Book Review: "The Silence of Bonaventure Arrow" by Rita Leganski

This is a beautiful story about a little boy endowed with a special ability that will save his family from their own painful secrets. Born without a voice, Bonaventure Arrow can hear everything, from the bayou grasses near his home in Bayou Cymbaline, to trees blowing in Arkansas, to penguins on the ice in Antarctica. But beyond that, Bonaventure can hear colors, feelings, faith; his mother's sorrow and guilt, his grandmother's shameful secrets, and his dead father speaking to him.  It is this special gift of hearing, combined with the help and guidance of a housekeeper who is more than she appears, that will allow Bonaventure to alleviate the pain of both the living and the dead.

The writing in this novel is superb, with creative descriptions of the sounds that might be made by things we cannot hear. For instance, the color red is described as sounding like trombones. The inventiveness in Bonaventure's communication, from extremely expressive facial expression when he is very small to learning sign and writing, is really something incredible. Additionally, the language in the story itself is beautiful as well as simple, creating the feeling of open affection for Bayou Cymbaline and its unique brand of southern culture. The words themselves, how they have been crafted together, is indicative of the characters' attitudes.

Religion, from voodoo and hoodoo to Catholicism and various revival churches, plays a large role in this story but skirts around the common problem of being preachy. Centered as it is in a place with such rich and varied cultural history, this novel takes full advantage of its location and Leganski does an incredible job of blending multiple religions and spiritual practices into (mostly) harmonious coexistence, focusing on their commonalities instead of their differences.

This book made me feel like a witness to something strange and beautiful happening to people outside of myself. I recommend this book to anyone who loves a creative story of monumental kindness and beauty and sweet selflessness that puts things back as they should be. Look for The Silence of Bonaventure Arrow, by Rita Leganski, in your favorite local bookstore starting in March of this year.

Book Review: "Calling Dr. Laura" by Nicole J. Georges

A few years ago I stumbled upon and enjoyed the first graphic memoir I ever read: "Fun Home," by Alison Bechdel. It remains a respected piece of queer literature about growing up to realize you are homosexual, and the challenges with both family and self-acceptance that a person in that situation can experience. Now Nicole J. Georges brings you the next generation in lesbian graphic memoirs with "Calling Dr. Laura."

Set in Portland, Oregon, Georges's book honors us with an honest look at her life and at her as a person: her anxiety about finding lasting love, questions about her paternity, being abused when she was a child, and her mother's cycles of emotional manipulation, anger, and affection. But these heavy topics are skillfully tempered by the presence of a real sense of humor and some pretty sweet moments. Georges seems to embrace the stereotypical image of a vegan, hipster lesbian living in Portland, as evidenced by her jokes about vegan food (peanut butter cups are the only reliable recipe in her vegan cookbook) and lesbian relationships ("What did the lesbian bring with her on the second date?"). There is also a lot of love for dogs and stray chickens that she lets into her life and her heart.

Part of what makes me think of this memoir as so honest is the open depiction of uncertainty with romance, family, and self-identity. But another aspect of that honesty that I really liked was the fact that Georges openly admits to listening to conservative advice radio shows, and enjoying them! This personality quirk turns out to be very important to Georges, forming a turning point in her life and underscoring the idea that being gay isn't as important as being a person.

I found the art in "Calling Dr. Laura" both enjoyable and interesting. It's done in black and white, with lots of shading. Depictions of memories and childhood experiences are drawn more simplistically, without lots of the gray tones that are evident in the rest of the story of her adult life. That adult life and more emotionally charged moments are done with more detail and more complex artwork, so that the more intense the moment, the more complex the drawings seemed to be.

The story ended a little bit abruptly for me, but Georges thoughtfully offers a q-and-a epilogue of sorts about the lack of closure for some of the issues presented in her story. If you love grapick memoirs, are looking to read your first one, or are interested in a good-hearted memoir that focuses more on family and self-acceptance than sexuality, I recommend "Calling Dr. Laura," by Nicole J. Georges. Look for it in  your favorite local, independently-owned bookstore as of last month.

Book Review: "The Archived" by Victoria Schwab

Ready for a teenage protagonist who will actively choose reason over drama while still managing to keep you on the edge of your seat? Enter Mackenzie Bishop, the badass girl around whom "The Archived," by Victoria Schwab, centers.

This is an awesome first installment of what is sure to be an exciting and creative young adult series. Mackenzie and her parents move into the Coronado, a hotel-turned-apartment complex with a mysterious past, as they try to move past the death of Mackenzie's younger brother Ben. But in addition to family tragedy and relocation, Mackenzie is dealing with another strain on her time that actually keeps her from moving away from Ben's death: she is a Keeper, working for the mysterious Archive, in which all Histories of the dead are kept and tended to by Librarians. If one of the Histories awakes and escapes into the Narrows, a labyrinthine borderland between the Archive and the outside world, it is Mackenzie's job to find them and use one of the myriad doors there to get them to Returns, where they are safely put back into the Archive. 

As she settles into her new Keeper territory at the Coronado, Mackenzie discovers that the apartments have a bloody, violent past that tugs at her morbid sense of curiosity. Her pursuit of the building's history combined with a new friend (who also happens to be a Keeper) and a strange person who appears to be living in the Narrows is a recipe for all sorts of teenage angst and hair-pulling. Refreshingly though, Mackenzie's character displays a stoic pragmatism that feels more realistic than over-the-top teenage love drama in the context of her job as a Keeper. However, this compartmentalization of her emotions doesn't prevent the reader from empathizing and connecting with her. It even, to me, made her more relatable, especially when the walls of her neat little compartments start coming down and she finds herself having to deal with both of her separate worlds at once. 

Reminiscent of Garth Nix and the "Abhorsen" trilogy, Schwab has created a new and very clever representation of death and what happens beyond that veil. as well as who will look after us. Mackenzie's character takes that role very seriously, giving her friend Wes (also a Keeper) ample opportunities to foil her sometimes dour demeanor with intelligent jokes and melodramatic humor. He never fails to make Mackenzie (or me) smile.

If you're ready for a strong female protagonist not so easily swept off her feet and away from her responsibilities to others, if you liked the "Abhorsen" books, or if you're just ready for a creative new look at death, I very highly recommend "The Archived" by Victoria Schwab. I warn you, however, that upon finishing the book you may find yourself madly refreshing Schwab's website, searching her website for the release date of the next installment. "The Archived" hit shelves at your favorite independent bookstore on January 22nd. 

Book Review: "The Demonologist" by Andrew Pyper

Andrew Pyper's latest book caught my eye originally as I was browsing through a stack of ARCs because the criminal suspense is centered around Milton's "Paradise Lost." Literary geek that I am, I had to pick it up and see what it had to offer.

                

The protagonist, Professor David Ullman, is a scholar of religious texts, particularly of Milton, although he is not a religious man himself. Trapped in a black hole of a marriage with his daughter Tess the only bright point in his life, Ullman is suddenly approached by a mysterious woman representing a benefactor who wants to fly him to Venice. Why? To witness and weigh in on an undisclosed phenomenon relating to his work as a "demonologist," as the representative puts it. After initially saying no, Ullman takes Tess with him on what he thinks will be a relaxing, all-expenses-paid consulting trip to Italy. Alas, there would be no story if this were the case.  When he finds his way to the mysterious house in which he is to witness the phenomenon, Ullman finds himself face-to-face with a demon who wants him to be a witness to its presence. This meeting heralds the beginning of a desperate search for Tess, taken by the unnamed demon, all across the United States with a hired assassin pursuing him and a cancer-ridden best friend as his only copilot.

               

While it was an overall okay suspense novel with an interesting premise, I expected a little bit more of Milton than was presented. "Paradise Lost" was used to identify the demon and his purpose in choosing Ullman, his motivations and his weakness. Ullman also used it to find clues about where to go in search of Tess, but these quotes and clips were taken completely out of context of the original work, some of them requiring such great leaps of thinking (see the one about Florida) that they were almost pointless. Pyper might have more easily just said "Hey, let's have them randomly decide to go visit Jacksonville." The purpose of this interstate trip, when revealed at the end, doesn't excuse the sheer obscurity, almost randomness, of the journey itself.

The reader and Ullman are both told that Tess will be lost forever if he cannot save her within a certain time limit, but never once did the protagonist express any sort of clue as to how he was supposed to get her back. I imagine that this would be the more realistic representation of a father whose child has been taken: desperately following cobweb-thin clues, running around half-lost and confused. This is probably a more realistic representation than the persona of the Bold Hero who knows exactly what he's doing, but it somehow seemed to detract a sense of urgency from the writing.

SPOILER ALERT: After all that work, all that self-discovery and desperation, not to mention what gas must have cost him, Tess is magically returned to Ullman and everything is fine? He just gets on a train at the instruction of his dead friend, who is an angel, and Tess is there waiting for him. This ending screams "Just believe in God and everything will instantly be okay!" It's like the Book of Job rewritten for the modern era, only instead of getting new children Ullman has his used model back again.

If you like supernatural crime novels with no romance (sorry, "Twilight" and "Fallen" fans) give "The Demonologist" a try. Andrew Pyper's latest will be at your favorite independently owned bookstore in March of this year. Also expect to see a book-based movie by Universal Studios. 

Hey, Bibliophiles!

Want to give away 20 copies of an awesome book to strangers? Apply to be a Giver for World Book Day in April! It's simple, it's free, and it's a really neat idea. If you're interested, which you should be (because come on, when was the last time YOU were handed a free book that wasn't a Bible?) be sure to sign up by January 23rd. Just go to the link below:

World Book Night USA

Children's Fantasy: "Lily the Silent" by Tod Davies

Holy social commentary, Batman! Literature has a long history of being used to teach morals and social values, ancient Greek plays and Aesop's Fables coming most notably to mind. Add to that list Tod Davies's new book "The History of Arcadia: Lily the Silent," especially if you're looking to brainwash your children into an extreme left-wing way of thinking long before they're registering to vote.

In this children's book, the beautiful Lily (who will one day be queen) is taken from her peaceful homeland of Arcadia when soldiers from the wasteful and proud Megalopolis invade her country. Taken with her faithful dog Rex to a children's mine, she is eventually noticed by a handsome but spineless socialite and brought into the upper crust of Megalopolitan society. But Lily turns out to be there for another reason: the most prominent socialites know that their used-up land is close to destruction, thanks to a mystical book they found on the moon and an angel that they captured and tortured. Lily, they discovered, is the key to stopping a great cataclysm. They send her into the sea to retrieve a mystical key from mermaids, but when she returns to land, she tricks the socialites and leaves Megalopolis, leading a vast number of women and children into the mountains ahead of a tidal wave that wipes out the rest of the jeering, mocking city. From there Lily leads everyone through a harsh winter in the mountains, has a baby, and brings them all into Arcadia, where she becomes queen.

...WTF?

This was a really random-ass book. Aside from that, something that stood out for me was that it didn't really "show" the reader at all; rather, it "told" everything in more of a "first this happened. And then this happened. But really it was like this," instead of being able to create an image of events through the writing. But as awkward as that sounds, it has the feel of a folktale to it, which fits neatly with the written-by-a-bard thing. The simplistic writing style also makes this a good children's book, without too many complicated writing techniques.

But content? Holy crap. I'm not at all afraid or ashamed to say that I am a very politically liberal person. But Davies overloads this story with an incredible number of black-and-white social critiques of our modern age. There are the general themes of resource management, environmental protection and sustainability, yes. But it doesn't stop there. Davies goes on to condemn video games, blonde people, social media and large-breasted women, equating them purely with Megalopolis and expressing wonder on Lily's behalf at how different things are in Arcadia (which, we can assume, is full of only small-chested brunettes who worship the frequently-referenced Goddess). So much for the image of an idyllic, inclusive society accepting of all people.

Honestly, unless you're raising your kid to be the next extreme leftist nut job who is mostly laughed at but occasionally gets hours on a liberal radio station in the wee hours of the morning, I wouldn't recommend this book to anyone. Nope, no one. And I'm pretty sure that's a first for me. Just in case you want to see what I mean when I say this is a terrible book though, Tod Davies's book "The History of Arcadia: Lily the Silent" came out in October. I suggest you check it out from your local library, and avoid wasting your money on purchasing a copy. 

Steampunk Fiction: "The Dark Unwinding" by Sharon Cameron

Love clockwork and steam punk stories of Victorian England? This, dear reader, is a book for you. Sharon Cameron's first novel is a great adventure full of quirky characters, first love, a detestable villain and a young woman coming into her own.

A 17-year-old orphan entirely dependent upon her entitled aunt's charity, Katherine Tulman is sent from London to her uncle's rural Stranwyne Keep one summer. The occasion, however, is no holiday. Katherine has been charged by her aunt with testifying to her uncle's insanity so that Katherine's useless lump of a cousin can inherit the estate, after a lengthy stewardship by her aunt, of course. But when Katherine arrives at Stranwyne, instead of the Bedlam she expects, she finds a thriving community that wouldn't exist without her uncle's harmless, if unorthodox, way of life. Katherine must make the decision to risk her own position in her aunt's household or betray Stranwyne Keep's inhabitants in a setup that feels familiar but not old.

The writing style is easy to read and Katherine's plight creates a real connection to the reader, especially when you get the feeling that some characters know more about the truth than either Katherine or the reader does. This ties closely into the time period (namely in regards to strained relations between England and post-Napoleon France) and gives rise to the emergence of a good old mystery in the midst of the other plot lines, blended and intertwined to perfection. I'll be the first to admit that I thought the culprit was someone different than I expected, and I've read a number of clockwork mysteries in my time.

The only gripe I have about the story's outcome is that Davy's implication isn't entirely clear to me regarding motivation. Passing details, though, that could have poked holes in the plot were tied up quite neatly, leaving a large sense of unfinished business to imply an intended sequel, which I for one hope will be forthcoming sooner rather than later.

Ask your independently-owned local bookseller for a copy of Sharon Cameron's "The Dark Unwinding" now.