First Words, Last Words
I ended 2011 and began 2012 reading the sortabiography of George Carlin, Last Words, in my opinion one of the most ingenious wordsmiths ever. I admired his love of words, his use of them for comedic and political purposes and his ability to rant and curse like no one else. I knew this man only through his live appearances, his albums, and his books. His, as he calls it, sortabiography, is brilliant, funny, and filled with his gift of words.
If you’ve been reading my blog in 2011 you know how much I like and how important I think first sentences of a book are. Here’s the first sentence of Last Words.
Sliding headfirst down a vagina with no clothes on and landing in the freshly shaven crotch of a screaming woman did not seem to be part of God’s plan for me.
From this place we can all only go forward.
Book Review: A Closer Look by Karen DelleCava
Karen is one of my fellow WestSide authors and I recently had a chance to read her debut novel, A Closer Look. My review follows:
A Closer Look – By: Karen DelleCava
This is a wonderfully poignant book about a teenage girl named Cassie who in addition to dealing with the normal challenges of growing up in suburbia, has alopecia, a disease that causes her hair to fall out prematurely. When this happens to Cassie she is just starting high school, getting a boyfriend, and starting track. In a society and an age group focused on looking good, Cassie must deal with the stigma of being not just different but “ugly.” Cassie is a heroine you completely root for from the first page. Ms. DelleCava’s voice for Cassie is impressive, pitch perfect in it’s ability to show us what goes on inside this teenager’s head. The struggle she goes through, and her parents, to accept the loss and change of identity is wrenching. The use of the track team and Cassies’ ability to lose herself in her running is especially effective. The secondary characters, from the boyfriend, Tommy, to the best girlfriend, Tara, to Cassie’s mother and father, are all well developed and stay away from stereotypes, providing support to Cassie in different and sometimes unexpected ways. This debut novel shows a sure hand at handling this difficult material, keeping it real, at times funny, and finally when all the tears are dry, hopeful. I’d recommend this to readers 12 and up.
Karen’s book can be purchased at indie-bound or amazon.
You can also check out Karen’s website/blog at karendellecava.com.
Quick Review: Amulet Graphic Novel by Kazu Kibuishi
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My son and I are reading a graphic novel series together. He gets to read them first and I get them when he’s finished. We both polish off each book in about an hour. There are only four books in the series so we’re hungry for more. I love a good graphic novel. I was never big into comic books but I have always loved longer , book length works. There’s something about both the visual and textual elements of them that really brings a smile to my face. Here’s what we’re reading now:
Amulet Book 1: The Stonekeeper
Amulet Book 2: The Stonekeeper’s Curse
Amulet Book 3: The Cloud Searchers
by: Kazu Kibuishi
Here’s the book description for book 1 from Amazon: After the tragic death of their father, Emily and Navin move with their mother to the home of her deceased great-grandfather, but the strange house proves to be dangerous. Before long, a sinister creature lures the kids’ mom through a door in the basement. Em and Navin, desperate not to lose her, follow her into an underground world inhabited by demons, robots, and talking animals. Eventually, they enlist the help of a small mechanical rabbit named Miskit. Together with Miskit, they face the most terrifying monster of all, and Em finally has the chance to save someone she loves.
What did I love about this? The opening is harrowing and real, and very, very dark. I love the artwork. Perspective is very effectively used to show the world from different characters ponts of view. I love that there is a young girl who is the protagonist. I love the world-building that Kibuishi does in creating a place for these characters to exist in. A walking house, ferocious adversaries, the lure of power over others, and a mom who is not a stereotype who worries about her children and actively protects them are all bonus features. And we haven’t even been through book 4 yet. I hope to pick it up tomorrow. Only, my son gets to read it first.
Age is 9 and up but keep in mind the opening is rough.
The Review Hat-Trick
A third review in one week! The Gods are smiling on me. It’s a reviewers hat-trick (three goals in a hockey game).
This is a review from Bryan Russell, writer, blogger, and one of the alchemists of Alchemy of Writing blog. Bryan’s review is one of my favorite. The last paragraph about historical novels in general and how Open Wounds fits into his view of them is all by itself, worth the trip to his blog. It’s insightful and wonderfully specific. Thanks, Bryan, for the kind words about my book.
Bryan mentions that he usually doesn’t read YA and that he was surprised by my book. So many people don’t read YA books because they perceive them as children’s books or not adult books and so not worth reading. I wish there was some way to help people get past that. My life is richer for reading books such as, Ghost Medicine, Marbury Lens, Stick, Sunrise Over Fallujah, The Subtle Knife, the Edge Chronicles, Hunger Games, and Crossing the Tracks.
Targeted marketing or the creation of genre ghettos?
I wonder which it is?
OWS
On Stick by Andrew Smith
Stick came out today, a new novel by Andrew Smith, the author of Ghost Medicine, In the Path of Falling Objects, and The Marbury Lens. These are three of my favorite books, each for different reasons but more than anything they are three books about the relationships young men have with each other, and more specifically, brothers. Stick is similar in that it explores this territory, Andrew Smith territory, but it is, like each of Andrew’s other books, different.
Synopsis from Amazon: Fourteen-year-old Stark McClellan (nicknamed Stick because he’s tall and thin) is bullied for being “deformed” – he was born with only one ear. His older brother Bosten is always there to defend Stick. But the boys can’t defend one another from their abusive parents. When Stick realizes Bosten is gay, he knows that to survive his father’s anger, Bosten must leave home. Stick has to find his brother, or he will never feel whole again. In his search, he will encounter good people, bad people, and people who are simply indifferent to kids from the wrong side of the tracks. But he never loses hope of finding love – and his brother.
This is a subtle book beautifully written, sensitive, and innocent. But what I like more than anything are two things Andrew does: 1) His uncanny ability to write from the perspective of fourteen-year-old Stick. It is his trademark as a writer – to be able to get inside the heads of these protagonists. There are no wrong turns in the story because Stick does what he needs to – nothing more and nothing less. This is an incredible feat of writing. The second thing that Andrew does that makes him stand out is write beautiful prose. Some writers write pretty words but you notice them because they write that way for the sake of writing that way. Andrew crafts every sentence and every sentence sings as part of a larger tapestry that is his novel. His prose seems effortless and his narrative flows without a hitch because of it. And this is not just the way he writes Stick’s thoughts, jumbled up sometimes and filled with holes another as if the words bang around inside and can’t exit – an ingenious technique he uses to show how Stick hears and perceives the world.
Here’s one of my favorites: “And none of what happened to us would ever make sense if I didn’t let the biggest monsters that swarm in my head come up and reveal their teeth there is no love in our house only rules.” When you read the context for this it will blow you away. In the land of realistic fiction for young adults, Andrew Smith is king.
Lunievicz 