REALLY good

I was so glad that my turn for Where the Line Bleeds finally came up from the library.  Man.  This book was just excellent.  Jesmyn Ward is just such an incredible writer.  This story unfolds so so so well and just sucked me in and really speaks volumes about the "land of opportunity" that is our country.  And man, it is even worse now than when this was written!   What a book. 

Worst Cover Ever

Man.  I mean I thought that there were some bad Gary Paulsen covers before, but the one for Tiltawhirl John has to be the worst.  Even the font is terrible.  Terrible.  Terrible.
But the book is great.  I have always been fascinated by carnies and the carnival.
I don't know how much of this is true to what Gary Paulsen experienced when he ran away and joined the circus as a teen, but it all reads just like real life.  Fascinating.  Excellent.
HORRIBLE COVER.

My Grandmother, the Car

Of course there isn't much I am too young to remember, but My Mother the Car is one of them.  Yes, this was a real show.  I have heard of it, but never seen it.   Apparently, TV Guide said it is the second worst tv show of all time.   Regardless, I thought of it when I read Alida's Song by Paulsen.  Yes, I am on a Paulsen binge.  In The Car there is a very powerful scene in which Waylon gets very upset when he and Terry and Wayne visit a religious commune and find that the women and girls don't get to eat with the men and apparently must work most of the time, while men and boys can just hang back and be men and boys.  You can tell that Paulsen has a lot of respect for women.  Not just from this scene, but in all of his writing.  In Alida's Song, you find out why.  Alida's song is the second of the three books about the times that Paulsen spent with his grandmother as he was growing up.  This woman did the world a favor when she helped to form the great man that Paulsen has become.  Again, not just a book for kids or teens or tweens, but for all. 

Paulsen at His Best

Man.  Man.   This Paulsen guy.  He definitely isn't a teen writer, or a children' writer.  He is a writer.   A darn, darn, darn good one.  I don't know why more adults don't read him.  Maybe some do and I just don't know any of them.  But one thing is for sure, they should.  The Quilt is the last in a trilogy of about Alida, The Boy's grandmother, who took care of him when he was a young child, with a drunk mother who had moved to Chicago to work in a war factory while his dad was in WW2.  Alida is a lives in a small town in the Canadian border in Minnesota and speaks Norwegian and loves her grandson and all of life.  You can tell that Paulsen is the man he is today because of the influence of this amazing woman.

Waste of Money and Time

Urban Legends didn't cost much, for the audio book, but I still wish I would have skipped it.  It was pretty much a wikipedia entry (a boring one) made into a book but with added pomp and arrogance.  Even the more fun and intriguing urban legends come across as a huge snore-fest in this long winded and ridiculous offering.