Perfect Fifths - Dewey's 24 Hour Readathon

So here I am, about two hours later, and I've finished another book from my To Be Read pile. 

This is my second time reading through the Jessica Darling series, which ends with Perfect Fifths.  While I wasn't totally satisfied with the story - much of it recreates Jessica and Marcus' first conversation after breaking up three years before - I was ultimately satisfied with this book as an ending to the series.  And now that I am thinking about it, maybe it was an accurate recreation of that first awkward conversation - where you don't want to say too much, but are trying to summarize what's gone on in your life while the other person has been absent.

Now that I've finished two books from my To Be Read pile, I am wondering if I'll be able to read beyond what I had originally planned.  I still feel pretty fresh, and am loving the feeling of checking books off my list.  We'll see how the rest of the day goes.  The girls will be home at some point this afternoon, but will be pretty worn out, so they may be willing to lay low tonight and watch a movie. 

Now off to the library to pick up some holds and return these overdue books!

Starry Night

I have been an Isabel Gillies fangirl for a long time.  When I was separating from my husband a few years ago, I discovered her memoir, Happens Every Day.  Even though the circumstances were very different, I took solace in her words.  Even though I knew I was doing the right thing, she too had felt that odd heartbreak and grief in saying goodbye to what she believed her life would be and greeting something very different.  She felt like the much cooler older sister that I never had, whose wisdom and pain I could learn from.  I reread Happens Every Day earlier this year, because I had just read her newer piece, A Year and Six Seconds.  I put them on hold at our library, and it was then that I discovered that she had just published a young adult novel.  I put that book on hold immediately, hoping I would love it just as much.

When it came in, I started it right away.  I quickly realized that I had another problem.  I couldn't stop reading it, yet didn't want it to end.  It has some of my favorite elements of young adult fiction in its pages - romance and school - along with fascinating characters, an amazing setting, and parents who are cool but also know how to set boundaries with their children.  It feels like a big, giddy whoosh of a book, but it also has the pinprick of real emotions.  I couldn't get enough!

The story centers on Wren Noorlander.  At 15, she seems to be sailing through life on the outside.  She has a very tight-knit group of friends - Vati, Reagan, Farah, and Charlie.  Wren is an amazing artist with a blossoming talent.  She is secure in her place at her private girls' school, knowing she has a great talent, but still having to work very hard in other subjects.  Wren has an older brother, Oliver, who is a senior in high school.  Despite the fact that he is getting older, and beginning to become slightly unknowable, he still has a strong relationship with Wren.  And their younger sister, Dinah, is a pre-teen with a cooking show on Food TV.  But all three siblings are also quite normal.  The next quote is a little out of context, but it illustrates Wren and Dinah perfectly: "...then the door at the top of the stairs flung open to reveal Dinah, still in her uniform, hand on her hip, head cocked to the side.  'You are going down!' she announced, not looking surprised at all that Nolan was standing there.  I glared at her. 'Is Mom home?' I whispered loudly as I trotted up. 'Oh yeah, she is, and she's on fire.  She had to start knitting because you are so late! It's a total ten.'" (p. 157)  This sample is so big sister-little sister that it still makes me laugh.

And then there are Wren's parents.  They have interesting jobs to start with - Wren's mom has a pottery studio, Wren's dad is the director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  No big deal, just the Metropolitan Museum of Art!  They are sophisticated, live in a large brownstone in New York City.  But here's what I love about the Noorlanders: they don't take all the opportunities they are afforded for granted.  They see all the amazing things they are lucky enough to give their children and they are clear about what those opportunities require of all of them.  Wren tells readers about how Dinah gets her own cooking show: "...Bravo called to say they were interested in having Dinah host a thirty minute cooking show.  Mom was repelled, but Dad, who is more relaxed about publicity and media and sort of everything, convinced Mom that it would only be good for Dinah.  I remember him saying at dinner, 'Nan, love, it's a wonderful life experience for her.  I don't see how we can stand in her way.'  My mother protested, 'I can stand directly in her way, David.  She is only NINE!'" (p. 27).  I read quite a bit of young adult fiction, and the parents are primarily absent, physically or emotionally.  Wren's parents may not know every single thing their children do, but they have a pretty good idea of what's happening in their lives.  I really like how connected Wren's parents are to Wren.  They may not always make the easiest or most popular choice for their children, and they are okay with it.  They are always there to supervise what's happening and support their children when they need it.  As a parent, I love their example.  It's a hard road to follow, but they put in the effort.

It's funny to me that I have gotten this far in my review without summarizing the plot.  One of Oliver's newer friends, Nolan, comes over to the Noorlander house after school one day.  Oliver, Nolan, Wren and her friends (Vati, Reagan, Farah and Charlie) have all been invited to their first Metropolitan Museum of Art opening.  It is a huge deal and the girls are besides themselves with excitement.  Then Wren meets Nolan, and things shift dramatically.  "' Who are you?'  Now this might sound weird, but Nolan's 'who are you?' did not come out badly...it was more like he was asking because he was enchanted with me, so that was wild - and nobody had ever asked me who I was  before, so I was way into it." (p. 88)  And she's off, muddling through her first love.  Wren and Nolan make some bad choices in their longing to be together, but those choices aren't totally terrible.  The night of the opening, Nolan talks Wren into ditching the party (and her parents) to go to a club and go dancing.  The consequences of that impetuous decision leaves Wren grounded and without a phone for weeks.  But it also leads to sweet scenes like this: "'Isn't it weird, how yesterday we didn't know each other, and now we are each other's person?' Nolan mused as he walked through the gates into Central Park." (p. 154).

One character I haven't yet mentioned in this post so far is the city of New York.  It is so interwoven into the story that it feels like another person.  After the above scene, Nolan and Wren stand under the echo bridge in Central Park and share their experiences of the bridge.  It bonds them - one of those initial moments in a relationship when everything seems to be identical in your lives up until you met.  But Nolan and Wren's relationship takes place in front of the city's backdrop: "We rode the 1 train up Broadway and he told me about his parents' divorce as the train rocked and screeched into station after station all the way to Eighty-Sixth Street." (p. 116)  "The air felt loaded in New York City.  It was one of those days that you feel not only that the temperature will drop but that something tremendous is going to happen.  It was a Monday in November and the sky was so blue it was violet, uninterrupted by clouds." (p. 4)  It's an amazing setting for me, living in a small(ish) Montana town with not a subway in sight.  For readers in most of the country, the teens' lives feel a little glamorous, full of a different sort of freedom that we ever taste as Wren and her friends casually move about the city.  For readers from New York City, I suspect it feels very accurate and real.

One of Gillies' strengths as a writer is her knack for the small details that make up our lives.  Wren describes her home like this: "There are Persian rugs running down the halls, and under those rugs the beaten-up floors are made from smooth, wide wooden planks.  Photographs and paintings hang on the walls from the floor to the ceiling, all mixed up." (p. 50)  Their home is eclectic yet cozy and you can feel its essence through Gillies' description.  Her writing is very concrete and real.

What I also love is how strong Wren's voice is throughout this novel.  Wren is often wrong about things, but she commits to a plan of action wholeheartedly. "I spent the next long time lost, feverishly drawing a barn owl rocketing into the night sky, shooting up, wings spread wide, soaring up up up and off the paper with one hundred of her feathers fluttering in the headwind.  If Oliver came upstairs, I didn't know it.  He might have come up and decided not to bother me.  I was somewhere far away." (p. 170-1)  Wren is full of giddy love, excitement, strongly held beliefs and emotions.  She is so endearing, and as the story unfolds, my heart broke for her in several different circumstances.

There is one other thing about Wren that I wanted to call attention to in this review.  In the beginning of the novel, while talking with her friends, Wren notes "I can never get names until at least ten minutes after I need them.  It's one strain of my other learning disorder: dysnomia.  I have that along with the dyslexia, dysgraphia, and a dollop of ADD." (p. 31).  Wren's learning disorders are definitely not the focus of this novel, but they are part of her too.  She has strategies to help her manage these: "...trying to zip up my backpack and go through the mental list that I am supposed to go through every time I leave the school so I don't space on anything." (p. 146).  Wren is matter of fact about the side effects of these - her impulsivity and her ability to focus on just one thing like her art are two sides of the same coin.  This story isn't about that struggle for Wren, but I like how it is presented here - as one small part of the whole.

I haven't even scratched the surface of the events of this novel, or the emotions contained within it.  But I'll encourage you to read this, to hear more about the Noorlander family and Wren's group of friends.  And I'll beg Isabel Gillies to keep writing about Wren and her friends, because I never want to leave their world.

Starry Night.  Isabel Gillies.  Farrar, Strauss & Giroux, 2014.

Borrowed from the Lewis & Clark library

The Crown of Columbus

I just finished The Crown of Columbus.  I had read it quite a few years ago (I'm sure more than 15 years ago!), and I couldn't remember more than that I had liked it a lot.  I am reading it this time as part of my ongoing quest to read all of Louise Erdrich's books.  I first started this project here, when I read Grandmother's Pigeon and then The Range Eternal.  Since then, I've been reading some of her adult novels in chronological order.  This time, I found The Crown of Columbus completely absorbing again.  I couldn't stop reading it and carrying it around.  The juxtaposition of voices in it was mesmerizing.  I liked Vivian's voice better than Roger's, but I suspect that was his personality at first too.  This is historical fiction, romance, and mystery all wrapped up in one, and it is an amazing story.  The ending is what I expected, and yet not.  I found myself caught up in the rhythms of the poetry and prose.  A great, great story, and so different from some of Erdrich's other work.

The Crown of Columbus.  Michael Dorris, Louise Erdrich.  Harper Perennial, 1991.

To All the Boys I've Loved Before

I have been a huge Jenny Han fan since The Summer I Turned Pretty came out in 2009.  You shouldn't be surprised by that information, since I just reviewed Burn for Burn and Fire  with Fire here and I already said how excited I was to read Ashes for Ashes.  So I shrieked out loud when I walked out my front door one morning, and discovered a package from Simon & Schuster.  The padded envelope contained the ARC of To All the Boys I've Loved Before, along with a notebook and pen.  I love getting publishing swag, and the fact that it was Jenny Han swag just made it that much better.  I started reading right away (with the Julio Iglesias and Willie Nelson duet stuck in my head, unfortunately).  I saved my review to post once the book was published.  Now the book is out so you can all run out and get it.  It is also a great choice to kick off my contribution for #weneeddiversebooks within the 48 Hour Book Challenge, so I am thrilled to be talking about it tonight.

Lara Jean Song is a romantic at heart.  She is the middle sister - there is an older sister, Margot, and a younger sister, Kitty.  Their doctor father has raised them alone since their mother died when Lara Jean was ten.  The sisters are sometimes called "the Song girls" - their mother (who was Korean)'s last name was Song, and "we all have Song for our middle name, and we look more Song than Covey anyway, more Korean than white." (p. 9)  Margot grew up quickly when their mom died, and runs the household most of the time.  Their father is an OB/GYN, and is unpredictable in his schedule, so the girls rely on each other.  Lara Jean and Kitty are used to Margot caring for them and keeping their lives organized.  Now Margot is going abroad to Scotland for college, and Lara Jean already misses her tremendously.  On the other hand, she is also determined to show Margot how successfully the rest of the family can survive when she's gone.  Right before Margot leaves, she breaks up with her boyfriend, Josh.  Lara Jean has spent lots of time with Margot and Josh (he is their neighbor too).  While she doesn't understand why Margot broke up with Josh, she has kept  a secret for a long time.  Lara Jean has always been in love with Josh too.

Lara Jean has a ritual for ending her crushes on guys - she writes them one last letter.  "They're not love letters in the strictest sense of the word.  My letters are for when I don't want to be in love anymore.  They're for good-bye.  Because after I write my letter, I'm no longer consumed by my all-consuming love....If love is like a possession, maybe my letters are like my exorcisms.  My letters set me free.  Or at least they are supposed to." (unpaged)  She has kept these letters in a hatbox, and there are five of them, the latest one to Josh.  So in the first week of school, Lara Jean is shocked when one of the popular crowd, Peter Kavinsky, tells her he wants to talk to her.  He says a letter was mailed to his house.  She can't figure out how this might have happened, and Lara Jean is mortified.  Because if Peter got his, then Josh did too.  And that means he knows how she feels about him still.  Even though he has belonged to Margot all along.

When Josh tries to talk to Lara Jean about the letter, she panics.  She sees Peter (who has just broken up with his girlfriend Gen) in the hall, and runs up and kisses him, in an effort to convince Josh that she doesn't like him at all.  Afterwards, Pete and Lara Jean decide to fake a relationship to make both Gen and Josh jealous.  It seems to be working.  At the same time, Josh is trying to figure out where he fits, both at school and in the Covey family, without Margot there.  And he's considering Lara Jean with new eyes, now that he knows that she liked him too.

While this book is created with some of my favorites subjects in mind - school and romance, it also has a strong sense of family and sisterhood, something I relate to very much.  You know I see the sister relationship in Frances and Gloria these days.  I've also written here about my relationship with my own sister previously.  My relationship with my sister is one of the most important things in my life, and it is quite often the lens through which I see myself.

This is also true of Lara Jean.  She always sees herself in relation to Margot, and Margot is a typical oldest sister.  On top of that Margot feels very responsible for her sisters, and takes care of most things for Kitty and Lara Jean.  The first time Lara Jean drives after Margot leaves for Scotland, she admits that her directional skills are under-developedc: "I've never had to know how to get to the mall, because Margot always drove us there. But now I have to do better, because I'm responsible for driving Kitty around." (p.33)  That is a perfect middle sister quote if I've ever heard one.  At the beginning of the novel, Lara Jean is bookended by her two sisters.  I've described Margot, and Kitty is demanding, slightly devious, and a little spoiled. Kitty is cute, Margot is smart.  There is nothing about Lara Jean that makes her stand out from her sisters when Margot leaves.  She doesn't actually want to stand out - Lara Jean is perfectly content to be one of "the Song girls".

When Margot goes away to college, all three sisters are forced to rethink their relationships to each other, rethink the definitions they comfortably fell into in the past few years.  For instance, Lara Jean and Margot have always babied Kitty and taken care of her every need.  "After Mommy died, we all had to realign ourselves.  Everybody had new roles.  Margot and I were no longer locked in battle, because we both understood that Kitty was ours to take care of now." (p. 338-9)  But with Margot gone, Lara Jean begins teaching Kitty some of the chores she had done with Margot previously.  They had always just done them, and shielded Kitty from having to do any chores.  Kitty becomes more independent as Lara Jean begins doing more with Peter and his friends, and it is a good thing.

Even from Scotland, Margot has been protecting her sisters.  She doesn't want them to know how unsure she is in her new environment, how lost and homesick she feels.  When Margot arrives home for Christmas break, Lara Jean realizes how much things have changed: "Is this how people lose touch?  I didn't think that could happen with sisters.  Maybe with other people, but never with us.  Before Margot left, I knew what she was thinking without having to ask; I knew everything about her.  Not anymore." (p. 294)  This really resonated with me.  I, too, went away to college, although not as far.  But I know how it feels to see the change in your family from the outside and not be able to find your comfortable place in your family again when you return.  You've changed.  They've changed.  Margot finally says to Lara Jean "'But then I left, and it's like you didn't need me as much as I thought.'  Her voice breaks. 'You were fine without me.'" (p. 344)  I have been in Margot's shoes and I know how she feels.  But what I hadn't considered was Lara Jean's perspective as the younger sister.  Lara Jean retorts "'Only because you taught me everything!'" (p. 344)  It is a watershed moment for the girls as they see their relationship anew.

I haven't talked much about the romance at the heart of this book, which is unusual for me.  But I will say this - I did love the romance here.  I was surprised at how much I rooted for Lara Jean and wanted her to realize the potential of what she might have as her relationships change.  She's never seen herself outside of her sisters before, and she has something to offer.  To me, this book is so much more about the sisters and how they change, but it is a fun look at romance too.

These sisters can weather anything together, and I love their friendship.  It was a great moment in my life when my sister and I became friends besides being sisters, and the Song girls need each other's friendship even more than they realize.  Jenny Han has scored another winner.

To All the Boys I've Loved Before.  Jenny Han.  Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, 2014.

ARC sent to me by the publisher for review

Eleanor & Park

This was my second time reading Eleanor & Park.  Usually I read the books I'm going to blog about twice - that way I can mark quotes I'd like to use in my review.  But I usually read books twice in a row, pretty quickly, so that I can remember all the things that struck me the first time.  This time, however, I had to read it the first time and return it - there were holds on it.  And that's fairly unusual - even though my public library is small, there are rarely holds lists there for more than the most popular titles.  I was gratified to see the long holds list.  I love when someone else in my town sees how great a book is without me having to shout it from the rooftops!  When I finally got it back, I dog-eared many, many pages with quotes I wanted to share.

Eleanor & Park would have been a sure win for me, no matter what.  It combines school (I love books set in schools, for whatever reason) and romance.  But the icing on the cake is that Rowell chose to set this in the '80's.  Without dating myself too much (yeah, right!), I grew up in the '80's.  So reading this didn't feel like a blast from the past, it felt like the way things were for me.

A side note about the time period - at my old library, they started putting historical fiction genre labels on books set in the 1980's.  While I technically agree that books set more than 20 years ago are historical fiction, boy, does that make me feel old!

Now back to Eleanor & Park.  It begins on the day Eleanor first gets on the bus.  It's a bus full of high school students, and like any group of students who have been riding the bus together for any length of time, they have created a stratification.  The coolest (and most obnoxious) kids sit in the back, freshmen in the front, and everyone else somewhere in the middle.  When Eleanor first stands tentatively in the front of the bus, Park notes that she is "not just new - but big and awkward.  With crazy hair, bright red on top of curly...She had on a plaid shirt, a man's shirt, with half a dozen weird necklaces hanging around her neck and scarves wrapped around her wrists.  She reminded Park of a scarecrow or one of the trouble dolls his mom kept on her dresser." (p. 8).  Eleanor looks so different from everyone else, and she is harassed from this very first moment.  By the time she has reached the seat where Park slumps down, she has been told she can't sit in multiple seats.  So Park tells her to sit next to him.  And not in a nice way, either.  Having grown up with these kids, he knows the comments he is in for even by sitting next to her.

And yet, from that small action, something huge grows.  They very slowly develop a friendship based first on the comics Park reads on the bus.  Then they begin listening to and sharing music.  One of my favorite pieces in the book was when Park gives Eleanor a Smiths tape - the album "How Soon is Now?" Park hears the lyrics as "I am the son... and the heir."  When Eleanor listens to it again, she hears "I am the sun...and the air." (p. 54)  It is one of those little moments where you see how different, how separate they each are.  And it makes their eventual romance that much sweeter.

Eleanor's life is very,very difficult.  She has just recently returned to her mom, siblings and stepfather.  She was living with another family for a long time after her stepfather kicked her out.  He's a drinker, a druggie, and has a temper.  Richie is just skeevy, and I can only imagine how exhausted Eleanor's mother is with the effort of keeping them all out of Richie's way.  There is no money.  The children don't have shampoo, toothpaste, clothes that fit.  Eleanor's daily reality is heartbreaking and the courage and grace that she carries is amazing.  She purposefully dresses in wild colors so people won't notice she's worn the same jeans three days that week.  That way, Eleanor feels like she can control what people say about her.

Eleanor lives in a carefully constructed house of lies and half-truths.  Her stepfather is fairly out of control, but no one can know about it.  They all live with an excruciating amount of tension.  And Park's life is almost the polar opposite.  His mother is Korean, and she met Park's father while he was serving in the military there.  Eleanor is astonished by Park's family - so content, so put together, so different.  "Eleanor imagined Park's dad, Tom Selleck, tucking his Dainty China person into his flak jacket and sneaking her out of Korea." (p.126).

Park sees how Eleanor looks to everyone else: "Eleanor, today, was wearing her sharkskin suit jacket and an old plaid cowboy shirt.  She had more in common with his grandpa than with his mom." (p. 122).  But he genuinely loves her, too.  "As soon as he said it, she broke into a smile.  And when Eleanor smiled, something broke inside him.  Something always did." (p. 163).  He loves her at first in spite of his wanting to fit in with everyone else.  Then, as their romance continues, he loves those things that stand out about her best of all.

Rowell has constructed an amazing book.  Of course, I love the music, but I also love many other things  about this book.  The romance is tender, juxtaposed against the suspense of Eleanor's family life.  I physically hurt for the whole family - their desolation is piercing.  Park's family is fascinating.  They are quirky, endearing, but not perfect.  Once Park's mother knows more about Eleanor's life, she tells Park "' In big family,' she said, 'everything, everybody spread so thin.'...'Nobody gets enough.' she said.  'Nobody gets what they need.  When you always hungry, you get hungry in your head.'" (p. 189).    This is such a strong description of Eleanor's family.  Eleanor often feels like whatever she might have comes at the expense of her siblings or her mother.

I also love that Eleanor and Park are not your typical romance characters.  I just read another teen romance (which shall remain nameless) where both of the main characters were gorgeous, blond and tanned.  It is a relief to have characters who aren't perfect.  They are originals.

Finally, Rowell's writing is extraordinary.  I said at the beginning of the post that I dog-eared lots of quotes.  I probably marked thirty quotes in this book - that moment of recognition happened over and over again for me.  There were places where truth shines, where romance shows its face, moments of breathtaking cruelty, moments of sheer perfection.  Teen romance feels like something to smile at, to marvel at.  And this book is no exception.  I can hardly wait to read Rainbow Rowell's next book!

Eleanor & Park.  Rainbow Rowell.  St. Martin's Griffin, 2013.

borrowed from Lewis & Clark Library

Reluctantly Alice

How much do I love Alice McKinley?  Let me count the ways…one, two, three,  four.  And now here’s a fifth way.

In Reluctantly Alice, Alice McKinley is starting seventh grade.  She and her friends have moved on to junior high, and I’m sure we have all felt the same way Alice feels.  “Junior high sure has a way of mixing you up, tossing kids around like a giant blender.” (p. 92).  Just before the summer began, Alice and her group of friends were at the top of their elementary school.  Everything they did was cool and clever to the younger kids in the school.  Now suddenly they are at the bottom of the barrel, watching the older kids to see what they do (9^th grade boys perform a Boxer Check in front of Alice and her astonished girl friends).  At the same time, these seventh graders are desperately trying not to be noticed by older kids.  They aren’t sure what to do, and they feel a little overwhelmed and lost.

Alice has decided to concentrate on having everyone like her this year.  She wants to be the kind of girl that causes everyone to smile when they think of her, and if anyone can do it, you get the feeling Alice can.  She rarely has something mean to say, she’s fun and daring, smart and funny.  Alice is honest and even her mishaps seem endearing.  But almost as soon as the school year begins, Alice has an enemy.  An 8^th grader in some of her classes, Denise, starts to dislike Alice and begins to taunt and bully Alice.  Like many bullies, Denise finds what she believes is Alice’s weakness (her mother’s death) and brings it up every chance she gets. This escalates into a serious bullying situation.  Denise and her group of friends throw food, trip Alice, laugh at her…it goes on and on.  And although this book was written before most of the focus on bullying in children’s literature, the solution Alice finds still rings true.  She comes up with this idea on her own, one that works for her without confronting Denise in a mean way (although she certainly thinks about it), but also extends kindness to Denise.  I don’t think her solution will work for everyone, but it fits Alice perfectly.  I also think it will help young teens realize that there may be a solution to their bullying problem that fits them.  Alice never tells a teacher about the bullying, but she does talk to her father and brother about it.  They give her suggestions, and Alice’s brother Lester does show up once at the school to help Alice, but they all seem to recognize that the answer has to come from Alice.

As in most of these books, Alice, Pamela and Elizabeth (her two best friends) continue to question love, romance and their changing bodies.  When Elizabeth has a pressing question that Alice tries to answer, Alice’s father steps in.  Alice has a strong, honest relationship with her father and brother.  They answer her questions with as much information as they think she can handle, and they know what to do if they don’t have answers to her questions.  Thus is set up one of my favorite scenes in this series so far.  Alice’s father takes Alice to the library, and allows her to research the answer to Elizabeth’s question herself.  When Alice is in the library stacks, “A librarian came by to get a book from the shelf, and she couldn’t help but see what I was looking at; she didn’t even blink.  Like it was okay to be curious.” (p. 90)  These are librarians at their most professional – they treat Alice respectfully and as an adult.  I love seeing librarians in such a positive light.  I love middle schoolers and teens getting to see that libraries can help answer questions in a non-judgmental way.  What a terrific scene!

There are many, many other things going on in this novel, some of which are carried over from other books in the series, some of which develop in this novel.  While it is definitely part of the whole series, you can pick up any Alice book and read it as a stand-alone novel.  However I would bet that no matter where you started in the series, you would want to read the whole set!!  I can’t say enough how much I do love Alice and the world Naylor creates in this series.  For the first time, in her biography at the end of the book, Naylor writes that she plans to keep writing the Alice series until Alice turns eighteen.  I’m so grateful – I can’t wait to see how Alice turns out!!

Reluctantly Alice.  Phyllis Reynolds Naylor.  Aladdin, 2000, ©1991.

Borrowed from the Lewis & Clark library

Alice in Rapture, Sort Of

“Somehow life seemed to be rushing ahead faster than I was ready for.  I’d barely get comfortable with one thing, and then – bam!- something new was happening.” (p. 122-3) 

This quote, to me, is the core of the appeal of the Alice series.  Don’t we all feel like this?  It serves to remind us adults that we aren’t the only ones who feel like life is always changing.  And it helps comfort girls who feel like they are the only ones among their group of friends who aren’t ready to have things change.

If you’re a regular follower of my blog, you know that the character of Alice McKinley has really struck a chord with me since the first book I read in this series many years ago.  I had read various books in the series over the years, but I decided I wanted to start Alice’s journey from the beginning of her preteen years.  I’ve already started blogging about the series here, hereand here.

This is the summer between Alice’s 6^th and 7^th grade years, and at the beginning, Alice feels that it is going to be a great summer.  She has two really great friends, Pamela and Elizabeth, and a boyfriend, Patrick.  Pamela’s cousin from New Jersey told Pamela that they need to start junior high with boyfriends in order to be accepted, so this becomes “The Summer of the First Boyfriend” according to Alice’s father.

And having a boyfriend requires a whole new set of social skills for the girls.  Since Alice has had all year to grow her friendship with the other girls, Naylor uses this novel to help Alice find her way with Patrick.  These are still young girls, so the most that goes on here is French kissing.  But each girl has a boyfriend during this summer, and they all make different relationship decisions.  Patrick and Alice see each other almost every day, mostly spending time on her front porch talking and holding hands.  Elizabeth believe that she shouldn’t even kiss a boy (because her parents have told her she is not allowed to date) and Pamela’s mother has threatened to cut off Pamela’s extremely long hair if she dates anyone.  Pamela decides to risk her mother’s anger and keep her boyfriend, but Elizabeth’s boyfriend breaks up with her when she won’t kiss him.

Patrick and Alice do lots of things together, including a supervised vacation at the beach, a fancy date at the country club and lots of time spent hanging out with their group of friends.  In other words, this is an appropriate romance for young teens – there is no pressure to do anything uncomfortable at this point in the series, and the teens are having a good time together without getting into trouble.  And when Alice decides that she would rather not have a boyfriend at the beginning of school, they downgrade to “special friends” without too much fuss.

One of the biggest topics in this series is Alice’s mother, who died when Alice was five.  Alice is always evaluating her mother’s absence and her impact on Alice’s life.  There are some real bittersweet moments in this novel.  Alice discovers a box of her mom’s memorabilia in their attic while looking for some clothes.  This brings her closer to her mother as it triggers some of Alice own memories (she hasn’t remembered much about her mother previously).  It also helps Alice begin to know her mother as a woman and a mother.

However, as a motherless girl, there are times when Alice really feels left out.  In this book she begins to find that there are substitute mothers in her life – her Aunt Sally and cousin Carol, who give her advice on what to give Patrick for his birthday; a neighbor who happens to show up when Alice is home sick with the flu; some of her older brother’s girlfriends…Alice isn’t alone.  And in fact, she has many strong women in her life to help her.  She just has to know where to look.

This series is so rewarding.  Every time I dive into one, I read it within an afternoon.  They are comforting and also address the anxiety of change.  It is a feeling we can all relate to, and that’s part of the reason I keep coming back.

Alice in Rapture, Sort Of.  Phyllis Reynolds Naylor.  Atheneum, 1989.

Borrowed from Lewis & Clark Library

Anna and the French Kiss

First of all, I know it's been a few weeks since my last post.  If you are wondering what I am reading in between posts, I am participating in two challenges this year.  I am reading in the YA Reading Challenge and, on my other blog, Picture Book Reading Challenge (for which the girls and I are trying to read 200 picture books/board books/readers).  I update those on a regular basis, even if I don't actively review them.

For some of you who know me and my reading tastes in real life, there will be no surprises when I tell you how much I loved Anna and the French Kiss.  After all, it has many of my favorite teen book elements in it - romance, friendship, and most important of all, boarding school!  In fact, when a librarian friend wrote to me about this book, she told me "This is a very Susan book!".  And it is - but it is so much more!
Anna Oliphant has been sent off to Paris for her senior year of high school .  Who wouldn't want to go to Paris?  Well, Anna for one.  She loves her life in Atlanta, with a potential new boyfriend, great friends, and a cool little brother.  Not to mention that she took Spanish the other three years of high school.  But her father, a Lurlene McDaniel-like author with a pen name, feels she must go there, and so she does.  She spends her first night at the School of America in Paris homesick and worried. 
The girl next door, Meredith, ends up taking Anna under her wing and introducing her to her friends.  Her group of friends are diverse and cool, including Etienne St. Clair.  One of the first things she learns about Etienne is that he has a girlfriend, so instead of falling in love with him (Anna tells herself) she'll just become his friend.

St. Clair (as the friends call him) and Anna have really strong chemistry.  I believe one of Perkins' strengths as an author is that she creates a believable, strong friendship between Anna and Etienne.  Because they have feelings for each other, they take time to get to know each other.  They spend time visiting all the landmarks of Paris, sitting together in class and learning about each other and their families and friends.  We learn about them, but also get to vicariously enjoy the sidelong glances, hands touching and all of the other signs that this friendship is headed towards romance.

Another thing that makes this novel work is its characters.  While the story revolves around Anna and Etienne, there are many strong characters surrounding them.  For instance, Anna's father is laughable - if he isn't your father.  He specializes in sappy novels, much like Nicholas Sparks or James Patterson.  Anna is embarassed by his novels, the movies made out of his novels and the way he talks to her.  Her father sends her an email telling her he will give her younger brother "her best" when he sees him.  He has arranged this year for the cachet it will give him as well.  Just imagine the author blurb on the back of his next novel, stating that his daughter is "studying in Paris".  Well...I've gotten a little off track here, but I really did love him in his awkwardness and awfulness.

While there is a romantic love story at the heart of this book, this is also a story of friendship.  When Meredith brings Anna into her group of friends, Anna has no idea how much they will shape her year in Paris.  With no French language skills, and coming into a senior class of 25, Anna could have spent the year very lost.  Her friends support her and help her learn her way around the city.  They translate breakfast menus, ticket orders - they help her without judging her or making her feel helpless.  But Meredith has had a crush on Etienne for a long time, and when Anna falls in love with him too, she has to work to maintain her friendship with Meredith.  The friends will all move in different directions as they (mostly) head off to college, but you don't get the sense that they will slip away from each other.  I like that Anna (and Perkins) doesn't emphasize the romance over her friendships.

At the end of the novel, you get the feeling that Anna and Etienne might actually make it - that their romance will last beyond high school and even as they grow and change in college.  To me, that is the mark of a great romance - you can believe in and envision these characters remaining in love as their lives develop.  This is Perkins' first novel, but I am excited to hear that she already has two companion novels in the works - one coming out later this year.  Who doesn't love a great love story?

Anna and the French Kiss.  Stephanie Perkins.  Dutton, 2010.
borrowed from Lewis & Clark Library

The Grooming of Alice

One of the first children's books I read in graduate school was Alice the Brave.  I loved it so much - even as an adult, I could still connect with and feel comforted by this short novel.  Ever since, I have loved this series of books for its wisdom and its sense of certainty in a world that is always changing.

And in The Grooming of Alice, the world is definitely changing.  Alice and her group of friends are moving on to high school in the fall.  They have the summer stretching out before them, and the girls decide to get into shape to look good in high school.  Alice's friend Elizabeth takes this diet too far after a teasing comment from a boy and begins to teeter into possible anorexia. 

The summer is also filled with potential changes for Alice.  Alice's single father is planning a trip to England (where his girlfriend is teaching for a year) to convince her to marry him. Alice is volunteering at a hospital where a much-loved teacher is dying.  Alice's friend Pamela is fighting with her father.  Life is messy, but it goes on.  Not everything is resolved in a happy manner, but it is resolved successfully.

This episode in the Alice series deals with sex in a frank but nonjudgemental way.  Alice has been with her boyfriend Patrick for a couple of years, and while they only kiss, she's beginning to wonder about...more.  Alice's mother died when she was young, which means that she often has to turn to her father and college-aged brother for advice.  Interestingly, her big brother does take the time to analyze sexual behavior with her, allowing her the freedom to ask questions without becoming too uncomfortable.  The girls also attend a seminar where they see pictures of naked bodies - the point being that there is a wide range of bodies and that all sizes and types are normal.  Again, this is really comforting for the kid who has questions and is afraid to ask their own parents.  However, it also makes this book (and others in the series) not appropriate for every reader.

Alice is every bit her age.  She isn't perfect - she makes mistakes, is grounded and yelled at, just like every other teen.  But she is wonderful - she has a real sense of herself and is questioning and changing.  Alice supports her friends, but is honest too.  She has a group of friends, but doesn't just follow the pack mentality.  She has a strong relationship with her brother and dad, but it's real too.  For instance, Alice asks her older brother what part of her body he would change, and he tells her that her lips should be changed - they should be stapled shut!

Because I've had a sick child this week, I found myself turning to Alice for comfort when I had a break - sometimes just a chapter, sometimes more.  I have always meant to read the series in order (and maybe collect them all!), since I've only read some titles, skipping around in the series.  So now is my opportunity to read the series in order ( I found this chronological listing on Phyllis Reynolds Naylor's website).  I already have the three prequels checked out from the library.  I'll report back!

The Grooming of Alice.  Phyllis Reynolds Naylor.  Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 2000.  from my personal collection