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?

Things in the Basement

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by Ben Hatke
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There are some mildly scary things, and it has a dark color palate. It’s in the Middle-Grade Graphic Novel section of the bookstore.

Milo’s family has just moved to a new house, and his mom has sent him to the basement to find one of his younger sibling’s lost socks. But once down there, Milo discovers that there’s a LOT more to the basement, as he goes on an epic adventure to find the sock.

Sure, that sounds simple. But with Hatke’s imagination and art, this adventure takes on a life of its own. There are some things that are scary at first, but Milo learns the importance of friendship and helping each other.

Like everything Hatke does, it’s charmingly drawn (I love the character that speaks entirely in emojis!), and is a heartfelt, sweet story. I picked it up on a whim and I’m so glad I did. It’s a great story and a fantastic graphic novel.

The Secret Life of Albert Entwistle

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by Matt Cain
First sentence: “Albert Entwistle was a postman.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There is bullying of a gay man, blatant homophobia, and violence by the police towards gay men. It’s in the fiction section of the bookstore.

Albert Entwistle has been a postman since he was 16 years old. It’s basically been his whole life, especially since his (overbearing and critical) mother died 18 years ago. Now that he’s almost 65, the Royal Mail has decided that it’s time for Albert to retire. This sends Albert into a bit a of a tailspin: what is he supposed to do with his life without the routine of carrying the mail?

The answer comes when he finds an old picture: he’s going to go looking for the boy he fell in love with when he was sixteen. On the way, he opens up to his coworkers, makes several friends, and learns to accept and be open about his sexuality.

I think I picked this up becuase a bookseller (at a different bookstore) told me it was very heart-warming and affirming, and I have to agree. It’s a sweet story about the importance of belonging and the way being open to other people can your enrich your life. It’s charming and sweet, and very English. It’s very cis, though it does talk about drag culture some, and there’s no on-page sex (it’s all implied). Perhaps it’s one of those gay books for non-gay people, but I liked it for the emphasis on friendships and community. It’s charming and sweet and a feel-good read. And I enjoyed it a lot.

Hazel Hill is Gonna Win This One

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by Maggie Horne
First sentence: “I’ve been told that it’s impossible to know everything, but I think I’ve found a loophole.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: This talks about sexual harassment and bullying, and has adults who don’t listen to/believe children. That might be triggering for some. It’s in the Middle-Grade section (grades 3-5) of the bookstore but might be more appropriate for the older end.

The only thing Hazel Hill has looked forward to the whole of her seventh-grade year was the speech competition. She lost out in sixth grade to Ella Quinn, but this year Hazel knows she will win. However, she is thrown off her objective one day when Tyler – a dude in her homeroom class – tells her that Ella Quinn, whom he has just broken up with (again), told him that she had a crush on Hazel. Which sends Hazel into a panic: she hasn’t told anyone she was gay! Is this real? What’s going on with Ella?

The answer is that Tyler has been sexually harassing Ella, and she’s trying to deal with it. As Hazel becomes friends with Ella (and her best friend Riley), she decides that Something Needs to Be Done about Tyler. The problem is that no adults are listening to or believing them.

It’s a bit more complex than that, and it has more to do with Hazel learning to have friends again, but that’s the gist. A boy is making girls’ lives difficult and adults don’t believe the girls, because they’re “just kids.”

I really loved this one. I’m always here for books about fierce girls, and this one is a good one. I liked the tone that the book took, and the focus on Hazel learning to be a friend helps ease the hardness of the subject matter. I loved Hazel’s relationship with her parents, as well as her acceptance of her own sexuality (even if she’s not ready to be out, yet). There are funny bits and happy bits, and it’s just an affirming book. Such a good read.

Audiobook: Midnight at the Houdini

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by Delilah S. Dawson
Read by Saskia Maarleveld
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Or listen at Libro.fm
Release date: September 5, 2023
Content: There are some precarious situations and a creepy guy who wants to hurt a teen girl. It’s in the YA section (grades 6-8) of the bookstore.

Anna has had a perfect life: her dad owns hotels in Las Vegas, so she hasn’t wanted anything. And her best friend, her sister Emily, has always been there for her. But on the night of Emily’s wedding, Anna is trapped in a storm and ends up in the Houdini – a mysterious, magical hotel that she has until midnight to get out of. Or she’ll be stuck there forever.

There’s more to the story, of course: There’s Max, the love interest who has been trapped in the hotel his whole life because his mother, Phoebe trapped them there. Anna’s dad and his friends are trapped there as well and have their own separate plot as we learn about Phoebe and the background of the Houdini.

I read in some promotional material that this was a loose retelling of The Tempest, and once I read that (about a quarter of the way into the book), I could see the similarities. And it made the book much better. I also really liked Maarleveld as a narrator; she kept the book engaging and I delighted in the way she did some of the voices. It was a lot of fun to listen to, and I’m glad I did.

Monthly Round Up: August 2023

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There’s nothing like a good vacation and then some Cybils reading to kick up your monthly numbers! My favorite this month:

System Collapse

When there’s a new Murderbot novel, it will always be my favorite. I love the series. As for the rest:

Graphic Novel:

Buzzing
Sunshine

Middle Grade:

Dad’s Girlfriend and Other Anxieties
The First Magnificent Summer
Race for the Ruby Turtle
Simon Sort of Says
Barely Floating (audiobook)
Lasagna Means I Love You
Morning Sun in Wuhan

Adult Fiction:

The Unhoneymooners
Business or Pleasure (audiobook)

Non-Fiction:

War and the American Difference
All In (audiobook)

What was your favorite this month?

Sunshine

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by Jarrett J. Korsoczka
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There are sick kids and talk of death. It’s in the Graphic Novel section of the bookstore.

In the companion to Hey Kiddo, Krosoczka depicts his experiences with Camp Sunshine, a place for sick kids – many of them terminally ill – and their families to go to get away from hospitals and being sick. Krosoczka volunteered for a week when he was 16, and he didn’t know what to expect when he first got there but ended up meeting incredible people and having his life changed for the better.

It was a touching and sweet graphic novel. I loved how Krosoczka depicted not only the other kids volunteering but also the kids and their families. He hits the highlights of the week he volunteered, and followed some of the relationships he kept afterward. It’s a good reminder that getting outside yourself and volunteering to help others is important. And it’s a good book.

Moning Sun in Wuhan

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by Ying Chang Compestine
First sentence: “It feels as though hours have passed since the waitress took my order.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There is talk of the COVID pandemic and the death of a parent. It’s in the Middle Grade (grades 3-5) of the bookstore.

Twelve-year-old Mei and her father are just surviving since her mother died a year ago. They go to work and school, and even though Mei likes to cook, she doesn’t really find any joy in it. Then, in January of 2020, a strange new disease crops up in their town in Wuhan. Suddenly Mei is cut off from her dad and friends. So, she figures out how to put her talent for cooking and organizing to help her neighborhood out in the early days of the lockdown.

So, I wanted to like this one. I appreciate that stories are starting to be told about the pandemic and I appreciate it being told from the perspective of the place where COVID started. But this one was just kind of… blah. It lacked any real conflict, and even the anxiety surrounding those first days of the pandemic. I get that it’s for younger kids, but it just wasn’t great.

That said, it’s good that it’s out there.

Lasagna Means I Love You

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by Kate O’Shaughnessy
First sentence: “Dear Nan, You died on a Tuesday.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There is talk of death and dying, and the main character is processing grief. it’s in the middle grade (grades 3-5) section of the bookstore.

Mo has lived with her grandma, Nan, all her life. And since Mo’s mom passed when she was six, Nan has been her guardian and basically only family. So, when Nan suddenly dies, Mo is a bit unmoored. Even more so when her mom’s brother, Billy, refuses to take Mo in, and she ends up in the foster care system. Nan’s last advice to Mo was to get a hobby. By chance, Mo stumbles across a cookbook full of family recipes, which gives her an idea: she’s going to collect family recipes, learn to cook them, and hopefully find a family recipe (and a family) of her own.

I appreciate that this book is aware of its privilege: Mo is a white kid and gets taken into a pretty well-off white home. She does recognize that this gives her privileges she might not have had otherwise (or that her friends from her old neighborhood in Brooklyn don’t have). But, at its heart, it’s a story of found family. And that’s always heart-warming. I thought O’Shaughnessy was good at portraying grief in both a way that seemed accessible as well as believable. And I liked the characters that surrounded Mo. Sure, a kid opening a one-night-only flash restaurant on New Year’s Eve is probably pretty unrealistic, but hey: I liked the thought and the spirit and the community that it built. A solid read.

Audiobook: Barely Floating

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by Lilliam Rivera
Read by Victoria Villarreal
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Or listen at Libro.fm
Release date: August 29, 2023
Content: There are a couple of mild swear words. It will be in the Middle-Grade section of the bookstore.

Nat has been out-swimming kids at her neighborhood pool for ages. She uses the money to go with her friend to the Anime Con. But one day, she catches a performance of the synchronized swimming team the L.A. Mermaids and she’s hooked. The problem? Her activist parents think synchronized swimming is too white and too focused on appearance for Nat to participate in. The solution? Lie to her parents, get her older cousin involved, and use her money to join the team anyway.

This is going to end badly. (Mild spoiler, there, but you see it coming).

On the one hand: this was so full of representation! There’s a not-skinny Latinx girl at the center of it, someone who is strong and fierce and not the person you think of when you think of synchronized swimming. There’s a boy on the team! It’s made up of not-super-rich kids! And, yet I was super anxious the whole way through because Nat was making some Choices. I get the choices – she felt like she couldn’t do anything else because her parents, who said they were open-minded, didn’t want to listen to her. But ALSO, from a parent’s perspective: AAAAAAHHHHH really!? How did she not get caught sooner?? How clueless are you?! So, mixed feelings to say the least. I did love Villarreal’s narration, though. She was a delight to listen to and brought all the characters to life. Will kids like this? Maybe? I love that the main character is a non-white girl who doesn’t fit the usual swimming stereotype. And maybe kids will like all the subterfuge she goes through to get what she wants.

I hope it finds its audience if only so we get more books like this.

Audiobook: Business or Pleasure

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by Rachel Lynn Solomon
Read by Hathaway Lee
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Or listen at Libro.fm
Content: Oh, there’s sooo much in here. All the f-bombs, all the on-page sex. Very, very spicy. It’s in the Romance section of the bookstore.

Chandler is a ghostwriter who is unhappy with her life. So when she meets a guy in a bar after a failed book signing (the author she wrote the book for didn’t even recognize Chandler’s name), she has a one-night stand with him. However, it’s the worst sex she’s ever had. (Or at least had in a long time.) So, when she gets a gig ghostwriting for the C-list actor Finn Walsh, she’s shocked (and a bit embarrassed) that he’s the guy she just slept with. She agrees to take the job, and as they travel from con to con (he’s best known for playing a science nerd on a werewolf show) they get to know each other, and the truth comes out: he’s terrible in bed. He’s a unicorn of a man and wants to know how to get better, so Chandler agrees to give him detailed sex lessons. Practical experience. The problem is: how can she keep her heart out of it?

Oh, this one made me blush! I kept hitting the very detailed, quite graphic sex scenes while at the gym (I’m blushing because I’m exercising, really!). But, honestly? It’s a fun book. It’s super sex-positive, and Chandler stresses in her lessons that communication between partners is vital to having a good experience. I kind of felt like I should be taking notes! But, beyond that, I enjoyed the relationship between Chandler and Finn, and how they pushed each other to become better and more confident people. So, yeah: super spicy, and probably not for everyone. But ultimately, I quite enjoyed it.