Thursday, June 28, 2007
Early June
The Last Green Tree by Jim Grimsley I confess that I do not remember anything about this book other than that I read it and didn't dislike it.
Peeps and The Last Days by Scott Westerfield. I read a slew of his books and some are better than others. These two are good and include the same group of characters who are changing and maturing (in all too normal, messy, ways). I am not enthusiastic about so many of the vampire based books marketed to teens (especially girls) but I felt that this set was less about the sex and more about the relationships and setting up a good history. The characters are diverse and some of the plot ideas are intriguing.
Less successful (because I didn't realize that it was from a separate series and not the first in the series) was Midnighters #3: Blue Noon by Scott Westerfield. I just didn't care about the characters and their problems seemed too complex to pick up from context reading.
I don't know how I missed blogging these three but since January I've read Uglies, Pretties, and Specials. Two girls, 14 and 11, declined to read the books based on what the girls thought were depressing cover blurbs. I was impressed. True, some of the plot is predictable but I enjoyed the world and the characters and the message and issues about body appearance and environmental concerns are interesting laid out. I look forward to reading Extras though I will probably check it out from the library rather than buy it.
And now for something completely different...Stork Naked by Piers Anthony. Am I getting old? Am I jaded? Have I lost my sense of humour? I used to love Piers Anthony's pun filled books but this time I was overwhelmed by the puns and felt that they almost wiped out the storyline. They weren't fun after the first few pages.
I was sure I had blogged this book earlier this Spring (sigh). Driving with Dead People by Monica Holloway - a memoir. It doesn't take long to see that the Holloways have some serious problems. Monica might identify her father's obsession with filming roadside accidents as strange but his real problem is the physical and emotional/psychic abuse that he heaps upon his wife and children. Monica grows up in a household where everyone walks in fear of being screamed at or having her pants pulled down in public. When her parents divorce, her father refuses to be involved in anything more than the legal documents require of him and her mother goes off to school, falls in love, and leaves her two daughters at home to care for themselves. The two high school girls manage to hide their abandonment from most of the town. while Mr. Holloway was the more outwardly abusive, both parents should be charged with abuse. Monica, finds herself as an adult and builds herself into strength. She helps her older sister through a suicidal time and comes to realize the greater damage her father did to them all. She later comes to deal with her father even though she knows that it may break the quiet relationship she had built with him.
Peeps and The Last Days by Scott Westerfield. I read a slew of his books and some are better than others. These two are good and include the same group of characters who are changing and maturing (in all too normal, messy, ways). I am not enthusiastic about so many of the vampire based books marketed to teens (especially girls) but I felt that this set was less about the sex and more about the relationships and setting up a good history. The characters are diverse and some of the plot ideas are intriguing.
Less successful (because I didn't realize that it was from a separate series and not the first in the series) was Midnighters #3: Blue Noon by Scott Westerfield. I just didn't care about the characters and their problems seemed too complex to pick up from context reading.
I don't know how I missed blogging these three but since January I've read Uglies, Pretties, and Specials. Two girls, 14 and 11, declined to read the books based on what the girls thought were depressing cover blurbs. I was impressed. True, some of the plot is predictable but I enjoyed the world and the characters and the message and issues about body appearance and environmental concerns are interesting laid out. I look forward to reading Extras though I will probably check it out from the library rather than buy it.
And now for something completely different...Stork Naked by Piers Anthony. Am I getting old? Am I jaded? Have I lost my sense of humour? I used to love Piers Anthony's pun filled books but this time I was overwhelmed by the puns and felt that they almost wiped out the storyline. They weren't fun after the first few pages.
I was sure I had blogged this book earlier this Spring (sigh). Driving with Dead People by Monica Holloway - a memoir. It doesn't take long to see that the Holloways have some serious problems. Monica might identify her father's obsession with filming roadside accidents as strange but his real problem is the physical and emotional/psychic abuse that he heaps upon his wife and children. Monica grows up in a household where everyone walks in fear of being screamed at or having her pants pulled down in public. When her parents divorce, her father refuses to be involved in anything more than the legal documents require of him and her mother goes off to school, falls in love, and leaves her two daughters at home to care for themselves. The two high school girls manage to hide their abandonment from most of the town. while Mr. Holloway was the more outwardly abusive, both parents should be charged with abuse. Monica, finds herself as an adult and builds herself into strength. She helps her older sister through a suicidal time and comes to realize the greater damage her father did to them all. She later comes to deal with her father even though she knows that it may break the quiet relationship she had built with him.
# posted by JJ @ 3:50 AM 
