07.19.08
Favorite Books
It occured to me that I was publishing book reviews— but I hadn’t mentioned any of my favorites! So because I really haven’t read any books I feel like reviewing lately (I like to keep my reviewing positive), I decided to do that today. They’re not all in order, but I’ve done my best to sort them out.
by Shannon Hale
Anidori-Kiladra Talianna Isilee is the Crown Princess of Kildenree. As the first born, she is meant to rule after her mother and father die… or at least she thought so.
But things change.
Her brother becomes the heir to the throne. Unbeknownest to Ani’s father, Ani’s mother betrothed her to the prince of Bayern, a neighboring country. Ani is only told after her father dies. So shortly after her sixteenth birthday, Ani sets out to meet the man she is to marry, armed with only a few guards, her lady-in-waiting, and her ability to speak with birds and her horse, Falada.
I really love this book. It is just my favorite book, period. No questions asked.
Criss Cross by Lynne Rae Perkins. I didn’t like this book the first time I read it, but the second time I really, really liked it. I think it was a little mature for me, the first time.
Just Listen by Sarah Dessen. I think it’s my favorite of all her books. At least, it’s my favorite out of the ones I’ve read.
by Jacqueline Woodson
It’s January 1971, and Frannie is living with her parents and deaf older brother, Sean. They live on the other side of the highway, the ‘black’ side. So when a white boy suddenly appeared in Frannie’s classroom, and her classmates take to calling him ‘Jesus boy’, she’s surprised. And when Samantha, her best friend, takes to believing Jesus boy is the real Jesus, come back, Frannie decides to investigate.
I really like this book. Told in Frannie’s light, easy narrative, it’s sweet and light and funny. Yet beneath it there’s a more serious matter. Maybe I like it because the religious issues in the book kind of match what I agree with. I picked it up because it won Newbery Honor, and I didn’t expect to like it very much. Turns out, I did. And a lot, too.
The Adoration of Jenna Fox by Mary E. Pearson. Actually, I’m not sure if this is really an absolute favorite. But then, even if it isn’t, it should be on your to read list if you haven’t read it already. This book is lovely.
Jane Austen’s books. I have a feeling that my favorite JA book at this particular moment is Sense and Sensibility, but I also love the rest. I am very good at flipflopping between them, because they are all. so. good.
by Juliet Marillier
Jena lives with her four sisters close to the Transylvania woods, a place of mystery and magic. The five of them find a portal that allow them to go to a dancing glen in the forest on every full moon, where they dance the night away with strang, magical creatures.
But Jena’s cousin, Costi, was drowned in the forest, in a pond. And now his brother, Cezar, wants to revenge him, by cutting down the forest… and killing Jena’s secret friends. To make matters worse, Jena is sure her older sister, Tati, is falling in love with a Night Person, which is forbidden. Can Jena figure out what to do and who to trust, before it’s too late?
Personally, I found this book fantastic. I liked it immediately. I don’t know about you, but books usually have to dwell on me for a while before I like them. Almost all of my favorite books have endured times of indifference from me. Plus, the cover is lovely.
On Pointe by Lorie Ann Grover. This isn’t the best book that I’ve read that’s written in verse, yet it’s my favorite that’s been written in verse. It just rings true.
Strays Like Us by Richard Peck. To be honest, it’s been a long time since I read this book, and I don’t think I’d like it as much as I did before. Still, I can’t help but remember this book.
So this is about all I’ll post for now.
Verity
07.17.08
Notes from a Liar and Her Dog
by Gennifer Choldenko
author of If a Tree Falls at Lunch Period.
For Antonia MacPherson, lying is natural. But that is only because she is adopted. It doesn’t matter what her mom says; she knows it’s true. Her mom is not her real mom; her dad is not her real dad; her sisters are not her real sisters. The only real one is Pistachio, her dog, who is her real dog.
But when Just Carol takes Ant under her wing, Ant might have to change. Just Carol likes the truth. And she won’t take anything less
I can’t say I was particularly impressed by this book. It had a believable subject, and a believable heroine, and it started well. I think everyone, at least once in their lives, has felt like Ant: a misfit whose parents don’t understand her and prefer their siblings. I believe everyone has probably lied before, and for some of the same reason that Ant lied. I really liked that start, and I liked the ending, too.
But the middle, I had problems with the middle. I hated Ant’s parents. I’m used to reading about parents who are slightly patronizing or difficult, but Ant’s parents weren’t just that. They were frustrating and selfish who seem to want to just ignore her. Especially her mom. I don’t blame Ant for sticking to her ‘real’ parents.
Parents can be frustrating; they can be bad. But I think this was unrealistic. Ant had tried many times to get through to her mother; it seemed to me like if Mrs. MacPherson didn’t believe her daughter or her daughter’s teacher the first times, why would she believe her the last time?
I liked the plot; I liked the idea. But to me, the parents kind of fouled the story. No one likes parents that are as hard as the MacPhersons. Unless Ant was exaggerating without realizing it, I truly doubt this.
I like Ant; I like Harrison, Ant’s best friend, and I like Just Carol, the teacher. I even like Elizabeth and Kate, her sisters. But I couldn’t like Ant’s parents. I suppose I was somewhat reconciled to Ant’s mom eventually, but I definitely did not like Ant’s dad. I like this book; I just think it might be better if shortened with a few confrontations between Ant and her mother cut out.
07.12.08
Undercover-Beth Kephart
by Beth Kephart
Elisa is a ghostwriter: she writes love notes for the boys in her school. It’s accepted, understood by her—her job to write notes for the girls and pass them off as by the boys without revealing herself.
But when Theo Moses asks for verses to court Lila, the most popular girl in school—someone who reminds Elisa of everything she isn’t— and Elisa agrees, life changes. Elisa stops writing for other people; she’s too busy writing for Theo. And when Elisa falls for Theo herself, it gets even more complicated.
At home, Elisa’s father, the only person she believes understands her, has left on a long business trip. Elisa retreats, like the undercover writer she is, to a deserted pond in the woods where she teaches herself to skate and gives herself confidence. Confidence she will need against Lila, who grows jealous of Elisa’s friendship with Theo.
I admit I wasn’t really taken into this book until later. I read about half and then I dropped it for a while. Not because the book was bad, but because I had others to read too, and I had just limited my reading amount.
So I picked it up again, yesterday. It reminds me a little of Waiting for Normal by Leslie Conner in the way that it didn’t get engrossing for me until the end.
But at the end—I really enjoyed the end. It’s not every book that manages to bore me for a while and then suddenly make a rebound, but this book managed it. This book was fun and beautiful and—yes, sad, too. It was sad in the way same way that some things are impossible.
I also loved Elisa’s poems, scattered throughout the book, both beautiful and compelling. Bittersweet. Elisa is a frank, honest and real-to-life girl, one who is normal. One reason I liked it, I think, is that in her way, Elisa is like me. I liked the open, not happily-ever-after ending, accompanied by a dash of hope, nevertheless. This is a lovely, sweetly written book.
07.09.08
Uprising
by Margaret Peterson Haddix
Here is the blurb that’s on the back of the cover:
New York City, 1910.
Bella, newly arrived from Italy and desperate to send money home to her family, is one of the hundreds of workers at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory who endure grueling conditions and brutal labor for meager wages.
Yetta, a Russian immigrant who also works at the Triangle factory, is an outspoken advocate for labor rights who becomes one of the leaders of the strike.
Jane, a society girl unhappy with the stifling limits of her existence, also gets involved in their cause.
As the strike drags on, the lives of the three girls become intertwined. All of them are in the factory one fateful day in March when a spark ignites some cloth. The resulting fire became one of the worst workplace disasters ever.
I really liked this book. It is a book about friendship and rights, about life and death. It’s serious and honest and bittersweet. It’s not completely realistic, and there were some places where I sat back and thought, Yeah, sure. (Sarcastically).
Because they didn’t seem correct. They just really didn’t. And yet… I really liked this book. In spite of the things I hardly believed and couldn’t believe and just didn’t believe, I still enjoyed this book. I think it’s not so much about the writing but more about the content. I found this book confusing, as if the time and stuff were unstable, but I liked it all the same. I don’t think I like it because of the literature (although the writing was okay) or the plot, but rather what was inside, about how everyone matters, no matter how little they do.
And it was a little scary. All those girls… not even twenty, not even old enough to go to college. I think Yetta was only sixteen. It impressed me how its ending was a little like, ‘Things happen, but life goes on. You can’t relive the past; you learn how to live with it and be grateful for whatever happens.’ I really felt like that as I was reading it, and yet it really wasn’t over condescending or corny or clichéd.
I enjoyed this book. I really did. It’s not on my favorites list, but it’s definitely on the memorable list.
07.03.08
Keeping the Moon
by Sarah Dessen
Colie is spending the summer with her eccentric aunt in a remote town where no one knows her. Which is okay, because that means that they definitely don’t know her as the former fat girl, the unpopular one, with nicknames such as Easy or Hole in One.
But she somehow gets a job at the Last Chance Dinner and meets two waitresses, along with her aunt’s tenant, who teaches her a lot more than she expected to learn.
I have to say, I was a little disappointed in this book. It was definitely different from the other books by Sarah Dessen that I’ve read. It’s short and to the point, which is different; I’m used to Sarah Dessen skipping and backtracking in a way that is easily followed.
Colie strikes me as a realistic character, and her situation seems realistic too. I also really love Isabel and Morgan, the waitresses–and Norman, the tenant.
But.
It seems like Colie changes too fast; in a way it seems slightly superficial, as if she’s doing it only because Isabel and Morgan are there, and they’re motivating her and pushing her.
And as for the romance… I do like romance; it’s sweet and I usually like the couples in Sarah Dessen’s books, but in this one, I don’t know. It seems it would make more sense if Colie and [insert person she ended up with] ended up as friends. As a couple, it seems kind of rapid, too fast, and not completely rounded.
So I have to say that I didn’t really like this book. I liked it; it was fun to read, but afterward it’s not really the sort of book that seems to stay with you, that you remember and can quote from memory. I liked Colie; I really did, I only liked her as a mild acquaintance, not as a long term one.
