July Reading Log

Troy High, by Shana Norris
Homer for cheerleaders. Very lite, I would say cute but I don't say cute.

When You Reach Me, by Rebecca Stead
Reviewed

The Mind of the Maker, by Dorothy Sayers
Wonderful. Quotes here.

Or Give Me Death, by Ann Rinaldi
The story of Patrick Henry's family, as their mother goes insane. Read as research for the novel I'm working on--my heroine's mother is modeled after Mrs. Henry.

Seven Reasons Why You Can Trust the Bible, by Erwin Lutzer
Great stuff. Straightforward.

Leaving the Bellweathers, by Kristin Clark Venuti
Reviewed

The Locked Garden, by Gloria Whelan
I liked this story. It felt unique, intelligent for middle grade readers, but very open-ended conclusion.

Candor, by Pam Bachorz
Reviewed

Sure. I see how it is.

You don't have time to read a drippingly-awesome novel like Cry, the Beloved Country, but you can photoshoot in front of the mirror. In your pajamas. With your long hair made to look like bangs.

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...

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I guess so.

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It's just so fun!

On My Nightstand for August

I must simply admit it: I cannot finish all the books I determined to read this month.

Of nine titles, three will be rolling over:

Cry, The Beloved Country, by Alan Paton
The Greatest Among You, by Randy Sims
Les Miserables, by Victor Hugo

And the additions are:

Anna Karenina, by Leo Tolstoy
Bran Hambric and the Farfield Curse, by Kaleb Nation
The Young Unicorns, by Madeleine L'Engle
Unnatural Death, by Dorothy Sayers

Scoop of the e-e-evening: When You Reach Me

I can usually tell by chapter three if a book is going to be a year-end favorite. By chapter three, I’ve come up at least once, murmuring, this is a good. book. With Rebecca Stead’s novel, When You Reach Me, I was neutral through page 133.

The writing was strong—“I walked up the hill, where the sunlight seemed to touch everything like it was a hyper kid running all over a toy store—it bounced off the dirty metal lampposts, the shiny brass awning posts, even the sunglasses of a woman walking her dogs with a cup of coffee in one hand. Everything shined.”

But nothing blew me away. It wasn’t shaping up to be a “more than” story. There are so many MG novels written each year, all about the microcosm. I want bigger things in a book. I want a story that makes me think about more than life—I want Life.

133 pages may sound like a long time to stay impartial, but the remaining story? It’s worth it.

Four mysterious letters change Miranda's world forever.

By sixth grade, Miranda and her best friend, Sal, know how to navigate their New York City neighborhood. They know where it's safe to go, like the local grocery store, and they know whom to avoid, like the crazy guy on the corner.

But things start to unravel. Sal gets punched by a new kid for what seems like no reason, and he shuts Miranda out of his life. The apartment key that Miranda's mom keeps hidden for emergencies is stolen. And then Miranda finds a mysterious note scrawled on a tiny slip of paper:

I am coming to save your friend's life, and my own.

I must ask two favors. First, you must write me a letter.

The notes keep coming, and Miranda slowly realizes that whoever is leaving them knows all about her, including things that have not even happened yet. Each message brings her closer to believing that only she can prevent a tragic death. Until the final note makes her think she's too late.

It’s been so long since I first met Meg Murray. I was twelve, I believe. The perfect age to discover L’Engle. Once A Wrinkle in Time had captivated me, I proceeded to devour the Murray stories (A Swiftly Tilting Planet wrenched my innermost parts), the Austin stories (A Ring of Endless Light refused to let go), to be encouraged by her thoughts on writing, to be challenged by her theological musings.

Within the last few years, I’ve become aware of "Christian neopagan" themes in her ideas (and yes, I do take such allegations with a grain of salt--but it still made me approach her with a little more caution.) What the knowledge didn’t do is dampen the wellsprings of my love for Madeleine’s stories. And it’s a love for Madeleine’s stories that drives When You Reach Me. Minutes after closing it, I went upstairs, made myself a mug of cocoa, and snuggled back down with a dusty book, too long neglected, fraught with delight—A Wrinkle in Time. And it was good.

Suffice it to say, if you love L’Engle, Stead’s novel will satisfy. Maybe you won’t realize the satisfaction until the last paragraph, or the last sentence, but at that moment, you will nod and murmur—this is a good. book.

All in a day's work

How to assist patrons who ask if we have

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and end up leaving with The Ameranth Enchantment tucked under their arm?

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...

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?!?!?!

The Mind of the Maker

Dorothy Sayers' The Mind of the Maker was one of five books I resolved to read in 2009. It was deep--I admit to glazing more than once. But in between, I gathered some great quotes:

[Writing] is a social act; but the poet is, first and foremost, his own society. (Emily, anyone?)

Idea, Energy, Power (Brilliant concept) For other minds, other analogies; but the artist's experience proves that the Trinitarian doctrine of Idea, Energy, Power is, quite literally, what it purports to be: a doctrine of the Creative Mind.

The componants of the material world are fixed; those of the world of imagination increase by a continuous and irreversible process, without any destruction or rearrangment of what went before.

[The good playwright] feels within himself a continual shifting of his Energy from the one character to the other as he writes. He is usually (I think) aware of the stage itself in his imagination; by an act of mental vision he disposes his characters upon it, and his centre of consciousness ' shifts as he goes, so that in writing down John's lines he seems to view the stage from John's point of view, while in writing Mary's reply he views it from Mary's point of view. At the same time, he knows quite well that his responsive Power is sitting, so to speak, in the stalls, watching the whole scene from the spectator's point of view, and he is also dimly conscious of the original and controlling Idea, which does not take the stage into account at all, but accepts or rejects every word according to some eternal scheme of values that is concerned only with the reality of all experience.

Our speculations about Shakespeare are almost as multifarious and foolish as our speculations about the maker of the universe, and, like those, are frequently concerned to establish that his works were not made by him but by another person of the same name.

...when plot precedes character and must be adhered to whatever happens, character inevitably suffers. (Writing Aloud, J. D. Beresford)

...if the characters and the situation are rightly conceived together, as integral parts of the same unity, then there will be no need to force them to the right solution of that situation.

The shadow on the world, thrown by the world
Standing in its own light, which light God is.

Where a book is concerned, the average man is a confirmed theist.

There are the propaganda writers -particularly the propaganda novelists and dramatists - Manichees, whose son assumes what looks like a genuine human body, but is in fact a hollow simulacrum that cannot truly live, love or suffer, but only perform exemplary gestures symbolical of the Idea. (This made me think of a lot of Christian Fiction)

Like "happiness", our two terms "problem" and "solution" are not to be found in the Bible-a point which gives to that wonderful literature a singular charm and cogency. . . . On the whole, the influence of these words is malign, and becomes increasingly so. They have deluded poor men with Messianic expectations .. . which are fatal to steadfast persistence in good workmanship and to well-doing in general. . . .-L. P. JACKS: Stevenson Lectures, 1926-7.

...the artist does not see life as a problem to be solved, but as a medium for creation.

...the Father-Idea of the book, providing the mechanics of the [problem], the catalyst that precipitates the instability of the emotional situation, and also a theme which unites the microcosm of the book to the macrocosm of the universe.

What is obvious here is the firmly implanted notion that all human situations are "problems" like detective problems, capable of a single, necessary, and categorical solution, which must be wholly right, while all others are wholly wrong. But this they cannot be, since human situations are subject to the law of human nature, whose evil is at all times rooted in its good, and whose good can only redeem, but not abolish, its evil. ... We do not, that is, merely examine the data to disentangle something that was in them already: we use them to construct something that was not there before: neither circumcision or uncircumcision, but a new creature.

[Each new book] is a "still" cut out and thrown off from the endless living picture which his creative mind reels out. It is a picture in itself, but it only leads from the picture behind it to the picture in front of it, as part of a connected process....And though he may imagine for the moment that this fresh world is wholly unconnected with the world he has just finished, yet, if he looks back along the sequence of his creatures, he will find that each was in some way the outcome and fulfilment of the rest-that all his worlds belong to the one universe that is the image of his own Idea.

[Theologians] are ready to use the "Father-symbol" to illustrate the likeness and familiarity between God and His children. But the "Creator-symbol" is used, if at all, to illustrate the deep gulf between God and His creatures. Yet, as Berdyaev says, "The image of the artist and the poet is imprinted more clearly on his works than on his children."

What I've Been Doing This Week (Or, A Few Photos from Cousin Camp '09)

Fleance and me taking a water break

My sister, the bloody Banquo

Karaoke night. I'm Miley Cyrus, Robbie is John Travolta. "I Thought I Lost You"

Three guesses who I'm filming...

Eyes Like Stars Winner

And the winner is ... Lady Roxi!

Thanks to everyone who entered!

Check back in August for another ARC giveaway: Darkwood, by M.E. Breen

Scoop of the e-e-evening: Leaving the Bellweathers

Coming from a family of nine, I couldn’t resist this tagline: “The Addams Family meets Cheaper by the Dozen.” I can still remember the first time I read Frank and Ern Gilbreth’s account of their life with ten siblings—I laughed myself to pieces, but also I envied them, craved the amazing atmosphere that bound the Gilbreths together. Obviously, a fictitious family can’t possess quite as many quirks as living, breathing humans, but Leaving the Bellweathers still caught my attention.

Meet the Bellweather family: Spider, a 14-year-old boy who surrounds himself and his family with dangerous--very dangerous--endangered animals; Ninda, a 13-year-old self-righteous do-gooder whose good deeds somehow always end in disaster; the 9-year-old triplets Spike, Brick, and Sassy, who speak to one another in Loud and Strong Voices; their hapless parents who only contribute to the chaos; and their wonderful, buttoned-up, and organized butler, Tristan Benway, who tells the tale of his attempted escape from the endangered alligators, scientific experiments run amok, smuggled-in circus performers, and general mayhem of the Bellweather family.

You can't deny that with such a tagline, comparisons are inevitable:

Like Cheaper by the Dozen, the story contains humor...

“May I use your credit card to pay for importing an endangered brute that might main or kill us, please?” ... “Why, certainly,” his mother said.... It was so nice to have a mother who believed in encouraging her children’s little schemes and hobbies.

Anyone who is familiar with twins or triplets knows that while there might be strong similarities in appearance, one can usually tell the individuals apart by some small difference. For instance, Brick Bellweather has short, curly blond hair; deceptively innocent, large blue eyes; and a dimple in his cheek. Sassy Bellweather has deceptively innocent, large blue eyes; short, curly blond hair and a dimple in her cheek. Spike Bellweather has a dimple in his cheek; deceptively innocent, large blue eyes; and short, curly blond hair.

Unlike Cheaper by the Dozen, however, and as the above quotes show, most of the Bellweather family’s escapades are larger-than-life. True, this is fiction, not embellished fact, but at times the antics were just too silly for my taste.

Like Cheaper by the Dozen, the Bellweathers have a mother named Lillian.

Unlike Cheaper by the Dozen, though, Dr. and Mrs. Bellweather are "hapless parents who only contribute to the chaos." Dr. Bellweather rumbles, “Poor genius fathers who have too many children to feed and aren’t respected in their own homes are surely as oppressed as your teeming masses!” I can picture Dr. Gilbreth sputtering those same words, but under his jesting surface, he knew that his children really did regard their parents with utmost respect.

I didn’t read far before I noticed the vocabulary. Bellweathers is geared toward ages 8 – 12, but I found it hard to imagine kids in that range persevering through words like “calisthenics,” “tirade” and “traversed.” Innocent enough on their own, but taken together, shot after shot, the prose felt a bit overwhelming for young readers.

But the stoic butler Benway has the same dry, martyr-like way about him as the Gilbreth’s hired man, Tom. I enjoyed that aspect. Speaking as a sister who has her own crosses to bear—her own young tornadoes—I sympathized with Benway’s plight.


ARC courtesy of Egmont USA
Release Date: 22 September 2009

Eyes Like Stars Book Giveaway!

If you’re dying to read Lisa Mantchev’s Eyes Like Stars, you’re in luck—enter here to win a free ARC!

All you have to do is tell someone about this contest, and direct them to my blog: http://www.noeldevries.blogspot.com/

Leave your name and email address in the comments section. I’ll draw a random winner at midnight on July 17th.

If you liked what you saw on my blog during the Eyes Like Stars tour

--even if you're just stopping by to enter this giveaway--

vote for Never Jam Today here. I appreciate your vote!

Kidz Book Buzz Blog Tour: Eyes Like Stars (A Midsummer Night's Dream)

“All her world's a stage,” reads the Eyes Like Stars tagline.

This was perfect timing for a Shakespeare-themed book tour, with Moth, Mustardseed & Co. as the heroine’s best friends —my siblings and I went to an outdoor performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream last weekend. The director’s twist was New Orleans, 1930, and boy, did the fairies get a makeover!

Gone were the airy sprites of the original play. Gone were the cheeky blighters of Lisa Mantchev’s novel. Instead, since the play's magic was rooted in the traditions of New Orleans, the costumes had nature-based references, as well as voo-doo and native culture.

It worked very well, and a mixture of southern and French accents gave a fresh spin to the script. Reminded me of the Mexican version my cousins and I staged. Quite different than the traditional, 1935 (Mickey Rooney) production. Or the 1999 (Michelle Pfeiffer) adaptation.

I love Arthur Rackham's Midsummer art.

How about you? Do you have a favorite fairy?

I especially like Pauline and Petrova's portrayals in Noel Streatfeild’s Ballet Shoes. Not a performance goes by that I don’t giggle at an actress’s perfectly innocent utterance of, “And I.”

Kidz Book Buzz Blog Tour: Eyes Like Stars (Review)

Eyes Like Stars threw me a serious curveball. Premise, cover, advance reviews, everything was working together for a really! exciting! experience! But when I sat down with the actual novel, it was much different than what I’d been expecting.

Welcome to the Theatre Illuminata, where the characters of every play ever written can be found behind the curtain. They were born to play their parts, and are bound to the Theatre by The Book—an ancient and magical tome of scripts. Bertie is not one of them, but they are her family—and she is about to lose them all and the only home she has ever known.

The setting is delicious: a stage that performs scene changes on command. Hungry? Cue French Patisserie, complete with “the intoxicating scents of buttery pastry and café lattes,” “tarts decorated with whirls of sliced apple,” and “croissants oozing chocolate from their middles.” Bored? Cue The Little Mermaid, and watch “seaweed hit the stage with wet thumps, sand [gather] in drifts, and saltwater [mist] the floor” as the “massive prow of the Persephone” soars out of the mist, swarming with friendly pirates. Or turn around and chat with Midsummer’s fairies hovering at your shoulder.

The cast is vast and varied: characters from every play imaginable, though heavily favoring Shakespearean drama—Ophelia, Ariel, Lady Macbeth, chorus girls, revolutionaries, buccaneers—as well as crew—Stage Manager, Wardrobe Mistress, Properties Manager. But there is a downside to the large cast. At times, you feel inundated with names and faces.

Since Eyes Like Stars is about life on the stage, it makes sense—in theory—for some of the text to be script, complete with stage directions. There were times, however, when small flashbacks felt bouncy because they were told in this folio form.

One thing that contributed to my overall perplexity was the grade school humor. Granted, most of it came from the fairies, who are typical immature boys. But in my mind, the silly jokes bumped against the novel’s YA romance and language (and I’m not talking about the Shakespearean insults).

But there is good humor, too. “A plan! We need a plan!” said Cobweb. “Vive la Revolution!” cried Moth and Mustardseed as they jumped to attention. Bertie held up both her hands. “If either of you start singing something from Les Mis, I’ll drop-kick you into next week.”

There is Ophelia drowning herself in every available set, Lady Macbeth and Gertrude fighting for center stage, chorus boys stealing Alice’s hookah from the properties department and opening a bubbly bar in one of the back dressing rooms.

Because Eyes Like Stars is the first of a trilogy, there is a lot left hanging at the end of the novel. Perhaps that also contributed to my curveball reaction, since I opened the book expecting to close it satisfied, and instead, Ms. Mantchev raised more questions than she answered.

But all in all, the story was entertaining, and sometimes, especially in the summer, you need a story intent on entertainment.

Kidz Book Buzz Blog Tour: Eyes Like Stars

Eyes Like Stars
by Lisa Mantchev

368 pages
Ages 12 and up
http://www.theatre-illuminata.com/

ARC courtesy of Feiwel & Friends

Today begins the Eyes Like Stars blog tour--I'll be posting through Wednesday, culminating in an ARC giveaway, but in the meantime, visit these other participating bloggers:

The 160 Acre Woods
A Christian Worldview of Fiction
A Patchwork of Books
Abby the Librarian
All About Children’s Books
And Another Book Read
Becky’s Book Reviews
Dolce Bellezza
Fireside Musings
The Friendly Book Nook
Homeschool Book Buzz
Homespun Light
Hyperbole
KidzBookBuzz.com
Never Jam Today
Reading is My Superpower
Through a Child’s Eyes

Readers of this blog, unite!

Bloggers who participated in the Darkwood blog tour were entered in a popularity poll to win a $25 Amazon certificate. If you liked what you saw here, you can vote me in. Danke!

Candor Book Giveaway!

If you liked what you heard about Pam Bachorz’s Candor, you’re in luck—enter here to win a free ARC!

All you have to do is tell someone about this contest, and direct them to my blog: http://www.noeldevries.blogspot.com/

Leave your name and email address in the comments section. I’ll draw a random winner at midnight on July 10th

EDITED 7/11 And the winner of the random drawing is... Kalea! Congratulations!

Scoop of the e-e-evening: Candor

If you’ve read 1984 or Brave New World, you know how the story goes: an elite few guide the trousered apes, making the world a better place for everyone. And (mostly) the apes like it. They get pleasure without worries, someone to take care of them physically, mentally, and spiritually—they get Francis Schaeffer’s “personal peace and affluence.” Unlike most dystopian fiction, however, in Pam Bachorz’s debut YA, Candor, the target apes are teenagers, checked into paradise by their parents.

Everything is perfect in the town of Candor, Florida. Teens respect their elders, do their chores, and enjoy homework ... because they’re controlled by subliminal messages. Only Oscar, the son of the town’s founder, knows how to get kids out—for a price. But when Nia moves into town, Oscar is smitten. He can’t stand to see her changed. Now he must decide to help Nia escape Candor and lose her forever, or keep her close and risk exposure.

A dystopian novel usually means meaty ideas: freewill ... inherent evil ... greatest good. But most of the time, it doesn’t answer questions, only raises them. It’s up to readers to draw conclusions. Problem is, in this relativistic society, the conclusions are limitless. And you know what they say ... when all the answers are right, none of them are.

Before I get carried away with content, a look at form: Ms. Bachorz writes a believable, average-teen-male voice. This includes a fair amount of physical obsession when it comes to girls, fyi.

She does a great job with character motivation—why does Oscar’s dad want to turn kids into cheerful zombies? Because his own firstborn, Oscar’s brother, was killed in a freak accident, doing a stupid teenage stunt. In Mr. Banks’ grief-stricken mind, being good is the best safety net.

And finally, Ms. Bachorz keeps you turning pages. Halfway through, I was asking, Will Oscar stay? Or will he leave?

Also, seriously nice cover.

But form is nothing without content, so back to the issues Candor raises.

“Aural addiction.” Without messages, “the withdrawal will kill you.” Realize that no matter who you are, where you are, you’re processing outside messages.

“Who was I supposed to hate more? The one who asked for it? Or the one who gave it to him?” The masses for accepting direction, or the elite for directing? We’re not innocent victims, here.

“...two players, loaded with the right Messages.” But who’s to say Oscar’s messages are right, and his father’s are wrong? Where there is no ultimate standard, it’s my word against yours.

“Make me like the rest of them,” pleads one boy who has temporarily escaped the Messages. “Take away everything else.” This goes back to personal peace and affluence, our modern absolute values/idols, and society’s most likely kamikaze candidates. Meet my needs, I don’t care what you take, just meet them. Boom.

But the ultimate point of fiction is to take questions raised in story and use them to examine the world we live in. So let me prod a couple of sweet lies with the toe of my boot—two ideas, straight from Ms. Bachorz’s text. They’re not the “messages” she is asking us to question, however. They’re part of the real world’s “truth.”

“I wish I was strong enough to do what I want all the time.”

“It’s always safest to trust yourself.”

What—sound fine to you?

That’s what I was afraid of.

“Sometimes it’s nice to do what the messages say. It’s like sinking into a warm bath, eyes shut, arms floating, and letting the water cover my face. I don’t have to breathe until someone tells me to.”

ARC courtesy of Egmont USA (and a fairy-godmother-ish Pam Bachorz!) September 2009