Review: North of Beautiful by Junstina Headley

genre: young adult

When you finish a book and you actually, literally, get chills and tears at the same time, THAT'S a good book.

Terra has the perfect look, if not for the port-wine stain birthmark on half of her face. Between that and her overbearing father, she's dug a hold inside herself and sh
oved in what she really wants and how she really feels: her college plans, her love of art - those things have a hard time rising to the surface because Terra's so afraid of what the world around her thinks when they see her.

But all it takes is one person to challenge everything you know about yourself, and Terra's new acquaintance Jacob somehow keeps stripping loose the pieces of Terra that have been hidden for years.

My sister told me it was amazing, and to be honest, it took me a little while to get into the groove of it. I didn't know why she raved so much until I got about half way through. Not only does it chip at the core of what we (especially as young women) view when we see ourselves in the mirror, it also touches on what we need from the people around us - and what we have the right to ask for. I had no idea of where this book was going to take me, and while one conflict in particular I saw coming, the rest I didn't. The only flaw, to me, is that every once and a while the dad seemed a little one dimensional to me, but I was so enthralled with how it affected the story, I was able to let it slip on by.

I love that it wasn't just about Terra and her looks. It went so much deeper, into standing up for yourself, resisting abuse, loving your family, embracing creativity, opening yourself to being loved. Throw in some geocaching and some amazing map-metaphors for life, and you've got yourself a serious winner.

review: The Memory Thief by Rachel Keener

genre: adult fiction
source: publicist

When Angel sets fire to the trailer that was her home and escapes into the surrounding tobacco fields, her greatest hope is for a chance to tell the story to the person she believes is out there waiting for her. The few trinkets she takes with her are the remnants of her past that pack the punches of the hurt she's endured. And while Angel is at the crux of our story, we also meet Hannah, the daughter of two missionaries. Her incredibly strict upbringing as a long-skirted "Holy Roller" doesn't prepare her for for her sixteenth summer on the Carolina coast, where suddenly all the rules she was taught fly in the face of the joy she discovers.

What is the relationship between these two people? It didn't long to figure it out, but I loved the mystery of discovering the intricacies of how it happened and how it would resolve itself in the end. There is so much deception, so many heartbreaks - everyone in this book is hurting. Usually that would make a book drag and depress me, but somehow, THIS one didn't. Angel's "trailer trash" upbringing, Hannah's way of dealing with her choices, it made for such interesting reading - I believed it. I believed their pain and their different ways of suffering it. I ached for Angel and her tobacco field solace.

This book just flows, not always in a straight line - we keep switching plots until finally things converge, but I never felt lost in the shuffle. I let myself get carried away by their grief, hoping at some point that things would resolve. And even though I would've liked a tiny bit more at the end, I also see why it works perfectly. I'm giving this book my "comfy nest" award because it's been a good long time since I've read such a harsh story that was written with such grace.

The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate by Jacqueline Kelly

genre: middle grade literature

Oh, this one is a gem. A glorious turn-of-the-century story of a precocious Texan girl who finds inside herself a passion for living things. Being of the female persuasion, and a bright one to boot, Calpurnia doesn't excel at those things a genteel mother would want her only girl out of seven children to excel at. But, slowly, the magical relationship that grows between her and one member of her family will teach her the thrill of the natural world and a longing to observe and discover.

I LOVED this piece of historical fiction. I loved her coming of age - that long for change but need for stability. I loved this picture of Texas and its 1899 culture and I appreciated how Kelly explored some of the deeper issues of womanhood and the place of women at the time. I loved that it made me excited to look out my window and remember what treasures the world has to offer us. It's hopeful and vibrant, funny and charming. Two thumbs up from me.

Giant by Edna Ferber

genre: fiction

I finished this sweeping novel of Texas while on an airplane, bound for my first visit to that great state. I had earlier sent a call out to my friends, asking what one should read before one's first trip to Texas, and when I saw that this suggestion was written by the author of So Big, a novel I loved, I knew I'd found a winner.

I was right.

Giant is absolutely a tale of Texas in the earlier part of this century, shortly after the Great War. It's a tale of ranches and cattle, dust and mesquite, Mexicans and Americans. We learn Texas history, geography and lore through the eyes of Leslie, a Virginian, the new bride of the famous rancher Bick Benedict. Leslie is a thinker, a talker, a reader - thirsty for knowledge and meaning, and constantly driving her husband crazy with her endless questioning.

I loved this book as a study of a marriage - East married to West, a thinking woman and a hard-working man and how they try to find a place of harmony in the land that he's crazy about and she's trying to fit herself into without loosing the woman that she is.

Ferber is a master at her art, the writing is of the kind that I read with a pen in hand, reading phrases and paragraphs twice to let the beauty of an idea or description really sink in. Sometimes it reminded me vaguely of Austen, some of the characters caricatures of the embittered old ranch madama, the rancher's daughter, the clucking hordes of unthinking cattle wives and the Stetson headed county commissioner. But, like in Austen, it rings true and gives and interesting offset and comparison to the main characters.

Okay, I'm gushing. I loved it. The beginning confused me a bit with lots of characters, but after a few chapters we go back in time to an earlier part of the story and I loved piecing it all together. If I wasn't already on my way to that state, I'd want to be.

Review: Lost by Jacqueline Davies

genre: young adult historical fiction

I have a mild obsession with immigrant stories from the turn of the century, especially those where the immigrants lived on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, so when the cover of this book caught my eye and I read the flap, I knew I wanted to try it.

Essie and her family have already had their share of heartbreak. When we meet her, her father has recently passed away and her mother is giving birth to a second sibling for Essie. This baby, born when Essie is 10, becomes the child of her heart and the impetus for much of what she does. The text goes back and forth between telling the story of the present and dairy entries of the past - so the book is like a puzzle, trying to figure out the tragic something that we're pretty sure happened to Essie at some point.

And in the present? Essie works at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory - you know the one? Fascinating and miserable, so we get a picture of immigrant workers living on the edge, willing to grind themselves to the bone so they don't loose their place and the few pennies that come from their backbreaking work. You get a real sense of the frantic pace of that workplace, the constant fear. Not just that, but you get a real sense of the entire Lower East Side, the street vendors and fire escapes, the neighborhood interactions, tenement living and the struggle of living hand to mouth in a city that seems to pit itself against your best efforts. Add to that a mysterious girl recently hired at the shirtwaist factory and Essie's distinct impression that she doesn't quite belong -and you've got one wallop of a book.

Lost is such a fitting title - each person is characterized in some way by that one word, either they have lost a someone, lost their dignity, their purpose, or lost their ability to exercise their free will. Beautifully written and painfully real, the ending wrapped things up a bit nicely, but after all Essie'd been through, honestly, I just felt like she deserved it.
4 of 25 for the 2010 young adult challenge

Review: Genesis by Bernard Beckett

genre: ya dystopian

book 2 of 25 for the Young Adult Reading Challenge
book 2 of 2 for the YA Dystopian Reading Challenge

The format of Genesis is one of the things that makes it so unique: when we meet Anax, she is beginning her entrance exam to The Academy. All her hopes for the future rest on her acceptance, so these four hours are the ones she has spent the last several years training for. Her topic of expertise? Adam, a critical figure in the history of the island Republic, one around whom both controversy and conspiracy theory swirl. We learn about the our earth's destruction (in the very near future for us) and re-creation through Anax as she answers her exam questions. She is forced to deconstruct her own assumptions and sift through everything she's ever been taught about history. We learn what has happened subsequently to our earth through the context of Anax's examination. Very cool.

Genesis is a book that will take your brain to the limit - the ethical questions, especially are abounding as we learn about Adam and part he played in the final war. I loved how it made me think, how it made me question and choose sides. Anax is such a sympathetic character, with feelings so much like mine (on an ethical level, anyway), that I loved hearing her interpretation of the events I was learning about. While sometimes the philosophical conversations got a bit...circular, they were pointed and really, made me think more every single time. I'm STILL thinking about it. What is it inside me that makes me human, what is worth protecting? Could I explain my own love of being human, if I had to? How do we determine, as a society, who gets to have "free will" and how shall we determine who gets to help make choices for all of us?

Books like this are why I love to read. With a slam-bang ending and a clear expectation that we are on this ride as much as Anax, this is one that I want to read and discuss. Great piece of work. Totally worthy of my Comfy Tree Award.

Review: James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl

genre: children's literature

Poor James, stuck living with his two crabby aunts. One day a peculiar thing happens, which leads to another peculiar thing happening and before you know it, James is living on a giant peach with some huge bugs. Sounds bizarre, right? And to be honest, it IS rather bizarre. To be living amongst huge bugs would completely freak me out. But the reason Dahl 's stories are classics is that the bizarre-ness WORKS. We believe it! We believe in the musically gifted Old Grandfather Grasshopper and the mild and motherly Ladybug. Sure there are crazy cloud people up in the sky creating out weather. Dahl's stories are just so readable and kid-centric. He empowers his readers with a sense that even when you are a kid, horrible things can happen to you but that you are strong enough to stay kind and patient until it all works out. What a fantastic message.

I read this one aloud to my 7 year old son and we had a rollicking good time. He fell for it hook, line and sinker and he was at times literally chewing his nails and hiding his head, and other times laughing his guts out. I can't ask for more than that.

Review: Hold On to Your Kids: Why Parents Need to Matter More Than Peers by Gordon Neufeld and Gabor Mate

genre: non-fiction, parenting

The premise of this astounding book is that in today's culture, more and more children are living their lives being more attached to their peers than their parents. Sound mind-blowing? Maybe not, but at the soul of this book is the idea that our attachment to our children is the one crucial thing that our children cannot truly grow-up without. The book goes in-depth into attachment theory, but not so deep that you can't find your way out again and understand how necessary it is. We learn about how this "peer attachment" can undermine parenting and what happens to children when they are learning their values from people their own age instead of from their parents and grandparents. "Bullies" and their tactics are pieced apart. But not only do we read the gloom and doom of what can happen to peer-oriented children - the entire last section is how, if they're already "lost," we can win them back. And if we still have our children attached to us, we learn ways to help them be truly independent and mature young adults.

The structure of the book is very linear - the lead author makes a generalized point and then several smaller sections expound on different portions of that general point. This worked for me, but some folks might find it pretty repetitive. I usually need that in non-fiction, otherwise I forget important things. The writing is very readable and I loved all the anecdotal stories, they made the things I was learning much more concrete - even though some of the examples made me feel terrified for my children to grow up any more than they already have.

I must have underlined half of this book, I found so many statements that rang true in a new way - it took me to places in my parenting mind that I have just never thought about, at least not consciously. Some sections gave me chills, they hit so close to home. I read so slowly that I had chances to try out some of the ideas as I read and I actually saw it - I actually saw that helping my son move from anger over something into sadness over it actually dissipated their frustration.

I have already passed on the name of this book to four people. I want to pass it on to everyone. I am looking at my kids and the way I deal with them in an entirely new way. And what does that mean? It means more parenting for me. More time invested in the three people that will give me the most satisfaction in the end: my kids.

review: The Singing Creek Where the Willows Grow - The Mystical Nature Diary of Opal Whiteley

book 4 of 5 for the Non-fiction five Challenge
genre: non-fiction/biography

I feel like I should preface this review with a line of a poem that I adored in my childhood:

“If you are a dreamer,come in. If you are a dreamer, a wisher, a liar, a hoper, a prayer, a magic-bean-buyer. If you're a pretender, come sit by my fire, for we have some flax-golden tales to spin. Come in! Come in!”
-Shel Silverstein

Opal Whiteley was a remarkable child. Her turn-of-the-century diary was printed onto scraps of paper, wrappings and discards, scratched out with colored pencils and crayons at the age of seven. Her biography (written by Benjamin Hoff, the author of the Toa of Pooh) details Opal's life, beginning with her early childhood in the woods of Oregon, near a logging community. She was an avid naturalist from an early age and went on to spend much of her early adulthood teaching about nature and science to young children.

At some point, however, certain people spread rumors discrediting her diary - claiming it was written when she was an adult, saying that someone so young couldn't possibly have written with such intensity and intelligence. Hoff, obviously, feels very strongly that the diary is authentic and goes to great lengths in the biography to provide evidence to back up his stance. And for me, reading the diary, I couldn't help but believe it was the work of a highly literary and insightful child. There's too much raw belief to think otherwise.

As for the diary itself, it's a place where people who are willing to heed Shel Silverstien's advice should tarry. Opal Whiteley isn't just a dreamer, she's a fairy, a woodland creature - Mother Nature embodied in a wild child who is so at one with the earth and its creatures that she can actually feel their pain. She writes of her conversations with the trees, the joy that the wind and the rain sing to her and each of her dozens of animal friends have long and illustrious names. She has crazy notions about helping her mother and is so innocent and yet grave about the way she wants to do right by the people she loves that it is sometimes painful. She describes this early Oregon landscape and some of its inhabitants (both human and otherwise) with a stark and loving richness.

Because of her father's French-Canadian heritage (they think), she writes with a strange sort of translated syntax which drove my husband crazy when I read it out loud, but which I found enchanting. It made her ideas and "thinks" so much more ethereal:

"By-and-by I came to a log. It was a nice little log. It was as long as three pigs as long as Peter Paul Rubens. I climbed upon it. I so did to look more looks about. The wind did blow in a real quick way-he made music all around. I danced on the log. It is so much a big amount of joy to dance on a log when the wind does play the harps in the forest. Then I do dance on tiptoe."

and

"I think it is very nice to help people have what they do have longings for."

Opal is always grateful, full of joy, trying to understand. She learns deep lessons about life and death (or bornings and goings-away, as she calls them). Her interactions with her mother were harsh and unfortunately littered with bouts of corporeal punishment, and reading them from Opal's point of view was sometimes heartbreaking. It made me want to just hug that girl and take her for a walk, but luckily she had many kindly neighbors, cows, dogs, frogs, crows, wood rats, chickens and horses to keep her company. Her fresh and unadulterated love of the earth, her recognition of the healing that comes from being outside among the animals and trees, her faith in fairies and God and angels - this unique perspective painted the entire diary with an unmistakable swash of joie de vivre.

If you are not one of those dreamers, if you don't every once and a while strain to hear the voice of the wind in the trees, this book may be a bit too sentimental for you. Her fondness for naming every single creature she befriends might tire you. Her precociousness might just make you thank the heavens that you weren't her mother. But for me, Opal's diary opened my eyes to a life of at-one-ness that made me want to laugh for joy and reminded me that, as Opal says, "this is a wonderful world to live in."

review: The Big Rock Candy Mountain by Wallace Stegner

genre: fiction
563 pages

I feel spent, having finished this book. I took more time reading it than any book in recent memory - and it wasn't only its 563 pages that made it a long read. I had to read with a pen at the ready, so many ideas and images and thoughts I wanted to highlight.

The Big Rock Candy Mountain is a western book. A character study. A journey. But not a there-and-back-again book like Bilbo Baggins wrote. It's a go and go again kind of journey, searching ever further afield for that one thing that will make you happy, always finding that it just slipped out of your fingers.

Bo Mason is that dreamer - a schemer who will gamble on a sure thing, following whatever lead will drop him on top of that Big Rock Candy Mountain the soonest. He'll farm, work the railroad, bootleg or run a "blind pig" - whatever it takes to get money in his pocket the fastest. And to Elsa, the daughter of Norwegian immigrants, Bo's zest for life and skills with a shotgun lure her into a love that will test all the strength she's got as they live their lives during the hard years of the early 20th century.

The road their life takes, the unbelievable anguish and sacrifice, the horrible choices and bum deals and the eking out of an existence, the packing up and starting over - you would think that it would be so depressing that you'd want to just chuck the book out the window. But Wallace Stegner is a literary genius because he ties up this cheerless and heartbreaking story with a writing style and way with words that is so amazing you can't help but be floored by the beauty of it. How is that possible? The turn of phrase and poignantly expressed truths stopped me time and again. And as we read the story from different points of view, we see the strengths in the characters, usually deeply hidden under their glaring weaknesses. All except Elsa, whose strengths and weaknesses are both transparent - she is one of the most intriguing and sympathetic characters I've read.

I also loved that this book took me to the Utah of long ago, an emerging place, a western wasteland of outcasts and misfits that was slowly turning into something grand and worthwhile - the side of Utah that the Mormons of my ancestry probably wished didn't exist and certainly wouldn't have appreciated. The language of some characters was really rough and there were scenes of serious ugliness. But this book made a time and place and cross-section of people so real to me. I can't even use the words "grand" or "epic" or "sweeping" because it felt too intimate for those adjectives, too painful - like reading someone's diary and finally understanding how hard their life had been. And despite the language, despite the ugliness, the scope of this book and the way it made me feel and the sense it gave me of a time now forgotten - a time when the great wandering of early Americans was coming to a close - those things make me want to give Big Rock Candy Mountain my book award:

Review: My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George

genre: middle-grade reader, survival

Recently my mother told me about the chapter book that she read to my brother oh so long ago that turned him into a reader: My Side of the Mountain. When I found it at a used book sale, I snatched it up and started it as soon as possible. I read this one aloud to my six year old and my 9 year old often would sit around and listen also.

My cover says it's "The classic story of wilderness survival." I have to agree, and the only part of this book that I had a hard time swallowing was the fact that teen-aged Sam just up and left his apartment in New York City without a backwards glance and hiked out to the Catskills. All the rest, I ate up hook-line-and sinker. He doesn't just survive, that Sam - he flourishes. He taught my boy and I all about how to make five-course meals out of mountain plants, how to trap animals, how to make whistles out of reeds and how to turn a giant tree into a home. Animals became dear friends and a vital source of food. And whether he was training his falcon to hunt or using every part of the animals he caught, Sam treated every living thing in the woods with respect and care.

Sam's voice was friendly, honest and descriptive - the illustrations gave us a sense of the wildness of his place and nicely broke up the text. He let us peek into his life as the seasons changed and we got a view of winter in the mountains unlike any I've ever read. He made mistakes and worked things out, made friends and had to find ways to stay out of sight when nosy folks made their way around.

I sometimes worried that the story would get too "non-fiction" for my boy, but he never got bored - this one held his attention from start to finish. The things we read about let to numerous interesting discussions, especially about animals. As a read aloud for this mommy and her 1st grade son, this book deserves:

Review: The Patron Saint of Butterflies by Cecilia Galante

genre: young adult
rating: 5/5

Agnes and Honey have been best friends since they slept next to each other as babies in the communal nursery. Recently, though, Agnes has started taking her quest for spiritual perfection to a level that Honey thinks is a little crazy. Life in the commune has taught them to avoid music and television, to pray constantly and to strive for absolute obedience to God's will - as defined through Emmanuel, their communal leader. What life in the commune did NOT teach them was how to think for themselves and when Honey starts seeing that there are things about Emmanuel and his "methods" that aren't the picture of holiness, Agnes wants nothing to do with it. It's not until a series of horrible things happen that Agnes has to start thinking really seriously about everything she's been taught to believe.

This book is amazing. First of all, we get to hear the story from the point of view of both Agnes and Honey - which brings a depth to the plot that I don't think you could get otherwise. Especially since, for the most part, readers will already understand Honey's point of view - we can see that Emmanuel is a nut; but to read it from the point of view of Agnes: that's some powerful stuff. To see the results of brainwashing, to see the exact same situation processed in completely different ways - that's an interesting story. And it's written so well, with a scorching plot that grabs you and makes you care.

Try this one for a deeper young adult offering about faith and how to reconcile the reality you've been taught with a desire to be true to yourself and your family.

review: Baking Cakes in Kigali by Gaile Parkin

genre: fiction
rating: 5/5

This beautiful African story, set in post-genocide Rwanda, is not only compellingly and simply told - but also touches on much of what makes us truly happy in life.

Angel is a Tanzanian living in Rwanda with her husband and the five grandchildren she's raising. Her claim to fame in the town of Kigali is her extraordinary and unique cakes. The process of designing the perfect cake for her customers lets her into their lives - they share their stories. Through these stories we see in many people a remarkable ability to adapt and to survive, to change and grow and find goodness wherever they are. We also see great depravity and horror as those who managed to live through the genocide begin to put heir lives and their country back together, with the help of people from many nations.

I loved so much about this book - I loved Angel's listening ear and her desire to look at things truthfully. I loved how the plot revolved around her cakes, those scrumptious creations designed for so many different reason and for so many different kinds of people. And the people! A cross section of humanity - UN workers, refugees, professors, volunteers, orphans, chauffeurs, stay-at-home moms and poor AIDS patients that are trying to gain skills to make a living. We meet so much of Africa and her people - as well as those from near and far who legitimately desire to help Rwanda come back to life. The educated and illiterate are living side by side - Hutus and Tutsis are choosing to look beyond their past to a larger-than-life future. I loved the depth of this charming story.

Read it.

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: 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: Gift From the Sea by Anne Morrow Lindbergh

book 4 of 5 for the Classics Challenge 09
book 2 of 5 for the Non-Fiction Five Challenge 09
genre: non-fiction
rating: 5/5

I remember seeing this book upon my mother's shelf when I was a child. The title intrigued me, I always wanted to find pictures of the sea inside and I wondered what sort of gift the sea could give. There weren't any pictures and the text didn't interest me, so I would always put it back a little disappointed.

Now that I am a woman and a mother, I found great wisdom in the text and I know now the gifts that the sea gave to Lindbergh, intangible and yet so vibrant and applicable. The sea and a few small precious beach treasures help her to look deeper into herself, to find what she can do to make her life a more simple and profound thing. She wants to be able to move with the flow of life, like the tide, ever willing to change and adapt, willing to let something new become the norm until some other new stage comes along.

Her writing is more than lyrical, it is profound and effortless. She sets the struggles in our lives out on a blank slate and reconciles them with the necessity of living in the here and now seeing those struggles in the context of a greater purpose. I loved her discussions of the ebb and flow of marriage and other relationships and how desperately important it is for each individual to find time alone to ponder and reflect, to fill up our wells once again so that, especially as mothers, we have enough to give to those around us that need us. And with that thought, I will end this with a quote:

Now, instead of planting our solitude with our own dream blossoms, we choke the space with continuous music, chatter, and companionship to which we do not even listen. It is simply there to fill the vacuum. When the noise stops there is no inner music to take its place. We must re-learn to be alone.

review: Fire by Kristin Cashore

book 3 for the Once Upon a Time III Challenge
genre: young adult fantasy
rating: 5/5

In Fire, our story takes us beyond the seven kingdoms of Graceling, to an eastern land that is teetering on the edge of war. The connections between Fire and Graceling are very few and center upon one character in particular, who is a crucial element to both plots.

The book Fire centers on the character of Fire - a girl who is born compellingly beautiful and with the ability to read and mold the minds of those around her. The beauty that makes her irresistible is both a danger and an asset and the imminent war becomes of the utmost importance to Fire as secrets are revealed and her abilities give her a crucial role among the King and his family.

Could I put this book down? Of course not. I think Cashore's writing is even tighter this time around, especially the dialogue. The plot is more political, more militarily focused with as much intrigue as Graceling and with characters just as conflicted and multidimensional. What especially kept me going was the romantic interplay between characters that I think Cashore does so well. Really, I loved the romantic plot line. Fire had to work through a lot of emotions and her occasional, seemingly random outbursts of emotion seemed to fit her as a character who has spent her entire life overflowing with everyone else's feelings. As in Graceling, I think that there are some moral and ethical issues that could provoke some interesting discussion, especially among teens.

An excellent fantasy, full of all the good stuff: magical creatures, magical abilities, battles with handsome soldiers and enough of a gray area between "right" and "wrong" to keep it from being trite. You don't need to have read Graceling first to appreciate this book, although I'm glad I read them in this order. If you HAVE read and loved Graceling, put this one on your list RIGHT NOW!

Review: Graceling by Kristin Cashore

book 2 for the Once Upon a Time III Challenge
genre: young adult fantasy
rating:5/5

Oh yes, this is a fun one. The story revolves around Katsa - a girl with ninja-like reflexes who has never been beaten in a fight and who can kill a man with her bare hands. She's got serious skills and this 'Grace' of hers makes her an amazing weapon. She has spent her life at the bidding of her arrogant uncle, the king, enforcing his word and handing out his kind of "justice." A chance encounter with an unknown man whose fighting skills nearly match her own flusters Katsa and is the start of an adventure that will involve more treachery and danger - and maybe even a chance to learn something even deeper about herself

I liked Katsa - I liked her spirit and her abilities, her awareness and the way her character was slowly and subtly refined throughout the book. She was a strong female protagonist but she had a lot to learn. The idea of having people with special powers to be exploited or appreciated was very intriguing and consistently played well into the plot. The romance was satisfyingly fresh and the relationships felt real. The pace was swift and I was surprised by things, even at the end. To be completely honest, sometimes the dialogue bordered on...not cheesy, just slightly unnatural. I was also a bit disappointed that she had such hostile views of marriage. But I am giving it five stars because I could not put the dang thing down and because I am going upstairs right now to read the prequel.

Review: Alas, Babylon by Pat Frank

book 2 of 4 for the It's the End of the World Reading Challenge II
book 2 of 5 for the Classics Challenge 09
Genre: post apocalyptic fiction
Rating: 5/5

What if the tension between the USSR and America in the 50s ended less peacefully, maybe involving exploding warheads and a nuclear holocaust? How would the common American rural town cope in such a situation?

Such a situation is at the heart of Alas, Babylon. The tiny town of Fort Repose, Florida, manages to survive the initial onslaught - but moving forward in world suddenly transformed into the dark ages proves to be an even bigger challenge. Florida itself is beautifully described and its bounty and climate plays an essential role as haven and provider. Our main characters are just normal people, flawed yet with untapped strength that catastrophe and necessity bring to the forefront. Other characters, of course, use the disaster to get gain, prey on those who have supplies, or live in denial until it's too late.

More interesting than the characters though, for me, is just the situation they found themselves in and how they got inventive about making life work again. That part was certainly the most intriguing. When Frank switched to the more military side of things my interest waned a bit, but those parts didn't usually last long. I think, perhaps, that Fort Repose was almost a bit too spared - sometimes there seemed to be a few too many good coincidences, but I liked it that way. It's hard to have a story about a town's survival if everyone gets horrendous radiation sickness :)

This book is amazing because it felt completely plausible - it's quite a wake up call, I can imagine it scaring the pants off of people in the 60s, realizing how easily fiction could've become fact. The science felt authentic and the military side of it did too (as far as I could tell). I read this book in essentially one sitting, it was that good.