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 Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place: The Unseen Guest

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by Maryrose Wood
ages: 9+
First sentence: “‘Lumawoo, look.'”
Support your local independent library: buy it there!
Others in the series: The Mysterious Howling, The Hidden Gallery

The best thing about this one is that finally (!) some of the questions I’ve had are finally being (slowly) answered.

See, Lord Frederick’s mother and her suitor, Admiral Faucet, show up at Ashton Place, with an ostrich. (Seriously.) The ostrich gets looks, and Admiral Faucet, intrigued by the Incorrigible’s tracking skills, takes them into the woods to find said runaway ostrich. Of course, their governess Penelope — somewhat daunted by the idea of taking the children into the woods, where there are scary bears and other animals — comes along.

Once in the woods, Strange Things happen. Penelope sees where the Incorrigibles were living before they came to Ashton Place, and discovers their relationship with the wolf, Mama Woof. Additionally, she learns of Admiral Faucet’s Grand Plan, which involves taking the Incorrigibles on the road as a freak show. After he squanders the Ashton fortune, of course. To stop him, Penelope turns to her friend Simon to hold a seance for Lord Frederick’s mother.

The best thing about these, still, is the narrator. Long, hilarious asides explaining words and meanings. Nudges to the reader about the characters. Silly, silly plot twists. I’m still not sure how many kids will like/get this one, but I sure find them enjoyable. Bring on the next installment.

The Book of Three

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by Lloyd Alexander
ages: 9+
First sentence: “Taran wanted to make a sword; but Coll, charged with the practical side of his education, decided on horseshoes.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!

This is one of the titles I remember having fond memories of as a kid. I don’t really remember the act of reading it, though I know I must have: I remember talking about it with friends, especially after the Disney monstrosity of a movie came out. (We were purists, if you can’t tell…) I know I’ve reread the story before this, but I don’t have any record of it, so it’s good that I was asked to reread it again (and write up a lengthy review…)

Taran is just an Assistant Pig Keeper at Caer Dallben, charged with taking care of the oracle pig, Hen Wen. He longs for adventure, and then one day, quite unexpectedly, he gets it: the Horned King and his minions (in service of the Big Baddie, Arawn — yes, that does remind me of Lord of the Rings, thanks for asking) make Hen Wen uneasy and she escapes her pen. Taran, because he’s just impulsive that way, takes off after her, falling in with Prince Gwydion for a bit before they get separated and Taran is on his own.

But he’s not alone: he collects a rag-tag band of friends:the half-animal, always hungry Gurgi; the headstrong Eilowny; the ever-exaggerating bard Fflewddeur Fflam (who will always be “flewder flam” instead of “fleoothur flam”); and the grumpy dwarf Doli. Together they find their way back to Gwydion, fight the Horned King (though Taran rightly asserts in the end that he didn’t do anything worthy of being called a hero), and realize there’s no place like home.

On the one hand, the book is really simplistic: boy leaves, boy has adventures, boy comes home a Wiser and Better person. And yet, I found it to be incredibly compelling. Perhaps it was because I loved it as a kid, but I don’t think that’s entirely it. 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.

And that is really the best kind of middle grade book. And yes, I am going to make the time to read the rest now.

The Books of Elsewhere: Spellbound

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by Jacqueline West
ages: 9+
First sentence: “Everyone who lived in the big stone house on Linden Street eventually went insane.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Others in the series: The Shadows

As a result of events in the first book, Olive is no longer able to get into the paintings — the doorway to Elsewhere — on her own. She needs the help of the cats — Horatio, Harvey and Leopold — to get in and out. And, increasingly, they are unwilling to help her. That, and her friend Morton is getting more and more cantankerous because Olive can’t find a solution to get him out of the painting for good.

Then a boy moves in two doors down, and starts asking questions he shouldn’t (or, rather, Olive doesn’t want to answer), but he puts an idea in her mind: if she can find the grimorie (book of spells), then maybe she can figure out not only how to get to Elsewhere by herself, but maybe she can figure out how to get Morton out.

Except, things don’t go the way Olive wants them to.

The best thing about this one is that it’s delightfully creepy. There’s a point when you, as the reader, know something bad HAS to happen, and yet West drags it out, bit by bit (but not in a painful way), stringing us along just enough for us to sit at the edge of our seats, wondering when the resolution will come.

And come it does.  (It’s quite satisfying, too.)

While it’s a continuation of the previous book, it’s also a stand-alone story of its own. You don’t really need to have read the first one to enjoy this one, and there really isn’t any threads left undone (well… not entirely true, but the undone thread isn’t entirely relevant to the story). And that truly makes this a winner of a series.

June 2012 Wrap-Up

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Summer is in full swing here, and my reading is reflecting it. Not only more (though much of that is due to Mother Reader‘s 48 Hour Book Challenge), but fluffier. Ah, gotta love the brain drain that the heat brings on.

It’s fitting that in a month where I mostly read Middle Grade books, that my favorite read was this:

Three Times Lucky

I loved it, but I have yet to convince my girls to read it, which makes me sad.

As for the rest:

Adult fiction

Good Omens
Ilium
Lady Cyclist’s Guide to Kashgar

Non-Fiction:

My Life as an Experiment
Yes, Chef

YA:

Crossed
The Lost Code
Matched
The Statistical Probability of  Love at First Sight
Seraphina
The List
At Yellow Lake

Middle Grade:

The Books of Elsewhere: The Shadows 
Out of the Dust (reread)
Postcards from Pismo
The Serpent’s Shadow
The Phantom Tollbooth
Calling on Dragons
Spy School
Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life

Graphic Novels

Batman
Stickman Odyssey: The Wrath of Zozimos

Only one audio book this month; I’ve been on a listening hiatus since school got out:

Cinder

What have your favorite reads been this month?

A Lady Cyclist’s Guide to Kashgar

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by Suzanne Joinson
ages: adult
First sentence: “I unhappily report that even Bicycling for Ladies WITH HINTS TO THE ART OF WHEELING – ADVICE TO BEGINNERS – DRESS – CARE OF THE BICYCLE – MECHANICS – TRAINING – EXERCISES, ETC. ETC. cannot assist me in this current predicament: we find ourselves in a situation.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!

Two things drew me to this book. First, the cover: I love it. I don’t know why (it’s not a young girl in a pretty dress, after all), but something about it just calls to me. And second, that first sentence. It’s wonderful, full of promise, of something … exciting.

And the premise sounded interesting as well: it’s 1923, and Evangeline English and her sister, Lizzie, have thrown their lot in with a evangelical missionary and are traveling to the wilds of Eastern Turkestan/Upper China. Lizzie and the missionary, Millicent, are there to convert people; Evangeline is there to write a book about cycling in this wild, unknown (at least to the English) place. It doesn’t go well, to say the least. They try to help a girl give birth, but the mother ends up dying, and they are placed under house arrest and given charge of the baby. From there, things only go down hill. There’s a lot of resistance to their missionary message, and Millicent is overbearing; she and Evangeline don’t get along.

However, that’s not the only story: it’s modern day London, and Frieda, the daughter of hippy parents and world traveler — is in a dead-end relationship with a married man. She’s back in town after a trip to Cairo, when two unusual things happen: one, she gets a letter telling her that she is the next-of-kin for an Irene Guy, whom she’s never even heard of; and a Yemeni man, Tayeb, parks himself outside of her door. Both of these things will change her life.

I spent a good portion of the book trying to figure out how these two stories were connected. I should have realized how much sooner than I did; if you’re paying attention, it’s pretty obvious. Even so, each of the stories might have made a decent book on their own; together it kind of seems forced. I wanted more from each of the stories, more than I got anyway, and I feel like in combing them Joinson somehow cheated me of the full story. That, and I think the most interesting character was the elusive Ilene Guy; her story seemed like the most intriguing.

That said, it wasn’t a bad book. There’s enough in it to keep my attention throughout it all, and while I didn’t love it in the end, at least I wasn’t bored by it. And that’s something.

Right?

Seraphina

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by Rachel Hartman
ages: 13+
First sentence: “I remember being born.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Release date: July 10, 2012
Review copy provided by my place of employment.

I should get the gushing out of the way first: I have read books about dragons, some of which were really clever, but I have never seen dragons like this.

And that blew. me. away.

I have struggled with how to sum this novel up, but am completely at a loss. There is so much going on, much of which is best left to be discovered as you go, that a summary is almost impossible. This is what I can tell you: the main character is Seraphina, a sixteen-year-old assistant chief musician in the castle. Except she has a secret, one that will cost her her life if revealed. The country is Goredd, which has been at peace with the dragons for forty years. It’s a tentative peace, one which is hanging by the slimmest of threads. There is prejudice against the dragons rampant in the populace of Goredd, a fire that is barely constrained. And so when Prince Rufus is found beheaded, it’s everyone’s — from the military down to the common people — assumption that the dragons did it, and there are people calling for blood.

And then there are the dragons. They walk among the humans, as humans: learning, teaching, advising, observing. Granted, they stand out to the humans; dragons are more rational, less emotional, mathematically minded, and not at all spontaneous. But, even though they are differences, it’s their ability to mimic humans that is the root of all the prejudice and terror in Goredd.

Really, that’s all you need to know to start. Know this as well: this is an excellent first novel. It’s a rich, rich world that Hartman has created, full of religion, politics, romance, music, and action. And while it works as the start of a trilogy, it also stands on it’s own, bringing the story arc to a satisfying conclusion, while leaving threads open to pursue in later books.

But really, read this one for the dragons. You’ll never see them like this again.

The Books of Elsewhere: The Shadows

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by Jacqueline West
ages: 9+
First sentence: “Ms. McMartin was definitely dead.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!

Eleven-year-old Olivia, the daughter of two absent-minded mathematicians, has lived her whole life in boring apartments. That is, until her parents by a creepy, old, drafty, mysterious stone house on Linden Street. It’s not only got character, it’s got paintings that Olivia swears are moving.

Not to mention the talking cat.

Soon, Olivia discovers a pair of old spectacles (great word, that), and finds that she can climb into the paintings. Once there, she discovers something more sinister: not only are these paintings in Elsewhere real, the people were once real people. They’ve been trapped there. And, inadvertently, Olivia has let free the person who trapped all these people — including her new friend, a 9-year-old boy named Morton. How is she going to set things to rights?

The jacket flap compared this one to Neil Gaiman and Roald Dahl, and I have to agree: there is the same dark undertones, same sense of foreboding that you get with Gaiman, and the same sense of the unusual you get with Dahl (not to mention the same underwhelming parental figures). But it also has a feel of it’s own: it won the Middle Grade Science Fiction/Fantasy Cybils for 2010 because they liked the pacing and humor and world building. I have to agree: I read this book quickly not just because it was a breeze to get through, but because I didn’t want to put it down.

And I can’t wait to see what other adventures Olivia and Morton will have.

My Life as an Experiment

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by A. J. Jacobs
age: adult
First sentence: “Over the years, I’ve gotten a lot of suggestions.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!

It’s no secret that I really like A. J. Jacobs. Even so, I somehow missed this book when it came out. Unlike his other three books, this is a series of short vignettes, one month projects ranging all over the place from a month of trying to be like George Washington, to a month of outsourcing his life to India, to a month practicing being radically honest.

While it’s a fascinating and fun little jaunt — my favorite chapter was the rationality project — it lacked the depth that his longer books have. See: he’s really not all about the gimmick, at least not in his big books. Sure, they’re gimmicky, and they’re silly, but there’s a profoundness (profundity??) to them that was missing from these experiments. And because of that, they weren’t nearly as interesting as they could have been.

That said, I’m not sure I’d want to read a whole book about him outsourcing his life, or even being George Washington (though I didn’t learn a thing from that chapter, since Hubby’s a pretty big GW fan). They worked as vignettes, even if the depth and reflection isn’t there. They are funny (the naked one was pretty hilarious), and his wife is still amazingly tolerant (though he gives her a month of whatever she wants, and she quite abuses the power). It has all the elements of his books, just not to the extent that I have come to enjoy.

Upon reflection, this would be a really good introduction to the weird world that is A. J. Jacobs.

Once Upon a Time VI

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I think, at some point, I stopped counting all the general fantasy that I read, so this isn’t a complete list. At any rate, I’m more than happy that Carl’s still giving me an excuse (although I don’t really need one) to clear out my fantasy lists every spring. This is what I read:

Fantasy:
Grave Mercy, Robin LaFevers The Floating Islands, by Rachel Neumeier
Huntress, by Malinda Lo
Hex Hall, by Rachel Hawkins
Castle in the Air, by Diana Wynne Jones
Demonglass, by Rachel Hawkins
Spell Bound, by Rachel Hawkins
Girl of Fire and Thorns, by Rae Carson
Dealing with Dragons, by Patricia Wreade
Searching for Dragons, by Patricia Wreade

My favorites for these were Grave Mercy (of course; though I haven’t been able to find a person to sell it to at the store, which depresses me greatly) and the Hex Hall series.

Mythology:
Ilium by Dan Simmons.
The Lost Code, by Kevin Emerson
The Serpent’s Shadow, by Rick Riordan

Rick Riordan wins, every time. Though I did like The Lost Code, too. Ilium, not so much.

Folklore:
Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett.

Fairy Tales:
Cinder, by Marissa Meyer.
Fables: book one, by Bill Willingham

I’m glad I read both, because I really enjoyed Fables and I’m glad I know what Cinder’s about now. 

What were your favorites?

Out of the Dust (reread)

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by Karen Hesse
ages: 11+
First sentence: “As summer wheat came ripe, so did I, born at home, on the kitchen floor.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!

My original “review”, from a long, long time ago was this: “Out of the Dust, Karen Hesse: Free-verse poetry about the Dust Bowl in Kansas. I’m not crazy about the free-verse idea; I found it difficult to ‘get into’ the story.”

First off: I was wrong. It’s the pan-handle of Oklahoma, not Kansas. Now that I live here, that’s a very important distinction to make. We’re not just all plains states lumped into one category out here.

Secondly: I’ve come to  actually really like novels in verse. And I think it suits this book; it’s spare like the environment is out here, especially during the Dust Bowl in the 1930s. It works as a form, and it doesn’t bog the story down.

That said, this book is SO depressing. 

It’s the story of Billy Jo, age 14, in 1934, the height of the Great Depression. It’s just her and her parents, out on the prairie; her father keeps trying to beat the odds and grow some wheat. Her mother is pregnant when tragedy strikes and both she and the baby die. Billy Jo, who is also injured in the accident, and her dad stick it out, trying to make everything work, even as it all is falling apart.

See? Not exactly cheery.

Other than elegance of the form and the depressing story, there isn’t much to say. It’s not my favorite out of the Newbery winners, but it’s not too bad, either.