YA Book Reviews for April 22, 2009
From CRBSLS
What I Saw and How I Lied
by Judy Blundell
This taut psychological thriller grabs the reader from the very first page. Blundell won the National Book Award for a tense tale which is set soon after the end of World War II. Almost 16 year old Evie is on the edge of womanhood, but feels herself an ugly duckling compared to her blond bombshell of a mother. For many years it had just been the two of them, but recently her mother married Joe, and for the first time Evie has a real family. However soon after he returns from the war, Evie's step-father abruptly transports the family from NYC to a resort town in Florida, where they take up residence in an off-season hotel. Soon Peter, a good looking young veteran from Joe's unit, enters the scene and the tension builds, as it is clear Peter holds a secret of some kind from the war years. Shady business dealings, betrayal, and murder are all part of the brew. This story is stylish, sly and crisp all at once; like film noire, it puts us in the mood of the period while cleverly ensnaring the characters (and the reader) in its grip. Great stuff for girls ages 13-16/17.
Reviewed by Ann Sayers
Thornspell
by Helen Lowe
This is a fairytale for grades 4 through 6. Young Prince Sigismund is bored and yearns for adventure. When it comes his way, it picks him up and plants him down in a very different place, both literally and figuratively. It turns out that our young prince has powerful abilities, and is destined to break the spell of the sleeping princess, if he can just get through that tangle of thorns. Sound familiar? It's supposed to: this is a re-telling (quite a distant spin-off) of the old familiar story. Much has been changed, but there is plenty of swordplay and an evil sorceress and magic and dragons and time travel and you-name-it in this lively and at times confusing story. Yes, it does end with a kiss. For innocent but earnest readers of traditional fairytales and "entry-level" fantasies.
Reviewed by Ann Sayers
Blind Side Evolution of a Game
by Michael Lewis
I'll be watching this year's NFL draft. (Didn't think I'd ever be saying that!) Michael Oher, the subject of Lewis' book is expected to be a first round draft pick for 2009. In his book, Lewis chronicles the changes in professional football, thanks in part to Lawrence Taylor (yes, of Dancing With The Stars) and several coaches whose strategies make is necessary for the recruitment of a new breed of lineman-tall, heavy and fast. Michael Oher had the potential. He also had a crack addict mother and a home, sort of, in the worst slum in Memphis. With fate or providence intervening, Michael is taken in by a weathy family who nurtures him through school and life lessons and eventually into college. The book ends with Michael's freshman year and the prospect of his draft. Both a football history lesson and a social commentary about letting children slip through the cracks, the book is also about how one family can make a difference to one child and bring hope to others. Not a difficult read, but dense. More high school level or high grade 8. I use this as a biography in a pinch.
Reviewed by Judi Stott
Lawn Boy
by Gary Paulsen
Fast and funny, this is a good read aloud. The gift of a lawn mower by his grandmother turns in to the business opportunity of a lifetime for our narrator. Soon he has employees, an accountant and even a bodyguard! Responsibilities keep growing, and making more money than his parents becomes a bit of an embarrassment, too. This is the kind of economic lesson I can understand, and it makes a great read aloud. Listed as Grades 4-7 by SLJ.
Reviewed by Judi Stott
The True Meaning of Smekday
by Adam Rex
New York: Hyperion, 2007. 423 pp. Grades 6 and up
Imagine The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn meets Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, a dystopia with laughs. Our Huck is a twelve-year-old biracial girl, Gratuity Tucci (her friends call her Tip). Our Jim is a pudgy Boov (pronounced Booooo-ov) who goes by the name J.Lo. He has riled his fellow Boovs by accidentally giving away their whereabouts to intergalactic nemeses, the Gorg, who bear no resemblance to Miss Watson, except perhaps in the ill will they harbor toward the likes of Jim / J.Lo.
The story begins, as so many space adventures do, with Gratuity’s mother acting strangely, telling tales of folding laundry for space aliens who have abducted her, until on Christmas Eve she is sucked back up to the mother ship. Well, actually, she’s only been teleported to Florida, where the Boov plan to contain all 300+ million U.S. citizens, at least until the aliens decide they like oranges. Now it’s time to relocate to Arizona. (The remnants of Sioux and Cherokee must have been chuckling all the way.)
At 423 pages, this book has been an impossible sell to middle school students. But now that I can promote it with total enthusiasm and tell them with a straight-but-smiling-face how much I HATED to see it end, I hope to find at least one or two Tips and J.Los with whom I can share this gem of a book on so many levels. Like Huck Finn, this book balances both substance and fun, inviting a range of readers to come in and enjoy themselves.
Reviewed by Donna Phillips
Game
by Walter Dean Myers.
New York: HarperTeen, 2008. Grades 7 and up
Drew Lawson has lots of company with his hoop dreams, but unlike many young African Americans who aspire to the NBA, Drew at least has a long shot at getting there. Until two white players show up during his senior year at Baldwin High and start to grab much of the attention that had previously gone to Drew and one or two of his friends. To make matters worse, Coach House seems to favor the new players, too. In a move of if-you-can’t-beat-them-join-them, Drew and Tomas, the white player who is an immigrant from the Czech Republic, have an occasional meal at each other’s home and reach some understanding of how their hoop dreams provide common ground. For both, “game” becomes not just basketball as a sport, but the content of their character—not just skill, but grit, maturity, humility, teamwork. It is also an opportunity to transcend a dead-end neighborhood where at best, young men stand around on the street corners and at worst, they wind up in jail or dead.
It’s always good news when a well-written sports book comes along that librarians can hand to middle school students. The profanity is limited to one or two words. The basketball action is spot-on. In fact, those with limited basketball savvy may struggle with the on-court descriptions. (My husband educated me on the finer points of a pick, just one example of the must-know technical terms I needed to make sense of the text.) Nevertheless, if you have the technical vocabulary or are willing to learn it, the book will reward you with a page-turning account of the Baldwin Chargers’ most memorable season and a team of players whose fate you care about.
Reviewed by Donna Phillips
