Calling for Teen Reviewers!

Percy Jackson series by Rick Riordan

The Percy Jackson series is a really fun series to read. It incorporates the fun of Greek mythology with a coming of age novel. It is interesting to read as the main characters Percy, Annabeth, and Grover go off on their own quests. As Percy is growing, the Titans, who were defeated before, continue to get stronger and alliances are made. It all leads to the Great Prophecy which is ultimately for a child of the Big Three to fulfill and so far it is meant for Percy. This series is full of thrill and adventure. I would recommend it to everyone.

Reviewed by Neha.

Sisterhood Everlasting by Ann Brashares

The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants continues in the adult installment, Sisterhood Everlasting.  Each girl has gone off in a direction of her life separate from the others: Carmen is an actress, living in New York City and engaged to a gorgeous guy in the industry (who her friends happen to not really love so much); Lena is mostly single, living in Providence and working a couple of days a week, working on her art in bits and pieces; Bridget and Eric live in San Francisco, though it's usually in a different apartment every couple of weeks, paid for through Eric's steady job but supported by Bee's fleeting fancies; and Tibby and Brian moved to Australia a few years ago for a job opportunity for Brian's software company.  

None of the girls talk to each other as much as they'd like, and none of them are really satisfied with where life has taken them so far.  However, each is completely overjoyed when they receive a package from Tibby that includes round-trip airline tickets to the Greek island of Santorini!  It's been ten years since the girls have all been together at Lena's grandparents' house and they know that this reunion is long overdue.  But before they reunite, tragedy takes one of them away and the other three need to figure out how to deal with their grief and live life as incomplete versions of themselves.  Much of the novel follows a depressing path, but light emerges in the form a few special characters, and in the end the reader is grateful for the opportunity to get to know the girls all over again.  This is a very worthy read.

Recommended for nostalgic adult readers and young adults new to the characters but looking for a book about changing relationships, truth in love, and families everlasting.

Reviewed by kate the librarian.

Leverage by Joshua C. Cohen

Danny is a gymnast, and (unfortunately) that includes having the body of a gymnast: strong but small.  Kyle is a football player, with the body of one, but not all that much else on the surface.  The football team and the gymnasts don't exactly get along, and when the gymnastics coach challenges the team for the shared use of the school gym, emotions run high and tensions run strong.  Danny and Kyle both wish that they could just be invisible because attention seems to always lead to pain, but neither of them can ignore the violence they witness that leads to another boy's suicide.  Yet neither one is sure that he has the strength to stand up and speak either.

This is a painful story to experience, at any age, and, yes, that's a warning.  There are many issues that are jumbled into this expansive novel -- among those issues are steroid abuse, unfortunate foster care situations, learning disabilities, child physical and sexual abuse, drinking, drugs, and random sex.  But the scene in the book that will stand out the most vividly involves three football players and one helpless freshman boy trapped in a locker room.  The author does not hold back and the reader is not shielded from the trauma and the horror any more than Danny is.  And yet as painful as the book might be to read, it is just as powerful to absorb.  It's a story that should be told again and again until it no longer exists.  The reader mourns the tragedy of the one and admires and celebrates the resulting strength that emerges from within the other.

Recommended primarily to adults and very mature teen readers.  This isn't a fun read, nor an easy one.  But it remains incredible.

Reviewed by kate the librarian.

Beauty Queens by Libba Bray

Libba Bray is either an unconquerable genius or a total loony-toon.  Either way, she's hilarious.  Beauty Queens is a must-read, and if you can get it on audio (read by the author!), all the better.  Think the television series Lost, the movie Miss Congeniality, and throw in some Lord of the Flies and your favorite chick lit to the mix . . .

While believing that they were on their way to a super fun beach vacation, fifty contestants for the Miss Teen Dream beauty pageant have been stranded on a desert island with no communication and no chaperones.  Miss New Mexico is left with an airline serving tray stuck in her forehead, Miss Texas AKA Taylor Rene Krystal Hawkins is the official leader of the bunch (until she goes completely mad), and Miss Rhode Island is actually a boy.  They have to figure out how to work together to survive and try to get themselves rescued, while navigating the unforeseen complications presented by a group of sexy pirates . . . and, of course, ultimately avoiding being killed at the hands of the Corporation.

This novel is complete satire, and it's completely hilarious.  At times it seems to be overdone, parts are predictable, and it's absolutely berating pop culture and politics - but then it turns around and convinces the reader that that was the whole point all along.  This should be a joy to listen to for any high school reader!

Reviewed by kate the librarian.

P. S. Does anyone else think that LadyBird Hope sounds exactly like Sarah Palin?!  Beautiful!

The Kissing Game : Short Stories by Aidan Chambers

In a note from the author, he talks a little bit about the style of "flash fiction."  As he explains it, flash fictions "are like a flash of light, a spark, which allows one quick view of a whole scene or person or event."  "They can be prose with or without dialogue, or only dialogue."  "Some of the greatest authors of literature wrote flash fictions.  For example, Kafka, Chekhov, Hemingway, Raymond Carver, Italo Calvino, and Kawabata, which he called 'palm-of-the-hand' stories."  Flash fictions are often very short stories, usually weighing in at 1,000 words or less.

In this collection of flash fictions, Aidan Chambers presents a variety of scenarios and emotions, including revenge, anger, and hypocrisy, mixed in alongside individuals' needs to guard what we love, fight back against our fears, and project airs of self-confidence in the view of those we want to appreciate us.  Love can be uncomprehendingly confusing, or heartbreakingly simple, often simultaneously.  These stories combine conflicting feelings and intentions to present unflinching looks at love and relationships from the perspective of the individual (rather than focusing on just the idea of "love").

Reviewed by kate the librarian.

P.S. Aidan Chambers is a Printz Award-winning author and the author of one of my all time favorites, This is All: The Pillow Book of Cordelia Kenn, which is just about as far from a short story as one can get.

Bright Young Things by Anna Godbersen

Cordelia Grey wants much more out of life than to be married young and stuck in her hometown of Union, Ohio with a whole bunch of babies and unfulfilled dreams.  She wants to go to New York City and be somebody.  So that plan is that she and her best friend, Letty Haubstadt, will hop on a train immediately following Cordelia's wedding, a ceremony that the two parties were being forced into, though one of them was a much more willing participant than the other.  And, no doubt about it, the very next day, Letty and Cordelia step off that train onto the streets New York City.

It is 1929.  Neither girl knows a soul in the big city, but both are looking for something very special.  Letty wants to be a star . . . has always wanted to be a star.  In her family of four other siblings, Letty was always the invisible one, despite her obvious talents for singing and performing.  She's convinced that NYC can offer her all the opportunity she'll need in order to shine.  Cordelia -- under the cover of simply wanting a bigger and better life for herself -- is desperately looking for her father, with whom she has never had any contact.  Astrid Donal is from a wealthy Long Island family, NYC-born, raised, and cultured.  She's currently dating Charlie Grey, the son of a big city mobster, and she takes an immediate and lasting liking to Cordelia when the daring young woman sneaks into Mr. Grey's birthday party at the guarded White Cove estate.

There is a different fate in store for each of these three young women, each finding her own way in a tricky big city world, and the author certainly has a knack for keeping the reader wanting to know what happens next to each of them.  With a plethora of romance, adventure, and history, this series opener is recommended most to high school girls.

Reviewed by kate the librarian.