Wintergirls

Thirty-three times Lia's estranged friend Cassie called her on that fateful night. Lia doesn't listen to the increasingly frantic messages until its too late. Cassie is found dead in a motel room, a victim of her eating disease. Lia is left with terrible pain and guilt that causes her anorexia and cutting habit to spin out of control.

Wintergirls is a chilling novel in which every piece of food eaten is listed by its calorie count. It is told in the first person in a stream of consciousness with parents referred to in parenthesis by their professional titles, crossed-out. There are blank pages. The self-loathing permeates.

This year's Edwards Award author Laurie Halse Anderson has chosen to write about a very serious problem. I kept wondering what teens who have eating diseases will think as they read it. Anderson indicated that she consulted with professionals who work with teens with eating disorders to be sure she portrayed the thinking realistically. As Publisher's Weekly (Jan. 26, 2009) put it, "As difficult as reading this novel can be, it is more difficult to put down." An important read for librarians and other adults.

City of Bones by Cassandra Clare

I enjoy reading young adult historical fiction. In fact, now that I think about it, I enjoy reading all the genres when I'm reading books written for teens. This is interesting because, when it comes to adult fiction, I am much pickier. I read mostly mysteries and historical fiction with occasional ventures into realistic fiction and some poetry. In my teen reading, I especially enjoy fantasy and science fiction but I rarely read those genres in my adult reading. Correspondingly, I haven't found a teen mystery series that really engages me. Now that you have sampled the major genres of teen books, what genre did you especially enjoy?

This is all a lead-in to the fact that I am blogging about a book that isn't historical fiction. Hey, when you are the instructor, you can break the rules. City of Bones by Cassandra Clare is an urban fantasy that has been on the list of books that I want to read for some time. It was number 6 on ALA's 2008 Top Ten Teen Books. The second in this series (Mortal Instruments), City of Ashes, is nominated for 2009. You can learn how the list is created and see the other titles nominated for this year at:
http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/yalsa/teenreading/teenstopten/teenstopten.cfm

Clary goes to an all-ages club with her friend Simon. There she witnesses a murder - but not your average murder. The attackers, she learns, are spectral Shadowhunters, charged with killing demonic creatures called Night Children. When Clary returns to her home, her mother is missing and the apartment has been tossed. Attacked by a horrible slithery beast, Clary winds up in The Institute where she learns that her mother (and her world) is not what she always believed. Vampires, werewolves, fairies, demons, and warlocks are everywhere and a giant struggle is going on to find the Mortal Cup. There is also a sexy love interest and fans of Stephanie Meyer's Twilight series should like this. Reviewers have pointed out a parallel to Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

PS- This week I also read a really good adult mystery - Look Again (Lisa Scottoline).

Multicultural

Fourteen year old Kendra lives with her loving but very strict Nana in the Bronx. Her mother, who she calls Renee, is just finishing up her Ph.D. and starting her first teaching job. Kendra yearns to live with her and be a bigger part of her life. The abandonment and rejection she feels when her mother shows no sign of wanting her is searing. She becomes sexually involved with hot Nashawn who her best friend (and aunt) also has a crush on. She is ashamed yet excited by what she is doing with Nashawn (including oral and anal sex). When Nana discovers what is going on, she cries and says, "Why are you doing this? Why? I'd been doing so good with you, and now"... She shakes her head. "What did I do wrong this time?" (Renee was 14 when she became pregnant with Kendra). Nana insists that Renee take Kendra in. The first part of the book is very gritty and real feeling. In the final section of the book, Kendra and her mother come together, Nashawn and Kendra develop a relationship that is more than sex, and Kendra's best friend forgives her. This seems to me to be a bit too easy to be realistic.

Kendra is the second book by Coe Booth. The first book, Tyrell, was also critically acclaimed. In an interview in Teacher Librarian (April 2009), Booth was asked whether her books were too edgy for young readers. She answered that when she was a crisis intervention counselor, she made frequent home visits and got to see firsthand the chaos so many children and teens are living in. "All too often these teens are carrying adult burdens before they are ready. So I choose to write about teenagers in these situations because they exist and they are not often reflected in literature."Coe Booth communicates with her fans in various ways including Facebook and Twitter.

Nonficton - No Choirboy

No Choirboy by Susan Kuklin

In an Booklist interview (9/15/08), Susan Kuklin said she originally planned that the book would be about capital punishment. However, "As I began writing, violence became the thread that held the book together. All three inmates grew up witnessing or being the direct recipients of acts of violence. Then they themselves committed their own violent acts. Now they will spend the rest of their lives in a very, very violent place."

Kuklin devoted 5 years to researching this book. She interviewed three prisoners who were given death-row sentences when they were teenagers. Most of the book consists of the prisoner's own words from the interview transcripts. She said it was very difficult to write because she had promised their attorneys not to discuss the crimes (their cases were still under appeal) and she promised her publisher not to use too much "legalese". She also interviewed the family of a man who was executed in 2002 for a murder he committed when he was 17 years old. The final chapters are interviews with the family of a murdered teen and a capital appellate lawyer who was the attorney of two of the interviewed inmates.

This book demonstrates the power of quality nonfiction. It is not a balanced overview of capital punishment in the Opposing Viewpoints series mode. It is not a website where a student gathers information and spits it back in a report. It is a book that gives insight and provokes thinking.

Note: The inmates interviewed are off death-row today because the Supreme Court ruling in 2002 (Atkins v. Virginia) that juveniles cannot be given the death penalty.

Teen Love Poems

When I was at Fairview Middle in Dayton, there was a girl who asked me several times for love poems. I wish I'd had this book then. Partly Cloudy: Poems of Love and Longing (Soto) is divided into two parts. The first part are poems told from the girl's point of view (A Girl's Tears, Her Songs) and the second from the boy's (A Boy's Body, His Words). Poetry is free verse and explores jealousy, tenderness, fear of rejection, joy, breaking up, humor.

Don't You See

If only you would turn
And see me. I think I am nice.

And you're nice too.
Doesn't that mean we are compatible?

And look! We go to the same
School, at the same hour,

And under the same sun.
The blossoms are fluttering

From the fruitless cherry tree.
Is this fruitless? I'm flying

In and out of your shadow,
Stepping up steps,

Down steps, slowing
For water at the drinking fountain,
And bending over to tie my shoe.

If only you would turn
And see me

Seeing you.

Graphic Novel

To dance: a ballerina's graphic novel (Siena Cherson Siegel with artwork by her husband Mark Siegel) is a memoir of one girl's life in dance as she trained to be a professional. Siena attended the School of American Ballet in the 1970s when the great George Balanchine reigned. I loved the graphic novel format for this book. The joy and pain shine through the spare words and lively art. For such a little book (you can read it in 30 minutes) there is a lot of information about the world of ballet as well as a character who you can care about. I think it would be enjoyed by upper elementary through high school - mostly by girls.

Nation

This 2009 Printz Honor book is a terrific adventure story but much more. In an alternative universe in the age of the great sailing ships, a tsunami wipes out the people of a tiny island that proudly calls itself The Nation. Only Mau survives. Shipwrecked on the island is an English girl who is unknowingly in line to inherit the British throne. This book is a survival story - a story of culture class between native people and Europeans. It is also a story about religious belief as Mau struggles to align the beliefs of his people and the eternal question: why does God(s) allow bad things to happen to innocent people? Why did I survive?
Oh and did I mention there is a little romance? Teens should enjoy this one.