Author: booknutgirls

booknutgirls http://thebooknutdotcom.wordpress.com I read. I blog. I sell books. I chauffeur my kids. What more do you need to know?

The Great Greene Heist

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by Varian Johnson
First sentence:
Support your local independent bookstore (actually, just support mine!) and buy it there! (Before the end of June, PLEASE.)
Review copy sent to me by the author, upon my request. Also, I’ve met him a couple of times and I think he’s fantastic.
Content: There’s no swearing, and only hints at romance. It’s in the middle grade section (grades 3-5) at the bookstore, though older kids would like the con aspects of it, I think.

Jackson Greene is going clean. He got ratted out (and caught) four months ago, in what he calls the “Kelsey Job” but what the school has come to know as the “Mid-Day PDA”. It cost him a certain amount of freedom (he can no longer have a cell phone, and he has weekly meetings with the principal, Dr. Kelsey) and one of his best friends, Gaby de la Cruz. Fast-forward to the fall of 8th grade, and student elections. Gaby’s running for president, and Jackson’s not going to get involved. That is until her opponent suddenly drops out, and Jackson’s nemesis, Keith Sinclair, enters the race. Jackson knows something fishy is up, and sets out to prove it. Of course, that means a long con. Which means he needs a crew.

Jackson assembles a memorable one: reminiscent of great heist movies (Oceans 11 is referenced more than once) and books (Heist Society!), Johnson weaves in not only every stereotypical element (there’s the right-hand-man, the tech guy, the runner, the money) but also plays against stereotype. My favorite is with the beautiful cheerleader Megan Feldman, who is a tech and programming genius. But there’s also Hashemi who is a budding inventor (my favorite: the MAPE, a beta cellphone the size of a brick); Bradley, a sixth-grade artist who’s mostly in awe of being included; Victor, the money behind the operation; and Charlie, twin brother to Gaby, and Jackson’s right-hand-man. And the cool thing? Only two of the crew is white.

It was refreshing that race rarely comes into play; for the most part characters were just that, and not the “Asian kid” or the “Black kid” or the “White girl”. Yes, one of the older secretaries is subtly racist, mixing up the names of the Asian kids and saying “Boys like you are always up to something or other.” It’s probably over-the-top, but in the context, it works. And the principle is a certified jerk (he was the one I wondered about: how did he ever get to be in charge of a school and not challenged?). But then again, this is all an elaborate fantasy: how many 13-year-old boys are capable of running a long con?

It was a ton of fun, though.

Amazon Is Evil. Or, Why You Really Should Support Your Local Bookstore

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A confession: before I started working at my local independent bookstore, I had no problem with Amazon. Cheap books mailed to my house? That’s AMAZING.

But the longer I work at the store, the more I’ve come to realize that what I once thought was a good thing — isn’t all competition? — is actually something incredibly harmful, especially for small, local bookstores. But also for the average reader.

I hear almost on a daily basis, when someone asks the price of a book, “But I can get it for $X [which is always less] on Amazon.” I used to smile and apologize, but lately my response has become more abrasive, something along the lines from “Yes, but by shopping there, you’re taking business away from us, and isn’t it important to have local businesses?” to “Amazon can offer you that book for $X because they buy up ALL THE STOCK. Which makes it more difficult for the rest of us to a) get the book and b) compete on prices.”

While the first answer is important (local bookstores are a good thing!), it’s the latter, really, that’s more harmful. Partially because it makes it difficult for small stores to get some books, but mostly because it gives Amazon a near-monopolistic advantage. Yes, Amazon has made books accessible to tons of readers, and books in people’s hands are always a good thing. And I do realize that stores like the one where I work may appear to some to be exclusive or even somewhat snobbish. (Then again, there’s always the library. That’s what I used when I couldn’t afford to buy books that I wanted to read. But that’s a different post.)

But letting Amazon — and the pursuit of cheap books — dominate the marketplace (they control more than a third of the book business in America) is a bad thing. See, they’re not a publishing house (not really — a sideline in self-published ebooks really doesn’t count). Rather, they’re a distributor of books. Their job is to put the books that are published in the hands of the readers who buy them. Their job is not to dictate the terms under which the publisher prices the books.

Which brings me to their disagreement with Hachette — a major publishing house, which publishes Little, Brown books, among many others. When Amazon raised the price and delayed deliveries on Hachette books, they were no longer playing the role of a distributor; they were using their position in the industry to strong-arm Hachette into agreeing to their terms. (They’ve even gone as far as to say — according to Michael Buckley that Hachette is not living up to their “standards”. ) That’s not what distributors do. And giving Amazon this kind of power is bad for everyone, not just Hachette. It’s bad because it’s never a good thing to allow distributors of books to get between authors and publishers and readers. Ask yourself how you feel when a library or a school bans a book. It’s the same principle: a middle man has gotten in the way of a book getting into the hands of a reader. And that’s exactly what Amazon is doing here.

Which is why — even though it’s time and gas and more expensive per book — you should buy books at your local bookstore (or check them out at the library!). Local stores would never presume to know better than the publishers how books should be priced, or say that they don’t want to carry certain titles. The policy at my store is this: if we don’t have it on our shelves (which is possible, since it’s a small store), we will get anything in for anyone, no questions asked.

And isn’t that what a bookstore is supposed to do?

The Inventor’s Secret

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by Andrea Cremer
First sentence: “Every heartbeat brought the boy closer.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There’s a couple of intense romantic moments, and the characters talk of “wanting” each other, but no actual physical contact takes place other than kissing. There is talk of an affair a character’s dad had, and there is quite a bit of violence. It’s in the YA section (grades 6-8th) but I wouldn’t blink at giving it to a savvy 5th grader.

It was the cover that caught my eye. The steampunk dragonfly with the explosion in the background promised really cool things. And since I hadn’t read any Cremer before (she of the Wolf series), I wasn’t really expecting anything.

So, I was more than blown away when I was pulled into an alternate history where the American Revolution failed, Boston converted to a maximum security prison, and the “traitors” were hanged for their crimes against the crown. And they were the lucky ones. In the years since the failed revolution, the Empire has just become stronger and more stratified. The elite live in the Floating City, New York City, in levels rising up into the sky. The lower you are, the worse off. There’s still a rebellion, out in the woods outside of the city, where the adults are trying to topple the Empire. And the children? They’re in the Catacombs, underground, safe from harm until they turn 18 and go to join the rebellion.

The Catacombs is all Charlotte remembers. She and her older brother, Ash, have been there since they were 5 and 7, respectively. And now, at nearly 18, Ash is in charge. This is where the plot gets a bit tricky to describe. Too much, and it sounds silly. And maybe it is.  I do know there was more romance than I was expecting, and it was a bit hackneyed and overwrought as well. But I loved the world. I loved the combination of history and mythology and technology. I loved how the class issues were at the forefront. I loved the imagination that Cremer put into the book, the cool little things — like mice bombs, or Pocky the gun — she littered everywhere.

No, it’s not perfect. Far from it. But it IS fun. And that’s exactly what I needed right now.

The Return of Zita

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by Ben Hatke
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Others in the series: Zita the Spacegirl, Legends of Zita the Spacegirl,

The last words (if you haven’t read the other two, go do it now) of Legends of Zita are “Gotcha!” And so, we find Zita, at the opening of this one, in front of the Court of Dungeon World, being “tried” for her “crimes”. But, then she finds out that the leader of the dungeon world — who also happens to be a Screed — is planning on getting a jump crystal and taking over Earth. Which means: he must be stopped. Though how on earth is Zita supposed to do this when she’s stuck in the deepest dungeon on the Dungeon World?

Well, with her friends of course.

In some ways, this is a crowded book: everyone Zita has met since the beginning of her adventures shows up. Sometimes, that’s a wonderful, surprising thing. Other times, it seems a bit forced. But I’m not sure how much I cared. Zita has heart and spunk, and I could plausibly believe that everyone (!) would come to her rescue and aid. The art, as always, is fantastic; it may not be sweepingly gorgeous,but Hatke knows how to blend text and illustration to make the action move forward, and to build intensity. And it’s accessible to the kids, which is what really matters. (K said: “You know how many times I’ve read this since we got it? TEN TIMES!”)

It’s a bittersweet ending, with Zita having to leave her friends. And I like how Hatke handled that as well. It’s such a superb series, from start to end. It makes me happy to be able to pick it up and read it all straight through  now, without having to wait.

Half Bad

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by Sally Green
First sentence: “There’s these two kids, boys, sitting close together, squished in by the big arms of an old chair.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Review copy pilfered from the ARC shelves at my place of employment
Content: There’s talk of imagined sex (none actual), and some (mostly mild) swearing. But the talk of the abuse Nathan takes is hard to get though, even for me as an adult. It’s in the teen section  (grades 9 and up) because of that. Be wary of giving this one to an overly-sensitive person.

I was talking this book up in January to a group of educators, saying to look for it, that Green turns the whole “white=good and black=bad” thing upside down. How little did I know.

It does do that: sure. But to say that’s all this first in a trilogy does is to woefully underestimate it.

Nathan is the illegitimate child of a White Witch — his mother — and the baddest of all Black witches. Marcus, Nathan’s father, has alluded the White Hunters for years. And so, to say that having his kid in their midst irks them is a gross understatement. So the council imposes Codes — restrictions — on all Half Bloods. They start mild, with yearly assessments, but get increasingly more restrictive as Nathan gets older. It ends with him being held in a cage for two years. This is partially because of a vision Marcus saw that Nathan would kill him. The White Hunters want to make that happen: he’s ostensibly being “trained” to murder his father. Not that he has any say in the matter.

So, yes, Greene is turning good and evil upside down; how can the “good” people treat someone who is different from them so atrociously. (And believe me, it’s worse than bad.) But, the black witches don’t fare so well, either. Marcus, from all reports (granted, they’re  untrustworthy) is a despicable person. And the one time we see him, he doesn’t entirely acquit himself either. And the only other black witches we see aren’t that much better. Perhaps it’s more a treatise on how power corrupts, and how differences become so ingrained that we can’t see those who aren’t the same as us.

And even though it was difficult at times to get through, emotionally, it did give me a lot to think about. I’m quite interested to see where she goes with this series, and if she can keep up the complex nature of the characters.

The Road Home

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by Ellen Emerson White
First sentence: “On Christmas morning, Rebecca lost her moral virginity, her sense of humor – and her two best friends.”
Content: This is a book about war, and doesn’t pull any punches. There’s language (with a couple of f-bombs), talk of sex (none actual) and lots and lots of violence. It’s also more emotionally mature. It’d be in the teen section (grades 9 and up) of the bookstore, if it were in print.

This was thrown at me by my wonderful friend Laura, without me knowing much else besides she thought it was really great.

This is the last book of a series about a family (I gathered, not having read any of the others), focusing on the daughter, Rebecca. Her long-time boyfriend was killed in Vietnam and her brother fled to Canada to avoid the draft. So she did the only logical thing: she signed up for a tour. Because it was the 1960s, and because women weren’t allowed to be on the front lines, and because Rebecca has an interest in medicine, she signed up to be a nurse. To say she didn’t know what she was getting into was an understatement. The book follows the second half of her tour in Vietnam, after a horrific event she was involved in, through to her coming home.

It’s taken me quite a while to get through this book, not because it was bad or I was disinterested — neither were true –but rather because it was so emotionally taxing. White knows how to write war. The mundane elements of being out in the field, the stress of the ER when helicopters full of wounded and dying soldiers come in. And then the PTSD of coming home. Especially in the 1960s, when there was so much anti-war sentiment at home. She captured Rebecca’s increasing despair, the difficulty she had in making it through so well, that I was drained each time I picked it up.

That’s not to say there wasn’t hopeful elements to the story: there were. Rebecca makes friends and even has a bit of a relationship But it’s not some miraculous recovery or some “ah-ha” moment. It’s very real, almost brutally so, and very honest.

I found it worth reading (once at least), and while I didn’t love it, I appreciated it. I appreciated the depiction of the soldiers and of Rebecca, and especially of her coming home. It’s not an easy read, but it’s definitely worth the time.

15 Books That Should Be the "Next Percy Jackson"

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I recently picked up a book that the publisher/my boss is hailing as the “next Percy Jackson”. It’s not. At least not in my book. Which got me to thinking: what should have been?

The first thing I need to do is figure out what makes Percy Jackson, well, Percy Jackson. I think a strong character/voice is a major thing; all my girls (and me, as well) have fallen for the loveable dork that is Percy. But it’s not just a strong main character, it’s a fantastic ensemble cast. My kids talk about Annabeth, Clarisse, Grover, Leo, Thalia, and Nico as much as Percy. I also think a strong opening: when I asked how The Lightning Thief opened up, the girls immediately responded: “Percy almost got killed!” It’s also pacing; Riordan knows how to intersperse action with a wee bit of romance (not too much!) and give us character development as well. It’s also — mostly — independent story arcs in each book, while keeping an over-arching story to tie the series together. And, at least in Percy’s case, it’s playing with mythology, exposing kids to something they wouldn’t have otherwise been exposed to (all of my girls who love Percy have turned to our D’Aulaires’ Book of Greek Myths to see what’s “real” and what’s not).

So, with that in mind, I came up with the following Percy Jackson read-alikes.

The Screaming Staircase, by Jonathan Stroud: “This book oozes kid appeal, giving us adventure, suspense, mystery, humor, ghosts, and even swordplay. The Screaming Staircase will engage readers until the very last page.” (from the Cybils description.)

The Great Greene Heist, by Varian Johnson: My review hasn’t gone up for this one yet (it’s out May 27), but it’s a fun book. Good characters, only a hint of romance, and while it’s not fantasy action, Johnson keeps the pacing going. A, who normally only loves fantasy, ate this one up.

Fablehaven, by Brandon Mull: Admittedly, I didn’t like this one. But I’m going off the fact that every kid I know who has started this series absolutely loved it. There must be some appeal in that, right?

Leviathan, by Scott Westerfeld: “It was an awesome, wild and weird ride, a fabulous adventure — no one writes nail-biting action like Westerfield — and a grand beginning to a story that has the potential to be absolutely amazing.”

Artemis Fowl, by Eoin Colfer: It’s been a long time since I’ve read this one, and  I gave up after the second book, I think. But I do remember it has a ton of action (as does the first in his more recent series, The Reluctant Assassin) I did write this: “Not very well written, but the world he has created is fantastic. That, and it’s interesting to be rooting for the ‘bad guy’.”

The Book of Three, by Lloyd Alexander: I think too many people have forgotten this one. Prydian is a fantastic world, and there are some amazing characters to visit with there. ” I think it’s because Alexander is a master storyteller, and he knows how to create characters that we can relate to and root for, ones that are flawed even in a black-and-white world.”

 The Hero’s Guide to Saving Your Kingdom, by Christopher Healey: I threw this one in here for the humor; Percy’s quite funny, as is this. “I’m not sure I’d call this book hilarious — no milk was ever snorted through my nose, a good benchmark, I think — but it was definitely amusing. From the chapter titles, all of which begin “Prince Charming…” (my favorite? “Prince Charming Walks into a Bar”. Sounds like a joke waiting to happen), to the silliness of the princes to the fact that it all just kinda sorta works out in the end, it was enough to keep a smile pasted on my face.”

Geeks, Girls and Secret Identities, by Mike Jung: “Yes, this is really over the top. WAY over the top. But, it worked for me. I liked the nod to the kind of superhero geekery that guys (and some girls) get into, knowing every little bit about the superhero they idolize. Jung just took it one step further and made the superhero a real, rather than made-up, person. Which, in my humble opinion, is way cool.”

The False Prince, by Jennifer E. Nelson: I compared it (unfavorable) to Megan Whalen Turner’s The Thief, but in retrospect, this is much more accessible and action-packed than MWT’s book is. ” The detailed world Nielsen creates is full of life, populated with mystery, twists and turns, and engaging and complex characters… Readers can’t help but cheer for [Sage], even as he struggles to come to grips with the ups and downs of a fate he doesn’t desire.”(from the Cybils description.)

The Mysterious Benedict Society, by Trenton Lee Stewart: A confession: I’ve never read this one. BUT, I did read the second book, which I thoroughly enjoyed. Not fantasy, but definitely fun.

You’ve probably noticed, by now, that most of these are all-male main characters. (And mostly all-male authors.) Partially that’s because of the nature of Percy, and partially (for better or worse) it’s what I found when I started thinking about this. I did, however, find a handful of books with girl main characters that are just as fun and just as awesome as Percy Jackson is.

 Magic Marks the Spot, by Caroline Carlson: “I liked this one an awful lot, mostly because of the above reason. But — aside from the unnecessary letters that were written in cursive, which is a real turn-off for kids These Days; the book got much better after I started skipping them — I really enjoyed all of it. There was humor (Miss Greyson, the governess/chaperone, was hilarious), sword fighting, a wee bit of romance (but not overstated; it was between the adults), and most of all Hilary being Awesome.”

The Inventor’s Secret, by Andrea Cremer: I haven’t put a review up on this one yet, as I’m not quite done with it. But I’m having a blast. The romance is probably a bit too pronounced for the lower middle-grade crowd, but it’s got action, snark, great characters, and a fantastic alternate history/steampunk world.

 The Penderwicks, by Jeanne Birdsall: Possibly the “quietest” book on this list, it’s still fun of wonderful elements: spot-on terrific writing, a great cast of characters, and some non-fantasy action and tension. Hubby’s read it out loud a few times to different girls, and I have yet to get tired of hearing it. “

Into the Wild, by Sarah Beth Durst: “This was a fabulous book.  But it’s hard to convey in a review how wonderfully clever it is, how enjoyable it is to read. Durst takes every single fairy tale character and uses them in new and unexpected ways, making the old stories come alive again. I loved the struggle for free will and how the Wild uses character’s choices; I loved how Julie used the Wild against itself, in order to make it through her story; and I loved how endings and beginnings were used.”

Zita the Spacegirl, by Ben Hartke: I think this one’s on here because it’s fresh in my mind, having just read the last one in the trilogy. But, it’s also here because K took them to school, and she got all the kids (except for the one boy who refused to read it because it’s about a girl. Grrrrr.) excited about Zita and her adventures. Still, even though it’s a graphic novel, I think it fits. It’s awesome.

So…. how did I do? What ones did I forget?

All These Things I’ve Done

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by Gabrielle Zevin
First sentence: “The night before my junior year — I was sixteen, barely — Gable Arsley said he wanted to sleep with me.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There’s talk of sex and a lot of kissing, but nothing graphic. And there’s talk of violence, but again, nothing graphic. It’s in the YA section (grades 6-9) of the bookstore.

This one is a hard one to sum up, partially because the world Zevin created is so complex. It’s futuristic, but not exactly a post-apocalyptic or dystopian. It’s a world where things are strictly rationed, and coffee and chocolate and books are illegal. So, much like alcohol in the 1920s, there is a strong black market for those items. And our main character, Anya Balanchine (her friends call her Annie), is part of the Balanchine mafia family that has a strong presence in the chocolate market. Her father was the head of the family until he was shot and killed (in front of her) when she was 9. Annie and her older brother, Leo (who is slightly mentally disabled due to another hit meant for her father that killed their mother and disabled Leo) and younger sister Natalya have been raised the past 7 years by their grandmother, whose health is slowly failing.

Over the course of the year, things spin out of control for Annie. Her ex-boyfriend, Gable, ends up poisoned by chocolate, and Annie ends up in juvenile prison because of that. She falls for and dates the son of the assistant DA, in spite of the extreme pressure to break it off. She stresses about Leo, especially since he begins working for the family. And her grandmother finally passes away.

All that managed to fill up the book, which I wanted to like very much. But, aside from world creation, there really isn’t much there. Annie is a fascinating character, but I got tired of her waffling. I wanted her to step up and take charge. It’s not good when the most interesting character is the head of the Japanese mafia family who shows up for probably 10 pages. I hoped for more out of this one, and was disappointed.

I might give the second one in the series a try, just to see if it gets any better.

Dorothy Must Die

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by Danielle Page
First sentence: “I first discovered I was trash three days before my ninth birthday — one year after my father lost his job and moved to Secaucus to live with a woman named Crystal and four years before my mother had the car accident, started taking pills, and begin exclusively wearing bedroom slippers instead of normal shoes.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Review copy handed to me by my manager who said “Get on this.”
Content: A pregnant teenager, a moderate amount of swearing including a few f-bombs, and some violence. The book belongs in the store’s teen section (grades 9+).

At first glance, the idea of this book is awesome: Dorothy from Wizard of Oz, didn’t want to be in Kansas after she went home, and found a way back to Oz, where she has taken over and is not only a tyrant, but she’s a bully. And she’s draining Oz of its magic. It is going to take another girl from Kansas — Amy, of the trailer park — who finds her way to this new and drained Oz, to kill the tyrant and save Oz from certain ruin.

See? Sounds pretty cool, right?

Well, not so much.

It’s not that this one was Horrible, per se. There were a lot of things to like about it, starting from the cool idea. I liked the way that Page developed the magic in the world, and made the Wicked Witches if not the good guys, at least the better ones. I liked Amy, and her willingness to try even though the odds were against her.

But that was about it. I won’t delineate my entire complaints (which include having Amy say “I was used to cornfields back in Kansas..” UM, where??), but rather my main one, this: why is this book not a stand-alone? There really was nothing in this book that either 1) warranted that it be 460 pages or 2) meant for it to go longer than one book. I think with some better plotting and editing (and less of the pregnant bully in the beginning) this could have been a tight, fun, cool romp in a unique version of Oz.

I guess I’m a bit miffed that it’s not, and that’s effecting how I see the book. Others (who don’t mind the whole drawn-out-ed-ness of this one) may find it more enjoyable. Part of me hopes she finds success with this, because it’s a really cool idea.

I just wish the execution was better.

So Long a Letter

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by Mariama Ba
First sentence: “Dear Aissatou, I have received your letter.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: It’s pretty serious and deals with issues of infidelity and polygamy and out-of-wedlock pregnancy. But there’s no swearing, sex, or violence. It’d be in the adult section of the bookstore.

Recently widowed, Ramatoulaye sits down to write a long letter to her best friend about all the events that led up to Ramatoulaye’s husband’s death. It was a happy story:  for 25 years, they were happily married. Ramatoulaye spent her life in devotion to her husband, bearing 12 children. Then one of his daughter’s friends caught his eye, and he woos her, and takes her as a second wife (as is permitted in Islam). That simple act wrecks Ramatoulaye, but she manages to survive as a single mother.

It’s a slim novel, and an interesting one. I didn’t particularly like the format –why, if she’s writing to her best friend, would Ramatoulaye need to recount her friends’ history (which was much like her own; her husband took a second wife. The difference is that Aissatou left her husband)? It didn’t make sense to me, logically, some of the things Ramatoulaye included in her letter. That said, if when I was able to get past that, I found the story was simultaneously enlightening and disheartening.

Enlightening, because that’s an area of the world I know very little about. And through Ramatoulaye, Ba brings to life the ordinary lives of Senegalese women. And disheartening because they have so few rights, as we have come to think of them. I read this book in the middle of the #WeNeedDiverseBooks campaign, and this is a prime example why I need to read more books like this. In my privileged home in my privileged country, it’s easy for me not to think about Senegalese women and their lives. But books like these help me. It helps that Ba is a good writer (aside from the format, of course), and was able to draw me into Rmatoulaye’s life.

And that’s what makes this book worthwhile.