Is This Book Okay For My Kid?

Even for someone who works in the book industry, it's impossible to stay up-to-date on every new book that comes out. This is a particular concern with children's and young adult literature, since many parents are concerned with whether a given book will be appropriate, subject-wise as well as regarding reading level, for their children. Common Sense Media has a great resource that you can find here that lists books that have been estimated to be suitable for each age group. Additionally book reviews, star ratings and parental commentary are all featured in an easily readable format that will let you either browse for something a young person might like, or look up a particular book in which they've shown interest. Take a look and get some new ideas for a great read or three as the summer winds down!

The College FYE Reading Assignment

In a lot of colleges and universities across the country, part of the Freshman Year Experience is reading a single book, distributed to all incoming Freshmen across campus, regardless of discipline. This book is discussed in different classes over the first quarter especially, examining it from multiple perspectives in an exercise designed to not only give students some sense of unity and commonality, having all read this as an introduction to college life, but to connect classes to one another and introduce students to the kind of analysis and exploration that will be their future in academia.

Communities also often get involved in campus-wide reads, and author visits are not uncommon as part of the large discussion. Books from Science to novels are selected, often by individual schools, to be featured as student reading. NPR has put together a sample list of some of what is being featured for these kinds of programs. You can check it out here.

Book Review: "Warm Bodies" by Isaac Marion

I normally detest zombie books.

Yeah, part of it is that they're scary and often gory as well. But more than that, I'm just not particularly interested in this brand of the undead. In most of these stories, zombies appear in either a global apocalypse or a small-town nightmare, wander around and moan, eat a few brains, and then are either repelled by a small, desperate group of survivors or triumph, and wander the undead earth forevermore, longing for more brains.

I picked up "Warm Bodies" by Isaac Marion because a coworker said it was her favorite book. She described to me the humor, the insight, the sentiment behind it and then actually let me borrow her loaner copy. Yup, she has a loner copy. That's how much she likes this book. So I read it. And I'll admit, I was skeptical at the beginning. I'd heard about the movie version of this, and had it branded as a sort of zombie "Twilight," teen romance meets necrophilia. While this novel hasn't made me want to go out and play HvZ, it took me by surprise and has challenged some of the assumptions I made about the zombie concept in general.

First of all, this book is hilarious. It's written from the perspective of R, a zombie. When you fall victim to the plague, which everyone does unless someone is good enough to destroy their brain on death, you forget everything. Your name, your memories, even how to read. R begins the story by describing how deeply unsatisfying his (un)existence as a zombie is, wandering around the airport that is the hub of zombie activity in the area. When they get hungry, they go into the city in hunting parties to find and devour human refugees from the huge, reinforced stadium that has become humanity's last bastion of the living. R is profoundly unimpressed with his own existence. He's not content to just moan and shamble any more. So he tries getting married, but even that is a hollow mockery of the meaning he's really looking for.

Then he meets Julie. Or rather, he eats Perry. When he consumes the brain of Julie's boyfriend on an ill-fated (for the humans) salvage trip, R falls completely in love with Julie. The problem? He doesn't know quite what that means or feels like any more. So he kidnaps her, disguises her as a zombie and keeps her with him at the airport for a while. During that time they get to know one another a little bit better, and R finds that parts of Perry's personality are integrating themselves into him. The resulting story is one of the struggle against hopelessness, towards acceptance and the desire to make the world a better place for everyone. It's also a retelling of Romeo and Juliet, which made for some interesting "aha!" moments.

While the story was entertaining, it wasn't particularly inspired. The hypothesized source of the zombie plague, discussed by Julie toward the end of the book, is pretty trite. But it fits in well with the rest of the book. Similarly, the apparent solution and cure for the plague is equally unimaginative and too sappy for me. What actually made this book a great read was R and his introspection. He's honest and matter-of-fact about his own presence and its influence on others, as well as his perceptions of the lackluster (un)life he's (un)living. He discusses the sick parodies of life that take place around him, including zombie sex, which he compares with slapping two dead chickens together. R's connection to Julie both confuses and galvanizes him, leading him to grasp toward more and reject the notion that he will spend eternity as just another one of the shambling masses.

One of my favorite aspects of R was the fact that he challenged the binary concept of life and death. He's (un)dead, but still retains enough of himself to question the point of his semi-existence and wonder after more meaning. Perry, on the other hand, was still physically alive but had lost the will to live or the ability to keep hoping for salvation, for humanity's victory. They make an interesting pair, and Julie's hopefulness is a beacon for R's returning humanity as well as a wake-up call to Perry about what he gave up.

Read this novel if, like me, you're a zombie skeptic. It's got humor, insight, and refreshingly real characters who will make you consider what humanity means, what we need and where we're going. It's been around for a while, so odds are good that you can find a copy of "Warm Bodies" today at your favorite local, independent bookstore.

Rankings of Classic YA Female Protagonists

This list of 20 classic female YA protagonists claims to have them "ranked." We're not told by what criteria, but by reading through the list one can infer that the ranking is based on, in the colloquial, "badassery." Independence, intelligence, capacity for taking action on one's own intellectually and creatively seem to be the common factors in the high-ranking protagonists, along with a certain sense of quirkiness unique to their specific books.

I'm not sure if it's fair to rank these protagonists and the books to which they belong as "better" or "worse" than one another. After all, while they're all considered "classic" they come from a wide variety of time periods where different standards were the social norm. I'm not saying that in 1913 (when "Pollyanna" was first published) every girl should have wanted to be like her; rather, it's what people expected to see in YA novels "for girls." Once 1979 rolled around it was more acceptable to present young women as they really are: awkward, out of sorts, dissatisfied, creative, brilliant, and fantastic.

So perhaps instead of being a ranked list, this collection of protagonists should be considered a scale of the traditional representation of female domesticity, or a representation of blandest to quirkiest. One might even base some sort of measure of likeability on how closely the protagonists on the list conform to our modern ideal of what being a young woman should be all about. However you choose to view it, enjoy this collection of 20 very different female protagonists from classic YA literature.

Book Review: "Made You Up" by Francesca Zappia

Speculative Fiction is all about the question "What if?" It's about taking things that are unreal in our world and putting them somewhere that they can exist, with the words on the page or screen as the portal between worlds. Sometimes, the unreality of a situation lies not in the setting or the mythical creatures, advanced technology and magic, but rather in the perspective of the characters themselves. We call these characters "unreliable narrators" because what they tell us cannot be trusted as true. However, in many cases it's this unreliability that makes their stories so compelling and beautiful.

That's definitely the case in "Made You Up," a young adult novel by Francesca Zappia. Main character Alex is starting her senior  year in high school. Years ago she was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, and she's learned tips and tricks in addition to taking her medication that help her to differentiate between hallucinations and reality, like consulting a Magic 8 Ball at work, perimeter checks whenever she enters a room, and taking photos with her digital camera. If the questionable images are still there later when she looks at them, then they were real. She'll be attending a new high school, after a psychotic break and some unfortunate graffiti necessitated her leaving her old school. Alex is doing much better now though. She has a job as a waitress, she's applying to colleges, nobody at East Shoal High School knows her secret, and she even has a friend named Tucker. If she can just make it through this year, she'll be out. She'll be okay.

As part of her community service for her graffiti incident, Alex is placed in a student club that does volunteer prep work for East Shoal's athletic events. In charge of that club is Miles, a social outcast and possible evil genius who reminds Alex uncannily of her first hallucination when she was very young. Tucker warns her to stay away from Miles, but eventually their quirks bring them together. Between her sometimes overprotective mother, her younger sister Charlie, her coping mechanisms and the friendships she starts to develop, Alex thinks the year is going okay. But one night on the way home from a party she has a break in front of Miles. Her secret revealed, she's forced to depend on him more than she'd like to make sure her new school doesn't turn on her the way her old one did. In addition, one of the school's queen bees gets involved in the club and there's something strange going on with the principal and the school's athletic score board. Just when things should be getting better, with a "normal" life and "normal" high school issues, Alex starts to fall apart. She's used to being "crazy"; it's the normalcy that might make her unravel.

Zappia put together a really, truly wonderful novel about someone whose brain just doesn't work the same way as everyone else's, and how rewarding and difficult it can be to finally see some of their world meshing. But she also shows how difficult and frustrating it can be when a person has to ignore what their senses are telling them exists, like a phoenix that lives in your neighborhood or a boy who reminds you of your first hallucination. Alex's character is especially beautiful because it's the little everyday things that make her question her own sanity. She knows she has to be aware of her triggers and her surroundings, knows that some of what she sees isn't real and knows to take care of herself to avoid the same sort of incident that took place at her old school. But as the author points out (brilliantly, I might add) it's not always as easy as knowing that there isn't really a python hanging out of the school ceiling.

This book is the perfect blend of self-discovery and acceptance, young romance, mystery and tough stuff. It starts out as a journey of self-acceptance for Alex and morphs into a budding romance mixed with trying to figure out what's going on with a cheerleader queen and the creepy school principal, and what they have to do with Miles and the athletic club. The two main parts of the story morphed so wonderfully into one another though that it didn't feel like separate issues. Alex isn't the only one learning how she interacts best with the world around her; Miles and Tucker are evolving with her, as is her relationship with her family members. And the evolution doesn't follow a rote script; characters react to events as they unfold, leaves in a stream, instead of being the ones dictating what "should" happen next in the story.

I wasn't entirely satisfied with the end of the book. While I thought Alex made the right choice for her, it wasn't clear that she was the one in charge of what happened next in her life. And the confrontation with the principal seemed a little too black-versus-white, good-versus-evil for a book that did such a great job of blurring the lines between perception and reality. It made me feel like there are "good" kinds of mental illness and "bad" kinds, where in my experience with them there are really just different ways that they manifest. Some coping mechanisms and treatments are obviously much healthier than others, but nothing has inherent value; it's all about how a given person's brain works or doesn't in different situations.

Despite what I thought were shortcomings at the story's end, I enjoyed this book from start to finish. It's written with incredible voice and sensitivity, and what turns out to be real or imaginary in Alex's world isn't what you thought it would be. That's what makes this truly a realistic representation of what things are like for Alex and people like her who deal with different kinds of mental illness that impact their perception of reality. This is one of my favorite YA books to come out this year, and if you're looking for a spellbinding writing style with a main character who will really get under your skin and into your heart, pick up this book. It's witty, it's clever, it's funny, endearing, heartbreaking and encouraging by turns. In other words, it's the complete package and better yet it's available now at your favorite local, independent bookstore.

Motivational Quotes to Keep You Writing

I'll freely admit that I've been in a writing slump lately. I'm working full-time, planning for an interstate move this September, and getting my metaphorical ducks in a row to start my Master's program the same month. Any spare time I have, I've been wanting to spend outside in the summer sunshine and packing in as many adventures and memories with loved ones as I possibly can.

But as many successful writers have observed, one of the most reliable ways to really get your writing out there is to build up the habit of writing every day. Persistence and output will pay off eventually, if you can get over that enormous hurdle of Just Keep Writing.

There are some great resources I've found to help me get back on my writing, committing myself to it and remembering exactly why it is that I do it: I love it. Foremost among them is my friendship with other writers, because the support and encouragement that they've given me, asking if I wrote today and having monthly check-ins on progress, is invaluable. Additionally, I've found things like this collection of quotes, compiled in April, from amazing writers on why they write, and about why it's important to keep writing. Take a look, be inspired, and keep on writing!

Book Review: "The Water Knife" by Paolo Bacigalupi

Paolo Bacigalupi is probably best-known for his Sci-Fi masterpiece "The Windup Girl," which was awarded both the Hugo and the Nebula awards when it was released in 2009. It's the kind of mindblowingly awesome writing that knocks your socks off, then dances around gleefully with them because you both know that you're never getting them back. I wasn't as impressed with his YA novels, like "The Doubt Factory," but Bacigalupi's most recent work "The Water Knife" features the same kind of intricate plots and razor's edge circumstances that earned "The Windup Girl" such acclaim.

Set in the American southwest, "The Water Knife" evokes a possible near future in which aquifers are all but dry, and the new corporate power players broker deals for water rights in the dwindling Colorado River. The richest can afford luxury apartments in Chinese-built facilities that function as their own ecosystems, with a 90% recycle rate that makes them nearly self-sufficient. But outside, the world is dying around them. With his signature usage of modern-day issues and intricate plot intersections, the author brings together three very different characters who will end by determining the fate of the dying city of Phoenix. Angel is a "water knife," an enforcer for the most famous and ruthless water baron in the southwest; Lucy is a journalist from the East Coast who moved to Phoenix for a story and "went native"; Maria is a teenage girl desperate to get out of Phoenix, hoping that her hard work and playing by the rules will earn her eventual salvation north of the Arizona border.

Part of what makes Bacigalupi's work such a compulsive read is the balance of hope and dread that he maintains throughout. The desperate settings for his best work both fascinate and horrify, because they really are potential future disasters that the Human Race may have to face. In fact much of the foundation for the situation in "The Water Knife" is based on a real book that also appears in the story, "Cadillac Desert" by Marc Reisner. The reader's investment in the outcome of the story is tied directly to the idea that this could very well be a part of our near future.

While engaging, this is not necessarily a fast-paced novel; all three characters make progress in their independent quests, but it doesn't even begin to become clear how those intersect until half-way through the book. The characters don't even all meet until the very end. Overall it's a very rewarding setup, based mainly on character development, to make your way through as a reader. It has all the apparent coincidence and "light bulb moments" of a real-life human interaction. However, this also means that it may be more of a challenging read for people who enjoy more fast-paced, mile-a-minute Sci-Fi.

Character development follows a similar gradual route for Angel, the one for whom the book is named. He begins the story as just another badass enforcer with rubber-stamped legal documents in hand, backed up by elite military forces. But he's changed by betrayal, by seeing the city and its residents up close, and by ending up on the other end of a water baron's wrath. it sounds like a stereotypical transformation, but it's the way in which Angel's character is written that makes  him more than just another redeemed antagonist; it's the sheer weight of events, of what he's pushing himself to do and the disaster around him, that eventually get to him. This is represented brilliantly by the ghost who haunts him with the warning refrain that those who live by the gun will also die by it.

Lucy is a marvelous foil for Angel, hardened to stone in her convictions where he begins to question his, her ideas of what should be right and what should be wrong her only anchor in a place where the normal rules don't seem to apply. She even observes in herself that she's become one of the Phoenix residents in spirit as well as body, that she came for story and found a home for which she's compelled to fight. Maria's story is more like the opposite of Angel's, a coming of age in which she is shown extreme cruelties and faces unimaginable odds, and still tries to get herself out by following the rules in which she no longer believes. They're just what she was taught to follow. She loses literally everything: her family, her income, her home, her best friend, even her virginity in her fight to get out. And in the end, that's all she has left to live for. There seems to be nothing that Phoenix cannot take from her, and it's unclear whether she has the strength or the conviction to fight back, and how she even could.

The end of this book is absolutely perfect. As the climax resolves, Bacigalupi sets up for a traditional good-versus-evil outcome, with the old-school vision of what *should* be the right thing poised to take control. But intervention comes from possibly the least likely source in a delightful twist that sent shivers down my spine and reminded me once and for all that the world we see through the window of "The Water Knife" is not our own. Yet.

"The Water Knife" was released at the beginning of this month and can be purchased now at your favorite local, independent bookstore. I highly recommend it!