Graphic Novel Interlude

A short pause in the summer reading recaps to bring you the best graphic novel I’ve read all year, Ghostopolis by Doug TenNapel.

My favorite part of this story was how much backstory all the characters had.  You could tell from the start that this was a huge world with characters who had lived there before the reader entered the story and would continue to be there afterwards.   I have found that some graphic novels aimed at the younger set feel like they just popped up out of nowhere–like the characters only existed the moment they were drawn on the first page.

Other things to love: the dry sense of humor.  The Afterworld TenNapel imagines.  (I had one small qualm with the timeline in the Afterworld but I will get over it.)  The artwork which has its own attitude and its own sense of humor.

Bottom line: Do you like well-told stories about what might happen when you die?  Do you like graphic novels?  If the answer to either of those is yes, I recommend this book.

Kids on Deserted Islands

Summer Reading Book #2: Lord of the Flies by William Golding
In which a bunch of boys find themselves stranded on a deserted island and turn into savages and things go badly until they get rescued.

Book #2.5 (i.e. not on my summer reading list): Beauty Queens by Libba Bray
In which a plane full of teen pageant contestants crashes on an island and the girls pull together to make huts, desalinate their water and become responsible women, unshackled from the eyes of the world and things go mostly okay until they get rescued (and then things basically turn into a James Bond movie).

Which deserted island book did I like better?  Good question.  Hard question.   I know which cover I like better:

I have seen many covers for Lord of the Flies and none of them have the”take me off the shelf” quality that Beauty Queens has.  Fortunately, I don’t judge books solely by their covers.  However, inside the books, you find something similar to the cover.  Lord of the Flies is thin on description and girls.  When I say thin on description, I don’t mean to imply that the book is mostly dialogue.  It’s more the feeling that Flies is about any boys that land on an island–one fat, one smart, one combative + the little ones.  This is an “every boy” story.  The Queens are more specific–part of that is Libba Bray’s writing style–and each girl helps to debunk a stereotype.

The last difference is a little bit spoiler-y: the boys kill each other and then get rescued, while the girls band together, kick butt and rescue themselves.  Although admittedly, Beauty Queens is satire.  It’s not meant to be realistic or possible (especially once you get to the insanity at the end) but I wished it was.  I want it to be possible because I want everything Bray is saying about girls to be true.  Any way you slice it, Beauty Queens is a feminist read.  Lord of the Flies is not feminist, nor is it uplifting in any way.  It is an unflinching look at human nature, which I appreciate even though it causes far more grimaces while reading.  Now I understand why high school teachers continue to use this book–I still wonder why mine didn’t include it.

Bottom line: Summer is always a good time to read about plane crashes and survival–either of these books do the trick, they just do it differently.

Book 1.5: Leverage by Joshua C. Cohen

Or the best reason to cheat on your summer reading list: a really good book!

Leverage is Joshua C. Cohen’s first novel.  I must admit that I love reading first novels.  There is so much potential and they often offer so many surprises.  Many first novels tend not to be stuck in the YA genre–they are simply good books published for young adults.  This is not a good book, nor a great book–it is an incredible book.

The cover gives a great impression of the book: strong, with some content that is very real (like those veined arms) but often borders on nauseating.  At least for me.  This is the story of Danny, a gymnast, and Kurt, a football player who narrate alternating chapters.  Danny is a small kid, loves gymnastics, struggles at home because his father has basically checked out.  Kurt is a big guy with a stutter who has been sent through a lot of foster homes and has seen a lot of ugly situations.  Since this story is about bullying we expect Kurt to be the bully and Danny to be the victim.  Fortunately for us, this isn’t entirely true.  The football players do abuse the gymnasts–physically, verbally, etc.  But the football players aren’t too keen on Kurt either with his stutter and his desire to not be an idiot all of the time.

The leaders of the football team–the quarterback, etc.–do not come off well in this book.  But they put themselves in that position, being macho men, taking the “vitamins” the coach offers, bullying whoever they can in whatever way they can.  Including Kurt, whose stutter does not allow him to escape the bullying, despite his football connection.  Cohen portrays the stutter well, it doesn’t take over conversation or make the book painful to read.  It just is.  Of course, this could be due to the fact that the stutter often keeps Kurt from speaking out loud, true for many stutterers in the fish bowl that is high school.  Anyone who was no the top dog in high school will recognize the story being told in this book.  Even when it’s ugly, it’s like watching a train wreck.  You just keep on turning the pages, hoping the end will not bring despair (mild spoiler: there is some hope).

The only parts I got lost in involved football.  Make no mistake–athletics play a huge role in this book.  Kurt plays some sort of role on the football team that doesn’t really matter if you don’t like football (he’s not the quarterback, that I know).  But if you know football or you like football, you might get even more out of the book than I did.  Knowing gymnastics events helps, too.

Bottom line: For people who like a well-written book that rings true and does not leave out the ugly parts.  (Ugly parts include verbal, physical and sexual abuse; murder; suicide; steroids–I think that’s about it, just FYI.)

My Favorite Books, 2010 edition

I have been reading everyone else’s favorite books lists and I just couldn’t help but jump in on the action.  I’m including the publication date as not all of these books were published in 2010 (yup, I caught up on some oldies but goodies this year).  With no further ado, and in no particular order:

Out of My Mind by Sharon M. Draper (2010): 11 year old Melody has cerebral palsy and has never spoken a word.  She gets a speaking machine and everything changes–except people still think she’s stupid because she drools and she’s stuck in a wheelchair.  Issues in this book were spot on, in only as many words as were necessary (as teen books get longer, I appreciate the ones that choose their words wisely more).

Chains (2008) and Forge (2010) by Laurie Halse Anderson: My review of Chains.  Forge is just as good, even though it’s not narrated by Isabel but by her friend Curzon, who winds up becoming a rebel soldier.  Good cold weather read as the soldiers at Valley Forge with no shoes or blankets or houses are colder than you’ll ever be.

Five Flavors of Dumb by Antony John (2010): Piper is deaf but somehow she becomes the manager of a hard rock band.  Premise sounds absurd but Piper is awesome.  Another book where you get to be in the head of someone totally different–like Melody from Out of My Mind.  I’m a sucker for this.

White Cat (Curse Workers #1) by Holly Black (2010):  Science fiction!  Curse workers and mafia and more twists and turns than I can explain without spoiling the book.  Trust me, the set up is worth it.  And the next one comes out in April!

Wolves, Boys and Other Things That Might Kill Me by Kristen Chandler (2010): I was so worried this was going to be paranormal when I read the title.  But it’s actually about real wolves in real life–the wolves that were reintroduced into Yellowstone.  KJ gets wrapped up in boys, wolves and small town politics.  Well-written and outdoorsy.

Girl in the Arena by Lise Haines (2009) My review on this blog

The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy and Goth Girl by Barry Lyga (2006): Unclear why I never read this one.  Fanboy spoke to me, in all his graphic novel and frustrated teenage glory.  I actually read the companion novel, Goth Girl Rising, right after I finished the first, which means I loved the characters.

Hate List by Jennifer Brown (2009): I almost forgot this one!  How could I do that?  Yes, it’s a book about the aftermath of a school shooting.  Valerie’s boyfriend was the shooter and to inspire him, he used the “hate list” that the two of them had created together.  Nick is dead but Valerie is going back to school.  As you might imagine, she is traumatized and ostracized. Just reading that description doesn’t do the book justice.  There is no moral high ground in this book–that’s the part I liked the most about it.  Valerie is struggling and you get to struggle along with her.  This shooting is also not based on any particular real life shootings and that helps it a lot.  Suffice it to say, this is a book about a school shooting that is not like any others you’ve read.  And that is probably why I was so moved by it.

I’m excited for lots of new books this coming year, including the one book I got for Christmas: Behemoth by Scott Westerfeld!  Happy New Year everyone!

Supporting Lady Writers

There has been a massive amount of discussion in the blogsphere about the Huffington Post article by Sara McCarry, “Faking Nice in the Blogosphere: Women and Book Reviews.” I will not attempt to recap all the criticism; Liz B has a great rebuttal and links to many relevant blogs on her blog, A Chair, A Fireplace & A Tea Cozy.  She’ been updating to include new responses and in reading one, I found a passage that I didn’t notice before.  And it made me mad (emphasis is mine):

“Nice lady writers don’t rock the boat, they don’t hurt people’s feelings, and they sure as hell don’t write about topics that make other lady writers uncomfortable.”

Really?  Ms. McCarry, I’m not sure you’re up on teenlit.  A couple of books by women writers spring to mind.

1. Living Dead Girl by Elizabeth Scott: Book about Alice, a teenage girl who was kidnapped at the age of 5 and made to be a sex slave to Ray. At the time the book starts, Ray is forcing Alice to find a replacement for her since she has gotten too old and he is no longer attracted to her. While this book was powerful, it was also powerfully disturbing and definitely controversial in the library I was working in at the time. Looking for reviews of this title leads to a review and discussion of how important it is to read books that make us uncomfortable over at Book Addiction.
2. Kendra by Coe Booth: The librarian who recommended I read this book and that the library purchase it thought that it had a stellar discussion and description of anal sex, which (sort of spoiler) the main character Kendra does with a guy to avoid losing her virginity since her grandmother is always threatening to her hymen examined (end sort of spoiler). Now, I’m not down on sex, but this is more about being pressured into having some sort of sex by a bad boy. I think it’s done fairly well, though I wasn’t as thrilled about it as my colleague. Neither was Ms. Stabooksi. I’m going to guess that the “Ms.” means she is a woman. I will say there was good press for this book at TeenReads (especially the last paragraph which admits this book has controversial content). For the record, I mostly agree with TeenReads.
3. Tender Morsels by Margo Lanagan: I wish someone had warned me, as an adult, that this is a book about rape. Before we get into the main story, the main character Liga is raped a number of times by her father, once resulting in a pregnancy, and then raped again by a group of boys, again resulting in a pregnancy. By the end of the book, we have seen several more rapes of different characters for various reasons. Most of these scenes are not explicit but Lanagan’s writing ensures that they continue to be shocking. I struggled with this book. But Six Boxes of Books makes a case for why it is a book that should be read despite its disturbing nature. Yup, even though it’s written by a lady writer, it sure is disturbing.

I rest my case. Lady writers do write about controversial, necessarily disturbing topics especially in the YA lit world. Why? Because teens deal with disturbing, controversial topics. Because lady writers aren’t afraid to shy away from hard topics, ones that will stick with readers. And I applaud them for that.

Unreliable Narrators, Part 2

Confession #1: I realized after my last post that I have not mentioned the one major gap in my reading. I’ll confess, I haven’t read that many adult books. Especially the classics. I mean, I probably read more adult books as a teenager than I do now, mostly because the young adult section of my library did not actually exist when I was a teenager. And now my focus is so much on teen and children’s books, that I don’t read many new adult books–unless I’ve been reading that author since my teenage years.

Confession #2: I am addicted to Sara Shepard’s Pretty Little Liars series, which is soon to be a new TV show on ABC Family. I think that may be more embarrassing than my lack of education in the classics. I mean, I have to tell you–I hate this series. I hate the characters, they are MEAN! Without exception. The parents are exceedingly cruel to their children, the four main characters are mean girls, hiding things from each other for their own gain (and a little out of embarrassment and fear of retribution) and the girl who died (not really a spoiler, we find out about this early in the first book) was the queen of mean. I’m not really sure if these books have any redeeming qualities–and yet I keep reading them! I think it’s the mystery (which I swear I’ve solved!) that keeps me reading the books. I mean, how will I know if I’m right if I stop reading now?

Anyway, I was reading Flawless, the second book in the series when I happened upon a particular passage. An English teacher is giving an assignment to one of the girls–a side project on unreliable narrators in literature. He says: “Well, the narrator tells us the story in a book, right? But what if…the narrator isn’t telling us the truth? Maybe he’s telling his skewed version of the story to get you on his side. Or to scare you. Or maybe he’s crazy!” (p. 123) That’s what I’ve been talking about, Mr. Fictional Teacher Man! That stopped me in my tracks. Aside from the fact that this is probably a clue in the series, given by our omniscient narrator, it made me realize–what am I missing by just reading teen books? How many adult books, maybe even classics, have I not read that might be relevant to these teen books I’m reading now? How can I recommend similar books to teens if I haven’t read them? How can I even claim to be an expert on books?

Answer: I don’t claim to be an expert on books, though I do know a hell of a lot about teen books. Knowing what you don’t know is the first step to learning more. So, I’m still looking for adult books with unreliable narrators. Anyone?

Good Girl/Bad Girl

How much do you know about your narrator?  Is she a good girl or bad girl?

That’s the question I’ve been asking myself a lot lately.  The answer is usually a lot, since as a reader, you often spend the novel in that person’s head (I’m talking about novels written in the first person here).  But in the past week or so, I’ve found myself reading books where the narrator may not be who you think she is.  The first is Liar by Justine Larbalestier, a book that created a lot of buzz last year but I only got my hands on recently.  The second is The Deadly Sister by Eliot Schrefer, a book that doesn’t come out until May 2010 (and I was lucky enough to get a second-hand ARC).

Let’s start with the similarities: mysterious covers, female narrators, and a death right at the beginning of the book.  In both cases, this is a boy who is the romantic interest of many people–a popular kid.  And again in both cases, these girls are confused and kind of angry.  But that’s where the perfect similarities stop.  In Liar, it’s fairly obvious and fairly clear that our narrator, Micah, is a liar.  She’s been called a liar her whole life and she demonstrates the ridiculous lies she has told to people which include her being a hermaphrodite.  Nothing to mess with there.  On the other hand, in The Deadly Sister, our narrator Abby is the good girl–the good sister to her drug-addicted runaway younger sister Maya who has most likely killed her GED tutor/boyfriend-type-person (who isn’t really her boyfriend at all).  But somehow, both of these narrators are telling a story that feels a little bit off.  A little bit contrived.  A little bit perfect.

Now, if I go much further, I am going to start to spoil the crap out of these books.  And let me tell you, The Deadly Sister was so creepily good, I would rather you read it yourself (and maybe scare yourself in the middle of the night like I did, to the point where I had to watch an episode of Ugly Betty to make the creepy feelings go away).  I’m not that into creepy books but this is a creepy mystery/thriller and that appeals to me.  Eliot Schrefer is the author of another thrillingly creepy book–and serious page-turner–The School for Dangerous Girls.  The Deadly Sister is a great follow-up and a perfect read-alike.

On the other hand, I found Liar to be almost confusing.  You know something is up and you know have to read closely from the beginning–especially if you paid any attention to the buzz around the content of this book (not the cover!).  But maybe there wasn’t enough urgency in the book for me.  Liar was more of a literary work.  I could feel the way Larbalestier wove the various threads of the story together to give the reader a way to figure out what was going on.  Schrefer just planted a lot of suspicion–and perhaps some threads that the real detail hounds would have noted early on.  In some ways, these two books are perfect complements–you can watch the same beginning lead you down different paths.  Beyond the initial similarities, the plots of these books are quite different and I think you’ll come to shockingly different conclusions about each narrator and story.

Bottom line: I love books that play with the narrator’s reliability as a storyteller.  I’ve seen this a lot in recent teen books (including older titles like Inexcusable by Chris Lynch or Touch by Francine Prose) and it makes for so much fun reading, especially for writers and storytellers.  I would love to know if there are great titles for adults that have the same type of narration that could be paired with these teen titles.

Pure: A (really pink) book review

Pure by Tera Elan McVoy
Simon Pulse, 2009

This is one of the pinkest books I’ve read this year.  Personally, I try very hard not to discriminate against books for their cover.  Fortunately, I’m not a teenage boy who might be embarrassed to be seen in public with this book–or the plethora of pink books on the market.  In fact, a recent talk by Dame Jacqueline Wilson (who has published nearly 100 books for children & teens!) reminded me just why publishers want pink books–more girls buy books, so more sales.

But this book is a whole lot more than just pink.  It’s about, as you might have guessed from the cherry on the front,virginity.  In this case, keeping it until marriage via a promise made with a purity ring.  This is a practice that has become common in mega-churches and the ceremony is often called (as it is in the book) the “Ring Thing” where all the girls promise together that they won’t have sex until they get married.  Fun, right?  Your next question is likely, why did I choose to read this crazy book about a bunch of religious girls?  It was recommended to me by a colleague I trust as a balanced representation and exploration of purity rings, religion and all the issues that carries with it.

What’s the story here?  Tabitha is best friends with Morgan, and they are friends with three other girls who all have purity rings.  As you might expect, one of the girls breaks her promise and has sex with her long-term boyfriend.  Predictably, this causes trouble.  The promise-breaker is shunned by most of her friends who believe she has sinned, broken her promise with Jesus, betrayed her friends, etc.  But Tabitha sticks by her.  Now, when we meet Tabitha, who narrates this story, we quickly learn that her family is somewhat liberal and she has gone to church by herself for years because religion is something she enjoys.  She is extremely close with her parents and they love her, but are not into the Ring Thing or religion.  They let her do her thing and go to her youth groups, often with her best friend Morgan who is the megachurch type of girl.

If you know me, the first thing I think of when I hear about youth groups and youth pastors is Dan Savage, sex advice columnist, and his usual rants against the specific youth pastors who are often found doing not so nice things to and with some of their youth.  (Spoiler!) And the youth pastor here is a problem, though you don’t see it until too late. (End spoiler!) And now I’ve brought up something entirely different: sex.  Wait, a book about rings for virginity until marriage is a book about sex?  Duh!  If you’re talking about not having sex, you’re talking about sex.  And Tabitha meets a boy, a cute boy whose kisses make her knees weak, so she is thinking about sex.  In a good way!  And she thinks about religion and God and Jesus and the Bible and all of it, in far more detail than most books I read ever get into.  I’m not gonna lie, it may have made my eyes glaze over at points.  But it wouldn’t if you were really interested in how religion is interpreted by teenage girls.

I was ultimately impressed by this book.  It reminded me about tolerance–especially that I need to practice it even when books are about *gasp* super-religious Christians.  Tabitha learns a lot about tolerance here, and she discovers it, rather than being taught it.  That makes this book feel authentic.  It’s also about deep friendship between girls.  Tabitha is so aware of her girlfriends, their smile.  I have to say, even without the pink cover, this would be a girl book.

Bottom line: This book was a stretch for me, but it won’t be a stretch for girls who want to read about friendship and girlfriends and betrayal.  You can sell it that way.  Or you can sell it because it is, in the end, a book about sex and consequences.

And the Winner Is..

If you’re a kidlit nerd like me, you know who the SLJ BoB winner is: Marching for Freedom by Elizabeth Partridge, by all accounts an incredible non-fiction title.  That I haven’t read despite making an effort to get my hands on it.  Oops.  It looks very serious, and I’ve heard it’s very moving.  Perhaps my favorite review can be found here, on Emily Reads. In the SLJ BoB commentary, Katherine Paterson said it “stirred her soul.”  I’ll admit she’s probably right and move on to talking about books I have read.  Sorry Marching for Freedom!  I’ll get to you some day.

Prediction: Charles and Emma vs The Lost Conspiracy

I have to admit, The Lost Conspiracy took me the better part of a week to finish.  And I just finished it–this morning.  The book that everyone SLJ’s BoB has been going on and on about, sending on to the next round, and the next.  And now, I understand why.  I had read a book by Frances Hardinge before: Well-Witched, a book targeted towards tweens that I barely made it through.  Had I remembered that, I might not have read this book with such an open mind.  Then again, this book is so well-done, it might have won me over anyway.  It certainly won over Judge Angela Johnson in Round 2, who admits to mostly reading contemporary fiction and that reading the first Harry Potter book took her a year to read.  A year!

The Lost Conspiracy is incredibly layered.  This 566-page chunk of a book starts out feeling like a anti-colonialist fantasy.  We meet Hathin and her sister Arilou, who is a Lost–a person whose senses can go out into the world without their body.  I like the concept of the Lost.  Hathin and Arilou are Lace, members of the island’s native tribe, who tell fanciful stories about the volcanoes on the island, smile all the time and decorate their teeth.  All of these details are great, and there are many more I haven’t mentioned.  There’s the usual conflict between the Lace and the Cavalcaste (the colonizers), though there has been a lot of racial mixing.  I am not going to get into plot here because I’m going to get overwhelmed.  Hardinge uses all the pages of her book to tell this story.  Only once did I think “Is it over yet?” and that was 10 pages out from the finish line, as the loose ends of the story were being tied up.  As you can guess, there were some serious loose ends in a novel this size.

We already know that I loved Charles and Emma (full review here).  So how would choose between these two?  Well, I would say that both probably required a lot of planning and plotting and probably some research and/or backstory creation.  Both books teach you something about human nature–though only features “real” people.  It’s really an impossible decision, but a decision nevertheless!

Bottom line: I would give it to The Lost Conspiracy.  It’s just so re-readable, in a way that Charles and Emma is not.  Maybe that’s a silly reason to reward a book, but it’s my silly reason.  I think re-readability is an important quality in literature.  I bet Judge Megan Whalen Turner will pick The Lost Conspiracy as well, though I haven’t yet read any of her books (The Thief is on my shelf!) nor do I know what reasons she will give.  Alas, I will have to wait until Wednesday to find out.