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?

My Best Of 2013

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To be perfectly honest, I’m not quite sure where 2013 went. Last time I checked, it was April. But then, I started a book group at work (which is still kind of struggling), organized my birthday party, sent a daughter to India, served on another Cybils panel, went to KidlitCon, and a saw a whole bunch of authors. It was a busy year! And, in between all that, I managed to read a bunch of books.

By the Numbers:

Middle Grade Fiction: 67
YA Fiction: 53
Graphic Novels: 9
Non-Fiction: 15
Adult Fiction: 25
(Number of those that were sci-fi/fantasy books: 80)
(Number of those that were audiobooks: 19)
(Number of those that were rereads: 15)

Grand Total: 169

Abandoned: 8

Not bad, for someone who doesn’t have time. Then again, I don’t watch too much TV or movies anymore.

And now this year’s awards:

Best Adult Fiction: The Golem and the Jinni
Best YA book: The Lucy Variations
Best Middle-grade book: The Escape from Mr. Lemoncello’s Library
Best MG Fantasy: You’ll see what we come up with on our shortlist tomorrow! 
Best YA Fantasy: Quintana of Charyn
Best Sci-Fi/Distopian: The 5th Wave
Best Graphic Novel: Boxers & Saints
Best Non-Fiction: The Telling Room
Best MG/YA Non-Fiction: Bomb
Best Romance: Just One Day/Just One Year
Best Mystery: There really wasn’t one this year.
Best Audiobook: Fragile Things


And in other categories…

Cover love: Anna Dressed in Blood
  
Don’t judge a book by its cover: The Screaming Staircase

*Swoon*: Perfect Scoundrels (HALE!)

I could have written it (but not as well): The Book of Mormon Girl

Long Title, Great Book:  Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore (Also: Google!)

Best in-person book group book: The Golem and the Jinni

Best YAckers book: The Blue Sword

Favorite reread: The Blue Sword (followed closely by Emma)

Rocking Retellings: Tiger Lily, The Madman’s Daughter, Dodger,

Third Best Cancer Book Ever: Me, Earl, and the Dying Girl

Yes, I am a Janeite: A Jane Austen Education, Pride and Prejudice, Emma, Northanger Abbey, Sense and Sensibility, Persuasion, Longbourn

Dickensian London, Represent!: How to Catch a Bogle, Rose, The Reluctant Assassin, Dodger, The Madman’s Daughter

Dystopian/Post-Apocalyptic isn’t overdone (yet): Parched, The Rithmatist

Begs to be Read Aloud: True Blue Scouts of Sugarman Swamp

Fine. I cried: One for the Murphys, The Running Dream


Hippies at Heart: Eva of the Farm

The polar bear is real, I swear: Timmy Failure: Mistakes Were Made

Oh the 80s!: Eleanor & Park,  Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe, Tell the Wolves I’m Home

Best Unreliable Narrator: The Unchangeable Spots of Lepoards

I *heart* Musicians: The Lucy Variations, The Year of Shadows

Books I should have read AGES ago: Blankets, The Castle of Otranto

Give it up for the Awesome Heroines:  Dark Triumph, The Boneshaker, Rose Under Fire, Quintana of Charyn, Untold, Scarlet, Out of the Easy, Magic Marks the Spot, All the Truth That’s In Me, Giants Beware, The Blue Sword

Guys rock: Guys Read: Other Worlds; Winger; An Abundance of Katherines; The Beginning of Everything


Mean Girls FTW: Confessions of a Hater

Evil Incarnate: The Homecoming of Samuel Lake

Author Events I dragged the girls to: Rick Riordan, Melissa de la Cruz, Shannon Messenger, Marissa Meyer, Eoin Colfer, Claire M. Caterer, Lenore Applehans, Kahled Hosseini

Snorting milk outta my nose award: Hero’s Guide to Storming the Castle

Series I devoured: Mortal Instruments (City of Bones, City of Ashes, City of Glass, City of Fallen Angels, City of Lost Souls); Infernal Devices (Clockwork Angel; Clockwork Prince; Clockwork Princess), The Grisha (Shadow and Bone, Siege and Storm)

Odd isn’t a strong enough word: Teen Boat!

Honorary Dude Award: Dude and the Zen Master, OCD, the Dude, and Me

Ghosts!: Ghost Hawk, The Screaming Staircase, Ghost Prison, Beholding Bee, The Year of Shadows, How I Became a Ghost, Anna Dressed in Blood, The Dream Thieves, The Madness Underneath, Paper Valentine

Woo-hoo, they’re back!: Perfect Scoundrels, Amulet: Prince of the Elves, The Runaway King, House of Hades, Wednesdays at the Tower


Waaaah, it’s OVER: Quintana of Charyn

Loved it, but can’t seem to sell it: Counting By 7s, The Different Girl, Just One Day/Just One Year, 

Can we have the sequel NOW?: The Screaming Staircase; The Madness Underneath; The Dream Thieves

Indulging in my desire to carry around a photo of Nathan Fillion: Deadly Heat 

It kind of called for a picture of Nathan Fillion.

Books I finished but didn’t feel the love for: Far, Far Away; Confessions of a Hater; The Lost Art of Mixing; Rebel Spirits; Blue Plate Special, What Would Barbara Do, A Tangle of Knots, Flora & Ulysses

Disappointing book by an author I respect: A Grimm Conclusion, Panic

Author everyone else loves that I discovered I liked: Maeve Binchy (Tara Road), Cassandra Clare, Rainbow Rowell (Eleanor & Park)

First-time authors I’d love to see more from: Claire M. Caterer (The Key & the Flame), Peggy Eddleman (Sky Jumpers), Kristopher Jansma (The Unchangeable Spots of Leopards), Helene Wecker (The Golem and the Jinni)

What are some of your bests this past year?

December 2013 Round-up

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Another year gone, another Cybils season ended. My panel is got together (virtually, of course) to decide/finalize our shortlists yesterday.I’m excited; I love this part of the process and we have a great shortlist! Though I think I’m going to take a bit of a break from middle grade fantasy. I have both S. and The Rosie Project on tap right now.

My favorite this month was one of the middle grade ones, but since that’d give away some of our shortlist, I’m going to pick my other favorite:

Just One Year

I’m a sucker for a romance that takes me all over the world.

As for the rest:

Middle Grade:
The Garden Princess
How to Catch a Bogle
How I Became a Ghost
The Screaming Staircase
The Lost Heir
Magic Marks the Spot 
Parched
The Real Boy
Rose
Sidekicked
Sky Jumpers
What We Found in the Sofa
and How it Saved the World
The True Blue Scouts of Sugarman Swamp
The Vengekeep Prophecies
The Wells Bequest
The Year of Shadows

YA:

The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender

Adult:

Absolution by Murder
Longbourn (audio)

Stay tuned for my best of the year post tomorrow and then the Cybils shortlists on Wednesday. And then 2014! Wow. The question is: how long will it take me to remember to write ’14 as the date?

The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender

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by Leslye Walton
First sentence: “To many, I was myth incarnate, the embodiment of a most superb legend, a fairy tale.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Release date: March 25, 2014
Review copy sent to me by the publisher in exchange for an IndieNext blurb.
Content: There are a few mild swear words, but lots of sex (none of it graphic), including a rape scene. It also reads more like an “adult” book than a “teen” one. I’ll probably shelve it in the Teen (grades 9 and up) section, though it might do better in the general fiction section at the bookstore.

While the title of the book suggests this book is about a girl named Ava Lavender, there is more to this story. In fact, it’s about Ava Lavender only because she’s the granddaughter of Emmaline Roux and daughter of Viviane Lavender. It’s equally their story. And it’s (to be honest) a difficult story to tell.

There’s foolish love, unrequited love, passion, and most of all a magic running through it all. It’s the magic of Like Water for Chocolate: Things happen because of the passion. Not the least of which is that Ava Lavender was born with wings. Not just little wings, either. Full-fledged, huge speckled wings. Her mother, being the person she is, doesn’t allow Ava to leave their hilltop Seattle home. But. Ava longs to be a “normal” teenager. Unfortunately, normality comes at a price.

The magic runs in other places as well: Ava’s twin, Henry, only talks when he needs to, and that’s not very often. Her grandmother sees ghosts. Her mother sense of smell is beyond extraordinary. The man down the road inspires people to confess their sins. Things like that.

The writing is… lyrical. The book… magical. And me? Well, I read it. See, magical realism and I don’t really get along terribly well. I wanted… something more to happen.  It’s not that it was a bad book; it wasn’t. It just wasn’t, well, my cup of tea.

The Vengekeep Prophecies

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by Brian Farrey
First line: “Even weeks later, I heard rumors that I had ruined the Festival of the Twins.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: Aside from the fact that Jax and his family are thieves — and  I suppose adults might have a problem with their kids reading that (though I don’t know why…), and maybe some scary monsters (depending on how sensitive your kids are; they’re not that scary) there’s absolutely nothing untoward in this book. Resides quite happily in the middle grade (3-5th grade) section of the bookstore.

Jax Grimjinx is a thief. He comes from a long line of thieves. It’s the family business, and has been for centuries. There’s only one problem: Jax is a bookish nerd, a klutz, and actually is quite a terrible thief. (Yes, it is his fault — this time — that the Grimjinx family ended up in jail.) Then a suspiciously convenient prophecy turns up, putting his family at the center as the Heroes. It predicts all sorts of Dire Perils for the town of Vengekeep, which start coming true. (It wasn’t supposed to: there really is no such thing as Lava Men.) There’s seemingly no stop to it. Until Jax with his bookishness figures out there might be a Way to break the prophecy. And it’s up to him — and his new friend, Callie — to go and get what is needed.

There’s so much to love in this book. Jax is a terrific character: a bookish kid (I love that he’s wearing glasses. I know it’s a little thing, but I do love it.), an unwilling hero, and yet he finds a way to outsmart the more Savvy characters and Save the Day. I love his relationship with Callie; none of that sappy romance stuff (I’ve decided that I don’t like romance in my middle grade fanatsy), but a good solid friendship that works. I love that it’s all plausible and that the “prophecy” isn’t something that’s set in stone, which gets old after a while. And the writing is tight; it kept me reading, turning pages, wondering what is going to happen next. I’m just glad the second one, The Shadowhand Convenant, just came out. Because I don’t want to wait to see what happens next to Jax and his family.

(Just for the record: because this is a Cybils nominee, I’ve been asked to make sure y’all know this is my opinion only, and not that of the panel.)

How I Became a Ghost

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by Tim Tingle
First line: “Maybe you have never read a book written by a ghost before.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: This is not a happy story. This is a sad and painful story. And even though the language is suitable for ages 8 and up, the content is, well, hard. And sad. And painful. (It was difficult even for me to get through because of the subject matter.) It’s in the middle grade (3-5th grade) section of the bookstore, but I’d be careful which child to give it to.

There was a time in my life, when I was junior or senior in high school, when I would have loved this story.

Isaac is a Choctaw boy, happy growing up in the swamps of the south. That is until the Nahullos — the white people — come along, and begin forcing his people out of their homes. And that’s when Isaac begins seeing ghosts. He sees shades of how his family and friends will die (horrible, horrible deaths). He foretells his own death and becomes a ghost. (No surprise: it’s in the first sentence!)

It’s when they’re on the Trail of Tears, however, that things get intense. The soldiers kidnap a girl, and it’s up to Isaac — as a ghost — and his friend — who can morph into a panther — to rescue her. They do, and it’s quite interesting how it happens.

I mentioned that I would have loved this story when I was younger. It’s because I was fascinated by — that seems the wrong word — the Native Americans, and their genocide. I would have eaten this book up, and passed it along to everyone I could. Now, though? Now, I just felt impossibly sad. I know it’s a tale that Needs to be told, a story that so many people need to be reminded of. But call it liberal guilt, call it having children: I couldn’t stomach it. It wasn’t violent, necessarily, but it was heart-wrenching. And even though Isaac turned out to be a hero, I never could find it in my heart to be proud of him (even though I wanted to).

It’s a well-written story, and a book that needs to be out there. I’m just not sure that I’m the right reader for it.

(Just for the record: because this is a Cybils nominee, I’ve been asked to make sure y’all know this is my opinion only, and not that of the panel.)

Happy Christmas!

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“And in despair I bowed my head;
“There is no peace on earth,” I said;
“For hate is strong,
And mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!”
Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
“God is not dead, nor doth he sleep!
The Wrong shall fail,
the Right prevail,
With peace on earth, good-will to men!” 
― Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

“One of the most glorious messes in the world is the mess created in the living room on Christmas day. Don’t clean it up too quickly.”  ― Andy Rooney

Happy Holidays from my blog to yours!

The True Blue Scouts of Sugar Man Swamp

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by Kathi Appelt
First sentence: “From the rooftop of Information Headquarters, Bingo and J’miah stood on their back paws and watched Little Mama and Daddy-O trundle away; their stripy gray and black silhouettes grew smaller and smaller in the deepening dusk.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Review copy snagged from the ARC shelves at my place of employment.
Content: There’s a few difficult words but it’s pretty appropriate for anyone. It’s in the middle grade (3-5th grade) section of the bookstore. I think it’d make a great read aloud for younger kids as well.

Bingo and J’miah are the two newest members of the Sugar Man Scouts. Like their ancestors before them, they are the raccoons that keep an eye on the Sugar Man Swamp, listening to the Voice, and keeping ready to wake the Sugar Man in case they need to.

I suppose I should back up and say that Sugar Man Swamp is in Texas (not Louisiana, which is where I thought it was for half the book and where I am convinced it should be) and in it grows this amazing sugarcane. From which Chap Brayburn and his mom make fried sugar pies. Which should be famous, but aren’t because they are off the Beaten Path.

And so, they owe lots of money to a nefarious businessman named Sonny Boy, who wants to sell the swamp to a ‘gator wrestler for a theme park.

Oh, and did I mention that a gang of wild hogs are on the rampage?

That kind of gives you a taste for this tale. And it is a tale. In fact, the narrator was bugging me — it’s a pretty intrusive narrator — until  I realized that this is the sort of book that begs to be read aloud. Once I imagined myself listening to this story, perhaps told by a fantastic storyteller with a fabulous Southern accent, then the book came alive for me. I understood the humor, I understood the whimsical nature of the characters, and — honestly — I fell for it.

It’s not perfect — it’s probably a bit longer than it needed to be — but it’s very, very good. And charming. And enjoyable.

And that’s enough for me.

(Just for the record: because this is a Cybils nominee, I’ve been asked to make sure y’all know this is my opinion only, and not that of the panel.)

The Year of Shadows

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by Claire Legrand
First sentence: “The year the ghost came started like this:”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Review copy provided by the publisher for the Cybils.
Content: There are ghosts and shades and it gets pretty scary. There’s also a lot of pre-teen Angst and a little bit of romance. For those reasons, even though it’s in the middle grade (3-5th grade) section of the bookstore, I’d probably hand it to the older end of the spectrum. But that’s just me.

Olivia hates her life. Her father — whom she less-than-affectionately calls the Maestro — is wholly absorbed with being the conductor of their town’s struggling orchestra. So involved that Olivia’s mother left. So involved that they sold their house and auctioned off their belongings and moved into the back rooms of the concert hall in order to keep the orchestra afloat. And for 13-year-old Olivia, this does not sit well. In fact, she loathes it. (Understatement of the century.)

She’s miserable, she’s basically homeless, and then… she discovers there are ghosts in the concert hall. Not just ghosts, but shades — ghosts that have given up the search for the chance to move on and given into Limbo — as well. And it’s the shades that are Dangerous. And it’s up to Olivia and her new friend Henry to help the ghosts move on and defeat the shades. And, perhaps, in the process maybe they can figure out how to save the concert hall and the orchestra.

I adored this book for lots of reasons. Olivia was dark and grumpy and prickly and perfect for a ghost story. I loved the musical setting for this — the concert hall, the strains of orchestral music (it needs a soundtrack!) running through the story; in the endnote, Legrand talks about choosing pieces to fit the mood of Olivia’s life, and being familiar with many of the pieces, I think she did fabulously. (I don’t know how non-musical readers would react to it, though. Would it make them want to go look up the pieces?) I enjoyed Henry and some of the other minor characters, with their New-Agey feel and their support of Olivia. Because the Maestro? He’s firmly in the bad parent camp. He’s not a “abusive/horrible/evil” dad, but rather the “neglectful/unobservant” dad. And I can understand Olivia’s anger towards him.

There is one quibble: there’s a plot twist near the end of the book that I didn’t feel was absolutely necessary. (And which added to the Maestro’s bad parent-ness.) I think Legrand needed it for plot purposes, but it felt like it was out of left field, and didn’t quite fit with the rest of the book.

Other than that, though, it was highly enjoyable.

(Just for the record: because this is a Cybils nominee, I’ve been asked to make sure y’all know this is my opinion only, and not that of the panel.)

Absolution by Murder

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by Peter Tremayne
First sentence: “The man had not been dead long.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: Murders, all off screen, and a lot (a LOT) of historical information to wade through. A novel for people with patience and time and a passing interest in Seventh Century Ireland/England/Catholicism. Nothing untoward (aside from the dead people) though.

This book is about a lot of things:
1. The mid-seventh century.
2. Early Catholicism in medieval England and Ireland.
3. The history of convents/monasteries in that time period.
4. The Saxon-Irish animosity of the time.
5. Saxon traditions that someone Irish would find despicable.
6. A woman court advocate in Ireland.
7. Solving a murder.

This book (I know I skipped the plot. It goes like this: there was a murder. They solve it. There’s 200 pages of incidental historical information.) has the same problem that many of the fantasy books I read have: there’s too much world-building (in this case, it’s medieval Great Britain) and not enough, well, plot.

I had the same problem I had with Deborah Harkness’s Shadow of Night: I felt like Tremayne (who is a professor of Celtic history) thought: “I’ve got ALL this historical information I NEED TO SHARE. Let’s see HOW MUCH I can put in this book!!” and then he proceeded to cram it ALL in. There was a plot — the abbess is murdered and Sister Fidelma (she’s the Irish woman court advocate) and a Saxon male (for the sake of balance) solve it. But I felt like the murder — which is really supposed to be the PLOT of the whole book — was incidental to the history. And I realized (even though I finished this one) that if I really wanted to read a book about medieval Great Britain, I’d find a non-fiction one.

What We Found in the Sofa and How it Saved the World

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by Henry Clark
First Sentence: “The sofa wasn’t there on Monday but it was there on Tuesday.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There was a bunch of bookish and cultural references that I don’t think a younger reader would “get”, but there isn’t anything content-wise (well, an angry dictator turning into a werewolf, maybe) that would be unsuitable for a younger reader. It’s in the middle grade (3-5th grade) section of the bookstore.

Friends River (he’s a guy; I wondered at first, too), Freak (not his real name), and Fiona all live at the edge of a huge underground fire that the town has nicknamed Hellsboro. If that’s not odd enough, one day when they’re waiting for the school bus, they discover a couch waitng for them. With a zucchini-colored crayon in between the cushions. Thus begins their adventure which includes an eccentric neighbor, a planet on the inside of a basketball (sort of), a computer/entity called Guernica, and a plot to enslave the human race.

And it seems that River, Freak, and Fiona are the only ones who can stop this from happening.

The best way to describe this book is an acid trip for kids. I know that sounds odd, but honestly, it’s the best description. This was jam-packed with odd TV and culture references (which, being an adult, I got), but it was more than that. I think it was meant to be funny — and it was, sometimes (the toilet hot-air balloon got a guffaw out of me) — but what started out as an awesome premise (a tessering couch that eats dust bunnies for fuel is pretty awesome) just kind of petered out. I  kept reading it because it was SO unbelievable: what weird, trippy, insane thing was going to happen to the friends next. So, I guess on one level it succeeded: it kept me reading.

But in the end, it left me unsatisfied and shaking my head. It was quite the trip, though.

(Just for the record: because this is a Cybils nominee, I’ve been asked to make sure y’all know this is my opinion only, and not that of the panel.)