And Again!

The Dark Root, the sixth installment of the Joe Gunther series was VERY good and another 5 star.  This book dealt with the rise of Asian American gangs and addressed the racial discrimination that went along with it.  Again, I feel like Archer was writing ahead of his time when he addresses issues back in the 90s that, sadly are still issues today (see #5) but are now, at least getting better, more appropriate attention. 

Colors

was a fantastic movie.  The Astonishing Color of After?  Well, it just didn't work for me.  I think it was the writing style, maybe?  Just too descriptive and flowery for my personal taste.  I guess I also didn't get all of the drama there was about Leigh not getting to know her grandparents.  A lot of people don't get to know their grandparents, for a lot of different reasons.  But this seemed to be SUCH a huge point of contention.  Not to say it shouldn't be a point of contention-- everyone would love to have a close family.  Yes, that is ideal.  But for it to be SUCH a big deal...well...
I did appreciate the mention of the good uses of electroconvulsive therapy, which is so often misunderstood.  I have a dear friend who found this to be the only cure for her depression.  And I know it does work for some.  Most times when it is demonized, it is because people get it confused with a lobotomy and think of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest or they don't realize how different it is now, from when it was first used.  Not to say that others wouldn't like it, but I had a hard time finishing it. 

Returned this one

I really don't like to return books on audible, even though they say it is okay.  But man, A Line in the Dark just was...wow, for me...bad.  Not to say that others won't like it, but wow, it was just not for me. 

A Secret Secret

Bob Shea has a series, Ballet Cat, and I LOVE these books.  And the first one is my favorite.  Which has NOTHING to do with It's Not Like It's a Secret, other than they both have "secret" in the title and they were both great book. This is a story of first love, of parents of self-discovery, of stereotypes and prejudice and Japanese culture and Asian culture and LBGTQ life and straight life and high school and communication and confusion and Latino culture and faithfulness and American culture.  This is just one, really great book.  I could see that there could be a danger in it being about TOO many things, now that I have listed them, but really, it isn't.  It is just really realistic, because real life is about a lot of things going on at once, too.  Great, great book.

Alvin, oh Alvin

When I first met Alvin I loved him.  But now, well, that third book...every little thing that used to endear me to Alvin now aggravates me.  He is whiny and his behavior is pretty much ridiculous.  Alvin Ho:  allergic to the Great Wall, the Forbidden Palace and Other Tourist Attractions will probably be the last in the series that I will read.  What I did really like were things I learned about Chinese culture and history.  But you know....if Look was so off base about Native American culture, how can anything she writes about anything be trusted?

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. 

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.

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.

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!

Dumping Days and Dumpling Nights

One of the best songs ever!  Good ole Freddy Fender.  There probably aren't a lot of blog posts out there that link Fender to Grace Lin, but I bet this isn't the only on.  Dumpling Days is the latest in the series about Pacy "Grace" Lin, from Upstate NY.  A Taiwanese-American, in this book Pacy and her family spend a month in Taiwan.  At first Pacy doesn't want to go, but by the end of the trip, she really feels a love for Taiwan.  Like the previous books in the series, The Year of the Rat and The Year of the Dog, this book is packed with really cool information about Taiwanese and Chinese traditions and it also just a plain old great growing up story full of humor and truth for people of any background.  I now understand the difference between Taiwan (officially known as the Republic of China) and the People's Republic of China.  Forty years old and only learning this now?  Shame on me.  Seriously.  That is kind of embarrassing.
It was cool to learn about Ghost Month and all of the different kinds of Asian dumplings.  But there are also very real lessons in here, like how to live with the ghosts of our past, how to live in two worlds, how life isn't black and white.  Great, great, great, great book.  I hope there are more to come.

Al Stewart

Have you thought about Al Stewart today? I must admit that I have been thinking a lot about him lately.  All while I was reading The Year of the Rat, I was singing The Year of the Cat in my head.  There is no Year of the Cat in the Chinese Zodiac as Pacy's dad explains in this sequel to The Year of the Dog.  Turns out the Year of the Cat is part of the Vietnamese Zodiac.  I love learning new things!

Once again, Grace Lin has taught me a lot!  TYOTR explains more Chinese and Taiwanese traditions.  Pacy and her family are Taiwanese, not Chinese, but they speak both languages (plus English) and I need to really find out more about China and Taiwan so that I can understand the whole thing a lot better.

This sequel is more serious than the first, as I guess it is as you grow, life that was once a bowl of cherries, sometimes feels just like the pits.  Pacy's best friend moves to California, Pacy is confused about what she wants to do when she gets older.  Loved this book and I am going to read Dumpling Days next!

Tradition

This was a totally sweet little book and something that makes it additionally cool is that much of it is from Grace Lin's personal experience. The Year of the Dog offers good laughs and a lot of neat stuff about Chinese traditions. At first I thought, "Man, the Chinese really have a lot of superstitions and traditions!" but then I thought, well every culture has a lot of superstitions and traditions, right? I think about how our family eats the New Year's Pretzel on New Year's Day and we throw salt over our shoulder when we spill it, both are German and probably other cultures' traditions, too.

It was really interesting to learn about celebrating the Chinese New Year and Red Egg Parties and cool things like that. Grace is in grade school...I can't remember which grade, but probably fifth or sixth. She has an older sister and a younger sister. Her family is Taiwanese, but all of the children were born in the U.S. One thing I found that was interesting was that Grace has a Chinese name, Pacy, but she is called Grace at school because Pacy would be weird. Pacy is not a weird name, I don't think. It's a great name, and so is Grace.