Kraken by China Miéville

Kraken

China Miéville is such a different author he has been given his own genre called New Weird. This book is a combination of fantasy, horror, police mystery, religion, and even humor. 

Kraken opens in the natural history museum in London where the curator is giving a tour of the collection of preserved specimens to a group including a class of students. After proudly showing them the collection preserved by Darwin himself, he proceeds to take them to see the real star of the collection, a giant squid, only to discover that the animal and the tank it was in had vanished. 

The book proceeds to follow Billy as he joins with Dane (the museum guard he had seen killed) and members of the FSRC (Fundamentalist and Sect-Related Crime Unit) to chase down members of the squid-worshiping sect and find out how it had been removed from the museum. The reader is treated to amazing new characters and creatures as they chase around London.

I highly recommend this book to readers who appreciate a real challenge.

Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell

Fangirl

It's been a while since I've read read a romantic story but here I am finally. 

Cather (Cath) is the twin sister of Wren. Their mother had abandoned the family when they were eight and they were raised by their bipolar father. Heading off to college Cath was concerned about him, disturbed that her sister didn't want to room with her, and pressured to finish writing her fan fiction story before the last episode of the original series is released.

She  has found great satisfaction and recognition for her stories about Simon Snow (think Harry Potter) on the website FanFixx. Having been allowed into the class Fiction Writing, she is shocked to find her teacher thinks fanfic is little more than plagiarism and she is finding it hard to create her own characters and situations.

Cath has more things to worry about as she starts college. From the location of the cafeteria to meeting new people she finds comfort in her writing.

I highly recommend this book to anyone going off to college.

Dead Mountain: The Untold True Story of the Dyatlov Pass Incident by Donnie Eichar

Dead Mountain

I'll admit that I am not one to go hiking in the middle of winter to the middle of nowhere and I think that anyone who thinks this is fun has got to be crazy. However, there are those who do, like ten young people in Russia, and this is their tragic story.

They were students at the Ural Polytechnic Institute in 1959 and during their winter break they planned this hike so they could qualify for a Level 3 hiker's certificate. They were experienced and fit (except for the one man who had to turn back). What, then, made them leave their tent in the middle of the night, without their overclothes and boots?

Theories ran the gamut from escaped gulag prisoners to wild animals to aliens. The author, Donnie Eichar, decided to solve this real-life mystery. He got all the records, pictures, and logs he could find. He also went to Russia, met the lone survivor, and followed  in their footsteps.

The answer was surprising and rooted in advanced physics. The work to solve the mystery was very interesting.

Salt, Sugar, Fat by Michael Moss

Salt, Sugar, Fat

This book is certainly an eye opener! When the powers-that-be look around and cry and wail about the dramatic surge in childhood obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and other ailments, they conveniently fail to notice how the major food companies have profits that parallel their increasing numbers. Mr. Moss has produced mountains of hard evidence how these companies have used every trick in the book to get us to buy and consume their products while ignoring their effects on our health.

What was most disturbing was how the relationship and collaboration between food and tobacco companies evolved, both of them sharing tips and tricks on how to convince the consumer that the ingredients weren't so bad and how we had to eat more and more and more.

Any senior who is researching a food related topic for their senior project must read and use this book.

Dr. Bird's Advice for Sad Poets by Evan Roskos

Dr. Bird's Advice for Sad Poets

James Whitman (no relation to Walt) lives with his parents, the Brute and the Banshee, who have recently kicked out his sister recently expelled from school for fighting. Now he enjoys all of the parental attention by himself. To use his phrase, "Yawp!" Now he suspects that he is suffering from depression and is toying with the idea of killing himself. He realizes he needs help.

His best friend is dating a 21-year old woman and is not a reliable source of empathy. He gains the attention of Beth, a girl at school who is trying to get him to look in his sister's room for some poetry she had written. He offers his own photography along with his own poetry and helps them develop an online publication. He tries to persuade the school to readmit his sister and allow her to walk the stage with the hope his parents would allow her to return home. He finds out that there was much more to the story than he realized.

Unlike most other young males who may turn to violence or drugs to deal with their issues, James turns inward with his problems.  His favorite way to cool off is to literally hug trees and he has an imaginary therapist, Dr. Bird, who talks out his problems with him.

I would recommend this book to readers who are dealing with 'stuff' like depression, thoughts of suicide, cutting, abusive parents, or leaving home.

Two Boys Kissing by David Levithan

Two Boys Kissing

When their friend, Tariq, is the victim of a hate crime, Craig and Harry (who used to be a couple) plan to set a new world record for longest kiss. They obtain permission to hold the event in front of their high school and Tariq sets up equipment to live stream. We also meet Peter and Neil who are in a relationship, Avery (a transsexual) and Ryan who are starting a relationship, and Cooper who is lost and feels totally alone. Watching over all of these young people is a host of dead AIDS victims who cheer and encourage them and are frustrated when their advice is not heard.

Of course these young men are not alone. We also meet their family and community members who have their own reactions and concerns for them. Luckily the ones with the bad reactions are in the minority and we see how the event does bring people together and  celebrate love. We also see how Harry supports Craig and helps in reach their goal. We should all be so lucky to have someone like him.

I highly recommend this book to YA readers.

Nothing Can Possibly Go Wrong by Prudence Shen & Faith Erin Hicks

Nothing Can Possibly Go Wrong

What could possibly go wrong when a group of nerdy robotic club members enlist help of the cheerleaders to bring their robot to a competition? 

This graphic novel follows Charlie who is dealing with an absentee father and a mother who lives in another state. His friend, Nate, who is the president of the robotics club, is trying to raise money for a field trip to a robot fair. Unfortunately the cheerleaders think they should have the money for new uniforms. The administration will leave the decision to the student council. Naturally that means Nate should run for president of the council. In retaliation the cheerleaders nominate Charlie as a candidate. Things escalate until the obvious solution was that they should pool their resources so they both win.

The first prize of a robot battle competition would be more than enough to meet both groups' needs. The cheerleaders are needed to front the money for the entry fee and gas and the club has the robot. Charlie has his dad's SUV with room for everyone as well as the robot.

Lots of fun for everyone.

2014 YALSA Reading Challenge

Last year I participated in this challenge and read lots of books I probably would not otherwise have read. The rules of the challenge are that you can't include a book you have already read unless you reread it for the challenge. This means that some books I have read and really liked I can't include. The list of books is made up of the winners and honor books from the Printz, Shneider Family, Stonewall, Alex, Margaret A. Edwards, Odyssey, and William C. Morris awards as well as the ALA's 2013 Best Audiobooks, Fiction, Quickpicks, and Nonfiction lists. The challenge is to read or listen to 25 books before June 22, not really too difficult to accomplish. So far I have read the following books (highlighted books available at NHS Library - the rest were borrowed from the Napa County Library):

• Zombie Baseball Beatdown by Paolo Bacigalupi - funny and scary
• Better Nate Than Ever by Tim Federle - impossibly crazy book about chasing a dream
• Maggot Moon by Sally Gardner - bizarre alternate history about a hoax moon landing
• Scowler by Daniel Kraus - cruelty and violence that would challenge Stephen King
• Midwinterblood by Marcus Sedgwick - marvelous fantasy tracing soul mates backwards through 7 different time periods
• Winger by Andrew Smith - rugby, bullies, private school - not a favorite
• Courage Has No Color: The True Story of the Triple Nickles, America's First Black Paratroopers by Tanya Lee Stone - lots of pictures bring this nonfiction to life
• The President Has Been Shot! The Assassination of John F. Kennedy by James Swanson - another nonfiction made interesting with pictures and diagrams
• Navigating Early by Clare Vanderpool - reminded me of Holes in some ways
• Rose Under Fire by Elizabeth Wein - sequel to Code Name Verity and just as amazing
• In the Shadow of Blackbirds by Cat Winters - excellent historical fiction/paranormal

The following are the books that I had already read. Even though they are excellent books, I have too many new ones to read to reread them. Know what I mean?

• The Nazi Hunters: How a Team of Spies and Survivors Captured the World's Most Notorious Nazi by Neal Bascomb - another interesting nonfiction book
• Beauty Queens by Libba Bray - screamingly funny retelling of Lord of the Flies
• Etiquette & Espionage by Gail Carriger - steampunk and girl spies adventure
• Ash by Malinda Lo - retelling of Cinderella story
• Hold Me Closer, Necromancer by Lish McBride- OK - chapter titles most fun part of the book
• Out of the Easy and Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys - both are fantastic historical fiction with great female protagonists
• Boxers & Saints by Gene Luen Yang - two graphic novels depicting different sides of the Boxer Rebellion in China
• The Book Thief by Markus Zusak - do I really have to say how amazing this book is?

The Rithmatist by Brandon Sanderson

The Rithmatist

Brandon Sanderson is known for his collaboration with Robert Jordan on the epic Wheel of Time fantasy series. Here he has created a new world and a new system of magic that should appeal to that other epic series, Harry Potter.

Joel is a young man who was not able to complete the all important ceremony that would let him know if he was a rithmatist or not. A rithmatist is able to use chalk to draw figures on the ground to defend or attack other rithmatists. At the beginning of each chapter is one of these shapes with an explanation of the theory behind it.  Joel is not a rithmatist but that doesn't stop him from knowing as much about the art as he can.  He sneaks into classes and reads everything he can get his hands on.  After he becomes friends with Melody, who is a rithmatist, he persuades her to let him into the restricted section of the library for even more in-depth books.  They have both been assigned to Professor Fitch for the summer - Melody needs to practice her drawing and Joel needs to assist on a special project tracking down graduates and determining if they are dead, living, or missing.

What is determined is that there have been disturbing disappearances of rithmatics and the two students become instrumental in learning what is going on.

This system of magic lacks the glamour and excitement that readers of Harry Potter are more familiar with. It may take time to appreciate this method of casting charms. We will have to see with the next installment of the series.

Love in the Time of Global Warming by Francesca Lia Block

Love in the Time of Global Warming

Francesca Lia Block is known for her edgy stories loaded with amazingly different characters and settings. And this book doesn't fail to challenge the reader.

It is a relatively short book full of genetically modified giants, magic butterflies, a transgender teen, an evil scientist, and characters straight out of the Odyssey. It starts with the bright young Pen (Penelope) left alone after a huge flood takes away her family and most everything else in the world. She survives due to the foresight of her father who stocked the basement with water and food. 

Pen is attacked by some marauders but is helped by one of them who lets her escape in his fully stocked van. He tells her to look for her mother in Las Vegas. On her way she meets/rescues more young people who join her on her odyssey (pun intended).

I recommend this book to fans of magical surrealism, action, and the story of the Odyssey.

Saints and Boxers by Gene Luen Yang

Boxers

Saints

As you can probably tell from the covers, these two books are companions. They take place at the same time and place and even overlap briefly. However, they are about very different people. They take place around 1900 in China at the time of the Boxer Rebellion, a very violent and tumultuous time.

If one should be read first, I think it should be Saints. It is about Four-Girl, the fourth and only surviving daughter of a family in a small, poor village. Girls have traditionally held little value in Chinese families and it is not a surprise that she is attracted to the words of a priest who offers her a more worthwhile existence. Four-Girl has visions of Joan of Arc which give her courage to strike out on her own and leave her family.

Boxers is about Little Bao, the third son of a family in another poor village. A stranger named Red Lantern comes to their village and trains the young men in kung fu. Many of them leave to defend China against the foreigners and Bao follows. A huge fan of Chinese opera, he and his friends transform into gods and dead emperors when they go into battle. They go all the way to Peking (now called Bejing) before meeting their violent deaths.

I highly recommend these books to fans of graphic novels and historical fiction.

The Housekeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa

The Housekeeper and the Professor

This story takes place in Japan and is told from the viewpoint of a woman who is a young single mother who works as a housekeeper. She is assigned to work in the little two room cottage inhabited by a math professor who had been in a car accident. He was only able to remember events that occurred before the accident and the previous 80 minutes. Every day she had to introduce herself to him because he did not know he had already met her. He kept notes to himself pinned to his jacket including one to remind himself he could only remember the last 80 minutes. 

Eventually she brought her 10-year old son to the professor's house after school and the professor called him Root because the flat top of his head reminded him of the square root sign. Root and the professor found they both loved the same baseball team even though the professor only remembered the players from before the accident.

What was fun was how the professor shared his love of mathematics with the housekeeper and her son. He taught them about prime numbers and i, the square root of -1. This story was enjoyable for the shared joy of math as well as the challenge of working with a person who has had a brain injury.

The Nazi Hunters: How a Team of Spies and Survivors Captured the World's Most Notorious Nazi by Neal Bascomb

The Nazi Hunters

Adolf Eichmann was the man responsible for building the death camps and organizing the transportation of Jews and others to their death during World War II. After the war he changed his name, escaped Europe with his family, and hid in Argentina. A group of men who were survivors of the camps tracked him to a poor area outside of Buenos Aries and smuggled him out of the country to publicly stand trial in Israel. He was eventually found guilty and hung.

There were many things about this story that reminded me of the recent search for Osama bin Laden. One major difference was that Eichmann was given a trial before he was executed. It took them 15 years to find where Eichmann was hiding but this was before the Internet, email, and spy satellites. They were able to capture and extradite him without night-vision goggles and fancy helicopters. 

The story is enhanced by many pictures of the people involved and various paraphernalia like the hypodermic used to sedate Eichmann. Readers who enjoy spy thrillers would enjoy this non-fiction book.

The Golden Day by Ursula Dubosarsky

The Golden Day

The Australian author, Ursula Dubosarsky, has given us this little jewel of a book, one of those that begs to be read slowly and savored. It takes place in a school for girls during the 1970s and in some ways reminded me of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie. A free-spirited teacher takes her class to a park to contemplate death. A man had been hung in Melbourne that morning and she wants the girls (who don't even know where Melbourne is) to think about things. 

It did seem a particularly wicked thing to do, the little girls agreed, on such a warm and lovely day when everything in it was so alive. Better to hang a person at night when it was already sad and dark.

They meet the handsome poet/gardener (teacher's boyfriend?) there who takes them to a cave to see some examples of indigenous art. The girls are a combination of innocent, immature, and rather silly and are completely clueless what to do when their teacher vanishes. Should they tell someone? Return to school? Tell about the gardener? It's hard to tell if they are more scared about what happened to the teacher or what might happen to themselves. I had an image of a huddled group of whimpering puppies.

Treat yourself to this delicious morsel of a book if you enjoy light mystery.

Hub Challenge completed

I finally received my goodie for finishing this challenge. It's silly that such a little thing means a lot but it doesn't really take a lot to make me happy.

My friend is the library clerk at a middle school and I designed a book mark to give to her students who had read 1,000,000 words and multiples thereof. It made me feel good to create something for them and even better to hear that some of them kept them and are still using them.

In any case, I read 25 books from a list of 80 (see my previous post). Some of them were wonderful, most of them were OK. It certainly gave me the incentive to read books I would probably not have read. Some of them I intend to purchase for our library so that more people have the chance to read them.

If anyone asks (and even if they don't), I recommend that my reading friends continue to challenge themselves; to read outside their comfort level and maybe discover a new format or genre that they have not previously enjoyed. In any case, read more nonfiction. Narrative nonfiction is really becoming a wonderful source of stories so get more of that. You might end up learning something along the way.

The Orphan Master's Son by Adam Johnson

The Orphan Master's Son

This extraordinary book gives the reader a glimpse into life in a very isolated country - North Korea. We follow the life of Pak Jun Do as he supervises orphans, learns how to fight in dark and cramped tunnels, works on a boat that kidnaps Japanese people off their beaches, and is subsequently taught English. He is then put on a fishing boat to monitor and transcribe radio transmissions. An unfortunate event on that boat caused him to be put into a mine prison where he kills and takes the identity of Commander Ga, the minister of prison mines and husband to the national actress, Sun Moon. To fit in with the fishermen who had tattoos of their wives on their chests, he put a tattoo of the actress on his chest, not imagining that he would ever meet her.

All through the book we see examples of life in a totalitarian country. Every home has a loud speaker wired in that broadcasts propaganda at any time of the day and night. Children grow up with only the stories they hear from this source. Everyone is in constant fear of being reported for the slightest infraction. Old people without family to take care of them, are killed by having their blood drained. And the prisons! The prisons!

This book won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Deservedly so.

My rating for this book: 

Angels in America, Parts I & II by Tony Kushner (1993)

Angels in America

 Part I and Part II of this play take place in 1985, just as people were learning about AIDS and how it was transmitted. It was a very terrifying time for homosexuals since they not only were the ones most commonly afflicted, but it gave others additional reasons to fear and hate them. So many gay people have enough problems with being gay without the added stress of a fatal disease threatening them. Our cast of characters are composed of four homosexuals and members of their friends and family. We see how this illness affects them as well.

This play won the Pulitzer prize in 1993 and if you are interested, HBO produced it for their network and should be available to watch.

My rating for these plays: 

Etiquette & Espionage by Gail Carriger

Etiquette & Espionage

I have enjoyed the adult series by this author called The Parasol Protectorate which features vampires and werewolves in Victorian England. This book takes this already fun format and ramps up the steampunk aspect of it a few dozen notches!

Sophorina is the youngest in a family of girls and when a mysterious Mrs. Barnaclegoose shows up one day offering to take her to a finishing school, her mother is happy, if a bit perplexed, to let her go. Sophorina is such a tomboy, it's hard to imagine anyone could attempt to teach her manners. She packs up a few things and is off. They don't get very far when they are attacked by flywaymen in airdinghies. They are after a prototype and thinks it is in their carriage. They get away thanks to Sophorina's quick thinking and bravado.

The story continues and we learn about Mademoiselle Geraldine's Finishing Academy for Young Ladies of Quality which is suspended in the air by multiple inflated balloons. We meet the young people who surely will factor in future stories and learn about this wonderful steampunk setting.

I highly recommend this to lovers of action, steampunk, or just something completely different. 

My recommendation for this book:   

HUB Challenge

The HUB Reading Challenge

This year, for the first time, I participated in The Hub Reading Challenge. The Hub is the blog for YALSA (Young Adults Library Services Association) and the challenge was to read at least 25 books from a list of 85 award winners. It started in the beginning of February and runs until June but I managed to finish early. Some of the books I read were in the NHS Library but most of them I had to borrow from the County library. A few I went ahead and bought for our library. The following is the list of books I read. The titles in bold are available from the NHS Library. The ones with an asterisk (*) I will probably purchase for our library soon.

My favorite book was The Round House and my favorite new discovery was Tamora Pierce. I enjoyed Squire so much that I intend to read the entire series during the summer! It was fun to be challenged to listen to audio books and read graphic novels. I was lucky to find The Diviners at the County Library on a Playaway, an MP3-sized gizmo with just that book on it. I listened to it in the car and at the gym. It was a long book but very fun to listen to.


1. The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater (2012) 
2. Juvenile in Justice by Richard Ross (2012)  
3. The Running Dream by Wendelin Van Draanen (2011) 
4. After the Snow by S.D. Crockett (2012) 
5. * My Friend Dahmer by Derf Backderf (2012) 
6. Sparks: The Epic, Completely True Blue, (Almost) Holy Quest of Debbie by S.J. Adams (2011) 
7. * Ultimate Comics, Spider-Man, Vol. 1 by Brian Michael Bendis and others (2012) 
8. Wonder Show by Hannah Barnaby (2012) 
9. * Heist Society by Ally Carter (2012) 
10. Boy 21 by Matthew Quick (2012) 
11. The Diviners by Libba Bray, read by January LaVoy (2012) (I listened to the audio version but the print version is in our library)
12. Prom & Prejudice by Elizabeth Eulberg (2011) 
13. Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Cabin Fever by Jeff Kinney, read by Ramon de Ocampo (2011) 
14. Seraphina by Rachel Hartman (2012) 
15. The Night She Disappeared by April Henry (2012) 
16. Putting Makeup on the Fat Boy by Bil Wright (2011) 
17. Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Sáenz (2012) 
18. Me and Earl and the Dying Girl by Jesse Andrews (2012) 
19. Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan (2012) 
20. The Pregnancy Project by Gaby Rodriguez (2012) 
21. The Round House by Louise Erdrich (2012) 
22. Friends with Boys by Faith Erin Hicks (2012) 
23. Daredevil, Vol. 1 by Mark Waid et al, (2012) 
24. Squire by Tamora Pierce (2001) 
25. * I Hunt Killers by Barry Lyga (2012) 

The Pregnancy Project by Gaby Rodriguez

The Pregnancy Project

Gaby's mother was a teen when she had her first child. Gaby was the eighth and last of her children and watched as her mother struggled to support and provide for them without the help of a father. As she watched her sisters and brothers become teen parents, she resolved to not let a pregnancy come between her and her goals. She could not help but watch how friends, family, and society as a whole regard and treat teen parents and she came up with an idea for her senior project.

She shared her plan with only her mother, one sister, her boyfriend, best friend, principal, and assistant superintendent. She was an honors student and would record how everyone saw and treated her when she revealed to them she was pregnant. That's right. She faked a pregnancy. Her co-conspirators would relate to her all they heard and for a few months she experienced how a pregnant teen was treated. Her goal was to show people how their attitudes and comments tore down a teen's self-esteem and how it was impossible to recover from this. 

I highly recommend this book to students to show how they can make a difference and maybe help someone who needs a shoulder to lean on.

My rating for this book: