Review of The Princess Plot, by Kirsten Boie

Audiobooks, Contemporary, Starred Review, Suspense, Teen Fiction Review 0

The Princess Plot

by Kirsten Boie

Narrated by Polly Lee

Recorded Books, 2009. Originally published in Germany in 2005. 9 CDs. 10.25 hours.
Starred Review

When I checked out The Princess Plot, I expected more of the fantasy tale I usually enjoy, set in a medieval kingdom. This story, however, is set in modern-day Europe, the story of a normal girl who gets embroiled in international affairs. Listening to it made it hard for me to get out of my car when I arrived at my destination!

The narrator did a great job. Since she has a British accent, I was imagining the book set in England. When I reached the end and learned it had been translated from German, that made a lot more sense — the geography of flying to the invented northern kingdom of Scandia fit better. Also, Jenna’s schedule of being out of school with the afternoon off fits with what I know about German teens.

The story is well-done. The plot is a little far-fetched, but the author has you going with it all the way. Jenna thinks of herself as very plain. She’s been brought up by a single mother who’s super-vigilant about Jenna staying safe and protected. So when her best friend wants her to go to an audition for girls their age to play a princess in a movie, she decides to do it without asking her mother’s permission. It seems strange when the producers pick Jenna instead of her friend and insist that she’d be absolutely perfect for the role. It feels strange, but also very, very good.

Then they take Jenna to the Kingdom of Scandia and tell her that she’s going to audition for the role by doing a favor for the princess of Scandia and being her replacement at the celebration of the princess’s birthday. The princess’s father recently died, and she wants to be out of the public eye. Or so they tell Jenna.

The reader knows that the princess has run away, and the regent and his people haven’t found her yet. The reader also knows that the “movie” people are sending Jenna fake text messages from her mother — so her mother does not actually know what’s going on.

We see the plot unfold, little by little. We’re given hints as to why they wanted Jenna. She’s a perfect double for the princess. We see that some North Scandian terrorists have been active lately, and get the feeling it may be connected with that.

The whole thing adds up to a captivating yarn about an ordinary girl — or at least someone who always thought she was ordinary — suddenly finding herself in a foreign country in the middle of a plot that’s way bigger than she is.

A sequel has recently come out, but my library hasn’t ordered it yet, so I will give in and order a copy for myself. I liked the people in this book, and very much would like to read about what happens next.

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Teens/princess_plot.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 Plain Kate, by Erin Bow

Children's Fiction Review, Fantasy, Starred Review 0

Plain Kate

by Erin Bow

Arthur A. Levine Books, Scholastic, 2010. 311 pages.
Starred Review

I read this book on a flight from Virginia to California, and I was enchanted. Right from the start, the language drew me in. Here is a passage from the beginning:

“Plain Kate’s father, Piotr, was a wood-carver. He gave Kate a carving knife before most children might be given a spoon. She could whittle before she could walk. When she was still a child, she could carve a rose that strangers would stop to smell, a dragonfly that trout would rise to strike.

“In Kate’s little town of Samilae, people thought that there was magic in a knife. A person who could wield a knife well was, in their eyes, halfway to a witch. So Plain Kate was very small the first time someone spat at her and crooked their fingers.

“Her father sat her down and spoke to her with great seriousness. ‘You are not a witch, Katerina. There is magic in the world, and some of it is wholesome, and some of it is not, but it is a thing that is in the blood, and it is not in yours.

“‘The foolish will always treat you badly, because they think you are not beautiful,’ he said, and she knew this was true. Plain Kate: She was plain as a stick, and thin as a stick, and flat as a stick. She had one eye the color of river mud and one eye the color of the river. Her nose was too long and her bones were too strong. Her father kissed her twice, once above each eyebrow. ‘We cannot help what fools think. But understand, it is your skill with a blade that draws this talk. If you want to give up your carving, you have my blessing.’

“‘I will never give it up,’ she answered.

“And he laughed and called her his Brave Star, and taught her to carve even better.”

Unfortunately, Kate’s father dies when she is still too young to become an apprentice. The guild sends a new carver to run his shop, and Kate ends up sleeping in the bottom drawer of her father’s stall, doing carving for people who are willing to defy the guild for someone who is an expert. Also in her father’s stall, she finds three kittens, and one stays with her, so she has a companion.

But then Kate meets a witch who wants her shadow. He cannot steal it — witchcraft works on the principle of willing exchanges. But he has ways to make sure Kate will want to bargain with him. The people are already suspicious of her, so when he calls fish to her, they are suspicious. He does more magic, until the townsfolk are so convinced she is cursing the town, she knows she has to leave.

The witch takes Kate’s shadow and gives her the true wish of her heart. Losing a shadow, though, is a slow process. Kate joins the Roamers, for awhile, and makes a friend. But will the Roamers keep her after they see she has no shadow? And what about the sleeping sickness that is turning up wherever she goes?

And what did the witch want with her shadow?

I loved this story. It’s a fantasy not quite like any other. There’s a talking cat, and I love the things he says — always perfectly cat-like. Here’s a scene with the cat, Taggle:

“‘Are we finished fleeing?’ the cat asked, the last word swallowed by a huge yawn. He stretched forward, lengthening his back and spreading his toes, then sprang onto the wall beside her. His nose worked. ‘Horses,’ he said. ‘Dogs. Hrrmmmmm. Humans. Chickens. And — ah, another cat! I must go and establish my dominance.’ He leapt off the wall.

“Plain Kate lunged after him. ‘Taggle! Wait!’ She snatched him out of the air by the scruff of his neck.

“‘Yerrrrowww!’ he shouted, hanging from her hand. ‘The insult! The indignity!’

“Kate fell to her knees and bundled the spitting cat against her chest. ‘Taggle!’ she hissed. ‘Stop!’

“‘I shall claw you in a moment, no matter how much I like you. Let me go!’ He writhed against her chest.

“‘Tag, you can’t talk.’

“‘I can talk,’ came the muffled, outraged voice. ‘I can also claw and bite and scra –‘

“‘No,’ she interrupted. ‘You can’t, you mustn’t talk. Listen to me. They’ll kill you if they hear you talk.'”

Kate is up against something very sinister, and she feels responsible, since her shadow is involved. But how can one girl, who doesn’t have magic, stop magic powerful enough to destroy a city? And will she find a place where she belongs?

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. The author said she wrote the first chapter on a plane. Watching the plane’s shadow separate and disappear gave her the idea of losing a shadow.

I’m going to call this Children’s Fiction, rather than Teen Fiction, but I think either group would like this book. The themes are serious, with people dying and Plain Kate living on her own. But she is still a child, too young to be an apprentice, on her own in the big world, with only a cat for a friend.

Buy from Amazon.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.

Source: This review is based on an uncorrected proof I got at the ALA Annual Conference.

Review of The Numbers Behind Numb3rs

Mathematical, Nonfiction Review, Starred Review 0

The Numbers Behind Numb3rs

Solving Crime with Mathematics

by Kevin Devlin and Gary Lorden

Plume (Penguin), 2007. 243 pages.
Starred Review

Okay, I admit that I’m a math geek. All I have to do to prove it is tell you about my prime factorization sweater.

So, it’s a no-brainer that I love the TV show Numb3rs. This book is written by Keith Devlin, “NPR’s ‘Math Guy,'” a consulting professor at Stanford, and Gary Lorden, “the Math Consultant on Numb3rs,” a math professor at Caltech (the school after which the fictional Calsci is modelled). They take the episodes of the first season of Numb3rs, explain the math concepts behind them, and talk about actual criminal cases where these concepts were used.

I think they do a great job of making the concepts understandable without getting bogged down with equations. I shouldn’t be surprised, since on the show Charlie always uses metaphors to explain what they can do with numbers.

A few of the things they talk about — with examples from actual cases — are DNA profiling, finding meaningful patterns in masses of information, using Bayesian Inference to detect the future, and making and breaking codes.

I don’t think I need to say much more about it. If you find this stuff fascinating, you know who you are! All I have to do is tell you this cool book exists.

If, on the other hand, this sounds mind-numbing and not the least bit cool to you, then no amount of my talking is likely to convince you, and I admit that you probably will not like the book.

But if you want to be dazzled by the power of numbers and get a handle on some of the powerful concepts that can be used to fight crime, you will thoroughly enjoy this book, as I did.

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/nonfiction/numbers_behind_numb3rs.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 Cardturner, by Louis Sachar

Contemporary, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

The Cardturner

by Louis Sachar

Delacorte Press, New York, 2010. 336 pages.
Starred Review

Ever since he was small, Alton’s parents have drilled it into him that his great-uncle Lester is his favorite uncle. Uncle Lester is rich, very rich, and Alton’s parents want to be remembered should anything ever happen to him, God forbid. He’s only actually met Uncle Lester one time, when Alton was six, at his uncle’s sixty-fifth birthday party. When Alton’s a junior in high school, his uncle takes a turn for the worse, and his parents start thinking what they could do with his money.

One person they’re worried about is Sophie Castaneda.

“I’d heard about the Castaneda family all my life, ‘the crazy Castanedas,’ but I never quite got my uncle’s relationship to them. It was complicated, to say the least.

“From what I understood, Sophie Castaneda was the daughter of Uncle Lester’s ex-wife’s crazy sister.

“When Uncle Lester was in his twenties, he had been married for less than a year. His wife had a sister who went insane. The sister had a daughter named Sophie King, who later changed her name to Sophie Finnick, and then became Sophie Castaneda when she got married.

“See what I mean?

“According to my mother, all the Castanedas were bonkers. I met Toni Castaneda, Sophie’s daughter, at my uncle’s sixty-fifth birthday. Toni was about six years old, and I remember I was glad to find someone my own age to play with. Toni ran up to me. She covered her ears with her hands, her elbows sticking out, and shouted, ‘Shut up! Leave me alone!’ and then she ran away.

“She didn’t do that just to me. I watched her tell other people to shut up and leave her alone too. I thought she was funny, but when I tried playing that game, I got in trouble for saying shut up.”

On one of Uncle Lester’s turns for the worse, he goes blind. Alton’s Dad figures he’ll have to stop playing cards, but then his mom hears that Uncle Lester is playing cards four days a week with Toni Castaneda. They aren’t sure how he can do that when he’s blind. Then they get some insight into it:

“It was the second-to-last day of school. I didn’t have any summer plans, just a vague notion about getting a job. I had just driven Leslie to her friend Marissa’s house, and when I got home I heard my mother say, ‘Alton would love to spend time with his favorite uncle!'”

Uncle Lester wants Alton to drive him to his bridge club and be his cardturner. He will tell Alton what card to play, and Alton will play it. Toni had the job before, but then, before playing a card, she asked, “Are you sure?” thus revealing to the other players that Uncle Lester had more cards he could play. He fired Toni and wants someone who knows nothing about bridge. Alton qualifies.

It turns out that Uncle Lester — Trapp is what everyone calls him at his bridge club — is a fantastic bridge player. Alton tells him the cards in his hand at the beginning of each game, and Trapp has no trouble remembering them all and all the cards played during the game. Other people ask him for advice after the day’s play, and he can still remember the cards that were dealt.

You might think a book about playing bridge would be boring, but this is anything but. When the plot requires some detail about the game, the author inserts a whale symbol (because of all the whaling details in Moby Dick) and then a summary box, so if you choose you can skip the details and cut to the summary.

Yes, this is a book about playing bridge — Trapp would like one more shot at the national championship — but it’s also about Alton learning about his uncle and his uncle’s surprising life. And then there’s Toni Castaneda, who is Trapp’s protege as a bridge player. She doesn’t seem crazy to Alton. Too bad his best friend seems interested in her.

I especially enjoy the last third of the book. I can’t give away what happens, but it’s perfect, and what follows brings everything together.

I grew up playing Rook, which is like a very simple form of bridge, so I could follow the play pretty well. The book did make me want to learn bridge! Like other Louis Sachar books, this book strongly appealed to the mathematical side of my brain. You can think of the bridge play as a series of puzzles, which were fun to read about. It was all in the context of a very human story, adding up to a great book.

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Teens/cardturner.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 Ladybug Girl at the Beach, by David Soman and Jacky Davis

Contemporary, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 0

Ladybug Girl at the Beach

by David Soman and Jacky Davis

Dial Books for Young Readers (Penguin), 2010. 36 pages.
Starred Review

A big thank-you to Betsy Bird for calling my attention to this book on her Fuse #8 blog.

This is another favorite of the year so far for me — another one with such wonderful illustrations, I hope it gets some Caldecott attention.

Lulu has already made an appearance in Ladybug Girl, and today her family is going to the beach. She has a ladybug swimsuit, complete with wings and antennae.

Lulu is excited to come to the beach. But then (in a stunning two-page spread) she sees the big waves and thinks it’s a good day for just making sand castles. Her dog, Bingo is a steadfast companion through the whole book.

Of course sand castles don’t last all day. They fly a kite, get some ice cream…

The whole book feels so real. It brings me right back to my first few times at the beach. The first time she gets her feet wet:

“Suddenly a wave crashes into her legs and nearly knocks her over.

“Just as she gets her balance the whirling water races back and tries to pull her in. Her feet get buried in the sand up to her ankles.

” ‘Are you okay, Bingo?’ Lulu asks. She looks around to see if anyone noticed that they were almost carried away, but everyone is playing just as they were before.”

The pictures that accompany this section are perfect — first tentatively dipping a toe in the water, then bracing against the splash of a wave, then bracing the other way and trying to keep her balance as the water rushes out, leaving big swathes in the sand in front of their feet.

The whole book so beautifully catches Lulu’s mood — happy, a little scared, kind of tired, a little bored — and then, determined!

Lulu gets determined when she’s digging in the sand for pirate treasure and the tide comes in and tries to take away her favorite pail. That’s when she remembers that she is Ladybug Girl!

Ladybug Girl isn’t afraid of anything!

From then on, we see Ladybug Girl and Bingo playing happily in and out of the water.

“Ladybug Girl and Bingo play until the bright blue sky turns pink. They make footprints in the sand.
“At least 14 miles of them, Ladybug Girl thinks. Every time the ocean erases them, they make more.”

Reading this book will make you remember what it’s like to be a child at the seashore. And don’t let me stop urging you to take a look at this book yourself to see the exquisite watercolor paintings. They’re playful, they’re gorgeous, they’re joyful, and most of all the artist knows how to perfectly portray a little girl who still has a tummy and loves being Ladybug Girl. Beautiful!

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Picture_Books/ladybug_girl_at_the_beach.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 Double Comfort Safari Club, by Alexander McCall Smith

Fiction Review, Light Reading, Mystery, Starred Review 0

The Double Comfort Safari Club

by Alexander McCall Smith

Pantheon Books, New York, 2010. 211 pages.
Starred Review

This is now the eleventh installment of the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency series. Though I think it would be an enjoyable book as a stand-alone, I still recommend that people start at the beginning, and they will be all the more touched by these developments in the lives of old friends.

In The Double Comfort Safari Club, we again have a nice tangle of cases for Mma Ramotswe, Botswana’s premiere detective, to solve. One of them necessitates that she and Mma Makutsi take a business trip to a safari camp, which is where the book gets its name. (I love the titles in this series!)
As usual, the solutions to the mysteries don’t really involve intellectual puzzles, as in traditional detective tales. These are more a chance for Mma Ramotswe and her friends to reflect on human nature and draw wise conclusions about life.

In this book, a terrible accident happens to Phuti Radiphuti, and his aunt tries to use it as an opportunity to keep him from Mma Makutsi. The reader’s heart will be touched, but be glad that she has friends like Precious Ramotswe to find a way to help in a bad situation.

As always, reading this book is like spending time with wise and kind friends. And the variety of cases keep things interesting. Always fun.

“Mma Ramotswe thought about this. Having the right approach to life was a great gift in this life. Her father, the late Obed Ramotswe, had always had the right approach to life — she was sure of that. And for a moment, as she sat there with her friend, with the late-afternoon sun slanting in through the window, she thought about how she owed her father so much. He had taught her almost everything she knew about how to lead a good life, and the lessons she had learned from him were as fresh today as they had ever been. Do not complain about your life. Do not blame others for things that you have brought upon yourself. Be content with who you are and where you are, and do whatever you can do to bring to others such contentment, and joy, and understanding that you have managed to find yourself.

“She closed her eyes. You can do that in the company of an old friend — you can close your eyes and think of the land that gave you life and breath, and of all the reasons why you are glad that you are there, with the people you know, with the people you love.”

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Fiction/double_comfort_safari_club.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 House of Dead Maids, by Clare B. Dunkle

Fantasy, Historical, Starred Review, Suspense, Teen Fiction Review 0

House of Dead Maids

by Clare B. Dunkle

Henry Holt Books for Young Readers, 2010. 146 pages.
Starred Review

I’ve never liked ghost stories. Too much imagination, I think. So I wasn’t planning to pick up this particular Advanced Review Copy at ALA Annual Conference — until I saw the author’s name, and then I snatched it up.

I consider Clare Dunkle a friend. We met when we both lived in Germany, after I raved about her first book, The Hollow Kingdom, on my blog right before she was doing a book signing at the local BX. We met up a few times after that, and I got to know her and like her. And her books continue to be fabulous. Here are my reviews of Close Kin, In the Coils of the Snake, By These Ten Bones, and The Sky Inside.

I still put off reading it, since the creepy cover freaked me out. (Though I’m sure it will entice many teen readers who come to the library looking for “scary” books.) But then I learned that Clare was doing a Blog Tour and asked her to include my site. So on October 14, 2010, I’m posting my first Author Interview! Her answers to my questions turned out to be fascinating, so I’m excited about it.

I read the book surrounded by people on a jet with my reading light firmly ON. I was coming back from the Horn Book at Simmons Colloquium in Boston. I had decided against reading it alone in my hotel room in a strange city! That was a good choice, because the book is definitely creepy. But it’s intriguing, and definitely got me hooked.

The House of Dead Maids is a prequel to Wuthering Heights. Now, believe it or not, I’ve never read Wuthering Heights. I had meant to, and even bought a paperback copy. I think I decided not to after all when my German landlady mentioned that she had to read it in her English class, and she thought it was awful. She asked why anyone would want to read such a horrible story. So I put it a little further on the back burner.

Clare assured me that I could read The House of Dead Maids before reading Wuthering Heights, and she’d expressed that she was hoping her book would get more readers for the classic novel. I do intend to finally read Wuthering Heights now and see what I think. I did read Jane Eyre long ago and completely fell in love with it. Reading The House of Dead Maids, Clare Dunkle completely succeeded in creating a voice that reminded me of Jane Eyre. She says she was trying to write like the Brontes, and I think she did. The voice pulled me into that world and that kind of mindset.

As always, Clare’s writing feels like it was actually written at the time — which makes you believe all the more that the supernatural happenings “really” happened. In this case, she wove in superstitions and rituals of the time for a terribly creepy tale.

Tabby Ackroyd is the narrator, an orphan taken to serve at a creepy mansion. She is given charge of a wild young boy who claims to be master of the house. Tabby doesn’t know what happened to the orphan who went there to serve before her. But then she sees ghosts all over the house and grounds. It turns out they were both brought there for a sinister purpose.

I like the way Tabby Ackroyd turns out to be the housekeeper of the Bronte sisters. I found it quite plausible that she told the girls, who loved ghost stories, this tale of a wild boy who wanted to be master. It was left for them to tell what became of him….

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Teens/house_of_dead_maids.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 Reader’s Edition picked up at ALA.

Review of The Art of Racing in the Rain, by Garth Stein

Fiction Review, Literary, Starred Review 0

The Art of Racing in the Rain

by Garth Stein

Harper, 2008. 321 pages.
Starred Review

I fully meant to read this book when it first came out, and I’m sure I had it checked out, but somehow it never made it to the top of the pile. So when the Fairfax County Public Library chose it for the 2010 All Fairfax Reads book, I decided it was high time to read it, and to make sure it was on the top of the pile, since with plenty of holds, I wouldn’t be able to renew it. I ended up reading it in two nights, and just loved it. I wish I’d read it sooner.

A friend of mine said she didn’t want to read it because she heard the dog dies in the end. That’s true, but you know that’s what he wants from the very first few pages, so it didn’t make me sad.

Here’s how Enzo, the dog telling the story, puts it, right at the beginning:

“I’m old. And while I’m very capable of getting older, that’s not the way I want to go out…. I don’t want to be kept alive. Because I know what’s next. I’ve seen it on TV. A documentary I saw about Mongolia, of all places. It was the best thing I’ve ever seen on television, other than the 1993 Grand Prix of Europe, of course, the greatest automobile race of all time in which Ayrton Senna proved himself to be a genius in the rain. After the 1993 Grand Prix, the best thing I’ve ever seen on TV is a documentary that explained everything to me, made it all clear, told the whole truth: when a dog is finished living his lifetimes as a dog, his next incarnation will be as a man.

“I’ve always felt almost human. I’ve always known that there’s something about me that’s different than other dogs. Sure, I’m stuffed into a dog’s body, but that’s just the shell. It’s what’s inside that’s important. The soul. And my soul is very human.

“I am ready to become a man now, though I realize I will lose all that I have been. All of my memories, all of my experiences. I would like to take them with me into my next life — there is so much I have gone through with the Swift family — but I have little say in the matter. What can I do but force myself to remember?”

Enzo then tells us the story of his life with the Swift family. Denny Swift, a race car driver, particularly good at racing in the rain, picked Enzo out from a pile of puppies at a farm.

Enzo was Denny’s companion. They studied racing videos together. Enzo was there when Denny fell in love, got married, and had a daughter. Then he was there when Denny’s wife got sick. He saw all that Denny went through, and wished he could tell what he’d seen and make things right.

The story is beautifully told and so touching. Enzo loves these people and does all he can to help them through an extremely difficult time.

The unusual perspective of the dog narrator never seems like a gimmick. Instead, it’s all the more poignant because Enzo sees injustice, but suffers from the lack of a tongue made for speaking and opposable thumbs.

I got to hear Garth Stein speak at the Fall for the Book Festival at George Mason University on September 19th. He was a very entertaining speaker, and fun to look at, too!

When he talked about how he got the idea for this book, he revealed that he actually saw a video where it explained that in Mongolia, there is a belief that dogs are on their way to reincarnating as humans. He also told about how much trouble he had getting the book published. His agent said that he couldn’t possibly sell a book narrated by a dog, so he fired his agent. But then he couldn’t find anyone who thought differently — until he met an author who had written a book narrated by a crow! That author’s agent loved the book!

And I have to admit, if you just say it’s a book narrated by a dog, it sounds like a gimmick. But this is pulled off beautifully. Garth Stein treated Enzo as a human soul with limitations — He could only speak with gestures, and he couldn’t manipulate things with his paws. But he had a great heart and saw Denny going through the fire but emerging victorious.

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Fiction/art_of_racing_in_the_rain.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 Suspect, by Kristin Wolden Nitz

Contemporary, Mystery, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Suspect

by Kristin Wolden Nitz

Peachtree, Atlanta, 2010. 199 pages.
Starred Review

Okay, I’ll say right up front that I’m biased about this book. Kristin Wolden Nitz is my friend. She’s a fellow member of the Sisters of Royaumont. We met at a children’s writers’ retreat at an abbey outside Paris back in 1999, started an e-mail critique group, and were reunited at another retreat at the same abbey, Abbaye de Royaumont in 2005, with time together in Paris before and after. Kristin is an inspiration to me as a writer. She’s persistent and versatile.

I’ve given Kristin some critiques on some of her books before they were published, but not this one. Getting to pick up a copy of the Uncorrected Proof at ALA Annual Conference was the first I got to read it. I was very impressed and enjoyed it thoroughly.

When her Grandma Kay needs some help for the summer at the family bed-and-breakfast, 17-year-old Jen agrees to help out. Her dad warns her, though, that Grandma Kay has gotten a crazy idea into her head that Jen’s mother is dead.

Jen’s mother left fourteen years ago. She’s written to Jen over the years and sent her presents, but she’s never been back. Now it’s been a few years since Jen heard from her. Still, why would Grandma Kay now think she’s dead? Has she been watching too many murder mysteries?

Grandma Kay does have a thing for mysteries. Every year she hosts a mystery weekend at the bed-and-breakfast for a competitive group of would-be sleuths. This year, Jen has an uncomfortable feeling that Grandma Kay is modeling the mystery after Jen’s mother’s disappearance. And Jen gets to play the role of the victim.

What’s more, if Jen’s mother was killed, who killed her? Was it one of the people Jen has known and loved all her life, one of the people assembled for the murder mystery weekend?

On top of everything else, Jen’s boyfriend just broke up with her, and she’s finding herself feeling strange things when she’s around Mark, her “uncousin” — like family, a friend since childhood, but not actually related to her.

It all adds up to an excellent “cozy” mystery. You’ve got believable romance, an intriguing and well-plotted mystery, and characters you like and enjoy.

There aren’t so many mysteries out there with teenage characters. This one takes a capable teenage girl and casts her in the middle of an intensely personal mystery she’d rather not be part of. Will she be the detective, or the victim?

This book will keep you turning the pages and leave you with a satisfied smile at the end.

Source: An Uncorrected Proof picked up at ALA.

Buy from Amazon.com

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Review of Ascendant, by Diana Peterfreund

Fantasy, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Ascendant

by Diana Peterfreund

HarperTeen, 2010. 392 pages.
Starred Review

Wow. I thought Diana Peterfreund’s first book about killer unicorns, Rampant was outstanding. But its sequel, Ascendant, is simply awesome. I just spent my Saturday reading it, and couldn’t tear myself away.

In the first book, things are fairly straightforward. Astrid Llewelyn learns that her crazy mother was right and unicorns are, in fact, bloodthirsty killers, and their family has magical powers for hunting them down and subduing them. She goes to Rome and trains with other girls they’ve found, virgin descendants of families from the ancient Order of the Lioness. They learn to hunt together and defeat a conspiracy against them. Along the way, she finds Giovanni, an Italian-American spending the summer in Rome, who loves her as she is.

In the second book, we’ve got the repercussions of this magical scenario. First, Giovanni goes back to college in America so she has to deal with a long-distance relationship. Now the world knows about the Reemergence of unicorns, and Astrid’s mother is capitalizing on their interest. The girls of the Order are still trying to kill any unicorns they can find, but their magic is growing. The hunters can read the unicorns’ thoughts, and Astrid doesn’t like killing something whose thoughts she can read — but her powers are superhuman when unicorns are around. And then, what about school? She wanted to be a doctor, but now she’s a high school dropout.

Meanwhile, Astrid’s cousin Philippa is trying to get unicorns worldwide protection as an endangered species. Astrid tries to reconcile those ideas with the work they are doing. After all, unicorns are attracted to hunters, so they need to train more hunters, or all the people around the untrained hunters will be in danger.

Then there’s the matter of the Remedy — the ancient cure that their ancestors knew how to make that would heal any wound and purify any poison. It works like the unicorns themselves heal when wounded, and like the hunters heal from stabbings by unicorn horns. Surely it can’t be bad for scientists to perform tests on any unicorns they can, in order to try to produce the remedy and save thousands? Can it?

That’s a basic idea of the themes and questions of the book — but the working out of them is much more complex. The plotting is very intricate, and a lot of things tie together in ways we don’t expect. The story is wonderfully well-told, and there are no easy answers. I hope with all my heart that Diana Peterfreund is working on a sequel, because the book doesn’t leave Astrid in a very good situation at all. I’m pretty confident there must be a third book coming, because that’s not the only thing that’s left unresolved. Though the story does end at a satisfying place, I want to learn that things get better for several of the hunters — and the unicorns.

Meanwhile, this book makes a terrific read. A story of characters who find out that saving the world isn’t as simple as it used to be.

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Teens/ascendant.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 uncorrected proof I got at ALA Annual Conference and had signed by the author.