Long Awaited

Well any book from Jewell Parker Rhodes is long awaited!  So it was no surprise that I bought Black Brother, Black Brother on the day it was released!   An excellent story.   Once again Rhodes takes a serious issue and isn't preachy.  She creates REAL characters and man...her characters are just so...I don't know...REAL.  Rhodes is one of my most favorite authors and is really creating classics here.  Classics that will be read years and years from now and hopefully, kids will read them and think, "Was it really that bad?" and not "Well, not much has changed."  

This is My Story, This is My Song

This is Our Story has more to do with this than this.  Although it is MUCH more macabre.  Again, I put 4 stars instead of 5 on a book by Ashley Elston and I just can't put my finger on why.  Probably just the length.  Because the book is written so well.  And I did buy this on audible and I will buy another!  Maybe I think that Elston is such a great writer, I just wish her editor were better.  Or she just wrote short books for losers like me!  Really good book though.  Really good.

Great Conclusion

The Thousandth Floor was an accidental discovery for me this year.  A trilogy that was meant to be a trilogy and each book was very fun to read and kept me wanting to find out more about this future world that wasn't too futurey to be not understandable!  The Towering Sky was the last one and I really loved the way that the author told enough of the backstory to make me remember but not enough so that it was boring!  Really good ending.

Just Really Good!

Tiffany Sly Lives Here Now came out this year and is another example of what I think has been a really great year so far for new books.  I am so glad that I randomly spied this one on the downloads available from my local library!  Dana L. Davis is a new to me author and well, I guess she is new to many as this is her first book!  It made me super happy to see that she already has a new one coming out next year.  And while that seems so far away, it will be here before we know it.  So I will be patient!
This was quite good.  Quite good.  Dealt with hard issues in a very real way and wasn't a "problem" novel, formulaic, that kind of thing.  I have to say that this was just really well done from all perspectives. The faith perspective is always the most interesting to me and I thought this was really well done.  Very real.  Good, good stuff.  I loved Tiffany and I ached for her and admired her.  I also loved Mrs. Stone.  And I didn't know what the DNA test results would show but I had my hopes the whole time.  And I was very happy with the results.  I also thought that Mr. Stone was such a real character.  So well drawn.  And London, too.  Just a really good read. 

Things for which I am thankful

are occasions like finding the series The Thousandth Floor by Katharine McGee.  I saw the second book on the shelf at the library and was able to get the first and the second on audio.  Man, I would have been so sad if the second book wasn't out yet!  This is one of those fun (but dark!) series like Private and Privilege.  In fact, this is also from Alloy Entertainment, as these two were.  This one has a sci-fi component to it, set in 2118.  It was SO good!  I can't wait until The Towering Sky which comes out in August!

People Like Us

People Like Us by Dominick Dunne is a book that I always wanted to read but never have.  And I still haven't.  People Like Us by Dana Mele is the book that I read!  I saw it on the shelf at the library and bought it after reading the reviews.  I am glad I did, but I know I only gave it four stars, just because I think it was a little too long for me.  But I can really recommend it.  I just wasn't SUPER wow'd by it.  But it is really good. 

Rated D for Disturbing!

You All Grow Up and Leave Me was super disturbing. Piper Weiss is complicated!  And she admits that.  I love her relationship with her mom, though.  And her willingness to admit that she knows her mom loves her and she loves her mom.  I think that is cool.
This is the story of Gary Wilensky.  And Weiss's raw and real feelings about him and who she was in his life and who she maybe wanted to be.
I do think that Weiss is harder on herself than she needs to be.  But that is what makes this book so well done.  She is very real and honest and willing to share.

Are Hurricane Children a Thing?

I need to google that.  Hang on.  Not that I can see from a quick google.  But It is early/late and I am tired so I will look again another day. 
Hurricane Child was a beautiful book.  About all kinds of love.  It was a love story on so many levels.  Kheryn Callender is an author I need to learn more about because this book was beautiful. 

Jason Reynolds

is truly amazing.  He drew me into a Spider-Man book!  Nothing personal against Spider-Man, I am just SO NOT a superhero person.  So not.  But this whole idea of a "new" Spider-Man, and the personality and the backstory and Miles's best friend and his family, and well, I loved it.  I don't think I will read any more of them, as they are not by Jason Reynolds and so I wouldn't be giving them a fair turn, I bet.  But Jason Reynolds's Miles Morales Spider-Man is awesome!  Actually now that I look closer, the other Miles ones are comic books, so yeah, I won't be doing those.  But I respect them!

Dear Martin, You would love this book.

Dear Martin was just so excellent.  I bought it when I saw that it had made the list of finalists for the Morris Award.  May I also admit that the Morris Award was completely unknown to me before I saw the email from YALSA announcing the finalists?  I am embarrassed, but I am transparent!  Relevant, real, amazing writing. I didn't know until I looked at her web page that Nic Stone is female.  Not a big deal or even a deal, but I am always impressed when an author can just really speak in the voice of someone different from they.  So good.  This one should be a Printz Honor for sure.  Only Auma's Long Run is higher in my opinion.  But man, this is close!

Three Things I Loved about This Book

1.  I loved the ending.  It worked out the way that I had hoped.

2.  It was sad, but it was hopeful. 

3.  The grief expressed here was so real.

I also loved that the people were human.

Tell Me Three Things was a great story.  And I loved the step-brother.  

And I loved that there were no easy answers and so it was no surprise that Julie Buxbaum has "been there."

So that is more than three things.  I hope to read more from Buxbaum in the future.  This was her first young adult book but there is another one out now! 

Bernadette

Great song.  Where'd You Go, Bernadette is another BOB book for the end of November.  I have to say this is probably my favorite so far.  This was very funny!  And it original, I thought!  Good stuff!  Dysfunctional Family?  Hmm...I don't know...more normal to me!

Softly and Tenderly

Jesus is calling, calling o sinner, come home.  I love that song.  Never heard it until my internship at my church in seminary.  Love that song.  Especially this version.  I love Anne Murray.
Of course that brings me to Openly, Honestly!  a 1.5 but a FREE one!  Whoa! I would have paid for it, before and after reading it.  I love Rafe.  I love Ben, too.  And I love Claire Olivia.  Can't wait for the next one!

First of all, great cover!

It was the simplicity and cuteness of the cover that caught me.  I really loved Openly Straight.  Sexuality is not an easy thing at any age.  And what I really liked about this book was the way Rafe, the main character, grew and changed as the book progressed.  His parents were super cool and funny!  I also really liked the ending.  Seemed very realistic to me.  And I am really looking forward to the next one.  And I see there is a .5!  So I will have to read that, too!

Eww!

Beware that Girl was GOOD!  After I finished it had that creep-tastic feeling of a shiver up and down my spine and all over.  I have to see what else Teresa Toten has written because after I finished this very good and different and creepy book, I realized that she also wrote Shattered Glass, which I totally loved, too!  Good good GOOD!

Dead Dead Dead

this is just a great song.  School of the Dead was good.  And I could recommend it.  But it didn't WOW me like Seer of Shadows.  But that was a WOW book!  A REALLY WOW book!  It is hard to like the main character. Well, not hard to like him, but hard to really, really like him.  Hard to really like him.  Yeah, not even one "really."  But that doesn't mean I didn't want to find out what happens.  I was guessing until the end, just not really sure what was true and what was not true, so that was a good sign.  And personally, I felt great satisfaction with the way in which Uncle Charlie's character played out in the book.  I know some people might have a different opinion, but it made sense to me and it just seemed to make the whole book work together in a better way!

Some Titles

are really, really good.  They intrigue and then, after or during the book you TOTALLY get the meaning!  That happened to me with Fans of the Impossible Life and a little while ago with Symptoms of Being Human.  This is the first book by Kate Scelsa.  And I was hoping there were more, but as I look at her page, I see she is one busy lady!  I will have to check out the podcast she does with her dad.
This book was very different and very real and well worth reading!  Just very, very good, even though it did make me super sad sometimes, but isn't that just like life?

Maybe...

While I really liked The Lying Game, I didn't like Pretty Little Liars.  I am sort of in between about The Perfectionists. by Sara Shepard.   Granted, what ruined PLL for me was the mistake I made in watching the show, but with LG I could wait for the next one.  With The Perfectionists, I wasn't even that excited about getting to the end.

So Many Songs

about trouble.  Here, here, here, and I am sure that there are more.   Those are all great songs, but non really compare to the greatness of the book Trouble by the incredible Gary D. Schmidt.
Incredible.  I know I seem to say that about a lot of books lately, but that's because I have just discovered some really incredible authors. These books are totally out of my usual go-to-i-like-this-kind-of-book box.  That's what reading and reading and reading did to me.  Before I started writing this blog, I never would have picked up a book like Here Lies the Librarian, Tiltawhirl John, Graceling, The Orange Houses and so many more.
In Trouble we meet the Smith family from Massachusetts, the very definition of WASPs.  But not in a stereotypical way.  Schmidt is an incredible author and I don't think he is capable of resorting to stereotyping in his writing.  I was sure that the family would be cold and heartless, but no, they really weren't.  They were real people.

I don't want to recap what happens, just read the goodreads summary, but right after that, read the book. Incredible.

Do You Want to Know a Secret

Secrets and Lies is the second book in the Truth or Dare series and I have to say, it kept my interest, but I think I have figured it out.  Maybe.  I don't know!  But I think I figured out the bad guy/girl!