Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow - Gabrielle Zevin

Title: Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow

Author: Gabrielle Zevin

Publisher: Viking (Penguin Random House Canada), 2022 (Hardcover)

Length: 397 pages

Genre: Adult; Realistic Fiction

Started: July 30, 2022

Finished: August 1, 2022

Summary:

From the inside cover:

In this exhilarating novel by the bestselling author of The Storied Life of A. J. Fikry, two friends - often in love, but never lovers - come together as creative partners in the world of video game design, where success brings them fame, joy, tragedy, duplicity, and, ultimately, a kind of immortality. 

On a bitter cold day, in the December of his junior year at Harvard, Sam Masur exits a subway car and sees, amid the hordes of people waiting on the platform, Sadie Green. He calls her name. For a moment, she pretends she hasn't heard him, but then she turns, and a game begins: a legendary collaboration that will launch them to stardom. These friends, intimates since childhood, borrow money, beg favours, and, before even graduating college, they have created their first blockbuster, Ichigo. Overnight, the world is theirs. Not even twenty-five years old, Sam and Sadie are brilliant, successful, and rich, but these qualities won't protect them from their own creative ambitions or the betrayals of their hearts. .

Spanning thirty years, from Cambridge, Massachusetts, to Venice Beach, California, and lands in between and far beyond, Gabrielle Zevin's Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow is a dazzling and intricately imagined novel that examines the multifarious nature of identity, disability, failure, the redemptive possibilities in play, and, above all, our need to connect: to be loved and to love. Yes, it is a love story, but it is not one you have read before. 

Review:

"The alternative to appropriation is a world where white European people make art about white European people with only white European references in it. Swap African or Asian or Latin or whatever culture you want for European. A world where everyone is blind and deaf to any culture or experience that is not their own. I hate that world, don't you? I'm terrified of that world, and I don't want to live in that world, and as a mixed-race person, I literally don't exist in it...And as any mixed-race person will tell you - to be half of two things is to be whole of nothing" (Zevin, pg. 78).

"How do you get into making video games anyway?" 

Sadie hated answering this question, especially after a person had told her that he hadn't heard of Ichigo. "Well, I learned to program computers in middle school. I got an eight hundred on my math SAT, won a Westinghouse and a Leipzig. And then I went to MIT, which by the way is highly competitive, even for a lowly female like myself, and studied computer science. At MIT, I learned four or five more programming languages and studied psychology, with an emphasis on ludic techniques and persuasive designs, and English, including narrative structures, the classics, and the history of interactive storytelling. Got myself a great mentor. Regrettably made him my boyfriend. Suffice it to say, I was young. And then I dropped out of school for a time to make a game because my best frenemy wanted me to. That game became the game you never heard of, but yeah, it sold around two and a half million copies, just in the U.S., soooo..." (Zevin, pgs. 235-236).

"Sadie was not a natural mother, though this was not a confession one was allowed to make. She craved solitude and personal space too much. But she loved this girl nonetheless...Sadie did not feel that her daughter Naomi was altogether a person yet, which was another thing that one could not admit. So many of the mothers she knew said that their children were exactly themselves from the moment they appeared in the world. But Sadie disagreed. What was a person without language? Tastes? Preferences? Experiences? And on the other side of childhood, what grown-up wanted to believe that they had emerged from their parents fully formed? Sadie knew that she herself had not become a person until recently. It was unreasonable to expect a child to emerge whole cloth. Naomi was a sketch of a person, who, at some point, would be a fully 3D character" (Zevin pgs. 381-382).

There has been so much hype for this book lately. Thankfully my library hold on it arrived pretty early considering this was just published a few weeks ago, so I settled in and was utterly spellbound by this book to the point where I read for most of the day and stayed up until 3am finishing the bulk of it. It was so easy to get lost in this story and become invested in Sam and Sadie and wanting to find out what happened to them. 

The story opens in an LA hospital in 1986. Eleven-year-old Sadie is visiting her older sister Alice, who is a cancer patient there, and comes across twelve-year-old Sam in the games room playing Nintendo. They bond over their shared love of games and talk until the nurses discover them. Sadie is asked to return to the hospital again to play with Sam, since his interaction with her is the first time Sam has spoken in the past six weeks since he was in a brutal car accident that killed his mother and permanently disabled his left foot. Thus begins Sam and Sadie's friendship, which picks up again in the late 1990s when they are attending Harvard and MIT and Sam asks Sadie to make a video game with him. What follows is an at times enjoyable and other times heart-wrenching romp through the world of corporate video game design (you don't have to be knowledgeable about or enjoy video games to get this story, but in my opinion is definitely helps), that explores how the choices we make affect not only ourselves but the people around us. Sam and Sadie are incredibly well-developed characters; you know an author does character development right when you read a scene and you want to both slap the character upside the head for the choices they're making, but you also can't fault them completely either because you know exactly what makes them tick. 

The incorporation of video games into the narrative structure at some points is a unique choice that works incredibly well here. For those people who might bemoan a novel that revolves around video games, fear not, there are also a ton of literary and classical references to satisfy you as well. The book's title itself comes from the "Out, brief candle" soliloquy from Shakespeare's Macbeth, which pleased me to no end as an English teacher. 

The book has wonderful biracial representation in Sam (and the author herself is the same racial makeup as Sam so she speaks from experience), and they talk about what it's like to be a mixed kid. I was pleasantly surprised at the disability inclusion with Sam as well, it's well done and though it's not a huge focal point in the story, it's discussed how his disability has affected his self-esteem and how it impacts his life. The story also discusses the sexism Sadie faces as a female studying at MIT and later trying to navigate the male-centric world of video games and trying to be taken seriously by the industry. 

The themes of love and play are central to the story. Play (all play, not just video games) is how characters connect with each other and reach out after long absences or fights, it's just really sweet to see. Love is explored in an interesting way here. Sam and Sadie never become romantically involved, and when they're asked about it at multiple points in the book, they both say that they love each other, just not in that romantic way. They're creative partners, and I love how the book explores platonic friendships and establishes that people can love others in ways that go beyond the physical. Also, both our deuteragonists are bi/pan, so yay for queer rep as well. 

Recommendation:

This is probably the best example of a coming-of-age story that I've read in a long time. It probably helps that it focuses on Gen-X experiences and feelings that I can relate to as an older Millennial. If you enjoy video games, stories with good examples of platonic friendship, great biracial and disability representation, or just a really good examination of how the choices we make affect ourselves and the people around us, give this story a go. 

Thoughts on the cover:

I love the inclusion of Hokusai's The Great Wave against the colourful title font, it works so well once you know how the two elements factor into the story. 

Where the Crawdads Sing - Delia Owens

 

Title: Where the Crawdads Sing

Author: Delia Owens

Publisher: Putnam (Penguin), 2018 (Hardcover)

Length: 368 pages

Genre: Adult; Realistic Fiction

Started: April 12, 2022

Finished: April 14, 2022

Summary:

From the inside cover:

For years, rumours of the "Marsh Girl" have haunted Barkley Cove, a quiet town on the North Carolina coast. So in late 1969, when handsome Chase Andrews is found dead, the locals immediately suspect Kya Clark, the so-called Marsh Girl. 

But Kya is not what they say. Sensitive and intelligent, she has survived for years alone in the marsh that she calls home, finding friends in the gulls and lessons in the sand. Then the time comes when she yearns to be touched and loved. When two young men from town become intrigued by her wild beauty, Kya opens herself to a new life - until the unthinkable happens. 

Where the Crawdads Sing is at once an exquisite ode to the natural world, a heartbreaking coming-of-age story, and a surprising tale of possible murder. Owens reminds us that we are forever shaped by the children we once were, and that we all are subject to the beautiful and violent secrets that nature keeps. 

Review:

Since this book was so hyped on TikTok this past year, it's been on my TBR list for the past few months. With the movie adaptation coming out in July, my friends at work and I vowed to finally read this so we could compare the versions. I honestly wasn't expecting much from something so lauded and popular (I find anything overly popular can be a mixed bag with my personal tastes), but I was pleasantly surprised by the end. 

Catherine Danielle Clark, otherwise known as Kya, has lived (mostly) alone in her family's shack at the edge of the North Carolina marshland since her mother and older siblings left her with her alcoholic, abusive father at the age of six. When he abandons her at the age of ten, she is left to fend for herself completely. With no formal schooling and the memories of her mother's teachings of how to live off the land to feed herself, Kya manages to survive to adulthood with the help of a childhood friend and the Black community that live in a segregated area away from the town. In 1969 when Kya is in her early 20s, a local man is found dead, and although Chase Andrews was a well-known player who slept with many women and angered many a husband, Kya is the prime suspect. 

The novel is told in alternating time jumps, starting with the early 1950s when Kya is a child and switching every other chapter or so to 1969 at the time of the murder. Kya's backstory is gripping and intriguing from the start, and adding in Chase's murder keeps the reader going, wondering how Kya could possibly be connected enough to Chase for the police to suspect her of murder. 

I personally liked the themes of resiliency and community that run throughout the book. Granted, sometimes Kya's resiliency is a bit too unrealistic to believe completely, especially in the chapters before she turns ten. 

The main detriment of this book, in my opinion, is the amount of dialect in it. Granted there has to be dialect to reflect the authenticity of the premise of the story, but I have the same issue with any book set in the American south; the dialect makes my brain have to work so much harder to understand what's going on. 

Recommendation:

If you like stories that are character-driven with a bit of mystery thrown in, you'll enjoy this. It was an engaging read and I can see why it's so popular, so give it a read before the movie version releases in the summer. 

Thoughts on the cover:

The shot used on the cover is very pretty and fits well with the descriptions in the book. 

Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe - Benjamin Alire Saenz

Title: Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe
Author: Benjamin Alire Saenz
Publisher: Simon & Schuster BFYR, 2012 (Hardcover)
Length: 359 pages
Genre: Young Adult; Realistic Fiction
Started: September 3, 2019
Finished: September 18, 2019

Summary:
From the inside cover:

Dante can swim. Ari can't. Dante is articulate and self-assured. Ari has a hard time with words and suffers from self-doubt. Dante gets lost in poetry and art. Ari gets lost in thoughts of his older brother who is in prison. Dante is fair-skinned. Ari's features are much darker. It seems that a boy like Dante, with his open and unique perspective on life, would be the last person to break down the walls that Ari has built around himself.

But when Ari and Dante meet, they bond. They share books, thoughts, dreams, laughter. They teach each other new vocabularies and begin to redefine each other's worlds. And they discover that the universe is a large and difficult place.

This is the story about two boys, Ari and Dante, who must learn to believe in each other and the power of their friendship if they are ever to become men.

In breathtaking prose, American Book Award winner Benjamin Alire Saenz captures those moments that make a boy a man as he explores loyalty and trust, friendship and love.

Review:
The last book I reviewed, We Contain Multitudes, was often compared to Aristotle and Dante in publications and other reviews. I've been meaning to read it for years but hadn't quite gotten around to it until now. I'm disappointed that I let such a gem of a book go unread for so many years, but I'm glad I've read it now.

Aristotle "Ari" Mendoza and Dante Quintana are teenage boys growing up in El Paso, Texas in the late 1980s. The book follows the pair across a couple of years, from age fifteen to seventeen, as they grow from tentative, unsure boys to confident young men.

Ari acts as our narrator, beginning as a boy who admits he's lonely but prefers to keep to himself. With a dad dealing with the traumas of his time in the Vietnam War, and his family struggling with the ghost of his older brother Bernardo in prison, Ari has questions about a lot of things but few answers. In comes Dante like a summer storm, gently but persistently involving himself in Ari's life, even across a great distance later on in the book. Eventually the two of them discover the answers they are seeking, while discovering love for each other.

The writing is beautiful without being pretentious, and the boys themselves are very well-developed as characters as well as realistic teen boys. The novel does a good job of developing the theme of what happens when secrets fester as opposed to having open lines of communication, which we see not only through Ari and Dante but also with Ari's dad and brother.

Recommendation:
This is a beautiful book that everyone should read. Not only is it an awesome story with good themes, it also has wonderful LGBTQ and Latino/a/x representation.

Thoughts on the cover:
The night sky with Ari's truck is a great choice for a cover image, and the colour scheme is very pleasing.

We Contain Multitudes - Sarah Henstra

Title: We Contain Multitudes
Author: Sarah Henstra
Publisher: Penguin Teen (Penguin Random House Canada), 2019 (Hardcover)
Length: 377 pages
Genre: Young Adult; Realistic Fiction
Started: August 17, 2019
Finished: August 23, 2019

Summary:
From the inside cover:

When Walt Whitman fan Jonathan Hopkirk and football player  Adam "Kurl" Kurlansky are partnered in a weekly pen pal assignment, they don't expect to get much out of it.

With each letter, however, the two are led deeper into a friendship that eventually grows into love. But faced with homophobia, bullying, and devastating family secrets, Jonathan and Kurl must struggle to hold on to their relationship - and each other.

This gripping, gorgeously written novel celebrates love and life with engaging characters and stunning language, making it perfect for fans of Jandy Nelson, Nina LaCour, and David Levithan.

Review:

"Do I contradict myself?

Very well then I contradict myself,

(I am large, I contain multitudes.)

      - Walt Whitman, "Song of Myself"


This excerpt from Walt Whitman's epic poem is included on the first page of the book in place of a dedication or a preface (perhaps not intentionally but I thought it interesting). It serves to highlight what I think is a theme that runs through this novel: people are complicated.

Adam Kurlansky ("Kurl") is eighteen and redoing his senior year of high school. He's a star football player recently let go from the team and has a reputation for picking fights. Jonathan Hopkirk is a slight, fifteen-year-old boy passionate about Walt Whitman's poetry to the point where he even dresses like him. These two seemingly polar opposites are paired together through a shared English teacher's assignment to write weekly letters to each other.

The novel is written in epistolary format, through letters written by Kurl and Jo back and forth to each other. At first the boys' only interactions with each other are through their letters, but as time progresses Kurl and Jo eventually spend more time together at and after school, which does make the format grate a bit at times. Jo can say "oh, I want to hear your account of the same event we were both present at" all he wants, but it still gets annoying.

The novel is beautifully written, I have to come right out and say that. The language at points has the ability to make you feel like you've been sucker-punched in the gut, it's that moving. The author is an English professor in Toronto (yay for local Canadian YA lit!), so that doesn't surprise me in the least. The only thing about the writing that bugged me a bit was that since the novel is told through letters, we're supposed to believe that all this beautiful writing is actually coming from eighteen and fifteen-year-old boys. I teach teenagers, few boys (heck, even girls) are capable of this level of writing, especially at age fifteen...I'd be more inclined to believe Kurl's letters are possible coming from an eighteen-year-old, but I really shake my head at the sophistication of Jo's letters. Here's some examples:

When asked by Kurl why he continues to dress in period costumes when it just makes him a bigger target to the bullies who already harass him for being gay, Jo responds:

"I do it on purpose, because I want to be mindful of the decades and centuries behind us of people making beautiful things designed to last. I want to walk down the hallways of Lincoln High with one part of me in the eternal, the timeless, and the other part of me slipping so fast through the here and now that nobody can pin me down, not even the butcher boys" (Jo, pg. 126).

No fifteen-year-old writes like that, not even the brilliant ones that are gifted in language (unless they all attend a very exclusive private school that I could only dream of teaching at). So I went through the book thinking Jo was, essentially, a unicorn.

After Kurl and Jo admit their feelings for each other and actually discuss their relationship in their letters, Kurl describes Jo as such:

"Your scent, Jo. It's like wool and bread and something else. I don't know. A scent like if laughter had a scent, or daybreak. You filled the whole car with a yellow light like daybreak. I swear it felt like light pouring into my veins" (Kurl, pg. 188).

Again, coming from Kurl it's slightly more believable, but still not something I would assume came from a teenage boy.

When Jo is contemplating revelations about his deceased mother, Raphael, and likening them to a Whitman poem:

"More bitter than I can bear. I was remembering, just now, those suffering words from Walt. You burn and sting me. Is that how Raphael feels to Lyle and and Gloria as well as to me? The lost Raphael, the ghost of Raphael? Or is it different for those who remember her, who knew her before she was a ghost?" (Jo, pg. 358)

Again, the writing is sophisticated and beautiful. These lines were a joy to read in a YA novel, we could use more complex writing in YA books as a whole. I just think the writing would more believable if written in third person rather than in a series of first-person letters by teenaged boys.

On to the story. Kurl and Jo's romance is realistic in how it unfolds and plays out, though there are more than a few questionable instances related to consent that I wish had been better explored or called out more than they were. There is quite a train wreck of climactic events that at first appear quite out of character for both boys until you remember that these are, in fact, teenagers, and they've both been dealing with the after-effects of a boat-load of trauma. That whole "people are complicated" bit comes in handy here.

Recommendation:
This book is a real treat for language and poetry lovers; it's a beautifully written story about that hesitant first love between teenagers that also happen to be boys and the challenges that go along with that. There are some aspects of the novel that I took issue with, but they don't necessarily take away from the overall enjoyment of the piece. I highly recommend this, it has received its fair share of hype for a reason.

Thoughts on the cover:
The image of Kurl and Jo laying on the grass (perhaps inspired by the park scene?) is a nice image that intrigues without spelling out the contents of the story. The limited colour palette with a pleasing aqua/turquoise background is a nice touch.

Give a Boy a Gun - Todd Strasser

Title: Give a Boy a Gun
Author: Todd Strasser
Publisher: Simon & Schuster BFYR (Paperback), 2012 (originally published in 2000)
Length: 208 pages
Genre: Young Adult; Realistic Fiction
Started: December 10, 2018
Finished: December 11, 2018

Summary:
From the back cover:

For as long as they can remember, Brendan and Gary have been mercilessly teased and harassed by the jocks who rule Middletown High. But not anymore. Stealing a small arsenal of guns from a neighbour, they take their classmates hostage at a school dance. In the panic of this desperate situation, it soon becomes clear that only one thing matters to Brendan and Gary: revenge.

Review:
I hadn't known that this book was actually published shortly after the Columbine shooting while I was still in high school. I think it would've been beneficial for me to have read it back then to help me make sense of things at the time.

As a teacher, every time we practice lock down drills I always explain to my classes about Columbine (it happened before any of them were ever born), and how that is the reason we now do these drills. Kids today are unfortunately so used to hearing about shootings, they're often surprised when I tell them that it wasn't long ago that they were relatively rare, and that being a teenager when Columbine occurred was a defining moment for my generation.

You can tell that this book is heavily influenced by Columbine: it takes place around the same time, the high school and town's name is very close to the name of the Colorado town where the shooting occurred, and the characters in the book even reference the Columbine shooters by name.

I appreciate that the author delves into multiple perspectives on the same incident by including statements from parents, teachers, classmates, counsellors, neighbours, etc. You see that kids can indeed fall through the cracks: there are details missed by one party that another picks up on, but there's no recourse or system to keep track of things like this and it goes by the wayside. It definitely strikes a chord with me as a teacher when we hit a wall with something related to a kid and can't help beyond a certain point because we've done all we're legally allowed to do.

The only part of this novel that I think hasn't aged well is the technology aspect. When this book was first published in 2000, smartphones didn't exist. We had cellphones back then, but they were basic Nokia-type bricks, not mini-computers that you could text message, record video, take photos, and search the internet. The widespread use of smartphones has definitely changed the landscape of today,  especially the invention of social media, and this novel's absence of it really does reinforce how things have changed in the past 10-15 years.

Recommendation:
This is a heavy story, but an important one. There are other books about school shootings that are more reflective of recent years, but I'd argue that this one is still important because it's indicative of the time in which it occurred.

Thoughts on the cover:
Seemingly benign until you notice the red dots on the figures.

Dear Evan Hansen - Val Emmich, Steven Levenson, Benj Pasek, Justin Paul

Title: Dear Evan Hansen
Author: Val Emmich, Steven Levenson, Benj Pasek, Justin Paul
Publisher: Poppy (Little, Brown and Company), 2018 (Hardcover)
Length: 358 pages
Genre: Young Adult; Realistic Fiction
Started: November 12, 2018
Finished: November 19, 2018

Summary:
From the inside cover:

Dear Evan Hansen,
Today is going to be an amazing day, and here's why...

When a letter that was never meant to be seen draws high school senior Evan Hansen into a family's grief over the loss of their son, Evan is given the chance of a lifetime: to belong. He just has to pretend that the notoriously troubled Connor Murphy was his secret best friend.

Suddenly, Evan isn't invisible anymore - even to the girl of his dreams. And Connor Murphy's parents have taken him in like their own, desperate to know more about their enigmatic son from his "closest friend." As Evan gets pulled deeper into the family's swirl of anger, regret, and confusion, he knows that what he's doing can't be right, but if he's helping people. how wrong can it be?

No longer incapacitated by anxiety or hiding from the disappointment in his mother's eyes, this new Evan has a purpose. And confidence. Every day is amazing. Until everything is in danger of unraveling and he comes face-to-face with his greatest obstacle: himself.

A simple lie leads to complicated truths in this bighearted story of grief, authenticity, and the struggle to belong in an age of instant connectivity and profound isolation.

Review:
I've heard great things about the musical that this novel stems from, and not having seen it yet, I figured I may as well give the novel version a go and see if I like it. The fact that the original creators and screenwriters were a part of the novel's creation reassured me a bit as well that this would be as close to the spirit of the musical as you can get when adapting to print. Sadly, though this story has the potential to be really amazing and heartfelt (and some parts truly are), the novel's titular character just doesn't really make me that invested in him.

Evan is a severely anxious seventeen-year-old boy who is also depressed to the point of suicidal ideation. At the start of his senior year, his therapist gives him the assignment of writing letters to himself in order to try to keep a more positive outlook. After a confrontation and misunderstanding one afternoon, classmate Connor Murphy ends up with one of Evan's letters to himself. When Connor dies by suicide that night, Evan is eventually contacted by the Murphy family, asking why their loner son was writing letters to Evan. With the best of intentions to ease the suffering of a grieving family, Evan tells the Murphys that Conner and he were good friends and had been communicating in secret. With the later creation of The Connor Project, a movement to remember Connor and create awareness for mental health and suicide, Evan is thrust into the spotlight and his life as he knows it changes very quickly. However, as Evan's mother begins to enquire about the sudden changes in her son's behaviour, Evan's own guilt and anxiety over his actions begin to grow.

There are a few things about this text that I do truly enjoy. There are some lovely moments and sentiments expressed by characters about feeling isolated and disconnected from others, they allow for readers to really empathize with the characters. I also like how the effects of grief on a family are shown, especially when the person who dies has complicated relationships with the family involved. It's liberating for Zoe to say that although she misses her brother, she doesn't miss the tension in the house or the times where he would become violent towards her.

On to the parts of the novel that just didn't do it for me. Evan is a sympathetic character to a certain extent, but when his lie kept snowballing after he had multiple opportunities to correct it I really lost interest in what happened to him. There's something about lying to a grieving family in the manner that Evan did that just doesn't sit right with me. Also, the events in the conclusion just didn't seem all that realistic either, it's as if Evan gets off too easily.

Recommendation:
I'd say this is worth the read whether you've seen the musical version of this or not, but it may fall flat for some readers as it did for me.

Thoughts on the cover:
The image of the tree, particularly the shading, is really well done; and the symbolism fits nicely with its mention in the novel.

Crush - Svetlana Chmakova

Title: Crush
Author: Svetlana Chmakova
Publisher: Yen Press, 2018 (Paperback)
Length: 240 pages
Genre: Children's Graphic Novel; Realistic Fiction
Started: November 11, 2018
Finished: November 11, 2018

Summary:
From the back cover:

Jorge seems to have it all together. He's big enough that nobody really messes with him, but he's also a genuinely sweet guy with a solid, reliable group of friends. The only time he ever really feels off his game is when he crosses paths with a certain girl... But when the group dynamic among the boys starts to shift, will Jorge be able to balance what his friends expect of him with what he actually wants?

Following the overwhelming success of Awkward and Brave, Svetlana Chmakova's award-winning Berrybrook Middle School series continues with its next instalment - Crush!

Review:
This is the third instalment of a graphic novel series that I absolutely adore. Copies of these should be in every middle-grade classroom, they're very topical and address issues (sometimes difficult ones) that all preteens and young teenagers deal with at some point in their lives.

After falling in love with Awkward, and enjoying Brave just as much (if not a little more), I hoped Crush would be the same. Thankfully, the author is simply amazing and delivers yet another new story that is just as impressive as the previous two.

This third book focuses on thirteen-year-old Jorge Ruiz, first introduced in Brave. Jorge, at first glance, seems like your stereotypical jock: he's big, plays baseball, and a lot of kids are a little afraid of him. But as Jensen first realizes in Brave, Jorge is actually a nice, no-nonsense guy with a moral code who looks out for people at school.

In Crush, Jorge begins the story with a solid group of friends that are very similar to him. When his friend Garrett begins mingling with a group of kids that behave in ways Jorge detests, he has to decide whether he is going to stay true to his own moral code or emulate what the other group is doing. Amidst all of this, the athletics club that Jorge is a part of is organizing a fundraiser ball, and Jorge himself develops a crush on fellow classmate Jazmine. So Jorge not only has to balance school, homework, baseball practice, and all the activities he has to help out with for the ball; he also has to juggle relationship drama on top of all that.

I really enjoy how the author manages to showcase both male and female characters throughout this series to create stories that appeal equally to boys and girls. Though one character does tend to be the main focus in each story, readers are introduced to several other students as secondary characters throughout each book that they will be able to see themselves reflected in at least a couple. The fact that this book focuses on friendship and budding romantic relationships but is from a male point of view is amazing in my opinion, just because it's rare to see a middle-grade story about those themes that doesn't come from a female main character.

I also like how the author focuses on the interactions of new clubs with each story, this time looking at the athletics club and the drama club. This subtly shows young readers that they can indeed be friends with all kinds of kids, and that they aren't limited to hanging out with those who share every single interest with them.

I really appreciate that the author included the issue of consent in this story. Characters of both sexes actually ask permission if they can kiss each other, and characters in turn give clear answers. This is really a wonderful example to set for the younger generation, it's presented as the default way to be respectful.

I also appreciate how, through Jorge, the author relates the idea that the people you choose to hang out with influence how you are perceived by others. Jorge dislikes James and his buddies because they're disrespectful jerks to everyone else, and loses a degree of respect for his friend Garrett when he starts hanging out with them.

This instalment, like the other two, showcases diversity across gender, race, cultural background, religion, body type, etc. I'm amazed at the different ways readers will see themselves reflected throughout this series.

Recommendation:
I can't recommend this series enough. If you've got a preteen/teenager at home that you need to buy books for or teach that age level, just go out and buy these, you won't be disappointed.

Thoughts on the cover:
I like the continuity from the first and second covers. Jorge and Jazmine are in full colour while Jorge's friends are in lighter monochrome, and the subtle blush marks on Jorge's cheeks are just too stinking cute.

That's Not What Happened - Kody Keplinger

Title: That's Not What Happened
Author: Kody Keplinger
Publisher: Scholastic Press, 2018 (Hardcover)
Length: 325 pages
Genre: Young Adult; Realistic Fiction
Started: October 17, 2018
Finished: October 19, 2018

Summary:
From the inside cover:

It's been three years since the Virgil County High School Massacre. Three years since my best friend, Sarah, was killed in a bathroom stall during the mass shooting. Everyone knows Sarah's story - that she died proclaiming her faith.

But it's not true.

I know be cause I was with her when she died. I didn't say anything then, and people got hurt because of it. Now Sarah's parents are publishing a book about her, so this might be my last chance to set the record straight...but I'm not the only survivor with a story to tell about what did - and didn't - happen that day.

Except Sarah's martyrdom is important to a lot of people, people who don't take kindly to what I'm trying to do. And the more I learn, the less certain I am about what's right. I don't know what will be worse: the guilt of staying silent or the consequences of speaking up.

From New York Times bestselling author Kody Keplinger comes an astonishing and thought-provoking exploration of the aftermath of tragedy, the power of narrative, and how we remember what we've lost.

Review:
I'm such a sucker for books like these, ones that talk about big issues that we don't often otherwise discuss in a way that invites something beyond the surface examination. School shootings are one of those issues.

Lee is one of six survivors of a mass shooting at her high school three years prior. Among the nine victims was her best friend, Sarah. Everybody believes that before she died, Sarah had a confrontation with the shooter about the cross necklace she was wearing, and is now thought of as a martyr. Lee tells us from the beginning that it isn't true, but she kept silent due to the harassment another survivor, Kellie Gaynor, received when she tried to tell the truth. As Lee is about to graduate, she learns that Sarah's parents have written a book about their daughter's story that is about to be released. Wanting to correct all the misconceptions that have emerged about the survivors as well as the victims, Lee asks the five to write letters telling their own stories about what really happened.

This novel is essentially about who controls the narrative in the aftermath of a tragedy. When people die, especially tragically, there's this aversion to talk about them as real people with flaws. No one likes to speak ill of the dead, after all. Lee is interested in the truth, even if it's not pretty, even if it means shattering the images people cling to in order to help them survive their grief. She doesn't shy away from admitting that even a victim people are mourning would've been classified as a jerk while living. But Lee grapples with her insistence on the truth, wondering who it really serves and if it does more harm than good.

I appreciated how the author made this book diverse in so many ways. Lee is asexual, and it plays a significant role in her character development. She's also the child of a single, teenaged mom who is very matter-of-fact about her deadbeat father and thankful to her mother for the sacrifices she's made. Denny is not only black (one of the only black kids in the school) but also blind. Eden is hispanic and a lesbian. The issue of religion is explored as well, from personal belief and lack of it, compared to organized religion.

I also like how the author included so many references to criticisms that we usually hear about in the aftermath of mass shootings: denying that the event ever occurred, calling the survivors "crisis actors," and pro-gun lobbyists confronting survivors. She was also very realistic about the effects of trauma: characters deal with anger, addiction, guilt, and depression that no one else really understands except for each other.

Recommendation:
This is a gripping, engrossing story that is hard to put down. This is something everybody should read, especially considering the frequency of mass shootings in recent years.

Thoughts on the cover:
The pencil, sharpener, and eraser marks reinforce the letter theme from the book; it's simple yet effective.

Only Child - Rhiannon Navin

Title: Only Child
Author: Rhiannon Navin
Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf, 2018 (Hardcover)
Length: 288 pages
Genre: Adult; Realistic Fiction
Started: August 8, 2018
Finished: August 8, 2018

Summary:
From the inside cover:

Sometimes the littlest bodies hold the biggest hearts, and the quietest voices speak the loudest.

Squeezed into a coat closet with his classmates and teacher, first-grader Zach Taylor can hear gunshots ringing through the halls of his school. They've practiced lockdown drills before - it was fun and exciting then. But this time it's not a drill. A gunman has entered the school, and in a matter of minutes he will take nineteen lives and irrevocably change the fabric of this close-knit community.

While Zach's mother pursues a quest for justice against the shooter's parents, holding them responsible for their son's actions, Zach retreats into the healing world of books and art. Armed with his new insights, and the optimism and stubbornness only a child could have, Zach becomes determined to help the adults in his life rediscover the universal truths of love and compassion they need to pull them through their darkest hour.

Only Child introduces readers to not one but two remarkable new voices: that of Zach Taylor, the precocious gentle narrator, and that of author Rhiannon Navin, who breathes life into him with the compassion, honesty, and humour of a natural storyteller. Dazzling and tenderhearted, Only Child teaches us all to "see through the noise of our adult lives, back to the undeniable truth of childhood - kindness begets kindness" (Bryan Reardon, author of Finding Jake).

Review:
As both a teacher and a mom (especially one who was a teenager during Columbine), school shootings are a paralyzing thing to read about. As a mom, I think immediately of my own six-year-old and the instinct to keep her safe (I cried when she first started lockdown drill practices in her school), and as a teacher the sickening thought that if my own class were ever involved in one, that I would most likely be killed trying to protect them.

Only Child is the story of six-year-old Zach, who survives a school shooting that claims the life of his older brother, Andy. Zach's story opens with him already in the closet as the shooting begins. The author grabs your interest right away with achingly real descriptions of what a class of six-year-olds and their teacher would be doing and feeling once they start to realize the "pops" they're hearing are actually gunshots. The teacher swears in her frustration trying to unlock her phone to call 911, kids are puking from fright and being confined in a closed space, Zach hones in on the smells and the sounds (which will later be PTSD triggers for him) because he literally can't do anything else. The chaos of the aftermath was wonderfully done too: the blood-stained clothes, the confusion, kids trying to wait for their parents and parents trying to figure out where their children are...it was so hard to read, but I have to give the author credit for a realistic portrayal.

The author not only handles the event of the shooting with realism, but also what happens after the families return home. I actually liked how the author addresses through Zach the idea that sometimes we have conflicting thoughts about people who die: Andy had ODD and was a challenging child who was a jerk to his little brother most of the time, and Zach calls out his parents when they gloss over that at the funeral and at the interviews that follow. The loss of a child is something that very few marriages manage to survive, so the aspect of the parents' relationship is depicted as well.

I fell in love with Zach as a narrator, he's not only lovable but realistic as well, reading his thoughts sounded like my six-year-old daughter talking. There is only one thing I take issue with regarding the author's portrayal of Zach: there is no way a six-year-old is mature enough to do some of the things Zach is depicted doing. Zach obtains all his information about the shooting through the news reports on TV and the iPad afterwards, requiring an impressive amount of reading. Now, this is plausible for some strong readers at six, my own kid surprises me at the complexity of words she can actually read on her own still months away from turning seven. But the author goes out of her way to mention that Zach isn't a particularly strong reader like Andy, who was tested as gifted and read the Harry Potter series at Zach's age. Zach also uses art and colour to illustrate his feelings, pairing up colours to match the mood he's in, completely on his own. That kind of concept would be difficult for some kids to understand, and for a six-year-old boy to just decide to do that completely on their own is something I have trouble believing.

Recommendation:
This is the emotional equivalent of getting hit by a train...times ten. Beware, you will ugly cry and need a box of tissues, but it's so worth it.

Thoughts on the cover:
It's very plain, but the seemingly random colours do tie into Zach's use of colour to describe his feelings: green for anger (like the Hulk), yellow for happy, grey for sadness, red for embarrassed.

How to Build a Girl - Caitlin Moran

Title: How to Build a Girl
Author: Caitlin Moran
Publisher: HarperCollins, 2014 (Hardcover)
Length: 338 pages
Genre: Adult; Realistic Fiction
Started: July 28, 2018
Finished: August 5, 2018

Summary:
From the inside cover:

What do you do in your teenage years when you realize what your parents taught you wasn't enough? You must go out and find books and poetry and pop songs and bad heroes - and build yourself.

It's 1990. Johanna Morrigan, fourteen, has shamed herself so badly on local TV that she decides that there's no point in being Johanna anymore and reinvents herself as Dolly Wilde - fast-talking, hard-drinking gothic hero and full-time Lady Sex Adventurer. She will save her poverty-stricken Bohemian family by becoming a writer - like Jo in Little Women, or the Brontes - but without the dying-young bit.

By sixteen, she's smoking cigarettes, getting drunk, and working for a music paper. She's writing pornographic letters to rock stars, having all the kinds of sex with all the kinds of men, and eviscerating bands in reviews of 600 words or less.

But what happens when Johanna realizes she's build Dolly with a fatal flaw? Is a box full of records, a wall full of posters, and a head full of paperbacks enough to build a girl after all?

Imagine The Bell Jar - written by Rizzo from Grease. How to Build a Girl is a funny, poignant, and heartbreakingly evocative story of self-discovery and invention, as only Caitlin Moran could tell it.

Review:
After reading the sequel to this book, How to Be Famous, I figured I'd give the first instalment a try. How to Build a Girl is a hilarious read for sure, but I much more enjoyed How to Be Famous. 

Fourteen-year-old Johanna lives in an overcrowded, low-income housing unit in Wolverhampton in the early 1990s. After she both humiliates herself on local television and accidentally gets her family kicked off their welfare benefits, she reinvents herself under the pseudonym of Dolly Wilde and gets a job as a music writer for the magazine D&ME. She dresses like a goth, smokes, does drugs, has lots of wild, crazy sex with men she barely knows, all while travelling around interviewing bands. Not only is she trying to help support her family, she's also trying to figure out who she is and what she wants to be, which makes this novel both appealing and a touch bit cliche. Granted, what saves this novel is that Johanna and her family are hilarious to read about. Johanna's not one of those annoying heroines who doesn't figure things out in the event of a royal screw-up, she smartens up and has some real growth.

Recommendation:
Not an overall fresh type of story, but funny as all hell, so it's worth the read.

Thoughts on the cover:
I like the continuity between this first instalment and the sequel's covers, very punk and grunge-y.

How to Be Famous - Caitlin Moran

Title: How to Be Famous
Author: Caitlin Moran
Publisher: HarperCollins, July 3, 2018, (Hardcover) (Review copy is an ARC from the publisher)
Length: 337 pages
Genre: Adult; Realistic Fiction
Started: June 21, 2018
Finished: June 29, 2018

Summary:
From the back cover:

Johanna Morrigan (aka Dolly Wilde) has it all: she is nineteen, lives in her own flat in London, and writes for the coolest music magazine in Britain. Her star is rising, just not quickly enough for her liking.

Then, John Kite, Johanna's unrequited love, has an album go to number one. Suddenly John exists on another plane of reality: that of the famouses, a world of rabid fans and VIP access. Johanna lacks the traditional trappings of fame (famous parents, mind-scorching hotness, exotic sandals, etc.), so she does the only thing a self-respecting Lady Sex Adventurer can do. She starts a magazine column critiquing the lives and follies of the famouses around her. But as Johanna skyrockets to fame herself, she begins to realize that with celebrity comes sacrifice, and hers may mean giving up the one person she was determined to keep.

For anyone who has been a girl or known one, who has admired fame or judged it, How to Be Famous is a big-hearted, hilarious tale of fame and fortune - and all they entail.

Review:
I've been familiar with Moran's work for several years now, so when I was contacted by the publisher asking me if I wanted a copy of her newest book, I enthusiastically said yes. How to Be Famous is a sequel of sorts to her previous novel, How to Build a Girl, which you don't need to have read to enjoy this newest instalment - I haven't, but I can assure you, I will be rectifying that shortly.

How to Be Famous takes place in London circa 1994-1995 and follows the life of Johanna Morrigan, a nineteen-year-old living the life most teenagers would die for. She lives on her own, writes for a music magazine, and gets to interview famous people for a living (oh, 1994, when someone could actually live independently and have a job in the entertainment industry in their late teens). Johanna's life isn't perfect though. She is becoming increasingly aware of the sexism inherent in the male-dominated industry she works for; and her unrequited love, John Kite, rockets to stardom, leaving her further behind. She decides to win John Kite's heart the way she does best: by writing.

Moran does a wonderful job of capturing the spirit that was the mid-90s, and reminding us that even though we're looking at these events more than 20 years in the future, the problems Johanna faces are, not surprisingly, quite contemporary and relatable. There's a definite feminist vibe to the book (as with all of Moran's works), but everything is conveyed so well through Johanna's experiences to the point where you have such empathy for the character that you would literally punch Jerry Sharp in the face if he suddenly appeared in corporeal form before you.

Moran also writes with an amazing sense of humour. I began reading this book while proctoring exams, and it was a serious struggle to not burst out laughing while my poor students were trying to concentrate. So I thank the author for not only writing a wonderful book, but for rescuing me from the complete boredom that is proctoring exams. Not only is Johanna's narration deliciously funny, the character of Suzanne is absolutely hysterical. Heck, all of the characters are, but Suzanne is a particular treat for readers.

Moran's writing is not only funny, she has a gift for metaphor as well. I have several passages that are particular favourites, but this one is probably the least spoiler-y: "At this point, John's life was like a zoo on fire. Animals running everywhere. If I kissed him here, then, that kiss would just be just one more confused penguin, lost in a crowd of panicking zebras, and lions trying to eat eagles. I didn't want to be a sidelined penguin. I wanted to be the whole Ark."

Recommendation:
A deliciously funny romp amidst the backdrop of the British music scene of the mid-1990s with a feminist twist. Give this a go, you won't be disappointed.

Thoughts on the cover:
I love the punk/grunge look on the kids in the image, and the hot pink and yellow colour scheme is just immensely appealing.

Archival Quality - Ivy Noelle Weir and Steenz

Title: Archival Quality
Author: Ivy Noelle Weir and Steenz
Publisher: Oni Press, 2018 (Paperback)
Length: 280 pages
Genre: Young Adult; Adult, Graphic Novel, Fantasy, Realistic Fiction, Mystery
Started: May 26, 2018
Finished: May 26, 2018

Summary:
From the inside cover:

The Logan Museum is a mysterious old building practically covered in skulls, and also the new workplace of Celeste "Cel" Walden, a librarian who was let go from her previous job after a mental breakdown. But Cel is desperate to feel useful, and Abayomi Abiola, the Logan Museum's chief curator, is desperate to hire an archivist.

Cel soon realizes the job is unlike any other she's had. There's an apartment onsite she's required to live in, she only works in the middle of the night, and she definitely gets the impression that there's more to the museum than Abayomi and her new boss, Holly Park, are letting on.

And then strange things start happening. Odd noises. Objects moving. Vivid, terrifying dreams of a young woman Cel's never met, but feels strangely drawn to. A woman who for some reason needs Cel's help.

As Cel attempts to learn more about her, she begins losing time, misplacing things, passing out - there's no denying the job is becoming dangerous. But Cel can't let go of the woman in her dreams. Who is she? Why is she so fixated on Cel? And does Cel have the power to save her when she's still trying to save herself?

Review:
This just sounded really unique when I came across it, and after reading it, I can say that this was definitely an intriguing choice.

Cel makes for an engaging character due to her mental health struggles, and the addition of the supernatural elements adds a unique and appealing twist to the story. It really does make you question whether Cel is actually seeing the ghost and the weird events or if it's just a reflection of her life after her breakdown. The backdrop of the museum as an asylum in the past also gives a nice little reflective piece on how our understanding of mental health has changed in just the past few decades, let alone the past 100 years.

I also really appreciated the examination of Cel's insistence that she do everything on her own without help, and how she has to come to terms with the idea that she needs to reach out to her support network and actually accept the help of others if she really wants to get better. The cast of characters is small, but nicely diverse across many aspects, so that gets bonus points as well.

Recommendation:

This is definitely a must-read, if not for the portrayal of mental health issues, then for the creative story. 

Thoughts on the cover:

I love the shiny gold that the title font is done in, it makes for a nice touch. 

A Girl Called Echo: Pemmican Wars - Katherena Vermette, Scott B. Henderson, Donovan Yaciuk

Title: A Girl Called Echo: Pemmican Wars (Vol. 1)
Author: Katherena Vermette, Scott B. Henderson, Donovan Yaciuk
Publisher: Highwater Press, 2017 (Paperback)
Length: 48 pages
Genre: Young Adult; Historical Fiction, Realistic Fiction, Science Fiction
Started: April 28, 2018
Finished: April 28, 2018

Summary:
From the back cover:

Echo Desjardins, a 13-year-old Metis girl adjusting to a new home and school, is struggling with loneliness while separated from her mother. Then an ordinary day in Mr. Bee's history class turns extraordinary, and Echo's life will never be the same. During Mr. Bee's lecture, Eco finds herself transported to another time and place - a bison hunt on the Saskatchewan prairie - and back again to the present. In the following weeks, Echo slips back and forth in time. She visits a Metis camp, travels the old fur-trade routes, and experiences the perilous and bygone era of the Pemmican Wars.

Pemmican Wars is the first graphic novel in the series A Girl Called Echo.

Review:
Lately, I've been actively trying to hunt down YA literature with Indigenous characters in them, so when I came across this I decided to give it a try.

Echo is a young Metis girl living in foster care. When she's learning about Metis history in class, she actually manages to travel to the Qu'Appelle Valley in Saskatchewan in 1814, in the middle of the Pemmican Wars. As she does this several times, she actually becomes involved in seeking out more of her history by checking out books from the library and relaying what she's learned to her mother during a visit.

The only downside of this book was that it wasn't even 50 pages long. The series does continue, but it is unfortunate that each volume is so small. I do like that the author includes historical timelines and notes to help explain concepts.

Recommendation:
This is definitely something I would buy for a classroom. Echo is a relatable character and the content is not only Canadian, but also representative of Indigenous history, something we sorely need more of  in YA literature.

Thoughts on the cover:
I lie the colour palette, and Echo's profile image is pensive and quiet, much like she is for most of the book.

Speak: The Graphic Novel - Laurie Halse Anderson and Emily Carroll

Title: Speak: The Graphic Novel
Author: Laurie Halse Anderson and Emily Carroll
Publisher: Farrar Straus Giroux (Macmillan), 2018 (Hardcover)
Length: 384 pages
Genre: Young Adult; Realistic Fiction, Graphic Novel
Started: April 8, 2018
Finished: April 8, 2018

Summary:
From the inside cover:

The critically acclaimed award-winning modern classic Speak is now a stunning graphic novel.

"Speak up for yourself - we want to know what you have to say." From the first moment of her freshman year at Merryweather High, Melinda knows this is a big fat lie, part of the nonsense of high school. She is friendless - an outcast - because of something that happened over the summer. Now nobody will talk to her, let alone listen. So what's the point of talking? Through her work on an art project, Melinda is finally able to face what really happened that night. But before she can make peace with the ghosts of the past, she has to confront the reality of the present - and stop someone who still wishes to do her harm. Only words can save her. She can't stay silent. Not anymore.

With powerful illustrations by Eisner Award-winning artist Emily Carroll, Speak: The Graphic Novel comes alive for new audiences and fans of the original.

Review:
I read Speak when I first started teaching, over a decade ago (before I even started this blog); it's what started my love affair with Laurie Halse Anderson's work as a whole.

Speak is such an influential novel, we still have it on reading lists for high schools today, even though it came out in 1999 when I was in high school. It allows for much-needed conversations about sexual assault and rape, more timely now than ever in the wake of the MeToo movement.

I was incredibly pleased to learn that Speak was coming out in graphic novel format, it only makes it even more accessible to new generations of readers. The artist brilliantly illustrates Melinda's struggles through her first year of high school, and the visual format allows for some really creative choices for expressing the book's themes.

Recommendation:
If you've already read Speak, you need to pick up the graphic novel version; it serves as a nice compliment to the original. If you haven't read Speak yet, just go read both of these.

Thoughts on the cover:
Similar to the original novel's cover, you have a fraction of Melinda's face mingled with a tree. I like the consistency of it and the nod to the original.

Threads of Blue - Suzanne LaFleur

Title: Threads of Blue (sequel to Beautiful Blue World)
Author: Suzanne LaFleur
Publisher: Wendy Lamb Books (Penguin), 2017 (Hardcover)
Length: 203 pages
Genre: Children's Realistic Fiction
Started: October 23, 2017
Finished: October 26, 2017

Summary:
From the publisher's website:

A war took Mathilde away from her family when she was chosen to serve her country, Sofarende, with other children working on a secret military project.

But now the other children - including her best friend, Megs - have fled to safety, and Mathilde is all alone, determined to complete her mission.

In this powerful and deeply moving sequel to the acclaimed Beautiful Blue World, Mathilde must make her way through a new stage of the war. Haunted by the bold choice she made on the night she chose her country's future over her own well-being, she clings to the promise Megs made long ago: "Whatever happens, I'll be with you."

Review:
I read Beautiful Blue World last year and loved it, so of course I knew I'd be picking up the sequel (especially with the cliffhanger ending of the first book).

This book picks up where the previous one left off, with Mathilde on her journey alone to Eilean after allowing Rainer to escape (essentially committing an act of treason). In doing so, she was separated from the rest of the child soldiers, including her friend Megs, and had to travel separately. She eventually makes it to Eilean and is reunited with her Sofarende military contacts while they form a plan of attack on Tyssia. Eventually, Mathilde and Gunnar are asked to go on a new mission that will lead them back into the ruins of Sofarende, all while Megs refuses to speak to Mathilde since her return.

Though I liked Beautiful Blue World better, this novel, like its predecessor, does a wonderful job of viewing war through a childlike lens. Mathilde spends time in a Eilean refugee camp with other Sofarender children and it really highlights how children experience war: worrying about whether family members are alive, trying to survive in a new environment, and worrying about who will take care of you. There's even the experience of rebuilding a war-torn country and the process of trying to locate missing family and resettling. The book even raises ethical concerns about how far one can do to end a war: do you bomb a country, possibly killing civilians, if it means you can force the enemy to leave? Or do you save the civilians and leave the future uncertain?

Recommendation:
Thought not as thought-provoking as its predecessor, this one is definitely worth a read if you enjoyed the story thus far.

Thoughts on the cover:
Beautifully symbolic, as with the first. You see Mathilde, Gunnar, and Rainer in the boat; its a lovely scene till you realize the shadows of the bombs over their heads.

Jane - Aline Brosh McKenna, Ramon K. Perez

Title: Jane
Author: Aline Brosh McKenna and Ramon K. Perez
Publisher: Archaia, 2017 (Hardcover)
Length: 224 pages
Genre: Young Adult/Adult; Classic, Realistic Fiction, Graphic Novel
Started: October 23, 2017
Finished: October 23, 2017

Summary:
From the back cover

Growing up in an unhappy family in a small New England town, Jane dreamed of escaping to New york City to study art and live a life of independent adventure. Soon after arriving, she takes a job as a nanny for a mysterious, powerful businessman, Rochester, and his lovable but lonely daughter, Adele, in a lavish apartment filled with unsettling secrets. Jane soon finds herself drawn into a world of intrigue, danger, and romance that takes her far beyond her childhood dreams.

Award-winning screenwriter Aline Brosh McKenna (The Devil Wears Prada, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend) makes her graphic novel debut with Eisner Award-winning illustrator Ramon K. Perez (Jim Henson's Tale of Sand) in this modern day reimagining of Charlotte Bronte's classic novel Jane Eyre.

Review:
I'm a Jane Eyre enthusiast, and like with Beauty and the Beast, I'll read any new version that is released; so of course I picked this up. This version does a great job of updating the story for a modern context: Jane is American, escapes her neglectful, extended family to study art in New York, and becomes a nanny to support herself. Rochester is a business tycoon whose wife was shot by a bullet intended for him, is now essentially brain-dead, and he keeps her in the upper floor of his Manhattan penthouse in hope of a recovery. Jane empathizes with Adele, and in her persistence in getting Rochester to step up and be a more involved father, the two bond and a romance develops.

This version does a great job of certain things but falls flat in others. The opening pages show rather than tell about Jane's childhood and neglectful upbringing using very little narrative dialogue, and a lovely metaphoric grayscale colour palette that slowly emerges to brilliant colour as readers see Jane settle in New York. On the other end, the romance between Jane and Rochester is horribly rushed and doesn't do justice to the original. The conversations that they're supposed to bond over are absent, and it just makes for an unrealistic portrayal of the pair. The art style isn't my cup of tea, but it is nicely done.

Recommendation:

Worth a read if you're a fan of the original, it's a nice modern take on the tale but not a perfect adaptation. 

Thoughts on the cover:

Showcases Jane's personality and the graphic novel's excellent use of colour. 

She and Her Cat - Makoto Shinkai and Tsubasa Yamaguchi

Title: She and Her Cat
Author: Makoto Shinkai and Tsubasa Yamaguchi
Publisher: Vertical Comics, 2017 (Paperback)
Length: 180 pages
Genre: Adult; Graphic Novel, Realistic Fiction
Started: October 6, 2017
Finished: October 6, 2017

Summary:
From the back cover:

"It was the start of spring. It was raining. That was the day that she brought me home."

This is the story of Miyu, a woman who lives alone with her cat, Chobi. As Miyu navigates the world of adulthood, she discovers both the freedom and the loneliness that come with living independently, and Chobi learns of the outside world through her actions. Time drifts slowly for Miyu and her cat, but the harsh realities of the world soon catch up...

Review:
Makoto Shinkai is a filmmaker who has an amazingly good reputation, and well-deserved too (I've seen practically all of his movies). I haven't seen the short piece this manga was adapted from though, hence why I picked it up.

The story is narrated from Chobi's (the cat's) perspective, which is always an interesting take on any piece of fiction. We only learn about Miyu through Chobi, so it takes a while before we discover that Miyu is living alone since she recently graduated and landed a job. She struggles with depression, and we see how the responsibility of taking care of Chobi helps Miyu cope. The manga perfectly captures the unconditional love pets have for their owners, and actually does a good job of framing the story from an animal's perspective.

Recommendation:

It's worth a read just for the unique subject matter, the fact that it's a touching story is just a bonus. 

Thoughts on the cover:

Encapsulates the feel of the work, and the pearlescent finish is just a nice added touch. 

Ban This Book - Alan Gratz

Title: Ban This Book
Author: Alan Gratz
Publisher: Starscape, 2017 (Hardcover)
Length: 243 pages
Genre: Children's Realistic Fiction
Started: September 21, 2017
Finished: September 21, 2017

Summary:
From the inside cover:

It's a battle of the books - and Amy Anne is determined to win!

It all started the say Amy Anne Ollinger tried to check out her favourite book in the whole world, From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, from the school library. That's when Mrs. Jones, the librarian, told her the bad news: her favourite book was banned! All because a classmate's mom thought the book wasn't appropriate for kids to read.

Amy Anne decides to fight back by starting a secret banned-books library out of her locker. As word spreads, Amy Anne's locker stash quickly grows into a school-wide sensation. Soon, she and her friends find themselves on the front line of an unexpected battle over book banning, censorship, and who has the right to decide what kids can read.

Review:
I so needed this book as a kid. Like Amy Anne, I was the little bookworm who was quiet and didn't stand up for themselves. I definitely would've appreciated Any Anne's transformation to become a kid who speaks her mind and stands up for what she believes in.

Amy Anne is nine, and with two younger sisters at home (one of whom she shares a room with) she doesn't get a lot of quiet time to herself. So she stays in the library after school reading book after book. When she tries to check out her favourite yet again, the librarian tells her it's been removed due to a parent challenging the book's content, along with several others deemed inappropriate. Even after her parents buy her a copy of her own, Amy Anne decides that good books deserve to be read, and that only someone's parents can tell a kid what they can and cannot read. When she discovers that some of her friends own copies of the other banned books, the B.B.L.L. (Banned Books Locker Library) begins. After pooling their money to purchase more books, and even receiving donated copies from authors, the B.B.L.L. begins to grow even further. When the principal uncovers their little operation, leading to the librarian being fired, Amy Anne and her friends decide to step up their game and really show the trustees how ridiculous book banning can be.

As an English teacher and general book-lover, this book and the story it tells is so incredibly important. The story takes place in North Carolina in the US, where I know they do have more issues with banned books and censorship. I'm fortunate that I work in a school board in Canada that hasn't really had an issue with book banning and censorship in general, although a board near mine did temporarily ban Philip Pullmans's His Dark Materials a few years back which I was absolutely incensed over. I'm of the opinion that if a kid is old enough to read something let them have at it, but to be a parent and have a conversation about the content your kid is reading, same as with movies or tv shows or any media they consume. Are there some books I wouldn't let my kid read at this stage? Of course, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't let her read them ever, and that's my prerogative as her parent.

The list of banned books in this novel are real: they've all been banned at some point in time in the US over the past several decades, and the reasons are mind-numbingly stupid. Amy Anne and her friends make that point crystal clear when they intentionally look for things that would get a book banned: any behaviour considered negative like disobeying parents, violence, sexual content of any kind, having LGBT or transgender characters, and many others. I look at that list and see many books that were actually required class reading in elementary school for me: Bridge to Terebithia, Island of the Blue Dolphins, From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, and Anne Frank: Diary of a Young Girl. Not only did these books not corrupt me as a child, they made me a better human being. I see books on that list that not only would I not mind if my child read them, I've already bought those exact copies in preparation for when she's a more proficient reader (she's not quite six yet, I figure give her another year to eighteen months and she'll be voraciously devouring everything on the shelves). So needless to say, the unrestricted right to read is one I will always defend.

I love Amy Anne's character development in this novel. She goes from a meek little mouse (as Trey's drawing depicts) with very closed-minded ideas about good books and the people that read them, to a kid who will speak her mind about what she feels is right, who realizes that different people like different things, and that even the parent that instigated the book banning is actually a good person who's just a bit misguided. I also like that Amy Anne is a person of colour (as are her family), we need more diversity in our kid's lit, not to mention on our book covers too.

The only thing I have issue with in this book is that there is no way a group of average nine year olds could've orchestrated the series of events as lined out in this book without parental influence of some kind (unless they were highly gifted, which the kids in question are not). Could kids of eleven or twelve do it? Sure, but not nine, no way. But aside from that suspension of disbelief, the book is awesome.

Recommendation:
All book lovers should read this, not to mention teachers, parents, hell let's make it everyone.

Thoughts on the cover:
Very basic. It gets the message across, but this is a book that would benefit from a good cover redesign.

Nunavik - Michel Hellman

Title: Nunavik
Author: Michel Hellman
Publisher: Pow Pow Press, 2017 (Paperback)
Length: 150 pages
Genre: Adult; Graphic Novel, Realistic Fiction
Started: August 20, 2017
Finished: August 21, 2017

Summary:
From the inside cover:

"Do you know what constitutes a typical Inuit family? A man, a woman, two children...and an anthropologist!" Follow Montreal author Michel Hellman on a trip to Nunavik as he discovers he's the punchline to that joke.

Review:
This was an interesting selection that popped up when I was browsing through new library books. Nunavik is the northern part of Quebec, sparsely inhabited by Inuit peoples, where Montreal artist/author Michel Hellman travels to for inspiration for his new graphic novel. The end result reads like a travelogue rather than an actual story, showcasing both the beauty of the North as well as its challenges.

The art style is simple, but conveys much, and it's an interesting detail that the artist decides to portray himself as a bear but truthfully depict everyone else. I liked how the author does explain the issues that Nunavik faces, but there's no real reflection on them, they're just presented with no follow up. This would make for a good discussion prompt for a classroom or a bookclub, though.

Recommendation:
A welcome look into a part of Canada rarely explored.

Thoughts on the cover:
The cover ives you a good idea of the artistic style.

Brave - Svetlana Chmakova

Title: Brave
Author: Svetlana Chmakova
Publisher: Yen Press, May 23, 2017 (Paperback)
Length: 248 pages
Genre: Children's/Young Adult; Graphic Novel, Realistic Fiction
Started: May 19, 2017
Finished: May 19, 2017

Summary:
From the back cover:

What does it mean to be brave?

In his dreams, Jensen is the biggest hero that ever was, saving the world and his friends on a daily basis. But his middle school reality is VERY different - math is hard, getting along with friends is hard...Even finding a partner for the class project is a huge problem when you always get picked last. And the pressure's on even more once the school newspaper's dynamic duo, Jenny and Akilah, draw Jensen into the whirlwind of school news, social-experiment projects, and behind-the-scenes club drama. Jensen has always played the middle school game one level at a time, but suddenly, someone's cranked up the difficulty setting. Will those daring daydreams of his finally work in his favour, or will he have to find real solutions to his real-life problems?

The charming world of Berrybrook Middle School gets a little bigger in this highly anticipated follow-up to Svetlana Chmakova's award-winning Awkward with a story about a boy who learns his own way of being brave!

Review:
I read Awkward, the first book of this series, back in 2015, and to this day I can't say enough good things about it. I've read practically everything this artist has put out over the years, and this new series set in the middle school years really strikes a chord with me as a teacher. Brave, the new instalment, takes all the great elements from Awkward and just gives readers even more to love.

Rather than focusing on Peppi and Jaime and their respective art and science club friends from the previous book, this one focuses mainly on Jensen, and Jenny and Akilah who work on the school newspaper, though previous characters do make repeat appearances. Jensen is a boy with big dreams but also big problems. He's failing math class, is being bullied on a daily basis, and his friends in the art club frequently leave him out of things. When he gets roped into helping Jenny and Akilah with a social experiment related to bullying, Jensen finally acknowledges the problems he's facing. With the help of his friends he figures out how to face his problems, as well as those of others, with bravery.

Brave does an awesome job yet again of showcasing diversity in many areas, including body types and abilities: Jensen and a few other characters have larger builds, Akilah and Mrs. Rashad are Muslim, the math tutor uses forearm crutches, and there's even a background character with vitiligo. I can't applaud this enough, but I really wish this were the norm in our books and graphic novels rather than a notable exception. The author also does a great job of taking the issues in the book a step further than what you'd normally see or expect in a middle grade book. The bullying Jensen faces from his friends is very subtle, which is why he denies for so long that it is indeed bullying. They make him the butt of their jokes and forget to include him, very much a frenemy-type relationship, which kids experience all the time but you don't usually see portrayals of. Also, Jensen doesn't stop at just resolving the bullying related to him, he goes as far as to change the entire culture in the school, including being nice to and inclusive towards one of the boys who bullied him. I love that the author goes the extra mile to get down to the root cause of the problem rather than just the surface issues. I also love how there's a subplot of Felicity getting suspended for an unfair dress code "violation" and the kids all work together to show their outrage in a respectful, yet persistent way in order to bring her back. This issue is popping up everywhere lately, and I especially like how the teachers in the story backed up the kids completely and supported them.

Recommendation:
Not only is the artwork adorable and and full-colour, the content alone makes this a must-have for classrooms and libraries. Awkward has won several awards (kids love it) and I have no doubt that Brave will as well. I also hope that there will be more from this series in the future, it is one of my favourites in recent years.

Thoughts on the cover:
Not quite as detailed and packed to the brim as Awkward's, but I like it, and each character's pose completely reflects their personality.