The Anybodies

The Anybodies
written by N.E. Bode

This is a must for children's book lovers!  It mimics the styles of Roald Dahl, Lemony Snicket, Harry Potter, and many more, and beyond that, references them, too.  It features a girl who can bring elements out of the books they came from and a grandmother with a house literally made of books.  And the characters!  They are all quirky and lovable, and even the antagonist is given a chance to be explained.  Mad props to any book that can explain the effects of trauma on a person's ability to love.  Easily one of my new favorites.

Rating: 5/5

Converting Kate

Converting Kate
written by Beckie Weinheimer

I could not have read this at a more opportune time.  I was raised in a conservative Muslim environment, and my experiences and thoughts were almost identical to those of Kate's.  This book is spot on with the doubts and uncertainty experienced when trying to get out of an extreme religious upbringing, and my praise and sympathies to the author for having to deal with this kind of stuff firsthand and then be able to write so eloquently about it.  The whole book is just beautiful, and Kate is privileged enough to live in a place where a liberal church exists--I have never had that experience, unfortunately.  I also like how the book ends on a kind of uncertain but hopeful note.  Nothing in life is certain, contrary to what religion might sometimes claim, and Kate still has a lot of thinking ahead of her.  It is really refreshing to see young adult fiction portraying teens thinking about the role their faith plays in their lives.  It's a natural part of most of our lives, and I wish there were more books that were open about that process.  The only other YA I have read that addresses religion is Sara Zarr's Once Was Lost.  Kudos to Weinheimer for her courage.

Found

Found
written by Margaret Peterson Haddix

I really enjoyed this book, but I'm unsure how the next few books will play out.  I am into sci-fi.  Historical fiction?  Not at all.  It seems like the sci-fi is being used just to make the HF more interesting, and I am not sure if it'll succeed.  I loved the suspense of this book, and I'm also very curious to see how they'll manage to keep that up.  I hope that this series functions as a cohesive series rather than each book being sort of a historical fiction standalone.  The explanation for time travel at the end of the book was predictably messy and confusing, but again, this is only book one and I am cautiously excited to see how everything plays out.

Fall to Pieces

Fall to Pieces
written by Vahini Naidoo

Wow, this book has a lot of negative reviews, and I'm not sure why.  I actually liked this book.  It took a while to get into, but was worth it for me.  The top  complaint seems to be the abundance of profanity, to which I say, have you ever been around teenagers?  It's accurate.  The other complaint I see is that it's 'melodramatic', which is just an insult to anyone who has lost a loved one.  Melodramatic?  Everyone deals with their grief in different ways, and the main character had just lost their best friend, to suicide, no less.  She and her friends do and say things that are harmful to both themselves and others, but they are in severe pain, and by the end of the book, they learn to resolve their problems and face their grief in a much healthier way.  For that development, I think this is a fantastic read and guide to managing unhealthy emotions in a turbulent time.  My only complaint would probably be the fact that therapy was brushed off so quickly and so often as an option.  Her best friend just died.  Of course she should be in therapy.  I'm always annoyed to see the already overwhelming stigma of mental health furthered in media, particularly a book addressing teen suicide.  You know that many of the readers of such a book will be individuals who identify with the subject, and therapy can be extremely helpful and even lifesaving when a good therapist is found.  Beyond that, the writing's not perfect, but the important ideas of pain and the freeing power of forgiveness are delivered wonderfully, and for that, I appreciate this book.

I got this book from...:Amazon Vine

The Basic Eight

The Basic Eight
written by Daniel Handler

**this review contains spoilers**

Let's start off with some of the positives.  The writing in this book is great--same dry, clever wit we saw in A Series of Unfortunate Events.  The characters and their development are second to none.  Handler has the ability to create extraordinarily rich characters.  The format is also an appealing aspect--being told from the future and written as a personal journal, with fake essay questions and vocabulary words in each chapter.  Unfortunately, despite its many positive qualities, the book did the one cringe-worthy thing I was dreading: a multiple personality plot twist.  Really?!  Handler is capable of so much better.  The entire time I was reading this book, I was so excited, but in the back of my mind, kept thinking that the one thing that would ruin it would be if Natasha and Flan were the same person.  What a disappointment.  And let's not even get into the mental health implications here.  Way to promote a dangerous stereotype.  I want to love this book so badly.  I want to pretend the ending never happened.  How can one small thing have such a profoundly negative impact on what was, up to that point, a great novel?  I would love to see Handler try his hand at a similar novel, one that's less problematic and less of a cop-out but in a similar setting.

I got this book from...:LibraryThing's SantaThing