Inheritance, or, The Vault of Souls

Christopher Paolini self published his first book Eragon in 2002, and all most 10 years later, the final book in the Inheritance cycle has been published. Inheritance is the longest book yet, as Paolini likes to write with excessive detail (think: J.R.R. Tolkien), but it does bring all of the story lines to a satisfying conclusion. These books are for those fans of pure fantasy, and you should not be intimidated by the length. For those who have read and enjoyed the first 3 books in the series, Inheritance will not disappoint.

Kirkus Review (December 1, 2011)

Capping the former Inheritance Trilogy, this fourth epic-length episode brings teenage Dragon Rider Eragon at last to a decisive faceoff with his greatest enemy. Beginning with the capture of the fortress city of Belatona, the rebellious Varden alliance wins multiple hard-fought victories before arriving at last before the iron gates of imperial Ur'baen, "wherein sits Galbatorix, proud, confident, and disdainful, for his is the strength of the dragons." Meanwhile, Eragon and his scaled companion Saphira fly off to the ruins of Doru Araeba in response to mysteriously delivered hints that something in a hidden "Vault of Souls" will help defeat their clever and overwhelmingly powerful adversary. Tucking in well-developed side plots, elaborate set pieces, internecine squabbles, extraneous characters, and piles of corpses, Paolini moves his tale along with all deliberate speed to its properly explosive, massively destructive climax. As in previous volumes, there are so many nods to Tolkien and other fantasists that authorial whiplash must have been a chronic hazard, but battle scenes are satisfyingly dramatic. Moreover, the act that leads to the thoroughly predictable outcome is just one of several ingenious twists, and before sailing off to lands unknown in a boat of Elvish make (sound familiar?), the young warrior/mage actually wages peace while methodically tying up loose ends over the final 90+ pages. Despite the long, anticlimactic wind-down, it is a strong conclusion to the crowd-pleasing series.

Mice!

Wow, what a busy start to the school year! Now we have snow on the ground, and our first snow day behind us. The two books that I have to write about this time happen to have mice as the main characters. This got me thinking about ALL of the books out there for middle school readers that have mice as their main characters. More on that in a minute...

Let's start with Bless this Mouse:
Lois Lowry is one of my all time favorite authors. I was so excited to find a new book by her in my library this summer. This is a fast read. Many of you will finish it quickly, but it is truly a funny and sweet story. Mouse Mistress Hildegarde is in charge of large family of church mice that live in Saint Bartholemew's church. She needs to lead her family to safety when the church decides to higher an exterminator, and then again during the feast of St. Francis, when the town can bring their pets to be blessed at the church (cats are a particular concern). Written with humor, this is a great read.

A Nest for Celeste: A Story About Art, Inspiration, and the Meaning of Home
This book would almost qualify as a graphic novel. Henry Cole, the author and illustrator of this book, has illustrated a number of children's books, and now he turns his talent to a book for older readers. Celeste, a mouse, is being bullied by rats and the household cat. Her fortunes change with the arrival of John James Audubon and his assistant Joseph. Set in Louisiana in 1821, there are some wonderful historical references, and it is an interesting look at Mr. Audubon. Celeste turns into a rather heroic character, facing many fears, and she provides a great deal of inspiration for Joseph. This is another highly entertaining, and fast read.

Other books with mice as the main characters:

Ragweed and Poppy
The Tale of Despereax
The Mouse and the Motorcycle (Ralph S. Mouse)
Time Stops for No Mouse
Redwall Series
The Rescuers
The Secrets of Nihm Series
Tumtum and Nutmeg
The Rescuers
Stuart Little
Basil of Baker Street
*Can you think of others?*

Brothers Grimm Revisited

I have blogged before about how much I love "twisted fairy tales," or familiar stories that have been made new again. This summer I noticed that there seemed to be A LOT of books based on the fairy tales of the Grimm Brothers. The Grimm fairy tales are dark, to say the least. Full of blood, morbid story lines, and graphic lessons to be learned (think: Hansel and Gretel), they have found a place comfortably among modern Gothic fantasy books. I read a few modern interpretations of these fairy tales this summer, and I have chosen to highlight one series, and two stand alone books. (See summaries below) I can guarantee you that these are not your parents fairy tales. There will be many moments in each of these books that will have you cringing with discomfort, and perhaps even keep you awake at night. Enjoy!

A Tale Dark and Grimm
With disarming delicacy and unexpected good cheer, Gidwitz reweaves some of the most shocking and bloody stories that the Brothers Grimm collected into a novel that's almost addictively compelling. He gives fair warning that this is no prettified, animated version of the old stories. "Are there any small children in the room now?" he asks midway through the first tale, "If so, it would be best if we just...hurried them off to bed. Because this is where things start to get, well...awesome." Many of humanity's least attractive, primal emotions are on display: greed, jealousy, lust, and cowardice. But, mostly it's the unspeakable betrayal by bad parents and their children's journey to maturation and forgiveness that are at the heart of the book. Anyone who's ever questioned why Hansel and Gretel's father is so readily complicit in their probable deaths and why the brother and sister, nonetheless, return home after their harrowing travails will find satisfying explanations here. Gidwitz is terrifying and funny at the same time. His storytelling is so assured that it's hard to believe this is his debut novel. And his treatment of the Grimms' tales is a whole new thing.
-From School Library Journal

The Grimm Legacy
Feeling left out from her stepfamily at home and from her classmates at her new school, Elizabeth is delighted when she gets a job at the New York Circulating Material Repository, a library that loans objects of historical value. She's particularly intrigued when she's given access to the Grimm Collection, a secret room that holds magical objects from the Brothers' tales, e.g., seven-league boots, a mermaid's comb, and the sinister mirror from "Snow White." However, when the items start to disappear, she and her fellow pages embark on a dangerous quest to catch the thief, only to find themselves among the suspects. This modern fantasy has intrigue, adventure, and romance, and the magical aspects of the tale are both clever and intricately woven, from rhyming charms to flying-carpet rides. -From School Library Journal

The Sisters Grimm
9 Book Series
Fairy-tale detectives Sabrina and Daphne Grimm live in the town of Ferryport Landing, a community of fairy-tale characters, Everafters, who are now using magical disguises to remain undetected alongside their normal neighbors. Ogres work at the post office, witches run the diner, and the town mayor is the legendary Prince Charming. Can the Sisters Grimm solve the problems that befall this town? - From Series Description

Welcome Back!

Another summer has flown by, and here we are ready for the start of the 2011-12 school year. I read a lot of books this summer, and in the next couple of weeks I am going to write reviews of all of them. I wanted to start with the new series by Rick Riordan (Percy Jackson author), The Kane Chronicles. I waited to read the first two books together, and I am so glad that I did! These books use the same winning writing as the Percy Jackson books, but the story is totally unique. Riordan gives us a new take on Egyptian mythology, and two new lead characters to love. The story is creative, often humorous, and very fast pace. I would recommend these books to all fantasy readers, and especially to our 5th graders as they begin their study of Egypt. See the full synopsis of the stories below. Have a great school year, and keep reading!!!

The Red Pyramid
Ever since their mother’s death, siblings Carter and Sadie have been near strangers. While Sadie’s lived with her grandparents in London, Carter has traveled the world with their father, the brilliant Egyptologist, Dr. Julius Kane.

One night they are reunited when their father takes them to the British Museum, hoping at last to set things right. Instead, he unleashes the Egyptian god Set, who banishes him to oblivion and forces the children to flee for their lives.

Soon, Carter and Sadie discover that the gods of Ancient Egypt are waking, and the worst of them—Set—is after the Kanes. To stop him, the siblings must embark on a dangerous journey across the globe—a quest leading them ever closer to the truth about their family, and their links to a secret order that has existed since the time of the pharaohs.

The Throne of Fire
In this exciting second installment of the three-book series, Carter and Sadie, offspring of the brilliant Egyptologist Dr. Julius Kane, embark on a worldwide search for the Book of Ra, but the House of Life and the gods of chaos are determined to stop them.

A Faraway Island

So many books have been written about Jewish survivors during World War II. This book deals with the little known evacuation of Jewish children from Austria to Sweden in the summer of 1939. Stephie and Nellie arrive in Sweden to live with two separate foster families, and while they worry about the fate of their parents, they have a lot of personal pain to work through, as well. The characters in this book are beautifully written, and totally engaging. This book is a quick read, and would make good reading while traveling this summer. Come check it out!

From School Library Journal:
In this gripping story, Stephie and Nellie, two Austrian Jewish sisters, are evacuated in 1938 from Vienna to a Swedish island and placed in separate foster homes. Twelve-year-old Stephie has promised her parents that she will try to ease her younger sister's way, a burdensome promise to keep. Auntie Alma, Nellie's Swedish mother, is warmer and more welcoming than Auntie Marta, Stephie's more austere foster parent. At first it seems that Nellie will have a more difficult time adjusting, but the opposite happens. Loneliness and a sense of isolation engulf Stephie. The shunning and taunting of cliquish, bigoted girls intensify her longing for home and the familiar, but Stephie bravely perseveres, bolstered by the hope that she will only be separated from her parents for a short time. Unfortunately this does not happen, and the girls must remain on this faraway island.

Mockingbird

It isn't very often that I read a book that actually makes me cry. Mockingbird had me crying on several different occasions. The story's narrator is a young girl named Caitlin, who as Asperger's syndrome. When her brother is killed in a school shooting she is trying to make sense of her world, and to find closure. The book begins after the shooting, but the characters pain is still very fresh. This is beautifully written, and it is not at all surprising that it won this year's National Book Award. Check it out!

From School Library Journal
From inside Caitlin's head, readers see the very personal aftermath of a middle school shooting that took the life of the older brother she adored. Caitlin is a bright fifth grader and a gifted artist. She also has Asperger's syndrome, and her brother, Devon, was the one who helped her interpret the world. Now she has only her father, a widower who is grieving anew and whose ability to relate to his daughter is limited. A compassionate school counselor works with her, trying to teach her the social skills that are so difficult for her. Through her own efforts and her therapy sessions, she begins to come to terms with her loss and makes her first, tentative steps toward friendship.

One Crazy Summer

With summer coming we all are starting to make plans for how we will spend our time. In the summer of 1968 Delphine, Vonetta, and Fern travel from Brooklyn to Oakland, CA to spend time with the mother that abandoned them and their father 7 years earlier. This book vividly portrays the racial tension that was rampant in the county during the 1960's. The language used it true to the time, and the girls distress over not really knowing their mother is palpable. This is book is so well written and, even though it is set in the 60's, the over arching themes are still relevant today. Come check out this great book!

From School Library Journal:
It is 1968, and three black sisters from Brooklyn have been put on a California-bound plane by their father to spend a month with their mother, a poet who ran off years before and is living in Oakland. It's the summer after Black Panther founder Huey Newton was jailed and member Bobby Hutton was gunned down trying to surrender to the Oakland police, and there are men in berets shouting "Black Power" on the news. Delphine, 11, remembers her mother, but after years of separation she's more apt to believe what her grandmother has said about her, that Cecile is a selfish, crazy woman who sleeps on the street. At least Cecile lives in a real house, but she reacts to her daughters' arrival without warmth or even curiosity. Instead, she sends the girls to eat breakfast at a center run by the Black Panther Party and tells them to stay out as long as they can so that she can work on her poetry. Over the course of the next four weeks, Delphine and her younger sisters, Vonetta and Fern, spend a lot of time learning about revolution and staying out of their mother's way. Emotionally challenging and beautifully written, this book immerses readers in a time and place and raises difficult questions of cultural and ethnic identity and personal responsibility. With memorable characters (all three girls have engaging, strong voices) and a powerful story, this is a book well worth reading and rereading.

Heart of a Samurai

It has been such a long time since my last post. I have been doing lots of reading, and I have many new reviews to publish, but today I would like to start with the best book I have read in a long time. Heart of a Samurai by Margi Preus is a 2011 Newbery Honor book. I was inspired to read it by recent events in Japan. This novel is based on the true story of Manjiro, a Japanese fisherman that was rescued following a shipwreck in 1841 by American whalers. The events that follow are truly amazing, and knowing that they all really did happen just makes them more incredible. Manjiro, later known to the American whaling crew as John Mung, is portrayed beautifully, and the descriptions of whaling in the 1800 are historically accurate, and horrifying to our 21 century minds. See below for a full summary, and come to the library to check it out!

From School Library Journal:A Japanese teenager living in the mid-19th century bridges two worlds in this stunning debut novel based on true events. Manjiro and his fellow fishermen find refuge on a remote island after a storm destroys their ship. When they are rescued by an American whaleboat captain and given the chance to return home with him, Manjiro accepts the offer. His encounters with a land that he has been taught is barbaric and his subsequent efforts to return to Japan shape him into an admirable character. Preus places readers in the young man's shoes, whether he is on a ship or in a Japanese prison. Her deftness in writing is evident in two poignant scenes, one in which Manjiro realizes the similarities between the Japanese and the Americans and the other when he reunites with his Japanese family. A sailor named Jolly and an American teen express the racism he experiences in America. Both of these characters gain sympathy from readers as their backgrounds are revealed, and as one of them comes to respect Manjiro. The truths he learns about himself and his fellow men and women are beautifully articulated. Manjiro's own drawings are well placed throughout the narrative and appropriately captioned. Preus includes extensive historical notes and a bibliography for those who want to know more about the man and the world in which he lived.

Lockdown

It has been a busy time around here, so it has been a while since my last entry. Walter Dean Myers loves to write about the experiences of inner city youth, and the challenges they face. In the book Lockdown he looks closely at the life of Reese during the time he is in a juvenile detention facility. Reese's comes from a bad neighborhood and a bad family situation, and during his time at the Progress facility he is forced to look at his life and make some serious decisions about its direction. With the guidance of prison officials and a friend he makes while working at a nursing home, his work release position, Reese's life is forever changed. I wasn't sure if I was going to like this story, but I was totally drawn in by the authentic voices of all the characters in the book. Take the time to check this one out!

From Booklist

Myers takes readers inside the walls of a juvenile corrections facility in this gritty novel. Fourteen-year-old Reese is in the second year of his sentence for stealing prescription pads and selling them to a neighborhood dealer. He fears that his life is headed in a direction that will inevitably lead him “upstate,” to the kind of prison you don’t leave. His determination to claw his way out of the downward spiral is tested when he stands up to defend a weaker boy, and the resulting recriminations only seem to reinforce the impossibility of escaping a hopeless future. Reese’s first-person narration rings with authenticity as he confronts the limits of his ability to describe his feelings, struggling to maintain faith in himself; Myers’ storytelling skills ensure that the messages he offers are never heavy-handed. The question of how to escape the cycle of violence and crime plaguing inner-city youth is treated with a resolution that suggests hope, but doesn’t guarantee it. A thoughtful book that could resonate with teens on a dangerous path. Grades 7-10. --Ian Chipman

Turtle in Paradise

Set in Key West in 1935, Turtle in Paradise is an interesting look at life during the Depression. Turtle, the main character in the story, lives in New Jersey with her single mother, and is sent to live with relatives in Key West when her mother finds work as a housekeeper for a woman that "can't abide by children." Filled with colorful characters and interesting adventures, I highly recommend this book for those interested in historical fiction. Even Earnest Hemingway makes a short appearance in the story!

From Booklist:

Eleven-year-old Turtle is not one to suffer fools gladly. And she runs into a lot of fools, especially the no-goods her starry-eyed mother meets. So it's a tough little Turtle who arrives in Key West in June of 1935. She's been sent to Florida to stay with relatives because her mother's latest housekeeping job doesn't allow children. Unfortunately, Mama has neglected to tell Aunt Minnie she's coming, and Turtle gets the stink eye from cousins with monikers like Buddy and Beans. As Turtle soon learns, everything is different in Key West, from the fruit hanging on trees to the scorpions in nightgowns to the ways kids earn money. She can't be part of her cousins' Diaper Gang (no girls allowed), which takes care of fussy babies, but when she finds a treasure map, she hopes she'll be on Easy Street like Little Orphan Annie. Holm uses family stories as the basis for this tale, part romp, part steely-eyed look at the Depression era.

And the winner is...

It has been such a long time since my last entry, and I apologize for the delay! The American Library Association just announced this year's list of award winning books. Most of you are familiar with the Caldecott and Newbery Medals, but they also give out the Printz Award for great young adult fiction, Coretta Scott King Award to excellent African American authors. Here are my suggestions of great books that have received awards this year:

Moon Over Manifest
Winner of the Newbery Medal
After a life of riding the rails with her father, 12-year-old Abilene can’t understand why he has sent her away to stay with Pastor Shady Howard in Manifest, Missouri, a town he left years earlier; but over the summer she pieces together his story. In 1936, Manifest is a town worn down by sadness, drought, and the Depression, but it is more welcoming to newcomers than it was in 1918, when it was a conglomeration of coal-mining immigrants who were kept apart by habit, company practice, and prejudice. Abilene quickly finds friends and uncovers a local mystery. Their summerlong “spy hunt” reveals deep-seated secrets and helps restore residents’ faith in the bright future once promised on the town’s sign. Abilene’s first-person narrative is intertwined with newspaper columns from 1917 to 1918 and stories told by a diviner, Miss Sadie, while letters home from a soldier fighting in WWI add yet another narrative layer. Vanderpool weaves humor and sorrow into a complex tale involving murders, orphans, bootlegging, and a mother in hiding. With believable dialogue, vocabulary and imagery appropriate to time and place, and well-developed characters, this rich and rewarding first novel is “like sucking on a butterscotch. Smooth and sweet.” --From Booklist

Ship Breaker
Winner of the Printz Award
A fast-paced postapocalyptic adventure set on the American Gulf Coast. Nailer works light crew; his dirty, dangerous job is to crawl deep into the wrecks of the ancient oil tankers that line the beach, scavenging copper wire and turning it over to his crew boss. After a brutal hurricane passes over, Nailer and his friend Pima stumble upon the wreck of a luxurious clipper ship. It's filled with valuable goods-a "Lucky Strike" that could make them rich, if only they can find a safe way to cash it in. Amid the wreckage, a girl barely clings to life. If they help her, she tells them, she can show them a world of privilege that they have never known. But can they trust her? --From School Library Journal

One Crazy Summer
Winner of the Coretta Scott King Book Award
It is 1968, and three black sisters from Brooklyn have been put on a California-bound plane by their father to spend a month with their mother, a poet who ran off years before and is living in Oakland. It's the summer after Black Panther founder Huey Newton was jailed and member Bobby Hutton was gunned down trying to surrender to the Oakland police, and there are men in berets shouting "Black Power" on the news. Delphine, 11, remembers her mother, but after years of separation she's more apt to believe what her grandmother has said about her, that Cecile is a selfish, crazy woman who sleeps on the street. At least Cecile lives in a real house, but she reacts to her daughters' arrival without warmth or even curiosity. Instead, she sends the girls to eat breakfast at a center run by the Black Panther Party and tells them to stay out as long as they can so that she can work on her poetry. Over the course of the next four weeks, Delphine and her younger sisters, Vonetta and Fern, spend a lot of time learning about revolution and staying out of their mother's way. --From School Library Journal