The Unchangeable Spots of Leopards

Kristopher Jansma has authored an extraordinary debut novel that will hit the shelves in March 2013. Depending on how you look at it, the book reads as a novel or a beautifully interwoven collection of short stories. It is engaging and humorous, but honest to a fault, and so good you won't want to put it down.

The epic tale is narrated by an unnamed man who takes us through his blue collar upbringing with a single mother to his adulthood as a struggling writer. In college, the narrator befriends Julian McGann, a talented writer, and his actress friend, Evelyn. Julian and Evelyn are quite privileged in comparison to the narrator, but welcome him into their inner circle with open arms. The narrator falls hopelessly in love with Evelyn from the start, but the relationship fails to progress. However, Julian remains a fast friend over time and places.
In addition to being an amazing piece of debut fiction, this book has a touch of narrative armchair travel. The narrator starts us out in the South of his childhood, then we move on to Manhattan, the Grand Canyon, Dubai, Ghana, and more. Yes, more. To save you the task of looking this up, the factoid about the Imagine Peace Tower in Iceland is 100% true. Perhaps I was living under a rock when this was constructed or discussed, but I am now in the know.
The story keeps its forward momentum and unfolds in ways that I don’t want to risk spoiling for you. I’ll just say that Julian’s eccentricities get the best of him, Evelyn is bound for a fairy tale life, and the narrator is a shady bugger. You may even discover that you are in a parallel universe of sorts where names change, but the characters remain the same. Unchangeable, no matter what you call them.

Rest in Peace Part 3--Children's Literature

We lost a lot of talented people in 2012. Children's authors, non-fiction writers, poets, and novelists. Over the next few weeks we will highlight some of their works and mourn the passing of some really wonderful people. This week we are focusing on the losses in the children's literature field.

Jose Aruego--(1932-2012)--he was a Filipino author and illustrator.   He was known for his drawings of amusing animals.  He died on his 80th birthday in New York City.

Jan Berenstain--(1923-2012)--she was the co-creator with her husband Stan (1923-2005) of the series the Berenstain Bears.  She was 88.

Leo Dillon--(1933-2012)--he along with his wife Diane, were an American team of illustrators.  They are the only two individuals to have won two consecutive Caldecott Medals.

Jean Craighead George--(1919-2012)--she was an American author of over 100 books for young adults.  She is best known for her Newbery Medal winning Julie of the Wolves and Newbery Honor book My Side of the Mountain.

Ellen Levine--(1939-2012)--was an American author whose books told stories of immigrants, slaves, and the fight for social justice.  She was a lawyer and producer for CBS documentaries before writing more than 20 books.

Margaret Mahy--(1936-2012)--she was a New Zealand author who wrote for both children and young adults.  She is one of only seven authors to have won two Carnegie Medals in Literature.  She was a librarian before becoming a full-time writer.

Jean Merrill--(1923-2012)--she was an American editor and author.  Her best-known book is The Pushcart War.  She died in Vermont at age 89.

Maurice Sendak--(1928-2012)--he was an American writer and illustrator.  The New York Times called him "the most important children's book artist of the 20th century."  He was best known for his award-winning book Where the Wild Things Are.

Donald J. Sobol--(1924-2012)--he was an American award-winning writer best known for his children's  Encyclopedia Brown mystery series.  He wrote more than 65 books.

ADHD or Not?

I recently read a book, Accelerated by Hruska Bronwen the concept intrigued me and then her writing captivated me.  The story is a satirical thriller.  Bronwen's  savvy writing brings contemporary issues into the light. Accelerated explores the pressure schools are under to improve test scores and the length the schools may go to achieve excellent marks. It also illustrates the parents' battle to choose between what they believe is best for their child and what the school states is best.  It is hard to go against the pressure a school exerts when they believe your child has ADHD and you are doing nothing about it. 

Sean Benning believes his son, Toby, is a normal child. He may not sit in his seat all the time and he talks to his friends before class rather than going straight to work, but he is a third grader. Isn't this what third graders do? This is where our story meets the headlines. Currently there are numerous investigations into schools that are pressuring parents to have their children evaluated for ADHD. Sometimes the diagnosis is wrong. Sometimes children have reactions to  treatment. The story comes to a head when Toby's best friend dies. The Bradley School issues a press release saying he died from peanut allergies, but he was not allergic to anything.  Sean becomes concerned and asks questions just as the school increases the pressure on him, to place Toby on medication.  

I did warn you that this is a thriller, right?  The body count is low, but the story will not disappoint. This novel is fictional, but it is not far from reality. I recommend this book for parents, teachers and young adults who hope one day to become a teacher. Perhaps we can meet children where they are and forego the medication.  Prepare to sit back and enjoy an excellent story.

Resurrection, love, loss, and redemption in a flash

One of my favorite authors that I have the most difficulty describing to other people is Alice Hoffman. I have been reading her books since I was a teenager, but when you throw words like mystical, paranormal, and psychological around people get nervous. Her writing is complex and covers a diverse range of topics, so those words are very shallow in comparison to what her work actually is --even though they are sometimes the best descriptors. She is able to create well researched literary fiction, such as The Dovekeepers, movie quality young adult novels like Aquamarine, and she can tell stories that make you ache for the characters, such as Skylight Confessions. Hoffman's heroines are strong protagonists that usually encompass some type of other worldly strength or quality, but are also completely normal and prone to costly mistakes. She can easily blur the line between mystical and commonplace to the point that you don’t even question the possibility of the story.

My favorite work of Hoffman’s, which is saying something, is The Ice Queen. I have met Hoffman fans that do not rank this among their top five, but something about the story continues to resonate with me.

The story focuses on the life of an emotionally cold librarian that leads a mundane life in a small town. She makes an idle wish to be struck by lightning, and the wish comes true. The lightning strike is a new beginning for her and she begins a quest to find Lazarus Jones, a fellow lightning strike survivor. Lazarus was struck dead when the lightning hit him, but was resurrected and left with a dark secret. The unnamed narrator hopes to get answers from Lazarus to help her overcome her fears and the past that hangs over her, but she finds a man as stunted as she is. The two begin a love affair, but continue to hide their secrets from one another. In the end, you are left pondering the power of guilt and the influence it has over our lives.

The ending carries a twist that would be hard for anyone to see coming. If you haven’t read anything by Alice Hoffman, you should.

Rest in Peace 2012 Part 2--Fantasy and Sci/Fi

We lost a lot of talented people in 2012. Children's authors, non-fiction writers, poets, and novelists. Over the next few weeks we will highlight some of their works and mourn the passing of some really wonderful people.  This week we are focusing on the losses in the Science Fiction and Mystery genres.

Janet Berliner--(1939-2012)--(Janet Berliner-Gluckman)--she was a South African born American horror writer.  This Bram Stoker Award winning author was also a member of the International Thriller Writers and Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America.

Ray Bradbury--(1920-2012)--he was one of the 20th century's most celebrated American writers. He wrote fantasy, science fiction, horror, and mystery fiction.  He is probably most well known for his novels Fahrenheit 451 and The Martian Chronicles.

Henry Denker--(1912-2012)--he was an American novelist and playwright.  He wrote Broadway plays, radio scripts, screenplays, and novels.  He was married to his wife Edith for 61 years, whom he met while in the hospital--she was his nurse.  He was 99.

Dorothy Gilman--(1923-2012)--she was an American espionage and mystery writer.  Best known for her Mrs. Pollifax series, this 88-year-old was a writer for over 60 years.

Harry Harrison--(1925-2012)--he (Henry Maxwell Dempsey) was an American science fiction author best known for his character the Stainless Steel Rat.  He was witty and funny and on learning of his death, fiction author Harlan Ellison said, "It's a day without stars in it."

Reginald Hill--(1936-2012)--he was an English crime writer best known for 20 novels featuring Yorkshire detectives Andrew Dalziel and Peter Pascoe, which spawned the BBC series Dalziel and Pascoe.  He wrote more than 30 other novels along with short stories and ghost tales.

Josepha Sherman--(1946-2012)--she was an American folklorist, anthologist, editor, and science fiction and fantasy author.  She won the Compton Crook Award in 1990.

K. D. Wentworth--(1951-2012)--Kathy Diane Wentworth was an American science fiction author.  This University of Tulsa graduate got her start winning the Writers of the Future contest in 1988.

Margaret Yorke--(1924-2012)--she was an English crime fiction writer.  During WWII she worked as a hospital librarian and then joined the Women's Royal Naval Service as a driver when she turned 18. This award-winning author was 88.

Do you believe in heaven?

No? Then Dr. Eben Alexander would like to have a word with you. Oh, to be fair, several years ago he would’ve agreed with you. Years spent in the field of medicine as both a neurosurgeon and an associate professor of surgery at Harvard gave him sufficient reason to question the existence of any sort of afterlife or a personal, loving God. And while he was accepting of the role faith played in providing comfort to many of his patients, he found little use for it in his own life. That is, until November 10, 2008, when Dr. Alexander was stricken with a rare form of bacterial meningitis and slipped into a coma. The doctors treating Dr. Alexander knew that simply surviving such an ordeal was extremely rare, and those who did survive were essentially doomed to spend the remainder of their years in a vegetative state. So imagine their surprise when, on the seventh day of his coma, Dr. Alexander opened his eyes and said to the astonishment of all who were present, “Don’t worry, all is well.” He had returned from the other side and boy did he have a story to tell, an amazing tale of a trip he took—to heaven? Yes, heaven, where he experienced firsthand a reality he thought couldn’t possibly exist, and where he even met and spoke with an entity he’d long denied: God. What he learned in that fantastical place could fill volumes, but Dr. Alexander has provided the most important lessons in his bestselling book, Proof of Heaven: A Neurosurgeon’s Journeyinto the Afterlife. Here’s a teaser: “Love is, without a doubt, the basis of everything. Not some abstract, hard-to-fathom kind of love but the day-to-day kind that everyone knows—the kind of love we feel when we look at our spouse and our children, or even our animals. In its purest and most powerful form, this love is not jealous or selfish, but unconditional. This is the reality of realities, the incomprehensibly glorious truth of truths . . .” So is Proof of Heaven really, well, proof of heaven? Read it and see, but proof or not, it is utterly fascinating.   

The Care and Handling of Roses with Thorns

I'm not really known for my gardening abilities. Every time I have tried to cultivate a green thumb, it has not gone well.  Somewhere along the way, my green thumb turns to a shade of black that would probably best be described as "harbinger of death." In recent years, I've focused my gardening efforts on books.  I enjoy reading about others' successes in the garden rather than continuing to slaughter innocent plants with my own good intentions. Enter Margaret Dilloway's new book, The Care and Handling of Roses with Thorns.

High school biology teacher Gal Garner is not known for her social grace or diplomacy. She's spent her life battling kidney disease and, at the age of 36, is in the eighth year of getting dialysis every other day. It's made her less-than-tolerant of others. Gal's real love, and obsession, is breeding roses. Gal's vocation of breeding roses requires precision, determination, and regimented routine, which fit well with her personality. However, these traits aren't as admired by her students. A misunderstanding, most likely a deliberate one, by Gal's sister leads to Gal's 15-year-old niece arriving without notice in the middle of school one day waiting for Gal to assume temporary guardianship. It turns out that regimen, precision, and determination aren't all Gal needs to help her niece, either.

I read and thoroughly Dilloway's first novel, How to Be an American Housewife, a lovely book about a woman trying to understand her mother, a Japanese war bride. In her newest book, Dilloway has written about a completely different situation, with very different characters, but has captivated my imagination no less than she did with her first book. It's a great read...and by me reading it rather than attempting to garden myself, it probably saved five or six plants. 

Every Day: It's Something New

Describe yourself.

Go on...take a minute and think about what words you'd use to describe yourself to someone you've never met. Did a physical attribute make the list of words? Or did you talk about your role in other people's lives? What if there was nothing physical to describe? Or if you couldn't describe yourself in relation to the people around? What if every morning, you woke up in a different person's life and body: sometimes it's a boy, sometimes it's a girl; sometimes it's someone beautiful, sometimes it's someone ugly. This is the life faced by A, the 16-year-old narrator in David Levithan's newest novel, Every Day.

A has lived 16 years without a life, family, or friends to call his (or her, since the narrator is genderless) own. A has a strong code of rules for living: do nothing that will interfere with the hosts' body and leave no trace behind of having been there. This all changes the day A jumps into a boy's body and meets the boy's girlfriend, Rhiannon, with whom A feels an instant and strong connection. Desperate to see Rhiannon again, and willing to orchestrate "chance" meetings, A becomes willing to take host bodies out of their normal routine. When a boy named Nathan remembers being powerless in his own body and speaks publicly, trouble begins.

David Levithan is a writer with a great skill for words (for a wonderful example in adult fiction, check out his book The Lover's Dictionary).  He uses this skill deftly to pose questions of what it really means to love someone and the relative weight of self-interest and maintaining ethical boundaries. Levithan has added yet another book to the list of reasons you should occasionally browse the teen section to find a great read. 

January's In The Queue

Insane City by Dave Barry
In Dave Barry's hilarious new novel, a slacker loses his suitcase, a wedding ring, and groomsmen on his way to marry his fiancee, a beautiful lawyer. Throw in a stripper nobody asked for, disapproving parents, and an orangutan with love on  his mind, and it's a wedding event bound to be remembered.

Good Kids: A Novel by Benjamin Nugent
Acclaimed author Benjamin Nugent's fiction debut is a hilarious, sad, handsomely plotted story of love and class. Stylistically adventurous but always accessible, Nugent trains a keen ear on the vernaculars of Generation Y and the baby boomers, as the young and middle-aged try to decide what parenting, background, and loyalty mean in an America struggling to redefine virtue.



The Future: Six Drivers of Global Change by Al Gore
From the former vice president and #1 New York Times bestselling author comes An Inconvenient Truth for everything--a frank and clear-eyed assessment of six critical drivers of global change in the decades to come. Ours is a time of revolutionary change that has no precedent in history.  Al Gore surveys our planet's beclouded horizon and offers a sober, learned, and ultimately hopeful forecast in the visionary tradition of Alvin Toffler's Future Shock and John Naisbitt's Megatrends .

Rocking New Year

Before I realized that it is almost impossible to listen to CD books in a car where the disc gets ejected constantly, I began lining up several biographies of famous musicians to listen to while on the road. I am not an audiobook person, but I thought it seemed more fitting to listen to the biographies of people that built careers by appealing to our auditory preferences. Not to mention, several of the books are read by familiar voices. Just for the sake of name dropping, Johnny Depp and Keith Carradine make the list of rock and roll biography readers. If you decide to read rather than listen, check out our music selection for appropriate background music for your walk/read on the wild side.

Here is a list of some recent rock musicians' biographies that will be sure to spice up your new year:

Who I am: a memoir by Pete Townshend

The man who sold the world: David Bowie and the 1970s by Peter Doggett

Waging heavy peace: a hippie dream by Neil Young

My cross to bear by Gregg Allman; with Alan Light

 

 

Mick Jagger by Phillip Norman

Bruce by Peter Ames Carlin

Kicking & dreaming: a story of Heart, soul, & rock and roll by Ann and Nancy Wilson; with Charles R. Cross

In the pleasure groove: love, death, & Duran Duran  by John Taylor; with Tom Sykes

Rest in Peace--2012

We lost a lot of talented people in 2012.  Children's authors, non-fiction writers, poets, and novelists. Over the next few weeks we will highlight some of their works and mourn the passing of some really wonderful people.

Nina Bawden--(1925-2012)--was a British novelist and children's writer.  She was one of a select group to have both served as a Booker judge and made the shortlist (in 1987 and 2010) as an author.

Maeve Binchy--(1940-2012)--was an Irish novelist, playwright, short story writers, columnist, and speaker best know for her take on humorous, small-town, Ireland.  Her novels sold more than 40 million copies worldwide, and her death is mourned as the passing of Ireland's best-loved, most generous, and most recognizable writer.

Bryce Courtenay--(1933-2012)--was one of Australia's most successful authors.  His novels are primarily  set in Australia, his adopted country, or South Africa, the country of his birth. His first novel The Power of One, was published in 1989 and became one of Australia's best-selling books.

Sarah Dreher--(1937-2012)--was an American lesbian novelist and playwright, and best known for her award-winning mystery series featuring amateur sleuth Stoner McTavish.  She was also a clinical psychologist and graduated from Wellesley College and got her PhD from Purdue.

Carlos Fuentes--(1928-2012)--was a Mexican novelist and essayist.  He has been described as "one of the most admired writers in the Spanish-speaking world" by the NY Times and "Mexico's most celebrated novelist" by The Guardian.

William Gay--(1941-2012)--was an American writer of novels and short stories.  His fiction is almost always set in in the rural South of the 1940s and 1950s and can be dark, violent, and Southern Gothic.  His works have parallels with Faulkner, Caldwell, and O'Connor.

Erica Kennedy--(1970-2012)--was a best-selling African-American author, journalist, blogger, and singer.  She attended Sarah Lawrence College and Oxford University. She was named by Ebony Magazine as one of the 100 most influential African-Americans in 2010.

Barry Unsworth--(1930-2012)--was a British writer known for his historical fiction.  He published 17 novels and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize three times, winning once in 1992.

Gore Vidal--(1925-2012)--was an American writer known for his essays, novels, screenplays, and Broadway plays. He was the last of a generation of American writers who had served during World War II.  He is probably best remembered for his caustic wit.