If You're Still within the Sound of My Voice

So this is one of the best songs ever.  And Glen Campbell has had some great ones.  This is the last book in the Secret Language of Girls trilogy.  I read the first one a long time ago and the second one since I've been doing the blog.  I highly recommend this series, but read them in order.  The friendship of Marilyn and Kate has changed as much as the girls have changed individually.  This was a very satisfying end to the series, told with the usual wisdom by the talented Frances O'Roark Dowell.  My only criticism of Dowell is that she wrote more! 

Fish Story

When I was a little girl, I won a goldfish as my elementary school Fun Day. This little dude lasted a really long time! I know I still had him in eighth grade. I know that is weird. But I am sure that he wasn't replaced, like the goldfish in The Fourteenth Goldfish. My parents hated that fish! They couldn't wait for him to die! I'm not sure why, because I did take care of him. I know that my cats enjoyed looking at him, too.

But that is neither here nor there.

The title of The Fourteenth Goldfish refers to the whole goldfish drama that Ellie went through, or didn't have to go through, rather, over goldfish. When Ellie was in preschool she had a rather progressive teacher and at the end of the year she gave all of the students a goldfish. The thing was, goldfish aren't supposed to live very long and their death would teach the children about the circle of life. Ellie's goldfish didn't teach her that though, because her fish never died. Her parents kept replacing it! Very clever.

The Fourteenth Goldfish is written by Jennifer L. Holm who also wrote, Turtle in Paradise, which I absolutely loved.   This book is kind of like the Intergalatic Bed and Breakfast series in that it is science fiction, but it good, meaty, growing-up stuff within its pages as well!  TFG is a growing up story, and a funny one.  Ellie's grandfather is a scientist who has found the Fountain of Youth, in the form of a jellyfish.  Instead of being a guy in his late 70s, he is now a young teen again.  Is that good, or is it bad?  There is a lot to be learned in this book, about growing up and moving on, about being more than you thought you could be.  It's about fathers and daughters and loss and the circle of life.  It's about science and art and the in between.  But it is hilarious and not preachy and not predictable.  I really, really loved this book and will find it very easy to recommend!  I was excited to get this on netgalley and look forward to its release! 

How did I miss this?

I do hate when I miss a book that I wish I could have read when it first came out.  I had no idea that Turn to Stone, a novella from Brian Freeman came out in February.  Man, man, man....this was so good and creepy. And it is a Jonathan Stride WITHOUT EVIL MAGGIE!  And it is set in the great state of Wisconsin!  But it is evil and creepy and I learned that the German word for the devil is teufel.  I had no idea who the bad guy/girl was.  I was always guessing.  So well done.  So so so well done.  Freeman has become my favorite mystery/detective author.  It is official!

If Only I Hadn't Seen Nell

I finally read the first book in The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place series, The Mysterious Howling.  I have always loved the cover, drawn by Jon Klassen.  And now I see that there are illustrations in the book, which I totally must look at because I missed them, being that I listened to this one!  Klassen is super, super amazing!  But I have to say, I really did enjoy the listening as well.  The reader did a great, great job.   Katherine Kellgren is her name.  Awesome!   I never wanted to read it though because it seemed long and I thought it was going to be too much like School of Fear.  Which I did like, but I stopped at the first one.
Anyway, this book was recommended to me by a gal named Gracie who reads everything and anything and really never steers me wrong, so downloaded it!
I gave this four of five stars because of the movie Nell.  This was a terrible, terrible movie.  Well I don't know if it was terrible, but it disturbed me so much!  And then there was the movie Mama, which I really liked even though it was super disturbing.  But when I started this book I had just left the house after seeing a bit of the Dr. Phil episode about the boy who was abused and kept under the stairs of his father's house.  So when I started listening to this book and realized the whole premise is that three children were discovered living in the woods, having been raised by wolves...well, it made me kinda ill.  But then I know I am being weird.  But still...it just hung over it for me.  And kept it from being a 5 of 5.
The thing is, this book is really smart and funny.  And the children are wonderful, as is their nanny.  Maybe if I just hadn't seen Nell and Mama and Dr. Phil...

Tiger, tiger burning bright....

The whole "Tiger, tiger burning bright" is the only part of the poem The Tiger that I remember at all, but I think we had to memorize it back in high school.  So much for that.  How sad.  I've also seen it written with a "y" instead of an "i" but I don't why.  Oh!  I am a poet!
Not really.
Okay.  So my friend, Mrs. Sawyer, her grandson is in Thailand.  And here he is with a tiger!  Is that not the coolest thing you have ever seen?  Apparently before tigers get to be two years old, you can hang with them like that!  Of course, I think maybe all of the tigers that Ted took a picture with are girl tigers and who could resist a guy like Ted!  Is he adorable or what?  You can read about all of his journeys here.
Of course, I am rambling.  I don't know what to say about DiCamillo's The Tiger Rising except that it is one of those books that everyone should read.  Kids, teens and adults.  I feel that way about The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane, too.  Great, great stuff here.  It makes you understand that a writer like DiCamillo just KNOWS more about life than a lot of us, well at least more than me anyway, that is for sure.  A wonderful, beautiful book.

What Happened?

I knew that Hex Hall was over, but then when School Spirits came out, I thought we were in for another series!  And we are in for another series from the awesome Rachel Hawkins, but the series is completely new and it is called Rebel Belle and this is the first one.
I did like Rebel Belle, but I think I had a bad attitude about it because I was hoping for School Spirits #2, which I guess isn't coming.  The other thing that didn't blow me away about this book is the mythology part.  Now that said, I know that mythology part is just the very thing that will make this popular with girls who liked the Percy Jackson series, and there are a ton of girls who did! It just wasn't my thing.   I love the set-in-south deal of this book and it comes across as very authentic.  I liked the main character too, she is a driven, I-have-to-do-everything-perfectly kind of girl who realizes that life is far from perfect.  I gave this one 3 of 5 stars, but just because of my personal disinterest in mythology, not because it isn't a good book.  I will probably read the second one.  I will be able to recommend this to a lot of people.

I Wonder...

If anyone remembers this song.  When I saw the title of the new Jenny Han book, To All the Boys I've Loved Before, I was instantly reminded of that song.  And then it hit me...probably no one else who reads this book will think about that song.  Because the song is super old!  True it has its own wikipedia entry, but 1984 was a long, long, long time ago.  Even Jenny Han herself is too young to remember the song, really.  She was only four when it came out!
But that is neither here nor there.
To All the Boys I've Loved Before is the first in a series.  I wonder if it will be a trilogy like The Summer I Turned Pretty.  I loved, loved, loved that series.
I did love this book, too, but I wasn't as goo-goo, madly obsessed with it as I have been with other Han books.  I am not sure why.  I still gave it four of five stars and it will be totally easy to recommend it.
What I loved about this book is that it is just so true to life.  Han has once again created believable characters.  Yes, some teens are having sex.  But some are not.  Some of the teens in this book have sex (but it is not described at all) but the main character doesn't.  She doesn't want to.  And yes, she is still normal!  The other thing I loved about TATBILB is that Lara Jean, the main character, really grows during the story.  She does a lot of realistic self-evaluation.  Her growth as a person is shown so well, not overbearing and obvious, but just an evolution, just like in real life, not a made-for-tv movie.
Once again, as in The Summer I Turned Pretty, loss plays a part in this novel.  Lara Jean's mother died when she was young and you can see how she, and her older and younger sister, and their father have been impacted by that.  It is great to see a really great father figure in this book, too.
This is a great little book and I am looking forward to the next one, which I will read for sure.

Maggie, I Wish Stride'd Never Seen Your Face

Okay.  That is a terrible post title.  A real groaner.  But man...EVERY TIME Maggie opens her mouth it results in a groan.  She is such a miserable woman.  MISERABLE.  The Cold Nowhere was one of the best books I have read this year.  How I LOVE Jonathan Stride.  And that is why I wish that Maggie would just. go. away. 
I also think that Maggie was probably a PTS and also that she could be best friends with Jen, the other evil woman who is out to hurt another man I love, Jesse Stone! 
I waited and waited so long for this book and it was worth the wait.  I read in a review somewhere that it seems like Freeman is unable to write a bad sentence and I couldn't agree more.  Even though there is love in the book, it didn't bother me at all.  I am pretty excited about seeing Duluth again, when I travel to Minnesota in June. 

I Gave in!

I had said for years that I would never read Hate that Cat, just because of the name!  I love, love, love kitties and just couldn't imagine reading a book with a title like that!  But then, Creech book after Creech book...I knew I had to read it. And I am so glad I did.  I read Love that Dog so long ago, I had forgotten that Walter Dean Myers is mentioned in it.  And you know how I love Mr. Walter Dean Myers!
I both listened to and read this book and I highly recommend that. 
It was neat to be reminded of the poetry of William Carlos Williams, of The Red Wheelbarrow fame!  I thought it was pretty funny that the boy writes about his uncle, who likes to fight with everyone, and thinks he is always right.  He says that his uncle told him that poems need to rhyme and that his poems were not good.  He also said that William Carlos Williams was a "minor poet."  I just found that very amusing, and I know that people can be like that uncle!  I thought that it was cool, too that this toady uncle was a college professor, just proving that even people in "important" jobs can also be wrong! 
Great book and well, I loved how the boy came to know the truth about cats!

Dark and Grim Tales...

These little stories don't have anything to do with the A Tale Dark and Grimm series.  The Key and The Brothers Piggett are two stories from a collection that came out recently called Grim.  I am reading so many different books right now, but as soon as I am done with Rebel Belle, I am going to read this one.  I really, really liked The Key and wish it would have been longer.  I loved everything I've ever read by Rachel Hawkins and this short story was no exception.  I did like the one by Kagawa, too!  In fact, I loved that as well, even though some folks disagree on that one.  I thought it was super creepy and told really well.  What are these stories?  Well, you can probably figure it out!  Creepy fairy tales, of course! 

More of Alvin...

Alvin has a new member of the family!  I do hope that this is not a Jump the Shark situation, because that would make me very sad!  Alvin Ho:  allergic to babies, burglars and other bumps in the night is the fifth book and if you take a look on goodreads, there are a lot of folks who didn't like this one at all.  Some folks thought Alvin and the gang came across as too naive or too stupid to be believed.  I don't know.  I enjoyed the book.  I have to say I gave it a four of five, though.  I mean that is still really good...but I will have to see how the sixth one goes. 

How much misery has there been? Is there still?

Before We Were Free taught me a lot.  It is the story of Anita, living in the Dominican Republic near the end of the reign of Rafael Trujillo, whom I had never heard of, I am embarrassed to say.  This book won the Pura Belpré Award in 2004, instead of the Newbery, of course, no shock there.  That went to The Tale of Despereaux, which I have not read...but come on, not even a Newbery Honor to BWWF?  Olive's Ocean got an Honor that year....really?   And this didn't?  Feels like 1954 to me.  This was the first book I've ever read by Julia Álveraz but it won't be my last.  Incredible.

On Broadway!

Five, Six, Seven Nate is a clever title, the second in the story of Nate, a tween we first met in Better Nate Than Ever.  Tim Federle is rising star on Broadway and so all of the ins and outs of putting together a Broadway musical are here.  I don't know much about the business, but if this is what it is like, it is crazy and tedious and frustrating and wonderful all at the same time.  I gave this one four of five just because I got a little bogged down with the insider stuff, but that was more of a reflection of me than of the book.  If you have always wanted to be on the stage, you won't mind it at all.  This is a great, great book.

The Title Says It

Carnal Curiosities wastes no time.  Stone hops into a bed with the first woman he encounters in this twenty-ninth addition to the Stone Barrington series.  This is old-school Stone and Dino.  No great literature here, but that's not what you're looking for if you are Stone fan.  Great stuff.  Loved it, as always.

Life and Death in Children's Books

This addition to the Alvin Ho series was really, really well done.  In Alvin Ho:  allergic to dead bodies, funerals and other fatal circumstances, Alvin faces something that is really scary for a lot of people:  death.  Alvin's gunggung's best friend dies and Alvin tells gunggung that he will go to the funeral with him. This spins Alvin into a grand state of worry  He is worried that his gunggung will die and, well, things get pretty crazy.
I am still feeling icky about number three, but this book was right on, a five of five.  So I would say, skip three and roll right on to this one.

Blooming

It is spring.  Western Pennsylvania had a pretty cold and snowy winter, for Western Pennsylvania.  But today, it does really feel like spring.  Bloomability is not a real word, but it should be.  While the cover is quite ugly, the book is quite good.  What can you expect from Sharon Creech, though?  This lady makes magic every time she touches a pen to paper, or fingers to a keyboard, whatever way, it doesn't matter.  She has become one of my favorite writers.  What I think I particularly love about Ms. Creech is that she makes me love books that I usually wouldn't even think to read.  I remember first reading Love that Dog so many years ago.  I was NOT a poetry chick.  But wow.
The same thing goes for Bloomability.  It isn't set in the US!  I rarely enjoy books not set in the US, because I rarely read them, but still, when I do, I do not enjoy them at all.  Bloomability takes place in an international boarding school in Switzerland.  Here is some information about boarding schools in Switzerland!
Dinnie is a girl from the US who has a dad who is one of those adventurer-type dads.  The dad who is always looking for the a "great opportunity" and doesn't provide much stability to his family.  He is a good guy though, a free spirit and I love the way that Creech doesn't put him down.  He is always moving on for the next big thing and then his family follows after him.  Dinnie's older sister gets married when she is in high school, has a baby.  Her older brother is in and out of jail.  Dinnie's mom is a good lady, too.  But when the chance for a "great opportunity" opens up for Dinnie, she makes her take it, giving Dinnie and opportunity that she wouldn't have otherwise.  Dinnie's mom's sister is married to a man who has become the new headmaster at an American/International boarding school in Switzerland.  Dinnie can go to the school for free.
I am embarrassed that I didn't know that Italy and Switzerland were so close!  There is even a language called Swiss-Italian!
So this is a coming-of-age story, a respectful tale of difference families and lifestyles, a story of international relations on a personal scale, and just wow, a great little book.

Flea

In this world where money is king, it does surprise me that Flea doesn't have her own series.  Flea is a big part of Alvin's problems in this third installment:  Alvin Ho:  Allergic to Birthday Parties, Science Projects and Other Man-Made Catastrophes.
The thing that made me pause was the playing of "Indians." I was pretty surprised and I had to give it one star for that.
I did some looking around for thoughts on this.
And this is what I found.
I am not going to throw the baby out with the bathwater.  But this is pretty awful.
Had this been Henry Huggins, published in 1950, it could begin a conversation about how far we have come and why we don't put up with that today.  But man...this just makes so sense at all.
As you will see, I do still love Alvin.  I just really can't recommend this book in the series.

Fire! Fire!

These guys were pretty funny.  The Great Chicago Fire was not.  The book, The Great Fire, by Jim Murphy, was excellent.  A Newbery Honor Book, and well deserved.
Mr. Murphy brings the past alive.  I had no idea about the classism factor that was a part of the fire.  I do remember the story of Mrs. O'Leary's cow and hearing Judy sing, "Shout how-now to Mrs. O'Leary's cow." But somewhere in my head I thought that maybe the whole cow story was a myth, but it wasn't.
The way that the poor were blamed for the fire was shocking, but then as I consider the human condition, I guess it isn't, still it is hard to read.
One of the players in this book was exceptionally horrid.  The newspaper reporter...I can't think of his name, and maybe that is best.  He should just be forgotten.  I wonder if this kind of blame goes on today when there are disasters.  Sadly, I bet it does.
Just like in Blizzard, it is just crazy to think about how hard it was to navigate the world before the advances in technology that we enjoy today.  Firefighters of yesterday and today are heroes, truly.  How many people would run INTO a fire while the rest of us are running away?

Changing the Stars...

So after I read Never Glue Your Friends to Chairs, the first in the Roscoe Riley Rules series, I gave it four of five stars on goodreads.  Now that it has been awhile, I have changed it to five. I've talked about Roscoe before, and like I said, I just think he is a terrific kid.  This is a great first chapter book for boys or girls. Roscoe is in time out when he tells us the story.  I think that is the format of the series.  I loved it when he says at the end that best part of time out is the family hug at the end.  Squee!  

In the City...

Man...Hollow City is as good as its cover.  As I mentioned in this post, I needed to refresh my memory on the details, but I am so glad I did.  I was fully able to enjoy this book, but it would be hard NOT to enjoy it.  Incredible.  Creepy and awesome.  I bought the book and the audio and they were worth every penny.  Another MASSIVE cliff-hanger, even more so than the first one!  I can't wait until the third!!

Bits and Pieces

Chris Lynch writes about tough stuff.  Pieces is another tough one and very original.  Inexcusable was really good and was a National Book Award finalist.
Eric's older brother, Duane is killed in an accident and his organs are given to three very different people in need. 
Eric is still really grieving, as you can imagine.  A group affiliated with the organ donation process arranges opportunite for the donor's family to meet the folks who received "pieces" from their loved one.  Eric is willing to do this and meets the single mom who got Duane's kidney, a young, naive teen who received some part of Duane's ear and a fairly obnoxious guy with who now is giving Duane's liver a workout with a lot of partying. 
Duane's old girlfriend comes back into town, just hearing about Duane's death as she was doing humanitarian work out of the country. 
This book was good but it seemed to drag for me in some places. I just read that it is a sequel to the book Iceman.  Maybe I would have enjoyed it more had I read the first one.   But look at that cover!  Dude.  Wow.  Terrible. 
Still, a good book.  I ended up giving it four of five stars. 

Ty, Alvin, Bily and Roscoe

Like the 4 PTSs but completely different from the 4 PTSs, in that they are not evil, are Alvin Ho, Billy Miller, Ty Perry and Roscoe Riley.  I am sure that these four guys would be wonderful friends. They are all in first or second grade and they are all decent and regular kids!  Real kids, even!  I think, though, that they would be bullied by Junie B., Ivy and Bean and Freddie.  Ty had penguin problems in his first book.  Now he is concerned about random acts of kindness and how to partake in non-random acts of kindness.  The thing about Ty is though, he is always kind.  And that is why I love him.  Squee!

Greetings! It's the SIXTH book and still just as awesome!

Olive, Seymour, Iggy, they are all back.  And there aren't enough good words in the world to describe how wonderful 43 Old Cemetery Road is.  These books are always, always a hit.  The three friends are now writing greeting cards for sticky situations, which is hilarious.  And there is a husband-wife team of robbers on the lose.  Fanastic.  Hilarious.  Wonderful.  Read them in order though, for maximum awesomeness!  Greetings from the Graveyard is another winner!

Self-harm

How wide-spread is self-harm?   Kiss of Broken Glass is a heart-breaking, but hopeful, but realistic, story of a girl who cuts.  We meet fifteen-year-old Kenna when she is being admitted to a hospital psych ward under Florida's Baker Act.  The Act means that she must stay for seventy-two hours under watch.  So the book takes place in seventy-two hours.  And what a seventy-two hours it is.  This is the first book I have ever read by Madeleine Kuderick.  And I can't wait to read another.  I see from her webpage that this is her first book, but it can't be her last.  The voice of Kenna is one that will stay with me for a long, long time.  I loved that there were no easy answers.  I loved the form in which it was written and then I loved, at the end, how Kuderick shared that writing this book was a personal journey, because of her daughter, who experienced an addiction to cutting.  How painful it must have been to write this book, but I hope at the same time it was helpful.  I am sure this book will be helpful to many, many others.  You know...I started this post with a question...but I think I know the answer.  Self-harm is pretty darn wide spread.  It just happens in so many different ways.  Drinking, drugs, sex, eating, cutting, smoking, bullying, gosh...anything and everything we do to demean ourselves.  To deny that we are children of God.  It is wide-spread.  It is everywhere.  That's why we need to be kinder to ourselves and to others. 

Life is Hard, for everyone!

Through to You was a good, good book.  I gave it five of five stars on goodreads because I thought Lauren Barholdt did a great job of offering insight into why some people act the way they act.  We're all so quick to judge people, especially guys who seem like "jerks" and worse words when they jump from girl to girl or close themselves off from real feelings.  Penn is one of those guys.  But we find out why Penn acts the way he does.  That doesn't excuse his behavior, but it really helps the reader to get a better understanding.  Maybe we all need to just take a chance on people, find out about people, who they are, what they are, and why they are.  No one gets through this world without feeling any pain, pain influences our behavior.  This was a very good relationship study, told from the POV of Penn and Harper, as they try to figure out how to be together, despite their baggage.

Oldie but Goodie

Mr. Popper's Penguins was written in 1938, that was a long time ago.  The story is set sort of during the time of the life of Gypsy Rose Lee in the time of Gypsy, or so it seemed to me.  That whole traveling act kinda deal.  I liked that. It made me think of Frances "Baby" Gumm, and we all know how much I love her!  This book makes a great read aloud for younger children.  It was made into a movie, starring Jim Carrey, which I did not see.   Well worth reading and funny illustrations.  It did win a Newbery Honor, which is weird because kids like it!

Camping...

I love the IDEA of camping.  Now that I have lost 43.8 lbs., yet still have about 210.3 to go, I am starting to think about all of the out-doorsey kinds of things that I can do again.  Camping is not one of them. It's the whole indoor plumbing thing.  I, like Alvin Ho, am Allergic to Camping, Hiking and Other Natural Disasters. The second Alvin Ho book is just a great at the first.  In this one, there is some serious father-son time, plus Anibelly (great name). Brother and sister go camping with Dad.  I love Alvin's relationship with his father and mother.

Freddie, Ivy, Bean and Junie B.

Freddie Thresher is a popular guy.  He has a series of twenty-seven books now.  Looks like one is due out this year so I guess he is still rolling.  This seems like one of those book package kinda deals, like I Survived.  The first one is this one, Tooth Trouble.
Freddie is a super rotten kid.  He is the male Junie B. pretty much.  I really can't say anything good about this book except that kids are reading it.  But man, it is pretty bad.  As I will write later, Roscoe Riley is a much better choice.

As I have said before, but I am happy to say again...

Madeleine L'Engle was brilliant.  I recently read and wrote about A Wrinkle in Time and I had to quickly move on to A Wind in the Door, which I loved even more, if that is even possible.  So much great stuff in here.  A book you can really get lost in.  I listened to the download and reversed multiple times just to hear the beauty of the power of a sentence or paragraph again.  A remarkable Christian writer.  A writer for everyone, really though.

A Graphic Version of Home

Last year I read and loved Miss Peregrin's Home for Peculiar Children.  Huge cliff-hanger deal.  So I was super excited when Hollow City finally came out.  I bought the hardback.  The only thing was, when I tried to read it, while I had remembered MPHFPC, I didn't remember a lot of the details.  I was super bummed.  Then I saw this!  Which I bought, too!  And it was a great way to read the first book in a whole new way!  Totally caught me up, and more because the art work is awesome.  This is a great way to refresh your memory about the first book without re-reading it, not that it would be a bad thing to re-read, but this graphic novel was excellent!

Alvin Ho! Love this kid!

I am embarrassed to admit that even though Alvin Ho been around since 2008 with this first book, Alvin Ho:  Allergic to Girls, School and Other Scary Things, I just read this now!  What a wonderful, wonderful series.  Alvin Ho is incredible.  He is loving and kind and normal!  Which means he does get into a lot of jams.  But man...this is a great book.  Alvin is a second grader, but I think that kids all the way up through fourth grade would love him.  Even kids who are 42, like me.  The thing about Alvin is that he is afraid, and therefore claims to be allergic to pretty much everything.  He goes to a psychotherapist to help with his fears.  I love it that he thinks that a psychotherapist is a psycho that helps you with your problems.  He is a smart kid!  He's an Asian-American so there a lot of neat things to learn about the culture.  What a great, great series.  As you will see, I am already on the fourth one now!

I Don't Know...

It's not so much that I don't believe Jon Krakauer's criticisms of the Three Cups of Tea guy, Greg Mortenson, founder of the Central Asia Institute.  Mortenson's antics have been well documented elsewhere and Mortenson himself has publicly confessed.  It's just that Three Cups of Deceit, I don't know...there was just something off about it.  I don't mean that it didn't tell the truth or that Krakauer lied or anything, no, not at all.  It was more like a personal attack or criticism or something.  Which I know it was, but the reviewer on goodreads who said, "the moral of the story is, don't f*&k with Jon Krakauer's money."  seems to have said it best.  Krakauer himself gave money to CAI and when he found out that there were lies in Three Cups of Tea he went on an investigation and did a piece for 60 Minutes and this ebook came out of it.  The good part of the book was that it was super short, unlike those that you need to listen to quickly to get through them.  I still sped this one up though.  I never read Three Cups of Tea, it is really not my thing at all.

Literary Fiction

Graven Images by Paul Fleischman is another one of those books that will be enjoyed by folks of all ages.  Fleischman is such a creative, thoughtful and original writer.  I have never fully understood the distinction between literary fiction and genre fiction, but after reading a couple Fleischman books, I would have to put him in the literary fiction camp.
This little book contains three short stories and the audio edition, and maybe the printed one, not sure, has a not from the author which explains how the idea evolved.  All three stories were so different but all involved a graven image, something carved in wood or stone or marble.  Great, great book.

Just not sure...

why a book like Blizzard isn't as popular as the I Survived series.  This was the first book I've ever read by Jim Murphy and the first I ever heard of the Great Blizzard of 1888.  Which was a REALLY bad storm!  This book is super well done.  I am not a history fan.  I am especially not a history fan of any time in history before WW2 and so for a book to get and keep my attention, the way that this one did, that is saying something.  It made me want to read more about this blizzard, and more by Murphy. 
The other thing that was really interesting here was the whole history of the National Weather Service.  A lot of folks, like me remember when you had to read a newspaper or watch tv or listen to the radio to find out the weather forecast.  Now it is available on your phone at any time.  Before that it was available on the computer at any time.  But back in these days?  Just crazy, crazy how it all went down!  A great read. 

Nate

I was wrong.  I thought Big Nate was a Diary of a Wimpy Kid rip-off.  I had no idea that it has actually been a comic strip since 1991!  I am very embarrassed and ashamed of those feelings!  I thought that a lot of this was funny, but the reason I didn't love it was that Nate is a jerk, really.  Greg can be jerky, but Nate is always a jerk, it seems.  There is a difference.  It is that whole Ramona vs. Junie B. deal.  But I will read the next one to give him a chance! 

Number 10...have I stayed too long at the fair?

It's bound to happen.  It happened with the Private/Privilege books, even.  And how I did love those.  But I think after gorging on the same deliciousness for so long, it was bound to get old.  Not to say that I am below the four star rating, not at all, Volume 10 was a solid four-star, but it just didn't have that five-star sparkle, as the others did for me.  While I do love Flycatcher and I loved what he did here with setting up Haven, I still don't know his backstory.  Did I miss it somewhere?  What horrible thing happened to his family?  Now I just read the wikipedia article and that makes sense.  But was this in a comic that I missed?  I am going to take a Fable break, but I know I will come back to them.  Maybe the break will help me to appreciate them as I once did! 

This One Had to Lose a Star

I do love Fables, as I have said, but I had to point out my usual trouble in this volume, number 9.  I was super excited to meet Hansel of Hansel and Gretel in this volume, but then, one tiny mistake was made, which of course, is my biggest pet peeve!   There is a flash-back scene in which Hansel refers to Father Somethingorother's sermons.  Father?  Really?  Sigh.  So anyway, another great addition to the series, but a pretty glaring mistake!

Not What I Thought It Was

When I saw the cover of The Mad Sculptor:  the maniac, the model and the murder that shook a nation I thought it would be like The Devil in the White City or The Monster of Florence but it wasn't.  That was totally my fault.  The author, Harold Schechter has been writing true-crime books for a very long time and he is true to his craft and does a great job at it.  I was just hoping for something more.
I had never heard of this crime, even though it is listed on Raymond Chandler's 1948 list of most memorable crimes of the century.  This is the story of Robert George Irwin, a guy with some serious psychological problems.  If you want a good true-crime book, this is a good one, but it's not like DIWC or TMOF.

Mustaches...all the rage!

I think that the mustache craze might be at its end, but for a while there, there were mustaches everywhere.  Fake Mustache came out at the height of the wackiness.  Tom Angleberger is best known for his Origami Yoda series.  There is a new one out and I haven't read it yet.  So I am sad.  But I did read Fake Mustache and I did like it.  I just didn't love it.  But I did read it rather quickly, because I had to write questions from it for work, so maybe I didn't really do it justice.  Of course, the cover is awful.  Awful.  But I really did find a lot of it to be rather funny.  It is a good one for guys and easy to recommend though, because I can see where it would be appeal to a lot of folks.  There is this evil dude, his name is Fako Mustacho he does something to people and they start robbing banks.  But I am not sure why.  And I am not sure why Casper, the kid who bought the fake mustache, bought it in the first place.   Is he Fako Mustacho?  I am not sure.  I think this book left me feeling very confused.  But a lot of people love it very much.  And a lot of boys love it, too! 

Much, much love...

A Wrinkle in Time is a tough book, I think.  But a beautiful one.  And one worth reading more than once.  Madeleine L'Engle, if she had to be described in one word, which would be impossible because she is just amazing that she can't be limited to a one-word description, but if she HAD to be, it would be brilliant. 
I remember my fourth grade teacher reading this book aloud to our class.  And then I tried to reread it last year, but I couldn't get into it.  But this year, I don't know...I finally really, really listened to it and it just spoke right to my heart.

Ah...miracles...

The Question of Miracles is one of the finest books I have read in a long time.  Iris is struggling with the loss of her best friend to a freak accident.  Why did she survive and why did Sarah die? 
Her family moves to a remote house in Oregon where she meets Boris and learns to open her heart again to friendship.  Boris' birth is under investigation by the Roman Catholic Church as a potential miracle.  Doctors had told his parents that he would be born dead, or die shortly after birth, but he was born just fine. 
As a pastor I so appreciate the questions brought up in the book.  The honesty with which they are asked, and the way that answers are attempted to be made, but yeah...there are always going to be differences of opinions and there always will be the sense of mystery. 
I loved this book from start to finish.  Last year at this time I was reading the ARC of Arnold's Burning, which I also loved.  Arnold is a wonderful author. 
When I was back in seminary school, I had a horrible professor, and I won't mention his name because that would be indescreet, but it rhymes with Bobert Bagnon.   He is a lot like Fred Phelps, only without a cowboy hat.  He told us a story that was a pretty poor story, but he just wasn't a good teacher, you know?  Still it fits when thinking about miracles.  Sort of.  He tried anyway. 
He told this story of two different little girls.  Both were going to Disney World.  One of the girls had a grandfather who told her that Disney would be a magical place and she would get to fly around on magic carpets and real animals would talk and there would be winged-horses to ride. 
The other girl's grandfather told her that Disney would be great fun, and that there would be rides and people dressed up like her favorite Disney characters and it would be a good time. 
The girl with the grandfather who talked about flying and magical animals, she was disappointed and didn't have that much fun.
The girl with the grandfather that told her it would be "a good time" had  wonderful time and was blown away by the Disney trip.
Bobert "Phelps" Bagnon said that this is compareable to when we talk about Christianity and miracles and Jesus. 
And we all looked at him. 
I think that we all felt a little sorry for Dr. Rhymes-with Bagnon.  He seems like the kind of man who endured terrible bullying when he was a child and teen.  Having been picked on for my weight, I know that can really change you. 
But we knew what he was trying to say.  Why did the grandfather have to tell all of lies, when the truth was really great as it was?  Why didn't he realize that the Disney experience was enough on its own, there was no need to add all of those other elements that weren't true, thus leading to his granddaughter's disappointment. 
The thing is, as I have said before, I am not a believer in miracles as they are commonly defined.  The saving of one person from a terrible accident, while another person is killed.  The decimation of a town while a church stands tall after a tornado, that kind of thing.  A "miraculous" recovery from cancer, while another succums.  God doesn't play that way.  Even a good person doesn't play that way.  Even a sketchy person, like I can be (A LOT) doesn't play that way. 
I DO believe, I DO KNOW that there is truth, Truth in THE MIRACLE.
God became flesh, dwelt among us, He took our sins upon Himself, suffered, died and was buried.  He rose again and because of this, we all will rise.  We will all live with Him in the Eternal Kingdom.  That's better than Disney World.  That's better than any earthly miracles.  That's the only miracle there needs to be.  So far beyond what we deserve.  So far beyond our full comprehension. 
Madeleine L'Engle said it well, ""All will be redeemed in God's fullness of time, all, not just the small portion of the population who have been given the grace to know and accept Christ. All the strayed and stolen sheep. All the little lost ones."
Jesus said it best, John 10:16.