2019 Sonderbooks Stand-outs

Stand-outs 0

It’s time to post my Sonderbooks Stand-outs from the books I read in 2019!

I like to post these on New Year’s Day, but this year I was in California for my mother’s memorial service, so it’s put off a bit. (Two books from the list, I read on the plane, though! This is why I wait until the year is completely over.)

Once again, I do not have my reviews for all of these books posted yet. This year, I’m going to make that a priority and try to at least post my reviews of my 2019 and 2018 Stand-outs before I post other reviews. One of my 2020 resolutions is to post reviews more regularly.

I always want to stress that these are my personal favorites. Sonderbooks Stand-outs are not any attempt to predict which books will win awards, and I don’t screen them for diversity or literary merit. These are simply the books that I personally enjoyed.

Let me give my stats for 2019. I did not include books I reread in my Stand-outs. (They’re already Stand-outs or I wouldn’t reread them.) In 2019, there were an abundance of those.

I reread 13 books in January as I was doing Newbery selection committee deliberations. I’ll never tell which books those were, except to say that our medalist and two honor books were included. In 2019, I also reread 12 books by L. M. Montgomery, in preparation for my amazing road trip to Prince Edward Island with my childhood friends.

Other totals of books read:
Grown-up Nonfiction: 38
Grown-up Fiction: 13 (Hmm. I meant to read more after being off the Newbery committee.)
Teen Fiction: 15
Children’s Fiction: 56
Children’s Nonfiction: 143 (Most of those are picture books.)
Picture Books: 458

Yes, that’s significantly fewer than I read the year before, but that’s what happens when you can no longer make reading the top priority in your life.

Here is my list of my personal favorite books I read in 2019. I will try hard to get these reviews posted in the next couple of weeks. I do break the Stand-outs into categories so I can honor lots and lots of books.

Adult Fiction:
1. Becoming Mrs. Lewis, by Patti Callahan
2. Spinning Silver, by Naomi Novik
3. The Harp of Kings, by Juliet Marillier
4. Marilla of Green Gables, by Sarah McCoy

Christian Nonfiction:
1. The Universal Christ, by Richard Rohr
2. Raising Hell, by Julie Ferwerda
3. That All Shall Be Saved, by David Bentley Hart
4. Creation and the Cross, by Elizabeth A. Johnson
5. Nothing But the Blood of Jesus, by J. D. Myers

Other Adult Nonfiction:
1. Educated, by Tara Westover
2. Just Mercy, by Bryan Stevenson
3. Becoming, by Michelle Obama
4. Joyful, by Ingrid Fetell Lee
5. The Landscapes of Green Gables, by Catherine Reid

Teen Fiction: (This is the category where they’re getting switched around a lot. These are all fantastic.)
1. Damsel, by Elana K. Arnold
2. Stepsister, by Jennifer Donnelly
3. Butterfly Yellow, by Thanhha Lai
4. The Wicked King, by Holly Black
5. The Toll, by Neal Shusterman
6. Lovely War, by Julie Berry
7. With the Fire on High, by Elizabeth Acevedo
8. On the Come Up, by Angie Thomas

Children’s Fiction:
1. We’re Not From Here, by Geoff Rodkey
2. Cog, by Greg van Eekhout
3. Pie in the Sky, by Remy Lai
4. Pay Attention, Carter Jones, by Gary D. Schmidt
5. Sal & Gabi Break the Universe, by Carlos Hernandez
6. White Bird, by R. J. Palacio
7. The Dark Lord Clementine, by Sarah Jean Horwitz
8. The Potter’s Boy, by Tony Mitton
9. Homerooms and Hall Passes, by Tom O’Connell
10. The Lost Girl, by Anne Ursu
11. Rabbit’s Bad Habits, by Julian Gough

Children’s Nonfiction Picture Books:
1. Nine Months, by Miranda Paul, illustrated by Jason Chin
2. How Many? A Different Kind of Counting Book, by Christopher Danielson
3. The Important Thing About Margaret Wise Brown, by Mac Barnett, illustrated by Sarah Jacoby
4. Can You Hear the Trees Talking? by Peter Wohlleben
5. The Lost Words, by Robert MacFarlane and Jackie Morris

Longer Children’s Nonfiction:
1. They Called Us Enemy, by George Takei, Justin Eisinger, and Steven Scott, art by Harmony Becker
2. Shout, by Laurie Halse Anderson
3. Ordinary Hazards, by Nikki Grimes
4. Free Lunch, by Rex Ogle
5. Best Friends, by Shannon Hale, artwork by LeUyen Pham

Picture Books:
1. Truman, by Jean Reidy
2. Saturday, by Oge Mora
3. Maybe Tomorrow? by Charlotte Agell, illustrated by Ana Ramírez González
4. One Fox: A Counting Book Thriller, by Kate Read
5. Harold & Hog Pretend for Real! by Dan Santat
6. Circle, by Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen
7. Penny and Her Sled, by Kevin Henkes

Happy Reading!

Revised to add: Aaaaaaaugh! I forgot Pie in the Sky, by Remy Lai!

Somehow, I didn’t get that book on my spreadsheet of books I read this year, so I forgot all about it when I first made this list. Alas! That means most of the other Children’s Fiction titles get their ranking revised downward. But if you’re wondering why the Children’s Fiction list looks slightly different than when I first posted it, the reason is that I forgot one title at first. (But it does stand out in my mind, honest! I just forgot I’d read it this year.)

Review of Brightly Burning, by Alexa Donne

Science Fiction, Stand-outs, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Brightly Burning

by Alexa Donne

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2018. 394 pages.
Starred Review
2018 Sonderbooks Stand-out:
#4 Teen Speculative Fiction

This book is a science fiction retelling of Jane Eyre, and is tremendously good. It reminded me of For Darkness Shows the Stars, a science fiction retelling of Persuasion, which I also loved.

However, the last time I reread Jane Eyre I was disappointed that now I can see a whole lot of things wrong with the relationship, so reading this book, I was somewhat upset with myself for finding it very romantic.

Now, they did clean up some of the more unsavory details. The ward of Captain Fairfax, in this book, is not his illegitimate daughter from a youthful indiscretion, and he doesn’t actually have an insane wife shut up in the attic. Nor is he many years older than our heroine.

However, he is Stella’s employer. She’s in a subordinate relationship to him, and he orders her to spend some time with him each evening, enjoying his library of actual paper books. And, similar to Mr. Rochester of Jane Eyre, he tries to make her jealous, and succeeds abominably. He brings a woman to their spaceship along with her family, and Stella learns that the families have long planned to one day combine resources with a marriage. To make matters worse, Captain Fairfax (of the ship Rochester) requires Stella to be present when the groups socialize in the evenings – just as Mr. Rochester did to Jane Eyre.

The end of the book does have things play out somewhat differently than what happens in Jane Eyre – though the gist is quite similar.

Once again, I don’t really see why I want our heroine to end up with this guy. And yet I do find the story romantic.

Maybe it rings too true when I remember the pain of unrequited love as a teenager having crushes? Only in our book, it turns out the love is not unrequited.

Or maybe it’s seeing someone who thinks herself small and insignificant being noticed for her shining character? In this book, Stella won’t let things progress between them until Captain Fairfax acknowledges her as an equal. (I’m glad that point was made, but it doesn’t quite make up for the disparity in power between them.) The truth is that in this book, Stella is the only one who seems willing to stand up for what’s right. So I’m not sure she should have fallen for him. But it is lovely that he found her, despite the fact that she wasn’t seeking his attention.

All that aside, as a science fiction retelling, this is cleverly executed with much obvious love for the original. The story is wonderful.

Parents, you might want to read both Jane Eyre and this book before you hand them to your teenage daughter – but I promise you’ll have a whole lot of fun if you do that. As well as having lots to discuss.

alexadonne.com
hmhco.com

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Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. The views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

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Review of Darius the Great Is Not Okay, by Adib Khorram

Award Winners, Contemporary, Stand-outs, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Darius the Great Is Not Okay

by Adib Khorram

Dial Books, 2018. 316 pages
Starred Review
Review written September 18, 2018, from a library book
2018 Sonderbooks Stand-out:
#3 General Teen Fiction
2019 Morris Award Winner
2019 Asian/Pacific American Award for Young Adult Literature

Darius the Great Is Not Okay is the story of Darius Kellner, who is a Fractional Persian – half Persian in his case, from his mother. Darius works in a tea store in Portland, and when we meet him, the kids who bully him walk in and give him a new degrading nickname and vandalize his bike.

His father, a German Übermensch, thinks he should just stand up to the bullies. Darius is sure he can never please him. Though at least they still have one thing they share – nightly time together watching Star Trek, Next Generation.

There’s a Skype visit with Darius’s grandparents in Iran, and his little sister, Laleh, speaks fluently with them in Farsi, but Darius never knows what to say. When they learn that his grandfather has a brain tumor and is not doing well, the family makes plans for an extended trip to Iran.

Most of the book is about that trip to Iran. But it’s also a book about friendship. Yes, I said friendship, not romance. I was delighted to read a book about genuine friendship between high school boys. Darius meets and makes friends with Sohrab in Iran, and right away they can be honest and open with each other. There are some bumps in their friendship – which makes it all the more authentic.

This is also a book about depression. Both Darius and his father take medication for depression, and Darius cries easily. He calls it “stress hormone secretion.” Darius does a lot of obsessing over what people think of him, and I like the way that’s honestly portrayed.

It’s also a book about family. Darius is meeting his Iranian family in person for the first time, and learning about his heritage – generations of his family have lived in the town of Yazd for centuries. They celebrate holidays together with extended family during the visit, and Darius realizes he loves these people.

But none of it is simple. His friend Sohrab is bullied for being Baha’i, and Sohrab’s father is in prison. Darius’s grandfather is dying, and his personality is changing – or so Darius is told, but he mourns that he never really knew his grandfather before, except on the computer screen. Laleh fits in so much better in Iran, since she speaks Farsi. And his father even lets Laleh replace Darius watching Star Trek, Next Generation.

I love Darius’s expressions throughout the book. There are multiple references to Lord of the Rings and Star Trek. I enjoyed that I got pretty much all the references. Will teens get those? Maybe some will. He calls the bullies “Soulless Minions of Orthodoxy” and his own mood swings “Mood Slingshot Maneuvers.”

Overall, it’s a beautiful story of a young man fighting his demons, finding his place in the world, and making and being a true friend.

adibkhorram.com

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Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. The views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

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Summer Reading 2019!

Stand-outs 0

It’s that time of year — when the children’s library staff go out to the local schools and talk about the summer reading — and some books the kids might enjoy reading.

I need to make a list of the books I’m booktalking, with covers, so that when the kids come to the library and can’t remember the title, they can browse the list. A fun place to put that is my blog. I will provide links to my reviews — though since this was my Newbery year, not all the reviews are posted yet.

[Just a note: Last year I couldn’t publish a list because of being on the Newbery committee. Many of my favorites and 2018 Sonderbooks Stand-outs got booktalked last year.]

My list is more ambitious than I actually end up having time to talk about. But here are the books I booktalked this year, very loosely organized by grade:

Kindergarten to 1st grade:

We Don’t Eat Our Classmates, by Ryan T. Higgins

Crash, Splash, or Moo!, by Bob Shea

Thank You, Omu!, by Oge Mora

Dreamers, by Yuyi Morales

We Are Brothers, by Yves Nadon

Kindergarten to 2nd grade:

Two nonfiction books about chickens:

The Hen Who Sailed Around the World, by Guirec Soudee

Hawk Mother, by Kara Hagedorn

Two nonfiction books about geography:

Water Land, by Christy Hale

Animal Antipodes, by Carly Allen-Fletcher

1st to 2nd grade:

Rabbit and Bear: Rabbit’s Bad Habits, by Jason Gough

(Reading about why rabbits eat their own poo is a sure-fire hit!)

A Is For Elizabeth, by Rachel Vail

2nd to 3rd grade:

Three picture books about inventions:

The Boo-Boos That Changed the World, by Barry Wittenstein

Magic Ramen, by Andrea Wang, illustrated by Kana Urbanowicz

Pass Go and Collect $200, by Tanya Lee Stone, illustrated by Steven Salerno

Like dragons? Both of these begin new series:

Dragons in a Bag, by Zetta Elliott

Knights vs. Dinosaurs, by Matt Phelan

Two chapter books for animal lovers:

Saving Winslow, by Sharon Creech

My Father’s Words, by Sarah MacLachlan

4th to 6th grade:

For these grades this year, I start with “my” Newbery winners!

Merci Suarez Changes Gears, by Meg Medina

The Night Diary, by Veera Hiranandani

The Book of Boy, by Catherine Gilbert Murdock

The winner for our own library’s Newbery Book Club:

The Flight of Swans, by Sarah McGuire

Two about Escalator Trades:

The Eleventh Trade, by Alyssa Hollingsworth

The Season of Styx Malone, by Kekla Magoon

Two partly told in pictures:

The Assassination of Brangwain Spurge, by M. T. Anderson

The Faithful Spy, by John Hendrix

Two about space for the 50th anniversary of the moon landing:

To the Moon, by Jeffrey Kluger

We’re Not From Here, by Geoff Rodkey

Two for Inventors:

Calling All Minds, by Temple Grandin

The Doughnut Fix, by Jessie Janowitz

Two great graphic novels:

Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy, by Rey Terciero

Be Prepared, by Vera Brosgol

Two more wonderful novels:

Sweep, by Jonathan Auxier

Nowhere Boy, by Katherine Marsh

As you can see, I had far too many favorites to get to talk about them all at each school. But it was fun to share those I could, and maybe they’ll check a few more from this list.

Review of Pay Attention, Carter Jones, by Gary D. Schmidt

Children's Fiction Review, Contemporary, Stand-outs, Starred Review 0

Pay Attention, Carter Jones

by Gary D. Schmidt

Review written March 25, 2019, from a library book
Clarion Books (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt), 2019. 217 pages.
Starred Review
2019 Sonderbooks Stand-out: #4 in Children’s Fiction

This book was delightful. I shouldn’t have chosen it to read during Silent Book Club, because I kept coming to spots that made me chuckle. My friend was reading Game of Thrones, and she said it was a little incongruous. Oops!

And yet some serious topics are covered in this book. There’s a little brother who died and an absent father. So that my primary response was chuckling shows that the serious topics were handled with a light touch and my overall response is delight.

Here’s how the book begins:

If it hadn’t been the first day of school, and if my mother hadn’t been crying her eyes out the night before, and if the fuel pump on the Jeep had been doing what a fuel pump on a Jeep is supposed to be doing, and if it hadn’t been raining like an Australian tropical thunderstorm – and I’ve been in one, so I know what it’s like – and if the very last quart of one percent milk hadn’t gone sour and clumped up, then probably my mother would never have let the Butler into our house.

As it was, it was a crazy morning, and Carter Jones was the one who answered the door when the Butler rang their bell.

There’s some confusion, but the Butler, Mr. Bowles-Fitzpatrick, takes things in hand. It turns out that Carter’s grandfather has died, and in his will, he provided a generous endowment for Mr. Bowles-Fitzpatrick to now serve his son’s family.

That son is Carter’s father, who is now serving with the military in Germany. But the family can definitely use his services, though Carter’s not so sure he wants someone calling him “Young Master Jones” and requiring him to behave with good manners.

And then the Butler dresses Carter up in white, along with his friend Billy, and takes him to the school football field to learn to play cricket.

It seems like disaster when the eighth grade cross country team sees them – two sixth graders dressed strangely being taught to play cricket by an Englishman. But one thing leads to another, and soon the entire eighth grade cross country team is learning the fine points of playing cricket.

There are tidbits about the game of cricket at the start of each chapter – and I’m still completely confused by the rules. Though I do have a much better idea of how it works than before I picked up this book.

The whole idea of a proper English gentleman’s gentleman dealing with an American sixth-grade boy is what gives this book layers upon layers of humor. Carter Jones, though, is dealing with some big issues – and Mr. Bowles-Fitzpatrick also has compassion, in his proper English way.

I finished this book with a smile on my face. Completely delightful!

PS: Something else I loved about the book was that the principal was Principal Swietek! And the town is Marysville! Why is that so exciting? We find out who Doug Swietek married from Okay for Now, which was set in Marysville in the sixties. (The principal is female and her first name is given at one point.) Very fun for Gary Schmidt fans. In fact, I reread my review of Okay for Now, and yes I was right that it was the same town. Now I want to reread the book.

hmhco.com

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Childrens_Fiction/pay_attention_carter_jones.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. The views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

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Review of Muse of Nightmares, by Laini Taylor

Audiobooks, Fantasy, Stand-outs, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Muse of Nightmares

by Laini Taylor
read by Steve West

Hachette Audio, 2018. 16 hours on 13 CDs.
Starred Review
Review written December 10, 2018, from a library audiobook
2018 Sonderbooks Stand-out:
#3 Teen Speculative Fiction

Wow. This book is wonderful. I confess, I listened to this book even though it’s technically eligible for the Newbery Medal. Our committee had agreed not to listen to audiobooks of eligible books so as not to be swayed in either direction. But the book this follows, Strange the Dreamer, was the book that gave me a crush on narrator Steve West (what a gorgeous voice!), and it’s very long – way too long to indulge in reading the book – and that first book struck me as much more appropriate for young adults than for children.

That continues to be my opinion. Yes, there are some teens in this book – but they are dealing with life as adults, deciding careers and where to live and yes, having sex. There are no parents telling them what to do.

This second book is even sexier than the first. I would hesitate to give it to a 14-year-old. In fact, it would almost be a shame to give this to anyone who hasn’t already had sex themselves – might give them the wrong idea. Our two protagonists have some special powers. Sarai is a ghost with a body – but she can do things like make her body light up when Lazlo kisses her. And they can go to fantasy locations in dreams – and it’s all very amazing. And I wouldn’t want to give anyone a misleading impression about what normal sex is like!

Even setting aside that part, this book is amazing. We’re set up at the end of the first book with what seems to be an impossible situation. Minya is keeping Sarai “alive” as a ghost. But Minya also wants to destroy the people of the city of Weep. Lazlo is caught in the middle. If he doesn’t let Minya get her vengeance, then she’s going to let Sorai completely die.

Can Laini Taylor pull off a satisfying and believable ending from that set-up? It turns out that yes, she can.

To pull off that satisfying ending involves telling another story and giving us a bigger picture of worlds parallel to the one where our story is set. It’s all intricate and well-worked-out and I am again marveling at Laini Taylor’s imagination.

It’s also long. Yes, there’s some repetition. Yes, there are some places where we get more descriptions of people’s emotions than we necessarily need. But again, listening to Steve West’s narration on my commute, I didn’t mind the experience being prolonged.

In the first book we found out about generations of abuse that happened to the people of the city of Weep. In the second book, we find out what was behind that abuse – and see realistic beginnings of healing from it.

And the whole story is intricate and imaginative and beautifully told.

lainitaylor.com
strangethedreamer.com
hachetteaudio.com

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Teens/muse_of_nightmares.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a library audiobook from Fairfax County Public Library.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. The views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

What did you think of this book?

Review of Sweep, by Jonathan Auxier

Children's Fiction Review, Fantasy, Stand-outs, Starred Review 0

Sweep

The Story of a Girl and Her Monster

by Jonathan Auxier

Amulet Books, 2018. 358 pages.
Starred Review
Review written September 23, 2018, from a book sent by the publisher
2018 Sonderbooks Stand-out:
#2 Children’s Fiction – Fantasy
2019 Sydney Taylor Gold Medal

The way this book begins gives you a feeling of the magic to come:

There are all sorts of wonderful things a person might see very early in the morning. You might see your parents sleeping. You might see an unclaimed penny on the sidewalk or the first rays of dawn. And if you are very, very lucky, you might even catch a glimpse of the girl and her Sweep.

Look! Here they are now, approaching through the early fog: a thin man with a long broom over one shoulder, the end bobbing up and down with every step. And trailing behind him, pail in hand, a little girl, who loves that man more than anything in the world.

The girl, Nan, is the assistant to the Sweep and life is beautiful by his side.

But one night, the Sweep doesn’t come back. He leaves her his hat and coat, with a charred clump of soot in its pocket. She calls it her “char,” and it’s oddly comforting and unnaturally warm, as she lives the difficult and dangerous life of a “climber” – working for a sweep who is not kind or loving with a bunch of other stray kids who have no other home.

But one day, when Nan’s life is in danger in a tight chimney, she calls out for help – and the char in her pocket comes to life and breaks through the chimney. She ends up escaping from the cruel master and hiding out with her char, who quickly grows into a creature bigger than she is herself. He’s oddly innocent and very protective of her – and eventually Nan figures out that the Sweep made her a golem to protect her. She names him Charlie

This lovely book tells about Nan and Charlie’s adventures in the city, trying to make a home for themselves and escape her cruel master, who is looking for her since she escaped the chimney and was thought to be dead. Meanwhile, we learn about the horrible plight of all the climber children in Victorian London. Can Nan and Charlie make things better for them as well?

But the main trouble with loving a golem? He only lasts until his job is done.

TheScop.com
amuletbooks.com

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Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. The views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

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Review of What the Night Sings, by Vesper Stamper

Award Winners, Historical, Stand-outs, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

What the Night Sings

by Vesper Stamper

Alfred A. Knopf, 2018. 266 pages.
Starred Review
Review written May 27, 2018.
2018 Sonderbooks Stand-out:
#2 General Teen Fiction

Wow. This is a Holocaust novel. They tend to be powerful. But not all of them have me closing the book saying, “Wow” – stunned by hope.

To be fair, the book begins as World War II is finishing. Gerta Rausch is in Bergen-Belsen as the British are liberating the camp, holding her bunkmate, sick with typhus, in her arms:

The soldiers begin removing the dead. There are so many. How could I not have noticed them lying right next to me?

And suddenly – Rivkah, too, is gone.

I feel her final breath wisp across my lips. They pull her from me, but I can’t let her go. She is my last connection to the living world. I clutch her arm, her hand, her fingers. I sing the lullaby after her, my foster mother. I know no one else in all of Bergen-Belsen, either from Auschwitz or Theresienstadt. Everyone has come and gone, piles of shells pulled in and out of waves, and I’m still here, a skeleton of a sea creature, dropped in this tide pool, living, watching, still living.

This book is about living – and trying to figure out how to make a life – after the war. Gerta is sixteen years old and in a displaced persons camp on the site of the old concentration camp. Her only family – her Papa – died during the war in the furnaces.

Gerta had trained to be an opera singer like her stepmother, her stepmother who watched while she and her papa were taken to the cattle cars. Gerta did manage to bring her papa’s viola with her – and got assignments to play in the camp orchestras. They played while people were sorted, for life or for death.

Part of the power of this book is that it includes illustrations. The book size is larger format than most novels, and many of the illustrations take up entire double-page spreads, though some are next to the text. The picture that hit me the hardest was a picture of a smokestack on the side with smoke going all the way across the top of the two pages. Those pages conclude with these words:

“Come with me,” the woman says softly, pragmatically. “You’ve been sent to the orchestra, yes? Well. Join your very lucky sisters. Music has saved your life today.”

“Where’s my papa?” I plead with her. “I want my papa!”

She signs and points ahead. “See that chimney?” she says, still softly, but so that I will clearly understand. “See that smoke? There’s your papa.”

But I said that it’s a book that left me with hope. Though the book does explain the dark setting, Gerta must make the hard choice to keep living. And to love. And it’s not easy.

I especially appreciated the Author’s Note at the back, because it put a bow on why the book felt so applicable to my life – I, who had never experienced anything remotely like the Holocaust. She explained that in high school she developed a deep identity as a musician.

There’s a problem with that, however. When you decide early on who you “truly are,” it can trick you into thinking that you were destined to live by a certain script. And when you’re out on your own and you realize that there is no script, you might panic.

Several years ago, I was rear-ended by a texting driver, which resulted in my arm being partially paralyzed. I completely lost the ability to play guitar – I had been a touring musician – and it took me a full year of rehab before I could reliably draw again. I had to relearn everything, even how to lift a fork to my mouth. This wasn’t in the script. A huge element of my deeply ingrained identity had been smashed. Like Gerta, I had hinged my future on a set of expectations, which depended on life’s machine running with no glitches. Being disabled cast a pall over every area of my life: my ability to drive, hold a baby, cook, hug or shake hands, let alone create art and music. How could I live my life? Without my script, who was I?

Perhaps that puts all the more power into Gerta’s story – and the art Vesper Stamper created to go with that story.

A stunning book about starting over when everything and everyone is gone. About finding joy again, about choosing life and choosing love.

vesperillustration.com

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Teens/what_the_night_sings.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a book sent from the publisher.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. The views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

What did you think of this book?

Review of Thunderhead, by Neal Shusterman

Science Fiction, Stand-outs, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Thunderhead

Arc of a Scythe Book 2

by Neal Shusterman

Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, 2018. 504 pages.
Review written January 25, 2018.
Starred Review
2018 Sonderbooks Stand-out:
#2 Teen Speculative Fiction

This book was a bad choice to bring to Silent Book Club — I wanted to shout when I got to the last page. I did NOT see that coming! (And it’s perfect!) And I doubt that any reader will see it coming, even if I warn you.

But let me back up. This book is a sequel to Scythe. One thing I liked about Scythe was that I wouldn’t have even known it was a Book One if the flap cover hadn’t said so. It wrap ups nicely, and you think good is winning.

Ummm, let’s just say that Good has many setbacks in Book Two.

This series is set in a future earth where mankind has conquered death. They have also eliminated government, and the world is run by the Cloud – which is now known as the Thunderhead. And the Thunderhead is a perfect ruler.

But because it’s not sustainable to have the population keep growing forever, some people need to die. They didn’t want to leave that choice into the hands of a machine, so that’s why the Scythedom was developed. Scythes must hold themselves to high standards and ten commandments. Their responsibility is to glean people and end their lives.

There is strong separation between Scythe and State. So even though the Thunderhead knows something is going terribly wrong with the scythes, it cannot intervene directly.

This book shows that something is indeed going terribly wrong.

I used to tell people that besides apparently having a grim reaper on the cover and being about two teens becoming apprentice scythes, the first book was more thought-provoking than grim. The second book, I’m not going to say that! Some truly horrific things happen in this book, as well as some enormous surprises.

But they are all brilliantly done and I really really really want to read the next book!

Since I won’t be able to post this review until a year after I write it, maybe the next book will be out and I can finally find out how this all turns out. (If this ends up being longer than a trilogy, I may scream.)

Added in March 2019: Nope, not yet! No next book yet. I want to add that this was probably the best-plotted book I read in 2018. In my opinion, though, it is not a children’s book. Teens will enjoy it, yes, but the book appeals to the part of them that is becoming an adult. The characters have chosen careers (grim ones) and are living on their own or with a mentor. And again, they are dealing with some truly horrific events and choices.

But wow! For young adults and old adults – this series will make you grapple with lots of big and profound life-or-death right-or-wrong questions you might never have even thought to propose before.

storyman.com
simonandschuster.com

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Teens/thunderhead.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a library book from Fairfax County Public Library.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. The views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

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Review of The Mad Wolf’s Daughter, by Diane Magras

Adventure, Children's Fiction Review, Historical, Stand-outs, Starred Review 0

The Mad Wolf’s Daughter

by Diane Magras

Kathy Dawson Books (Penguin), 2018. 280 pages.
Starred Review
Review written April 7, 2018, from a book sent by the publisher
2018 Sonderbooks Stand-out:
#2 Historical Children’s Fiction

As this book begins, Drest tries to warn her brother and her father that she sees boats coming to their lair, but they’re convinced she’s dreaming. They know different when attackers burst upon them.

Her father, the war band leader, gets her to flee and hide. But she sees him and all her brothers taken away. She is determined to save them – even if it means reviving the knight who got thrown down a cliff by one of the other knights.

This is a wonderful historical fiction novel – set in medieval Scotland about a young girl who’s small but fierce and resourceful. Her brothers have trained her well. But she only has six days to get to the castle to save her family, and her journey is not uneventful.

You come to love Drest’s fierce, fighting spirit, which is tempered by compassion for those who need help.

Here’s where Drest approaches the knight at the base of the cliff:

Tears sprang to Drest’s eyes. “Your toad-witted people took my da and my brothers. And I didn’t throw you down here; one of your own men did.”

The young knight’s voice quivered. “What a filthy lie. Those are my most faithful men.”

His despair gave Drest courage. She crept closer. “Maybe some of them, but not the one who was up on the cliff with you. I watched him fight and push you down here.” The mist was thickening around them. Drest looked back to find the trail. “Do you know where they’ve taken my da?”

The young knight’s eyes widened. “To Faintree Castle. Do you even know who we are?”

“Nay,” said Drest, “why should I?”

“Everything in this part of the lowlands – including this headland – belongs to Faintree Castle.”

“Is that the truth? Strange. I’ve always known that my da owned this headland and all the lowlands.”

That’s only the beginning of Drest’s surprising adventures.

Fair warning is that while this book finishes at a good stopping-place, not everything is resolved, so I trust there will be more adventures to come. But this book has enough to make this lass become a legend.

dianemagras.com
penguin.com/middle-grade

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Childrens_Fiction/mad_wolfs_daughter.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. The views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

What did you think of this book?