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Read Aloud Thursday: Love Aubrey by Suzanne LaFleur

Oct29

Bethy-Bee (age 10) read and then listened to this book on CD and enjoyed it very much, although it’s not a Pollyanna-type book. In fact it’s rather sad, as we repeated many times in our talk about the book.

Me: What was Love, Aubrey about?

BB: A girl named Aubrey whose dad and sister died in a car crash and her mom abandoned her. It’s kind of a sad book, Her grandma comes to visit her and her mom, and when she finds out that her mom isn’t there, she has to take Aubrey back to where the grandma lives.

Me: How old is Aubrey?

BB: She’s eleven.

Me: Do you think you could take care of yourself? You’re ten. How long could you take care of yourself?

BB: Yeah I’d be really scared, but yeah, I could. As long as the TV was working and I had lots of food. As long as everything was still working. I could probably do it for a while.

Me: Aubrey made a friend when she came to her grandma’s. Why do you think Bridget wanted to be Aubrey’s friend?

BB: She knew Aubrey didn’t have any other friends, and Aubrey had been having a really hard time. And they just started playing together and became friends.

Me: What did Bridget do for Aubrey to be a friend to her?

BB: She was nice to her, didn’t talk about what happened to her dad and sister.

Me: What did you like best about the book?

BB: Hmmm. I liked the part where she stayed with Bridget for a while when her Grandma went to be with her mom. Really, I liked all the parts where she kept remembering stuff, all the little flashbacks.

Me: Was there anything you didn’t like?

BB: Not really.

Me: I thought it was kind of weird that she was friends with that boy, Marcus.

BB: Yeah, he was strange.

BB: One thing is Aubrey was always sad. Most of the book she always remembered her dad and little sister, and she was really sad. And when I listened to the audio version the reader made her sound really sad all the time and depressed. I guess I would be sad, too, if it happened to me. The audio version also made Aubrey’s little sister sound really countrified, like she was from the Veggie Tales Grapes of Wrath or something.

Me: Aubrey had to make a hard decision at the end of the book. Do you think she made the right decision?

BB: I think she did make the right decision because her mom was ready, but she wasn’t. I think if she went back to her mom then it wouldn’t work because she would still be really sad. I thought that counselor lady in the book sort of helped her, but she was kind of annoying. She was kind of interfering with Aubrey’s business, and it made her annoyed. And her grandma was dumb to think she needed a guidance counselor. Aubrey was already writing letters, and that helped her. But the counselor did help her when she was trying to run away, and that was good. If Aubrey did need to talk to anybody, though, she could talk to her fish.

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This book is also nominated for a Cybil Award, but the views expressed here are strictly my own —and Betsy-Bee’s.

Silly Talk: Laughing It Up with Middle Grade Fiction

Oct26

The Dunderheads by Paul Fleischman.

The Problem With the Puddles by Kate Feiffer.

Dessert First by Hallie Durand.

All three of these very silly stories were nominated for the Cybils Middle Grade Fiction Award. The Dunderheads is almost a picture book (56 pages), very silly, about a class of dunderheads whose teacher, Miss Breakbone hates kids. She also confiscates contraband, including a one-eared toy cat that Theodore aka Junkyard found in the trash and planned to give to his cat-loving mother for her birthday. Dunderheads to the rescue! The gang of multi-talented misfits finds its way to Miss Breakbone’s house to reclaim the cat and show Miss Breakbone that she can’t get away with stealing from the Dunderheads.

Fleischman says of his story, “Behind The Dunderheads lies not only Ocean’s Eleven and Mission: Impossible but also The Fool of the World and the Flying Ship, The Five Chinese Brothers, and similar folk tales from deep in our past.” I was also reminded of Harry Allard’s Miss Nelson Is Missing.

Becky on The Dunderheads: “The premise of this is fun. And most readers will probably enjoy it more than I did. What with the plotting, pranking, and spitting.”

Dessert First features a teacher, Mrs. Howdy Doody, with quite a different personality from that of Miss Breakbone. In fact, I would guess that Miss Howdy Doody’s middle name is Pollyanna, and she says things like “I am inspired!” and “My dear happy learners.” A little too much sugar in Mrs. Howdy Doody’s make-up, and it turns out that sugar is Dessert Schneider’s problem, too. She likes dessert, talks her family into serving dessert first, and finds it hard to resist any dessert available. When Dessert’s mom makes Double Decker Chocolate Bars and leaves a note instructing everyone to leave them alone, Dessert is sorely tempted. What’s an eight year old dessert lover to do when there are Double D’s in the refrigerator “sitting together neatly on Mummy’s shiny turquoise paper”?

I enjoyed this little tale about temptation, and repentance, and confession, and forgiveness, and restitution–all in a shiny, easy to read package! I may have to read this one to Z-baby who has her own issues with sugar, and dessert and resisting temptation.

Reading Zone on Dessert First: “Dessert reminded me a lot of another fun early middle grade character- Clementine. She’s spunky, spirited, happy, and even a little “fresh” at times. Even better? She’s real! She reminded me a lot of the 3rd graders I student taught a few years ago.”

The Problem with the Puddles is the silliest of the three Sillies. Norton Juster (author of one of my favorites, The Phantom Tollbooth) contributes a blurb on the back of the cover extolling the wordplay and the “lively boisterous manner” of this book, and I would agree. However, it’s just not The Phantom Tollbooth. The Puddle family leaves the country for the city and accidentally leaves their two dogs, both named Sally, behind. Hilarity and confusion ensue. The dogs set off for the city on their own; the Puddles try to get back to the country to retrieve the dogs. Chronic disagreements, complications, a messy misunderstanding, and a dog-collecting secret catcher get in the way of the ultimate reunion.

I really think some kids would love this story, and others would just think it was . . . silly. You probably know already which of the two categories fits your reading interests.

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Mr. Lincoln’s Boys Tell His Story

Oct24

Lincoln and His Boys by Rosemary Wells.

Me and Willie and Pa by F.N. Monjo.

Rosemary Wells’ fictionalized memoir of Abraham Lincoln and his sons, Willie and Tad, was nominated for a Cybil Award. So I read it. Of course, it reminded me of F.N. Monjo’s (out of print) classic in the same genre and with the same subject, Me and Willie and Pa, published in 1973. So I got that one down and re-read it.

Monjo’s book includes a lot more information. Neither book is very long. Me and Willie and Pa is 94 (large) pages long. The Wells book is 93 pages, but smaller. However, Monjo’s book has a lot more stories about the war and about Lincoln’s jokes and anecdotes. Although Ms. Wells probably has the right end of the stick, having Willie, then Tad tell only about those incidents and stories that a young boy would be interested in and know about, I must say as an adult I enjoyed reading Me and Willie and Tad more because of the extra information. Perhaps Lincoln and HIs Boys would be more appropriate to recommend to third and fourth graders, while Me and Willie and Pa could be given to fifth and sixth graders, although those age guidelines certainly aren’t hard and fast rules.

IMG_0365Both books present the same picture of Lincoln as a father, indulgent to a fault. He allowed his boys to invade cabinet meetings, play soldier by ordering guards around, and accompany him on visits to the troops. When either the politicians or Mary Lincoln complained that Mr. Lincoln was spoiling the boys, both books agree that Lincoln paid them no mind and continued to allow his sons the freedom to be rowdy, noisy, and spirited. We’ll never know if Lincoln’s indulgent child-rearing practices would have made Tad and Willie into strong, independent men or spoiled rotten brats. Willie died uirng Lincoln’s first term in office, and Tad died in Chicago three months after his eighteenth birthday. Maybe in light of their early deaths, it’s good to know that they had a very happy childhood and a loving father.

Mary Lincoln has always been a problematic character, and both books tell about her overwhelming grief after Willie’s death and about her free-spending ways in dressing and in decorating the White House. However, in Lincoln and His Boys, Mary Lincoln seems like a loving wife and mother and a well-meaning, if sometimes misunderstood, First Lady. Monjo’s portrayal includes a couple of stories that cast Mrs. Lincoln in a harsher light, including a story about her screaming in a jealous rage when Mr. Lincoln went out to review the troops alongside a pretty general’s wife.

Ms. Wells ends her story with President Lincoln and Tad in Richmond, Lincoln ordering the band to play “Dixie” because “it’s Federal property now.” Mr. Monjo ends his narrative with Lincoln’s assassination, and he has Tad ask the poignant question, “How could anyone want to hurt my Pa?”

I’d recommend either or both books for an introduction to Lincoln and the Civil War and for a tender story of a father who loved his sons and gave them the foundation of a father’s attention and joy in being with them. The stories about Lincoln and his relations with his family and with the people around him are always endearing and somewhat sentimental and heart-tugging. He was a complicated man (aren’t we all?), but these books present one aspect of his character quite well: his love for his young sons.

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Middle School Sit-Com Novels

Oct19

When Engineer Husband lets them, my daughters like to watch Satuday morning sit-coms featuring Hannah Montana and other clones and sidekicks (Josh Drake?) getting themselves in and out of middle school/high school escapades and dramas. I can picture each of the following novels as a Saturday morning sit com with various ideas and characters to explore.

Models Don’t Eat Chocolate Cookies by Erin Dionne. Twelve year old Celeste Harris might be interested in becoming a model were it not for one BIG problem. Her body type and weight actually qualify her to try out for Miss Husky Peach, a job which would make her a model–for plus-sized clothing. When her aunt enters Celeste in the contest, thinking she’s doing her niece a great favor, Celeste is trapped. She doesn’t want to disappoint her mom or her aunt, but becoming Miss Husky Peach would make her life at school even more miserable than it already is. I can so see a made-for-TV movie or even a series built around the premise of the Miss Husky Peach Pageant. Celeste and her fellow plus-sized contestants would be great characters for a script-writer to explore and write about. In the book, Celeste ends up losing some weight and also becoming more comfortable with her body type. I thought the book’s treatment of girls with weight problems was balanced and realistic.

So Sit-Com #1: Miss Husky Peach.

The Kind of Friends We Used to Be by Frances O’Roark Dowell. Next on the Saturday morning line-up is Ms. Dowell’s books about surviving seventh grade. It has a sort of “make new friends, but keep the old” theme; in fact, that could be the theme song if someone would update it and put it to a rock beat. Kate and Marylin have been best friends practically all their lives, but now they’re moving in different directions. Marylin has joined the cheerleader squad, and Kate wants to wear black combat boots and become a girl guitar player on MTV2. Over the course of the novel, Kate and Marylin try to maintain their friendship, but they also make new friends, each of which could easily become a fully developed character inhis or her own right. That multiplicity of interesting characters makes The Kind of Friends We Used To Be intriguing as fodder for a TV series. Each week could feature a different character from Kate’s and Marylin’s school, such as:
Rhetta Mayes, the Goth artist preacher’s kid.
Flannery, the girl whose dad, Hawaii Bob, promised her a guitar but forgot to come home to give it to her.
Matthew Holler, the poet who likes arrowheads and bird feathers and interesting-shaped sticks.
Madison LaCarte, the novelist who needs to put a little more story in her stories.
Benjamin Huddle, the geeky but cute Student Government President.

I can see the episodes involving each of these minor characters being expanded into a thirty minute sit-com with interesting problems and a satisfying resolution at the end.

Sit-Com #2: Friends, or possibly Kate and Marylin (because the book tItle is too long).

My Life in Pink and Green by Lisa Greenwald. Twelve year old Lucy Desberg tries to save her family’s drugstore and pharmacy with a series of ideas and projects, some good, others not so inspired. Lucy’s mom is comic relief, a ditzy optimist who takes on a series of causes and is convinced that she can save the world, or at least save the local dog park from being turned into a parking lot. Lucy’s grandma is the more practical type, worried about their family’s financially struggling pharmacy business. Another recurring character in this one would be Lucy’s best friend, Sunita, and one episode could be about Lucy’s attempts to help Sunita “get her man” when Sunita develops her first crush on fellow seventh grader Evan Mass. Lucy’s also a budding make-up artist, and she has several opportunities to help older girls learn to apply the make-up that they buy from the family drugstore. Each chapter of the book begins with either a beauty tip or a business tip, and the TV series could follow suit and begin in the same way.

TV series #3: My Life in Pink and Green.

The best possibility of the three? The Kind of Friends We Used to Be. However, maybe you could take all three books, extract the best characters and scenes from each one, and sort of mish-mosh them all together. Lots of twelve and thirteen year olds with twelve and thirteen year old problems relate to one another and resolve their issues in a half an hour on Saturday morning. I like the title My LIfe in Pink and Green.

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Cybils Verse Novels

Oct17

All the Broken Pieces by Ann E. Burg.

Tropical Secrets: Holocaust Refugees in Cuba by Margarita Engle.

A poem begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a lovesickness.
~Robert Frost

Both of these books fit Mr. Frost’s statement about poetry; they’re both about a sense of wrong, a homesickness, and a lovesickness. However, with the first, All the Broken Pieces, I got a lump in the throat. With the second, I only thought, “How interesting! Holocaust refugees in Cuba.”

I’m thinking that makes All the Broken Pieces better poetry. It’s also a more emotionally engaging story. Matt Pin, the narrator of the story, is the son of a Vietnamese woman and an American soldier. His mother sends him on one of the last refugee flights out of VIetnam after the war so that he can live a life in country where he won’t suffer for being part American. However, Matt is never sure whether his “other mother” just wanted him to leave because of what happened to his little brother. Matt loves his “now father” and his “now mother,” but he’s not entirely sure they really will be there for him even if he disappoints them. So, Matt is sort of lost between cultures, not knowing where or how to belong. He also deals with prejudice, finds peace in playing music, and finds a way to excel as a pitcher on the school baseball team. Here’s a brief sample of the one of the story poems in this novel:

Music is soothing.

Music is not like words.

Words are messy.
Words spill out
like splattered blood,
oozing in every direction
leaving stains
that won’t come out
no matter how hard you scrub.

But not music.
Even when it’s so loud
you can’t hear anything else,
music lulls you to sleep.

Right now,
I need music.

Other bloggers on All the Broken Pieces: Reading Junky, A Year of Reading, Saecker at Kid’s Lit.

Tropical Secrets was also about a boy, Daniel, sent away by his parents for his safety. In this book the parents are Jews living in Hitler’s Germany. They scrape together all the funds they have to send their son to safety in another country, and Daniel ends up in Cuba. Daniel, like Matt, is unsure of himself and of how he fits into this new and strange-to-him culture. Like Matt, Daniel finds solace in music. Maybe I just didn’t identify with Daniel so strongly because the poems in the book are not all from David’s point of view. Some of the poems tell the story from the point of view of a Cuban girl, Paloma, and others from the elderly vantage point of David, a Jewish Russian refugee who has been in Cuba for many years.

Becky loved Tropical Secrets. Rasco from RIF says it’s a ” special experience from the illustrated cover to the final words.” Book Addict found it to be “very emotional.” Fuse #8 says it’s “a remarkable novel about an amazing and true moment you probably will not find in your average elementary school world history textbook.”

I just couldn’t get the feel of it, no lump in the throat.

Anything But Typical by Nora Raleigh Baskin

Oct12

“When I write I can be heard. And known.
But nobody has to look at me. Nobody has to see me at all.”

Jason Blake is twelve years old. He writes stories on a website called Storyboard. Jason is NOT neurotypical. He is autistic.

This story, told from the point of view of an autistic boy who is also very gifted in the area of language and creative writing, makes me want to know more about how other people think, especially those who are not mainstream, not what we would call normal. Reading about someone who is autistic or mentally different in some other way always teaches me more about the thought processes and communication protocols that we who are neurotypical take for granted. As Jason’s mom says toward the end of the book, taking a trip with Jason teaches her (and me) more about ourselves.

And this story asks questions that I’m not prepared to answer completely, but that are important questions:

What is love exactly? Jason says, “Love is like yellow. Warm and safe.” If you can’t really express love to someone in a language that the beloved can understand, is it still love? Does love only become real when it’s understood and accepted? Or is it there all the time, working and making the loved one warm and safe, even if he can’t understand?

How much do computers assist in communication and how much and in what ways do they hinder true communication? Jason’s only means of communication is his computer where he writes stories and sends messages to the outside world. However, Jason not only uses his computer; he hides behind it. When an opportunity comes for him to meet a girl that he has only known via the internet, Jason is terrified. He knows that when people meet him in person, they find him difficult and somewhat repellant. Jason uses the computer to reveal himself to others, and he also uses his computer skills as a bridge to neurotypical world. However, the computer can also protect him from reality and from trying to live up to the expectations of others. Is this kind of protection a good thing or a bad one? Is the help and protection that Jason gets from his mom and his dad and his aide at school good or bad? Probably a bit of both, and it’s difficult for them to know how much to push Jason to act “normal” and how much to protect him from the cruelty in the world and how much to just allow him to be who he is.

“Why tell a story if there is no one there to read it? Why make a sound if no one will hear it?”
One answer to these questions is given by a character in the book: “Writing is all we have. . . . All we are, all we can be, are the stories we tell.”
There may be other answers. If you knew no one would ever read your blog, would you still write? If I were alone in the universe, or if my only audience were God, could I still live? Would I have any reason to live?

I don’t want to give away too much of the plot of this wonderful children’s novel, but I do want to assure you that Anything But Typical tells a story worth reading . . . and thinking about . . . and reading again . . . and even praying about perhaps. How can we love the unlovely in a way that they can experience? How can communication happen between people who speak completely different languages? How can we experience the love of other people and of God when each of has his own limitations and language barriers?

Unsigned Hype by Booker T. Mattison

Oct11

O.K., really, really outside my comfort zone. I don’t even know the difference between hip-hop and rap. And when the narrator of this story, fifteen year old Tory Tyson, starts talking about “laying down some banging beats” and “reggaeton tracks”, I’m lost. Nevertheless, I enjoyed this essay into urban fiction from Revell Publishers, a division of Baker Publishing Group (yes, that’s a Christian publishing house).

The story is classic: Tory’s rise to fame as a rap/hip hop producer is fraught with temptations and with danger to his reputation and even his life. But Tory’s “moms” is praying for him, and he finds a friend who keeps him grounded in discussions of the meaning of absolute truth, character, and integrity. He also gains a girlfriend and loses a best friend in the process. Some of the scenes were a little high on the drama scale: Tory gets arrested at one point, and he survives an attempted shooting. But I think the drama will appeal to young adult readers, and the story doesn’t get too preachy for me, although some non-Christian readers may disagree with my assessment in that area. As Tory says, “Christians are masters of the bait-and-switch. They invite you to something like they’re really interested in being around you, but what they really want to do is turn you over to Jesus.”

I won’t lie; there’s a lot of Jesus stuff in this novel. But there’s also a lot of rap music talk, a lot of growing up, and a lot of figuring out what it means to preserve a man’s integrity. I’m not going to be listening to any hip hop (or rap) artists as a result of reading this novel, and you’re not going to be rooked into becoming a Christian if you’re not one already. However, it gave me a new perspective on the urban music scene, and you might find something of interest here, too.

I nominated this one for the Cybils in the Young Adult Fiction category because it’s fun.

Other views:
Au Courant: “Unsigned Hype astonished me. I was amazed at how someone so culturally different than me could actually be relatable and REAL. It further impressed me with a mature teenager, Tory, as a main character.”

First Time Out: Debutante Authors

Oct10

The Year the Swallows Came Early by Kathryn Fitzmaurice.

The Beef Princess of Practical County by Michelle Houts.

Other than a female narrator and the fact that both are written by a first time author, these two books don’t really have much in common. Oh, also the setting in each book provides a nice hook for the story.

The Year the Swallows Came Early is set in San Juan Capistrano. I remember reading about the old mission town where the swallows return each spring to make their home until they migrate in the fall. Groovy, aka Eleanor, the eleven year old narrator tells the story of how her own father betrayed her trust and went to jail. Groovy is a likable young lady with ambition to become a fine chef someday, and Ms. Fitzmaurice, the author, gets her voice just right. Groovy is growing up, dealing with issues of deception and forgiveness, and yet she’s still a child. She talks and thinks like an eleven year old, with a refreshing innocence that is often missing in these days of precocious, sometimes jaded, child book characters. And I loved the ending to this book. It had hope and realism and lessons learned and growth for all of the characters in the book, without being saccharine-sweet.

More reviews of The Year the Swallows Came Early
Natasha at Maw Books: “Kathryn Fitzmaurice develops these characters so well and so early that I just had to see where this story was going to go. In addition to Groovy and her parents, we meet other wonderful characters who each have a story of their own.”
Into the Wardrobe: “I also enjoyed the novel because of the simple food descriptions that realistically captured the fun, wonder, and passion of a foodie who is only eleven years old.”

My favorite part of The Beef Princess of Practical County was the setting; it takes place on a modern-day beef farm in Practical County, Indiana. I’ve read several books about farm life, but I can’t think of another book that focuses on the farm itself and on what it’s like to be a part of a family farming operation in the twenty-first century. Most farm books I can think of are either about historical farm life or about escaping farm life. The Beef Princess celebrates the beef industry while also showing how difficult it can be to raise and eventually sell animals that are destined for the dinner table. I was a bit disappointed to find an instance or two of bad editing in the book, and some of the minor characters are a bit stereotypical (a set of snooty, bad girl sisters, the Darling sisters). However, the setting and the gentle story of a girl growing up on the farm save the book from being too formulaic and make it a good choice for rural readers looking for a book about “someone like me” and city dwellers looking to see what it’s like to live on a farm.

Other opinions on The Beef Princess of Practical County:
Bookworm Readers: “There’s not much to say about The Beef Princess of Practical County except that it was a simple, clean, and sweet book about growing up and letting go. The narration was excellent–Libby had a real voice and actually sounded like a 12 year old girl.”
Amanda at A Patchwork of Books: “Libby and those calves are just going to pull at your heart strings and seriously make becoming a vegetarian a possibility in your life. Such a creative plot concept with true-to-life characters, great emotion, and just enough funny moments to really melt your heart.”

These two good solid stories are harbingers, I hope, of more to come from both of these debut authors. Both of these books were nominated for the Cybils Middle Grade Fiction Award.

Magic Happens

Oct8

Wow! I just read two books for my “job” as a panelist for the Middle Grade Fiction Cybils, and they were both fantastic. Only it turns out that we’re not allowed any, or not much, magic in our category. Both of the books I read were nominated in the Middle Grade Fiction category but got moved to Science FIction/Fantasy. Heads up to that other judging panel: the following two books are absolutely wonderful. Read them first. (Yes, I am openly trying to influence the judges and all you readers out there. What’s the FTC going to do about it? I got these books from the library.)

First I read When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead. I was already pre-disposed to like Ms. Stead’s novel because Madeleine L’Engle is one of my very favorite authors. And I had already read a lot buzz about When You Reach Me, and one of things I’d read was that the girl protagonist in the book is a great fan of A Wrinkle in Time. Any friend of Madeleine L’Engle is a friend of mine.

However, as I began reading the book, I began to think that maybe my expectations were too high. I stayed confused about three-fourths of the way through the book, but I was willing to hang on because of Madeleine and and because it looked as if there might be some light at the end of the tunnel. I could sort of, kind of, see where the book was going, but on the other hand, it was really confusing. Of course, as you might have guessed, there’s time travel involved. And where there is time travel there is bound to be mind-bending confusion. What you need to know going into When You Reach Me is that:
a) it’s not as good as A Wrinkle in Time, but it’s pretty good. Definitely worth your time.
b) you need to keep reading even if you don’t understand what’s going or exactly when you are. All will become clear.

Any Which Wall by Laurel Snyder is also about magical time travel, and it’s also fan fiction of the very best kind. Only this time it’s Edward Eager, author of Knight’s Castle and Half Magic and other wonderful, magical books, that is the focus of the the author’s tribute. In Any Which Wall, Eager’s books are barely mentioned, but the flavor of his writing and of his joy in magic, is right there. Four children find a magic wall that can take them anywhere, anytime. And there’s a bit of an allusion to the Problem of Susan in the Narnia books: there’s a Susan here who has been too eager to grow up in all the wrong ways and who learns a lesson about what it really means, and doesn’t, to become mature.

As the author says in her “Brief Note on the Existence and True Nature of Magic”: “There are many kinds of magic in the world, and not all of it starts with a sound track of thunderous music to alert unsuspecting explorers to fabulous adventures ahead.” So, just in case you’re not alerted yet, I’m telling you very plainly that When You Reach Me and Any Which Wall are a couple of magical books.

I liked When You Reach Me, and I loved Any Which Wall. Anyone who enjoyed L’Engle and Eager and C.S. Lewis’s Narnia when he was a child (and who hasn’t lost his ability to experience magic in the world) should check out both of these new fantasy/scifi titles. And any child who loves magic books and has already read all of the above should also try these.

Other bloggers on When You Reach Me:
Welcome to My Tweendom: “Refreshingly different and filled with insight, Rebecca Stead’s When You Reach Me is part mystery, part slice-of-life, and part science fiction. It has the feel of the kind of book that is going to stand the test of time.”
The Book Muncher: “When You Reach Me is a truly delightful and remarkably unique story that incorporates themes as simple as friendship and love to concepts as complex as the scientific possibility of time travel. Readers will be drawn into Miranda’s story from the first page with the exciting air of mystery Stead creates.”
The Reading Zone: “In 6th grade I have a lot students who enjoy the tv show LOST (as do I). I would call When You Reach Me LOST for the middle school set. The strands of the story all start weaving themselves together, leaving you breathless at the end, much as I imagine I will be at the end of the final season of LOST.”

Other book bloggers on Any Which Wall:
Charlotte’s Library: “a splendiferously fun journey through time and space in the best Edward Eager tradition of great characterization, brisk writing, and snappy dialogue among the children.”
Never Jam Today: “Strangers to Edward Eager will still love Any Which Wall, and will hopefully be led back to the master of us all. But devotees will have even more fun. They’ll spot brilliant strokes, like Henry and Emma playing Parcheesi … a game played by the children in Eager’s novels.”
Jen Robinson: “Any Which Wall is about remaining childlike. It’s about keeping your eyes open to glimpse potential moments of magic. it’s about paying attention to how other people feel, doing the right thing, and displaying initiative and bravery. It is a return to Eager’s golden age of children’s literature.”

Images from Baseball for Middle School Readers

Oct7

Mudville by Kurtis Scaletta.

The Girl Who Threw Butterflies by Mick Cochrane.

I’m not really a sports fan, but if I were going to be a sports fan, I’d probably pick baseball. There’s something special about baseball books. They get all metaphorical and philosophical on you, and yet they’re still tied to a physical game. It’s fun, and it’s poetic, and it’s baseball details —all at the same time.

In The Girl Who Threw Butterflies the conceit is that life and relationships are like a knuckleball pitch, aka a butterfly pitch or a floater.

“The knuckleball wasn’t just a pitch. It was an attitude toward life. It was a way of being in the world. It was a philosophy. “You don’t aim a butterfly,” her father used to say. “You release it.” Each pitch had a life of its own. It wasn’t about control, it wasn’t about muscle. Each floating and fluttering pitch was a little miracle. It was all about surprise. To her, though she would never say so, every knuckleball she threw seemed like a living thing, each of them full of impish high spirits.”

Molly, the central character in this novel, is dealing with the recent death of her father and with the growing pains associated with being thirteen and the only child of a grieving mother. Molly’s relationship with her mother is sort of like pitching in a baseball game; Molly releases bits of information to her mother, and sometimes the pitch is perfectly controlled and other times it goes wild and starts a huge argument. Molly is quite interested in communication, in the sign language that coaches use to signal their players, in the codes that scorekeepers use to score a baseball game, in the nonverbal cues that define her relationship with her mom and with friends. The book is full of these analogies and metaphors, and if I had time I would go back and re-read it just to enjoy the richness of the story and the parallelsbetween the game of baseball and the game of life.

Mudville, the other baseball book that I read, has its own baseball magic going on. As Molly is missing her father, Roy the protagonist and narrator in Mudville is missing his mother. She left five years and hasn’t returned to Moundville, the town where Roy lives with his dad. And Sturgis, Roy’s foster brother and the other central character in the book, is missing father and mother. However, the real tragedy in Moundville, nicknamed Mudville for good reason, is that it’s been raining for twenty-two years, every day, ever since the Moundville baseball team had its game with arch-rival Sinister Bend called because rain in the final inning. Twenty-two years ago when Roy’s dad was a player on the Moundville team. Now Roy’s father rainproofs house for a living, and SInister Bend has been swept away by a flood. And Roy dreams of becoming a Major League catcher.

Mudville is more of a boys’ book, a little less philosophical but no less poetic and atmospheric than The Girl Who Threw Butterflies. It’s less about communication and more about possibilities, about “what-if”. What if it rained every day for twenty-two years? What if the rain suddenly stopped? What if there were a curse on the town that caused the rain? What if there wasn’t? What if the Cubs won the World Series? What if Moundville were able to put a baseball team together and win against the Sinister Bend, against all odds? What if the best pitcher on the Moundville team deserted to the opposing team?

Both of these books will appeal to baseball fans, but also to anyone who enjoys sports metaphors and a touch of magical realism. They would be best for seventh and eighth graders, the upper end of the Middle Grade Fiction category for the Cybils competition. If I were a librarian and I managed to sell one of these two to a reader who enjoyed it, I’d immediately put the other book in that reader’s hands, along with James Preller’s Six Innings and perhaps Keeping Score by Linda Sue Park, both from last year.