Book Review: The Marrow Thieves by Cherie Dimaline

 

Frances (Frenchie) and his brother are hiding in a treehouse at the beginning of this story, but they soon find themselves in trouble as the recruiters have found them. Mitch distracts the recruiters to allow Frances to escape. 

Frances is Native American. The time is the future. People have stopped dreaming and their only hope is harvesting the marrow of Native Americans - the place where dreams still are generated. Frances finds himself on the run from the recruiters - this is not a safe time for Native Americans. Soon he is rescued by a group of strangers.

This book has a little of everything: A diverse cast of characters, survivalism, grobal warming, a dystopian world, friends and family, love and luv. And hope. And a happy ending.

Try this story, you won't be sorry.

"Cold is an effective alarm clock, and I was up before the sun. The fire had gone out, but not long ago, since there was still smoke. The cough I'd been cultivating over the past few days was more insistent now. I coughed, and each push of air brought a fresh ache out of my back and legs. The jump and run had really done a number. Still, I stood and started my jumping jacks following Mitch's morning warm-up routine even through he wasn't there to remind me. 

'C'mon French, I've seen higher from a boulder.'"

Do you think you could survive alone in the great north woods? alone? What would you draw upon to save your own skin?

Book Review: The Greatest Thing by Sarah Winifred Searle

Entering her sophomore year in high school, Winifred (Fred) feels umoored - a bit nervous. While this is typical on each first day of school, it is particularly difficult for Fred because her two best (only) friends transferred to private school. Fred wondering is she will be able to move on.

It doesn't take long for Fred to reconnect with a former friend and make some new friends, but the self doubt that she constantly lives with plays havoc with her life. She is starting to swirl out of control - not being able to sleep and cutting her arms in order to feel something - even eating food which she knows will make her sick in order to punish herself.

This is a great book to view/read if you want to vicariously want to taste this brand of mental illness. And perhaps the hope that is sitting beyond mental illness if help arrives. 

This is a quick read which is more than worth the time.

 

Book Review: 10 Blind Dates / Ashley Elston

 Merry Christmas vacation. Oh it isn't that time of year? Well, let me tell you, there is not bad time to read this book - it is a bit of a romp.

Sophie is excited for a few hours all to herself - it is something that happens VERY infrequently. Between her senior year in high school, college selection, clubs, and a father who is chief of police and incredibly protective she gets little alone time or time alone with her boyfriend, Griffen. When she calls Griffin to share the good news - he suggests that Sophie joins him at a party. Unfortunately, when she gets there she overhears him talking about how he was looking forward to some time away from her - and the heartbreak begins.

Sophie makes her way to her Nona's and Papa's house - a place where her very large extended family gather and is quickly embraced by her Nona and surrounded with love. But Nona is always scheming and she finds a way to take Sophie's mind off her troubles: 10 blind dates during the Christmas break. AND the blind dates will be set up by members of Sophie's extended family. What could go wrong???

Reading this book is a great little brain vacation for anyone who likes crazy antics, a few laughs, and an escape from studying for exams. This is a story about love - the love of friends, the love of family, the heartbreak of lost love, and finally of just plain luv. 

You can find this book on the shelves of the South Library or check out NPL for audio and ebook options. There is also a companion book, 10 Truths and a Dare which I look forward to reading when I need something light.

Book Review: The Storied Life of A. J. Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin

This book was a recommendation from my daughter. I finished this at the end of last week and I just want to turn to the first page and read it again. The end of this book offered me a perspective that I didn't start with and now I want/need to start over. 

This is about books, and love, and life, and death. It is messy and funny and heartbreaking. 

"We read to know we're not alone. We read because we are alone. We read and we are not alone. We are not alone.

I am thankful for this book. I borrowed it through my SORA account which is connected to my Nashua Public Library Libby account. You can connect your accounts too. 

 

Book Review: Brown Girl Dreaming / Jacqueline Woodson

This is a memoir -- in verse -- of the evolution of an author -- who happens to live in brown skin. How can a book get any better than that?

This book is so gently written. It will take you back to the 1960s and early 1970s when Woodson was just beginning her life. She was born in Columbus, Ohio - but spent most of her early life between places, the north and the south: Brooklyn, NY and South Carolina. And while the stark different between her grandparents red stone house with a porch for sitting and a yard big enough for gardening and playing AND living in Brooklyn where there is only one tree, people are crowded together and the air smells of city - the biggest difference was how a brown person had to walk so differently through each of these places. There was a freedom in NYC to walk through the neighborhood (though not past a certain street) that was different from the back-of-the-bus life in South Carolina. The vestiges of Jim Crow still colored the world in the mid sixties.

But this is more than living and growing as a person of color. Here Woodson shares her evolution as a writer. Her love of words and her different way of learning to read. She shares her love for her family. And finally, she draws a verbal picture of growing up in the Church of the Latter-Day Saints. Here you will find a life filled with double dutch and fireflies, friends and bullies, family joys and sorrows, living between two worlds, Christianity and Islam, words, words, words. 

One of my favorite quotes: 

"If someone had taken
that [picture] book out of my hand 
said, You're too old for this 
maybe
I'd never have believed
that someone who looked like me
could be in the pages of the book
that someone who looked like me
had a story."

You can find a print copy of this book in the South library. Nashua Public Library also has print copies and you can borrow the audiobook from Overdrive.

Book Review: Internment by Samira Ahmed

This book starts with a book burning. 

Layla is living in a time when America is out of control: a new president, a Muslim ban, exclusion laws, rampant Islamophobia, and a curfew, and finally relocation camps. 

This story, set in a near future America, features a repeat of the injustices played out after Pearl Harbor was bombed and many Japanese Americans were placed in relocation camps, but this story revolves around Muslims. After Layla sneaks out to meet her boyfriend and is out past curfew - she races home only to hear loud knocks on her door in the middle of that night by the Exclusion Authority. Though not a consequence of her actions, her family is targeted for relocation and given 10 minutes to pack a single bag each to take into their new lives. Phones are confiscated - there is no way to tell her boyfriend what is happening, she has no pictures of them together, no way to hear his voice. And so it begins...

So if you found yourself in Layla's position - what would you do? Keep quiet and try to survive? Or rattle all the chains, put yourself and your family in danger, and try to change things EVEN THOUGH YOU KNOW THE DANGERS?

This book moves at a fast clip and will keep you thinking all the way through. It is available in print in our library or through SORA. 

"Unless we know our history, we're doomed to repeat it? Isn't that the lesson? But we always forget. Forgetting is the American grain."

 

Book Review: Let's Call it a Doomsday / Katie Henry

Ellis, both a Mormon and a prepper, is afraid of taking almost any kind of step. She worries that she will not be prepared when something goes wrong, when the end of the world is upon us. And then she meets Hannah who has seen the end of the world in her dreams. And the two become friends.

This is such a cool story about learning where a person fits into a religious organization, in this case Mormon, but it is a pretty universal experience. But also about learning who one is - it touches upon love and religion, appearance, expectations from family and school and self. It is about beginning to define one's self and being open to what is around us.

Book Review: How it Went Down / Kekla Magoon

Imagine witnessing a murder. On a street, in your neighborhood, right in front of you. Imagine that it was a white man and that the person killed was a black teen. What did you see? What happens next? What are the ripples?

This book begins with such a murder then each subsequent chapter is from the perspective of someone touched by this experience. What do witnesses see? What is going on in their heads? How does this impact each character?

Why read this story? Stories are complicated, people see different things. Black boys are too often killed by white people. Black Lives Matter.