Book Review Ask the Passengers

King, A. S. (2013). Ask the passengers: A novel. New York: Little, Brown and Company.

Astrid Jones is a teen girl who lives in a small town full of close-minded people, possibly falls in love with a girl and begins to question her sexuality. She keeps her questions to herself for the time being, not sure of her own feelings and fearing the reactions of her family and openly intolerant community. But one day Astrid’s cover is blown, and she is forced to face the fallout.  The novel has vivid and memorable characters and very interesting family dynamics. Astrid sends her love to strangers. She gives it away to passengers in the sky, because that’s the only way she’ll be free. Her demanding, over-controlling mother talks at her, her dad smokes weed, and her sister worries too much about her reputation to be of any help. Astrid’s perception of her surroundings struck me as wise and authentic; her narration has a relaxed that endured her to me. Through her I witnessed the conflicts within a dysfunctional family and a small town.

Grade Level Recommendation: 9-12^th

Below is the author’s website

https://www.as-king.com/

Book Review The Baby-Sitters Club Kristy's Great Idea

Martin, Ann M. (Lecturer with the Open University). (n.d.). Kristy’s Great Idea: Full Color Edition (the Baby-Sitters Club Graphix #1): Full Color Edition. Graphix.

I devoured this book in one day!!! It brought back such good memories when reading the classic books growing up! I was obsessed with everything BSC I even had the board game!!!! It was great to live through these characters stores in a new way. Divorce, diabetes, weird babysitting jobs…it’s all still relevant. I was very impressed by the full color graphic pictures! I am not a fan of graphic novels but leave it to the BSC to make me a fan!  It was great to have my favorite characters come back to life Kristy, Claudia, Mary Anne, and Stacy. The book still has all the classic elements of a YA reader such as friendship, drama, first loves, divorce, and just trying to fit in and get through highschool.

Grade Level Recommendations 3-7

 More great books in this series 

Book Review Grasshopper Jungle

Smith, A. (2015). Grasshopper jungle. London: Electric Monkey.

Austin is a 16-year-old living in Eagling, Iowa. He is in love with his girlfriend Shann and he is also in love with his best friend Robbie. This book was very weird, quirky, and strange. Austin is real all American teenage male, who happens to be bi-sexual but he’s still trying to figure that out. The book includes many themes of sexuality and friendship from a teenage boy point of view. The book also includes a giant praying mantises that burst out of plague victims’ bodies and are about to take over the world. The book was very vulgar. I don’t think I’ve read the words “horny”, “balls”, or “sperm” so much. The novel over all was very engaging because it was just so absurd, but you wanted to know what was going to happen next.

The greatest things about the novel was the first-person narration. Austin was telling us the story in is retrospective style narration that would even ventur3e off into omniscient narration. As the reader this gave us so many angles to the story, we were aware of everything that was going on in the story.  The novel has received many awards including a Michael L. Printz Award Nominee in 2015, Milwaukee County Teen Book Award Nominee, Boston Globe-Horn Book Award for Fiction.

Grade Level Recommendations: 9-12^th

Below is a trailer for the book

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hoab5CT4ccg

Below is the author Andrew Smith website

http://www.authorandrewsmith.com/Author_Andrew_Smith/Home.html

Book Review Piecing Me Together

Watson, R. (2017). Piecing me together. London: Bloomsbury.

This is a coming of age story for a young African American girl Jade. Jade is trying to make a positive impact in her life by taking every opportunity. She is on a scholarship from a mostly white school and is e3xpereincing that fish out of water feeling. Jade knows what she wants unlike most teenagers. She knows that she wants to escape her poor neighborhood, go to a great college on a scholarship, and eventually buy her mama the house she isn’t able to afford on her own. 

The book follows Jade's year of school as she faces challenges with friends, her mentor, and discusses topics of racial identity (both within and outside of the black community), history & politics, and the thing that's most important to Jade—her art. She makes beautiful collages and is inspired by her life to put pieces together as she tries to come to terms with her own identity as a young woman, a black girl, and someone straddling so many divides.  This book was a true resonate with me as an African American woman I see myself in this beautiful complicated heroine as she pieces herself together. Piecing Me Together has received several awards including Newberry Medal Nominee, Los Angels Times Book Prize Nominee for Young Adult Literature, Coretta Scott King Award for Author.

Grade Level Recommendation: 7^th-12^th

Below is a book talk with the author Renee Watson with Urban Teachers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lNVhS48QMqw

Book Review Ghost

Reynolds, J. (2016). Ghost. New York, NY: Atheneum.

       Castle Crenshaw goes by the name Ghost, because he is a wicked fast runner. The first time he ran, he was running for his life. Ghost and his mother are not well off; his father attempted to shoot them one drunken night, and Ghost retains a certain amount of fear and desire to run from that traumatic night. His mother, meanwhile, is struggling financially, and is studying to become a nurse.  Now that her is older, Ghose puts his natural talent to work by running track. But he’s not running toward the finish line, he’s running away from his past and the anger he’s got buried deep inside of him and this story unfolds as he is trying to figure it all out.

 This book is the first of Jason Reynold’s middle grade series about track. Jason Reynolds manages to squeeze numerous topics into his books without making the narrative feel over crowded. Ghost touches on thievery, gun violence, bullying, drug abuse, honesty, family dynamics, friendship, and healthy ways to channel anger and hurt into positive action. It is more than just a sports story, it was a sensitive, realistic look at a young person dealing with trauma and trying to avoid the crushing effect of racism, poverty, and abuse. Ghost has won many awards including Odyssey Award Nominee, Dorothy Canfield Fisher Children’s Book Award Nominee, NAIBA Book of the Year for Middle Readers, NCTE Charlotte Huck Award, Great Lakes Great Books Award for 6-8, YALSA 2017 Top Ten Best Fiction for Young Adults.

Grade Level Recommendations: 5^th-9^th

Author Jason Reynolds Website

https://www.jasonwritesbooks.com/

 Patina (Track Book  #2) 

Sunny (Track Book  #3) 

LU (Track Book #4) 

Book Review Tell Me Three Things

Buxbaum, J. (2016). Tell me three things. New York: Random House.

   I  adored this book! I can see why it made the YALSA 2017 Top Ten Quick Pick for Reluctant Young Adult Readers. The book was humors, quick paced, and adorable! Two years following the death of her mother, Jessie’s father springs the fact that he has fallen in love and eloped! Jessie must leave everything she knows in Chicago to move in with her new stepmother and her teenage son. Things aren’t going so well for Jessie it appears that her step brother seems completely disinterested in her. The kids in her new school seem to have known another forever. He father is so happy an in love he ignored how hard this is for her.

    Jessie is struggling to fit in at Wood Valley Hight School. Out of the blue she receives helpful emails which later turn into text messages from “Somebody Nobody.” She begins to meet so many wonderful characters and with each male one she encounters she wonders if he could possibly be her SN. Who is SN? He seems to be perfect and goes to her school. Yet she’s not sure which great guy he could be and is almost scared that he’s not who she wants him to be. 

Through the new friends she has made and her chats with the mysterious SN jessie makes her own way in L.A.

   I adored how the author gifted Jessie the one thing everyone wants which is to feel truly seen and to feel known and that’s exactly what she has with SN. The reveal of SN has me on edge and that is the key to making this book so suspenseful!! It is kind of predictable, yet you scared to find out who SN is. It’s a modern fresh take on a secret admirer that made this so book so charming!

Grade Level Recommendation: 7-9

Book Trailer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0VYs_bK2uPM

Book Review The Hate U Give

Thomas, A. (2017). The hate u give. NY: HarperCollins

The truth casts a shadow over the kitchen—people like us in situations like this become hashtags, but they rarely get justice. I think we all wait for that one time though, that one time when it ends right.
Maybe this can be it.

       The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas is the best book for every single young adult and adult in 2017!!!! The book is inspired by the BlackLivesMatter movement.  Everyone needs to read this book. That is how powerful, transparent, and hopeful this book leaves you. The main character is a teenage black girl, Starr Carter, who lives in a crime-riddled neighborhood, so each day she leaves her home, Garden Heights, to attend an affluent school across town, Williamson Prep.  So she is faced with the realities of living a double life. She must navigate through both worlds. She gets to be herself with her black friend and in her neighborhood. She must be another person with her predominantly white wealthy friends from her school.

      One night she attends a party in her neighborhood that turn violent. After leaving the party with her childhood friend, Khalil, her life and her community is forever changes. A traffic stop turns tragic when unarmed Khalil is repeatedly shot by a police officer after failing to follow police instructions. Khalil goes to pick up a hairbrush and is killed by the police office. When reading the book I felt like Khalil was the face of all the many recent police killings of unarmed young black men in America. The events of that night serve as the spark that sets off an explosion. Starr’s neighborhood has a long-standing animosity for the police, citing multiple instances of police brutality and harassment. This book addressed every single contemporary topic on race relations, police, social, political, and economic issues that our country is facing at this moment. This book gives a human voice to the debate that dived this country BlackLivesMatter, AllLivesMatter, BlueLivesMatter. All the characters in the book are full dimensional and have powerful voices.

         The literary element was the most powerful in this book was Thomas’s use of symbolism throughout the book. There are two that embodied the theme and tone of this novel. The author Angie Thomas publicly states that rapper Tupac Shuakur’ was an inspiration because she wanted this book to be a platform and give voice to her activism jut like Tupac used his art as a platform for activism. Tupac Shakur’s concept of THUG LIFE- The Hate U Give Little Infants Fucks Everybody- is an important motif in the novel and the source of the books title. Tupac’s acronym explains the evil nature of poverty and crime.

        The reason for the poverty and crime is a result of an oppressive, racist social system. Starr and Khalil discuss the acronym shortly before Khalil’s death, and Starr discusses Tupac’s message with her father later, she concludes that she can’t be silent about the shooting. She must use her voice to speak out against the horrible incident. This motif/symbol is carried throughout the entire novel. It represents the darkness of the world that we live in every day. But, the second symbol is what makes this book so powerful and inspirational.

       The second symbol is Black Jesus is a symbol of love, hope, and strength of African-American in the face of oppression. Maverick makes Jesus black and leads his family in a group prayer each morning. The family get strength from this prayer every day. Black Jesus is a symbol of religion and the hope and belief in a greater good. That we must have faith and hope that things will get better.  It represents the hope and light of humanity that despite all the hate in the world that there is still love and light.

  The Hate U Give is powerful, emotional, and inspirational. I look forward to more books by Angie Thomas because her voice is needed. The book has won numerous awards most notable is the Coretta Scott King Award Nominee for Author Honor, National Book Award Nominee for Young People’s Literature, Carnegie Medal Nominee, NAACP Image Award Nominee for Youth/Teens, Michael L. Printz Honor Award.

Grade Level Recommendations: 9-12^th

Author’s Website

http://angiethomas.com/

Book Review

Books and Big Hair

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkGip0FD3sE

Interview with Angie Thomas on her inspiration for The Hate U Give

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6ufAb82GJ0

Official Movie Trailer The Hate U Give

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3MM8OkVT0hw

Teacher Resources

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/THE-HATE-U-GIVE-by-Angie-Thomas-Complete-Study-Unit-Editable-3164632

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/THE-HATE-U-GIVE-UNIT-PLAN-COMMON-CORE-APPROVED-3682947

Book Review The Fault In Our Stars

Green, J. (2013). The fault in our stars. London: Penguin books.

The Fault In Our Stars is love story full of humor, sadness, friendship, and hope. The book is written in first person view of one of the main characters Hazel Grace Lancaster. Hazel has Stage IV cancer and is only being kept alive by a medicine that keeps her tumor from growing.  She attends a church support group where she meets a friend Issac and a boy who becomes the love of her life and changes her life for ever Augustus Waters. He also has cancer but is in remission. The friendship starts with Hazel sharing her favorite book by author Peter Van Houten An Imperial Affliction. Hazel is reluctant to have feelings for Augustus because of her cancer. Through the course of this book the relationship between Hazel and Augustus turn into an epic love story.

Honestly this book was beautifully written and the themes throughout the book make all the characters three dimensional. Somehow while reading the book it’s not just about two kids dying of terminal cancer but that they begin to live despite of dying. There are several heavy themes throughout the story such as the meaning of life and death, friendship, and love.  The characters have different opinions of life and death, and what happens after death, and the meaning of life. It is weave throughout the book in delicate matter but makes the reader pause and emotionally react to those intense scenes in the book.

Friendship is another theme throughout the book and Green also show a platonic friendship between Hazel and Issacs. Through friendship empathy is shown. Maybe its because the main characters have cancer and have developed a great deal of empathy towards everyone because they are dying.  The last theme throughout the whole book is love. Romantic, friendship, and familial love themes runs deep throughout the book. Augustus who falls head over heals in the love with Hazel and wants to proclaim it and shower her in it. But Hazel fears love doesn’t want to hurt him because she is dying. The love shown between both Hazel and Augustus family is true, enduring, and faithful love.

This is truly wonderful writing by Green. I didn’t even feel like I was reading a YA book. This realistic fiction books pulls at the heart strings but leaves you hopeful for Hazel Grace Lancaster because of love and friendship that she had with Augustus. The Fault In Our Stars has received many awards, highly acclaimed, New York Times #1 bestseller, and was made into a full-length motion picture in 2014.

“As he read, I fell in love the way you fall asleep: slowly, and then all at once.”

Hazel (p.125)

Below is the trailer to the motion picture The Fault In Our Stars

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mHlzhHaAQjA

The author John Green website

http://www.johngreenbooks.com/

Book Review Persepolis The Story of A Childhood

Satrapi, M. (2004). Persepolis. NY: Pantheon

       This book is a graphic novel that is an autobiographical memoir by Marjane Satrapi. I have read several graphic novels, but I will admit it’s not my favorite genre of books. So this was a difficult read for read for me. The novel is mostly about her childhood living in Iran in turbulent times. It takes place in the late 70’s and early 80’s. The novel depicts what life was like for her in a changing country. Marjane and her parents are rebels against the new regime. The book is written from the viewpoint of Marjane. The book shows how Marjane adjusts to new restrictive lifestyle as well as a history of the country told by her.

       The drawings are black and white and child like because the story is told from the perspective of Marjane during childhood. Throughout the novel Marjane feels a tension between the glorious and great past of the Persian Empire and the violence and problems of modern Iran.  The book follows her childhood through the turbulent times. Marjane grows up to become a “rebel” and, after a confrontation with one of her teachers and she is kicked out of school. The Satrapi’s fear that the country is no longer safe for their daughter send her away. They send Marjane to Austria to attend a French school.  This novel is on the banned books list for young adult literature. The author went on to write three more books.

Below is an article published in Vogue where Emma Watson interviewed Marjane Satrapi

https://www.vogue.com/article/emma-watson-interviews-marjane-satrapi

Book Review Staying Fat for Sarah Brynes

Crutcher, C. (2003). Staying fat for Sarah Byrnes. New York, NY: Greenwillow Books, an imprint of HarperCollins.

        Eric Calhoune (Moby) is the fat kid in his school and his best friend Sarah Brynes is the weird girl whose body is covered with burn scars. His senior year Moby joins the swim team, he starts to lose the unwanted weight and is starting to fit in and gain popularity. When Moby starts to lose weight, he is faced with another problem. He believes if he loses the weight there won’t be a bond that brought him and Sarah Brynes together in the first place. I really enjoyed how all the characters in this book were invested in Moby and Sarah Brynes. It was also refreshing to see a true friendship in Sarah Brynes and Moby that did not turn into a romantic relationship.

       In addition Ms. Lemry was a great adult character in the book. It is difficult for teenagers to seek help from adults who will really listen and try to help them with everyday problems. It felt good to see that there was a connection with adults and teenagers in a positive way. The plot moved at a steady pace. The author also included the background of how Moby and Sarah Bynres became friends. The author does a good job on taking on several young adult issues such as obesity, domestic violence and the importance of life relatable. The book reminds you that adults can be horrible villains, make and do bad things to kids all the time. But adults can also be loving, brave, courageous heroes. All it takes is for you as an adult to build a trusting relationship like Ms. Lemry. In my opinion she was the true hero, light, and hope in this book. This book won the California Young Readers Medal for Young Adults. Below I have linked the author’s Chris Crutcher website.

Grade Level Recommendation: 9-12^th  

http://www.chriscrutcher.com/