Review of Cruel Beauty, by Rosamund Hodge

Audiobooks, Fairy Tale Variant, Fantasy, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Cruel Beauty

by Rosamund Hodge
read by Elizabeth Knowelden

HarperAudio, 2014. 10 hours, 17 minutes.
Review written April 19, 2022, from a library eaudiobook
Starred Review

This is a Beauty and the Beast tale with complicated and beautiful world-building. I chose this audiobook because none of my audio holds were available and I wanted something to listen to while cleaning house. So I searched for books read by my favorite narrator, Elizabeth Knowelden. She makes any book a magical experience. As soon as I checked the book out, several of my holds were available all at once, but I was already hooked and finished this book before I was willing to look at any of them.

All her life, Nyx has known that when she comes of age, she will marry the Gentle Lord — and she must destroy him. She has been trained in just enough of the magical arts to make the Gentle Lord’s magical castle collapse in on him to free Arcadia forever. The catch is that she would be trapped as well. The Gentle Lord supposedly keeps the demons in Arcadia in check, but not always successfully. Since the time of the Sundering, Arcadia has been separate from the rest of the world with the Gentle Lord ruling over them. He makes bargains with people — bargains that pretty much always turn out badly for those who agree to them. Before her birth, Nyx’s father made a bargain for children, with the price that one of his twin daughters would have to marry the Gentle Lord on her 17th birthday. But he forgot to include that his wife would have the strength to bear children, and Nyx’s mother died in childbirth.

All her life, Nyx’s family has been preparing her for this task, but unsurprisingly, she’s not happy about it. She’s expected to avenge her mother and bring about the deliverance of Arcadia, but at the cost of her own life. When she gets to the Gentle Lord’s castle, nothing is as she had thought. She works on the plan to find the hearts of water, fire, earth, and air to negate them and bring down the castle, but as she follows this quest, she learns that’s not going to free Arcadia after all.

And it turns out there are two beasts in the castle. There’s the Gentle Lord, known as Ignafex, and his shadow-servant, Shade — who is only in human form at night. They share the same face, but Ignafex has eyes of a demon. Nyx needs to find out who they are and how they got there, or she’ll never be able to defeat the Gentle Lord — and there are questions and secrets and layers to everything.

I’m not sure if I would have enjoyed this book as much if I had read it myself, but as always, Elizabeth Knowelden cast a spell and enthralled me with this complex and dangerous world.

rosamundhodge.net

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Review of Manhattan: Mapping the Story of an Island, by Jennifer Thermes

Children's Nonfiction Review, History, Starred Review 0

Manhattan

Mapping the Story of an Island

by Jennifer Thermes

Abrams Books for Young Readers, 2019. 64 pages.
Review written January 28, 2022, from a library book
Starred Review

This book is fascinating! I’m sorry that I didn’t discover it until I was pulling it from the library shelves to take off the New sticker. Usually I do that task rather mindlessly, but this book called out to me to open it, and then I couldn’t put it away until I’d pored over the fascinating details.

It’s a large-format book that uses maps to tell the history of the island of Manhattan. It talks about how it was formed and then about the Lenape living on Mannahatta for thousands of years.

Then it tells about the history of the island (with maps) through time periods. The Dutch put a town on the island, followed by the British, who occupied the city during the American Revolution. The commissioners planned the grid of streets in 1811. Further events resulted in changes, including the Great Fire of 1835, which led to the development of Central Park, and the Great Blizzard of 1888, which led to the development of the subway. It also mentions the importance of the slave trade to the city and slave labor to build the city. Free African Americans eventually moved outside the city to Seneca Village — and that land was taken from them for a low price to build Central Park.

We read about the importance of immigration to the island and the Gilded Age of 1870 to 1900, where millionaires lived on Fifth Avenue, while immigrants lived in poverty in tenements downtown. We learn about the building of subways and bridges and skyscrapers, which all changed the look of the city. And of course, it finishes up with Manhattan today — though I was surprised by a page before that mentioning Hurricane Sandy in 2012 and how the subways were flooded. The new threat to Manhattan is rising sea levels. As the author states, “Protecting it from water will be this century’s greatest challenge.”

And after all these big, fascinating pages of details, there’s a complete timeline in the back, next to a page of select sources.

I’ve been to New York City a few times, which helped give me context. If I ever get the chance to go again, rereading this book would be a wonderful way to prepare.

jenniferthermes.com
abramsyoungreaders.com

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Review of Anatomy: A Love Story, by Dana Schwartz

Audiobooks, Historical, Teen Fiction Review 0

Anatomy

A Love Story

by Dana Schwartz
read by Mhairi Morrison and Tim Campbell

Macmillan Audio, 2022. 9 hours, 35 minutes.
Review written July 2, 2022, from a library eaudiobook.

Here’s an atmospheric tale set in old Edinburgh and read with a wonderful Scottish accent.

Hazel Sinnett is a young lady who’s always known she’s going to marry her cousin Bernard, a viscount. But she’s also always wanted to be a surgeon, studying her father’s books, even though it’s not a profession for a young lady.

When she tries to get into a demonstration at the Anatomists’ Society of a new gas that will put patients to sleep during surgery, a chance encounter with a Resurrection Man named Jack gives her a way to watch.

Jack Currer makes some money by digging up dead bodies and selling them to the Anatomists’ Society so they can study them. So when Hazel gets thrown out of the Anatomists’ Society because she’s a woman, but is challenged to try the exam anyway — she needs some corpses to study, and Jack can help.

But at the same time, they discover many of the corpses are mutilated, with body parts removed. And some of the Resurrection Men are going missing.

There are so many atmospheric undercurrents and warnings of danger and a touch of romance as Hazel must surmount numerous obstacles in order to become a surgeon.

With excerpts from an old medical textbook, I wondered how much of this was based on fact. Well, a lot of the setting is real, but by the end the reader realizes this isn’t actually quite our world that they live in. It’s certainly a dangerous one, though, and I was on the edge of my seat navigating it with Hazel.

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Sonderling Sunday – Lockwood & Co.!

Sonderling Sunday 0

It’s time for Sonderling Sunday! That time of the week when I play with language by looking at the German translation of children’s books.

And – I recently traveled to Germany, after being away for 18 years – and purchased a new children’s book in German to use – Lockwood and Co. Book 1, The Screaming Staircase, by Jonathan Stroud! I’m excited to go through another much-loved book.

First, the full German title is Lockwood & Co.: Die Seufzende Wendeltreppe I don’t think it’s nearly as catchy as The Screaming Staircase, but what can you do? There are two translators listed, Katharina Orgaß and Gerald Jung. The English edition has 390 pages, and the German edition has 428 pages.

The chapters do not have titles, but there are five parts to the book, that do have titles. Part I in English is “The Ghost,” which is simply enough translated as Der Geist.

I like to start with the first sentence of chapter 1, which is a nice long one in this case:

“Of the first few hauntings I investigated with Lockwood & Co. I intend to say little, in part to protect the identity of the victims, in part because of the gruesome nature of the incidents, but mainly because, in a variety of ingenious ways, we succeeded in messing them all up.”
= Zu den ersten Fällen, an denen ich bei Lockwood & Co. mitgearbeitet habe, möchte ich hier nicht viel sagen. Einerseits, weil die Opfer anonym bleiben sollen, andererseits, weil die Einzelheiten allzu grausig sind, aber vor allem, weil wir es tatsächlich fertiggebracht haben, diese Aufträge allesamt gründlich zu vermasseln.

Now I’ll cite intriguing phrases:

“Chattering Bones” = Knochenknirscher (I think that’s a much better name for a spook.)

“unnecessary” = vermeidbare [Google translate: “avoidable”]

“creeping shadow” = Heimsuchung [“home-seeking”, “visitation”]

“hemline” = Rocksaum

“unblemished record” = ruhmreiche Bilanz [“fame-rich balance”]

“misty autumn afternoon” = nebligen Nachmittag [they leave out autumn]

I always like finding when Germans have one word for something and English doesn’t:
“rang the bell” = läuteten [To be fair, this is a case where you can figure out what they rang.]

“bell pull” = Klingelzug [“Ring-train”]

“scuffs on the letter box” = der Briefschlitz war verschrammt

“four diamond panes of frosted glass” = vier rautenförmigen Milchglasscheiben

“Don’t blab about everything you see.” = Nicht einfach drauflosreden.

“And, above all, don’t impersonate the client. = Und vor allem: Nicht den Klienten nachäffen!

“It never goes down well.” = Das geht immer schief.

“accents” = Dialekte

“Irish dockworker” = irischer Hafenarbeiter

“speech impediment” = Sprachfehler

“collar of his coat” = Mantelkragen

“vole” = Maulwurf

“clips” = Spangen

“no-nonsense manner” = ziemlich streng [“quite strict”]

“an enormous wool cardigan with sagging pockets at the sides”
= eine viel zu weite Strickjacke mit ausgebeulten Taschen
[“a much too wide knitted-jacket with out-bulging pockets”]

“resentment” = Feindseligkeit

“carefully brushed hair” = sorgfältig gekämmte [Ha! “gekämmte” is the opposite of “unkempt” in English!]

“polished rapiers” = blitzenden Degen [“flashing swords”]

I found a sentence they left out: “It lingered long on our faces.”

“disturbances” = Störungen

“supervisor” = Vorgesetzten

“licenses” = Zulassungsurkunde [“approval-certificates”]

“curfew” = Ausgangssperre [“Going-out-lock”]

“antsy” = kribbelig

“hilt of my rapier” = mein Degenknauf [“my sword-knob”]

And the last sentence of the first section:

“He grinned at me, stepped up to the door and, with a magician’s flourish, turned the key in the lock.”
= Lockwood grinste mich an, steckte den Schlüssel ins Haustürschloss und drehte ihn mit der schwungvollen Gebärde eines Zauberkünstlers herum.

That’s it for tonight! I’m leaving off on page 9 of the English version, Seite 17 in German. (But the German edition began the text on page 11, the English on page 3.) I very much hope that using most of these words will be vermeidbare and that you don’t run into any Knochenknirscher!

Bis bald!

Review of When Women Were Dragons, by Kelly Barnhill

Fiction Review, Science Fiction, Starred Review 0

When Women Were Dragons

by Kelly Barnhill

Doubleday, 2022. 337 pages.
Review written July 6, 2024, from an Advance Reader Copy I got at an American Library Association conference.
Starred Review

Okay, this novel is something else. And I say that in a good way – it’s not like anything else I’ve read. I’m very glad I finally got around to reading it — I’ve been meaning to since before it was published in 2022. But I did some traveling and like to take Advance Reader Copies on my travels and give them away to friends before I return. This one I didn’t finish in time, but it still provided hours of entertaining reading on airplanes.

This book takes place in an alternate reality mostly in the 1950s and 1960s. The only thing that’s different from our world is that women have a tendency to spontaneously turn into dragons and take to the skies. In fact, in 1955, there was a Mass Dragoning event in which 642,987 American women transformed into dragons.

Here’s a matter-of-fact description of the event by our narrator, Alex Green, whose Aunt Marla left them during the event:

The facts, of course, are indisputable, but that did not stop people from attempting to dispute the facts. There were eyewitnesses, photographic evidence, utterly destroyed homes and businesses, and no fewer than 1246 confirmed cases of philandering husbands extracted from the embrace of their mistresses and devoured on the spot, in view of astonished onlookers. One dragoning – from its initial gasp, to the eruption of tooth and claw and wing, to the explosion of speed and fire – was caught on 35mm film, taken at a child’s birthday party in a backyard in Albany. Only one of three national news broadcasters attempted to show the film, but was censured immediately by FCC (and slapped with a hefty fine for the dissemination of obscene and profane material) and forced to suspend operations for a full week before having their license re-instated. It is assumed that more such films exist, but they were presumably either confiscated by local authorities (and in that case, are lost forever) or have been simply socked away in stacks of film canisters, hoarded in boxes in basements, likely decomposed by now. Too embarrassing to look at. Too inappropriate. It’s dragons, after all – tainted, it would seem, with feminine stink. Such things are not discussed. Best forgotten, people said.

The drive to forget dragons was so intense that when Alex’s family took in her cousin Beatrice after Beatrice’s mother’s dragoning, Alex was forbidden to call Beatrice anything but her sister. She’d always been her sister. Aunt Marla must be forgotten.

This is the story of Alex and Beatrice. For two of her teen years, Alex was solely responsible for bringing up Beatrice. It’s also about the drive to turn into dragons and women’s place in society and life choices and all the ramifications of all of that. The chapters are interspersed with notes from a scientist who surreptitiously studies dragons.

Although many of the dragons transform in a moment of rage, many also do so in a time of great joy. The book is dedicated to Christine Blasey Ford, “whose testimony triggered this book,” so it is indeed about rage, but it is also about joy, about taking up space, and about living lives with magnificence.

All told, it’s a fascinating book that makes me want to find my inner dragon.

KellyBarnhill.wordpress.com
doubleday.com

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Review of Miss Quinces, by Kat Fajardo

Children's Fiction Review, Contemporary, Graphic Novel, Starred Review 0

Miss Quinces

by Kat Fajardo
color by Mariana Azzi

Graphix (Scholastic), 2022. 252 pages.
Review written June 28, 2022, from a library book
Starred Review

The trials and tribulations of middle school and early high school are perfect material for graphic novels, and this one will delight young graphic novel fans.

All Sue wants to do the summer she turns fifteen is hang out with her comic creator nerdy friends, but her family is going to Honduras to see her abuela and various aunts, uncles, and cousins. Once there, to Sue’s horror, she learns that her mother has planned to throw her a quinceañera.

Sue protests, because she doesn’t want all the attention, doesn’t know how to dance, doesn’t speak Spanish well, and doesn’t like pink. But her abuela tells her about family traditions and she works out a deal with her mother that might make even having a quinces party worth it.

The plans all get thrown off in various ways, but the result is a graphic novel full of humor and heart with a big family learning how much they love each other despite lots of foibles.

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*Note* To try to catch up on posting reviews, I’m posting the oldest reviews I’ve written on my blog without making a page on my main website. They’re still good books.

Review of Home in a Lunchbox, by Cherry Mo

Contemporary, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 0

Home in a Lunchbox

by Cherry Mo

Penguin Workshop, 2024. 40 pages.
Review written July 19, 2024, from a library book.
Starred Review

The more I look at this beautiful picture book, the more charmed I am.

It’s a story of a young girl moving with her family from Hong Kong to America, and it’s told mostly in pictures, with color showing emotion.

On the endpapers, we see a moving truck leaving behind the lights of Hong Kong and moving to a suburban street in America. On the title page, the sweet little girl’s mother gives her a loving good-by kiss, while good food is giving off smells on the table beside them. The girl is wearing a backpack and holding a lunchbox.

Right away at the bus stop, a friendly girl says Hello to our hero. She answers “Hel…lo!” When the girl asks, “What’s your name,” she consults writing on her hand, which gives her translations for the words Hello, Thank you, and I don’t know. So she answers, “Th…ank you…”

Riding the bus and getting school, the pictures show us how alone the little girl feels. She’s in color, but all around her the kids are drawn in gray. She’s given a worksheet and fills in “I don’t know” in all the blanks.

But when lunchtime comes and she opens her lunchbox, all is color and sparkles. There’s a full spread where we can see that her food gives her memories of happy times with family and friends back home.

As the week goes on, more mortifying times happen – especially when she asks for a “Toilet.” But in panels as days go by, she still gets color and sparkles and happiness when she opens her lunchbox.

And finally, it’s the lunchbox that helps her make friends. The original girl from the bus stop has been watching her. An exchange of food happens, they see her nametag on her lunch (Jun) and a new small group of friends comes together — now all full of color and happiness.

There’s a spread at the back explaining the food in Jun’s lunchbox, and the words she’s written on her hand, in English and Cantonese. It also explains that most people in Hong Kong learn the British way of asking for a restroom – asking for a “toilet.”

The back flap tells us the author based the book on her own experiences moving to the United States from Hong Kong when she was 10 years old. She’s communicated the whole thing so beautifully, in a picture book that transcends language.

cherrymo.com
penguin.com/kids

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Review of The Seagull and the Sea Captain, by Sy Montgomery, illustrated by Amy Schimler-Safford

Contemporary, Picture Book Review 0

The Seagull and the Sea Captain

by Sy Montgomery
illustrated by Amy Schimler-Safford

Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, 2022. 36 pages.
Review written June 8, 2022, from a library book

Science writer Sy Montgomery has taken a true story of a friendship between a herring gull and a sea captain and turned it into a sweet picture book.

The sea captain takes his family’s schooner out of Gloucester Harbor during the summer season. One day in 2013, a gull got some food from him, and he noticed that gull had a toe missing. The same gull has been visiting his boat ever since.

We’ve got details in the back and lots of interesting facts about gulls. Meanwhile, the picture book story imagines the perspectives of both the man and the gull. The story is quiet but lovely, telling of a connection between a man and a bird.

Here’s how the story part ends:

And now every summer, from May to October, Polly Five Toes joins the captain on his schooner almost every day. Often he even sits on the captain’s head! “That’s the best view,” explains the captain. Polly Five Toes enjoys the crackers, and also enjoys the view. But the best part, he agrees with the captain, is the journey together — because everything’s more fun with a friend.

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*Note* To try to catch up on posting reviews, I’m posting the oldest reviews I’ve written on my blog without making a page on my main website. They’re still good books.

Review of Gather, by Kenneth M. Cadow

Contemporary, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Gather

by Kenneth M. Cadow

Candlewick Press, 2023. 325 pages.
Review written June 26, 2024, from a library book.
2023 National Book Award Finalist
2024 Printz Honor Book
2024 Capitol Choices Selection
Starred Review

I finally got this book read a few days before I get to go to the Printz Award Ceremony and get to hear the author give his speech. I only wish I’d gotten around to it sooner.

In many ways this book reminded me of Demon Copperhead, by Barbara Kingsolver, as it is also about a poor kid living in rural America with a lot going against him. This book features a giant, lovable dog — a dog named Gather. Here’s how Ian, the sixteen-year-old narrator, explains his name:

I thought I’d name him Hunter at first, since he knew how to take care of himself. But since he was eating mostly vegetables he found on his own, well, that’s how I came to name him Gather.

Everyone who sees Gather offers up speculation as to what breed he might be, and it gets to be comical how few suggest the same thing. Gather’s a lovable dog who stays with Ian through everything.

The book opens in November with Ian’s mother’s friend bringing her back from the hospital. His mom has had trouble with drugs ever since she hurt her back and lost her job at the nursing home. Ian’s family has lived on this land for hundreds of years, and he used to go over it all with his Gramps. But Gram left after Gramps died, and then his dad left, and now it’s just Ian and his mother, who doesn’t have as much connection to the land as Ian does.

As they figure out ways to keep going, we learn that Ian can fix just about anything mechanical and has all kinds of savvy about things that aren’t taught in school. He goes to school, but has to drop off the basketball team to try to find a job. And while Ian goes around with Gather, helping people out, making money here and there, we learn about Ian and about his rural community. And when trouble comes, we understand how they all come together to help Ian, and we understand his heart.

Ian – whose name is short for Dorian Gray Henry – is one of those kids in literature that I just want to give a big hug. You come to appreciate what a great kid he is, but also how much is stacked against him. Reading this book, and spending time with Ian and Gather, is a treat.

candlewick.com

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Review of Carrimebac: The Town that Walked, by David Barclay Moore, illustrated by John Holyfield

Fantasy, Folk Tales, Historical, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 0

Carrimebac

The Town That Walked

by David Barclay Moore
illustrated by John Holyfield

Candlewick Press, 2022. 40 pages.
Review written May 25, 2022, from a library book
Starred Review

The flap of this picture book calls it an “original folk tale,” and I’m not sure if technically one person can make up a folk tale, but that’s the feeling this book gives, whether or not you bog down on the technicality.

This is the story of how a town of African Americans outwitted the “Fearful Folks” (who wear white hoods and carry torches) back in 1876.

And it’s all about a 100-year-old lady, Rootilla Redgums, and her peculiar grandson.

Rootilla brought magic to the town.

She taught them to weave rugs that never wore down, to fire or bake ceramic jugs that never emptied of sarsaparilla, and to carve wooden walking sticks that somehow never got you lost in the woods.

But the Fearful Folks who lived around the town believed the Blacks who lived there practiced magic.

Rootilla always used to say that she wasn’t magic.
But the things she made were . . .

The first night the Fearful Folks decided to attack, Rootilla thwarted them, turning their torches into cornstalks. But they were planning to come back, and that next morning, on her 100th birthday, Rootilla passed away. She asked her ten-year-old grandson to carry her back to where she came from.

The way he answered that request makes a tale where the whole town escapes — and now there’s a lake in its place, named Carrimebac in memory of the folks who lived there before.

This magical and folksy tale is delightful fun. It’s always good to hear a story about humble people victorious over those who want to oppress them. The beautifully painted illustrations add to the warm feelings the book brings.

davidbarclaymoore.com
johnholyfield.com

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Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but 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?

*Note* To try to catch up on posting reviews, I’m posting the oldest reviews I’ve written on my blog without making a page on my main website. They’re still good books.