Quick Hits: Part I

I'm seven books behind in posting, not including posts already in draft. A bunch of new books just came in, which is going to get me even further behind. So I'm just going to do a some quick impressions of a few of the books I've recently finished.

Once a Witch by Carolyn MacCullough
3Q 4P; Audience: J/S

Tamsin is the only unTalented person in her family, even though her grandmother predicted when she was born that she would be immensely powerful and a beacon for all. She's felt like an outsider her entire life, which partly explains why she agrees to take on a "finding" task even though she's not the person the request is intended for. As she works to find the item, a lot of things change: she discovers she truly is very Talented indeed, she gets reacquainted with her best friend and sparks fly, and she puts her family into the gravest danger they have faced in over a hundred years.

Magic, romance, time travel, and danger: it's a great mix. Tamsin is a very relatable character. I felt very positively about this book right up until the climax, where it fell apart a bit. It wasn't clear to me what the villain actually needed to do in order to achieve his objective, but somehow our protagonist (Tamsin) knew exactly what he planned. Predictions about the future are an important element in this book. It's made clear that "the future is like water", so a foreseen future can still change. But we should at least see the branching point where things could go one way or the other. There's at least one prediction about what will happen if Tamsin Travels into the past that has her mother in a panic, yet I don't recall any situation where Tamsin actually finds herself confronting that likelihood or any slight change that prevents it from occurring. It would appear from the ending that there will be a sequel, so perhaps that prognosticated event has yet to happen. But if that's the case, why is it so prominently mentioned now? I also thought Tamsin adapted to her new-found Talent and power awfully quickly. But overall, I liked the characters (though some of the family members and their Talents push the edge of twee), especially Tamsin and Gabriel, and I was caught up in the story most of the way through. It was a good escape-reading book.

Give Up the Ghost by Megan Crewe
4P 4P; Audience: J/S

Ever since her sister Paige died, Cass can see and talk to ghosts. For years, she's used this ability to gather dirt on her classmates, particularly the ones who have been giving her grief ever since middle school. Very much the loner, she doesn't know how to react when Paul, one of the guys who hangs with that group, asks her for help contacting his dead mother. She makes a deal with him: she'll help him if he'll help her get the goods on her ex-best friend's boyfriend. What she doesn't count on is how very messed up Paul is. What she doesn't expect to do is let someone see the real her for the first time in a very long time. After years of allowing only ghosts into her life, interacting with a live human being is difficult and frightening.

Ghosts aside, this is a keeping-it-real novel. Cass is dealing with the loss of her sister, a mother who seems to want to be anywhere but with her, and a betrayal by her best friend that has left her a social outcast. She's unhappy, angry, and unable to trust anyone. Paul is in a world of hurt. He's as angry at his friends as Cass is. None of them seem to understand or care how he feels about his mother's death, and he feels totally alone. These are two people who need to reach out to someone else and who are equally unwilling or unable to do so. Certainly they have no intention of revealing their pain to each other, and it's a surprise to both when it happens.

Minor quibble: Middle school can certainly be a miserable experience, but people generally move on from its petty backstabbing and casual cruelties a little better than Cass and her one-time friends do. I found it a little hard to believe that she was still persona non grata four years later. Danielle's dirty work and Paige's death (and Cass's new-found ability to see and talk to ghosts) came almost simultaneously, so we're asked to accept that the two together set Cass on her leave-me-the-hell-alone path. Mmmm...okay, I'll go with it, but with a raised eyebrow.

There's no presto-chango magic fix in this book. Change is slow and painful, and there's not much of a tidy wrapping up at the end. I was left with a sense of life going on as a work in progress. Grieving and forgiving and learning to trust are all things that take a while, and this book acknowledges that. I appreciated that.

On Keeping One's Distance, Purposely and Not

I'm really far behind in posting on books I read in January and February, so I'm going to try to toss up a few slightly shorter posts. (Of course, with me, slightly shorter generally means five or six paragraphs instead of seven or eight! So shorter is definitely a relative term!)

How to Say Goodbye in Robot by Natalie Standiford (4Q 3P) has already gotten all kinds of attention in blogs and review journals. It seems to be one of the hot books of the season so far. While I enjoyed reading it, I don't think it's going to be on my top ten of 2010 (technically, it's from late 2009, but I read it in January).

Bea is accustomed to moving, but this time, things are different. Nobody wants to start a new school in their senior year. And her mother is acting very strangely. She's crying at the drop of a hat and fixating on chickens. When Bea refuses to cry when a gerbil that isn't even theirs dies, her mother calls her a robot for being so heartless. Bea decides being robot-like isn't such a bad idea. Things hurt less when you don't feel anything. so she decides not to feel anything. She meets Jonah at school, where she's purposely keeping her distance from everyone. Jonah's been called Ghost Boy for years, both because of his albino-like appearance and because he keeps such a low profile that he's practically invisible. For some reason, Jonah will talk to Bea, and he's the one person she lets into her life in any meaningful way. Jonah finally reveals the tragedy that's been the driving force in his life: the death of his mother and twin brother in a car accident. When Jonah discovers that his father has been lying to him about the accident and its aftermath for years, he and Bea go on a seemingly hopeless quest to find the one thing that can fill the hole in his life.

Musings:

Bea and Jonah keep people at arm's length, and that's pretty much how I felt about them too. I didn't connect to them at the level I wanted to, even though Jonah's situation was infuriating and very sad. Bea's story might have been more compelling for me if it had continued to develop in the direction it seemed to be going. But ultimately, the issues surrounding her mother didn't hold together for me. I couldn't buy the reactions that resulted from the cause. I did like the use of the late-night radio show and its quirky loyal followers to give them a place they could fit in and be accepted. Those sections were a welcome relief from the cold, like cuddling up with an afghan and cocoa after being outside on a dreary February day.

Food for thought: Are Bea and Jonah good for each other? Is Jonah what Bea needed at the time, or did their friendship reinforce her robot responses to everyone else around her? Would it have been healthier for Jonah if Bea had encouraged him to handle his discovery of his brother and his father's decision differently? Are Jonah's actions at the end selfish or self-preservation?

Pieces of the Puzzle

Frannie in Pieces by Delia Ephron

4Q 3P; Audience: M/J

Frannie is devastated when her father dies. His house was a warm, comforting place, a place where she knew she'd always be understood. Her father saw the world through an artist's eyes, and he taught Frannie to see the art in everything. Her relationship with her mother isn't like that. Even her best friend doesn't get her the way her father did. That huge hole he's left behind - will she ever be able to fill it? It doesn't seem likely.

Her father left his house and its contents to her. It takes weeks before she's ready to face going back there, let alone choose which of his belongs to keep (as many as possible) and which to give away (not that, not that, definitely not that). It is in his studio ("It looks like he's just taken a break") that she makes her most significant find: a carved wooden box with Frances Anne carved on the top. Below her name is 1000. Inside the box are pieces of a handmade jigsaw puzzle. It must have been meant as a birthday gift for her. It is all the more precious because her father never planned ahead, and her birthday is weeks away. He'd been thinking about her.

Her father's death has sent Frannie into a significant depression. She pushes everyone away, including her best friend (who wants to listen to her talk about her new boyfriend when all Frannie can think about is how much she misses her father). All she wants to do is lie on the floor in her room and grieve. But the jigsaw puzzle calls to her. She takes it out and slowly begins to put it together.
Piece by piece, edge by edge, the picture slowly takes shape. It's a village. What village? Where is it? Frannie thinks she knows the answers, but she is in for more than one shock. The more she concentrates on the puzzle, the more real it seems to her. There are times she could swear she was actually inside the puzzle. Could that be? How could that possibly be?

Much to her dismay, Frannie doesn't get to spend all of her time locked in her room with her puzzle and her grief. Her mother has arranged a summer job for her. Something to keep her occupied. Something to keep her mind off death and dying. Something right up her alley: teaching arts and crafts at a summer camp. There is far more humor in this book than one might expect to find in a book about dealing with grief, and much of it comes from Frannie's experiences as a camp counselor. There are quirky campers, a dreamy co-counselor, and Frannie's unique take on how to make art with the under-ten crowd. Poison is a riveting subject, for instance. Wouldn't a collage of all the poisonous things in your home that look innocuous be eye-catching? Dishwashing detergent ("If swallowed...call a Poison Control Center"). Batteries ("May explode"). Toothpaste ("May be harmful if swallowed"). Mouthwash (ditto). Not surprisingly, Frannie's avant-garde art style raises a few eyebrows (parents) and gives rise to more than a few grins (the reader).

The dash of is-this-really-happening-or-is-she-a-little-crazy certainly will keep readers intrigued. Several well-placed pictures help underscore how important and omnipresent art is in Frannie's life and in her relationship with her father. And there's more depth here than may at first meet the eye. Using assembling a jigsaw puzzle as a metaphor for putting a life back together again after it falls apart works surprisingly well. Readers who enjoy fast-paced books may want to give this one a pass, but for those who like books that fold you in their arms and carry you gently away, it's a winner.

Quotes to give you a flavor of the book:

Do you know what it says on a tube of toothpaste? In small print? You have to read the small print because they never tell you anything scary in large print. Large print is what they want you to see. Here's what the large print says: FOR BEST RESULTS, SQUEEZE TUBE FROM THE BOTTOM AND FLATTEN AS YOU GO UP. But the important stuff is small. Tiny. If more than used for brushing is accidentally swallowed, get medical help or contact a Poison Control Center right away. You can die from toothpaste.

I've been going to Cobweb since kindergarten. Every week the school holds a meeting, its word for assembly, about world awareness. At the last one a doctor spoke about all the orphans in Africa who had lost their parents to AIDS. The purpose of these meetings is to raise more sensitive human beings, but all that sensitivity didn't stop Sukie Jameson from bragging about her breasts or kids from staring at me when I returned to school. I stared right back...Perhaps they expected a mark on my forehead, like an outline of a man with line through him, kind of like a traffic warning sign.

All the counselors look to be my age. Well, I look old for my age in my opinion, because of my awesome maturity and possible air of tragedy...One counselor, a guy with a buzz cut, is doing push-ups...I guess you need to be in good shape to handle a bunch of kids under the age of ten. "Hey, I'm Simon, who are you?" He jogs a circle around me..."I'm Frannie." I give him a Mona Lisa smile...Jenna [her best friend] and I practiced Mona Lisa smiles in front of the mirror. When someone bugged us at school, we would say, Give him (or her) the MLS*. With the MLS, it's not clear if you're smiling, being secretive, or, in the case of me with Simon right now, acting superior. "Frannie," he repeats. "Frannie-bo-banny." Forget the MLS. A total snub is in order. (pp. 121-123)

(* I confess that I found Frannie's use of initials instead of whole words frustrating at times. I couldn't ever remember what ENP was supposed to stand for, but it was used repeatedly to describe another counselor. Turns out, I discovered just now, that it's an "Extremely neat person". Okay.)

I won't quote more, but I hope it's clear from these few that Frannie's voice is droll and a little wry, and quite worth spending time with.

Person Frances Anne

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No Right Turn - booktalk

NO RIGHT TURN
by Terry Trueman

My father committed suicide. The shot wasn’t that loud, really, just one pop, not even as loud as a big firecracker, but I knew instantly what it was, and I ran downstairs. I saw my father sitting there with the bullet in his head. I called 911. Then I gave CPR to a dead man. Now, three years later, it’s like I died that day, too. I don’t talk to anyone, and nobody talks to me. I go to school and come home, but nothing seems real. Nothing matters. My life is just me and my mom. And that’s fine with me. I thought she was fine with it, too, until she started dating Don, the guy who just moved in down the street. What do we need him around for?

Don has a Corvette. I’m not a gearhead, but this car is sweet, It’s a 1976 model, low to the ground, with high curved fenders and a custom paint job: white on top and blue-green all along the lower section. The windows are tinted, and the tires are big, with bright chrome hubs. It’s sleek, powerful, and man, is it fast. Riding in the Stingray is like being strapped on the back of an oversized cheetah. It feels like it’s taking us for a ride, not the other way around. The rush is incredible: the rumble of the engine, the deep vibration. Soon we’re going over 100 mph. Then Don lets me drive. Let me tell you, it’s nothing like driving my mother’s Honda. When we finally get back to Don’s, I know I have to drive this car again. I have to.

Don’s out of town every Wednesday. If there’s ever a fire, the car’s what Don will save, and he doesn’t want to waste time searching for his keys. So he leaves them in the ignition. I know the code to his garage door. It’s like he’s practically inviting me to take the car for a ride. So I do. Every Wednesday night, that car and I have a date. I take it out to where the streets are straight and quiet, and I floor that pedal. Don installed a nitrous oxide system, so now it has even more horsepower. Geez, that baby flies! Or sometimes I drive around town, because what good is it if you never get to see people turn a little green when they see you behind the wheel of a ‘Vette? That’s how I meet Becka Thorson, the most gorgeous girl in the world. She thinks the car is mine. And she likes me. Or maybe she just likes the ‘Vette. I don’t know. As long as she’s sitting next to me, I don’t really care.

If I get caught, my mother will kill me. Becka won’t trust me. I don’t know what Don will do. But I know what the police will do. They’ll charge me with grand theft auto. But after three years of feeling as dead as my father, I’m finally feeling alive again. It’s worth the risk.

When Is a Joyride Not a Joy?

Okay...this was written in August and never posted, apparently. Since it's been two weeks since I posted anything other than a stop-gap post, I'm going to go ahead and publish this even though I must have wanted to edit it or add another thought. Since I have no idea what I had in mind, there's no point in waiting any longer.

TWOC: Taken Without Owner's Consent by Graham Joyce
4Q 3P S

Matt’s having a hellish time. He’s on probation and seeing a court-mandated counselor/probation officer. It’s not unusual for him to wake up screaming from horrible nightmares. And during the day, he’s haunted by the mocking image of his brother Josh, who died over a year ago. Matt taught Josh everything he ever needed to know about TWOCing – stealing cars to go joyriding. What Matt would like to forget, but can’t, is the horrible night he, Josh, and Josh’s girlfriend went on a terrible joyride that ended with Josh dead and Jools (the girlfriend) horribly disfigured. Only Matt walked away from the crash seemingly unscathed. But with those nightmares, strange memory lapses, and seeing Josh outside every window, Matt’s only unmarked on the outside. Inside, he’s a mess. Matt’s parole officer offers him the chance to participate in a weekend Outward Bound-type program that will, if he finishes it successfully, reduce his probation time. They'll be rock climbing, hiking, and (::sigh::) participating in group discussions "in a spirit of openness and honesty". Matt's not the outdoors type, and he's not convinced that this is anything he wants to do, but he's not really given that much of a choice. He has two companions on this trip. Gilb's a quiet kid with horrible acne ("even his zits have zits"), spiked, henna-dyed hair, and a vacant look ("he has a look about him, like someone removed the front part of his brain"). He's also a graffiti whiz, which Amy, the third companion, thinks is pretty cool. (They've both seen his work, and he's good.) Amy's a much bolder personality. Her hair is so short, you can see all the cuts on her scalp ("it looks as though she tried to cut her own hair with long-handled tree-pruning shears". Later she sports a multi-colored mohawk.) She's a fan of army-surplus clothes, and heavy goth-type makeup. She's also an in-your-face kind of girl who doesn't take any guff from anyone, least of all Matt. Amy's prone to setting fires where they don't belong. It probably won't surprise anyone to learn that this weekend trip is a big turning point in Matt's life. He learns a lot about himself over those two days, and some of it is stuff he'd really rather not have discovered. It also probably won't surprise anyone when Matt winds up bonding with Amy and Gilb. But Graham Joyce takes his readers on a heck of a ride (in more ways than one - this is, after all, a book about a kid who likes to go joyriding!) while Matt is on that journey of discovery. I'm pretty sure that even teens who don't really get into books will find themselves holding on for dear life when Matt, Amy, and Gilb break out of camp, steal a car, and take off on a joyride that starts out as a thrill and winds up in a place that gives Matt nightmares. This book is an interesting mix. It reads like realistic fiction, but the main character insists he is being haunted by the ghost of his dead brother. It has moments of action and suspense, but it also has many quieter scenes. Personally, I often found myself holding on to the edge of my seat (figuratively speaking) as I read, and I think I held my breath more than once. I also laughed far more than once. Matt, the main character, has a wicked sense of humor and he’s a very sarcastic observer. That makes for a fun read in between all the suspenseful and action-packed moments. But even with the humor and sarcasm, Graham Joyce never lets you forget that Matt is a very damaged kid who is dealing with a world of hurt. I cared about Matt, and he felt very real to me. Ultimately, I thought that Matt's problems and the book itself are resolved too neatly, and that the development of the relationship between Matt, Gilb, and Amy was a little too quick and neat. Because of those factors, this book hovers between a 3 and a 4 in quality for me, but I went with the four because the voice is so consistently strong and I found the storyline compelling. I wasn't sure where Matt's story was going, even though other aspects of the book were more predictable. British terms and slang are used throughout. That’s usually not a problem for me, but this time, I did get puzzled by a few terms. I wish I’d known that there was a glossary in the back. It would have helped. A couple of the terms I wasn’t familiar with turned out to be slang for part of the male anatomy. Others were sport-related terms that may or may not be specifically British. I was familiar with other terms from other books, but if you haven't read a lot of books written by British authors, you'll want to look at the glossary first.

Quotes:

A few lines from the book, chosen to give you an idea of Matt's voice:

(Sarah, Matt's probation officer/counselor, who is pretty hot:) "You seem so distracted, Matt. I wish you'd tell me what's going on in that head of yours."
Is she winding me up? If she can cross her legs like that and not know what's going on in the head of a sixteen-year-old boy, I don't think she's much of a probation officer.

A taste of Matt's day/nightmares. Jake has just handed Matt a bag, telling him he's too thin:

But I don't know about this bag. It has a bad weight. I open the bag, reach in, and pull out some of its contents. In my hand is a human ear, slightly ragged and bloody at its edge. And a toe. And a finger amputated at the second knuckle....I glance up from the bag and there is Jake outside the window laughing his head off, and in my hand are these body parts and I start screaming loud, louder. I start screaming and I don't stop even though no one downstairs can hear me because Slay Dog Dog are laying down some really heavy chords and screaming vocals themselves. But then the track reaches its end and I'm still screaming when my dad bursts into the room...."It's all right son, it's all right," he says, taking a bag of biscuits out of my hand.

Matt talks about learning how to break into and hotwire cars from his brother. At one point, he explains that they didn't always steal the cars. Half the fun was in seeing how fast they could break into a car. Sometimes, just for fun, they'd leave their business card for the owners:

"Your car was checked today by the NEIGHBOURHOOD WATCH SCHEME. It took only (blank) seconds to enter your car and poke around the glove compartment, where we found (blank - we would write things like "condom," "G-string,", etc. in this space). Please take greater care in the future and have a nice day. With the blanks neatly filled in, we would leave the car on the seat for the driver to find. We even did a police car once. You're dying to ask, aren't you? Thirty-nine seconds.

Matt's not too impressed with the conditions at the camp. The food in particular is less than inspiring. And this royal feast, this banquet for kings, is garnished with a sprinkling of green plastic-toy frogspawn, which on closer inspection proves to be tiny bullet-hard peas, boiled to death for God-knows-what crimes against humanity. And I'm not going to quote anything from this, but I'll tell you that the horse riding scene is one of my favorites in the book.


In the time since I wrote this, I can see that the 3P rating seems pretty accurate. But that's how it does just by sitting on my New Books shelf. I think it would sell pretty well in formal/informal booktalking situation (I may test that this week!).

The Miner's Daughter, briefly

The Miner's Daughter by Gretchen Moran Laskas
5Q 3P M/J/S

In 1932, the United States was in the midst of the Great Depression. Bread cost five cents (eight if it was sliced), a quart of milk cost a quarter, and you could buy a two pound jar of peanut butter for fifteen cents. Those prices seem incredible to us today, but what is even more incredible is how hard it was then for people to pay them. It was even harder if your livelihood depended entirely on someone else.

This book makes it clearer than any history textbook ever could just how deeply and inextricably miners' families were trapped in their hand-to-mouth existence. They were entirely at the mercy of mining company. What work there was to be had was at the whims of the company. What goods were to be had were available only at the company store. Nobody had the means to go elsewhere if they didn't like the prices or the products. Many of the people never traveled outside of their own town. Most of the children quit school after just a few years, because their help was needed in the mines or at home. And when it came to elections, "free" and "choice" weren't words in the company's vocabulary. They expected the miners and their families to vote for who and what was good for the company, not for themselves.

This is life as Willa Lowell knows it. She desperately wants to go to school and learn more, but she is needed at home. Her mother is pregnant again, and the pregnancy is not going well. Willa is deeply afraid that her mother's life is in danger. She struggles to do as many of the chores as possible so that her mother can rest. Since there is no running water in the town, that includes several daily trips to the water pump in town to haul back pails of water. The feeling of quiet desperation hangs over her home and the town. But a gleam of light comes when Miss Grace comes to town, bringing with her a whiff of the outside world, a sense of possibilities, and books. Miss Grace and new books to read open up Willa's world in ways that she could never have imagined.

As the months pass, her mother gives birth, her father and brother leave town in search of work, and Willa cuts her hair and dresses as a boy in order to get a job picking fruits and vegetables on nearby farms. She also falls in love. Through it all, Miss Grace remains a powerful influence on Willa, encouraging her to read books and to write down her thoughts. It is through Miss Grace that Willa and her family are made a life-changing offer. It will get them out of the mining town and give them a home of their own. But it means leaving her best friend and the boy who wants to marry her behind, and Willa is deeply unhappy about that, not just because she will miss them, but also because the opportunity is only available to white, Anglo-Saxon Protestants. Not only does this exclude her best friend and boyfriend, Willa believes it is anti-American, even if it is a government-sponsored program. Miss Grace and her family convince her to go, but Willa can't help expressing how she feels about the injustice that comes with this wonderful opportunity. She never expects that what she writes will open yet another whole new world for her. Her life may have started out without hope or prospects, but it will not end that way.

The writing is lyrical and moving. Moments of beauty and tenderness alternate with moments of despair and heartrending poignancy. I recommend this to teens who want to read historical fiction set in the United States. And while it isn't a classic romance story, it has enough romance in it to satisfy those fans, too, I think.

You can read more about the author and this book on her web site.

When the Shark Bites, It Bites

Shark Girl by Kelly Bingham
4Q 4P, M/J/S

I admit it. This book had me near tears more than once, even though I was trying hard not to get emotional. (I feel like such a sap when I cry over something I'm reading.)

I also admit that I came to this book thinking it smacked of ripping off Bethany Hamilton's story (Soul Surfer, and that annoyed (even offended) me a bit. But the reviews were good, and I know it's the kind of story that a lot of people like to read, so I bought it for our teen collection. I wasn't going to read it, but I needed a book I could read quickly at lunch. Since this is written in free verse, letters, and phone calls, it looked like a very fast read. So I took it, a little bit grudgingly. Six pages into the book, I was hooked and having trouble swallowing my food over the lump in my throat.

The last thing that Jane expects when she, her mother, and her brother go to the beach one June day is that she'll wake up from a coma ten days later to discover that her right arm has been amputated just above the elbow after a harrowing shark attack leaves her arm so badly mutilated it can't be saved. The cards and letters that flood into the hospital can't begin to ease her pain, anger, and depression. Why her? Why couldn't it have happened to someone else? She loves to cook. She's an award-winning artist. She needs her arm! These people who are writing to her can't begin to comprehend what she is feeling. Why can't they leave her alone to mourn the person she'll never be again?

Kelly Bingham does a terrific job making it clear how such a tragic event doesn't just alter the life of the person it happens to. It is almost as hard to read about Jane's mother and brother's attempts to deal with the aftermath as it is to read about Jane's anger and despair. Where do you draw the line between being sympathetic and supportive and and TOO sympathetic and supportive? When is it time to force someone to move forward? When Jane's brother lashes out at her for expecting everyone to wait on her, it's both a shocking and liberating moment, for them and for the reader. The ways that Michael encourages (and forces) her to learn to do things for herself were touching and empowering. And I positively ached for Jane's mother as she tried to encourage Jane to go out in public, to draw again, to get back to as much of her old life and self as possible. There's a poem called "Constant" that is painful to read no matter whose perspective you read it from. It's equally moving to read about Jane's frustrations with her friends. Are they insensitive, or is Jane too sensitive? All of these poems and conversations, as well as Jane's tender moments with a little boy from the hospital, make for a very emotional read.

A few favorite moments:

(from "Leaving", p. 84, as Jane prepares to leave the hospital)
The problem is
life outside the window
is life outside.
Not here.
People out there
are out there.
Too many.

The eyes of the doctors
are familiar.
The kind of seeing I can almost live with.
It's their job, taking care of people like me.
I was welcome here.
I fit in.
Out there,
I won't.

Whew! If that doesn't communicate how scary it is to know you have to face people who are used to seeing you a different way, I don't know what would.

Then there's the poem called "The Web". Jane's discovering the world of Internet support groups, and she's not at all receptive:


Motivational speakers.
Forums.
Chat rooms.

And overwhelmingly:
Most of the time, we become
a better person than we were.

I was fine
with who I was.

I will never
become one of these heroic
icons, spreading hope
from the other side,
one hand waving.


I could feel Jane's resistance pushing out at me from the pages of the book.

"Moat, Overlooking" is a powerful poem depicting an artist's despair at knowing she'll never again be the artist she used to be. She's realizing that the things she used to draw aren't the subjects she would draw now:


These pictures
are from someone else's world,
someone else's memories,
not mine.

What, then, is now?
If I can't return to
Horse, Grazing,
am I doomed to be a
van Gogh imitation?
Tortured, wrecked, surviving
pain through the art of my darkest attic,
creations spun from the haunted memories
of the Shark Girl
trying to accommodate with her left hand?
Will the subject matter
be endless grays and white-capped
waves, gaunt faces, thin children,
rain?

I have no legs
to cross the bridge
toward Sunflower, Blooming,
and return home.


Eventually, Jane does start showing signs that she might be able to move forward. I liked this particular poem in part because it shows Jane now able to think about people other than herself and to recognize their sincere desire to help, when before she was too angry about too much to be able to do so.


(from "Tools", p. 223)
Fingering my new tools
I think about the people
who devote their lives
to inventing stuff like this.
Things that make life
a bit easier.

I wonder who they are

and why they invent things like this

and if they ever hear the words

"thank you".

Seeing Jane develop new interests and discovering that she doesn't have to leave her old ones behind makes this a moving, inspiring, and empowering story. I can't speak for Bethany Hamilton or anyone else who has ever lost a limb, but I can say that this book really helped me understand what they and their families might be going through and gave me some things to think about. I'm glad I ordered it and I'm glad that I wanted that quick read at lunch. I'm sure that I'll find myself recommending this book to a lot of readers in the future.


Post edited to include some links, including a very interesting interview of Kelly Bingham by Cynthia Leitich Smith (one of these days I'm going to finish my blog post on Smith's Tantalize, which I'm having a really hard time writing) and Bingham's web site. (In the interview, Kelly Bingham talks about how she got the idea to write this book, and Bethany Hamilton's name does come up. I was happy to see that she actually finished the book a few days before Bethany Hamilton was injured.)

Finding the Joy: Becoming Chloe (booktalk)

Becoming Chloe by Catherine Ryan Hyde
4Q 3P S


Jordy just wants to sleep, but between the throbbing in his head and the grunts of the couple having sex outside, it’s not happening. Who’d want to have sex lying on filthy cold concrete? Then again, he’s only been in the city a few days, and already he’s seen worse. Still... he peeks out the window. There are three more pairs of feet circling the couple on the ground. This isn’t sex. It’s rape. He doesn’t want to call attention to himself, but he can’t ignore the situation. Deepening his voice, he yells, “I called the police!” Will they run or will they come after him? A police siren shrieks nearby. They scatter. The girl calmly picks herself up, looks for her missing shoe, and climbs through the open window into the cellar, her jeans dragging on one leg behind her. All she says is “hi.” “Are you ok?” Jordy asks. “Oh. Me? Yeah. Sure. Sure. I’m fine.” Jordy doesn’t get it. She’s just been raped, but she doesn’t seem to care. Is she loaded? Is she not smart enough to know what just happened? Jordy, meet Chloe. Chloe, meet Jordy.

Jordy can’t figure Chloe out. On the one hand, she’s childlike and seems incapable of understanding even the most basic things. But when the gash on his forehead and the bite in his hand become infected and he’s too sick to move, Chloe somehow has the smarts to get him antibiotics and a doctor who will help him. Jordy wonders how she can be so slow, yet so smart. The doctor can only guess: “Maybe she doesn’t want to understand things she doesn’t think she can change anyhow.” Jordy asks, “So, could she get better? If someone made her feel safe and took care of her?” The doctor replies, “A better question would be, Does she have anybody in her life who cares enough to do all that for her?” Jordy has enough on his plate right now, just trying to survive on his own. And he’s gay, so it’s not like there’s any attraction. But yes. He doesn’t know why, but he cares. He does whatever it takes, including hustling, to care for Chloe and keep them together.

For a while, things are okay. For a while, they’re even pretty good. Maybe that’s the problem. When things are really bad, Chloe coped by understanding as little as possible. But now she’s beginning to feel safe and cared for, and that isn’t working for her anymore. She’s seeing more, understanding too much. Jordy realizes she’s thinking that maybe she no longer wants to live in a world like this. She doesn’t believe it’s a nice place. Jordy tells her he’s not sure if it’s a nice place, but he knows for a fact that it’s beautiful. She doesn’t believe him. He realizes that nobody has ever shown her what a beautiful world it is. She doesn’t even recognize beauty. He makes her promise: if he can convince her that the world is a beautiful place, she’ll promise to stay in it.

This is ultimately a book about hope. It’s about finding the joy and the beauty in life. Not just in the big, obvious things, like climbing to the top of a mountain or seeing the Grand Canyon, but in the little things, like a flying bird, flowers by the side of the road, someone offering a bike or a cold drink of water. Jordy realizes it isn’t just Chloe who needs to understand that. He needs to, too: I look around, breathe, close my eyes... Then I look around at the view again. And I realize that for all the joy we've seen so far, I've allowed it all to remain outside of me. It's always been over there. Look, over there. Some joy just went by. A little more just flew by. And when I realize that, I let it into me. And I become the joy. Just for a split second, I think I do.

Whenever I think about this book, it makes me remember to look for the beauty and find the joy.

Funny ha-ha or funny strange? Anchors or Tentacles?

It's Kind of a Funny Story by Ned Vizzini
4Q 3P J?/S

I'm very backed up on blog posts about books I've read over the past month (see previous post for explanation), so this one may be briefer than usual. (Cheers abound, I suspect.) I didn't take notes of any particular lines or moments I liked, for instance.

Note about the cover: It's great. It's absolutely perfect for the book. But that becomes apparent only after reading the story, so I don't know if casual browsers will seize on it.

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Craig Gilner lives in New York City, which means he has the kind of opportunity most kids entering high school don't have. In most cases, kids who go to public school have very little choice about the schools they go to. All the kids who live where they live go to a particular school. Charter schools are changing this in some communities, but it's only in places like NYC where kids actually have a smorgasbord of schools to choose from. Are they interested in math? There's a high school specializing in that. Are they into the arts? Try to get into the High School of Performing Arts. And so on. Craig's a smart kid, and he wants to have a really good job when he gets out of school. He wants to be a Leader of Tomorrow. So he decides he wants to go to Manhattan's Executive Pre-Professional High School, where students get prepared for jobs on Wall Street and Fortune 500 companies. He preps for the entrance exam with the single-mindedness of bear going after honey. Forget friends. Flashcards and test prep books are his constant companions. And they work. He gets in. So does his best friend, Aaron, who gets in having done no cramming whatsoever. They celebrate by getting high and throwing a party. Maybe this is where it all begins to go wrong for Craig. Three things happen that night that start the ball rolling downhill: the pot, the realization that Aaron didn't have to sweat the exam the way he did, and losing Nia, the girl he's just realized he's in lust with, to Aaron.

It takes a while for Craig to realize that any of those three things are a problem. But it doesn't take long for Craig to realize that Executive Pre-Professional isn't the dream school he thought it was. Sure, he aced the test. But so did everyone else in his class. The truth is, he just can't hack this school. Everyone is smarter than he is. He has a 93 average, and in this school, that's barely skating by. He can't keep up, so he begins to give up. He doesn't do his homework. He doesn't join any clubs. He comes home, gets high, and daydreams the day away. And then those daydreams turn into nightmares. He is pursued by all the Tentacles in his life, the things he must do that he can't do, the things that grab at him and drag him down, tie him into knots so that he can no longer function. His Anchors, the things that keep him safe (like his parents and little sister), aren't enough to keep him above water. Little by little, Craig starts to spiral down into a deep depression. He can't sleep. He can't eat. He can't work. None of this is helped by Aaron or Nia. The more Craig sees them together, the more depressed he gets. Why couldn't Nia have chosen him?

Craig's parents are concerned and involved, and they see that he gets into therapy. For a while, it helps. Craig is put on Zoloft, and his depression begins to lift. In fact, after a while, Craig decides he's cured and no longer needs to take his medication. It's a Tentacle, not an Anchor. This turns out to be a very bad decision. This time, the depression that hits is even worse. But nobody realizes just how depressed Craig is until the day that he decides to kill himself by jumping off the Brooklyn Bridge. But first he's going to say goodbye, sort of. He has a last conversation with his sister, he calls Nia and asks if he ever had a shot with her, and he asks his mother if he can sleep in her bed. All night long, Craig waits for his moment. Suddenly, it's 5:00 a.m., and if he's going to do it, it had better be now. But before he goes, Craig picks up a book from his mother's bookshelf: How to Survive the Loss of a Love. He's paged through it before, but this time, it has a different meaning for him. And this time, he follows through on one of its suggestions and calls for help. The suicide hotline volunteer convinces him to head to the nearest hospital's emergency room and ask for help. He is checked into the adult psychiatric unit.

Over the next five days, Craig interacts with and observes his fellow patients and learns quite a bit about himself in the process. Among the most important things that Craig discovers is really a rediscovery. Years ago, he loved to draw. He didn't draw houses and trees and dogs; he drew maps. But over time, he left art behind. Here, in the psych ward, art becomes an Anchor. He begins to draw his maps again, but this time, they are more than maps. This time, they become brain maps. People maps. Maps that connect people. Maps that connect him with himself.

Craig isn't the only teenager in the psych ward. There's a girl here, too. Her name is Noelle, and she's in the ward in part because she attacked her own face with scissors. Noelle is not an easy girl to get to know. But Craig quickly realizes that Nia may have outer beauty, but inside, she's more screwed up than he is. Noelle may have some problems, but her head is on straight in the ways that count. This may not be the start of a beautiful friendship, but it's the start of something really important.

Craig doesn't spend a long time in the psych ward, but it's long enough for him to start figuring what he needs to do to get rid of all those Tentacles. It's long enough for him to realize that there are times to walk away from things that used to look good to and for you but are really rotten. And it's long enough for him to realize that life is worth living after all.

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This is Ned Vizzini's third published book, and he's only in his mid-20s. I think he knows a little something about the pressures of living up to expectations. I know he knows something about being in a psych ward. He starting writing this book a week after he spent five days as an inpatient in a psych ward in a New York hospital and finished it in about a month. To learn a little more about Ned, visit his My Space page.

What did I think about this book? I didn't love love love it the way most reviewers did, but I thought it very well done. One of Vizzini's trademarks is his sense of humor, and that is in evidence in this book, too. Craig's observations about himself and, especially, the people around him (mostly in the hospital) are full of a humor that isn't at the expense of anyone. Craig can laugh at his fellow patients because he knows they're just human, and that he's just human, too. I also enjoyed the verbal jousting between Noelle and Craig. I thought the scenes involving Nia, Noelle, and Craig were very interesting. Which girl is the healthier mentally? Not, I think, the one you'd guess at first. I did have a problem, though, with how quickly Craig seems to recover his mental health. Here's a boy who hasn't been able to keep a meal down for weeks, but as soon (as soon!) as he checks in, he's not only eating full meals, he's having seconds. Hmmm. He also seems to lose any suicidal feelings almost immediately. I imagine that it's a huge relief for him to step outside of life for a while, and that the safe confines of the psych ward make it possible for him to pretend that everything is okay. But it seems too easy, too fast. And where is the therapy in this ward? His therapist sees him twice, I think, and no doctor (psychiatrist) sees him (other than to decide to admit him) the day he checks in. The music and (possibly) art therapy seem to be done by volunteers. There doesn't seem to be any group counseling. It all makes it seem a bit like Craig is just on a mini-vacation. I was happy to read the scene where Craig panics when he gets a call from his school principal, because that made it clear that his problems hadn't just vanished. Still, overall, this book holds together, and the ending is a rallying cry for anyone who has ever been depressed, as well as for those of us who need to be reminded regularly to cherish the little moments in our lives.

Hmmm. Did I say this would be short? I think I'm congenitally unable to be brief in anything but physical stature. Sorry!