Author Archives: Alicia Abdul

Sometimes a book and you just don’t click, even when they’re the most talked about and you really, really want to like it, but you just can’t. That’s the way I feel about two recent reads and I think I can put my finger on what I didn’t like about them, though that’s not to say that they won’t speak to others. Yet, for me, I had to stop the CPR… an apt quote for those times when it’s just not working out.

The first was Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli which won the Morris Debut Author award for 2016 and the second was A World Without You by Beth Revis which will be out in just a few short days and is already buzzed about.

Starting with Simon, I could tell from the first chapters that I wasn’t going to be into it primarily, as a testament to the newer YA fiction that’s out there like The Great American Whatever by Tim Federle or Look Past by Eric Devine, because authors are pulling away from a book centering around the character’s sexual identity and instead incorporating it into a larger story. And then once I got to know Simon, I became more disinterested by the banter between his secret friend that seemed contrived while none of the secondary characters shined for me to champion either. Flatline.

As for Revis’ new book, I wanted it to be Challenger Deep by Neal Shusterman and when you love a book as much as I love Challenger Deep, it’s hard to compare. I tried to stay objective and keep an open mind but the problem was that I didn’t read the summary before reading the book, so I didn’t already realize that it had been explained that Bo does have a mental illness though he believes he’s at a home for exceptional youth. I started the book thinking I was reading magical realism akin to Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs, when in fact, they are delusions in which he believes he has transported a girl at the school to another time period and lost her there. Again, this is not the case: she has committed suicide and Bo cannot accept this fact. But, there is no explicit description. And even when the secondary narrator, Bo’s sister Phoebe is introduced, you would think this would provide clarity. Instead, it’s superfluous and muddies the water further. Flatline again though the struggle between what is real and what is imaginary is a very real peak into mental illness and what Shusterman illustrated so well for me.

I will continue on, as my TBR pile so eloquently demonstrates, but these were not favorites.

I don’t yet have Jennifer Mathieu’s name committed to my memory, so imagine my surprise when I finished my newest download from Netgalley called Afterward and posted my review on Goodreads only to realize I’ve read two others from her! So now, I must commit her name to memory as she’s turned out some lovely and touching stories. In finishing Afterward, I can say that the lasting feeling I have is akin to Oribiting Jupiter by Gary Schmidt. It’s this quiet recognition of a well-written story that sticks in your bones.

As Mathieu mentions in her afterword, this story doesn’t happen in real life very often, but it does happen and it’s worth writing about, especially when memorable characters are created and the the story unfolds as an homage to the courage it takes to survive but also to the self-care needed to move past difficult situations as Ethan and Caroline’s story attests to.

Memorable Character: Ethan without a doubt, as a boy who was taken as a pre-teen by a man who abused him and controlled him for years, is now back in the arms of his parents who tried to never give up hope that they’d find him again. He takes to meeting with a psychiatrist who provides him an avenue to explore what happened to him that includes bringing his his dog and also allowing Ethan to ask the tough questions: is he gay because he had to do that with Marty? Should he tell Dylan’s sister, Caroline, that he feels responsible for Dylan being kidnapped as well because he opened the door and “played the part”? How can he move on and go back to school? How much smothering should he take from his mother? There’s is a slow character development that endears readers to him from the very moment we learn who he is, that he has suffered abuse from a man who committed suicide when the cops finally found Ethan and Dylan. He’s open to a friendship with Dylan’s sister, who is trying to come to terms with Dylan’s kidnapping as well and befriends Ethan under the shared hobby of music. He wants everyone to feel comfortable, even when he was ripped away from his family for years before finally being rescued.

Memorable Scene: Each scene in the garage when Caroline rides up on her bike and starts a conversation with Ethan and subsequently meets him to “jam out”. It’s such an innocent way to begin their friendship. Caroline is curious about Ethan’s experiences and how she can use him to help her autistic brother deal with it as well. The alternating narratives help understand both Ethan and Caroline’s motivations creating a unique story.

Advised to give this to fans of Gary Schmidt’s Orbiting Jupiter and Jasmine Warga’s My Heart and Other Black Holes.

…that’s how I read this book: in one sitting, way past my bedtime, so be sure that your schedule is clear until morning when you crack open Never Ever by Sara Saedi. It was the combination of an easily-readable narrative, an imaginative setting, with a darkness that compliments both the romantic elements and relationships among the characters.

Memorable Character: Wylie, the main character who has discovered her father’s affair and is trying to keep some peace while her parents decide to divorce and her younger brother is a day away from jail because of an accident that she helped cause. She’s befriended (and a bit smitten) with Phinn, a boy at a party who gives her a flower that allows her to fly before he takes her and her two younger brothers to Minor Island, the island where none of the inhabitants ever grow up. It’s what happens on the island and how Wylie responds at each turn that create the darkness as she discovers her “Peter Pan” may have a darker side that turns this Peter Pan story into Lord of the Flies.

Memorable Scene: Close the beginning, it’s when Phinn decides to pull out the small pouch that looks like it has been woven out of reeds and presents her with a bundle of tiny blue flowers that he’s asking her to try “hoping we could have an adventure together”. Realistically unnerved and curious, Wylie immediately begins to walk away before Phinn eats one and demonstrates that their consumption allows the consumer to fly. (And the fairy tale begins…)

Memorable Quote: A scrawl on a wall and a poem recited on the island “Never forget to live life to the fullest. Do it for the troubled; do it for the lost. The days may feel shorter; the nights may feel long. But when we remember, our memories grow strong.” This was the Phinn-created mantra that ends up being the biggest (and darkest) twist to the plot.

This is absolutely one of the more enjoyable 2016 reads with the splashes of magical realism that’s got a choke-hold on me right now, but it’s the attention to family since Wylie is joined on the island by her two brothers Micah and Joshua and the interwoven details of her parents, and the lasting questions readers can pose to themselves– if you could stay on an island and never age, would you leave everything else behind?