Teen/YA Review: Between Shades of Gray

Like most avid readers, I have been hearing rave reviews of Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys, a teen/YA historical novel, since it was first published in 2011. When it came time to choose a birthday gift for my 14-year old cousin who loves history, I decided to give her two of the best YA historical novels I could find. She is especially fascinated by the World War II period of history and loved The Diary of Anne Frank, so I chose The Book Thief and Between Shades of Gray for her. In her thank you note to me, she said she was in the middle of reading Between Shades of Gray and never wanted it to end. I decided I needed to finally read this acclaimed novel for myself, so we can talk about it when I see her at Thanksgiving next week. This compelling novel about a little-known historical tragedy deserves all of the praise it’s gotten.

In 1941, fifteen year-old Lina is living a typical teen life with her family in Lithuania, which has recently been occupied by the Soviet Union. Her family is close and loving, she loves to draw and paint, she and her cousin enjoy sharing their dreams and wishes with each other, and she is even beginning to notice boys. Then her world is shattered when the Soviet secret police burst into her home one day and force her and her mother and younger brother into a train car headed for an unknown destination. Lina’s father was taken the day before, and the family has no idea where he is.

The Soviets separate the women and children from the men, and they are forced into crowded freight train cars, where they struggle to stay alive with little food or water. Eventually, Lina, her mother, and her brother arrive at a Soviet work camp. Conditions are inhumane, and they are made to work at hard labor for 12 hours or more a day, with a food ration of just a piece of bread for each person each day. Lina struggles to remain hopeful and to find a way to find her father and get word to him of where they are being kept. Although she knows it is dangerous, she draws pictures of their experiences and hides them, in the hope that someday their story will be told. She surreptitiously draws coded pictures that she passes along from one person to the next, hoping they will eventually arrive at the prison camp where her father is being held.

This is a beautifully written and emotionally powerful story. Lina and her fellow captives come alive on these pages, and it is impossible to set this book aside – or forget its characters – once you start it. Behind this moving story are real-life facts that are astonishing and that most people, myself included, have never heard before. While most of the world was watching Hitler and the Nazis in Germany, the Soviet Union was quietly deporting hundreds of thousands of people from the Baltic countries of Latvia, Estonia,  and Lithuania (as well as Finland) to Soviet labor camps and prisons in Siberia, some further north than the Arctic Circle. These people were deemed anti-Soviet for one reason or another and included doctors, engineers, teachers and university professors, librarians, and more. Many of them, including children, were held prisoner for 10-15 years in Siberia, under horrifying conditions.

It was stunning to me that all of this went on, and I’d never heard about it before. It seems that few people did. Even after the prisoners were returned to their hometowns (more than a decade later!), their beloved countries were still a part of the Soviet Union, and they were warned that if they ever spoke of their experiences, the secret police would immediately deport them and their families back to Siberia. This forced silence continued until the Soviet Union was disbanded in 1991 and the Baltic countries once again regained their names. Thankfully, some people – like Lina in the novel – wrote or drew about their experiences and buried or hid their journals and drawings to be found decades later.

This novel just blew me away. Between the fascinating historical backdrop and the engaging characters, the story as a whole was absolutely compelling. A week after finishing it, I still can not get it out of my mind. Everyone should read this amazing book and learn about this mostly unknown tragedy. I can’t wait to talk to my cousin about it next week!

338 pages, Philomel Books

Listening Library

NOTE: Like many Holocaust novels, this book describes some horrible events and includes a fair amount of tragedy and death; however, it also sends a message of hope and love, showing how people can survive and maintain their spirits under the most atrocious conditions. It is best for teens and young adults (and adults); parts of the book may be too disturbing for younger children.

If you want to hear more about the book and the history that it is based on, check out the author’s video on the book's website.

Note: This post contains affiliate links. Purchases from these links provide a small commission to me (pennies per purchase), to help offset the time I spend writing for this blog, at no extra cost to you.

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Listen to a sample of the audio book here and/or download it from Audible.

 

You can buy the book through Bookshop.org, where your purchase will support the indie bookstore of your choice (or all indie bookstores)--the convenience of shopping online while still buying local!

 
  
  

Or you can order Between Shades of Gray from Book Depository, with free shipping worldwide.

It's Monday 11/18! What Are You Reading?

Ah, I love the peace and quiet of a Monday morning! I know most people hate Mondays, but after a busy weekend with everyone at home (which I enjoy, too!), I like to get back into my weekday routine and dive into the week's projects. I am especially happy this Monday morning because I seem to be finally feeling better, after two months of struggling with a flare-up of my chronic illness. I am hoping this improvement continues this time!

We all enjoyed our books last week:

• I finished Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys and was absolutely blown away by this emotionally powerful teen/YA novel. It's about a teen girl in Lithuania in 1941 whose family is deported to a Soviet labor camp in Siberia. I knew nothing about these horrible events that took place at the same time as World War II (and apparently, neither did most of the rest of the world who were focused on the Nazis). I just can't stop thinking about this incredible novel.
• I am now reading The Dream by Harry Bernstein, a follow-up to his first memoir, The Invisible Wall, which I read earlier this year and loved. This second memoir is about Harry's family's move from England to America in 1922 and their realization of his mother's dream of a better life. Like the first book, this one is excellent so far.
• I am still listening to Rotters by Danial Kraus on audio, a teen/YA novel about grave-robbing, bullying, and the meaning of family. Yes, still listening! It's a long audio book, and I didn't have much time to listen while my son was home sick.
• My husband, Ken, is reading Starvation Lake by Bryan Gruley on his Kindle. It's a suspense novel, and he's enjoying it.
• Jamie, 19, started to feel better last week and moved back into his dorm on Tuesday, after more than a week at home sick. He is still not feeling quite back to his normal baseline and now he is trying to catch up at school, so his reading time has mostly disappeared again. He is still reading the third and final book in the Night Angel trilogy, Beyond the Shadows by Brent Weeks - he absolutely loves this series!
• Craig, 15, has just started reading The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon for his British Literature class. I love how the English teachers at his school incorporate contemporary fiction into the curriculum as well as classics (though I still don't understand how you can teach Brit Lit and skip Dickens!) Although Craig doesn't enjoy reading much, we keep telling him he'll like this book. My husband, older son, and I have all read it and loved it.

 I posted a couple of reviews last week:

Review of Where'd You Go, Bernadette by Maria Semple, a hilarious and warm novel about family.

Review of Tell Us We're Home by Marina Budhos, a middle-grade/teen novel about recent immigrants trying to find their place in their new world.

I also wrote a Weekend Cooking post, with links to several delicious and nutritious recipes.

(What Are You Reading Monday is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey, with a kid/teen version hosted by Unleashing Readers.)

And, remember, Book By Book is now on Facebook, so you can get updates and join in some fun bookish conversations there.

And now Great Books for Kids and Teens has its own Facebook page, too!

What are you and your family reading this week? 

Middle-Grade/Teen Review: Tell Us We’re Home

 Tell Us We’re Home by Marina Budhos is a unique novel aimed at older middle-grade or teen readers about three girls who are daughters of maids and nannies in a wealthy town where most of their classmates are from the families for whom their mothers work. It’s an interesting perspective on immigrants that I’d never considered before, and I enjoyed the novel.

Jaya, Maria, and Lola were all born in different countries but now live in the same small town in New Jersey. Each of them felt alone and isolated until she met the other two, and the three of them became instant friends because they had so much in common in spite of their vastly different cultural backgrounds. Their mothers all work for local families as maids and nannies, which leaves the girls each feeling very different from most of her classmates. The three become fast friends, saving coins to buy a milkshake to share, walking back from school together, and confiding in each other about the difficulties of being poor in a wealthy town.

Finding each other was a turning point for each of the girls, but life proves to be even more challenging than they expected. Jaya’s mother is accused of theft and loses two of her jobs. Maria is worried about her cousin, who is embroiled in a battle over the local playing fields where he and his friends want to play soccer – a battle that threatens to involve the entire town. Lola worries about her father’s unending depression and his inability to find work as an engineer, as he had back in Slovakia, while the bills pile up and her mother’s health worsens. Although the three friends share a lot with each other, each of their own problems threatens to pull them apart and get in the way of their friendship.

I enjoyed this novel for several reasons. It deals with a topic that I’d never really thought about before – what life is like for recent immigrants in the U.S. today, especially kids who are dumped into an unfamiliar environment at a time in their lives when they are struggling with ordinary adolescent issues, like self-image, confidence, and identity. I also liked that it didn’t over-simplify the issues. There are no easy answers to the complex problems that plague these three friends and no tidy happily-ever-after at the end. Certainly, they do resolve some of their worst problems and come to realize they can rely on each other, but deeper cultural and community issues remain, just like in real life.

My only complaint about Tell Us We’re Home was some uneven editing throughout, and especially toward the end. There were minor inconsistencies, places where the action suddenly jumped somewhere else, and other petty annoyances. For instance, in one chapter, the girls are drinking hot chocolate and then a sentence later it says that one girl held her hot mug of tea. Like I said, these were minor problems, indicative of sloppy editing, that were easy for me to overlook since the story itself was so engaging.

All in all, this is a warm, tender, thought-provoking story about immigrants, cultural differences, community, and mostly, friendship.

247 pages, Atheneum Books for Young Readers (Simon & Schuster)

 

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

Happy Veteran's Day! My grandfather is on my mind today. He served in the Marines during World War II and was at Iwo Jima (in fact, he was injured there), and that experience shaped the rest of his life. He was forever fascinated by everything related to the War, and the Marines he served with became his lifelong friends. All of the men and women who serve and protect us should be honored, not just today but every day.

So, I was feeling better last week and back on my feet, for the most part. But, our college-aged son came home sick on Monday evening, and he is still here. He probably has mono (we are waiting for blood work to confirm), which is a serious issue for someone with the immune system disorder that he and I both have. So, he is living at home for now and could be for quite a while.

As always, books provide all of us with comfort and escape during rough times:

• I finished Tell Us We're Home by Marina Budhos, a middle-grade novel about the daughters of maids and nannies living in a wealthy town where their classmates are mostly the kids of families their moms work for. It was very good, and I will try to post a review this week.
• Next, I read Where'd You Go, Bernadette by Maria Semple for an upcoming book discussion/dinner this week hosted by my local bookstore (a local chef prepares food related to the book being discussed - I can't wait!). This book is clever and hilarious, filled with delicious, spot-on satire of modern life, especially life as a parent of a school-age child. I was laughing out loud from the first page to the last, though it is also a warm and tender story about love and families.
• Last night, I started Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys, a highly acclaimed teen/YA novel about a young Lithuanian girl in 1941 whose family is taken by the Soviets to a Siberian labor camp. I recently gave this book to my 14-year old cousin for her birthday (she is an avid history fan), so I wanted to read it myself so we can talk about it at Thanksgiving time!
• I am still listening to Rotters by Daniel Kraus on audio, a unique, dark novel about grave-robbing and bullying. It's a bit of a downer, but the story is compelling.
• My husband, Ken, finished Ghost Man by Roger Dobbs, a thriller by a first-time author that I gave him for his birthday last month. He said it was interesting how the author gets you rooting for the main character, even though he's a very bad guy.
• Now, he has gone back to finish Starvation Lake by Bryan Gruley, an e-book thriller he started on his Kindle while traveling two weeks ago.
• Jamie, 19, was home sick all week. The only silver lining to that is that he finally had some time to read, though catching up on all the TV shows he's missed while at college occupied a lot of his time, too.  He finished Shadows Edge by Brent Weeks, book 2 of the Night Angel trilogy, a favorite of his.
• Next, he read Infinity by Sherrilyn Kenyon, the first book in the Chronicles of Nick series, a book I gave him for Christmas last year.
• Now, he is reading the third and final book in the Night Angel trilogy, Beyond the Shadows by Brent Weeks.

With Jamie home last week (lots of cooking for me and the TV on all the time!), I didn't manage to write any reviews, but I did write some fun posts last week:

Top Ten (Actually, Seven) Sequels I Can't Wait to Read

Top Ten Kids/Teen/YA Sequels I Can't Wait to Read

Summary of Books Read in October and Challenges Progress

Catching Fire Movie Trailer

Weekend Cooking post, with recipes for lots of our favorite comfort meals.

(What are you reading Monday is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey, with a kid/teen version hosted by Unleashing Readers.)

And, remember, Book By Book is now on Facebook, so you can get updates and join in some fun bookish conversations there. 

And now Great Books for Kids and Teens has its own Facebook page, too! 

What are you and your family reading this week?

Books Read in October

October is one of my favorite months - I can't believe it's over already! It was a rough month for me - lots of sick days (weeks), but that means I had lots of reading time.

October was also Dangerous Reads Month (inspired by Tanya at Girl xoxo), and I thoroughly enjoyed reading and listening to lots of creepy books! Here's what I finished reading in October:

• Dreams of My Russian Summers by Andre Makine, novel (Russia)
• Unbroken by Paula Morris, teen/YA ghost story novel (Louisiana)
• City of Women by David Gilham, historical fiction (Germany)

• In the After by Demitria Lunetta, teen/YA post-apocalyptic/dytopian audio book (Illinois)
• UnWholly by Neal Schusterman, teen/YA dystopian novel (Arizona)
• In the Woods by Tana French, mystery novel (Ireland) 

So, six books total, all fiction, evenly split between teen/YA and adult novels and one was an audio book. No nonfiction or middle-grade books this month. I think you can see just from the covers that most were creepy good fits for Dangerous Reads Month! I missed a couple of reviews early in the month while I was sick. It's hard to choose a favorite, but I think for this month it was City of Women.

Update on 2013 Reading Challenges:
I added four new locations for my 2013 Where Are You Reading Challenge: Louisiana, Arizona, Ireland, and Russia. That brings my totals up to 26 states and 11 countries. Three of these book were from my TBR shelves, bringing my total up to 16 for the 2013 TBR Pile Reading Challenge. I listened to one audio books for the 2013 Audio Book Challenge, bringing my total up to 11 for this year so far.

Oh, and in October, I started Facebook pages for both of my book blogs: Book By Book and Great Books for Kids and Teens. Check them out and click "Like" to get updates on new blog posts and reviews and have fun chatting with other book lovers!

All in all, it was a great reading month! What were your favorite books read in October?

Catching Fire Trailer

The movie adaptation of Catching Fire, sequel to The Hunger Games, comes to theaters on November 22!!

Check out the trailer:



We can't wait to see this one - my husband, son, and I all loved this trilogy.

Did you read Catching Fire? Are you looking forward to the movie?

P.S. Remember that Great Books for Kids and Teens is now on Facebook! Like the page and you can keep up with posts and reviews and enjoy chatting with other book lovers!

Top Ten Sequels I Can't Wait to Read

It's Tuesday and that means it's Top Ten Tuesday over at The Broke and the Bookish. Head over there and check out all the top ten lists! Today's topic is Top Ten Sequels I Can't Wait to Read. At first, I was going to skip this topic because I don't read a lot of series, but in looking through my reading journal, I realized there are some series and trilogies that I do want to finish. I still couldn't come up with ten, but I got close.

So, without further ado, here are Top Ten (er, Nine) Sequels I Can't Wait to Read:
 
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1. UnSouled by Neal Schusterman, follow-up to Unwind and UnWholly (just finished last week!)
2. In the End, sequel to In the After by Demitria Lunetta, an audio I just finished last month.
3. Infinity Ring Book 3 - The Trap Door by Lisa McMann - I probably won't read the entire series, but McMann is one of my favorite authors, and I enjoyed Books 1 & 2.
4. Book 3, end of the trilogy starting with The Pathfinder and Ruins by Orson Scott Card
5. Dustlands, Book 2 - Rebel Heart by Moira Young, sequel to Blood Red Road
6. Insurgent and Allegiant, sequels to Divergent by Veronica Roth (I have some catching up to do!)
7. The rest of the series that follows Dicey’s Song by Cynthia Voight
8. The Blood, Book 3 of Morpheus Road, sequel to The Light and The Black by D.J. MacHale 
9. Monsters of Men, Book 3 of the Chaos Walking series by Patrick Ness - I loved The Knifeof Never Letting Go and The Ask and the Answer.

Some of these are already sitting on my shelf, waiting patiently! There is just never enough time to read all the books I want to read. If you are also interested in the grown-up sequels I am looking forward to, check out my list at Book By Book.

What middle-grade or teen/YA sequels are you looking forward to?

It's Monday 11/4! What Are You Reading?

Eeek! November already? It seems to sneak up on me every year, on the heels of all the Halloween excitement. I had another week sick on the couch, which was very frustrating. "Just" a flare-up of my chronic illness this time, but that makes almost a full month of not being very productive. So, I am hoping that November is a fresh start! And it's certainly been good so far...my son was invited away for the weekend with a friend's family, so my husband and I got away together for a mini 24-hour getaway to the beach. We've been trying to do this for over a year, so we thoroughly enjoyed the little break and the time together.

Sick time always means plenty of reading time for me (the silver lining) - here's what we read last week:

• I closed out Dangerous Reads Month and finished In the Woods by Tana French, a compelling mystery that is also beautifully written. Here's my review.
• I am now reading (and almost finished with) Tell Us We're Home by Marina Budhos, a middle-grade novel about three young girls who bond as friends because they are all daughters of maids in a very wealthy town where their classmates' families are their mothers' employers. It's been a very engaging story about the experiences of recent immigrants - can't wait to see how it ends today.
• I am still listening to Rotters by Daniel Kraus, a teen/YA audio book that won the Odyssey award for audio excellence. While it fit in well with Dangerous Reads Month (it deals with grave-robbing), I was surprised to learn that it is also about bullying. Its very good so far - I just started Part 2.
• My husband, Ken, was away on business last week, so he chose a book on his Kindle, Starvation Lake by Bryan Gruley, a mystery/suspense novel, to read while he was traveling.
• Now that he's back home, he's returned to Ghost Man by Roger Dobbs, a birthday gift from me last month. It's a fast-paced thriller by a first-time author, and he's enjoying it so far.
• Jamie, 19, is still reading Shadows Edge by Brent Weeks, book 2 of the Night Angel trilogy. He loves this series but hasn't had much reading time at college lately.
• Craig, 15, has been reading Beowulf for his Brit Lit class; I saw he had written an essay about the novel last night, so I think they are almost done with it.

Last week, I posted two new reviews:

In the Woods by Tana French

UnWholly by Neal Schusterman

What are you and your family reading this week?

(What are you reading Monday is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey, with a kid/teen version hosted by Unleashing Readers.)

And, remember, Book By Book is now on Facebook, so you can get updates and join in some fun bookish conversations there.  

And now Great Books for Kids and Teens has its own Facebook page, too!

My husband and I at Rehoboth Beach this weekend.

Teen/YA Review: UnWholly

One of my favorite books read for Dangerous Reads Month was UnWholly by Neal Schusterman, the sequel to his popular and highly acclaimed Unwind, which my husband, son, and I all loved. This super creepy dystopian thriller kept me up way too late reading every night!

The setting of this trilogy is a United States just slightly into the future, where a second civil war, The Heartland War, has been fought over reproductive rights. The pro-lifers and the pro-choicers finally ended the war with the Unwind Accord that says that life is inviolable starting at conception;  however, unruly or disagreeable teens (is there any other kind?) can be “unwound,” whereby all of their organs and body parts are transplanted into others so that life does not officially end. So, a kid who gets bad grades or rebels against his or her parents may wake up one morning to find officers from the National Juvenile Authority ready to take them to a harvest camp because their parents signed an Unwind Order. I know – super creepy, right??

In Unwind, Schusterman created a chilling but compelling story about a group of teens who, in various ways, escaped their unwinding. Connor escaped from the Juvies on the way to harvest camp and was officially declared an AWOL. During a car accident, he took Lev, a tithe (yes, a kid born to be unwound), as an unwilling hostage to help him escape.  Risa, an orphan and ward of the state also escaped when she was sent to a harvest camp to relieve overcrowding in her state home.

Don’t worry – no spoilers here for those who haven’t read Unwind yet! In the second book, these teens’ stories continue as they try to stay alive, evade the Juvenile Authorities, and help other Unwinds to escape. The story alternates between each of the main characters’ perspectives (plus a few new ones), providing a wide range of points of view of this frightening world. A new teen character is also introduced: Cam, a new kind of person who must come to grips with his own strange history and who learns a startling truth about unwinding.

Although the novel is action-packed from start to finish and filled with suspense, Schusterman also delves more deeply here into the ethical issues that arise from this strange new world (as all good dystopian stories do). The characters grapple with all kinds of moral issues, as the events from the first novel reverberated through society. Does the good done by providing much-needed transplant organs and tissues make up for the evil of unwinding? Should the needs of the many outweigh the rights of the few? What makes someone human and defines life? Although horrifying, this world is also compelling; Schusterman himself said that he intended Unwind to be a stand-alone book, but he just couldn’t stop thinking about the world he’d created there.

While the gripping story and intricate plot kept me turning the pages, I also enjoyed the thought-provoking nature of the novel. Schusterman has created a world that is unfathomable and yet eerily similar to our own. The unthinkable act of unwinding is rationalized in frighteningly calm and logical ways. The teen characters in this trilogy are realistically portrayed and feel like old friends by the second book. The third and final book of the trilogy, UnSouled, will be released next week – my husband, son and I can’t wait to see how it all ends!

401 pages, Simon & Schuster

 

It's Monday 10/28! What Are You Reading?

Thank goodness it's Monday - I need to recover from my relaxing weekend. ha ha Seriously, we had a very good weekend. Too often, our weekends turn out to be just work around the house, but this time, my husband and I went out to dinner with our oldest friends Saturday night, and we drove to our favorite pumpkin farm on Sunday with both sons (and a friend) along - it was nice to have the whole family together (our oldest is in college).

So, a good weekend though exhausting for me! We enjoyed some good reading last week, too:

• I finished Unwholly by Neal Schusterman, a teen/YA dystopian thriller and the sequel to his highly acclaimed Unwind, about a future world where wayward teens can be "unwound," with all of their body parts transplanted in other people so that they are officially still alive. Chilling and perfect for Dangerous Reads Month! I can't wait to read the final book in the trilogy, Unsouled, which will be released next week.
• Now, I am reading one last book for Dangerous Reads Month, In the Woods by Tana French. I bought it (and later, the next two in the series) for my husband, and he's been telling me I have to read them. He was right - in some ways, it is a classic murder mystery, but with a twist and with excellent writing. Some passages read more like literary fiction than a typical mystery.
• I am listening to Rotters by Daniel Kraus, a teen/YA novel on audio. The audio book won the Odyssey award a couple of years ago, and it is excellent so far. It's also a fit for Dangerous Reads Month since it is about grave robbing...though I was surprised to find out that it is also about bullying.
• My husband, Ken, read Blood Red Road, a teen/YA post-apocalyptic novel that my son and I both liked. The main character narrates the book in an unusual slang-type style but, like me, he soon got used to the odd writing style and enjoyed the book. Book 2 in the Dustlands series, Rebel Heart, was just released this month, so all three of us are looking forward to reading it.
• Last night, Ken started Ghost Man by Roger Dobbs, another gift from me. This is a thriller written by a first-time author, and I've heard it is excellent.
• Jamie, 19, has been very busy at college with mid-terms, so he hasn't had much reading time. He said he is still working on Shadows Edge by Brent Weeks, book 2 of the Night Angel trilogy, and it is excellent so far. We bought him the first book for his birthday this summer, and he loves the series.
• Craig, 15, is still reading Beowulf for Brit Lit class.

I posted two reviews (both good Dangerous Reads books, if you want to get into the Halloween spirit!) last week, plus some other fun posts:

Review of The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman, a supernatural coming-of-age tale by a master storyteller.

Review of In the After by Demitria Lunetta, a teen/YA post-apocalyptic and dystopian novel that I listened to on audio.

Weekend Cooking post, featuring some of the highlights of our last few weeks.

First peek at The Book Thief movie trailer - I can't wait!

What are you and your family reading this week?

(What are you reading Monday is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey, with a kid/teen version hosted by Unleashing Readers.)

And, remember, Book By Book is now on Facebook, so you can get updates and join in some fun bookish conversations there. 

Our family at our favorite pumpkin farm

Teen/YA Review: In the After

Continuing the creepy fun in Dangerous Reads Month, I listened to the teen/YA audio book In the After by Demitria Lunetta. This suspenseful story combines both post-apocalyptic and dystopian elements into a fast-paced novel full of surprises.

Amy is fourteen when They come and change the world. Gruesome green-skinned monsters, They have a taste for human flesh and quickly take over the world. TV news coverage shows Them arriving in a ship, before all forms of media disappear. Amy is fortunate to live in a high –security house that helps keep Them away and her safe, but her parents – who were out when the attack began – are missing. The creatures seem to have a poor sense of sight and smell but excellent hearing, and Amy quickly learns to live a very silent existence, especially on those dangerous occasions when she must leave the house for supplies. On one of those excursions, Amy discovers a scared and battered toddler, all alone in a deserted grocery store, so she takes her home and calls her Baby.

Amy and Baby live together for several years in the safe house, using their own form of sign language to communicate and rarely seeing other human beings. They become very close, and their life together falls into a routine, though danger is still lurking just outside the fence.

Then one day, they are saved! A community called New Hope finds them and takes them into the safety of their compound where many others are living safely and peaceably together.  Finally, Amy can relax, and they can both get used to not being alone anymore. It takes a period of adjustment, but they both make new friends, start school, and settle into life in New Hope. But certain things just don’t seem right to Amy, and the more she learns about New Hope, the more concerned she becomes.  Besides Them outside the compound, she now worries about new dangers possibly lurking right inside their new home and how to keep herself and Baby safe.

Throughout the story – through both the post-apocalyptic beginning and the dystopian second half – the suspense and tension are maintained.  I listened to the book in record time. Like another post-apocalyptic novel I recently finished, AMatter of Days, this one also contains some unlikely coincidences – Amy’s father was an environmentalist who installed solar panels so they could live “off the grid” and her mother had a super-secret government job that required an electric security fence around their house – that ensured the main character’s survival in the frightening post-apocalyptic world. As with that book, I just accepted those contrivances as necessary to the story and went along for the ride – and it was a wild ride! It sounds like there might be a sequel coming…ah, yes, I see on the author’s blog that In the End will be released June 24, 2014. I can’t wait!

Listening Library/Harper Children’s Audio

If you want to listen to a sample of the audio, click on the amazon link below - there is a "Listen" button just below the photo of the cover. 

The Book Thief Movie Preview!

I'm so excited!!

One of my all-time favorite books, The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, has been made into a movie! I've read the book twice myself and recently gave it to my 14-year old cousin who loves historical fiction and is fascinated by World War II for her birthday. Check out the official movie trailer:



I think it looks sooo good! I can't wait to see it....January!

What do you think? Does the trailer look good to you? Will you see the movie?

It's Monday 10/21! What Are You Reading?

Happy Monday!

It is a happy Monday for me, as I am finally feeling better after being sick for over two weeks. I turned the corner last week just in time to go to my neighborhood book group's 125th book celebration! It was so good to be out among friends  - and talking about books, too! So, today feels like a fresh start, with a new week ahead and feeling like my old self again.

With all that time spent sick, I've had plenty of reading time:

• I finished City of Women by David Gillham in time for my book group discussion/dinner. It's an emotionally powerful, raw story of women living in Berlin during World War II - ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances, as the author says. I really enjoyed it, as did most of the others in my group.
• I also finished my audio book, a teen/YA novel called In the After by Demitria Lunetta, part of my Dangerous Reads Month. It's a post-apocalyptic story about a teen girl and a toddler trying to survive an invasion of flesh-eating monsters, but the second half is also dystopian. I enjoyed the original story and the suspense.
• I started another teen/YA dystopian novel for Dangerous Reads Month, Unwholly by Neal Schusterman. This is the sequel to Unwind, Schusterman's novel about a future world where abortion is illegal but parents can choose to "unwind" unruly teens between their 13th and 18th birthdays. All parts are used and implanted into other people, so the theory is that the child is still technically alive. Oh, yeah...super creepy stuff! The sequel is just as good as the first book - I can't wait to read book 3 which was just recently released.
• I also started another teen/YA audio book, Rotters. Like Unwholly, this one has been sitting on my shelf for a long time. I was hoping my teen sons would agree to listen to it with me during our road trip this summer, but they say they are done with that (sniff, sniff). It won an Odyssey award for audio book excellence and is very good so far. It also fits in with Dangerous Reads Month, as the story includes grave-robbing (though I haven't gotten to that part yet).
• My husband, Ken, just finished NOS4A2 by Joe Hill last night and said it was very good and very Stephen King-ish (Hill is King's son)...i.e. super creepy! I'm not sure what he's going to read next - like me, he has a big stack of books waiting to be read.
• It's mid-term time in college, so Jamie, 19, hasn't had much time for reading, though he did start Shadows Edge by Brent Weeks, book 2 of the Night Angel trilogy.
• And Craig, 15, is still reading Beowulf for British Lit class.

After I started to feel better at the end of the week, I finally managed a few blog posts and reviews - Woohoo!

BookPage's list of 13 Creepiest Books for October - if you want to get into the spirit of the season, this list is a great place to start!

Review of City of Women by David Gillham, historical fiction set in Berlin in 1943.

Review of A Matter of Days by Amber Kizer, a teen/YA post-apocalyptic audio book.

What are you and your family reading this week?

(What are you reading Monday is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey, with a kid/teen version hosted by Unleashing Readers.) 

And, remember, Book By Book is now on Facebook, so you can get updates and join in some fun bookish conversations there.

Teen/YA Review: A Matter of Days

I like post-apocalyptic novels. Whatever the cause of the apocalypse, it is intriguing to see how the characters survive in a world that is our world but dramatically changed. In the case of A Matter of Days by Amber Kizer, the cause is a weaponized virus.

The story opens on Day 56 of the Blustar Pandemic, a virus that killed 95% of the world’s population. Sixteen year-old Nadia and her younger brother, Rabbit, have watched their mother finally succumb to the virus and are now left on their own. They need to make their way across the U.S., from their home in Seattle all the way to West Virginia, to meet up with their uncle and grandfather, who are their only remaining family.

So, this falls into the category of a journey/road trip sort of post-apocalyptic adventure, which is one of my favorite kinds. The two kids head out from their home, past all the empty houses in their neighborhood, as Nadia very quickly learns to drive. As they make their way across the U.S., they face survival situations – needing to find food, shelter, and stay healthy – but they also face other remaining survivors, many of whom are desperate and/or violent. Along the way, they do meet up with some others, including a neglected dog, a small child, and a guy who grew up on the streets of Los Angeles, whom they aren’t sure they can trust.

I was pulled right into this suspenseful plot with likeable characters. I listened to the audio book, which was well done and engaging. The book is written in first-person in Nadia’s voice, and the narrator did a good job with it. My only criticism is that there were some convenient coincidences to help the story along: their uncle is a disease specialist in the military so he was able to send them vaccines for the virus, their father was also in the military and a survivalist, so he taught them all kinds of tips on how to survive (“be the cockroach”), and their grandfather is a paranoid anti-government person who happens to have a well-stocked survivalist compound. Then again, maybe the story wouldn’t have worked otherwise.

Despite these little contrivances, I fully enjoyed the story, and its fast pace kept me interested and entertained. I came to care about Nadia and Rabbit and cheered them on as they made their way across the deserted country, amid plenty of suspense and danger. I would like to read some of Kizer’s other novels – this is the first one I’ve read.

Listening Library

Listen to an excerpt:


 

It's Monday 10/14! What Are You Reading?

I was hoping for a fresh start on this Monday morning, but I still I am still in bad shape. I've been down and out for a couple of weeks now, and last week was the worst. I think I was exposed to a virus (probably the cold my son had a few weeks ago!) that triggered a severe flare-up of my immune disorder that has now developed into bronchitis. I was feeling a bit better yesterday after a few days on antibiotics, but I probably did too much and woke up today feeling totally wiped out again. So, I am resting (again) and trying to recover (still).

I was so bad last week that I couldn't manage a single review, but I did accomplish one thing: I started a Facebook page for Book By Book! Check it out, click "Like", and you'll get updates on new reviews and blog posts, the chance to interact with other book lovers, and plenty of reading fun! I have lots of ideas for fun, interactive features using this page.

The only good thing about being so sick is having an excuse to read a lot:

• I finished my first book for Dangerous Reads Month, Unbroken by Paula Morris, a teen/YA ghost story set in New Orleans and sequel to Ruined. I enjoyed both books very much, and Unbroken set the perfect spooky mood for this month!
• A kind neighbor went to the library for me so that I could begin our book group selection for this week, City of Women by David Gillham. I chose this one, and I am loving it so far! It's about women in Berlin during World War II, when most of the men were off fighting the war. Lots of twists and turns; I am totally engrossed in the characters and the story. My husband told me last night to stop talking to the book because the characters never listen to me!
• I am listening to a teen/YA post-apocalyptic novel on audio, In the After by Demitria Lunetta. This is another engrossing story and another one for Dangerous Reads Month, with a teen girl trying to survive and take care of a toddler after human-eating aliens attack the earth.
• My husband, Ken, is reading NOS4A2 by Joe Hill, a gift from the kids and I for Father's Day. He says it is very Stephen King-like so far (Hill is King's son). I've heard this one is super creepy, so it is a perfect choice for Dangerous Reads Month!
• Jamie, 19, was home from college yesterday for a few hours and said he'd finally had time to finish the book he was reading when he started school in August! He's been sick a bit lately, too, so he also had some reading/resting time this week. He finished Luck in the Shadows by Lynn Flewelling, book 1 of The Nightrunner series.
• Now, Jamie is reading Shadows Edge by Brent Weeks, book 2 of the Night Angel trilogy that he started this summer while we were on vacation.
• Craig, 15, is still reading Beowulf for his British Lit class.

Just two quick posts last week:

October is Dangerous Reads Month!

Book By Book Now on Facebook

What are you and your family reading this week?

(What are you reading Monday is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey, with a kid/teen version hosted by Unleashing Readers.) 

October is Dangerous Reads Month!

Just like last year, Tanya Patrice over at Girlxoxo has inspired me to celebrate October with spooky, seasonal books. She has declared this October Dangerous Reads Month, and I am joining in on the fun here! Thanks - as always - for the inspiration, Tanya, and for the very cool image!

I've been trying to read lots of TBR books this year since my shelves are overflowing, so I searched through my many bookcases when I read about Dangerous Reads Month. I don't have a lot of classic horror novels waiting, but I've come up with several dangerous choices to squeeze in among my book group books this month and most of them are teen/YA novels:

• Unbroken by Paula Morris - what better way to kick off a spooky month than with a teen/YA ghost story set in New Orleans? Loving it so far!
• Unwholly by Neal Schusterman, the second book in his teen/YA dystopian trilogy about a society that can "unwind" a teen before they turn 18. This one's been waiting patiently on my shelf for a year now, and book #3 comes out next month. Very creepy premise.
• I am currently listening to In the After by Demitria Lunetta, a teen/YA post-apocalyptic novel about a teen girl and a toddler trying to survive in a world that's been taken over by human-eating aliens - ew!
• On the grown-up side, I have a couple of Laura Lippman novels to choose from - I figured that a good murder mystery is plenty dangerous, and my husband has read a few of these that I haven't gotten to yet.
• And I encouraged my husband to join the fun - he's just started NOS4A2 by Joe Hill, a Father's Day gift that I gave him - I've heard it's super-creepy.

So, those are my plans. How about you? What will you read for this spooky, dangerous month?

It's Monday 10/7! What Are You Reading?

Whew - rough week last week. Another busy one and my chronic illness was flared up most of the week, so I had to rest a lot and cancel many of my plans. One of the things we had to cancel was a camping weekend we were all looking forward to. That was disappointing, but after 11 years of living with chronic illness, we are used to last-minute changes and going with the flow! I'm doing a little better today and am hoping for a better week...though the calendar is chock full again!

The one benefit of feeling poorly is plenty of quiet reading time! Here's what we read last week:

• I finished The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky, the classic teen/YA coming-of-age novel. It was amazing! It was a great choice for Banned Books week - check out my review.
• Next I went back to Dreams of My Russian Summers by Andre Makine and finished it finally! It's a slow read - literary fiction - but it was a good story, and I was glad I stuck with it. I'm sorry I missed the book group discussion, though - I've found that my enjoyment of more difficult books is really enhanced when I can discuss it with others.
• Before my next book group read, I wanted to squeeze in a teen/YA novel. I have been reading Unbroken by Paula Morris, sequel to Ruined. It's a ghost story set in New Orleans, and a perfect way to kick off October!
• I also started a new audio book last week and am already halfway through it - amazing progress for me! I am listening to In the After by Demitria Lunetta, a suspenseful post-apocalyptic teen/YA novel.
• My husband, Ken, finished Time and Again by Jack Finney, a classic time travel novel that he and I both enjoyed. He noted that it was slower-paced than he expected, and I agree - it reads more like historical fiction than science fiction.
• Now, he is reading a Father's Day gift I gave him: NOS4A2 by Joe Hill. I'd heard that this supernatural thriller written by Stephen King's son was a good one, so I hope he enjoys it.
• Craig, 15, is still reading Beowulf for Brit Lit, and Jamie, 19, is still too busy with college to have any free reading time!

 I posted two new reviews last week:

Review of Hope's Boy, a memoir by Andrew Bridge.

Review of The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky, a teen/YA classic.

And a summary of Books Read in September.

What are you and your family reading this week?

(What are you reading Monday is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey, with a kid/teen version hosted by Unleashing Readers.) 

I spent a relaxing weekend reading on the deck!

Teen/YA Review: The Perks of Being a Wallflower

In celebration of Banned Books Week, I read a classic teen/YA novel that is always high on the list of banned books, The Perks of being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky. I don’t know how I missed this wonderful novel for so long! I devoured it in just a few days and felt like I got to know the characters intimately and lived in their world.

The entire novel is written through a series of letters that the main character, Charlie, writes to an anonymous “friend.” This is someone Charlie doesn’t know personally but overhead a classmate talking about, and he starts writing to him to ease his anxiety over starting high school. Charlie has good reason to feel anxious. His only real friend from middle school committed suicide, leaving Charlie mourning, confused, and alone.

Charlie describes his days at high school in a way that is familiar to anyone who went to high school…the cliques, the social pressures, the desire to be liked, and the insecurities. He also talks about his family – his mom, dad, older brother who has just left for college, and his older sister who is a senior in high school. Charlie’s family seems very ordinary; he loves them and they love him, but they can drive him crazy at times. His descriptions of holiday dinners with extended family are especially amusing for anyone who has a dysfunctional family of their own!

One evening at a football game, Charlie recognizes a boy from his shop class, a boy known by his classmates as Nothing. Charlie sits down next to him and begins talking with him (finding out his real name is Patrick) and gets to know his stepsister, Sam, too. Although Charlie can be very quirky at times, Patrick and Sam have their own reasons for not quite fitting in, and they all become friends, eventually pulling Charlie into their own group of friends until he finally feels like he belongs.

Charlie himself admits that one of his problems is that he thinks too much, and that is part of what makes his narration so irresistible. He analyzes everything (who didn’t in high school?), wonders about everything, and questions everything. His English teacher, who gives him extra books to read all year long, tells him he needs to participate in life more, but Charlie feels there are some advantages to being a wallflower, always quietly observing the world around him.

This quintessential coming-of-age novel follows Charlie through his entire freshman year, as he experiences all those things familiar to many high schoolers: dances, first dates, the ups and downs of friendships, drugs and drinking, and the Rocky Horror Picture Show. Adding to the fun are ample references to music (mix tapes – it’s set in 1991!), movies, and literature. He writes to his anonymous friend with open candor about his hopes and fears, all that is happening around him, and all that confuses him. Along the way, he grows and learns more about himself and how to feel comfortable in the world. And the reader goes along for the ride, laughing, cringing, crying, and, ultimately, caring about Charlie on his wild ride through his first year of high school.

213 pages, Gallery Books (Simon & Schuster)

Why has it been banned? Ah, The Perks of Being a Wallflower is a censor’s dream! It has a bit of everything – sex, drugs, yup – rock ‘n roll, too! There is also homosexuality, swearing, and sexual abuse. All of it is dealt with in a very frank, almost innocent, way, as Charlie tries to figure things out for himself.

P.S. Now that I’ve read the book, I want to see the movie, though I am a bit leery after loving the book so much. I can see from the movie photo on the cover that the characters don’t look as described in the book which drives me crazy in a book adaptation…but I have heard that the movie is excellent (including from my son!), so I look forward to giving it a try.