Twelve Kinds of Ice

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by Ellen Byran Obed, Illustrated by Barbara McClintock
ages: 8+
First sentence: “The first ice came on the sheep pails in the  barn — a skim of ice so thin that it broke when we touched it.”
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There are some books where you can write pages and pages about them. There are other books when one word can sum up everything you read.

Charming.

It’s not really a story, it’s a catalog of winter memories. The progression of winter through ice, from the first crack of ice through building a rink in the backyard, to the melting that comes with spring. The illustrations are lovely, the prose spare, and the result: charming.

It made me miss a real winter, the winters I remember from my childhood (though I’m not sure I’ve ever had a winter like they get in Maine). And it made me wistful that my children don’t get those kind of deep winters that make for good ice here in Kansas.

In short: charming.

Number the Stars

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by Lois Lowry
ages: 9+
First sentence: “I’ll race you to the corner, Ellen!”
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I read this a long time ago, but only wrote this little review about it:  “A compelling story about a Danish family during the Nazi resistance and how they help save their Jewish neighbors. Made me proud to have Danish ancestors. (Though, admittedly, none were there in 1943.)”

While I had much of the same reaction upon rereading, I was struck with how simple this book was.

It’s the story of a Danish family in 1943. The Nazis have taken over Denmark, and the Johansens — Father, Mother, daughters Annemarie and Kirstie (their older sister Lise died a couple years before) — is learning to adapt. It’s not fun, it’s not easy, but they’re stalwart and determined. Then, one night, the rabbis warned their congregations that the Nazis were coming for them. That includes the Johansens’ neighbors and good friends, the Rosens. It falls to the Johansens to help the Rosens escape to Sweden.

I think the best part of the book is that it’s based on a true story. The Danish really did help the Jews escape the Nazis. There really were courageous people who sacrificed their safety to help their friends.

But the story itself was… simplistic. I know Lowry was writing for middle grade readers, but there lacked a complexity that even the best middle grade readers have. It was straightforward, matter-of-fact, and lacked a depth that I had hoped for.

It’s not that I didn’t enjoy the book; I did. It’s just that there are better WWII books out there. Even though, as a Dane, I do appreciate having this story told.

Paper Valentine

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by Brenna Yovanoff
ages: 13+
First sentence: “My sister, Ariel, is sprawled upside down on the couch, pointing with the TV remote.”
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Hannah’s friend Lillian slowly killed herself through anorexia, finally dying about six months ago. And ever since then, she’s been haunting Hannah, hanging out, commenting on her life, not really allowing Hannah to let go and move on.

But things are changing this summer: Hannah’s become interested in Finny Boone, one of the social un-elite, whom she’s known forever but never really paid attention to. And young girls are being murdered, which means the whole town is on edge. Somehow, all three of those things — Finny, Lillian, and the killer — are connected, and maybe by figuring out how, Hannah will be able to deal with her grief and move on.

On the surface, this is a hodgepodge of things: a murder mystery, a ghost story, a Teen Issue story, a grief and loss story. But, for some reasons, in Yovanoff’s hands, most of those elements work really well together. I say most, because I had the most issues with the serial killer part of the story. I’m not going to give away any spoilers, but while I didn’t really see the ending coming, it wasn’t a satisfying conclusion to the whole mystery. That, and the bad guy monologues. I hate it when they monologue. It’s so… pat. Like the information should have been out there already, and we didn’t really need to hear it all from the bad guy’s mouth. Except in this case, it wasn’t.

That, and I found the characters incredibly difficult to connect to. Hannah was mopey, Lillian pushed Hannah around, and her other “friends” weren’t so nice (my favorite scene? When Hannah confronted the Clique and told them off. You go girl.) Finney was the Strong Silent Guy, and Ariel was the Cute Younger Sister. While I found the book to be intense, it was in spite of the characters and unlike Lauren Oliver’s Before I Fall or Laurie Halse Anderson’s Wintergirls, I didn’t buy Hannah’s growth arc.

Still, there were some pretty creepy moments, and I have to give Yovanoff credit for that. I just wish it worked better as a whole.

The Terrible Thing that Happened to Barnaby Brocket

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by John Boyne
ages: 11+
First sentence: “This is the story of Barnaby Brocket, and to understand Barnaby, first you have to understand his parents: two people who were so afraid of anyone who was different that they did a terrible thing that would have the most appalling consequences for everyone they loved.”
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Barnaby Brocket was born to ordinary parents in an ordinary part of Sydney. It should have been a happy existence, except for one thing: Barnaby defies the law of gravity. He floats. This is a problem, not just for the obvious reasons of floating away, but because his parents just. don’t. like. anything out of the ordinary. And floating certainly is.

So Barnaby’s mother does the unthinkable: he lets him float away. And a whole new world is opened up to Barnaby. He goes on adventures, meets new people, and discovers that being unusual is actually quite good.

I really wanted to like this one. I think the idea is clever, and even the moral (heavy-handed though it is) as stated on page 91 (“Just because your version of normal isn’t the same as someone else’s version doesn’t mean that there’s anything wrong with you.”) is a good one, I just couldn’t finish it. It was quirky and clever and all that, but maybe it was too quirky and too clever, because I found myself bored to tears. In fact, I found myself thinking that the best thing about this was the drawings by Oliver Jeffers. And on that note, I bailed.

In fact, as I was skimming the ending, I was wondering what child — especially middle grade; it’s a bit complex (see the first sentence as an example!) for a 9 year old, and it would be a tough sell for your average 11 year old. It seemed to me that it was one of those books that adults think children should like, but they never do. (Though it also occurred to me that it might make a good read-aloud.)

Well, you can’t win them all, I suppose.

(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.)

Perfect Scoundrels

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by Ally Carter
ages: 12+
First sentence: “Of all the people who knew about the big house in the middle of Wyndham Woods, very few had ever been inside.”
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Others in the series: Heist Society, Uncommon Criminals

I have decided (only took me three books, too), that one of the things I like best about this series is that it’s not really a “series”. You don’t have to read the first two to get the third (though they’re fun and you should read them). Each one is a separate con/heist while building upon the characters we’ve come to know and love (and, in my case, swoon over).

This one is all about Hale. (*swoon* You should have seen me at the store when these came in. I was a complete fangirl. HALE!) The short version is that we learn a lot about his family, his past, and his life. Which, to tell the truth, doesn’t really bode well for Kat. Hale’s beloved grandma Hazel has just passed away,  and it turns out that Hale is the sole inheritor of the business, with the family lawyer named as trustee until Hale turns 25. And fortune. Except, Marcus (ever-trusty chauffeur/butler/guy) believes there’s something wrong: his sister, Marianne, who was Hazel’s companion and friend, was completely cut out. He asserts that the will read is fake, and hires Kat to find and steal the real one back.

Of course, that’s not the whole story. But to tell you it would be to ruin your fun. I will tell you this: out of the three, this one has the tightest con. I didn’t figure it out until it was nearly over, and then I just sat back, reveling in the brilliance of it all. And while Hale wasn’t perfectly charming the whole book, it was still Hale. I know I shouldn’t have crushes on 17-year-old fictional men, but honestly: *swoon*

Plus the whole gang is back, and there are some brilliantly funny moments as they set up the long con. We get to meet more of Kat’s family, with all their brilliance and weirdness. Though I have to say that my new favorite minor character is Silas. Please: more of him!

All the other fun elements that I’ve come to expect from these books are there: jetting around the world, rappelling down buildings, breaking into banks, and just a little bit of kissing (in closets). I hope Ally Carter has a few more of these up her sleeves, because, heaven knows I can always find time to read them.

If only because I *swoon* over Hale.

The Sweet Revenge of Celia Door

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by Karen Finneyfrock
ages: 13+
First sentence: “At fourteen I turned Dark.”
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Release date: February 21, 2013
Review copy provided by my place of employment.

Celia Door is determined to make a new start her freshman. She’s got her shell, her Darkness, and her poetry, and she is NOT going to let the things that happened in eighth grade, or her parents “trial” separation, get her down. Except this: she is going to, somehow, get back at the girls who ruined (!) her life with The Book in eighth grade.

I’m going to stop right here for a minute. One of the issues I had with this book was that we don’t find out what the big deal was about The Book in eighth grade, why these girls — Sandy and Mandy — were so mean, until nearly the end of the book. Granted, when we do find out, it’s a classic example of bullying, one that makes the two girls out to be real harpies.  While I understood why it took so long for the author to reveal the reason behind Celia’s actions, knowing it sooner probably would have made Celia more sympathetic. Or, at the very least, made me less likely to want to smack her.

Back to the story.

Celia makes it through the first day, but things aren’t looking good. Sandy and Mandy are still on her case, she has no friends, and (horror of horrors) her Language Arts teacher isn’t sympathetic to Celia’s love of writing poetry. Things look Bleak until she meets Drake, a NYC transplant (he didn’t get into the art school he wanted, and his local PS is pathetic, so his parents sent him to live with his grandmother). He and Celia becomes friends: for him, she’s someone that’s edgy, unlike their suburban cookie-cutter classmates. For her, he’s someone who doesn’t know about The Book and has an air of Sophistication and Mystery that comes with being from NYC. And being gay.

On top of all that, things with Celia’s parents have gone from bad to worse, and she’s only feeling trapped in her life. (Another aside: I wanted to smack her mom, as well. Or, at the very least, shake her and tell her to talk TO her daughter instead of AT her. Parenting is so easy when it’s a book character, and you’re outside the book.)

For the most part, I liked this book, even with all its issue-button pushing. In fact, I may have liked it for that. While it’s not as powerful as some others I’ve read, it’s a solid book about bullying, about coming out and finding yourself, and about accepting things for what they are. It’s aimed for a younger readership than some of the other issue books I’ve read (aside from four “f-bombs” — which really didn’t feel out of place, to be totally honest — it’s pretty tame), and yet it still deals with things that kids have to deal with.

And for that, I applaud Finneyfrock.

Audiobook: To Kill a Mockingbird

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by Harper Lee
Read by Sissy Spacek
ages: adult
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I’m not going to sum this one up; everyone has read it already. So here are my thoughts from listening to this one for the first time since high school.

1. They say the n-word a lot. A lot. And, while I understand that it was part of the south in the 1930s, it sure made me uncomfortable.

2. I had to keep reminding myself that not everyone in the south is like most people in this book. That we need more Atticuses and Scouts and Jems and Boo Radleys in this world and less Bob Ewells.

3. That said, Sissy Spacek’s Southern drawl was just delightful. I got out of the car many a time speaking Southern myself.

4. Not much happens in the book, which surprised me. Check that: two Really Big Things happen, but in between it’s a lot of daily life, a lot of character sketches. And I wasn’t bored. Which also really surprised me.

5. I want to be a parent like Atticus. I sometimes wish my girls could have childhoods like Jem and Scout did.

6. Anyone who says that courts are fair is lying. Still. And that made me sad. Tom Robinson was TOTALLY innocent.

7. I think I finally understand the title now. It wasn’t something I remembered from before.

8. I’m so glad I decided to reread it. I hadn’t remembered much from the book at all, and it was delightful rediscovering this classic.

State of the TBR Pile 13: February 2013

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My TBR pile was actually under control. And then the SLJ BoB crew announced their lineup and my pile exploded.

Also: I bought myself a mini Mini a week ago. Even though I can’t drive it, it makes me happy.

One for the Money, by Janet Evanovich (lent to me by a member of my in-person book group)
Titanic: Voices From the Disaster, by Deborah Hopkinson (SLJ BoB book)
Paper Valentine, by Brenna Yovanoff (for the YAckers)
Eva of the Farm, by Dia Calhoun (recommended by a dear friend of mine)
Endangered, by Eliot Schrefer (SLJ BoB book)
A Tangle of Knots, by Lisa Graff (came in at work, and it looked good)
Prophecy, by Ellen Oh  (Mike Jung recommended it)
Twelve Kinds of Ice, by Ellen Bryan Obed (it got Newbery buzz, and caught my eye)
After Eli, by Rebecca Rupp (picked it up for C, and thought it looked good)
Revolution 19, by Gregg Rosenblum (seeing if this is any different from all the other dystopians out there)
The Diviners, Libba Bray (I WILL READ THIS.)
Temple Grandin: How the Girl Who Loved Cows Embraced Autism and Changed the World, by Sy Montgomery (SLJ BoB book)
No Crystal Stair, by Vaunda Micheaux Nelson (SLJ BoB book)
Moonbird, by Phillip M. Hoose  (SLJ BoB book)

What’s on your pile?

Scarlet

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by Marissa Meyer
ages: 12+
First sentence: “Scarlet was descending toward the alley behind the Rieux Tavern when her portscreen chimed from the passenger seat, followed by an automated voice: “Comm received for Mademoiselle Scarlet Benoit from the Toulouse Law Enforcement Department of Missing Persons.“
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Others in the series: Cinder
Review copy handed to me by the publishing representative.

I wasn’t going to read this one. Really. After my issues with Cinder, I was going to let the whole series slide. But the Macmillian rep who comes by the store once a quarter handed this to me back in November with the words: this is a LOT better than the first.  So, I took a chance.

And was completely blown away.

I’m not going to say this is the Best Book Evah, but honestly? Meyer took what was kind of a weird thing in Cinder, and delivered something intense. (Obviously, spoilers for Cinder will follow.)

Scarlet Benoit’s grand-mere has been missing for two weeks, and she’s getting annoyed at the lack of leads in the case. It’s not a suicide, like the authorities have ruled: Scarlet knows her grandmother well enough to know that. But she has no idea where to start looking for her. Then a strange man called Wolf falls into her life, claiming to have knowledge — though he’s reluctant to share it — about where her grandmother is. They head to Paris to get some answers.

Meanwhile, Cinder escapes from prison and teams up with an American to try and process all the information that’s been given her in the last 24 hours. Turns out that Scarlet’s grandmother may have information that Cinder needs as well.

All that against the backdrop of an impending invasion from the very creepy Lunar queen Levana.

The thing I liked best about this one, I think, is that Meyer gives us more of this fascinating futuristic world that she’s created. Sure, Scarlet is loosely based on Little Red Riding Hood, but it’s not so much a fairy tale as a story of what people will do for those that they care for. Which makes it sound deeper than it is. Really? It’s just a lot of fun, a great second novel in a series. (You don’t often hear that.) Which leaves me begging for the next installment.