The Rules of Survival

Book: The Rules of Survival
Author: Nancy Werlin
Audience: Teen
In a Nutshell: When your mother is dangerous and you have no one to go to for help, who do you go to for help?

Matthew’s earliest memory is of his mother, Nikki, smashing one chair after another against the kitchen wall, for no reason. Now he’s thirteen, he has two younger sisters, and the three of them live on constant high alert; say the right thing and go through the motions of being happy and normal, or she’ll snap and instantly she’ll change from loving mother to dangerous monster. Sometimes she hits them, or threatens them with a kitchen knife, or screams at them and says horrible things. Sometimes it’s worse. Matthew tries to protect his sisters by taking her anger on himself, but that doesn’t always work. He knows this isn’t living; this is just surviving, but it’s all he knows how to do.

Then one Saturday night, after he sneaks out while Nikki is off partying, Matthew meets a man-- well, “meets” isn’t the right word. He only makes eye contact for a moment. It’s right after he sees this man stand up to some jerk who’s threatening his own son. The man’s name is Murdoch, and somehow Matthew is convinced that Murdoch can help them, maybe even save them. But he doesn’t know Murdoch’s last name, or anything about him, and Boston is a big city. Even if Matthew can find him, what does he expect one stranger to do when his own father is afraid to get involved? He doesn’t really know, but he can’t let six-year-old Emmy grow up in fear the way he and Callie have. But Nikki is unpredictable and very dangerous; the price of their freedom will be high, and not just for them.

If I could’ve read this book while driving, showering, and sleeping to avoid putting it down, I would have. It’s a gripping, perfectly-paced story about abuse, the good and bad sides of fear, the difference one person can make, and the pain we cause by just standing by.

Larklight

Book: Larklight: A Rousing Tale of Dauntless Pluck in the Farthest Reaches of Space
Author: Philip Reeve (Illustrator: David Wyatt)
Audience: Grades 4-7
In a Nutshell: Victorian space adventure (yes, really!) with pirates, giant spiders, and a touch of romance

Art Mumby, his older sister Myrtle, and their scientist father live at Larklight, their old and quirky home in orbit just beyond the moon. Art dreams of adventure, and Myrtle dreams of visiting proper society on Earth- more specifically, in London, at the grand, soon-to-be-opened Crystal Palace commissioned by Her Majesty Queen Victoria. They both soon find much more excitement than they bargained for when giant white spiders attack Larklight and capture their father. The siblings manage to escape, and soon find themselves rescued by the notorious pirate Jack Havock, who turns out to be no older than Myrtle. His crew of assorted aliens are really a good sort, but then again, when's the last time you read an adventure story with pirates who were really, truly bad? The spiders haven't given up on finding Art and Myrtle; they seem to think there's a very important key to Larklight, and they won't stop chasing the Mumby's until they have it in their creepy, spidery clutches.

The action blasts from the moon, to Venus, to Mars, to the dangerous and mysterious rings of Saturn, then back to Earth, as Art and Myrtle are separated and eventually reunited as each one does their part to stay alive and save the solar system from destruction (those spiders aren't messing around). I adore Philip Reeve's Hungry City Chronicles for teens and adults, and this is just as good, plus appropriate for the grade school crowd. The action is non-stop, the world is clever and imaginative and full of great creatures like hoverhogs and the Tentacle Twins, and the characters are vivid and likable. Myrtle got on my nerves at first, being all stereotypically proper and girly, but she kicks butt in her own way by the end. Oh, and there are plenty of pen and ink illustrations, which is very helpful in trying to visualize all the fastastical creatures and places. Don't expect space and space travel to behave exactly like they do in real life, but once you hard-core realists get over it, this book is fantastic fun. If it weren't for Reeve's pesky British citizenship, I would put this on my personal Newbery Award shortlist.

Rash

Book: Rash
Author: Pete Hautman
Audience: Teen
In a Nutshell: things get dangerous when you put safety first

I've put off blogging this book for a long time, and I think it's because I liked it so much. I wanted to be sure to cover everything that I thought was great, and do it justice, and that has resulted in doing nothing at all. So I'm diving in.

Bo Marston has anger management issues, and it runs in the family. His father has been in a work camp for years thanks to a road rage incident, and Bo's mother is afraid he's headed in the same direction. The year is 2076, and the U.S.S.A. has hit the extremes of certain recent trends in this satirical view of the future. Renamed the United Safer States of America several years previously, American society has decided it would "rather be safe than free." Angry or aggressive behavior results in very harsh punishment. Football and all other contact sports are illegal; even running high school track, Bo must wear more padding than a hockey goalie. Not that hockey is legal. Anything that has been deemed unhealthy is also banned, including smoking, drinking, and junk food; obesity itself is illegal.

Bo's anger lands him in jail on the frozen tundra, where he's forced to work in a pizza factory, play illegal football, and survive with the help of a homework assignment named Bork. This survival adventure story has come back to mind more times than almost any book I read that year, probably because signs abound around us that being safe is becoming more important than anything else, including having fun or being free. Or maybe people are just getting stupider. The Onion thinks so too. Whatever the reason, if you like "dangerous" things like sports, junk food, and real see-saws, and want a story with lots of action, humor, and something to think about, try Rash.

The End

Book: The End (Book the Thirteenth in A Series of Unfortunate Events)
Author: Lemony Snicket
Audience: Grades 4-8
In a Nutshell: the Baudelaires are shipwrecked on an island w/ pieces of the last 12 books; and The End is not the end.

Here it is at long-awaited last: Book 13.

I liked it. It answered some questions. Left some others to the imagination. But at last, we know who Beatrice is. Did anybody guess? I didn't. But then, I'm a bad guesser.

The All-New Tenchi Muyo!

Book: The All-New Tenchi-Muyo! Vol. 7
Author: Hitoshi Okuda
Audience: Teen
In a Nutshell: One 17-year-old boy, some hyperactive alien women, a space pirate, a carrot-eating spaceship and more

Tenchi and his wacky group of alien girls help a girl learn to walk again; her motivation is seeing Tsunami, their tree spirit, and writing a picture book about him.

manga sub-genre: harem comedy

Storky

Book: Storky: How I Lost My Nickname and Won the Girl
Author: D. L. Garfinkle
Audience: High School
In a Nutshell: freshman guy's diary of love, Scrabble, and a fat dentist

To be honest, I read this a long time ago, and the only notes I kept were the nutshell description above, and a list of important names. And in the many months between then and now, the actual details have faded. In an effort to get caught up with posting, I'm leaving it there, so here you go:

Mike Pomerantz (a.k.a. Storky), Gina, Nate, sis Amanda, Sydney, old Duke.

I will also say that I remember it being very solidly from a teen guy's perspective, so you can guess where his mind is most of the time. Reminds me a little of Gary Paulsen's Amazing Life of Birds, where the main character spends a lot of time seeing ELBOWS everywhere, but elbows is not really the portion of anatomy he's talking about. Storky has a little older content, but they're both funny guy diaries, so maybe that's why they are connected in my mind. Some family drama with a not-entirely-welcome new father figure, and a relationship with an old guy who plays Scrabble that becomes very important in his life. That's all I've got for now.

Fruits Basket

Book: Fruits Basket, Volume 1
Author: Natsuki Takaya
Audience: Teen
In a Nutshell: orphan girl finds new friends with crazy zodiac animal powers

Those Left Behind (Serenity graphic novel)

Book: Those Left Behind (a Serenity graphic novel)
Author: Joss Whedon
Artist: Will Conrad
Audience: Teen to Adult
In a Nutshell: what happened between Firefly (TV) tand Serenity (movie)

If you are a Browncoat, you should read this graphic novel. If you are a Browncoat, you probably already own this graphic novel. If you don't know what a Browncoat is, welcome to the fan world of Firefly, a marvelous but short-lived western sci-fi series by the creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It was truly one of the best sci-fi series to come around in the last 10 years, so of course Fox gave it the shaft. But it lived on in the hearts and DVD collections of rabid fans everywhere, and by some miracle Joss Whedon actually got a theatrical movie released to follow it up. The show and the movie are very, very shiny, to use Firefly lingo. I won't go into detail, but I'll throw the term "mercenary space cowboys" out there and let you rent/borrow/buy the DVD's and fall in love with Firefly yourself.

This graphic novel fills in a story that takes place between the end of the show and where the movie picks up. Without being a critical piece of the Firefly universe, the story does manage to be very interesting and relevant to the characters. But those of us who get all starry-eyed when Joss Whedon's name is mentioned have come to expect no less.

Eyes of the Storm (Bone, Book 3)

Book: Eyes of the Storm (Bone, Book 3)
Author: Jeff Smith
Audience: Grades 4-7
In a Nutshell: Bones and humans (and a dragon) against a returning evil

This excellent graphic novel series continues with Bone, Thorn, Grandma, Phoney, Smiley, and the rest of the people (and bones) in the Valley preparing to fight the big bad evil that's coming in the form of rat creatures and some creepy hooded figure who serves the ancient, powerful, hive-minded Locusts. Ooooo...

The Last Days

Book: The Last Days
Author: Scott Westerfeld
Audience: Teen
In a Nutshell: supernatural rock summons giant evil worms

In this sequel to Peeps, when strangers Moz and Pearl save a precious Stratocaster guitar from a fall out a window, it's the birth of their rock band. Along with Zahler on bass, Alana Ray on drums (make that paint buckets), and somewhat functional peep Minerva on vocals, they make otherworldly music with Minerva's ancient, inhuman lyrics that draws peeps (vampires) like, well, like vampires to a blood bank. Eventually the higher purpose of their music becomes clear as they team up with Cal, Lace, and the rest of the Night Guard from Peeps, who finally show up about two-thirds of the way through the book, and stage a series of outdoor concerts that draw out both the worms and the peeps to fight them.

The majority of the book is heavily descriptive of the formation of the band and the music they learn to make together. It's interesting reading if you're into music, but I've gotta say I was glad to see Cal and Co. finally show up and get the plot moving. It all wrapped up pretty neatly and quickly, seeing as how the music part took up so much real estate, but vampire fans, fans of Peeps , and rock-band-minded readers will probably like it.

The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume 1: The Pox Party

Book: The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation; Volume 1: The Pox Party
Author: M.T. Anderson
Audience: Teen
In a Nutshell: a young boy is a slave, an experiment, then a rebel fighter in revoluntionary America

Like I've said before, I looove M.T. Anderson. And here he's written another very original, distinctive, disturbing book that sticks in your mind a long time after the last page turns, whether you want it there or not. And he won the National Book Award for it, so bravo! That said, this is not an easy read. It's written in impressively accurate 18th-century-style English, and it's long. Octavian and his mother, Casseopeia, are African slaves owned by a group of radical scientists and scholars called the Novanglian College of Lucidity. In the sober city of Boston, they live in opulence and are treated as exotic royalty, but Octavian must weigh his food and feces. When their fortunes shift and a harsh new benefactor takes control, the experiment of Octavian and his mother takes a dark turn: scientific proof of the inferiority of the African races. I won't give away the details, but some horrible things happen, and Octavian's personal account goes silent. The story picks up in secondary sources and through the letters of a revolutionary soldier as Octavian ends up with the man's unit. The history depicted is slightly alternative, but similar enough to the history books to make readers take a good hard look at what they think they know about the American Revolution.

The book is chock full of themes of human rights, freedom, friendship, and the fuzziness of right and wrong, good and bad in the American Revolution-- and by extension, the whole American experience? Or any world-changing conflict? Let's say yes. After all, that's the sort of thing they hand out National Book Awards for.

Part Two is coming (sometime) and even though I generally have little to no interest in revolutionary fiction, I can't wait.