,” I said, reciting the familiar line I usually told about my family.  “I’m not exactly sure where.”

Then, Leah finds an online Sibling Registry hosted by the reproductive agency her mom used and discovers she has siblings who were also fathered by Donor 730.  She feels compelled to meet these previously unknown brothers and sisters but isn’t sure what her mother will think.

It’s an interesting story.  Although the premise may not be something most kids can relate to, Leah’s struggles will be familiar to all adolescents – feelings of embarrassment over aspects of her family, wanting to fit in and just be a “normal” kid, and straddling the line between childhood and growing up.  It’s a well-written story with realistic, likeable characters and a thought-provoking plot.

194 pages, Simon & Schuster

For more information on this and other novels, visit the author’s website. 

 

It's Monday 6/6! What Are You Reading?

Happy Monday!

The past week passed by in a blur - I'm still very sick and was unable to do much of anything all week, so I apologize for not being able to get around and visit blogs like I usually do (or post much on my own blogs).  I'm hoping to start improving this week, but then I'll be very busy preparing for our upcoming vacation and getting to all the kids' last-week-of-school events.  Busy time of year!

Well, the one good thing about being this sick is having lots of reading time:

• I finished reading The Story of Beautiful Girl by Rachel Simon, a local author here in Delaware.  I loved her two memoirs, Riding the Bus with My Sister and Building a Home with my Husband, and her new novel is absolutely wonderful.  It tells the story of the love between a deaf man and a mentally handicapped woman, both institutionalized in the 1950's.  It's a beautiful story, beautifully written, and I do hope to find time to write this review this week.
• Since I've read very few kids and teen books this past month (see my May summary), I decided to focus on those for a while.  I read a middle-grade novel, My So-Called Family by CourtneySheinmel, about a girl with a very 21st-century problem.  Leah doesn't have a father; she has a donor.  And despite having a loving mother and step-father and an adorable step-brother she loves very much, Leah still feels like something is missing from her life.  I enjoyed the novel.
• Now I'm reading a teen/YA novel, Deadly: How do you catch an invisible killer? by Julie Chibbaro.  It's a fascinating novel based on the real-life story of Typhoid Mary.  In the novel, sixteen-year old Prudence lives in NYC in 1906 and is interested in science - not a popular or acceptable choice for girls of that time.  She gets a job as an assistant at the Department of Health and Sanitation, helping her boss track down the cause of a typhoid epidemic.  It's well-written and absorbing.
• Ken finished Num8ers by Rachel Ward, a teen/YA thriller that I enjoyed, then moved onto its sequel The Chaos.  He says he enjoyed the series very much.
• Jamie, 16, was also quite sick all week, plus was busy trying to finish his schoolwork.  He has three exams this week and then he is free for the summer!  He is still re-reading the Redwall series by Brian Jacques but has filled a carton with books he wants to read on vacation!  I'm going to ship it out to California ahead of time for him (plus a few for me!).

In addition to my May summary, I did manage to post one new review last week, of the teen/YA novel The Deathday Letter by Shaun David Hutchinson,  a darkly humorous look at the meaning of life and death.


What are you and your family reading this week?



(What are you reading Monday is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey.)