Dread Nation

I got this one the day it came out, and I was soooo pumped!  It was great and I can't wait to get it into the classroom library.

The premise is cool - during the Civil War, the dead get up and walk.  The zombies, called "shamblers" will eat you and a bite will turn you.  So this changes the entire course of U.S. history as we know it.  Cities have started building their own defenses, and people have their own opinions about how to stop the shamblers.  One of the things that has been put in to place are training schools, part of the "Negro and Native Reeducation Act" in the book.  As part of this act kids of a certain age go to "school" to learn how to fight the walking dead.

The main character, Jane McKeene, attends one of these schools, the reputable Miss Preston's, and Jane is on the of the best at the school.  Jane was separated from her mother and entire family, and she yearns to get back to them.  But once she graduates from Miss Preston's will she be able to go home and see if her mother is even there??  Or will she be hired as an "attendant" who will protect her white mistress from shambler attacks?  Jane hasn't heard from her mother in so long, she fears the worst.

The girls of Miss Preston's go to a lecture in Baltimore that changes the entire course of her story.  What happens at the lecture plus the mysterious disappearance of a neighboring family get Jane wrapped up in something that is much more serious and sinister than she thought.

I loved Jane's voice and the entire organization of the book.  Each chapter has excerpts from Jane's letters, and I enjoyed reading the real story and piecing together the rest from the letter snippets.  Jane is a tough young woman of color who kicks major zombie butt.  The secondary characters in the novel are all wonderful and important to Jane's story, too.  I loved the setting and the history wrapped up with this new vision.  Jane is spunky and doesn't let others bully or scare her.  I loved this main character and the world Ireland has created.  This is going to be an awesome series and I can't wait for more installments.  The books is action packed, but also eye opening when you consider the darker side of American history and how this book speaks to us today.

There's more evil in the world than just the shamblers.  Good thing Jane McKeene is ready to take on all of it.

Mercury

I haven't read too many graphic novels, and I am hoping to keep up with the genre more.  The kids like them.  I was excited to read Hope Larson's Mercury.  It was a great graphic novel for me to start with!

Mercury alternates between two stories.  Both stories are set in Nova Scotia and both main characters are teen-aged girls dealing with life stuff.  In the present is Tara.  She and her mom lost their old house to a fire.  Tara is living with her aunt, uncle, and cousin while her mom looks for work out of town to try to help them get back on their feet after losing everything.  Tara feels nervous going back to high school (10th grade) because she'd been home schooled for a while and she doesn't know if she'll get the hang of it.  She does pretty good though and even gets a love interest very soon after school starts.  What connects her to the past is a necklace that her aunt let her have out of her mom's old jewelry box.  The necklace is beautiful but seems to have a mind of its own.

The other story is set in the same place but in 1859.  Josey is living with her family when a mysterious stranger shows up and wants to go into business mining for gold with Josey's father.  They strike up a deal and begin.  He's a handsome stranger, and Josey has to decide how she feels about him even though her mother gets a very bad vibe from the man.  He has a mysterious necklace that he is very protective of.

The elusive pot o gold binds these two stories together.  Read to see how the two stories intertwine and what happens with the necklace that has survived the generations and now lives on Tara's neck.

The book was great.  It was a quick read.  I stayed interested the whole time because Larson takes you back and forth quickly.  It was neat to be reminded that even though  times are different, family, love, and loss are the same no matter what.  I highly recommend this one to all.

Water for Elephants by Sarah Gruen

I borrowed this book from my Mom forever ago and finally got a chance to pick it up.  I've been wanting to read it forever and it totally lived up to my expectations.  I'm really interested to see the movie when it comes out probably next year.

Right now Jacob Jankowski is ninety, or ninety-three...something around there.  He's in a nursing home and trying to make it through each day of sitting around and eating the terrible mushy food.  But in the past Jacob is a young man about to finish veterinary school at Cornell.  Just before he sits for his final examinations - his world changes forever.  He won't be taking over his father's veterinary practice like he thought.  He finds himself alone and on the road.

Jacob hooks up with the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth and his life becomes an adventure he'd never imagined.  He finds work, actually gets to tend to the animals after a while, and meets a very beautiful woman.  He learns the ways of the circus, interacts with all of the crazy characters and workers, and he makes it.

But life in the circus isn't always easy.  Money isn't always there.  And it's really hard to work anywhere if you fall in love with your boss' wife....

In the book ninety or ninety-three year old Jacob thinks back about his time with the circus and the reader gets to experience a time and place like none other.  I felt like I was right there.  The descriptions of the circus and the people came to life.  You like Jacob from the beginning and you are on his side throughout as he navigates a life he never dreamed he would be living.

I would definitely recommend this book to everyone.  It's so fun and unique.  I used to watch Carnivale on HBO before they ended it and it brought wonderful memories of that show back to me.  A great read for all.

Flygirl by Sherri L. Smith

Shop Indie BookstoresThis story about Ida Mae Jones was an amazing new take on a WWII story.  There are many YA books about the time period, but this one shows us a whole new world - the world of the WASP (Women Airforce Service Pilots).

Ida Mae lives in Louisiana with her mama, grandfather, and younger brother.  Her older brother is away at medical school, and her father died a few years before in a farming accident.  Ida Mae and her friend Jolene clean houses to make money after graduating from high school.  While Ida Mae cleans, all she can think about is getting enough money saved up to go to Chicago to try to get licensed as a pilot.

She knows all about flying.  Her daddy got a plane and dusted crops.  From the moment Ida Mae went up the first time, she knew she wanted to be in the air, feeling the wind in her hair and seeing the sky all around her.

When the war starts, life changes for all Americans.  Ida's brother goes to war, and Ida learns about the WASP program.  She wants to go so badly but the only problem is that she is black.  "Negro" women aren't even considered for the program, so the only way Ida Mae can join is if she keeps her hair straight and uses her light skin to "pass" as white.  Against the wishes of her mother, she goes to Texas to become a real pilot.  Texas isn't a safe place, though, for a black girl pretending to be a white pilot, and while Ida is confident that she can fly planes, she's not so sure she can pull this off the whole time.

I loved the girls that she joins in the WASP program, especially Lily and Patsy.  All the girls doing men's work reminded me of the movie A League of Their Own.  The girls in the book have a fun time and help each other through life during the war.  This is a great read that shows a wonderful new perspective on a WWII story.

The Monstrumologist - by Rick Yancey

Shop Indie BookstoresThe Lowdown:
Will Henry is an orphan in New England during the late nineteenth century.  He has nothing save his little hat and his "caretaker," if you can call him that, Dr. Pellinore Warthrop.  Will's life is like nothing you could ever imagine because Dr. Warthrop isn't your regular kind of doctor...he's a monstrumologist - one who studies and hunts monsters.  Don't go thinking about Monsters, Inc...or anything sweet right now, though...the kinds of things that the doctor studies are creatures you've never imagined.  Will's seen his fare share of oddities and gruesome creatures, but nothing could even begin to prepare Will for what he sees one night when a gravedigger arrives in the middle of the night.  What the gravedigger brings Dr. Warthrop is disgusting, sickening, sad, "a crime." 

I daresay your average adult would have fled the room in horror, run screaming up that stairs and out of the house, for what lay withing that burlap cocoon laid shame to all the platitudes and promises from a  thousand pulpits upon the nature of a just and loving God, of a balanced and kind universe, and the dignity of man.  A crime, the old grave-digger had called it.  Indeed there seemed no better word for it, though a crime requires a criminal...and who or what was the criminal in this case? (14)

Once Will and the doctor unwrap this "package," and view its contents, and answer this question, their worlds are not the same, for inside of the burlap covering is a creature that will reek havoc on everyone until it (or they...should I say) is stopped.  Will and Dr. Warthrop have to figure out not only how to stop these creatures but also why and how they came to be in New England to begin with.  This night takes Will and the reader on a journey they will never forget.

What I Liked:
This book made me almost run and hide, throw up, scream out loud...you get the picture.  This is one of the sickest (I mean that in all senses of that word) books I've read in a long time.  I loved the writing and the style.  It reminded me of Octavian Nothing in that I really felt that I was taken back right to a particular time and place in history.  The setting was perfect, and these characters are amazaing.  Will, Pellinore, and the wonderful fabulous and insane Jack Kearns were so fun to read about.  I wanted to run away from them and their monster-hunting tasks but also be a part of their strange monster-hunting team.  More than anything the extremely graphic and gory descriptions written by Yancey made me "ick" and "oh my lord" and "ugggghhh" aloud the entire time I read the book.  I was more into and freaked out by this book than I was by watching Paranormal Activity.  This creepy book was a wonderfully scary horror tale.  I loved every moment. 

Read this if...
You want to be grossed out.
You love horror stories and scary movies.
You want to be bad and hunt monsters.
You want to take a journey back in time.
You want a thrilling read.
You want to go on an adventure into graveyards and undergound scary places.
You want to see creatures that you've never even been able to imagine.

Ophelia - by Lisa Klein

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The Lowdown

Experience Hamlet in a completely new way by reading Lisa Klein's Ophelia.  Whether you know and love the Shakespeare play or not, this book is sure to please.  Beginning when Ophelia is just a young  girl, Klein shows us what it was like to grow up at court in Denmark's Elsinore.  Ophelia leaves her father and brother to tend and wait on Queen Gertrude.  While at court, she catches the eye and heart of the young, handsome, dark-haired Prince Hamlet.  They meet in secret and swear their love.  Can this love between them stay strong and keep them grounded, though, as Denmark rots all around them?  When Hamlet learns of his father's death and sees a ghost, he begins to focus on his own mind and not Ophelia.  We all think we know Ophelia.  She went made because her father died.  But that might not be the case...Read to hear this classic story finally from Ophelia's point of view. 

What I Liked

This is a real love story but it's not too overly romantic.  I loved watching the relationship between Hamlet and Ophelia develop and grow.  In the play, you don't get to focus on Ophelia too much because the character of Hamlet always takes center stage.  Here, though, the relationship blossoms before your eyes and you understand what these two characters were like together.  Ophelia is a smart girl, but she deals with many love issues just like kids today.  One night while reading with the Queen, the Queen tells Ophelia,

I think that she must be cruel if she wants to be loved....for once a lady succumbs to the man's desire, he rejects her as unworthy of it.

 Ophelia, hearing this, worries about the love she has shown her Prince.  She questions herself,

Because I showed my love to Hamlet, would his ardor diminish?  Was love like a hunger, easily satisfied by feeding?  Or did it grow by what it fed on?  Should I have withheld my kisses and thus increased his appetite for them?

 This book did a great job just showing what all the characters were going through.  Klein's story is believable and exciting.  I do know a lot about the play, so I also loved seeing lines in the book that I recognized from the play.

Read This If...

You want to hear what Ophelia has to say...finally!

You like classic love stories.

You like historical fiction.

You like making connections to the stuff you read (or have read) in English class!

You want to read a story about a kick-butt girl.

Grade:  A-

The Luxe by Anna Godberson

So, honestly, as a grown-up, I felt a little guilty for picking up The Luxe at the bookstore, but I really loved that dress on the cover!  I was hoping for some turn of the century, gossip-girl-like drama, and that is exactly what I got with this book.

The Luxe takes place in 1899 in Manhattan, and it was really fun to be taken back to the times when people "called" upon one another and attended fabulous parties.   Not that people don't attend parties now, but back then the parties were different.

The main characters are Elizabeth and Diana Holland, two New York sisters who are very much at the center of the social scene in Manhattan.  Elizabeth has been away in Europe, and her return starts the action of the story.  She and her sister have to appear to have lots of money, when the  truth is that  they have none.  Their father died and since then their mother has had to pay off his large debts, leaving the girls with nothing but their reputations....kind of reminds me of Rose and her mother in the movie Titanic.  With this knowledge weighing on her, Elizabeth has to play her part well and try to find a good match.  The wonderful and rich Henry Schoonmaker is single and a great catch that girls would die for. The only problem is that she sort of loves someone else...

Of course there must be a bad girl to add to this mix, and that's where Elizabeth's friend Penelope comes in.  Penelope is the wild girl (reminds me of Blair on Gossip Girl) and she always makes sure things are stirred up.

So against this backdrop, the girls, the guys, and the parents all try to match each other up.

I like the writing style of this book.  It was easy to read, but unique, too, because Godberson starts each chapter off with a little "real life snippet" of something:  a letter, a newspaper article, a line from the gossip column of the paper...and then the chapter starts from there.  Each chapter is focused on one of the girls, too, so you get to see things from each girls point of view.

I really enjoyed the book.  I did sort of figure out how things would unfold before they did, but it was ok, and still a fun book to read.  I did get the sequel, Rumors, and plan to read it soon.  All in all a fun book with old school girl drama, which, really, isn't that different from the girl drama of today.  I recommend this book to readers who are interested in drama, relationships, and love.

Grade:  B