Review of The Chronicles of Harris Burdick, illustrated by Chris Van Allsburg

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

The Chronicles of Harris Burdick

14 Amazing Authors Tell the Tales

illustrated by Chris Van Allsburg

Houghton Mifflin Books for Children, 2011. 221 pages.
Starred Review
2011 Sonderbooks Standout: Children’s Fiction #5

One of the highlights of my year this year was when, on vacation, I was driving my son a couple hours in the State of Washington to visit a college, and I got him to read aloud to me from The Chronicles of Harris Burdick as I drove. He’s 17, and we both thoroughly enjoyed the stories.

But let me backtrack. Many years ago, when I was first married (so about 25 years ago, in fact), a friend of my husband and me gave us The Mysteries of Harris Burdick for Christmas. (Thanks, Len!) It maybe wasn’t a traditional gift to give a young couple, but we both loved it.

In the introduction to this new book, Lemony Snicket summarizes the premise behind the original book:

“The story of Harris Burdick is a story everybody knows, though there is hardly anything to be known about him. More than twenty-five years ago, a man named Peter Wenders was visited by a stranger who introduced himself as Harris Burdick and who left behind fourteen fascinating drawings with equally if not more fascinating captions, promising to return the next day with more illustrations and the stories to match. Mr. Wenders never saw him again, and for years readers have pored breathlessly over Mr. Burdick’s oeuvre, a phrase that here means ‘looked at the drawings, read the captions, and tried to think what the stories might be like.’ The result has been an enormous collection of stories, produced by readers all over the globe, imagining worlds of which Mr. Burdick gave us only a glimpse.”

The original pictures, especially combined with the captions and titles, all have something eerie or surreal about them. For example, there’s the picture that goes with the story “Under the Rug” that shows a lump under a rug, and a man with a bowtie holding a chair over his head about to swing it at the lump. The caption reads, “Two weeks passed and it happened again.”

I’ve always had a special place in my heart for the picture that goes with “The Seven Chairs.” You see a grand cathedral, and two priests standing and looking at a nun who is sitting calmly on a chair that is floating into the cathedral. The caption reads, “The fifth one ended up in France.”

Chris Van Allsburg implied so much between the pictures, the titles, and the captions.

Back in 1993, Stephen King wrote a story to go with “The House on Maple Street” (the picture with the caption “It was perfect lift-off.”) For this volume, they asked fourteen distinguished authors (including Chris Van Allsburg) to write stories to go with the pictures.

At first, I thought it might be a shame to actually write down a story. But I’ve been thinking about these pictures too long. I don’t feel like these are the only possibilities. In fact, looking at the pictures still gets your mind spinning — but these offerings are still tremendous fun.

Some do a better job than others, and some used approaches I wouldn’t have ever taken, but I can honestly say that I enjoyed all the stories. In fact, this would be a fine collection of stories even if it didn’t have such an intriguing history. In fact, I hope the publishers will consider making this a tradition every decade or so, and get 14 more authors to write the stories!

My personal favorites, in order of appearance, were Jon Scieszka’s “Under the Rug”; Jules Feiffer’s “Uninvited Guests”; Kate DiCamillo’s “The Third-Floor Bedroom”; Chris Van Allsburg’s “Oscar and Alphonse”; Stephen King’s “The House on Maple Street”; and my very favorite, M. T. Anderson’s “Just Desert.”

These stories are eerie enough, they aren’t for the usual picture book crowd. Teens, like my son, will definitely enjoy them, and so will elementary age kids who can handle and enjoy some creepiness.

Like the years when we’d read our new Harry Potter book in England or Bavaria or wherever we were traveling on vacation, this book, in a smaller way, definitely enhanced my vacation. After all those years of reading to my boys, it’s a treat to find a book that my son is willing to read to me. We only finished half the book on vacation, but when I read M. T. Anderson’s story, I insisted that my son read it as well. I can confidently say this book spans many age ranges.

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Childrens_Fiction/chronicles_of_harris_burdick.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 an Advance Review Copy I got at ALA Annual Conference.

Review of Traveling With Pomegranates, by Sue Monk Kidd and Ann Kidd Taylor

Musings, Nonfiction Review, Stand-outs, Starred Review, True Stories 0

Traveling With Pomegranates

A Mother-Daughter Story

by Sue Monk Kidd and Ann Kidd Taylor

Viking, 2009. 282 pages.
Starred Review
2012 Sonderbooks Stand-out: #1 Biography

Sue Monk Kidd does meditative books very well. She catches you up in her musings and helps you reach life-changing insights along with her.

In this book, she pairs up with her daughter and both of them will speak to your soul.

This book covers some journeys the two took together, to Greece and France and home to South Carolina. The travels were momentous for both women. The first journey happened when Sue was turning fifty and Ann was graduating from college and growing up. So Sue was dealing with aging and maturing as a mother. And Ann was dealing with her life direction.

They both write in such a way that I felt I shared in both journeys. And both are dealing with a calling to write. Here’s a passage that Sue wrote:

“Perhaps she fought any urge to be a writer out of a need to separate herself from me and my path, the same way I separated myself from my mother and her path. When Ann went to college, I felt the invisible way she broke from me, in that way mothers feel barely discernible things. Even now, as we weave this new closeness, I do not mistake the separate core in her, her own nascent true self, and I watch how she protects it, even as she struggles to unfold it. Do her intuitions about writing come now because she has finally found enough of her separate self to entertain them?

“In my case, losing the small, true light was more like turning my back on it and finding something manageable. Becoming a nurse seemed more doable and sensible. You graduated and took a board exam. When you said, ‘I’m a nurse,’ you knew what you were talking about. You had proof. Nobody would register me as a writer. Would I be a writer if I never published anything? Would I be one even if I did? And the real question: how likely was it to happen? At eighteen, I couldn’t find the courage. I took all that passion and sublimated it into nursing. Until, at twenty-nine, it simply refused to go there anymore.

“I wonder if that’s the perennial story of writers: you find the true light, you lose the true light, you find it again. And maybe again.”

Later, back home in South Carolina, Ann writes:

“One day I thought: what if I approached learning the craft of writing as if it were an apprenticeship? Just do myself a favor and accept that it’s going to be a process, a slow, laborious process. In the Middle Ages, an apprenticeship lasted seven years. That was believed to be the minimum amount of time it took to learn a craft. I started to think of myself as an apprentice. I would tell myself, Relax, you’ve got seven years.”

That’s just a little taste of the luxurious explorations these women do, bringing the reader along into symbolism, and archetypes, and mother-daughter bonding. I read this book slowly and meditatively, a little at a time, and stretched out the enjoyment all the longer that way. A lovely book. You’ll feel you have two new friends when you finish.

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Nonfiction/traveling_with_pomegranates.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 given to me by the publisher at 2010 ALA Annual Conference and signed by both authors.

Review of Stars, by Mary Lyn Ray and Marla Frazee

Contemporary, Creativity, Picture Book Review, Stand-outs, Starred Review 2

Stars

by Mary Lyn Ray
illustrated by Marla Frazee

Beach Lane Books, 2011. 36 pages.
Starred Review
2011 Sonderbooks Stand-out: #1 Picture Books

I’m normally not very touched by conceptual picture books trying to give readers a warm feeling. But Stars is something special.

I love Marla Frazee’s illustrations, and the children in this book have all the emotional expression of her pictures of Clementine. The words point out how many different kinds of stars there are, from stars in the sky to stars on plants to fireworks.

The illustration on the cover appears in the book accompanied by these words:

“What if you could have a star? They shine like little silver eggs you could gather in a basket.

“Except you know you can’t. Not really.”

The next page begins a concept that carries on through further pages:

“But you can draw a star on shiny paper and cut around it. Then you can put it in your pocket. Having a star in your pocket is like having your best rock in your pocket, but different.

“Because a star is different from a rock.”

Later, we’re told:

“Some days you feel shiny as a star. If you’ve done something important, people may call you a star.

“But some days you don’t feel shiny.

“Those days, it’s good to reach for the one in your pocket.”

Of course, the perfect marriage of words and illustrations enhance these words, as well as the appropriate vertical format.

I think I may go make a star to put in my pocket.

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Picture_Books/stars.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 the Fairfax County Public Library.

Review of The Name of the Wind, by Patrick Rothfuss

Adventure, Fantasy, Fiction Review, Stand-outs, Starred Review 0

The Name of the Wind

The Kingkiller Chronicle: Day One

by Patrick Rothfuss

DAW Books, 2007. 722 pages.
Starred Review
2011 Sonderbooks Stand-out: #2 Fantasy Fiction

This book wasn’t even on my radar until the second book came out and several of my siblings bragged on Facebook about who got their hands on it first. Then my sister Marcy posted a short quotation from the sequel, and by the language alone, I knew this writer was something special. When I went to the bookstore to purchase it, I picked it up and then wandered into the music and movies section of the store. One of the employees saw me holding The Name of the Wind and talked with me for ten minutes about how it’s her favorite book! So I was already quite sure I’d made a good choice.

Then I started reading, and right away the language pulled me in. The book has the feel of a true epic, of something sweeping and important.

The book begins in an inn with a bunch of locals sitting around and Old Cob telling stories. Looking it over after reading the book, I see lots of clues about what’s to follow. On the second page of Chapter One, you understand the significance of the title in the story that’s told of Taborlin escaping from a tower and the Chandrian.

“‘But Taborlin knew the names of all things, and so all things were his to command. He said to the stone: “Break!” and the stone broke. The wall tore like a piece of paper, and through that hole Taborlin could see the sky and breathe the sweet spring air. He stepped to the edge, looked down, and without a second thought he stepped out into the open air. . . .’

“The boy’s eyes were wide. ‘He didn’t!’

“Cob nodded seriously. ‘So Taborlin fell, but he did not despair. For he knew the name of the wind, and so the wind obeyed him. He spoke to the wind and it cradled and caressed him. It bore him to the ground as gently as a puff of thistledown and set him on his feet softly as a mother’s kiss.”

We also quickly learn that there’s something mysterious about the young, red-haired innkeeper.

“He called himself Kote. He had chosen the name carefully when he came to this place. He had taken a new name for most of the usual reasons, and for a few unusual ones as well, not the least of which was the fact that names were important to him.”

I wondered about the subtitle of the book: Day One of the Kingkiller Chronicles. Was the whole thing supposed to happen in a day? Some sort of demon appears and attacks a man, and Kote deals with it without making it obvious that he knows what he’s doing. Several days pass very quickly.

Then a traveler called the Chronicler comes on the path to the inn. In the night, he encounters Kote, who saves him from an attack of more spider-shaped demons with razor-sharp feet. When Kote takes the Chronicler to his inn, the Chronicler recognizes him as Kvothe. He came there to find him, to hear the real story behind all the tales.

Kote takes some convincing. Finally, he tells the Chronicler that the only way he will tell his story is if he has three days. Three days to prepare and tell it properly. So the first book is what he tells the Chronicler on the first day, the start of his story.

Kvothe begins his tale:

“‘In some ways, it began when I heard her singing. Her voice twinning, mixing with my own. Her voice was like a portrait of her soul: wild as fire, sharp as shattered glass, sweet and clean as clover.’

“Kvothe shook his head. ‘No. It began at the University. I went to learn magic of the sort they talk about in stories. Magic like Taborlin the Great. I wanted to learn the name of the wind. I wanted fire and lightning. I wanted answers to ten thousand questions and access to their archives. But what I found at the University was much different than a story, and I was much dismayed.

“‘But I expect the true beginning lies in what led me to the University. Unexpected fires at twilight. A man with eyes like ice at the bottom of a well. The smell of blood and burning hair. The Chandrian.’ He nodded to himself. ‘Yes, I suppose that is where it all begins. This is, in many ways, a story of the Chandrian.'”

His introduction is masterful:

“My name is Kvothe, pronounced nearly the same as ‘Quothe.’ Names are important as they tell you a great deal about a person. I’ve had more names than anyone has a right to.

“The Adem call me Maedre. Which, depending on how it’s spoken, can mean ‘The Flame,’ ‘The Thunder,’ or ‘The Broken Tree.’

“‘The Flame’ is obvious if you’ve ever seen me. I have red hair, bright. If I had been born a couple hundred years ago I would probably have been burned as a demon. I keep it short but it’s unruly. When left to its own devices, it sticks up and makes me look as if I have been set afire.

“‘The Thunder’ I attribute to a strong baritone and a great deal of stage training at an early age.

“I’ve never thought of ‘The Broken Tree’ as very significant. Although in retrospect I suppose it could be considered at least partially prophetic.

“My first mentor called me E’lir because I was clever and I knew it. My first real lover called me Dulator because she liked the sound of it. I have been called Shadicar, Lightfinger, and Six-String. I have been called Kvothe the Bloodless, Kvothe the Arcane, and Kvothe Kingkiller. I have earned those names. Bought and paid for them.

“But I was brought up as Kvothe. My father once told me it meant ‘to know.’

“I have, of course, been called many other things. Most of them uncouth, although very few were unearned.

“I have stolen princesses back from sleeping barrow kings. I have burned down the town of Trebon. I have spent the night with Felurian and left with both my sanity and my life. I was expelled from the University at a younger age than most people are allowed in. I tread paths by moonlight that others fear to speak of during the day. I have talked to gods, loved women, and written songs that make the minstrels weep.

“You may have heard of me.”

This is what you’re getting in this book. It’s only the start of an epic tale, basically the story of Kvothe’s childhood. We learn how he was brought up in a band of traveling players, incredibly quick to learn. We hear how his parents were killed and he spent years on the streets of a city, but then made it to the University. Along the way, a few of the things he mentioned above happen.

And in the frame, in the present time, grave things are afoot. There’s no telling how that will play out.

The worst thing about this series: It is not complete. Of course, I will have the joy of rereading the first two books when the third comes out. Patrick Rothfuss has a lot of loose ends to tie up, but I have no doubts that he will be able to pull it off.

This was the sort of book that I told everybody about while I was reading it. Now I’ll urge my website readers. This book is unforgettable. Read it!

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Fiction/name_of_the_wind.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 my own book, purchased in a Barnes & Noble bookstore.

Review of Child of the Prophecy, by Juliet Marillier

Fantasy, Fiction Review, Starred Review 0

Child of the Prophecy

by Juliet Marillier

TOR Fantasy, 2002. 596 pages.
Starred Review

Child of the Prophecy is the third book in Juliet Marillier’s Sevenwaters Trilogy. She has managed to make each book completely different from the others, each romance totally distinct, and yet all of them equally brilliant.

I expected this third book to be all about the obvious child of the prophecy, Johnny, who was born in the second book and foretold in the first book. Instead, the book is about Fianne, who is the granddaughter of the evil sorceress Oonagh, who enchanted the brothers into swans in the first book. Lady Oonagh still lives, and now she is sending her granddaughter to Sevenwaters to finally get vengeance and destroy the people of Sevenwaters.

However, Fianne is a daughter of Sevenwaters herself. She finds herself loving the family that she meets for the first time. But if she reveals anyone she loves to her grandmother, her grandmother will use that love against her by attacking them.

It was strange to read this book and find yourself rooting for Fianne — even knowing that she was a tool in the hands of the sorceress.

Juliet Marillier brings the book and the trilogy to a wonderful and satisfying conclusion, weaving another magnificent tale in this third book.

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Fiction/child_of_the_prophecy.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 my own copy of the book, purchased via Amazon.

Review of The Mislaid Magician, by Patricia C. Wrede and Caroline Stevermer

Alternate History, Fantasy, Mystery, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

The Mislaid Magician
or
Ten Years After

Being the Private Correspondence Between Two Prominent Families Regarding a Scandal Touching the Highest Levels of Government and the Security of the Realm

by Patricia C. Wrede and Caroline Stevermer

Harcourt, 2006. 328 pages.
Starred Review

I loved these authors’ earlier books, Sorcery and Cecilia and The Grand Tour, so much, it was a no-brainer to buy this third book about cousins Kate and Cecy in a magical regency England just as soon as it came out. However, I was still at the stage where I only got library books read, because library books have a due date. So the book sat in one of my many to-be-read piles and peeked out at me tantalizingly.

Well, after I loaded up on Advance Review Copies at ALA Annual Conference this summer, I decided to make myself a rule, or I’d never get any of those books read. Now I alternate. After every library book, I read a book I own. It’s working great, and this was one of the first books I own that I selected. I was so happy to finally get around to reading it!

The books are set in an alternate England, where people mix their attention to manners with magic. The authors have written the books by writing letters between the characters, Kate and Cecy, who are cousins. It’s been a long time since I’ve read the earlier books, but that wasn’t a problem with understanding what was going on. And, after all, the book is set ten years into the young ladies’ marriages, so it’s probably appropriate to read it later.

At the start of the book, Cecy and her husband James are asked by the Duke of Wellington to investigate the disappearance of a distinguished magician who was investigating a problem with the ley lines — lines of magic that run throughout England. They leave their children with Kate and Thomas, and the precocious children of both couples figure into the correspondence.

What follows is a mystery and an absorbing adventure. This is clever, light reading. There are some very fun and surprising bits of magic thrown into the mix. I don’t need to say a lot more. These books take regency England mixed in with magic. If that sounds delightful to you, you should definitely read them. This one isn’t really a romance like the first, but it is a fun mystery and reminds me more of Amelia Peabody books from when Ramses was young.

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Teens/mislaid_magician.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 my own copy, purchased via Amazon.

Review of Across the Great Barrier, by Patricia C. Wrede

Alternate History, Fantasy, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Across the Great Barrier

by Patricia C. Wrede

Scholastic Press, New York, 2011. 339 pages.
Starred Review

I like Patricia C. Wrede’s writing so much, I pre-ordered a copy of this book, and was delighted when it showed up on my doorstep. This book is the second book in the Frontier Magic series, continuing in the fascinating world the author created in Thirteenth Child.

These books are set in an alternate reality Old West, where the world has magic. The West of “Columbia” was never settled by humans, because ferocious magical creatures live there, including saber cats and dragons and mammoths and other dangerous creatures.

I like the alternate reality Patricia C. Wrede has built, because she has lots of things that are different. So many alternate reality books assume just a few differences, and that history would go the same as it did. But why would that happen? I like the way she has lots of little differences, like different names for things. Children are called childings. Europe is Avrupa. America is Columbia. Of course, there are also huge differences, like the existence of magical creatures.

Another thing I like about this series is that it’s one series that has a family like the one I came from — thirteen kids! There aren’t very many out there. Now, to be honest, by this time Eff’s brothers and sisters are all grown (which is realistic), so it doesn’t feel like a big family story, but I still have a soft spot for a book with a family like mine, even if the main character is a lot more analogous to my youngest sister, and has an experience nothing like those of us at the top of the birth order.

This book is not very dramatic, but it’s simply a good story. I hope the series continues a long time. As in Thirteenth Child, the narrator does a lot of telling about events, rather than dramatizing scenes, so a lot of time passes. But it’s all very interesting, since it’s about this fascinating world. Eff is figuring out how her own magic works, while also solving some mysteries across the Great Barrier.

The Great Barrier is a magical barrier set up in the Mississippi River that protects the country from the fearsome magical creatures that live out West. However, there are settlements that have been allowed beyond the Great Barrier, and in this book, Eff gets to go with a research party to catalog the plant and animal life. They find some startlingly realistic statue fragments, and there is no mark of any tool. Is something turning creatures into stone?

This book still gives the feeling that there’s lots more to be told. Eff’s twin, Lan, and their friend William go off to college in the East and don’t show up a lot in this book. Eff’s still finding her niche and ways to use her talents and interest in magical animals. By the end of the book, she feels like a friend, and I very much want to hear more about her.

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Teens/across_the_great_barrier.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 the Fairfax County Public Library.

Review of Fly By Night, by Frances Hardinge

Adventure, Alternate History, Audiobooks, Children's Fiction Review, Fantasy, Starred Review 0

Fly By Night

by Frances Hardinge
performed by Jill Turner

Recorded Books, 2006. 14 hours, 12 compact discs.
Starred Review

I’d been meaning to read Fly By Night for quite some time, and listening to the recorded book ended up being a delightful way to do it. I always enjoy British narrators, and Jill Turner’s exquisite voice was the perfect way to highlight the extraordinary language contained in this book.

Frances Hardinge has an imagination not quite like anyone else’s. In the world she’s created for Fly By Night there are many different “Beloved” the people worship, and your name is given depending on the time when you are born, and the Beloved who is honored on that day. In the Prelude to this book, Mosca Mye has just been born after dusk, at the time sacred to Goodman Palpitattle, He Who Keeps Flies out of Jams and Butter Churns.

To give you just a taste of Frances Hardinge’s imagination, these are a few of the other Beloved:

Goodlady Cramflick, She Who Keeps the Vegetables of the Garden Crisp;
Goodlady Prill, Protector of Pigs;
Goodman Grayglory, He Who Guides the Sword in Battle;
Goodlady Agragap, She Who Frightens the Harelip Fairy from the Childbed;
and Goodman Blackwhistle of the Favorable Wind.

Her language is completely delightful to listen to. This book is full of similes that are both unique and wonderfully apt. A few examples of those:

As the story opens, she talks about the sleeping villagers:

“On this particular night their dreams were a little ruffled by the unusual excitement of the day, but already the water that seeped into every soul was smoothing their minds back into placidity, like a duck’s bill glossing its plumage.”

Describing the village:
“There was no escaping the sound of water. It had many voices. The clearest sounded like someone shaking glass beads in a sieve. The waterfall spray beat the leaves with a noise like paper children applauding. From the ravines rose a sound like the chuckle of granite-throated goblins.”

As it opens, Mosca wants to get out of the village where she lives with her uncle. She decides to free Eponymous Clent, who won over the town, but was then exposed as a fraud. She finds him hanging upside-down on the Chiding Stone, and tells him she’ll let him out if he gives her a job.

“‘I want to travel,’ Mosca declared. ‘The sooner the better,’ she added, with an apprehensive look over her shoulder.

“‘Do you even have the first idea of what my profession entails?’

“‘Yes,’ said Mosca. ‘You tell lies for money.’

“‘Ah. Aha. My child, you have a flawed grasp of the nature of myth-making. I am a poet and storyteller, a creator of ballads and sagas. Pray do not confuse the exercise of the imagination with mere mendacity. I am a master of the mysteries of words, their meanings and music and mellifluous magic.'”

And so the tale begins. Mosca goes off with Eponymous Clent and her pet goose Saracen, who attacks (and defeats) anyone but Mosca. They head for the city of Mandelion, and on the way, in one of my favorite scenes, they come across a coach being attacked by a bedraggled band of highwaymen. Clent recognizes the duchess inside the carriage and asks her for a job if he can keep the highwayman from robbing her.

Clent tells the highwayman, named Blythe, that a young lady inside is very ill and needs her money to get to a doctor. Blythe plans to steal from her anyway, but then asks what he stands to lose.

“After a moment’s dramatic pause, Clent let his arms drop.

“‘I am a writer of ballads — I value gestures. I understand them. I know what I can do with them. Let us suppose, for example, that you allowed this young woman to stay in her carriage, handed her back her money, and wished her and her people godspeed back to Mandelion so that she could find a physician who might save her life — ah, what I could do with that!’

“Blythe’s eyes asked silently what Clent could do with that.

“‘I could write a ballad that would make proverbial the chivalry of Clamoring Captain Blythe. When you rode the cold cobbles of a midnight street, you would hear it sung in the taverns you passed, to give you more warmth than that thin coat of yours. When you were hunted across the moors by the constables, hundreds would lie sleepless, hoping that brave Captain Blythe still ran free.

“‘And when at night you lay on your bed of earth under your dripping roof of bracken, with no company but the wind and your horse champing moss near your head, you would know that in a glittering banquet hall somewhere, some young lady of birth would be thinking of you.

“‘That is what you stand to lose.'”

The wild adventure that follows is not a simple case of good versus evil, because it’s hard to tell who is good and who is bad, though we know all along that we’re rooting for Mosca. Yes, we see Captain Blythe again, and yes, the ballad has consequences. In fact, all kinds of things from early in the book are woven together later in the book. The plot is imaginative, intricate, and most enjoyable.

I didn’t find this book particularly heart-warming. But I did find it delightful intellectual fun. The language is rich and melodious, the world-building is imaginative and funny, and the plotting is clever and well-woven.

In the words of Mosca’s father, Quillam Mye:

“There is only one thing that is more dangerous than Truth. Those who would try to silence Truth’s voice are more destructive by far.”

I like the Disclaimer at the end:

“This is not a historical novel. It is a yarn. Although the Realm is based roughly on England at the start of the eighteenth century, I have taken appalling liberties with historical authenticity and, when I felt like it, the laws of physics.”

This is a good yarn that kids of all ages will enjoy. The audiobook would make a fantastic family listen-along for a wide span of ages.

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Childrens_Fiction/fly_by_night.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 the Fairfax County Public Library.

Review of ScreamFree Marriage, by Hal Edward Runkel

Nonfiction Review, Personal Growth, Relationships, Starred Review 0

ScreamFree Marriage

Calming Down, Growing Up, and Getting Closer

by Hal Edward Runkel, LMFT
with Jenny Runkel

Crown Archetype, New York, 2011. 276 pages.
Starred Review

Why, you may ask, would someone who’s recently completed a painful divorce want to read a book on improving your marriage?

Well, I asked myself that a few times as I was in the middle of this book, and I did read it slowly, only a chapter at a time, because in many ways the good advice made me wistful.

If I ever remarry, I will purchase a copy of this book. As it is, for my own growth, I think it’s good to look back and figure out the ways my own immature responses hurt our marriage. It can only help me grow.

And that’s what this book is about: Behaving like a grown-up, an emotionally mature person in your marriage.

I read the book because I was extremely impressed with the author’s earlier book, ScreamFree Parenting. So even though I’m not married any more, I very much wanted to read what he had to say about marriage. His mantra is in the subtitle: “Calm Down, Grow Up, Get Closer.” As the author talks about different scenarios in marriage, you can see what good advice that is.

When Hal Runkel talks about calming down and keeping your cool, he’s not referring to hiding your emotions from your partner. Indeed, that’s one of the ways he describes that some people scream.

“In ScreamFree Marriage, ‘keeping your cool’ does not refer to simple anger-management techniques or artificial rules of engagement (fighting fair). No, becoming ScreamFree in your marriage refers to something far more optimistic. Here, keeping your cool means discovering and holding on to your truest self — and having the courage to openly pursue your truest desires — even in the midst of your greatest conflicts. It means willingly and calmly facing the natural fires of marital commitment, and actually growing up — and getting closer — through them.

“Entering into such conflicts with integrity is not an easy task; it’s not supposed to be. Developing a marriage built on passion, commitment, and deep connection means committing yourself to a new way of relating. It means keeping your cool as you face conflicts with your spouse that may have previously set you off in some form of ‘screaming.’ Being Scream Free means holding on to your deepest desires for connection and boldy making yourself vulnerable . . . without knowing how your spouse will respond. It means viewing old marital patterns through new lenses, no longer seeing those patterns as indications of irreconcilable differences, but rather as opportunities to grow your personal integrity and transform your relationship. It’s not a journey for timid spirits, but the rewards are certainly worth the struggle.”

Now, I used to absolutely hate it when my husband said I was “screaming” at him when I knew full well that I was not. (I can give an example of screaming!) However, the author has this to say:

“Now, I hear what some of you are thinking. ‘But I don’t ever scream at my spouse.’ And that’s what I used to think as well. But what I mean by ‘screaming’ is not just yelling with a raised voice. Screaming is the term I use to describe the greatest enemy we all face in our marriage: emotional reactivity. That’s a big, clinical expression to describe the process of letting our anxious emotions override our clear thinking. Getting emotionally reactive means allowing our worst fears or worries to drive our choices, instead of our highest principles. And whenever we allow ourselves to be driven by our anxiety, we usually create the very outcome we were hoping to avoid in the first place.”

Again, the author is not talking about stuffing feelings. He’s talking about getting to a calm place where you can share your true feelings with your partner and be open to hearing your partner’s true feelings. And the “Grow Up” part of his mantra is about coming from a place of maturity, not from emotional reactivity. I liked this passage, because it rings true:

“The greatest thing you can do for your marriage is to learn to focus more on yourself, yes, I believe you actually need to become more self-centered. Now, before you call this crazy talk, hear me out. Every great marriage is a self-centered marriage because every great marriage requires two centered selves. Every great marriage is a bond between two whole, centered people. These two strong individuals actively work on improving themselves for the other’s benefit, without necessarily depending on the other to do the same. These two are afraid of neither separation nor togetherness, and work to seek a balance of both. These two pay more attention to their own behavior, which they can control, than their spouse’s which, thankfully, they cannot.”

The author goes on to show you the beauty of his formula: “Calm Down, Grow Up, Get Closer.” I’ll just summarize the two sub-steps of each step. For “Calm Down,” you Pause Yourself (self-explanatory) and Go to the Balcony, mentally take yourself out of and above the moment, gain some perspective.

In the “Grow Up” step, you first Spot Your Pattern. Figure out what part of the pattern you are contributing to. What actions that you are taking are contributing? Once you’ve figured that out, “Step on the Scales.” Analyze your own behavior and ask yourself why you’re doing what you’re doing. (And Hal Runkel has a nice example in his own marriage to illustrate these steps.) Ask yourself why this particular pattern means so much to you. But also ask yourself, “What, in this situation, do I want most to see happen?”

The third step of ScreamFree Marriage is “Get Closer.” This begins with part one: “Show Your Cards.”

“And the first step in getting closer is, naturally, quite revealing. It is quite risky. It is the move we so often avoid in all our relationships, especially our marriages, because it necessitates so much openness and vulnerability. And yet, do it we must if we are going to have a chance at getting what we want most. What are we talking about? We’re talking about doing or saying that one thing you’ve been so reluctant to do or say for fear of rejection, abuse, looking stupid, feeling weak, or simply not getting the response you’d hoped for. We’re talking about laying down your hand and showing your cards.

“Now, for those of you totally unfamiliar with poker, this metaphor may not mean anything. My guess is that most of us, however, can understand the meaning here quite clearly. Showing your cards is about mustering the courage to recognize that it’s your turn to reveal what you’ve got. In the game of poker, this is always the tensest moment, because it’s the boldest effort to win — and thus carries with it the opportunity to lose. Showing your cards in marriage is daring to risk revealing who you are, what you’re thinking and feeling, and what you want most. This is the clearest, starkest move of Authentic Self-Representation.”

Then, after you Show Your Cards, the final part is to “Champion Your Spouse.” This does not mean telling your spouse he’d better do what you want.

“While getting closer is all about focusing on yourself and representing that self to your spouse, it is also about welcoming, and encouraging your spouse to do the same.

“Now I know that sounds a little contrary to what I was saying earlier about not doing this in order to provoke a particular response from your spouse. That’s not what this is. Championing your spouse is working hard to communicate — not so much with words or actions but by your very calm presence — that you welcome, and even invite, any response at all. Even if that response is reactive screaming (non-abusive, of course). Even if that response is silence. Even if that response is confusion, frustration, or choosing to voice a concern right back at you. By championing your spouse, you are again communicating what you want most — that voluntary connection that makes both partners feel prized, valued, and stronger as individuals. In reality, you cannot have that connection without your spouse choosing to reveal himself, in some way, back to you. . . .

“What you do want your spouse to do is show you what he’s got. You don’t want him to ‘play it close to the vest,’ hiding himself and his true feelings and desires from you. You want him to reveal and represent himself because just as you want to make yourself known, you want to know him. That’s why you got married! To share yourself with someone who wants to share himself with you. It’s ironic that we can’t wait to get to know each other better, until we get a few years under our belt. Then our fears, and memories of disappointment, make us a little gun-shy. We either shy away from conflict or reactively reveal ourselves in aggressive, attacking ways that force our partner to shy away from us.”

So you get the idea. The author talks about how to use these steps in many common areas of marital conflict, and then talks a bit more about developing true intimacy through self-revelation. I wish I could have tried it out in my own marriage!

Before I close my review, I want to cover a section that impressed me toward the end of the book. The author does, very realistically, encourage you to focus on yourself and your own growth — but I liked this section about personal growth and encouraging your spouse to grow:

“I certainly understand the dynamic of one spouse trying to change the other, and the other trying to resist those efforts. In many ways, that dynamic is the exact pattern I’m calling people away from. I’m asking folks to stop focusing on their spouse and return their gaze to themselves. But that applies to both the spouse doing the attempted manipulation as well as the spouse trying to resist being changed. Stop focusing so much on what your spouse is trying to do to you, and start focusing on something much more fruitful: changing yourself.

“What’s fascinating about the Popeye defense” [“I yam what I yam, and that’s all that I yam.” Your spouse should just accept you for who you are.] “is that when it’s used, it comes across as some healthy self-acceptance that everyone needs to adopt. ‘I can accept me for me — why can’t she?’ On the surface, in our pop-psychology-riddled society, this may have the appearance of wisdom. But dig deeper, and this attitude is not only unwise, it’s actually harmful to both you and your marriage. . . .

“Just think about that for a moment. You want your spouse to just accept you for who you are? Really? Even if you’re lazy? Even if you totally let your body go and become weak, fat, and unhealthy? Even if you drink too much or watch too much TV or read too many romance novels? Even if you neglect your kids, spend without discretion, complain about your spouse to your friends instead of addressing the issue directly? Your spouse is just supposed to sit back and accept all these behaviors as the honest, unchanging you he/she is stuck with forever?

“If your answer is no, then Calm Down, Grow Up, and Get Closer by actually seeking out your spouse’s feedback. Go to him and ask what you could be doing better. Ask her directly how she thinks you’re doing, and what she wishes you would do more or and less of. Why? Because if you’re going to be the best spouse possible, then you need continual feedback on how you’re doing and how you can improve.

“Now, if your answer is yes, that you believe your spouse should just accept you fully, warts and all, then I want you to listen carefully. Your problem is not your spouse’s efforts to change you. Your problem is that you don’t respect yourself — at all. You don’t even like yourself. Anyone who respects herself is going to actively work to improve herself, rarely sitting back and remaining satisfied. Anyone who even likes himself is going to nurture his God-given desire to grow in wisdom, and build on his skills and abilities. Instead, you’re just wallowing in atrophy, using your emotional muscles only to defend yourself against your spouse’s efforts to change you. And you’re wondering why even the good things in life just don’t seem to be as pleasurable as they once were. That’s because you’ve ‘accepted’ yourself and demanded that your spouse do the same.

“But I know you. I know that you don’t want your spouse to just accept you. You want her to respect you. You want her to respect that you are not a child, incapable of doing anything for himself and in need of a mommy to tell him how to behave. You want him to see you as an adult, one who knows herself and knows what she needs to do. Well, there’s one way to gain that respect.

“Let love rule. Call yourself to your own standard. The standard you’ve already set for yourself by saying ‘I love you’ and ‘I do.’ You wish for and work for your spouse to have the best possible life, including the best possible spouse, and you believe you’re the one for the job. That’s what it means to love your spouse, and yourself.”

See what I mean? There’s good stuff here! May it help many, many couples Calm Down, Grow Up, and Get Closer.

I’m going to close with a quotation Hal Runkel included that made me laugh:

“My friends tell me I have an intimacy problem. But they don’t really know me.” — Garry Shandling

After all, if your spouse doesn’t understand you, could there perhaps be something you can do about that?

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Nonfiction/screamfree_marriage.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 the Fairfax County Public Library.

Review of The Little Rabbit Who Liked to Say MOO, by Jonathan Allen

Animal Characters, Good for the Very Young, Picture Book Review, Readalouds, Starred Review 0

The Little Rabbit Who Liked to Say MOO

by Jonathan Allen

Boxer Books, 2008. 28 pages.
Starred Review

I was very surprised to realize I hadn’t reviewed this book yet. It’s been a favorite Storytime choice of mine ever since I found it in the New Books section in 2008. It’s absolutely perfect for toddlers and young preschoolers. They are generally quite good at animal sounds, and this throws in a nice twist.

Here’s how it begins:

“Little Rabbit sat in the farmer’s field.

“‘Moo,’ said Little Rabbit. ‘Moo.’

“‘Why are you saying moo?’ asked Calf. ‘You’re not a cow.’

“‘I like moo,’ said Little Rabbit, ‘and rabbits don’t have a big noise.’

“‘Can you make other noises?’ asked Calf.

“‘I like baa,’ said Little Rabbit.

“‘So do I,’ said Calf.”

You can guess how the book goes from there. The two cute little animals Baa together and a lamb comes to investigate… and so on. At the end, all the animals declare their favorite sounds, and Little Rabbit makes a surprising choice that will provide a laugh.

This is a happy book, with cute baby animals doing silly things and making the “wrong” sounds. Like I said, it’s a fantastic choice for Storytime, and would also be great for sharing with a little one who has mastered animal sounds and knows how the world works. They will especially enjoy the twist!

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Picture_Books/little_rabbit_who_liked_to_say_moo.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 the Fairfax County Public Library.