Marcelo in the real world – Francisco X. Stork

Marcelo is seventeen and has a summer job working at his school caring for the ponies.   He is looking forward to starting on Monday, but his father, Arturo,  has other plans for him. Arturo believes that Marcelo should work in the mail room of his law firm because Marcelo needs experience in the real world.

Marcelo’s school is a private school for children with developmental or physical disabilities called Paterson. Marcelo has a form of Autism that is best described as Asperger’s Syndrome.  He is very literal, he notices everything, he doesn’t seem to feel emotions as others do, and he can hear “internal music.”  Which is part of his  special interest that he calls remembering.

Arturo makes a deal with Marcelo.  If he is able to complete the summer job and follow all the rules, he can complete his high school education at Paterson.  If he fails to live up to expectations, Marcelo will have to go to the public high school.  Unfortunately for Marcelo, when he arrives at the law firm he is assigned to work with Jasmine and she resents his being there.

Then there is Wendell, the son of Arturo’s partner.  He has designs on Jasmine and wants Marcelo to help in getting Jasmine on his boat so that he can bring her “below.”  Marcelo is going to find out that the real world can be pretty nasty.  It is a good thing that he can go to Rabbi Heschel and speak about theological and moral issues even though he is Catholic.

Marcelo in the real world by Francisco X. Stork is the recipient of  the 2010 teen Schneider Family Book Award.  From the ALA Website:  “The Schneider Family Book Awards honor an author or illustrator for a book that embodies an artistic expression of the disability experience for child and adolescent audiences.”

The Ask and the Answer – Patrick Ness

I don’t even know where to begin with this one. The Ask and the Answer is the second book in Patrick Ness’s Chaos Walking trilogy. I blogged about the first book last week – I loved it. I love this one, as well.  My problem is this… How do I tell you about this book without ruining the first book if you have not yet read it? At least you could go and read what I wrote about it. Go ahead – I’ll wait.

So, the last book ends with Todd and Viola (the girl who was in the center of the silence I had mentioned in the previous post)  reaching the city (Haven)  that they were running towards during the whole first book.  The second book deals with what they find in Haven.  It is no longer Haven.

Todd and Viola are separated and neither knows if the other is alive.  Each gets caught up in different sides of a civil war.  Neither knows who to trust.  Each ends up doing things that they don’t want to do.  How do you decide what to do when there seems to be no right answer?  Should you do a terrible deed because at least if you were the one doing it you wouldn’t be as nasty about it as someone else?  Horrible.  I can’t wait until I can get my hands on the next one – which won’t be until September of 2010.

Ghosts of War: the true story of a 19-year-old GI – Ryan Smithson

Ryan Smithson joined the Army Reserve straight from high school and became a Heavy Construction Equipment Operator.  Why did he join the military?  In 2001 he turned 16.  In 2001 planes hit the World Trade Center.  In 2001 the world changed for the United States like it hadn’t since the bombing at Pearl Harbor.   Ghosts of war: the true story of a 19-year-old GI is Ryan’s story of why he joined and what he did.

He tells of boot camp and deployment.  He tells of leaving his family behind and his formation of a new family, a brother and sisterhood of war.   He tells of his months in the Middle East doing good work with good people for the good of a nation.  He tells of the boredom, the horror, the humor, the fright, and the friendship of war.  He tells of the poverty, the hunger, the thirst and the hope of the people of Iraq.

This man is a hero.  As are the men and women he served with.  Their deeds are not shown on the news or written up in papers and magazines.  This memoir tells their work and while there is reactionary language – and really, what could you expect after a near miss by a mortar – and described violence – well, yeah, it is a war memoir – this is a very readable book for teens.

The Knife of Never Letting Go – Patrick Ness

New World is a planet colonized a time back.  There were other people, of a sort, living on the planet when the settlers arrived.  Then there was war and the other people, the Spackle, were killed, but not before they released a toxin that gave animals the ability to talk,  killed all the women and made the thoughts of men be heard by all.  All thoughts.  All the Noise.

Todd is 30 days away from becoming a man when the novel begins, which means that he has lived 13 years and 12 months.  He is the last boy in Prentisstown, the last boy on New World,  and there won’t be any more.  There can’t be, of course.  All the women are dead.  And the only people left are the people in Prentisstown.   At least that is what Todd has known his whole life.

He and his dog, Manchee, were out picking apples in the swamp one day when they came across quiet.  Silence.  A void in the Noise.  Todd and Manchee have never, but never heard quiet.  And at the center of that quiet is a girl.

The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness is book 1 in the Chaos Walking trilogy.   Todd, Manchee and the girl are shortly running for their lives.  And running to warn others (yes – there are others) that the army that is Prentisstown is coming.  This novel is fast paced, heart wrenching, at times funny and when I got to the last page I put my head down and groaned.  What a way to end a book.  Bring on book two!

Shiver – Maggie Stiefvater

Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater (pronounced “Steve-Otter” according to her website) is the first book in The Wolves of Mercy Falls trilogy.

Grace lives with her neglectful parents on the edge of a wood in Mercy Falls, Minnesota.  Living in the wood are wolves.  When she was younger, the wolves attacked her as she was playing on the swings.  One wolf saved her from the others and since that time she has been fascinated by her wolf with the incredible yellow eyes.

And the wolf?  The wolf is fascinated right back.  And he isn’t always a wolf.  In the heat of summer he is a young man named Sam but when the temperature falls, he is the yellow eyed wolf who is drawn to the girl he once saved.

When finally, finally(!) they meet there is no denying their feelings for each other, and Sam must fight against the falling temperature to keep himself from turning into the wolf.  Because each year a person changes into a wolf it is harder to turn back into a human and this may be Sam’s last year.

Book two is due out in July 2010 and will be called Linger.

Carter Finally Gets It – Brent Crawford

Will Carter, known to everyone as Carter, and thankfully not Slappy (and is that a funny/painful story…)  is about to become a freshman at Merrian High.   Carter finally gets it by Brent Crawford is all about Carter’s freshman year and it is funny (read: hilarious) and embarrassing (read: cringe-worthy).

Carter has a mild form of ADD and has to really concentrate on not spacing out, which can be a problem when he is playing sports (football and swimming).   Luckily, he has a close group of friends but, man can he get himself into situations!

From going to high school parties where people get drunk and his bike gets stolen, to dating and bragging in the locker room, Carter has a lot to deal with.  His sister tries to help out by giving him advice.  Which isn’t a bad idea because if he does something embarrassing it will reflect poorly on her.  Expect to read language you would hear walking down the hall of a high school and expect to be telling the people around you what it is that you are reading that is so funny.  I’m sure you will easily convince others to pick up a copy.  That is, once you stop snorting and have wiped the tears from your eyes.

Fire – Kristin Cashore

There is trouble in the Dells. The last king had been controlled by the human monster, Cansrel, and between the two of them they made a mess of the kingdom. Now there are factions who want to take the kingdom away from young King Nash and war is on the horizon.

Monsters are terribly beautiful.  They are shaped like any other animal of their species, but they come in vibrant colors.  Monsters stun their prey with their beauty, and then take over their minds, making the prey that much easier to catch.

Fire, Cansrel’s daughter,  is the last human monster.  She is beautiful beyond words with hair the color of fire.  Her appearance instills great passion in all who see her.  Non human monsters want nothing more than to consume her and humans either love her or hate her.

King Nash sends for Fire so that she might interrogate strangers, assassins and supposed supporters to find out who the enemy is, what they are planning, and how to keep the country from falling apart.  But, Fire is not like her father.  She hated what Cansrel did with his power and she is afraid that if she uses her power, she will become like him.

But, first she has to get to King City.  Imagine how hard that is when there are monster raptors dropping upon her from above, because they really, really want to eat her.  Then there are the humans in the army surrounding her who really, really love her, or really, really hate her.  (Imagine the love to be like that seen at a rock concert.  Uncontrolled hysteria.  Not everyone is effected that way, but enough are to become a problem.)  It is a good thing that she has a guard of 20 people who know how to control their own minds.

Fire by Kristin Cashore is a companion novel to Graceling (a 2009 Teens’ Top Ten winner). You can read either one first.  But, I expect that if you read one, you will really, really want to read the other.

Duluth Public Library’s Read Beyond Reality Tournament Winner Announced

Read Beyond Reality Tournament – Week 4: Ninjas vs Fairies

Here we are at the last week of the tournament and we have Ninjas vs Fairies.  Who would have thought that these would be the final two?  I thought for sure that the vampires would have a go of it…

Anyway.  I would expect ninjas and fairies, both, to be hyper aware of their surroundings.  Both are committed to the effort of being unseen.  Ninjas may have a greater level of concentration and determination, whereas fairies might be a bit flighty.  Then again, fairies have magic on their side.

Who will win and be the final one standing in the Read Beyond Reality Tournament?  Cast your vote and find out next week who won.

2009 Teens’ Top Ten Winners announced

YALSA reports that more than 11,000 teens voted for the 2009 Teens’ Top Ten and here is the list in order of votes:

1.  Green, John Paper Towns
2.  Meyer, Stephenie Breaking Dawn
3.  Collins, Suzanne The Hunger Games
4.  Clare, Cassandra City of Ashes
5.  Hopkins, Ellen Identical
6.  Gaiman, Neil The Graveyard Book
7.  McMann, Lisa Wake
8.  Cast, Kristin & P.C. Untamed
9.  Lockhart, E. The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks
10.  Cashore, Kristin Graceling

Of the 10, I have read four and enjoyed them all.