All posts in: books

25 Sep 2011

september 2011 – reading wishlist

You know what they say: the grass is always greener inside the book you aren’t reading!

In my case, this is true. The most recent grass on my side of the fence? A hopelessly HOPELESSLY sexist Heinlein novel written in 1964 that went FIFTEEN YEARS without being checked out from the library.

June 6 1995 – Oct 20 2010

I am lusting for greener book covers.

1. Someone Like You by Sarah Dessen – I was starting to really enjoy my little summer Dessen-a-thon, and my little row of her newer, hardback books keep catching my eye in my bedroom. I haven’t re-read this one since I was in high school! What if it’s more amazing than I remember! The world may never know… because I am too busy reading science fiction and fantasy.

2. This Book is Overdue by Marilyn Johnson – A friend of mine bought this for me for my birthday in March, and I keep forgetting to pick it up and read it. I am ashamed, and it looks like it might perk me up a bit.

3. Pearl by Jo Knowles – I saw her speak about being a working writer at the children’s lit conference and there is just something so honest about the way she describes her books that they get stuck in my head. Plus, I think I read once that she started writing this one while working in the office one door down from where I work! Crazy!

4. Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs – This one is receiving buzz and good reviews… and my friend and co-blogger Lindsey suggested I join her friend and writer Tracey for an online YA book club! I thought it sounded fun and even forked over some of my hard-earned cash to purchase a hardback (which I NEVER do, people), but I am pretty sure I am not going to finish in time. Ah, well. I will perhaps post about what I can, but no, I will not have time to actually finish this one.

5. Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bordain – ANOTHER friend of mind bought this for me for CHRISTMAS… I think you know where this is heading. I REALLY want to read this one – from reading one chapter, I can tell it’s one of those books that I won’t want to put down – but ALAS, Alack, etc

6. Beneath a Meth Moon by Jacqueline Woodson – New Jacqueline Woodson… who personally bestowed an Advanced Reading Copy upon my roommate. I feel itchy knowing it’s sitting in her bedroom, but that I can’t read it!

7. Slow Love by Dominique Browning – Janssen gave it a great review. Need I say more?

8. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J. K. Rowling – Would y’all Judgy McJudgersons keep your mouth shut right now? Thanks.

books

23 Sep 2011

some pig

A quick way to divide the Children’s Lit People from the Not-Children’s-Lit-People?

“Where’s Papa going with that axe?”

Mean anything to you?

I’m not sure I would have been able to pass the test before I started my program, and I haven’t read the book since I was in 4th grade…

but reading it now, I have to say

Charlotte’s Web = best book.

If you disagree, I will fight you.

books

02 Sep 2011

science fiction and/or fantasy

This semester, I am taking my VERY LAST Children’s Literature course.

(sob)

That course is Science Fiction & Fantasy.

(….. sob)

In general, I am trying to rid my life of unnecessary anxiety, so I am trying to think POSITIVELY! About this CLASS!

A miracle could happen, you guys!

My first major task for this course: read Lloyd Alexander’s The Chronicles of Prydain.

I am currently trudging through The Book of Three.

Ugh. Just look at this cover. There’s a man on a horse with a fricking horned SKULL, you guys!

If you picked up this book, you could be nearly certain that the names of characters would be unpronouncable.

But.

If we’re being positive…

what if sometime before December, the esteemed genre of science fiction and fantasy for children grows on me?

…

It could happen.

Right?

(I would have to ignore, of course, the moment in my personal history when, as a library assistant, I banished every (under-circulating) Lloyd Alexander book to a storage closet)

(Sorry Lloyd)

adventures

29 Aug 2011

this is what happened during Irene

1. We cleaned our apartment pretty much top to bottom. And rearranged the bedroom.

2. We did grocery shopping early and bought non-perishable, stove-free dinners (read: farmer’s market tomatoes + basil on a french baguette with mayo) and bottled water.

3. I stayed up too late drinking a Hurricane or two.

4. The next morning, I couldn’t sleep off my hurricane after-effects because the wind was being too windy.

5. Lance and I made an executive decision to get the heck out of bed because the windy wind was bending a large tree toward our bedroom window with increasing vigor. (Note: the tree is still standing, although we monitored it closely throughout the day)

6. I cried about forgetting to put in our cold-brewed iced coffee together before bed (see: Hurricanes), and Lance brewed me some espresso.

7. We ventured out of the house in the afternoon to find that life was still going on. People were, in fact, dining at restaurants. What was surprising: people were strangely interested in eating the food at 7-11. Like, every person in there was really excited about 7-11 pizza and wings and such. (Note: we were buying energy drinks and dishwasher soap)

8. After it became evident that the power was *probably* not going out, we did all the laundry, folded it all and put it ALL AWAY. I need a hurricane every Sunday, people.

9. I started to contemplate how stupid weather reporting is. I am all for being sensible and safe, but Weather.com was getting a little ridiculous. It seemed our forecast was getting more and more favorable as Irene approached, but Weather.com wasn’t like “Great news!” it was like “(things aren’t looking as bad) BUT YOU STILL BETTER BEWARE OF CATASTROPHIC DEVASTATION!! AAAAGH!!! DOOM!

Even today – it’s gorgeous and sunny, but Weather.com wants me to REMEMBER THE FURY!!! IT’S NOT GONE YET!!

10. Ummmm yeah. Things got real boring from there. I pretty much couldn’t put down this one book I was reading.

You know the feeling. The book becomes your life. Either you’re reading it, or you are laying around bored and thinking, “I should probably just go back to reading,” and you finish a chapter and don’t stop to think “maybe I should take a break,” you just keep flipping the pages and then it’s time for bed but maybe you could read one more chapter?

Surely I don’t need to tell you that this is best achieved on a rainy, lazy, hurricainey day.

books

25 Aug 2011

it’s a disaster

So, on Tuesday, I felt my first earthquake.

I’m sure you heard all about it, and even my family in Michigan felt it, so yeah, not the biggest deal. I was by myself in my 3rd floor office, so I thought I was having some kind of anxiety-related dizziness/hallucination or something, but the Internet quickly put me in my place.

Tonight, we might get some severe thunderstorms with hail. Great, just what I need on the night I have Restaurant Week reservations for dinner.

Oh, but later? Later this weekend, we might be visited by HURRICANE IRENE. As in, this Hurricane Irene may pass over Boston or Western Mass and leave us in its wake.

Oh, and sometimes, the eastern side of a hurricane (us), can create tornadoes.

!!!!!!

So I’m thinking about non-perishable dinners, buying bottled water and candles, and buying booze.

I already have 10 or 12 books from the library to read, plus THE LAST BOOK OF HARRY POTTER…

But I’m thinking that I might die anyway, because this book I read once? Gave me a mortal phobia of natural disasters. Some of you might have heard of it.

If you haven’t read Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer, I would not recommend it as a “The Power is Out” read.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to stock up on batteries, penicillin, and Xanax.

books

10 Aug 2011

june 2011 – reading round-up

June…

Came in like a lion, went out like… Harry Potter.

This is woefully overdue. I hope I remember any single thing about any of these books. Please don’t fault me for fudging weird details.

1. The Last American Man by Elizabeth Gilbert

This was one of my “trapped on a plane” books! But what a great book to be trapped on a plane with! I really enjoyed this book for three reasons. Reason #1: Eustace Conway – “The Last American Man” – is damn interesting. He kept hundreds of turtles in his backyard as a child. He left home at 17 and lived in a teepee while he put himself through college. He rode horseback across the United States with his brother. Much like my affection toward Unlikely Memoirs, I also like Unlikely Biographies… even though these two imaginary genres have kind of an inverse relationship. Unlikely Memoirs are normal people writing their life stories in interesting ways : Unlikely Biographies are profiles of people who are relatively normal (read: not famous), but have fascinating lives nonetheless.

I am getting confused.

Anyway. Reason #2: Gilbert’s biography walks the line between capturing Eustaces’s cool, fascinating-ness and showing the dirty-underbelly that make humans HUMAN. The book spends a lot of time commenting on the effect Eustace has on others – he’s incredibly charismatic – but Gilbert also talks about his character flaws that keep him from getting everything he wants. For this reason (and other more obvious ones), this book reminds me of John Krakauer’s Into the Wild – which is a high compliment!

Reason #3: Say what you will about Gilbert’s writing tone – I know it rubs people the wrong way – but I absolutely eat it up. Reading this book is like your best friend telling you about this amazing person they met. There’s an intimacy and definite passion in her writing. She could probably write about dirty socks and I’d want to read it. But to each his own!

National Book Award Finalist 2002

2. That Summer by Sarah Dessen

The first on my endeavor to Re-read Every Sarah Dessen Book in order. I’ve actually read this one at least twice, so I’m more familiar with it than others.

Everyone (myself included) talks about how reading one Sarah Dessen book is like reading Every Other Sarah Dessen book. Her books do have a similar aesthetic, often follow a particular narrative structure (messed up girl meets boy, boy helps girl not be so messed up), and share locations and characters. True true true. But re-reading these older titles, I am suprised by how non-romancey they are, or at least how the “heart-throb” love interests take a backseat to other stuff going on in the foreground of the novel.

This book, Dessen’s first, doesn’t even HAVE a love interest, really. The narrator, Haven, is a bit preoccupied with her older sister’s ex-boyfriend, but never in an actual romantic capacity. This story is all about Haven’s relationship with her older sister, and both sister’s reactions to a parental divorce. There’s a kind of spooky side plot about a local girl who became famous as a model but who had a mental breakdown and had to move home, too. A lot more than just boy-meets-girl.

3. Carrots ‘N’ Cake by Tina Haupert

I generally like books by bloggers. I don’t know what this means about my literary tastes, but I really do enjoy the “blogging” writing style, whatever that is. I like seeing how the writer’s personal style changes when confronted with a longer form of prose.

I whipped through Dooce’s It Sucked and then I Cried over one Christmas break, loved Girl’s Gone Child‘s Rockabye as a First Book After the Semester’s Over, savored Orangette‘s A Homemade Life while vacationing in DC, and am slowly giggling my way through Pioneer Woman‘s awfully silly Black Heels to Tractor Wheels.

However, I am not sure that Haupert’s blogging “personality” really translates well to book form. It could be that she keeps a food/fitness blog and not a personal blog, but I was disappointed in the lack of narrative in her book. It’s a fine book – well written and a lot of interesting content – but what it boils down to in the end is really basic fitness information aimed at those who are just embarking upon fitness journeys. No eye opening info, for me anyway, and not enough narrative content to keep me interested.

I will still continue to enjoy Haupert’s blog, but I just don’t think I’m the right reader for this particular book.

4. All These Things I’ve Done by Gabrielle Zevin

I told you about how when I visit my parents, I can always count on an unexpected book to grab my attention, usually from its abandoned position on a coffee table? Never a book that another family member is reading, of course. That would be mean!

Ahem.

Anyway, there is a second book phenomenon that I almost forgot about when I was at home in May: my mother’s occasional influx of Advanced Reading Copies! Yay librarians!

This was an ARC written by an author who wrote two other books I’ve enjoyed – Elsewhere, a book about the afterlife, and Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac, a book about what would happen if your memory from age 11-17 and what you would think about yourself.

All These Things I’ve Done, however, is a dystopia.

Big suprise, right?

I am about dystopia-d out, but I brought this all the way from Michigan to Boston so I thought I might at least try to read it. The dsytopian premise was interesting – class/power structures had gotten out of hand in America, and the government has stepped in to regulate, but of course have regulated some other stuff too, like declaring a prohibition on coffee and chocolate. The narrator, Anya, is a part of a mafia family that owns an overseas chocolate factory, but her parents have both died and left her and her two siblings in the care of their dying grandmother. Anya is kind of on the fence about her family – she loves them with fierce loyalty, but at the same time, their illegal doings eventually got her father killed – but she is managing to care for her siblings without involving herself with them too much. Things become more complicated when she is accused of poisoning her ex-boyfriend with a bar of tainted chocolate. And of course, things become even MORE complicated when she falls in love with the new kid in town – the District Attorney’s son.

There was some horrible cliffhanger in anticipation of a trilogy. I have completely repressed it from my mind, apparently. Which also could speak to my overall opinion of the book: it was a fine book, but had some annoying patterns. I didn’t really buy Anya’s switch from hating Win to conducting a torrid affair. I thought that her attitude throughout the book was kind of haughty and not particularly endearing. And can we write some more standalone books, people? Not everything needs to be a trilogy. And not every author needs to write a dystopia.

I am awfully testy.

5. Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver

I think that I could read this book every year for the rest of my life and be happy. This year, I read it at just the best time: June, when the farmer’s market is about to open, when you can finally spend some time outdoors, when you can actually start eating fresh, local produce instead of dreaming about it.

The first time I read this book, it was February in Michigan. Don’t do that.

For those who are behind the times, this is a book about feeding your family with locally (and often personally) grown food as a way of life. It is one of my favorite books because it is exactly the kind of life I wish I had. I would like nothing better than to become Barbara Kingsolver, ASAP.

Also, can I plug the audio recording of this book for a moment? Read by the author. It makes for a personal, lovely, listening experience.

6. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J. K. Rowling

So, I got this notion about re-reading all the Harry Potter books in anticipation of the movie.

Spoiler alert: I haven’t seen the movie yet. (whuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuups)

Anyway, I have read this first volume the most – probably four times now – and I am always shocked to remember exactly how much it reads like standard juvenile fiction. New kid comes to a new school, finds adventure, happy ending!

Never a bad read, but always feels like grunt-work to get through to the longer novels.

Side story: in an attempt to acquire the most random, unmatched collection of this series, I bought a copy of this book for 50 cents at a thrift shop.

What I didn’t notice – my copy ended on page 179.

7. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J. K. Rowling

The action picks up! Harry’s second year of school, and things get a bit more interesting, thematically and plotwise. I like how Rowling introduces the idea that Harry being a celebrity at school doesn’t necessarily mean he is well-liked. I also liked how Tom Riddle’s back story become relevant to the story.

Again, Adventure —>Dumbledore spends way too many pages telling Harry what everything meant about what just happened to him —> Gryffindor Wins The House Cup!

I don’t even remember if they actually did win the cup that year, but they might as well have. Happy Endings all around.

I also liked the orchestra of musical saws at the ghost party.

8. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J. K. Rowling

I am not really up on my HP research, but I would be willing to wager that this is the book where Rowling was like, “Hey, I think I’m really onto something here. Let’s turn this into something epic.”

The time turning plot really annoys me because I think the book/movie is going to be over BUT THEN IT’S NOT. wtf.

I did, however, cry when Harry sees himself and thinks its his father.

That is just so sad.

books

06 Aug 2011

generation gap

I like Harry Potter. Don’t get me wrong.

But unlike many folks I’ve met, I did not grow up waiting for the day that I would wake up and have an owl to deliver my Hogwarts letter.

I was born a few years too early, I guess

Me?

I am still waiting for the day

that I wake up

and my life is a musical.

books

02 Jul 2011

like.hate

Things I Like

1. Comic adaptations of novels I still (despite grad school) love.

2. Re-reading the Harry Potter books and then watching each movie as I finish a book. I’m on number three!

That is quite a movie poster…

nice face/nice hair/nice creepy stair, Rupert Grint/Emma Watson/Daniel Radcliffe

3. Fancy drinks. I made this one – the Redhead in Bed – but mine didn’t look so pretty. But I wanted to do something special with the last farmshare strawberries of the season!

I didn’t follow the recipe exactly and may have gotten myself and my roommates drunk. While we watch Harry Potter.

WHUPS!

Things I Hate

1. Feeling swamped with homework already, before my second class has even started. I had to read this book in 24 hours.

And it took me about 100 pages to notice the book’s cover and therefore feel self-conscious about reading it on the bus. Nice.

2. Being underemployed. I put out a major fire at work on Friday involving this book:

It involved two hours of near-constant attention at work, doing things beyond my job description perhaps, and was followed by three or four hours of decompressing from the experience afterwards.

All because the people who actually earn salaries and should have been carrying the fire hose were on vacation for the 4th of July.

wierwoirdjsf24rWRAS;f@#ASDF:mas

3. Not being able to eat a breakfast sandwich at Sorella’s every morning.

I didn’t take a picture but can you picture….

– fried eggs

– American cheese

– avocado

– sprouts

– lox

all on an English muffin?

I hate that I have to make my own breakfast tomorrow.

book reviews

03 Jun 2011

May 2011 Reading Round-up

Oh, May.

You were a treat.

I read a lot. I read a lot of books I really enjoyed. I read a lot of books that I really enjoyed and then wanted to read more.

All around, a fun month for reading!

1. Amy & Roger’s Epic Detour by Morgan Matson

My last “on-syllabus” book of the semester, but also the first “on-syllabus” book of my grad school career that had me completely at hello. Maybe there are books you read that make you want to give the book a hug, or maybe, a smart, mature book might leave you wanting to marry a book, but this book made me want to eat it. And it would taste like candy.

Actually, that’s a fairly accurate description of many of the books I read in May!

But anyway, the story begins with Amy’s family dissolving. Her father died in an accident, her twin brother was shipped off to rehab, and her mother decided to take a new job in Connecticut, leaving Amy behind in California while they sell one house and buy another. When it comes time for Amy to join her mother, it also seems like a great way for Amy’s mother to be rejoined with the red Jeep she left behind.

One problem: Amy doesn’t drive. Enter romantic interest: Roger. An old family friend finishing his first year of college and spending the summer with his father in Pennsylvania, Roger needs a ride and Amy has a car that needs driving. Amy’s mother has their route calculated and hotel reservations made along the way… but of course, what kind of book would it be if Amy and Roger didn’t decide to take off on their own?

Hijinks, emotional arcs, likable side-characters, make-overs, road trip playlists, local food indulgences, and tortured flirtation ensue.

Devoured it.

Loved it.

2. Hard Love by Ellen Wittlinger

This is one of those quintessentially “YA” Young Adult book. One of the original Printz Honors, I feel like this book could be voted Most Likely To Show Up On Your Children’t Lit Course Syllabus. I, therefore, have read it three or four times before, and at least once when I was an actual teenager.

If you are one of the two people on this planet who have not read this novel, it is quite good, I think, and here’s what you need to know:

John’s parents are divorced. He lives with his mom and takes the train into Boston to visit his Dad’s bachelor pad on the weekends. His father ignores him and goes on dates, his mother weeps about her divorce and doesn’t show John any affection. John has one friend who is kind of a loser and spends too much time representing a heteronormative, nerdy kind of teenaged lifestyle.

John’s life sucks, so why not recreate yourself a little? John writes a zine (aww…. how nineties is that!!) under the name “Gio,” and gets the attention of another zine-writer, Marisol, who lives in Cambridge. Marisol is gorgeous, challenging, mercurial, and a lesbian. Of course, John/Gio falls in love.

The whole “girl falls in love with gay best friend” is almost a narrative trope at this point, but I can’t say I’ve heard of a story about the reverse other than this one!

2000 Printz Honor

3. Unbearable Lightness by Portia de Rossi

I picked up this book for two reasons.

Reason #1: I used to watch Ally McBeal in high school, and I remember clearly all of the hype about the show’s actresses, including Portia de Rossi. Supposedly, the environment on the set was toxic: Calista Flockhart was clearly a too-skinny freak of nature and the show dressed her to accentuate her thinness, so the rest of the female cast felt like they needed to be gaunt to compete. I hoped that de Rossi’s memoir would be an insider account of what was going on there, in the cast of an only moderately successful television show, that seemed to formally usher in the stick-figure-body aesthetic of the late 90s and early 00s.

Reason #2: I heard it was actually a decent read, not obviously ghost-written or trashy.

I was right about #2, for sure. The back cover has blurbs from Jonathan Safran Foer, Jeanette Walls, and Augusten Burroughs for goodness sake! This is not your average celebrity memoir!

I didn’t find what I was expecting with #1, but what I found was equally interesting. This book really is not a Hollywood tell-all but a memoir. De Rossi describes her childhood in Australia, her career as a model that segued into acting, and her struggle to identify (inwardly and outwardly) as a homosexual woman.

By the time she made it onto the cast of Ally, she was already heavily into disordered eating, habits that developed when she was a young, aspiring model that her peers and parents seemed to approve of (or at least look the other way from). Hanging out with Calista Flockhart and Courtney Thorne-Smith and Lucy Liu didn’t drive de Rossi to anorexia, but the pressure of being a working actress in LA, with frequent costume fittings and sample-sized clothing, and with the means to over-exercise and seek professional help from a nutritionist, it was easier for de Rossi’s already present disorder to escalate quickly.

She barely mentions her female costars in this book, but she so clearly portrays this kind of pandemic Hollywood attitude toward women’s weight and appearance that it is easy to imagine that Flockhart and Thorne-Smith and Liu could have easily had similar personal experiences that kept them losing weight during the show’s filming… and contributing to whatever effect that had on women watching their show from home.

Anywaaaaay, super interesting read that I breezed through in an afternoon. I found myself very invested in de Rossi’s life and career and worried for her health, and I was glad to know that in Real Life, she was doing okay.

And yes, I’ve been watching Ally McBeal reruns on Netflix. It’s kind of like Grey’s Anatomy with lawyers!

4. Made for You and Me by Caitlin Shetterly

I picked this up from one of my favorite places to hear about quirky new books: NPR’s weekly “What We’re Reading” report.

And while I was reading it, I realized that when it comes to narrative non-fiction, I have a really big soft-spot for books like Shetterly’s.

I think I might call them “Memoirs by normal-ish people who have done little noteworthy other than craft their particular life experience into an interesting story.”

And this is why I don’t get mad when 20-somethings write memoirs. For me, a memoir isn’ about the destination, it’s about the journey! If you can take me on a journey, I love you.

Anyway. I loved this book. The journey Shetterly takes you on is one from New England to Los Angeles and back again. Caitlin gets married and she and her husband decide to pursue their lifelong dream of moving to LA and living as working artistic-people. However, the move is neither cheap nor smooth (as very few moves tend to be), and their savings is pretty much shot… just in time for the Great Recession to swing in to eliminate the middle-class day jobs the two were hoping to acquire to pay the rent, and for Caitlin to get pregnant…. and if that weren’t enough, she develops hyperemesis gravidarum and can’t walk across the living room much less find a job or work.

So the thirty-something couple and their new baby end up moving back to Maine… and moving in with Catilin’s mother. But that’s not really the point. The point is that Shetterly takes you on this very American journey of hope, pursuit of happiness, and the nuclear family… when she fails, you can see how thousands of other American families can so easily fail even when they are doing everything right… but also that we are all kind of in this economic rollercoaster ride together.

Her story could be anybody’s story, but in a good way.

5. Bumped by Megan McCafferty

My awesome roommate pre-ordered this book for me for my birthday in March! This is one of my favorite methods for gift receiving – I would gladly forgo a gift on my actual day of birth in exchange for an Amazon delivery on pub day! It’s a little like Christmas!

I have waxed poetic about my love of Megan McCafferty’s Jessica Darling oeuvre before.

I had mixed but generally positive feelings about Bumped, which is McCafferty’s first “straight” YA novel, as well as a departure into the oh-so-trendy world of futuristic dystopia.

The dystopian premise: every adult gets a disease that renders them sterile. All procreation lies on the shoulders of the teenage demographic… so of course, the whole system becomes heavily monetized, with babies being purchased, adoptions and surrogacy brokered by the powerful and rich, and the more fertile you are, the cooler, most popular, and closer to celebrity you become!

I didn’t have any problems with the story itself. The premise was interesting with lots of surprising and thought provoking details, and the main plot clever and snappy (two twins, separated at birth, meeting for the first time: one who lives in a private, religious cult that favors traditional attitudes toward procreating such as “marriage” and “don’t sell your baby,” the other a popular overachieving girl with a contract to bear a child for a high-powered couple as soon as they find a suitable sperm donor).

But I am, sadly, getting a little bored/overwhelmed with the poor, beat-int0-the-ground dystopia.

Similarly, the recent influx of built-in-trilogies. Can’t we just write longer books instead of spreading out the goods intentionally?

I’ll be excited to read book 2, though, whenever it comes out…

6. What Happened To Goodbye by Sarah Dessen

What to say about a Sarah Dessen book that hasn’t already been said?

Janssen wrote a pretty solid review a few months ago. I stand by everything she says about this novel and the whole “Sarah Dessen” aesthetic.

There’s just something comforting about her novels. Everything you want out of this book, you will get. So while some people might find her novels formulaic, I delight in finding out exactly how she plays with the formula with each successive book, and how her knack for creating likable, three-dimensional characters and rich settings (although they are always suburban?!? who can do that?), make me, the reader, seduced into her novels.

Another win for Ms. Dessen.

An aside for fellow Dessenophiles: this is the THIRD book that Jason has appeared in as a significant minor character… what is it about that boy? Do you think Sarah Dessen has a soft spot for the old nerd? Do you think he’s having some kind of multi-book storyline that will end up with him as a love interest two or three books down the road? I’m so obsessed with this…

7. Something Borrowed by Emily Giffin

Okay, at this point in my summer-break reading, I’m not even pretending to be a literary-type person.

Whatever.

This is chick lit! It’s been turned into a RomCom! It’s got a lot of silliness and betrayal and sex and consumerism!

I liked it.

This is probably like saying “I like eating Krispy Kreme donuts.” Of course you like eating Krispy Kreme donuts! They are deep fried in fat and covered in sugar! Your body was made to like eating Krispy Kreme donuts!

I ate a book donut in May and it was good. I put the sequel on hold. I was a little disheartened that the book ended with the protagonist kind of “falling into” the resolution of her love-triangle, but all in all I thought the conclusion was an interesting way to end the novel. Is it too much to ask for a female romantic protagonist who isn’t either A) totally confident and outgoing and take charge or B) completely mousy and ineffective and doesn’t DO anything?

I guess I can’t eat a bunch of donuts and expect them to be better than… something that’s not just a donut.

8. What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami

Do you ever get into a reading mood? When you just want to read a certain type of book or books about a certain topic or maybe the same book over and over again?

Maybe it’s just me.

But I hope you like books about running, because that’s what I’m in the mood for.

That being said, I really liked this book for many reasons other than the fact that it is a book about running. The author is a well-known writer of fiction in Japan, so he can craft a sentence for sure. And I loved the Not-Western-ness of some of his attitudes and of his writing style in general. Refreshing.

But above all, this is one of those kind of meandering, philosophical books that has you reaching for a pen and paper to jot down quotes that say something so perfectly, something you never thought anyone else ever thought about except for you.

For example, this quote that has nothing to do with writing but everything to do with life (and maybe YA fiction):

Sixteen is an intensely troublesome age. You worry about little things, can’t pinpoint where you are in any objective way, become really proficient at strange, pointless skills, and are held in thrall by inexplicable complexes. As you get older, though, through trial and error you learn to get what you need, and throw out what should be discarded. And you start to recognize (or be resigned to the fact) that since your faults and deficiencies are well night infinite, you’d best figure out your good points and learn to get by with what you have.”

Good stuff. The book is structured as short essay-type pieces that revolve around Murakami’s experiences a long distance runner, but yeah, it’s not all about running. Don’t worry. Try it anyway.

9. Hush by Eishes Chayil

Okay. I am pounding out a whole system of weird reading philosophies here, but bear with me. Along with reading moods, I think people have “hot topics” that they just can’t resist. Ever. Sometimes, the topics just come to you: my mother has read more books about mountain climbers than 95% of the population, but very rarely chooses to read a book just because it’s about mountain climbers. She reads them because somebody recommended the book or because it’s about something entirely other than climbing mountains but somehow is also about climbing mountains, et cetera.

Anyway. One of my hot topics for reading/documentaries/Dateline specials?

Secluded religious communities that hold onto traditional ways of life in spite of all the 21st century America happening around them.

So, basically, stories about fundamentalist Mormons, the Amish,

and Orthodox Jews!

Hush is an intense young adult novel about life for young girls in extremely Orthodox communities. The kind of child abuse that occurs in this novel is by no means unique or even prevalent to this religious community, but the religious beliefs regarding women, sex, marriage, and the pressure placed upon a family unit to be godly, to be pious, to be normal, creates a kind of strange environment in which severe child abuse gets swept under the rug. Young victims are ignored or silenced and perpetrators are never confronted and can continue to abuse other children.

It’s a vicious cycle. This book is not only an “insider’s look” at a religious community that still thrives today, slightly outside the focus of the average American, but also calls attention to this systemic problem and calls for action to be made within the communities themselves.

2011 William C. Morris Award Finalist

10. My Darling, My Hamburger by Paul Zindel

File this one under “Trying to Read Those Children’s/YA Books Everyone Has Already Assumed I’ve Read.”

Also file this one under “Weird Books That I Don’t Quite Appreciate Because I’m A Modern Reader With Modern Expectations.”

This is Zindel’s “problem novel” about abortion. I read it a few weeks ago but don’t remember much about it other than the fact that female low-self esteem was usually followed by this random older guy appearing to take the offending (and desperate) girl out on a date… where they found this guy and decided he was worth speaking to was a mystery to me: his character is basically Generic Offensive Asshole.

I guess when you are feeling down, this is what you get, ladies. A Generic Offensive Asshole to punish you for making bad decisions.

11. Born to Run by Christopher McDougall

See: Reading Mood… but also see: Reading Candy! This book was awesome and I ate it right up in like, two days.

This book is…

– One part Intro to Ultramarathons. Running 50 to 100 mile races might not seem like the most interesting topic for a book, but it certainly attracts a very interesting breed of person and McDougall does a great job of capturing the many interesting characters who have found and excelled at the sport. (Spoiler: they are all kind of crazy)

– One part History of People. Running, McDougall posits, is an innately human thing to do. He gathers the data and research on primitive running cultures and examines how they run, why they run, what they eat, how they live, and talks about how those choices keep them free from injury and able to maintain superior athletic performance. I now want to run around barefoot all the time and eat chia seeds.

– One part Epic Adventure. McDougall does a story on the notoriously elusive and skilled runners, the Tarahumara. In digging into the jungles of Mexico to find them, he meets a random crazy ultramarathoning white dude who has earned the Tarahumara respect… and who also wants to bring some of America’s best ultramarathoners down to the jungle to have an epic 50 mile race. Somehow McDougall and this Crazy Guy convince some of those crazy characters to travel down into Mexico (while avoiding food poisoning, falling off cliffs, and Mexican drug cartels) and compete against the Tarahumara.

They pull it off in the end, but the path to get there is pretty ridiculous.

I really just want to buy this book for people. I don’t know why, but I do.

12. Bossypants by Tina Fey

I read this book from start to finish last Wednesday while I sat in various airports for various lengths of time!

I’m not sure I have much to say about it, though. This book is getting a lot of good press and for good reason. Everyone wants Tina Fey to be their best friend, and here she is, telling you about her life and making you laugh.

My favorite part is when she writes about 30 Rock, and how she wanted to write a really popular, accessible sitcom that would make a lot of money… but for some reason, 30 Rock just wouldn’t have it. It just became weirder and weirder.

That just makes me smile.

13. Good Eggs by Phoebe Potts

When I was planning out books to bring with me for my trip to Michigan, I had this feeling that I would find at least one good book lying around my house. Probably a book I hadn’t heard of, or maybe one I’d been meaning to read that would just appear on a kitchen counter…

This was that book! And it was really good!

Remember how I like “Memoirs by normal-ish people who have done little noteworthy other than craft their particular life experience into an interesting story?” Here’s another one! AND it’s a graphic novel!! Best day ever!!!

This actually did kind of remind me of Made for You and Me, but in reverse. Where Caitlin is an artistic New England girl struggling to find a place in the world after she gets married and becomes unexpectedly pregnant, Pheobe Potts is an artistic New England girl struggling to find a place in the world after she gets married and becomes unexpectedly infertile.

I’m glad I spotted this book hiding on the bottom level of the end table sitting next to the chair in my parents’ family room.