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Category Archives: Fiction

Readers advisory from March ’22

31 Mar

To try to keep up with reading everything you want to read is the same analogy as trying to find information on the internet which is that it’s like trying to take a drink from a fire hydrant- more will keep coming at you. So the task is always to enjoy it. Yes there are times when I have to read certain things like for a committee or a book review for a magazine that has a deadline, but this year I’ve found I have a lot more flexibility and I’m enjoying myself.

The Only Good Indians I already posted about here. That was a highlight from this month that warranted its own post. And a few others for various reasons which I’ll share now, going backwards from audience since The Only Good Indians‘ target audience is adult.

Anatomy: A Love Story by Dana Schwartz was a perfect Gothic tale to a YA audience. As I’ve shared in the conversations I’ve had since reading it is that while I knew that the subtitle was “a love story”, I think Schwartz could have kept it solely about Hazel’s pursuit of being a physician and it been solidly fabulous. I know why Schwartz included the romance and the ending relied, in part, on it’s existence, but Hazel’s strength of character was memorable all by itself.

I have a good friend who is a high school art teacher. As soon as I closed the book, I sent her a few texts asking if she knew much about Savage. Then I told her she needed to read Augusta Savage: The Shape of a Sculptor’s Life by Marilyn Nelson pronto and that I was just as taken with Nelson’s choice to write in verse but that there was historical context in addition to the biographical content and that I loved a quote that was included by Savage: “I have created nothing really beautiful, really lasting, but if I can inspire one of these youngsters to develop the talent I know they possess, then my monument will be in their work.” Immensely powerful.

And last, a picture book by Phung Nguyen Quang and illustrated by Huynh Kim Lien called My First Day. I will end up owning this book soon because the captivating artwork unlocks a reader’s imagination as much as it connects to every experience we’ve had with a “first”. Yes, the boy is on his way to his first day of school through a maze of obstacles, but perseveres. The writing matches the tone of the design and creates an all-encompassing experience. A feast for the eyes.

 
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Posted by on March 31, 2022 in Adult, Authors, Book of the Month, Childrens, Cover Love, Fiction, Nonfiction, Verse, Young Adult

 

Someone to talk to

23 Mar

Many years ago I had a habit of eschewing the popular book titles for the singular reason that I didn’t want to read what everyone else was reading. And at the time, I was exclusively reading for my target YA audience and not reading as widely as I do now. But I realized the downside was that when I eventually read those titles, I didn’t have as many people to talk to about them because those people were on to the next best read and vaguely remembered the book enough for any meaningful discussion.

Yet, I arrive here at 7:30pm on a Wednesday night, asking who out there has read The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones because I need someone to talk to.

The skillful writing, the paranormal happenings, the past merging with the present and future, the horror, traditions, the mood… I could go on. I know it’s been a year and a half. You’d think I’d learn my lesson. But I haven’t.

Who can I talk to about it?

 
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Posted by on March 23, 2022 in Adult, Audiobooks, Fiction

 

Six for Saturday

19 Mar

… and in six words each.

  1. Magical Boy by The Kao

Brightly colored with action and heart

2. Poisoning the Pecks of Grand Rapids: The Scandalous 1916 Murder Plot by Tobin T. Buhk

True crime meets awkward family drama

3. Broken Wish (The Mirror series) by Julie C. Dao

Magical series each with separate authors

4. Dionysos: The New God (Olympians series) by George O’Connor

Is it really the end, George?

5. Manu! by Kelly Fernandez

Dark and funny for middle grade

6. Let’s Get Physical: How Women Discovered Exercise and Reshaped the World by Danielle Friedman

Curiosity meets research about exercising women

 
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Posted by on March 19, 2022 in Adult, Audiobooks, Fiction, Graphic novels, Middle grade, Nonfiction, Young Adult

 

Let’s talk about it

05 Mar

I don’t usually fall asleep on the couch at 6pm, but when I do I have an excuse. It was a Friday night after a day that included instruction in the morning about citing sources and then a book discussion virtual author visit collaboration with an outside agency that was doubling as my observation for the afternoon. There was some heightened stress with this event because it had been postponed two weeks earlier due to physical violence at our school that led to a lockdown and early student release. I wanted to make sure this went off without a hitch.

There were a few obstacles to get here:

  1. This was strictly student interest based. This was a collaboration with our county’s case manager for crime victims and those experiencing sexual violence who wanted to pair a book about dating violence with discussion of resources and what healthy relationships look like. We settled on Bad Romance by Heather Demetrios, bought the books, and distributed them to students interested during lunch periods using an “all call”. We had a range of ninth through twelfth graders, though some had signed up because their friend was signing up. Their buy-in waned as we got closer to the event. Students chose not to attend either because of the vulnerability of the discussion or because they weren’t truly interested at the start (maybe it was the donut they got with the book?)
  2. Scheduling the event. Due to the pandemic, our school day shifted start and end times and after school looks vastly different than it used to be. Namely, unless it’s a specific club or sport, they don’t stay after school anymore, so the option to do an after school event wasn’t really discussed. We settled on an “in-house field trip” for the event spanning several periods. But this posed problems for students who had quizzes and tests they couldn’t miss. They came for a little while but didn’t get the impact of the full event.
  3. It was rescheduled. They’re teenagers and my fifteen years as their high school librarian has taught me one thing that is best summed up with the Zits comic from a few weeks back–

I sent emails, I made invitations, I made an updated invitation bookmark, I put it on social media. Yet, some students still didn’t show up.

But with all of that, here were the wins:

  1. For newer librarians, I want you to repeat after me “quality over quantity”. I learned this for my first author visit more than ten years ago. It’s been to have a smaller group of students who want to be there, than pack an auditorium of students who don’t. I will take authentic, meaningful connection even in a school as large as ours rather than trying to force the connection. So when we first started warming up with introductions and book discussion and the student exclaimed that “this was probably like the best book I’ve ever read” you could have wiped up the puddle of tears from underneath my chair. This is why we do the things we do.
  2. We had the author virtually! This was something our community partner had checked in on and when Demetrios was available, we were behind excited. It went deeper when Demetrios told her story and shared super powerful exercises that the students did in addition to the Q&A.
  3. Snacks! You can’t have a program like this without snacks. And because I’m a nerd and had to reread the book anyway, I decided to take notes on any food mentioned in the book to see if that would work. Yup! Snacks included Doritos, Pepsi, Oreos, Twizzlers, donuts, and Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. Was that a general mix of unhealthiness? Sure, but it works for snacks for teens who regularly show up with a Monster and Takis at 8am. I won’t always encourage this, but it worked for an afternoon book discussion pick-me-up. And the donuts were the first to go.
  4. True connection. The students that were there were highly engaged with each other and with our community partner, the author, and myself. They valued the conversation and asked whether more of these types of activities would continue. The community partner and I looked at each other and knew that that’s exactly where we were going if this was successful.

Then the bell rang and students were done for the day and week as it was a Friday afternoon, but they left happy and fed. The minute they walked out the door, the reflection conversation immediately began in my head and with the community partner. How did that go? What could we do better? What would we change next time?

There will be a next time…

 
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Posted by on March 5, 2022 in Authors, Events, Fiction, Reflections, Young Adult

 

Readers advisory for February ’22

28 Feb

The end of month brings a brief pause to reflect on what I’ve read over the past month. I’ve usually always worked toward identifying that one book that made me pause. I also read a lot so one book each month is difficult and why I generally break the one book rule I’ve self-imposed, hence why I changed the title of the month’s-end post to readers advisory.

This month I decided to pull my favorite children’s book, young adult, and adult title. In order, a nonfiction, a graphic novel, and the audiobook.

Born Hungry: Julia Child Becomes ‘the French chef’ written by Alex Prud’homme and illustrated by Sarah Green was an easy choice for a book everyone should read because children’s biographies are superbly informative in addition to capturing (when done right) the essence of the topic at hand. In this case, the nephew of Child, writes a celebratory story of how Child didn’t become ‘the French chef’ until very late in life, proving that you can do anything you set your mind to and have a passion for. Using Green’s bright and vivid illustrations to compliment the story, it is a feel-good story that’s food-centered.

Yasmeen written by Saif A. Ahmed and illustrated by Fabiana Moscolo is a graphic novel with a hard truth to face. That many girls were kidnapped, raped, tortured, and maimed as part of the unrest in the Middle East. Yasmeen is an Iraqi girl whose family settled in Texas after leaving their war torn home but without her because she had been captured and used as a pawn. The graphic novel does not sugarcoat her trauma and the fight she gave to break free. But what levels this graphic novel up is the intricate use of time in the panels and on the pages which takes an astute reader of the format because of the level of understanding of the story, characters, and setting. A passive reader will not understand the story completely. And it’s powerful. You do not want to miss anything.

I listened to the audiobook read by Michelle Zauner, the author and subject of Crying in H Mart: A Memoir. While I did not know who she was and had only downloaded the audiobook because of it’s popularity and subject matter (you’ll often find that I read and share about food memoirs or food stories). I recognize that there is wide general appeal, but it went deeper for me as I’m sure that others who feel like they do about the book can attest; it’s Zauner’s relationship and caretaking of her cancer-stricken mother and simultaneously about the food of her life through the lens of her now suffering mother. Food is balm. Food is love. Food is history. Food is memory. I don’t often reread books, but because I had listened to the audiobook, I’ve considered rereading it in print because I remember several times stopping in my tracks while listening to a poignant phrase or sentence or scene.

What did you read this past month that you loved?

 
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Posted by on February 28, 2022 in Adult, Audiobooks, Book of the Month, Childrens, Fiction, Graphic novels, Nonfiction, Young Adult

 

Down the rabbit hole

26 Feb

Several years ago I read Higginbotham’s Midnight at Chernobyl and recognized the depth of research that went in to writing a book of that heft, literally and figuratively. I had also read Blankman’s historical fiction called The Blackbird Girls that deals with Chernobyl and religion for a tween audience. Then with the attack on Ukraine by Russia this past week, I decided to put Marino’s Escape from Chernobyl at the top of my TBR where it was sitting somewhere in the middle and it brought me back to the tragedy, drama, and cover up that was the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, especially with the ticking clock to start each chapter.

And it didn’t end there; in a rare move, my husband ordered the HBO miniseries Chernobyl that had aired several years ago that so many had talked about but we had never watched because I had mentioned it.

He is glued to the TV watching the news coverage on multiple channels plus the radio. So between my reading and the current state of affairs, we mixed some drinks and sat down to binge the series on a Friday night. What a powerful mix of dramatic storytelling and truth. I can learn quite a bit from books, but there’s something about the visual elements of the series that aided in a deeper understanding of the politics and science that dominated the narrative of this disaster.

And what did I spend some time doing this morning? Researching other books to read and putting a few on hold at my library and downloading another via Hoopla. I’m already down the rabbit hole. I figured I would keep going.

What topics have wrapped you up in a multimedia quest to learn as much as you could about them?

 
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Posted by on February 26, 2022 in Adult, Fiction, Middle grade, Nonfiction, Research, Shows, Young Adult

 

Pigskin picks

13 Feb

In honor of the Super Bowl today, here are a few pigskin picks.

Whether fiction or nonfiction, these all hit on topics associated with the game.

  • A verse novel that features ZJ’s dad whose brain is failing him after multiple concussions playing the sport which inalterably changes the family
  • DJ is a girl playing a male-dominated sport
  • Based on Green’s own past with the sport, this fictional story of Ben, a middle school quarterback deciding whether the cost of the game is worth it seeing his dad suffering from debilitating pain from his years playing professional football
  • Love, Zac always gives me goosebumps. Most of the story is Zac’s own words from the journals he kept and Forgrave’s commentary about the status of the sport of American football
  • Some men gave some, some men gave all and Tillman gave up a career in professional football to serve his country and paid the ultimate price

Each of these stories is worthy of a read, just maybe not during the game today. Go Rams. Go Bengals. I’m just hear for the cider and snacks.

 
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Posted by on February 13, 2022 in Authors, Fiction, Nonfiction, Verse, Young Adult

 

Readers advisory from January ’22

31 Jan

Continual improvement is something to strive for, taking to heart Maya Angelou’s quote

Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.

So what used to be the “outstanding book of the month”, I’ve rebranded “readers advisory” taking into account my blog and handles on various social media. This will be a book I read during the month to highlight which will range from children’s books to adult, any genre, and published whenever. And in true obnoxious fashion, I couldn’t pick just one from this past month– really I could have picked three or four, though I’ve distilled it down to two.

Both young adult fiction, one already released and one that will be published in June. Yet what they have in common is eloquent storytelling. Chim’s historical fiction title Freedom Swimmer taught me about the Cultural Revolution and actual freedom swimmers through the intertwined stories of two characters. Albert’s witchy fiction is a mystery layered with magic, real magic in which Ivy discovers her mother’s history with witchcraft and how that has affected Ivy’s life and her own gifts. I could not put either down when I picked them up.

In addition their evocative covers highlight elements of the story that draw readers in be it the placid waters as a boy dives in or the hot pink text and gold rabbit doorknocker. Teens will pull them off the shelves from the covers alone. Freedom Swimmer is quick, almost too quick, while Albert sculpts a robust story that engages readers from start to finish.

This two-some cannot be more different, yet they both stuck with me after I had finished reading them and that’s why I have an advisory out for all to read them.

 
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Posted by on January 31, 2022 in Book of the Month, Cover Love, Fiction, Upcoming Releases, Young Adult

 

Cupid’s arrow straight to my heart with An Arrow to the Moon

26 Jan

During lunch I typically read something from the shelves or the new cart that I can get through during the period which is usually a graphic novel, a manga, a short nonfiction book over a few days. This is in addition to the audiobook I have on for the car and housework. And in addition to the book I’m reading in the course of the day or week. So I know I’m in love with a book when my general reading book becomes my lunch reading book. That’s what happened when Emily X.R. Pan’s book, to be released in April, made its way into my life.

An Arrow To The Moon is includes elements of magical realism that were present in her first book The Astonishing Color of After. But this one had a layer of moodiness that lent an atmosphere of quiet desperation. Hunter’s family has hidden themselves away in ways Hunter has yet to grasp. But protecting his younger brother Cody helps him find purpose. He also has an instant connection to Luna, a girl who thought she wanted to be the stereotypical perfect Asian child: going to college, getting a well-paying job, doing as her parents say, staying away from boys. And that first connection (for a 90s girl who still owns the Romeo + Juliet DVD as well as the movie soundtrack) happens at a fish tank.

And the pieces begin to fit together. Pan’s use of multiple perspectives continually refreshes the story in addition to her short chapters though the book itself is a hearty 400 pages. I hurried up and then slowed down; I wanted to know what was going to happen next but I also didn’t want it to end. Though when it did I clutched it to my chest in awe of how Pan wove Chinese mythology with a pair of contemporary star-crossed lovers battling misperceptions and parental infidelity, secret-keeping and their own mythological beginnings. It has magic and it is magic.

This one was like Cupid’s arrow striking my heart, my big bookish heart that is a sucker for atmospheric and intelligent writing eager for something new and different. THIS was it.

 
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Posted by on January 26, 2022 in Authors, Cover Love, Fiction, Upcoming Releases, Young Adult

 

Four and please, plenty more

24 Jan

Jennifer Dugan will publish four young adult fiction novels come May 17, 2022 with her newest, Melt With You. She does have some comics which I haven’t read, however, I have read all four of her YA fiction titles and I can tell you she works some unbelievable magic in between the pages of her books typically focused on love and coming-of-age.

First, let’s celebrate her titles and covers which are the first things teen readers see and evaluate. The titles tells you exactly what you’re getting and the covers do too. The artwork is soft but mixes the contemporary story with the illustrated style that pulls a person toward it.

Second, the books are character-centered. You can tell from the covers which all feature the main characters on the covers, but also the minute you step into the book, you’re in the middle of someone’s head: how they feel, what their conflict is, how they want to move forward and problem-solve (or avoid it).

And third, they’re feel-good stories. Yes, there is the conflict that needs to be resolved but ultimately, the issue that the character is experiencing is able to be overcome or dealt with. Dugan’s stories are the ones that make it easy to believe that teens can overcome obstacles and work through issues. Oftentimes I find as I’m booktalking in my high school library that there is death, destruction, and heartbreak around every corner. Those books have a place but too many in a row makes it seem like being a teenager is a dark, hopeless place and that’s not true. They’ll raise their hand and ask for a funny book or a romance and ask why everyone’s parents are dead.

It doesn’t hurt that Dugan is somewhat local to us here in upstate New York and as I’m writing this, I’m writing myself a Post-it reminder to contact her to arrange a visit to our school in the near future.

And as the title of my post proclaims, I hope that she doesn’t stop at four, but has plenty more to come.

 
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Posted by on January 24, 2022 in Authors, Cover Love, Fiction, Upcoming Releases, Young Adult

 
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