Hero

Hero by S.L. Rottman

Okay, if you enjoyed The Outsiders, you'll probably enjoy this book. It's very boy-centered, very realistic, and very tough. The author even has initials like S.E. Hinton! (Also, S.R. Rottman is a girl, too!)

Sean is a 15 year old who is frequently in trouble - in school and out of school. His father is absent, and his mother is an emotionally and physically abusive drunk. After getting picked up by the police for trouble-making, Sean must complete community service at a farm owned by Mr. H. On Sean's first day there, he must help Mr. H with a difficult labor and delivery of a foal - a foal that Sean names Knickers. The foal's mother instantly rejects her baby, and Knickers must be bottle fed and kept away from his mother. Sean makes an instant connection with this young horse, and his attitude about his community service begins to change. While Sean finds purpose in his work at the farm, his mother's abusiveness escalates.

At first, this felt very programmed. However, the story goes to an unexpected place in the last few chapters, and that definitely improved the story a great deal. And while this story is a great companion to The Outsiders, it doesn't capture the deft characterization that SE Hinton manages (even though she was only 15!). (Also, I must mention that sometimes SE Hinton's characterization DEFINITELY shows her youth! Like the overly detailed descriptions of physical appearance!) It also doesn't make the characters nearly as lovable. But for fans of The Outsiders, I would very much recommend this book!

First Part Last (A Coretta Scott King Award)

by Angela Johnson

Poetic prose told from the first person perspective of Bobby, a teen father who is the primary parent of his daughter. The chapters alternate between his narration of the present and all his struggles encountered while caring for baby Feather, and chapters about the past, including those moments prior to and during his girlfriend Nia's pregnancy.

Poignant and superbly written. Also, it flies by at only 131 pages and crisp, clean narration.

Grade: A+

Someone Like You

A rather dull cover of the book.

by Sarah Dessen

Haley helps her bff, Scarlett, deal with her pregnancy while working through her own strained relationship with her mother. This book is a quick, easy read dealing with a rather typical girl's transition from mom's best friend to an individual fighting to define herself. The unusual backdrop is that of her friend's pregnancy.

All in all, this book was good and quick - a few hours will finish it up - but not the quality I expected from Dessen. My sister also agrees, and I believe she's read probably 100% of Dessen's books up to a publication date of 2009.

Grade: C+

Lock and Key

by Sarah Dessen

Not as good as Keeping the Moon, and definitely longer, but still a great read in my opinion. Definitely a girl's book and has all the markers of a great vacation read. What I love about Dessen's books is they are so easily upper teen fiction.

Here's a review from Reading Rants! since it's been awhile for me:
http://www.readingrants.org/2008/05/05/lock-and-key-by-sarah-dessen/

The Mailbox

by Audrey Shafer

By far the best book I have read all summer long. It's a quiet book, focusing on a young boy's love of his uncle.

Gabe Price has had a hard life - tossed from foster home to foster home - until his social worker is able to find his one last living relative - Uncle Vernon. So fifth grader Gabe finally has the stability and home that he always wanted. Vernon's not the warm, fuzzy type, though. A bit rough and crusty, and certainly more than a bit curmudgeonly, Vernon - a vet who seems somewhat haunted by his life in Vietnam - dispenses advice and knowledge to Gabe in small bits and pieces. But it is a good fit for both of them, and they clearly appreciate each other's presence. Oddly, the reader learns all of this after Vernon's death - so I'll back up a bit.

Gabe, a 12 year old boy, returns from his first day of middle school to find Uncle Vernon dead in his study. No fowl play. Just dead. Gabe is naturally shocked and terrified. While most 12 year-olds would run to the nearest adult, Gabe must contend with the fact that Vernon's death means that he will return to foster care. So Gabe shuts the door and goes to bed.

When he wakes up the body is gone. (Ah, the plot thickens!) Gabe is now even more terrified, but in an effort to cling to the one bit of security and stability he has left, he goes to school and returns to find an envelope in the mailbox. A stranger is communicating to Gabe. A stranger who knows about Uncle Vernon. A stranger who seems to know Gabe's conundrum. And where Uncle Vernon's body is.

The mystery of it pulls you in, eh? That's why so many 6th graders said they wanted to read it. But while you wait to discover what exactly happened to Uncle Vernon's body, you fall in love with Gabe and his bittersweet grieving reflections.

This book rocked. I loved the characterization. Gabe and his desire for a home. Gabe and his friends, sometimes childish, sometimes so genuine. Gabe and his dog. Gabe and his teachers. Gabe and the mysterious letter writer. Just a plain great read.

Grade: A+

Out of My Mind

by Sharon Draper.

Melody is a middle school girl with a lot on her mind, but she has spastic quadriplegic cerebral palsy. She has little control over her movements and has no speech. Melody lives at home with a loving family that has no idea of what she is truly capable of. She is limited by the word board that is in front of her. She spends countless hours in a special education room listening to mundane lessons.

But things change, little by little (but they seem fast in the book). First, Melody is mainstreamed into several new classes. She has an awesome new aide. Most importantly, she gains the ability to truly communicate with the use of some high-tech assistive technology. Using a computer board, Melody is now able to speak - very much a la Stephen Hawking.

For the first time, Melody is able to show her exceptional intelligence and her normal middle-school personality. She makes friends - kind of. She's able to say something back to the rude and heartless. She is able to tell her family how much she loves them. And she wows her classmates by getting on the quiz bowl team, helping them win their way all the way to the nationals.

But it's not all perfect. Really. Melody is brought to such heights, you begin to become frustrated. I mean, she is dealing with severe CP, and the book feels damned optimistic. That's why you become frustrated. You know it can't go on, but you want it to. You know it can't go on, and something worse will happen. How happy can this happy ending be? (And for those of you who know me, I'm not a big one for vibrant happy endings anyway.)

I'm going to leave it there and not say anything else. I'll just comment on the style. This book was well-written, straight forward with clean and crisp language. At times, Melody can have some beautiful poetic prose, but that's mostly just at the start and finish. It's an interesting view into the world of someone who is trapped in their body, and I think it would definitely open up any person's view into this type of disability. However, I do think that this book plays it a little too light, but as there are so few fiction books out there on the severely disabled, it's hard to judge. On a side note, this is a great companion to Stuck in Neutral by Terry Trueman, which was about another character with severe CP, but that book was much heavier and darker. I liked Out of My Mind much better, because Melody and her family were much more likable. I guess, although I don't profess to love happy endings, in the end I would prefer to dream that children dealt the most unfair physical hand are at least brought into truly loving and responsive families.

Grade: B

Waiting for Normal

by Leslie Connor

Addie has moved again. And her last chance for stability seems to have gone, too. Her step-father, Dwight, now has custody of her two younger half-sisters and is moving closer to a new job. Now it's just Addie and her unreliable mother, living in a dumpy trailer on the corner of busy intersection. Her only neighbor is a convenience store. Her only view is an abandoned paved lot. Her mother loves her but can best be described as neglectful and, perhaps, bipolar. (I'm no psychiatrist.)

This is the story of Addie, a young girl struggling to survive and waiting for a chance at normal.

This was a sweet (and bittersweet) novel of a young girl, neglected, who struggles to maintain a life of normalcy. The narrator's voice feels natural and honest. The prose was easy to read, the plot easy to follow, and the characters - even some of the secondary ones - easy to feel a connection to. This story left me with a lump in my throat - due to a combined mixture of sadness and happiness.

Grade: A

The Disreputable History of Frankie Landeau-Banks

The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks by E. Lockhart

Frankie is a smart, witty, and observant sophomore. She is an overachiever. She has a trajectory. A plan. A blueprint. All leading to success. Frankie also now has looks. Once a plain Jane honor student at a prestigious boarding school, Frankie returns her second year looking HOT. Her new looks attract the attention and sentiments of Matthew, a senior who lives the highest echelon of her school's social hierarchy. And -Boom- Frankie falls in love.

Typical, eh?

But Frankie doesn't just fall in love with Matthew. She falls in love with his group of guy friends, too. They exude an easiness, a confidence, a friendliness that is charming, magnetic. Frankie both loves these boys and envies them. She envies the time they demand from Matthew and she envies their self-assured natures. Frankie, who is by no means underprivileged, realizes that these teen boys are like this because they are at the top of the world. They are a part of the "Old Boy" society. They are the next generation's future leaders. What have they to doubt? What worries might they have? They have their intelligence, their culture, and their family status.

But that's not really why Frankie's upset. Through her own snoopery, Frankie realizes that these boys are a part of a secret all-male society at the school called the Basset Hounds. One that she is not privy, too. Frankie, frustrated by her own lack of "power" as a girl (because she wants to exert power over these boys) decides that she will find a way to infiltrate the society and become the new "King".

The book is full of intelligent insights and a likable protragonist. Her misdeeds are clever, and the reader will happily speed through the pages to discover more about the mysterious order of the Basset Hounds and to learn of Frankie's newest pranks. In some ways, I loved the way information was presented in this book - somewhat reminiscent of Dan Brown.

One caveat: I had trouble "connecting" with the protagonist. I didn't really feel a strong emotional connection, but this book is more about the ideas and the plot rather than the emotion. But that's easily beat out by the following: I really enjoyed the fact that this book used a sophisticated vocabulary. While I love YA books, I feel that sometimes the vocabulary is less than challenging.
Grade: B+

Drums, Girls & Dangerous Pie

Drums, Girls and Dangerous Pie by Jordan Sonnenblick

This is a fast, serious, sarcastic, reassuring YA read. I'm serious. This is perfect for middle school. Even the format and layout is excellent. Arial-type font, lots of white space to help feel like you're flying through the pages. At the onset, the protagonist is easy to identify with. Steven Alper is an 8th grade boy grappling with his goals (drumming and Renee), girls (Renee and Annette), and his family. Steven's first person narration is well-mixed with sincere reflection and emotion and sarcasm and humor.

By the second chapter, Steven's five-year old brother, Jeffrey, has been diagnosed with leukemia. The story flies by as Steven relates how his family copes (in good ways and in bad) with the cancer. Steven withdraws, agonizes over his brother, and go through many other emotions as he tries to come to terms with how he should be handling this situation and his life. Through Steven's narration, the reader will also fall in love with his charming and brave little brother. The other characters are well-drawn, although we don't get a lot of insight into them; however, this is first-person narration.

This is an excellent, but quick read. If I give any more information, I'll be taking away a good bit of the story. I'll leave with a fun reflection from Steven.

We argued back and forth about this for a while. Initially, my mom was on my dad's side, but as the "discussion" (It's amazing - my parents call everything a discussion. If I were standing across the street, firing a bazooka at my mother, while my father was launching mortars back at me, and Jeffrey was charging down the driveway with a grenade in his teeth, my parents would say we should stop having this public "discussion.") ...

Grade: A

The Misfits

The Misfits by James Howe

These are our names.

Bobby.
Addie.
Joe.
Skeezie.

These are our names. But they are only names. They don't tell you who we are. We have other names, too. Names we have been called, names we have been given. We figured it out. Between us, we have a total of seventy-two names, other than the names you see here. These names we have been called since kindergarten. The names we remember, anyway.

Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me.

Anybody who believes that has never been called a name.

The Misfits centers on the protagonist and narrator, Bobby Goodspeed, and his friends: Addie, Skeezie, and Joe. Each has grown up being picked on by classmates for being too fat, too smart, too bad, or too gay. When school election time rolls around, Addie wants to organize a third-party system for Paintbrush Falls Middle School. Despite her efforts, Addie's efforts fall short with the administration: she seems to have no real purpose for a third party. However, Bobby hits upon the idea of a "No-Name" Party. A party whose platform is to end name calling.

This narrative is set up in an interesting manner that took some slight getting used to. Chapters are narrated in first-person, present tense by Bobby Goodspeed, a delightful and articulate personality. Interspersed are chapters in transcript format, detailing the groups "forums" at a local diner. The "Gang of Five" as Bobby and his friends call themselves (five because it adds mystery) regularly meet on Fridays for their forums. Forums are where the friends discuss big and small issues: name calling, goals for the future, middle school justice, popularity, etc.

Bobby's insights are humorous and relate-able, but at times, too mature for a seventh grader. However, Bobby is also an avid reader and that probably can be accounted for when looking at his fabulous vocabulary. Each of the Gang of Five and other cast of characters adds a lot of flavor to the story line. One complaint that I have is that the story seemed to take a long time to really go anywhere. Addie's efforts to start various justice, freedom, or liberation third party systems almost lost my attention completely. Unfortunately, this seems to be about 1/3 of the book.

I read this book for school. Each 7th grader will need to read this book or Schooled by Korman. I'm trying to really reach some conclusions about the parallels between the two books that go beyond the superficial: school misfits, school elections, etc. I would say that the message from The Misfits feels more explicit and the outcomes more realistic. In Schooled, the protagonist, a hippie, home-schooled boy, enters public school and becomes the local hero. In The Misfits, the Gang of Five does find recognition, but it has a more believable outcome (and yet, still hopeful). In addition, it covers the realm of homosexuality, which is a subject that needs to be broached in middle school (imo). What I really enjoyed about Schooled was the multiple perspectives: from the bullied, to the bystander, the principal, etc. Schooled is a fun read: quick and easy. I think kids will connect more readily to it because the language is easier to follow. Despite the multiple perspectives, I think it is easier to comprehend than the narrative/transcript format. However, the lessons in it are sometimes overshadowed by the sheer unrealistic nature of the story. The Misfits is a more complex and challenging read, although still humorous, that has a more realistic lesson.

Grade: A-

Currently Reading: Nancie Atwell's The Reading Zone and Drums, Girls, and Dangerous Pie.

Wintergirls

Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson

The ideas of deception and perception are central to this story. How can a person deceive themselves so much that they are happily on the brink of death? This is a hypnotic read into the mind of 17 year old Lia, an anorexic. For years, she and her friend, Cassie, have struggled in a perverse race to see who could be the thinnest. However, after several hospitalizations for both girls, Cassie breaks up their friendship in an attempt to appear rehabilitated.

When the story opens, Lia has just been told that Cassie has died in a motel room. Lia, who had ignored Cassie's recent phone calls, slips even deeper into her own mind, which is as deceptive as a house of mirrors. With little to anchor herself to reality, she begins her fight against food with a renewed vigor. She begins to see the ghost of Cassie, which causes her to spiral downward even more. While everyone around her tries to save her, in the end only Cassie can make the decision.

The poetic prose and first person perspective invite the reader into the mind of Lia. The author uses strike-through words to mimic Lia's first thoughts, and then Lia's reformed and revised thoughts appear. For example, when Lia is offered food, her first reaction is that she is hungry. But these words have a strike through them, and after appear Lia's revised thoughts: often focusing on how the food will make her fat, ugly, gross. The author also illustrates Lia's repetitive and punishing habit of calling herself fat, ugly, and stupid. Lia repeats these words and sayings almost as though they were a path to enlightenment or a form of meditation. The poetic nature of the writing, and other various techniques that help mimic Lia's thoughts, allowed me to "become Lia," even though at every moment I knew how warped her perception was.

Grade: A+

Pictures of Hollis Woods

Pictures of Hollis Woods by Patricia Reilly Giff

The prose in this book feels poetic, fleeting, dreamy, and yet utterly absorbing. The writing immerses you and intoxicates you. I love this type of writing. It recalls Donna Jo Napoli, but only at times. For some reason, the best comparison I can make of this writing is to the book Mariette in Ecstasy, which is about a young nun's religious experiences. I know that I should have several other authors who have a similar writing, but I can't remember. That's one of the reasons why I started this blog. To remember.

This book is told as Hollis Woods looks back on several pictures that she has drawn of the Regan family. Hollis Woods is a foster child, abandoned at birth. The Regans were a family that took her in, and made her their own. However, after a horrible accident, Hollis runs away from them. Eventually, child services catches up with her and places her with Josie, an aging artist. Hollis finds herself immediately loving Josie, who understands Hollis's passion for drawing. However, Josie is also beginning to forget too much. When child services discovers this, they plan to move Hollis away. She takes Josie and they run away to the Regans' summer home.

Once again, the writing is top-notch. Because Hollis is an artist, all of the writing is very sensory - but not overly descriptive. This really lends itself to the fuzzy memories that Hollis is recalling.

Grade: A+

(I might liken the writing to The Girl with a Pearl Earring, but I haven't read that in ages. Perhaps I am making the comparison just because they both have art has a foundation of the plot?)

Schooled

Schooled by Gordan Korman

Schooled starts off with the unlikely and ends with the unlikely too, but that's okay because every once in a while a middle school geek can dream, right? Cap Anderson is a home-schooled 8th grader who has been raised by his hippie Grandma named Rain. Rain is Cap's only true friend. His life consists of nature and self-directed learning ... and very little contact with the modern world.

When Rain falls from a tree and must be hospitalized for several weeks, Cap is taken in by a local social worker named Mrs. Donnelly. Cap is enrolled at Claverage Middle School and immediately becomes the butt of many jokes and the biggest prank of all... being voted class president. A longstanding tradition at C-Average Middle School involves voting the biggest loser as class president, and then giving him or her a hard time for the remainder of the year. At this point, hijinks ensue that make us grin (at times at Cap's expense), lift our spirits (due to Cap's unwavering belief in the good nature of people), and make us squirm (because it makes us feel awkward to see someone unknowingly blunder so badly).

This book is chock full of a cast of characters. Each chapter is told in first person from a different character's point of view. (The last book I read like this was My Sister's Keeper by Piccoult.) It's extremely well-done. The prose is peppy, quick, and easy to visualize. Readers will even find themselves relating to many of the characters and empathizing with them too -- even for the coolest (and cruelest) middle-schooler, Zach Powers. Some might criticize this book for being unrealistic, but it's nice to dream that the school outcast can become the most beloved member of a school.

This would/could make a great read aloud.

Grade: A-

My Sister's Keeper

My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult

I finished this book over a week ago. But I am so overwhelmed by it that I have been hesitant to write anything about it. I'm still ruminating over it. The storyline. The ethics. The narration style.

In short, this is a story about a family that must make a decision that can never possibly lead to a happy ending. Anna, a young girl, was genetically conceived to be a match to her older sister, Kate, who has leukemia. As time has progressed, more has been asked medically of Anna. Now, she is being asked to give her kidney.

Anna is coming to terms with where her life ends and her sister's life begins. Without Anna, Kate cannot be. And Anna has decided that she needs control of her own life and body.

Where does familial obligation end and personal autonomy begin? What right does a person have to deny their sister life? And what if your life was created with the singular purpose of providing a solution to death?

My Sister's Keeper is told from a multitude of perspectives. From the mother who struggles with a sick daughter and the turmoil of asking her other daughter to endure pain. From the father who decides to side with Anna. There are chapters from the brother's perspective and also from the lawyer's and child advocate's perspectives. All of the multiple view points give the reader a more comprehensive view of just how difficult these decisions are ethically and morally.

I've included this link, which does a much better job reviewing this book.

Side Note: I am adding this book to my subgenre of books about genetic transplants, which include The House of Scorpions and Never Let Me Go.

Grade: A+