The New Books I Read in May

I find it hard to believe that I am still keeping track of new books I've read this year--I never made it past January before. So here's the list of all the books I read in May that I had never read before:

Magic or Madness and Magic Lessons, by Justine Larbalestier. How nice it is to start a series after it's been around for a while, and the author has had a chance to write a few more books. I'm saving the third book, Magic's Child, for Mother Reader's 48 Hour Reading Challenge (which I am not going to loose sleep over because I will not have much time to read, what with house guests and an archaeological excavation at a the site of Roger William's trading post that I foolishly said I would be happy to do in my copious free time).

The Dead and Gone, by Susan Beth Pfeffer. This of course is the sequel to Life as We Knew It. Reading LAWKI, I kept wanting to make survival suggestions to the characters; perhaps because the Dead and Gone takes place in NY city, or perhaps because Pfeffer's world building was more successful (her world destroying was very good indeed in both books), I had an easier time suspending my disbelief.

What the Moon Saw, by Laura Resau and Leap of Faith by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley. I read these two back to back, which made for an interesting combination. Both books required me to accompany their teenage narrators on journeys toward belief in things I don't believe in--in the first, Mayan spiritual beliefs, in the second, the tenants of Catholicism. But both writers were able to convince me that it was possible for the characters themselves to believe, which made for good reading.

A Curse Dark as Gold by Elizabeth Bunce. I had high hopes for this book, but it didn't do it for me...I sometimes have a hard time reding books where too much goes wrong (on a daily basis, as opposed to catastrophes).

Ways to Live Forever by Sally Nicholls. I read this one on Mother's Day, which maybe made things worse. I knew it would make me cry, but I'd heard it was a great book...It's a great book, and it made me cry. 11 year old boy with leukemia; right from the get go, we know that the doctors have given up and sent him home to die. Whah. But it's a great, loving, funny book, if you can see the words through your tears...

Clockwork Heart by Dru Pagliassotti. In my opinion, this suspense/fantasy is an excellent airplane book--keeps your attention the whole trip, but if it gets left in the seat pocket, you won't be crushed.

Other:
Carver by Ruth Yaffe Radin
Return to Harken House by Joan Aiken
Tisha: The Story of a Young Teacher in the Alaska Wilderness by Robert Specht and Anne Prudy

Edwin Arlington Robinson for Poetry Friday

It seems to me that there's not that much attention being paid to poems for the 8th grade type kid (perhaps there is, and I am just missing something, which wouldn't surprise me). So here's my suggestion for that age group--the poems of Edwin Arlington Robinson (1869-1935).

When I was twelve, my mother read me some of his poems, and, that being the eighties, I was, like, wow. Even thought the punches that Robinson packs may be obvious to the adult, I think that for a 12 year old, it's a pretty powerful moment when the point of one of his poems is realized. And because the messages aren't wrapped in a lot of metaphor and literary allusion, getting the point is fairly straightforward.

Here's one of my favorites:

Richard Cory

Whenever Richard Cory went down town,
We people on the pavement looked at him:
He was a gentleman from sole to crown,
Clean favored, and imperially slim.

And he was always quietly arrayed,
And he was always human when he talked;
But still he fluttered pulses when he said,
"Good-morning," and he glittered when he walked.

And he was rich - yes, richer than a king -
And admirably schooled in every grace;
In fine we thought that he was everything
To make us wish that we were in his place.

So on we worked, and waited for the light,
And went without the meat, and cursed the bread;
And Richard Cory, one calm summer night,
Went home and put a bullet through his head.

And perhaps as a reaction to my fascination with Dungeons and Dragons, my mother read me this one several times:

Miniver Cheevy

Miniver Cheevy, child of scorn,
Grew lean while he assailed the seasons
He wept that he was ever born,
And he had reasons.

Miniver loved the days of old
When swords were bright and steeds were prancing;
The vision of a warrior bold
Would send him dancing.

Miniver sighed for what was not,
And dreamed, and rested from his labors;
He dreamed of Thebes and Camelot,
And Priam's neighbors.

Miniver mourned the ripe renown
That made so many a name so fragrant;
He mourned Romance, now on the town,
And Art, a vagrant.

Miniver loved the Medici,
Albeit he had never seen one;
He would have sinned incessantly
Could he have been one.

Miniver cursed the commonplace
And eyed a khaki suit with loathing:
He missed the medieval grace
Of iron clothing.

Miniver scorned the gold he sought,
But sore annoyed was he without it;
Miniver thought, and thought, and thought,
And thought about it.

Miniver Cheevy, born too late,
Scratched his head and kept on thinking;
Miniver coughed, and called it fate,
And kept on drinking.

Oh well. I still think the Medici are rather romantic...

For more great poems, visit today's edition of Poetry Friday at Wild Rose Reader!

Looking for, and finding, lost books

I spend a lot of time wandering around the house looking for whatever book I happen to be reading, but I am almost always successful (fallen behind radiators is a good bet. Or the top of the toaster, that being one of the few surfaces in the kitchen that is always free of clutter. Except when it has a book on top of it).

But that is not the sort of lost book I have in mind at the moment--I'm thinking of those books read once long ago, that your parents left behind when you moved and you have never seen again. Here is a most excellent website that organizes all the places you might go on line to find those books, and I can't think of anything to add to it.

But if anyone ever read a book about a boy with (I think) a club foot (or perhaps some other issue related to walking), who lives on an island and bird watches (with some sort of bird related triumphant conclusion), that ends with the boy riding the bus to the school on the mainland, please let me know. It could be an English book, because it was left behind in the Bahamas when I was eleven, along with all my Enid Blytons (not that I hold a grudge). Whereas for some reason all the hardback Nancy Drews were lovingly packed, and I have no desire to ever read them again, and this summer my mother wants them out of her attic. I vote we sell them, but then wonder if someday I will have a granddaughter who will spend a fortune buying them all over again....Fortunately I have been able to replace the majority of the Enid Blytons at a reasonable cost.

The Cat on the Mat is Flat

After leaving the Navy's Autonomous Underwater Vehicle Fest (and a grand time it was) I wrested a living from the hostile earth (i.e. I planted my vegetables, which occupied much of the weekend), and then turned to the long neglected task of returning library books. Although it is true that I work very hard organizing book sales for the library, it is not a labor of love--I do it because I can't afford to pay the fines we rack up--sigh. I'm a bad patron.

Among the books that were overdue was this gem: The Cat on the Mat is Flat, by Andy Griffiths, illustrated by Terry Denton (9 chapters, 166 pages, Feiwel and Friends, 2006).
This book is a series of rhyming stories, illustrated with black and white cartoons. It is utterly perfect for the boy, aged 7-9, who is having a hard time with reading. It is not just that the stories are easy to read--if one wanted that, one could grab any number of books without a second thought. But almost all of them would look like baby books, whereas The Cat on the Mat is Flat looks like a Real Book that a Cool Boy might be carrying around. The front cover, with its scenes of cartoon violence, shows clearly that this is not a book for the very young and very sweet (although my boys often are; perhaps consistantly sweet is closer to what I mean).

Although the words are such as one might find in, say, an Usbourne book like Toad Makes a Road, the cartoons that accompany them and the slapsticky mayhem of the rhyming stories are very boy friendly (which is not, of course, to buy into gender stereotypes, but for whatever reason I truly believe that boys will find a cat being whacked with a baseball bat more amusing than girls will). For example:

Around and around and around the mat
the rat chased the cat with the baseball bat

until...

KERSPLAT!

Never again did that cat chase the rat--
the cat was much too flat for that.

If you, like me, want to see your 7 year old boy sitting reading by himself, try this book.

Andy Griffiths is the author of The Day My Butt Went Psycho, and other books for older kids.

Here are some other reactions to this book (and strangely they all seem to agree with my own opinion. Coincidence or conspiracy?) at BookBoy, at Pink Me, and atWhat You Want to Read.

(and incidentally, these are new blogs for me, and it felt rather adventurous to venture out into new territory. All three looked interesting, and I plan to go back, and explore them further. In my copious free time ha ha).

AUV Fest 08 drawing to a close...

I haven't been posting for these past days. Instead, I've been in Newport, wearing my Underwater Archaeologist hat, and having the socks knocked off me by the really cool autonomous underwater vehicles the Naval Research Center and NOAA have been testing. These robotic, free-swimming machines are, as a bonus to the tax payers, being tested on archaeological sites as well as looking for hidden underwater mines. To reiterate, they're really cool machines producing really cool information about our shipwrecks--it would probably make a good children's book (to drag this post on topic).

Anyway, today is media day, tomorrow is distinguished visitor day (which presents the same old fashion problem I've had for years--conveying out-doorsy Ocean Explorer while looking crisp and professional).

So I'll be back, d.v., posting about books on Friday.

In the meantime, here's the NOAA website that tells more about AUVFest 08.

The Meme of Five

Elaine at Wild Rose Reader has tagged me, so here goes...

1. The rules of the game get posted at the beginning.
2. Each player answers the questions about themselves.
3. At the end of the post, the player then tags five people and posts their names, then goes to their blogs and leaves them a comment, letting them know they’ve been tagged and asking them to read the player’s blog.
4. Let the person who tagged you know when you’ve posted your answer.

What were you doing five years ago?
I was on maternity leave with my week old baby...

What are five things on your to-do list for today (not in any particular order)?

Some of these have been done:
1. pack provisions for a two day stay in Newport, RI
2. find socks for children (tricky), make sure children put socks on (often I do it for them while they are still asleep. Faster, but perhaps it is traumatizing for them to be woken in the morning by someone grabbing their feet out from under the covers and they will have to spend lots of money on psychoanalysis?), get them to school
3. Take bus to Newport, walk to the Naval Underwater Warfare Center
4. Do a reasonably competent job analyzing the data from the autonomous underwater vehicles that are even now collecting more data in Narragansett Bay (note--the data isn't ready for me yet, which is why I am blogging and not analyzing. It has to be pretty processed by others before I can make any sense of it).
5. brush teeth

What are five snacks you enjoy?
1-5 Cookies

What five things would you do if you were a billionaire?
1. Buy houses for my two siblings and my husband's two siblings
2. Fund solar panels on libraries and schools throughout the country
3. Fund solar initiatives (like the non profit that provides solar stoves to women in Kenya)
4. Quit my job and open a children's bookstore
5. Buy new socks for the whole family!

What are five of your bad habits?
1. Not buying enough socks for my children
2. Not washing and sorting my children's socks in a timely fashion
3. Leaving things (books, cups, gardening implements, socks) where they are when I am done with them. I worry about my children in this regard, as my husband does this too, so we have breed for this.
4. Not returning library books promptly (the real reason I became president of the Friends of the Libary is related to this, but I don't want to come flat out and say it because I don't want to get anyone in trouble).
5. Procrastination

What are five places where you have lived?

Arlington VA, Portugal, the Bahamas, England, Rhode Island


What are five jobs you've had?
1. Babysitter
2. Housecleaner (ha ha this is ironic)
3. Archaeological field crew
4. Sales Clerk in map store
5. Archaeologist for state agency


I now tag:

Amanda at A Patchwork of Books
Els at Librarian Mom
Anne at Librarianne
and
Susan at Chicken Spaghetti
and a fifth slot for anyone else who hasn't done it already!

I'm off being an Ocean Explorer

I'm off this week dong high tech shipwreck exploration, courtesy of NOAA and the Navy, at AUVfest 08. AUV's are autonomous underwater vehicles--high tech free-swimming robotic machines. The Navy's interested in using them for detecting underwater mines; NOAA in using them to explore shipwrecks. This week and next the latest in AUV technology is being deployed off Newport, RI. And since I'm the state of Rhode Island's official underwater archaeologist, that's where I am, seeing pictures of my shipwrecks such as I've never seen before. So I won't be posting much this week...but if you click through the link, and go to the ocean explorers' gallery, you can see a picture of me, carefully chosen to suggest that I live a life of seafaring fun!

In a Blue Room-- Interview with Jim Averbeck

In a Blue Room, by Jim Averbeck, illustrated by Tricia Tusa (Harcourt, 2008)

This utterly charming picture book begins thus: "In a blue room Alice bounces, wide-awake past bedtime" and indeed, she is truly bouncing--in the second picture, when Mama comes in, all we see of Alice are her feet. "I can only sleep in a blue room," she says. (If you happen to be reading this out loud to a child, the child point out that Alice's room is yellow. Do not worry. All will be made clear). Alice's mother is an example to us all (making this a good one for a Mother's Day review). She does not say, "Oh for crying out loud get into bed." Instead, on each visit to Alice's room, she brings gifts to appeal to each sense, such as sweet smelling flowers and soothing tea. And as Alice drifts into sleep, her room is made blue by the light of the moon.

Simple, whimsical, sweet drawings well belanced with carfully chosen words make for a magical book. And one that leads nicely to light-turning out--"let's make your room blue too...."

I am pleased and proud to have interviewed Jim Averbeck last week:

Me: I know very little about how picture books are made. At what point in the process did you first see Tricia's illustrations? Were your words set in stone at that point, or were you able to make changes? If so, did you?

Jim: My editor, Sam McFerrin, and I had gone through two rounds of revision and sent the “final” product to Tricia. The first illustrations I saw were black and white sketches a few months later. I was thrilled with her interpretation. We did make some changes in the text at this point. They were very subtle, but helped the story and pictures work better together. Later, when I got the color proofs, we changed where the text was on certain pages- again very minor, subtle tweaks. Then at some point, I wanted to make one more tweak and Sam said, “Too late. It’s at the printers!” Most writers revise in their heads even after the book is out. We just can’t help it. Thank goodness the editor is there to stop the madness and get the thing on the bookshelf at some point.

Me: The five sense are all introduced in the book--sight obviously has to be last, so the room can be blue, but how did you decide on the order of the others?

Jim: I actually played with the order a lot. The first factor to influence it was logic. I thought it wouldn’t make sense for Mama to bring flowers in at the end. It would be too big of a disruption if Alice were already close to sleep. Same thing with the herbal tea, since it would require Alice to sip it. So, flowers came first, followed by tea.

Also, Mama says less and less as Alice drifts off. So when Alice objects to the flowers, Mama replies with three one-syllable words. When Alice objects to the tea: two. And so on until she says nothing at all. So I had to figure out which words felt the most soothing toward the end and followed this pattern, which affected the order of what Mama brings.

Me: (at least partly tongue in cheek). Did it ever occur to you that bringing a vase full of flowers into the room of a child bouncing vigorously on her bed might be a bad idea? Likewise a hot cup of tea. Unwise. And if all the children who fall in love with your book start demanding hot cups of tea in bed, with disastrous consequences, will you need insurance or is the publisher liable?

Jim: I blame my editor for this. You see, the lines about the flowers originally read:
“Time for bed,” Mama says, “and I’ve brought flowers in a heavily bottom-weighted, shatter-proof, magnetic vase for the metal table in your room.”
The editor rejected this as “too wordy.”
Likewise, the tea lines read:
Mama returns with a tumble-proof, “Mr Commuter®” mug of tea at a steamy, but safe, 104 degrees (Fahrenheit.)
Here my editor not only objected to the “wordiness” but also to what she called an “obvious commercial endorsement.”
Fortunately, the legal department has less rigorously literary standards than the editorial department. If you look at the inner side of the dust jacket, you will see clearly reproduced in 6-point, white typeface a disclaimer that indemnifies both myself and the publisher from any liability resulting from any “use or interpretation of the text or images in the book that falls outside included instructions” (also printed in white on the inner dust-jacket.

Me: Is there a question you've been dying to have asked, because you have the perfect answer all ready for it?

Jim: Q: We all know that picture book writers are grateful for their editors, illustrators, and publishing houses, but is there anyone else you’d like to thank.
A: Oh! I am so glad you asked. I’d like to give a shout out to Mrs. Skroki and Mrs. Meyer, teachers from sixth grade and high school (respectively) who got me interested in reading and art (also respectively.)
Also, John Schindel who taught me to write for children, and Julie Downing and Ashley Wolff, who taught me to illustrate for them.

Me: (referencing Jim's time in the Cameroon in the Peace Corps) Have you ever read Gerald Durrell's books about animal collecting in the Cameroon?

Jim: I haven’t. But I just requested one from the San Francisco Public Library. Looks fascinating. I have read a book called “Mango Elephants in the Sun” by Susana Herrera, who was a volunteer at the same time I was, and who wrote about her experiences in this book. She was the first person to read my first story and she gave me little exercises to improve it. (And we are all grateful she pointed me in the right direction.)

Me: I shall look for Mango Elephants!

Me again: What color is your room?

Jim: My current bedroom is “Bahaman Sea Blue” according to Benjamin Moore paint manufacturers. But I am in the process of moving; Mr. Moore tells me that my new room will be “Fairytale Blue.” How appropriate for a children’s book writer.

Me: Thanks so much! I really like your book lots. I have put it carefully away on a tall shelf, away from the grubby hands of my children, in case it goes on to win major awards.

Jim: Oh dear! You should buy a second copy for the children. (or as many as are required so each has his/her own. My accountant would like to encourage you to have a large family, if you don’t already.)

Me. Two children is plenty, thanks. But I do plan on buying a copy for my public library!

Here are other interviews with Jim, at The Well Read Child, at The Imaginary Blog, at Tales from Mount Rushmore, and at Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast. I'm happy to add anyone I missed!

Westlin Winds

It's my tenth wedding anniversary today, so this poem by Robert Burns is in honor of my husband (even though the poem is not seasonally appropriate). One of the (many) nice things about my husband is that he came with a lot of great music, including a cd by the great Scottish singer, Dick Gaughan (Handful of Earth) that has a most lovely setting of this poem. When the words meet the music, it becomes one of the most beautiful songs I know (and makes me weep every time).

Westlin Winds

Now westlin winds and slaughtering guns
Bring autumn's pleasant weather
The moorcock springs on whirring wings
Among the blooming heather
Now waving grain, wild o'er the plain
Delights the weary farmer
And the moon shines bright as I rove at night
To muse upon my charmer

The partridge loves the fruitful fells
The plover loves the mountain
The woodcock haunts the lonely dells
The soaring hern the fountain
Through lofty groves the cushat roves
The path of man to shun it
The hazel bush o'erhangs the thrush
The spreading thorn the linnet

Thus every kind their pleasure find
The savage and the tender
Some social join and leagues combine
Some solitary wander
Avaunt! Away! the cruel sway,
Tyrannic man's dominion
The sportsman's joy, the murdering cry
The fluttering, gory pinion

But Peggy dear the evening's clear
Thick flies the skimming swallow
The sky is blue, the fields in view
All fading green and yellow
Come let us stray our gladsome way
And view the charms of nature
The rustling corn, the fruited thorn
And every happy creature

We'll gently walk and sweetly talk
Till the silent moon shines clearly
I'll grasp thy waist and, fondly pressed,
Swear how I love thee dearly
Not vernal showers to budding flowers
Not autumn to the farmer
So dear can be as thou to me
My fair, my lovely charmer.

There's a bit of the song at Dick Gaughan's website--the music really does make it much more so.

The Poetry Friday roundup is here at Writer2be today!

Teenagers reading-

"It's now cool for teenagers to read"

Here's the link to a rather cheering story from today's Providence Journal, about a book club formed last year at Hope High School. Hope is an urban, largely minority school that was in such a bad way a few years ago that the state intervened. It's better now, thanks in large part to dedicated teachers like those who founded the book club-- Jodi Timpani and Laura Almagno.

Rather annoyingly, the article only mentions two specific books the club members have read--Bento Box in the Heartland: My Japanese Girlhood in Whitebread America (Linda Furiya) and Wicked.

Updated:

Here's what the Hope teenagers have read so far:

The Memory of Running
My Sister's Keeper
19 minutes
Change of Heart
The Pact
World War Z
Water for Elephants

I have read none of them...always there are more books landing on the to be read pile!!:)

Jock Meets Nessie, also spelling, writing on computers and becoming a reader

My 7 year old son asked me to post here a story he wrote for school (see below). He wrote a short, laborious, and unreadable first draft by hand--unreadable not because his handwriting is so bad, but because his spelling so often does not result in recognizable words. Then he re-wrote it on the computer (with a bit of typing help from me), and did the spell checking himself. The result is something that he can read back to himself, which I assume gives him confidence that he is a reader as well as a writer, and is thus a Good Thing. Gratifying, but I wonder if, like his Mama (who can't even blame computers), he will ever learn to spell on his own.

Having gotten this self-consciously trying to make my kid's story relevant to a larger readership interested in children's literacy section out of the way,

here is

JOCK MEETS NESSIE

Once there was a man named Jock (he was Scottish). He went to Loch Ness to fish. But he wanted to see Nessie because when he was a little boy he'd found a magical compass on the bank of Loch Ness. Engraved in old English runes were the words “Give this to Nessie!” He had kept it all the years since, hoping to give it to Nessie. “I would love to see her,” whispered Jock to himself. He thought that Nessie was a plesiosaur.

It was early in the morning. Jock ran down the slope to the dock. He got to his boat and untied it. He started to row into the lake. Looking around and enjoying the sweet summer air, he spied bubbles rising in a ring. Jock decided to go to the ring of bubbles.

Jock got to the bubbling water and leaned over the side of his boat to see if Nessie was there. He saw Nessie’s head, but he thought it was a fish. “It isn’t Nessie, but it looks like a big fish!” Jock prepared his line and tossed it in. Nessie bit the bait and tugged hard. Jock suddenly realized that it wasn’t a fish! He screamed out, “If you’re Nessie, show yourself!”

Nessie rose out of the water. She looked like a plesiosaur alright! She snorted and swam around Jock and his boat. Jock felt so happy that he could give Nessie the compass. He tossed it over the side of the boat and Nessie caught it her jaws. He was relieved because finally he had seen Nessie and given her the compass.

Nessie dove down and put the compass inside a secret cave. Then she came back up to the surface and snorted twice and dove back down. She came up again with two fish in her mouth. She tossed them into Jock’s boat.

Jock wondered if she would use the compass find her way back to the ocean. Nessie had not left Jock and his boat. Then the strangest thing happened. Nessie started to speak. “Thank you, Jock,” said Nessie. “ It was very kind of you to give that to me. Now I have done my thanks, so I will return to my ocean home. I’ve been a prisoner in Loch Ness for all these years, and I’m so glad you gave me that compass so I can be free.”

She disappeared back under the water, and a piece of paper floated up from below. Jock took his net and fished it out of the water. It said, “We’ll have other adventures.” And it was signed, Nessie.

The End.

Books I read in April

I broke no records for new books read in April--for much of the month I was poorly and my husband was off playing Irish music in Japan, so I did a lot of comfort re-reading. But here are the new to me books I read:

Persepolis by Marjane Satrape I have now painlessly acquired a much clearer understand of 20th century Iranian history.

Best Foot Forward by Joan Bauer (my review)

Skin Hunger by Kathleen Duey (my review, which is really more a whine)

Eleven by Patricia Reily Giff (review pending)

Project Mulberry by Linda Sue Park (my review)

Captain Peggy Angela Brazil, picked up for $2 in a used book store. Angela Brazil is one of the Big Names of the early 20th century girl's boarding school genre, and although I wouldn't spend much more than $2 on one of her books, it was quite a good read. I won't spoil it for you, but Peggy's quick thinking when she saved the bus load of school girls at the end was truly admirable!

Winterbound by Margery Bianco A very happy find at the same book store. I learned of this book here, at the blog Collecting Children's Books, and although it didn't really do it for Peter, I thought it was great! But then, I am a huge sucker for books where girls have to make a home for younger siblings under difficult circumstances, particularly out in the country. If any fan of Gwendoline Courtney* should read this (unlikely), you will definitely like this book.

Emergence: Labeled Autistic by Temple Grandin and Margaret M. Sceriano Fascinating.


*Gwendoline Courtney was a mid 20th century English writer of books for girls--several of her stories (Sally's Family, The Farm on the Downs, The Girls of Friar's Rise) are about families in relatively isolated, difficult circumstances...I particularly recommend Sally's Family (which I shall someday review in full...d.v.)

Good Enough, by Paula Yoo

Good Enough, by Paula Yoo (2008, Harper Teen) is imperfectly titled. It is much more than good enough; in fact, it is very good indeed.

It tells of Patti, a high school student whose Korean parents expect nothing less than the best from her--anything less, no matter how good, isn't enough, and might keep her from HARVARDYALEPRINCTON. Patti and the kids in her Korean American youth group want to make their parents happy, but sometimes it's all a bit much. And sometimes, a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do, even if it means ditching Youth Group to run off to a Night Club (shock horror) with a Boy (greater horror)...

But before Patti gets to this point, she practices violin, takes practice SAT tests compulsively, starts to believe the Boy maybe likes her, and shares very funny tips on how to make your Korean American parents happy.

Maybe this doesn't sound like the stuff of which a great read is made, but Patti is so likeable and believable that it works. There aren't any great conflicts here, or great triumphs or failures. Instead, there's a funny and compassionate take on how to balance being true to yourself (and finding out who "yourself" is) with loving your parents and understanding their point of view.

Here's a great interview with Paula Yoo over at the Ya Ya Yas. And here's Paula's own website. Then check out this great project, Fusion Stories, that's promoting 10 new books for young readers about Asian Americans that "aren’t traditional tales set in Asia nor stories about coming to America for the first time."

ps: my only gripe with this book is that Bryn Mawr, my college, shares the number 12space with Smith, Mount Holyoke, and Wellesley on the Korean Parents list of preferred colleges, with the following note: "This is only for pretty girls like Tiffany Chung, whose parents will feel better if she attends an all-female Seven Sisters college because dating is wrong and evil." I realize that this is the opinion of the Korean Parents, but hmph to that :) !

For Poetry Friday --- What's Left

What’s Left
(for Peter Hennessy)

I used to wait for the flowers,

my pleasure reposed on them.

Now I like plants before they get to the blossom.

Leafy ones - foxgloves, comfrey, delphiniums -

fleshy tiers of strong leaves pushing up

into air grown daily lighter and more sheened

with bright dust like the eyeshadow

that tall young woman in the bookshop wears,

its shimmer and crumble on her white lids.

The washing sways on the line, the sparrows pull

at the heaps of drying weeds that I’ve left around.

Perhaps this is middle age. Untidy, unfinished,

knowing there’ll never be time now to finish,

liking the plants - their strong lives -

not caring about flowers, sitting in weeds

to write things down, look at things,

watching the sway of shirts on the line,

the cloth filtering light.

I know more or less

how to live through my life now.

But I want to know how to live what’s left

with my eyes open and my hands open;

I want to stand at the door in the rain

listening, sniffing, gaping.

Fearful and joyous,

like an idiot before God.

Kerry Hardiein, from Being Alive, ed Neil Astley, Bloodaxe Books 2004

I think this poem will have more meaning for me in a few more years (I don't feel middle aged just yet, and I am not quite ready to be unmoved by the blooming delphiniums) but much of it resonates for me even now. Especially the heaps of weeds lying around! :).

As a critical note--I don't think the woman in the bookstore adds one single thing to the poem. Agree? Disagree?

The Poetry Friday Roundup is at Big A little a today!

Rabbit and Squirrel: A Tale of War and Peas

So I am watching my peas grow (go peas!) and thought that it would be a nice time to take a look at a pea related book that arrived recently--Rabbit and Squirrel: A Tale of War and Peas, by Kara LaReau and Scott Magoon (2008, Harcourt).

Um, this isn't a happy gardening book for kids. This is Picture Book Noir, one I think snarky adults will appreciate lots and lots more! The Rabbit and the Squirrel are scary looking, the colors somber, and the plot fearsome and rather pessimistic.

It's not my cup of tea, but here are two other reviews, from Three Silly Chicks and Fuse #8, who liked it lots. I guess I'm just so anxious about my precious baby garden right now that I have no vegetable sense of humor at the moment. Probably in September, when I am sick of the whole wretched thing and tomatoes are dripping down around me and the crabgrass has won (again), I will appreciate it more.

Best Foot Forward

About this time last year, I read Rules of the Road, by Joan Bauer (2000) (here's my review). I thought it was great fun taking a road trip through the world of shoe sales with its heroine, Jenna, and the grand dame of the show world, Mrs. Gladstone, whose chauffeur she became for a summer. So I was most pleased last week to find on the shelf of my very own library its sequel, Best Foot Forward (2005).

Jenna is back in school, and back in the shoe store, and it is the business of shoe selling that is uppermost in her mind. For the quality and customer service that her chain of stores stands for is under threat, and Jenna must unravel a chain of corporate greed and third world exploitation to protect both the chain and Mrs. Gladstone. And there's the matter of Tanner Cobb, a new employee in the store with a dodgy past, and uncertain future, and a nack for shoe sales, not to mention the nice doughnut store guy...

Without the road trip to carry it along, this must have been a tougher book to write, and as a stand alone, I'm not sure how well it works. But I truly enjoy the shoeish details with which Baur packs her story, and I like Jenna a lot (I'm one of those weak readers who likes to like the main character). I'm not sure I believe in her exactly, because her life and competence in the Shoe World is rather incredible, and her non-shoe world is very shadowy, but I do enjoy her!

Joan Bauer has a new book, Peeled, coming out tomorrow (May 1)! Here are a few reviews--at Bookshelves of Doom, at And Another Book Read and Look Books.

My backyard--isn't Spring just the prettiest little old thing (even more so in real life)

Environmental Disasters

Environmental Disasters, by Michael Woods and Mary B. Woods (Lerner 2008, 64pp). Part of the Disasters Up Close series, writen for Grade 5 and up.

This isn't cheerful reading, but it is darned interesting. Chemical leaks, killer smog, a vanishing sea, and the explosion of a nuclear reactor (among other disasters) are presented here in an utterly engrossing, horrifying, riveting way. The subject matter in itself is fascinating, but the authors have given the material a human touch that makes it unputdownable by bringing real people into it. Here's seven year old Barry Linton, for instance, talking about the Killer Smog that killed over 4,000 people in London in December, 1953- "Even in our...living room, it was misty and choky," Linton remembered. "And every time I blew my nose, it looked like soot in my hanky" (page 23). Aziza Sultan recalled the 1984 gas leak in Bhopal thus - "The room was filled with a white cloud....Each breath [seemed] as if I was breathing in fire" (page 29).

These oral testimonies of hellish situations are coupled with very clear descriptive prose, explaining with copious examples what environmental disasters are, what causes them, where they happen, and how their effects are measured. And it ends with a vague hope that we are, perhaps, learning enough from our mistakes that we will not all be doomed...

There are copious (and fascinating) illustrations, a list of safety tips, a timeline (I didn't know that Edward I made the first air pollution law in 1272 to reduce smog in London), a glossary, a list of Disaster Sites to visit (fun for the whole family?), source notes, and further resources.

This wasn't a book I felt I wanted to read to my children--they are still too young to know the horror that people can unleash, through carelessness, greed, and stupidity. But as a curious reader, I found this book a true page turner (and I bet a lot of kids will too). I think the Woods should write a book on the same subject for grownups, who need the lessons contained in these stories spelled out to them much more than today's children do, brought up as they are with Earth Day and Recycling.

This book was reviewed a few weeks ago by Diane Chen over at the School Library Journal, who was also taken with the Edward I trivia tidbit. It's already been featured at the Nonfiction Monday roundup, but certainly deserves another go!

Fantasy

When I was a young reader, but getting older, I had little desire to leave the warmth and safety of the children's room, and move on to the Young Adult section (this was the Arlington, VA, Central Library in the 1970s/80s, btw). The YA section had many fewer books and it was open on three sides--not pleasant (poor teenagers never seem to get sheltered nook-like areas in libraries, I guess for fear of what they would get up to, but this could be a reason why teen library use drops off?). When I did try books from the YA section, they didn't seem my cup of tea--not escapist enough (the only one I remember specifically was Cobbler's Dream, by Monica Dickens, about a blind horse and some unhappy teenagers). So I turned to fantasy.

To this day, it is fantasy books that I expect the most from (which makes it all the more pleasant when a down-to-earth book, like The Wednesday Wars, knocks my socks off). And it is only for fantasy books by authors that I love and trust that I will shell out my own real money on release day (although I gaily spend Friends of the Library money hither and yon).

The point of this is that I've just seen the cover of Chalice, by Robin McKinley, coming on the 18th of September (happy sigh:)

And if you weren't reading Robin McKinley's blog last fall, here is a link to a great post in which she describes its genesis in depth.

I am also looking forward to The House of Many Ways, by Diana Wynne Jones (10 June) and The Bell at Sealey Head, by Patricia McKillip (2 Sept). So comforting.

But there is no new Ricky Ricotta book (Dav Pilkey) coming out. This is something else I would go out and buy on the release day, because it would make my son blissfully happy. Judging by the number of people doing google searches to find out about it, my son is not alone, and if anyone knows anything about what has happened or is going to happen, let us know. Apparently there is going to be a new Captain Underpants book this year, but that is nothing to me....

Eeyore's Poem

I read the last story of the House at Pooh Corner (AA Milne) to my children a few weeks ago—the story that Milne wrote on purpose so as to put an end to it all. I distrusted this particular story as a child (it’s very different from all the others), and I don’t like reading it now because it is about Christopher Robin growing up and that sort of thing makes me sniff.

But anyway, there is a Poem in this chapter, one written by Eeyore. And my children though it was just the funniest poem they had ever heard in all their lives. I had to read it through 5 times in a row that day, and several times on the days that followed, and my seven year old memorized it for that week’s poem memorizing homework. So here it is, with a bit of Narrative Context:

"Don't Bustle me," said Eeyore, getting up slowly. "Don't now-then me." He took a piece of paper from behind his ear, and unfolded it. "Nobody knows anything about this," he went on. "This is a Surprise." He coughed in an important way, and began again: "What-nots and Etceteras, before I begin, or perhaps I should say, before I end, I have a piece of Poetry to read to you. Hitherto--hitherto--a long word meaning--well, you'll see what it means directly--hitherto, as I was saying, all the Poetry in the Forest has been written by Pooh, a Bear with a Pleasing Manner but a Positively Startling Lack of Brain. The Poem which I am now about to read to you was written by Eeyore, or Myself, in a Quiet Moment. If somebody will take Roo's bull's-eye away from him, and wake up Owl, we shall all be able to enjoy it. I call it--POEM." This was it:

Christopher Robin is going.
At least I think he is.
Where?
Nobody knows.
But he is going -
I mean he goes
(To rhyme with "knows")
Do we care?
(To rhyme with "where")
We do
Very much.
(I haven't got a rhyme for that "is" in the second line yet.
Bother).
(Now I haven't got a rhyme for bother. Bother)
Those two bothers will have to rhyme with each other
Buther.
The fact is this is more difficult
than I thought,
I ought -
(Very good indeed)
I ought
to begin again,
But it is easier
To stop.
Christopher Robin, good-bye,
I
(Good)
I
And all your friends
Sends -
I mean all your friend
Send -
(Very awkward this, it keeps going wrong.)
Well, anyhow, we send
Our love
END.

"If anybody wants to clap," said Eeyore when he had read this, "now is the time to do it."
They all clapped.
"Thank you," said Eeyore. "Unexpected and gratifying, if a little lacking in Smack."
"It's much better than mine," said Pooh admiringly, and he really thought it was.
"Well," explained Eeyore modestly, "it was meant to be."

The Poetry Friday Roundup is at The Miss Rumphius Effect today!