Review: Life as We Knew It. by Susan Beth Pfeffer

book 4 of 4 for the It's The End of the World 2009 Challenge
book 5 of 12 for the YA Challenge 2009
genre: ya/apocalypitc
rating: 5/5

I've read many post-apocalyptic books - books that take place long after some sort of giant disaster that has changed the way the world and everyone on it functions. While I am a huge fan of these books, I am an even bigger fan of apocalyptic books - the ones where we actually watch the characters who are in the thick of that disaster - the ones where the characters have to cope with, first of all, not dying in the initial tragedy, but also coming to grips with the new "real" that exists afterwards.

Life As We Knew It is one of these second kind of books. High schooler Miranda and the rest of the world are excited about the fact that an asteroid is going to hit the moon - what an event! Except, no one counted on the impact knocking the moon out of its orbit, and the resulting changes on the earth make for some pretty apocalyptic times. Crazy tides, wild weather - and survival is the name of the game. Miranda's life in a remote suburb gives them more options than most and the fact that she's got a tight-knit family surrounding her to help out makes a big difference, too.

The story is told through Miranda's diary and the author got her tone and "teenage-ness" just right. Her frustrations and concerns, so limited to her small circle of experience, felt authentic - as did all the disastrous happenings - I just believed it all. To be completely truthful, this book scared the pants off me, its terrifying plausibility made me want to run to the store and buy them out of canned goods and firewood. It's horrifying to imagine what we would really all do in such a situation, what resources we would have to help us to survive. I couldn't put this book down and the only real problem with Life As We Knew It is that once you've started reading it, you can't get it out of your head.

Review: The Chosen One by Carol Lynch Williams

genre: young adult
rating: 5/5

A sequestered life - a "chosen" people, Kyra's family life is guided by the revelations of the "prophet." It's the prophet who decides what wives will marry and belong to each man and it's the prophet and his "God Squad" who help enforce God's laws and dispense holy discipline as necessary.

This way of life - one father and many mothers - was Kyra's only experience until two chance meetings open her eyes to the beauty that life has to offer. As she tries to reconcile her absolute love for her parents and siblings with her "sinful" desires, she discovers something her 13 years have not prepared her for: she has been chosen to marry her father's brother.

Her instincts and the traditions of her family clash in this fantastically gripping and horrifying look at a fundamentalist cult. I fully believed Kyra's voice as an early teen - her frustration and the depth of her emotion. I even could relate to and pity her father and mothers, their blind belief in the prophet and his work - the book is that well written. Whether or not you are a fan of young adult fiction, this suspenseful novel of polygamist life will knock your socks off.

Review: Gifts by Ursula K. Le Guin

book 4 for the Once Upon a Time III Challenge
genre: fantasy
rating: 4/5

Not everyone in the Uplands has a gift - a special and specific ability - but those who do are revered and feared, depending on what their gift is. The men in Orrec's family are to be able to, with a wave of their hand and a look from their gifted eyes, to destroy whatever they see. For Orrec, though, this kind of gift seems more like a curse and he chooses to blindfold himself and live as though he were blind instead of unintentionally destroying those that the loves. With the help of a childhood friend named Gry, Orrec sorts through his feelings while trying to decide what life holds for him.

This was an engaging read. I like the idea of "gifts, " it felt very fleshed out and Orrec is a sympathetic character. I appreciated his struggle and there is a nice theme of the power of books and the spoken word. It took me way longer than I wanted it to for me to keep names and places straight, though, which was a bit frustrating. I wish I had gotten to know Gry a bit better, she's an intriguing character, but overall I really did like this. It would probably be great for a young adult book group - there could be a lot to discuss.

Review: The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows

genre: fiction
rating: 5/5

A small island in the English Channel, recently liberated from German Occupation. A smart-alecky authoress in war-torn London who is searching for something fresh to write about. A hidden roast pig. A group of eclectic islanders who get together to discuss literature.

I am telling you, put these elements together and you get one of the most pleasant and entertaining reads I have enjoyed for a long time. It's a story of surviving a war and putting your life back together afterward. It's about the thrill of new friendships and the joy of old ones. It's about finding the beauty in a horrible situation and the people we meet that change the way we live our lives.

I don't want to tell you anything else because it was such a pleasure to discover on its own. Except, I do want to say that it's written in epistolary style, is as clever and witty as it could possibly be and that I wouldn't change a thing about it. If I could give it six stars, I would. If I could have these characters for my own neighbors, that would be even better.

Review: The Wish Maker by Ali Sethi

book 7 of 10 for the Orbis Terrarum Challenge
genre: fiction
rating: 3.5/5

Docile Zaki and beautiful Samar. Cousins in Pakistan, living together in the home of Zaki's grandmother and mother. Zaki lives in this woman's world, growing up as a modern Pakistan emerges. The political situation is active yet tenuous and Zaki's mother's involvement is seen through the eyes of the young and provide a unique perspective of Pakistan during the era of Pakistan's first and only female prime minister, Benazir Bhutto.

The politics and religious life of Pakistanis are a constant backdrop throughout this multi generational story. The life of our protagonist Zaki is mingled with the stories of his mother, grandmother, great-auntie and father. While I liked the different view of Pakistan that these tangents presented, I sometimes felt that the transitions between the present and the past and back again were sudden and choppy. They also made the plot move forward slowly for me, which isn't always a bad thing but sometimes I got bogged down. It took me a long time to finish because it took me so long to get engaged enough to want to pick it up. I will say, however, that these views added depth to my knowledge of not just the members of his family (and why they made the choices they did), but also of Pakistani history, capturing the experiences of many different types of people.

Despite the slowness of the pace, this book is beautifully written. Sethi has a strong sense of aesthetics and lyricism. Small expressions would so perfectly capture an emotion or an action. Instead of saying, for example, that two women sat down to catch up, Sethi says, "They sat in the garden...pouring from vats of recently acquired experience." I love that image! He was also surprisingly good at knowing how teenage girls would respond or act in certain situations - I believed his character's behavior, even when I didn't like it. I felt like the relationship between the cousins could have been more fleshed out, but I still liked the idea of their closeness.

The Wish Maker is a coming of age story. A story of wishes and lost dreams and of a boy and his a country on the brink of finding themselves.