RSS

Category Archives: Nonfiction

Flow

08 Apr

20200408BlogBanner

2020-04-05 14.57.23Maybe it’s because I’m a woman or maybe it’s because I’m a librarian, but either way, I want to take a moment to celebrate books about periods. They’ve been kind of having a moment. And I knew I wanted to share a post about periods two days ago when I finished Lily Williams and Karen Schneeman’s graphic novel published by First Second this past January called Go With the Flow. It’s a celebration of menstruation and friendship alongside actively advocating for rights.

Memorable character: While Sasha is the new girl, she’s not the most memorable. Abby is the one that’s rocking the boat. She’s the girl that wants to get something done and she uses her voice and influence through a blog and face time with the school principal about why pads and tampons aren’t stocked in the bathrooms and why they should cost money in the first place. One of the harsher realities of friendship is ushered in when Abby goes rogue and ends up putting the other girls in a tight spot where their communication sees them through (and a good ol’ fashioned apology), but you can’t blame the passionate girl for her actions when she believes so strongly. It leads to the first of a few memorable panels interspersed throughout the book for a memorable quote Abby uses in her blog said by Gloria Steinem: “If men could menstruate, men would brag about how long and how much.”

2020-04-05 19.51.58But let’s also give it up for the most memorable scene where Sasha’s blood-stained pants are showing as the girls usher her to the bathroom and why the book works so well in its graphic novel format. Most can empathize or sympathize with her situation and it’s the kind of thing that is discussed in other books discussing periods: the truthful portrayal.

I advise graphic novel lovers, middle grade fans, advocates, and the like to read and purchase multiple copies of this book to share. It allows girls to be seen by showing the myriad of experiences with periods.

And once you’re done with Go With the Flow, I urge you to pick up others that cover the same topic. Here are some of my other favorites.

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on April 8, 2020 in Adult, Authors, Blogging, Cover Love, Fiction, Graphic novels, Middle grade, Nonfiction, Short Story, Young Adult

 

Reading time capsule: Part II

04 Apr

20200404BlogBanner

Yesterday’s post was what I would put into a reading time capsule outside of the actual books themselves. Today I tackle what books I would want in the time capsule. And like picking your favorite dress or favorite child, it’s just impossible, but I’m giving it my best shot… and how big is the capsule??!?

  • Saga graphic novel collection by Vaughan and Staples. I just spent the last nine days re-reading a volume a day and loving every minute of it
  • Harris and Me by Gary Paulsen is the first book I remember laughing out loud at while reading
  • Every Ruta Sepetys book written and I’m going to go sci-fi here and say that when she writes another, just virtually drop it in there because I know I’ll want to read those too
  • Deathwatch by Robb White was the first book I remember recommending to a student as a first year teacher where the kid came back to thank me for my awesome recommendation
  • Reclaiming Conversation: The Power of Talk in a Digital Age by Sherry Turkle is a book I read several years ago and still bring up at least once a week in conversation. The number of Post-its sticking out of that book made it look ten times fatter
  • Crank by Ellen Hopkins. It’s verse style was somewhat revolutionary at the time and it’s loosely fictionalized version of her daughter’s experience brought so much out in the open. She became our first author visit at the high school that we hosted and we haven’t looked back in ten years
  • Darius the Great is Not Okay by Adib Khorram because I was on the William C. Morris award committee that named it the 2019 winner
  • Mudbound by Hillary Jordan had a whole mood and is one of the most impactful book written for adults when I live in a world reading mostly YA
  • Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson came out the year I graduated high school. I read it the following year in a YA lit class while I was studying English education and we met Anderson when she visited a local school district as a college class. Her depiction of high school brought back every sight, smell, and sound and who knew as a more than decades-old high school librarian that I would still be recommending it along with the graphic novel and companion Shout
  • You can’t not add a few classics: mine would be The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger and Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
  • The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides is another book that is full of big mood that skillfully and sinfully explores femalehood. I don’t have sisters, but I get the Lisbon girls and I remember connecting just as deeply to Sofia Coppola’s big screen adaptation (and buying the soundtrack)
  • The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold was the first book that I actually photocopied several pages out of to keep in a folder to go back and re-read whenever I wanted

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Do I have honorable mentions? Ones that I’d stuff in the crevices and crannies of the capsule. Here are a few of those that are less memories-driven but more emotionally-connected. Challenger Deep by Neal Shusterman, The Serpent King by Jeff Zentner, Hole In My Life by Jack Gantos, The 57 Bus by Dashka Slater, every Jason Reynolds book published, Ghosts of War by Ryan Smithson, The Vagina Monologues by Eve Ensler, North of Beautiful by Justina Chen, Flash Burnout by L.K. Madigan, Twilight by Stephanie Meyer, Rupi Kaur’s poetry, The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, and A Northern Light by Jennifer Donnelly.

What are some of yours?

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on April 4, 2020 in Adult, Authors, Blogging, Fiction, Graphic novels, Miscellaneous, Nonfiction, Poetry, Verse, Young Adult

 

A roller coaster of emotions

20 Mar

RollerCoasterofEmotions

Whenever I’ve read something or a few somethings, I will usually throw up a sticky note on my computer, give it a working title for a future blog post and wait until the inspiration strikes to write it. I’m ready to write from my working title “emotional roller coasters” and talk about three titles I’d read recently that unequivocally fall under this heading: Nikki Grimes’ Ordinary Hazards, A.J. Dungo’s In Waves, and Jenni Hendriks and Ted Caplan’s Unpregnant.

First, the fictional Unpregnant. What more can you ask for than a book targeted toward teens talking about abortion. It isn’t often that we find books wholly centered on the topic. I think I remember Exit, Pursued by a Bear the first time that it felt really real in a contemporary YA book. And then there’s Girls on the Verge which I highly recommend. But what most people comment on after reading this book is that while it is a frustratingly painful circumstance that puts Veronica in this situation, there is a dark humor that provides the balance that not all hope is ever lost regardless of the choice made though the most memorable scene is one of sadness:

“And that was it. Dinner was no different from any other dinner we’d had. My brother went over every play he’d made in baseball that weekend. My mother shoveled more food onto our plates. My dad made noises at appropriate times to make it seem like he was participating in the conversation. They didn’t even bother to ask any more about my weekend. They weren’t interested. I was a known quantity. The good daughter. The hard worker. I should have been grateful. I was angry. They didn’t see me. If they did, they would have known something had happened. Instead they only saw the pieces I was made of. A question already answered.”

Then there’s Ordinary Hazards, Grimes’ memoir of a few years of her childhood struggling with her mother’s alcoholism and paranoid schizophrenia  and her father’s intermittent absence which led to a childhood in the foster care system. But the biggest takeaway is the strength of memoir as a genre. Grimes explains memoir and really helps readers turn themselves into writers by showcasing that everyone has a story however joyous or heartbreaking. In addition, her choice to use verse is a touchstone text on its exemplary use in form, function, and lyricism.

Then last, is a graphic novel (I didn’t mean to represent two genres and a format under one umbrella of emotional stories but this is why books are amazing). It’s In Waves. I read this on my lunch at work about a month ago and was glad I was eating alone. Because I cried. Dungo’s tribute to his partner before her passing and while she was undergoing treatment shines in his visual choices in line, color, and symbolism. He also effortlessly weaves in a more factual story of the history of surfing yet it never once takes away from the roller coaster of his relationship as it weathered the storm of illness.

As everyone’s emotions are on similar roller coasters all across the world, I thought I would share three books that provide mirrors to the same mountains and valleys we’re feeling.

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on March 20, 2020 in Authors, Cover Love, Fiction, Graphic novels, Nonfiction, Verse, Young Adult

 

Delicious books

28 Feb

DeliciousBooks

2020-02-25 05.45.11-1-1Fat Tuesday is also Paczki Day. Paczkis are Polish doughnuts usually with jelly filling and rolled in either powdered sugar or granulated sugar. They’re made on Fat Tuesday in preparation for the Lenten season’s austerity. This past Monday, I homemade them and was excited to share them with my family, colleagues, and neighbors who all know my love for baking.

 

So it won’t come as any surprise that I also enjoy reading about books with cooking and baking in them. I’ve read Notes from a Young Black Chef (nonfiction biography) and With the Fire on High (young adult fiction) to Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant (nonfiction short story collection) and Maker Comics: Bake Like a Pro! (graphic novel) to name a few.

 

Recently I’ve read two others that I’d like to share a bit about: the Love Sugar Magic middle grade series and Salty, Bitter, Sweet.

While the rest of the series will be in the queue, I have only listened to the first book called A Dash of Sugar in which Leonora Legrono’s family owns a bakery preparing for The Day of the Dead when she accidentally discovers that she is a bruja, a witch of Mexican ancestry like her mother and the rest of her sisters who use magic in the kitchen. It’s a heartfelt mix of family, culture, and baking with a deliciously humorous plot.

The second, Salty, Bitter, Sweet, is firmly a young adult title that follows Isabella Fields to France on her father and stepmother’s cherry farm where she is going to be apprenticing with a famous chef and a group of teenagers vying for a spot in his Michelin-rated restaurant. Her passion for perfection in the kitchen is thwarted by the mishaps during her apprenticeship and her stepmother’s stepson visiting for the summer. It’s a solid, well-woven story with a beautiful backdrop and rich stories of fond family memories in the kitchen. Look for it on March 3rd.

In the comments below, please recommend any more books about food that I should read!

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on February 28, 2020 in Adult, Authors, Cover Love, Fiction, Graphic novels, Middle grade, Nonfiction, Short Story, Upcoming Releases, Young Adult

 

Remember

09 Jan

Remember

I made an Instagram story yesterday evening. It was a picture from the back of the Photography II classroom of a dozen kids looking at Isabel Quintero and Zeke Pena, the author and illustrator of the graphic novel Photographic: The Life of Graciela Iturbide that I blogged about in 2019 alluding to this collaboration. Above it I said “I f*ing love what I do” with a bouncing heart emoji over the Smartboard projector in the photo and a gif of a girl waving a book next to the words “school librarian”.

Because, I f*ing love my job as a school librarian and days like this remind me of that exponentially.

I’ve spent about a month in and out of this class working with the teacher and students to include the graphic novel into their identity unit that teaches them about portrait taking where they photograph six different portraits for the project.

Remember and remind yourself of days like these above on the days that I feel like this below:

GoslingMeme

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on January 9, 2020 in Authors, Events, Graphic novels, Miscellaneous, Nonfiction, Young Adult

 

“Santa, can you bring my mommy a new heart?”

21 Dec

This post was originally published on the Times Union Books Blog.

I’m going to end the year making you ugly cry, so be prepared. Yet, I’m still going to connect it back to a book but also share a much more important message that is best said via video.

This is my cousin. Since I don’t have a sister, she is the closest thing as a cousin who lived up the road most of my life. And that was what has happened over the last few months which culminated in a heart transplant, the gift of new life, on December 4th.

I had been out to visit her before things turned worse and as I returned to work, I saw a book that had been sitting on our shelves. For some reason I thought that maybe I’d read it but I wasn’t sure, so I took it with me to lunch and was instantly drawn in because it mirrored the real life experience my cousin was going through: the right book at the right time. I’m sure we’ve all experienced that at one time. The book was The Man Who Touched His Own Heart: True Tales of Science, Surgery, and Mystery by Rob Dunn, which is a fascinating deep dive into the heart from 2015 in a fairly comprehensive look that includes chapters on da Vinci and dogs as well as air pollution and what animal’s heart could likely be the most useful in transplantation. Dunn is an associate professor of Ecology and Evolution and brings a bevy of knowledge. While the title itself is taken from one of the stories, the book as a whole brings together multiple stories that adequately represent his opening statistic: one in three adults in the world will die of a disease of the cardiovascular system. Dunn does well by the couch scientist in us all to tell the story of the heart without complicated medical jargon and chronologically explain our understanding of this vital organ. As a reader, I know much more about how hearts work and respect how he goes about explaining it all through the brilliance and courageousness of professionals (and sometimes non-professionals).

I was particularly struck by the romantic notion that people had in the 1400s that Dunn shares

“In the 1400s, it was often said that the story of each lived life was written on the inside walls of the heart by a scribbling and obsessive God. When the heart was finally opened and examined in detail later in the same century, no such notes were discovered. Still, each mended heart bears the mark of a different kind of narration. Each mended heart beats out a conclusion to the struggles of the scientists, artists, surgeons, and writers who, with heroism, hubris, and insight, have done battle with the heart’s mysteries for millenia. Each mended heart beats out a story of frailty but also of possibility.”

For my cousin, mending her heart wasn’t possible, she needed a new one. She got one because someone decided to donate theirs. So, my message is two-fold: donate life through blood and organ donation. If you need a goal for 2020, make it this if you’re not already. And second, take this opportunity to learn, explore, escape, re-evaluate, and empathize with books. If that’s not a 2020 goal to read more, add that to your list too.

Signing off for 2019.

 
2 Comments

Posted by on December 21, 2019 in Adult, Authors, Miscellaneous, Nonfiction, Short Story

 

The top 15 of 2019 on the 15th

15 Dec

Top15of2019 (1)

Let’s make this a thing!

Last year I shared two lists: an adult and a YA/middle grade top 10 based on the books published in that calendar year. This year, absent from my list will be any fiction titles since I’m finishing up my term on YALSA’s Best Fiction for Young Adults blogging team. Our final list will be available soon and in the meantime you can see the titles we’ve all blogged about throughout the year.

Now onto my top 15 published today, December 15th for 2019.

Graphic novels (in no particular order)

  • Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me by Mariko Tamaki and Rosemary Valero-O’Connell: The color palette and storyline is richly detailed with the internal romantic lives of teenagers, especially highlighting unrequited and abusive relationships in a powerful story.
  • Pilu of the Woods by Mai K. Nguyen: A family-focused middle grade graphic novel with a vividly earthy color palette and a magical understanding of our natural world that has a message.
  • White Bird by R.J. Palacio: The historical graphic novel wrapped in a contemporary story that shows the power of technology and the need for youth to talk to their older relatives to reveal the secret stories that might never get told.
  • Maker Comics: Bake like a Pro! by Falynn Koch: I love baking, so this is my absolutely favorite maker comic to date. It’s so practical and useful wrapped in the goofy story of wizards honing their skills.
  • Bloom by Kevin Panetta and Savanna Ganucheau: The same use of a smart color palette like Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me, this romantic GLBTQ story in a bakery clearly has me gah-gah.
  • Pumpkinheads by Rainbow Rowell and Faith Erin Hicks: An endearing slow burning romance at a pumpkin patch where what you wish for isn’t always what you really need. The adventures were a humorous addition to a good ol’ fashioned romance in the fall. The setting is it’s own lovely character.
  • Kiss #8 by Colleen A.F. Venable and Ellen T. Crenshaw: Ah, what more can be said about a girl figuring out relationships while the readers follow along.
  • Hephaistos: God of Fire by George O’Connor: I’m all about this graphic novel series that keeps mythology alive for us all.

A picture book

  • Liberty Arrives!: How America’s Grandest Statue Found Her Home by Robert Byrd: I read it and then immediately booked a trip to the Statue of Liberty with my family. Yes, we were one of the lucky 400 per day to head up to her crown on a chilly October morning. So you should read the book and take the trip too.

And those fabulously fascinating nonfiction titles (again, in no particular order):

  • The Miracle and Tragedy of the Dionne Quintuplets by Sarah Miller: It’s a shocking look at five babies born in 1934 that shouldn’t have survived but did, then were ripped from their parents and raised as an amusement park attraction whose visits per year rivaled Niagara Falls.
  • Notes from a Young Black Chef by Kwame Onwuachi with Joshua David Stein: A truly spectacular behind the scenes look at Onwuachi’s rise to popular chef that mixes the personal and the professional (and includes recipes!)
  • Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs? by Caitlin Doughty: We all know I’m obsessed with Doughty and this one didn’t disappoint by sharing funny, gross, and impossibly weird questions posed by kids and Doughty’s straightforward and quirky answers that are truthful and entertaining.
  • Franklin D. Roosevelt: The Making of America by Teri Kanefield: Her series always entertains and informs about those that built America. Kanefield never shies away from details that are less than stellar about these individuals and does the same with FDR.
  • Shout by Laurie Halse Anderson: I mean, Anderson powerful words in prose format? Yes, please. The story is meant to be uncomfortable but also powerful and uplifting. A true battlecry for a new era.
  • Rising Water: The Story of the Thai Cave Rescue by Marc Aronson: Whenever I’m talking about this book to teens, I’m always sharing how I knew what the outcome was and I was still sweating whether they were going to make it out alive! That is how capable Aronson is as a writer in manipulating our emotions.
 
Leave a comment

Posted by on December 15, 2019 in Adult, Authors, Cover Love, Graphic novels, Middle grade, Nonfiction, Verse, Young Adult

 

Photographic memories: A collaboration with wings

30 Sep

PhotographicMemories

Spending a massive amount of time reading fiction for my year-long commitment to the Best Fiction for Young Adults blogging team means that I need a mental break once in a while to read nonfiction, poetry, short stories, and anything graphic to keep me fresh for fiction. And in the words of Frenchman Stendhal, “a good book is an event in my life.” Photographic: The Life of Graciela Iturbide is one such book from this past weekend. It hasn’t left me.

Published in 2018, I saw the cover frequently and wanted to get my hands on it. Focused on the life of Graciela Iturbide, she is the title character and the most memorable. A life that endured a tragedy, the death of a child, which she never talked about, it threw her into a tailspin and she became uber-focused on photography by specifically documenting her native Mexico.

2019-09-28 10.45.05And it’s the likes of illustrator Zeke Peña combined with the words of Isabel Quintero that merge Iturbide’s photography with an illustrated style that brings it to life two-fold. The most memorable panel, the one in which Peña re-works the iconic woman with the iguanas side by side with the photograph courtesy of Getty Images, is striking. And there are other panels that captivate the reader in their presentation and solidifies Peña’s skill both individually and collaboratively working with Quintero’s storytelling. Plus, the font itself worked seamlessly for my eyeballs to move around the pages and panels. Even Peña recognizes the beauty of illustrations by thanking readers “you and your eyeballs for reading this book”. You’re welcome, Peña. Thank you for illustrating it. And it got me thinking about my own life at thirty-something– how would Peña draw mine? What would Quintero write about me? Perhaps the best kind of self-reflective writing prompts could come from this book.

2019-09-28 10.45.18-1

How can we know so little about Iturbide? I am grateful to author and illustrator for starting the conversation with this glorious ode to her life and skill. And nothing says it better than Quintero’s words on Iturbide’s travels in this memorable quote: “Traveling is lonely. Not a desperate loneliness but the kind that asks me to reflect more deeply about the place I’m in. The wings behind my eyes open wide; traveling helps me see my many selves better”.

I advise (that like me) you read this more than once, keep it close by to recommend often, order multiple copies, and encourage budding photographers with this graphic novel biography.

 
1 Comment

Posted by on September 30, 2019 in Authors, Cover Love, Graphic novels, Nonfiction

 

A week of booktalks

22 Sep

AWeekofBooktalks

I say it frequently, whether I’m tweeting about our readers’ reading habits in the library or animatedly talking about it with teacher colleagues, if I could do nothing other than booktalking as a high school librarian I would be even happier. It could be one-on-one or a whole class, but I can’t help but get excited about all of the books at our fingertips.

This past week, my co-librarian and I spent the week working with our ENL classes for orientations and booktalks and the majority of our 10th grade students booktalking for independent reading.

My favorite utterance was “can we check out more than one?” Ummmm, YES! We’ll continue over the next few weeks filling in here and there for more booktalks but the majority took place within this past week. While I’m exhausted and the library is in general loving disarray, I’m filled with love for authors, their books, and our students.

2019-09-16 16.00.47Here were some of my favorites to discuss:

  • Attack on Titan by Isayama
  • Proud by Muhammad
  • Long Way Down by Reynolds
  • Milk and Honey by Kaur
  • Lockdown: Escape from Furnace by Smith
  • Ms. Marvel by Wilson
  • Black Enough edited by Zoboi
  • The Selection by Cass
  • Chasing King’s Killer by Swanson
  • Between Shades of Gray by Sepetys
 
Leave a comment

Posted by on September 22, 2019 in Fiction, Graphic novels, Middle grade, Nonfiction, Poetry, Verse, Young Adult

 

Bringing it together

06 Aug

BringingItTogether

I regularly contribute to a few other blogs in addition to this one. This has taken shape over the last several years and focuses on a different kind of audience though ultimately it still boils down to books, reading, teaching, and librarianship. So in an effort to share out some of the other posts that often don’t make it back to this one, here is a post to bring it all together.

  • YALSA’s The Hub
    • A division of the American Library Association the Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA) uses The Hub to share out current recommendations for some of their virtual committees. This year, I sit on the Best Fiction for Young Adults (BFYA) 2020 committee. You’ll see several of my posts alongside other committee members’ and the other committees as well.
  • Times Union‘s Books Blog
  • Nerdy Book Club
    •  A national blog that celebrates a love of reading when it comes to children’s and young adult literature and is the brainchild of Colby Sharp, Donalyn Miller, Katherine Sokolowski, and Cindy Minnich.
 
Leave a comment

Posted by on August 6, 2019 in Blogging, Childrens, Events, Fiction, Middle grade, Miscellaneous, Nonfiction

 
← Older posts
Newer posts →