book review – Page 18 – The Dusty Jacket

Bed-Knob and Broomstick by Mary Norton (J)

Bedknob and Broomstick

Bed-Knob and Broomstick

Mary Norton (Juvenile Fiction)

Carey, Charles, and Paul Wilson are rather ordinary children who are planning to spend a rather ordinary summer with an old aunt in Bedfordshire. The children, not being very fond of her house, choose to spend most of their time outdoors playing in the barns, by the river, in the lanes, and on the hills. One day seemed to flow into the next rather uneventfully until the day that Miss Price hurt her ankle. It was on that day where this story truly begins because Miss Price didn’t just visit the sick or teach piano or was the most ladylike in the village. Miss Price also happened to be a witch…well, a novice witch…and it was this same Miss Price who cast a spell upon one of Paul’s bed-knobs—a spell that could take him and his bed anyplace in the present or past. A spell that would eventually lead to a trip to the police station, an encounter with cannibals, and a chance meeting with a lonely necromancer. Perhaps this will not be an ordinary summer for the Wilson children after all.

Bed-Knob and Broomstick is the combination of Norton’s The Magic Bed-knob (1943) and Bonfires and Broomsticks (1947). The first part covers the initial meeting between the Wilson children and Miss Price and details their adventures in the present while the second part picks up two years after and sends the group into the past. Norton’s tale is sure to delight younger readers and has enough unexpected twists and turns to keep older readers engaged as well.

Bed-Knob and Broomstick is a humorous, suspenseful, and enchanting book filled with courage, loyalty, friendship, and love. American author Debasish Mridha once said, “The magic of love is that it has the power to create a magical world in and around us.” Norton indeed gives us a magical world which teaches us that you’re never too young for an adventure and you’re never too old to find love.

Rating: 5/5

* Book cover image attributed to www.amazon.com

Big Fish by Daniel Wallace

Big Fish

Big Fish

Daniel Wallace (Adult Fiction)

Edward Bloom was born in Ashland, Alabama during the driest summer in forty years. Edward knew he was destined for greatness…at least that’s what he always imagined. He was to be a big fish in a big pond. After all, wasn’t it his birth that finally brought water to his town’s scorched ground? Weren’t people and animals inexplicably drawn to him? Throughout his life, Edward would be a sailor, a successful business owner, and a true man of the world who also bought an entire town down to the last square inch. Edward was also a husband, a father, and a friend to all. But most of all, Edward Bloom was a myth. His son, William, longs to be close to a father whose past is as vast and complicated as the current space between the two. With Edward on his deathbed, can William distinguish fact from fiction so that he can better understand his father? Surely stories of a two-headed geisha, a giant, and a mermaid can’t possibly be true…can they?

Daniel Wallace gives us a quirky and lighthearted story showing us the complex and messy relationship between a father and son. This book is a quick read so only lightly scratches the surface regarding Edward’s inability or unwillingness to emotionally connect with his son. All attempts at intimacy by William yield little more than a humorous story and a punchline and the reader shares in his growing frustration and apathy. Edward explains to William that his own father was rarely around, but this fact doesn’t make it any less painful for William who is constantly at odds with a pithy metaphor or a ready one-liner.

Fathers are so many things to their sons or daughters: superhero, knight, prince charming, mentor, teacher, coach, buddy. Like Edward, our own dads seem invincible, immortal, and a tad mythical. Edward measured greatness through deeds. William merely wanted a father who was an active participant rather than an occasional onlooker. And although laughter is said to be the best medicine, perhaps laughter is not the medicine, but it merely makes the real medicine go down a little easier.

Edward once said to William, “Remembering a man’s stories makes his immortal, did you know that?” I have many stories from my father’s past—stories made up of fact and fiction that intertwine and entangle themselves like vines on a trellis. Over time, it becomes increasingly difficult to separate the truth from fantasy, but in the end, it doesn’t really matter because you realize that even though your dad didn’t own a town or rescue a mermaid, he’s still pretty great because he’s YOUR dad and that alone makes him a pretty big fish.

Rating: 4/5

*Book cover image attributed to www.goodreads.com

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War & Watermelon by Rich Wallace (YA Historical Fiction)

It’s Tween & Teen Tuesday when we review either a Juvenile (J) or Young Adult (YA) book.

War and Watermelon

War & Watermelon

Rich Wallace (Young Adult Historical Fiction)

If you were to rank boys based on “coolness”, Brody Winslow would be near the bottom…low-middle at best. But things could be worse. It’s August 1969 and his brother Ryan could STILL avoid the draft (if he just got off his butt), the New York Mets COULD win a game (if they just got off their butt), and Brody MIGHT be a starter on his football team (if he could just stay off his butt). All in all, things are looking pretty good. In less than a month, Brody will be starting junior high school and his brother has promised to take him to a farm in upstate New York for some hippie concert protesting the war in Vietnam. That might be fun. Big changes are coming and Brody is about to tackle them all…whether he’s ready or not.

Rich Wallace started his early writing career as a sports editor for various New Jersey newspapers and his talent shows in War & Watermelon where the football and baseball references abound. But what’s really at the core of this tender and sentimental book is the special bond shared by brothers Ryan and Brody. Unlike the competitive or jealous sibling relationships you find in some books, the Winslow boys are fiercely supportive, loyal, and kind to one another. As Ryan’s 18^th birthday approaches—along with his draft status—Brody senses his brother’s increasing anxiety and is not sure how to comfort him: “I should get to bed; we’ve got another game tomorrow night. But I wouldn’t be sleeping anyway, so I’d rather stay here with Ryan. He’d been there for me. Teaching me how to shoot a basketball or cook a hot dog. Taking me to the movies, even when he goes to the drive-in with Jenny. Giving me things like a Giants jersey he got too big for, or a flashlight when I was four and scared that there was a monster in my closet. Now he’s scared. I’m scared, too. We might as well sit here together.” There’s also a tight-knit relationship between Ryan, Brody, and their father. Nights sitting up cheering on their Mets while eating olives and saltines or laughing out loud to re-reruns of The Honeymooners are clearly enjoyed and treasured by all three.

War & Watermelon is a humorous and delightful book about one young man trying to make a difference and one boy trying to make it through the day. It’s a little slice of Americana served with grape soda pop and a bag of pretzels in front of a black and white TV. It isn’t dramatic, suspenseful, thrilling, or riddled with angst. Some may even go so far as to call it trite or boring. But as Brody Winslow once said, “We wander around for an hour, shoot some baskets, then go home. Yeah, it was boring, but that’s life. Boring isn’t always so bad”. I would even venture to say that boring can be great…now pass the olives and turn on the TV!

Rating: 4/5

* Book cover image attributed to www.goodreads.com

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The Dogs of Babel by Carolyn Parkhurst

The Dogs of Babel

The Dogs of Babel

Carolyn Parkhurst (Adult Fiction)

“Here is what we know, those of us who can speak to tell a story: On the afternoon of October 24, my wife, Lexy Ransome, climbed to the top of the apple tree in our backyard and fell to her death. There were no witnesses, save our dog, Lorelei.”

Paul Iverson is desperate to understand how his young, beautiful, and artistic wife died. Judging by her injuries and how her body landed, the police conclude that she didn’t jump. There are so many things that Paul is just discovering like there are two ways of falling and that each one tells a story. That on the day she died, Lexy rearranged the books on their bookshelf and cooked an entire steak just for Lorelei. The books, the steak, and the apple tree all tell Paul that the day Lexy died wasn’t a usual day. There are so many questions and the only one who can answer them can’t even speak…yet.

Carolyn Parkhurst delivers a novel that is a thriller wrapped around a mystery and enclosed within an endearing and heartbreaking love story. Paul is our narrator and shares with us the moment he heard of Lexy’s death and then rewinds to show us how his and Lexy’s story began with their initial meeting and subsequent first date. His voice is rich in detail and overflows with the love he feels for his wife and the loss he experiences by a life cut tragically short. Every marriage has its ups and downs and Paul and Lexy’s marriage is no different; however, she was the yin to his yang and their union was symbiotic albeit sometimes tempestuous.

The Dogs of Babel is a beautiful, painful, thoughtful, and at times humorous story, but at its very core is a man grieving and desperate for answers. His obsession of finding out the truth from his dog is futile and ridiculous. We know it, his friends and colleagues know it, and even Paul himself knows it, but when you’re drowning, you’ll grasp for anything that can serve as a lifeline. In this case, his lifeline is Lorelei. Parkhurst gives us a memorable and stirring novel about the ones left behind when a sudden and untimely tragedy occurs. The ones left with questions, loneliness, and oftentimes guilt and whose daily goals are measured by mere breaths.

Paul Iverson was a linguist by profession, and he often made a game of seeing how many words he could make out of a name. He felt that these newly formed words somehow gave insight into the person themselves. With The Dogs of Babel, I see the words blood, desolate, loathe, and death, but I also see self, glee, holdfast, and heals. In the Bible, The Tower of Babel signified the beginning of the division of mankind through the infliction of diverse languages—punishment for man’s desire to reach the heavens for “godlike” status. But Parkhurst reminds us that grief and love are universal and transcend the written word or spoken language. They unite us in our healing and help us find a way to move forward…one breath at a time.

Rating: 5/5

*Book cover image attributed to www.goodreads.com

The Giver by Lois Lowry (YA Science Fiction)

The Giver

The Giver

Lois Lowry (Young Adult Science Fiction)

It is against the rules to brag. It is against the rules to keep your feelings hidden. It is against the rules to point out someone’s differences. There are a lot of rules in the community—rules that are very hard to change, but keep the community orderly, predictable, pleasant, and safe. Rules are good and will be followed or offenders will face the terrible punishment of release. Jonas has nothing to worry about because he follows the rules. What he is worried about is the Ceremony of Twelve where he, along with the community’s other twelve-year-olds, will be separated into an Assignment Group and receive training for adult life. Jonas isn’t sure what he is suited for: nurturer, doctor, speaker, engineer, laborer. When the big day finally arrives, Jonas isn’t assigned like the others. Instead, he is selected and for the first time in his life, he’ll know what’s it like to feel alone and apart.

Lois Lowry’s The Giver was published in 1993 and since that time, it has graced a spot on the American Library Association’s list of banned books. Life really does seem to imitate art since members in Lowry’s fictional community are themselves banned from reading all books except the dictionary and The Book of Rules. Lowry addressed this very issue in the F.A.Q. section of her website (www.loislowry.com) by saying, “I think banning books is a very, very dangerous thing. It takes away an important freedom. The world portrayed in The Giver is a world where choice has been taken away. It is a frightening world. Let’s work hard to keep it from truly happening.” Much of the resistance to The Giver stems from its targeted age group (grades 5-8) with the ALA considering the book “unsuited to age group”. I would tend to agree that the subjects discussed in this book are weighty and extremely complex (population control, free will, memory suppression, psychological manipulation). Interestingly, while some schools are banning this book, others are embracing it and actually making it required reading. With such sensitive topics as infanticide and geriatricide, The Giver is a book that clearly benefits from teacher-led group discussions. Talking about individual choice, the challenges of change, and the benefits and drawbacks of constancy can be debated and explored in a thoughtful and engaging environment.

One of the things that Jonas learns from the Giver is that the community was built to protect people from their own wrong choices. Almost like the ALA and their list of books. As Lowry said on her site, “Any time there is an attempt to ban a book, you should fight it as hard as you can. It’s okay for a parent to say, ‘I don’t want my child to read this book.’ But it is not okay for anyone to try to make that decision for other people.” We’re fighting, Ms. Lowry, as hard as we can.

Reviewer’s Note: The Giver is the first in a series of four books. All take place in the same futuristic time era but have different protagonists.

Rating: 4/5

* Book cover image attributed to www.barnesandnoble.com

The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler (Mystery)

The Big Sleep

The Big Sleep

Raymond Chandler (Adult Fiction Mystery)

“It was about eleven o’clock in the morning, mid October, with the sun not shining and a look of hard wet rain in the clearness of the foothills. I was wearing my powder-blue suit, with dark blue shirt, tie and display handkerchief, black brogues, black wool socks with dark blue clocks on them. I was neat, clean, shaved and sober, and I didn’t care who knew it. I was everything the well-dressed private detective ought to be. I was calling on four million dollars.”

Philip Marlowe is thirty-eight, single, and makes a living as a private detective charging clients $25 per day plus expenses. It pays the rent. Then a case arrives involving a very wealthy General Guy Sternwood. The general is being blackmailed (again) and he wants Marlowe to handle the matter “personally”. Over the next five days, Marlowe becomes embroiled in pornography, gambling, missing persons, and murder. It’s just an average week in the life of Philip Marlowe.

The Big Sleep is a gritty, edgy crime novel where the skirts are tight, the brandy is served cold, and cigarette smoke permeates every square inch of a room. Chandler’s writing is sharp and crisp and the similes and metaphors fly around faster than bullets: “He sounded like a man who had slept well and didn’t owe too much money.” or “Her whole body shivered and her face fell apart like a bride’s pie crust.” Chandler wrote this book about fifty years before the introduction of “girl power” so readers shouldn’t be surprised at seeing women being objectified, marginalized, abused (they tend to get slapped around a LOT), and vilified. But it really wouldn’t be the same book if some blonde-haired Trixie kept pulling Marlowe out of tight fixes. Would it?

Chandler entertains us with a book that’s as humorous as it is dark. The only downside is his penchant for overly describing everything. True, we know exactly what a character looks like (down to his sock pattern) or how a room is laid out (as well as the color of the wallpaper), but the momentum of the story is dragged down by the weight of these excessive details. Still, this is a small price to pay considering Chandler gives us such gems as, “Neither of the two people in the room paid any attention to the way I came in, although only one of them was dead.” It’s good to be Philip Marlowe.

Reviewer’s Note: The version read was published in 2011 by Thinking Ink Media and should be avoided due to numerous editing errors found throughout the book.

Rating: 4/5

*Book cover image attributed to www.amazon.com

The Wheel on the School by Meindert DeJong (J)

The Wheel on the School

The Wheel on the School

Meindert DeJong (Juvenile Fiction)

Welcome to Shora, a fishing village in Holland on the shore of the North Sea in Friesland. Shora has some houses, a church, a clock tower, and a school, but it is the school children that makes this town—this story—so special. Of these six school children, there is only one girl and her name is Lina. One day, in the middle of arithmetic, Lina asks a question that will set in motion a series of events that will change their little village forever: “Teacher, may I read a little story about storks?” You see, no one can remember a time when there were storks in Shora and Lina’s essay made everyone begin to wonder and ask why this was so. So begins the story of Jella, Eelka, Auka, twins Pier and Dirk, and Lina who share a common dream of bringing the storks back to Shora. But for now, that dream would have to wait…at least until after arithmetic.

Every now and then, a book comes along that reminds you why you fell in love with reading. Meindert DeJong’s story about a small Dutch village is such a book. It’s a charming and enchanting story about how a single dream ignited the imagination and united a village. DeJong brings the reclusive, the misunderstood, and the outsider together to show that each has importance and value. His message of inclusion and acceptance is delivered warmly and lovingly and gives readers a sense of hope and faith and the promise that perhaps dreams really can come true.

The Wheel on the School is a brilliant gem that shows us how a legless man could still walk tall among his fellow fishermen, how a heavyset and slow boy could become a hero, how a lonely grandmother could become a friend, and how a girl could be just as strong and brave as the boys. Mostly, this story reminds us that even in the midst of the impossible, lies the possible.

Rating: 5/5

* Book cover image attributed to www.amazon.com

The Girl Who Fell from the Sky by Heidi W. Durrow

The Girl Who Fell From the Sky

The Girl Who Fell from the Sky

Heidi W. Durrow (Adult Fiction)

Rachel Morse is eleven years old and living with her paternal grandmother in Portland, Oregon. Born to a Danish mother and an African-American GI father, she finds herself caught between two very different worlds and struggles to find a place somewhere in the middle. However, it is the early 1980s and Rachel is often forced to choose between black and white: “I see people two different ways now: people who look like me and people who don’t look like me.” She builds her world around “last-time things” (like speaking Danish or saying Mor, which means mother) and “first-time things” (like feeling shame or excluded) and lives each day storing her anger and hurt inside an imaginary bottle. Fighting against a tragic past and facing an uncertain future, will Rachel have to give up one part of herself in order to embrace the other?

Durrow gives us a haunting and heartbreaking coming-of-age story about a biracial girl desperately trying to find her place in the world. Like Rachel, Durrow’s mother was Danish, her father was a black serviceman, and she possesses a set of piercing-blue eyes. We can see what Durrow must have dealt with as we see Rachel longing to fit in and be accepted. Rachel’s backstory is tragic and unimaginable and one can only imagine the inner strength our young heroine possesses in order to avoid a fate like her mother’s. The beginning of the book is a little confusing as Durrow floods the reader with several characters in various situations across different points in time. The storyline eventually smooths out, but then you begin to understand the meaning behind the title. This launches the story in an unpredictable direction and the pace never slows from there.

Perhaps the most distressing storyline belongs to Nella, Rachel’s mother. A Danish immigrant, she is unused to the treatment her biracial children face in America (her marriage was generally accepted in Europe). As a mother, she loves her children unconditionally and vows to protect them at all costs. She is broken by the injustices thrown at her children and wonders why people are unable to see her children as she does: “My children are one half of black. They are also one half of me. I want them to be anything. They are not just a color that people see.”

The Girl Who Fell from the Sky is haunting and harrowing. It is not one of those feel-good books that is wrapped up in a pretty bow. Instead, we are given a story that is raw and poignant and uncomfortably ugly but honest. Under anyone else’s pen, the reader might be left with a sense of hopelessness, but Durrow is, in a sense, telling us her own story which, at its very core, is a story of survival. A story where a girl refuses to be boiled down to simply this or that. She is more than just the sum of her parts and her acceptance of this is enough to give us a relatively satisfying ending. As Rachel says, “I’m not the new girl. I’m not the color of my skin. I’m a story. One with a past and a future unwritten.” And with that, the girl who fell from the sky realized that she had wings and could fly.

Rating: 4/5

*Book cover image attributed to www.amazon.com

Abel’s Island by William Steig (J)

Abels Island

Abel’s Island

William Steig (Juvenile Fiction)

Abelard Hassam di Chirico Flint, of the Mossville Flints, is a very pampered mouse who likes things “just so”. Living off the wealth of his mother, he shares a comfortable house with his wife, Amanda, and lives a life that is predictable, satiable, and pleasant. But on one particular day, during a perfectly nice picnic, Abel’s life is turned upside down when a sudden hurricane separates him from everyone he loves and all that he knows. Lost and alone, can one small mouse—who has been surrounded by ease and extravagance all his life—conjure up enough wit and grit to survive?

I grew up adoring William Steig’s Sylvester and the Magic Pebble and so I was delighted to see that Abel’s Island shared the same valuable moral: possessions can never equal the riches and wealth provided by family. Abel’s cup overflows with friends, family, and fortune, but when circumstances place him in a life-or-death situation, he begins to question his life and his worth and wonders if there might be a bigger being in charge: “Was it just an accident that he was here on this uninhabited island? Abel began to wonder. Was he being singled out for some reason: was he being tested? If so, why?” All of us, at one time or another, have felt like Abel. That just when life seems to be going along swimmingly, the rug suddenly is pulled right out from under us. Is it because we’ve become too complacent? Too comfortable? Or is it simply a reminder of how fragile and temporary life is and that every minute should be cherished and savored and never taken for granted.

I love books for young readers that reinforce the idea that there is strength, resilience, and courage in each of us and these things are waiting for just the right opportunity to emerge. A. A. Milne passed away twenty years before Abel was born on paper, but the words of encouragement that he offered to a bear full of stuff and fluff could very well have been meant for Abel as well: “You’re braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.” In the end, Abel proved that he WAS quite able after all. Silly old mouse.

Rating: 5/5

* Book cover image attributed to www.amazon.com

Chosen by a Horse – Susan Richards (Memoir)

Chosen by a Horse

Chosen by a Horse

Susan Richards (Memoir)

She was only five years old when she was given her first horse. Her grandmother had given it to her and its name was Bunty. From that moment on, Susan Richards’s love for horses would be equaled only by her love for books and writing. Horses, like books, were Susan’s escape from a world filled with abuse, betrayal, and loss. For the first time in her memory, her life now was happy on her farm with her three horses. But on a cold March day, Susan received an urgent call from the SPCA asking for emergency foster homes for a number of abused race horses. Susan didn’t hesitate to heed the call. When she arrived, how could she ever have known that a gentle and lame horse named Lay Me Down would not only choose Susan to be her rescuer, but would ultimately be the one that would rescue Susan.

Chosen by a Horse is an emotional and loving memoir about two broken and neglected souls who miraculously found each other. Susan describes Lay Me Down’s ability to trust and love again to be far easier than her own by writing, “Unlike me, Lay Me Down seemed to feel no rancor. In spite of everything, she was open and trusting of people, qualities I decidedly lacked…What exactly was it that enabled an abused animal, for lack of a better word, to love again?” Susan’s struggle to commit and trust was clearly detailed throughout the book. Through all of her emotional battles, she couldn’t have asked for nor gotten a better mentor than Lay Me Down. Her quiet faith and hope would inspire Susan to take another chance and to trust in another…even if it meant getting hurt all over again.

You don’t have to be a horse-lover to appreciate this book and its message of second chances, survival, and healing. Anyone who has ever opened their home and heart to an animal will be touched, moved, and inspired by this heartbreakingly beautiful and compassionate story. “In the steady gaze of the horse shines a silent eloquence that speaks of love and loyalty, strength and courage. It is the window that reveals to us how willing is his spirit, how generous is his heart.”—Author Unknown. Susan Richards heard the silent words spoken by a broken horse and it was those words that helped heal her broken heart. How blessed was she to be chosen by a horse.

Rating: 5/5

*Book cover image attributed to www.amazon.com