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3 more Cybils

1 Comment / 2009, Books in Bed, Children's Literature, Cybil Challenge, Favorites, Non-Fiction, Poetry /

Astronaut Handbook was cute, nicely drawn but not my cup of tea, really.

Honeybee was pretty good, better than I expected. I preferred the prose to the poetry but even some of the poetry drew me in. Young poetry and prose readers won’t be turned off by this, though in some places it reads a little older than I expected.

Ain’t Nothing But a Man was excellent. Maybe it’s just because I liked John Henry as a kid and so was already drawn to the story or maybe because it was just really interesting? I don’t know, but this is another one I’d like to own. (The information about how to be a Historian, in the back, was also excellent.) If I was a Cybils judge, I’d be sorely tempted to vote this one as the winner. (I know, I haven’t read the others yet but… still, this is going to be tough to beat.)

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People of the Book

2 Comments / 2009, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction, Women /

You know what happens when an author writes one book that you really LOVED and another book that let you DOWN? Well I don’t know what happens to you but what happens to me is… I hesitate. Did I really want to read People of the Book? March just wasn’t great. Year of Wonders was great. What will this book be?

It was very good. Ten times better than March though not quite as good as Year of Wonders. I wasn’t sure I was going to like it – such a mishmash of characters but it didn’t take long for me to settle in and begin to like Hannah and all of the “people of the book”.

Excellent ending, I was worried. In fact worried enough that with about 30 pages left, I was tempted to put the book down and not finish it.

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Ironside: A Modern Faery’s Tale

2 Comments / 2009, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction, Sci Fi and Fantasy, Young Adult /

I don’t know how we missed the release of Ironside in 2007 but we did. If I hadn’t taken RJ to Barnes & Noble a couple of weeks to spend her Christmas gift card (thanks Mom!) I never would have known she had written another book in the series. I was just sitting there on the floor in the YA section discussing the merits of the various pirate and vampire series’ with RJ and there it was – staring at me from the shelf.

No I did not buy it. I put a note in my iPhone to remind me to reserve it at the library, duh.

And now I’ve ready it.

Wonderful. Ten times better than Valiant and as good as Tithe. Characters from both are in Ironside and they’re brought together perfectly, seamlessly even. Holly Black writes YA dark faery stories fabulously.

Now, a question – if you were a changeling, would you tell YOUR mother?

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I was told there’d be cake

1 Comment / 2009, Books in Bed, Favorites, Non-Fiction, short stories /

Every year I look forward to Zandria’s end of year reading list because Zan reads a lot of non-fiction. Every year I scroll through her “read” list and pull a few non-fictions from her list and add them to my “must read” list.

The first for this year is I Was Told There’d Be Cake.

I was ambivalent. Essays can either be excellent or really horrible. I was pretty sure this one wasn’t going to be horrible, I saw too many good reviews. Still, I worried. For about three minutes and then I sat back, relaxed and enjoyed the reading.

Thank you, Zan.

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Cabinet of Wonders

1 Comment / 2009, Books in Bed, Children's Literature, Cybil Challenge, Favorites, Fiction, Sci Fi and Fantasy, Young Adult /

I loved, loved, LOVED The Cabinet of Wonders! I started it last night and could easily have just read it straight through. But, sleep is important to us old folk so I didn’t. As soon as I finished it, I handed it to RJ telling her she must, must MUST read it right this second. I hope she likes it as much as I did.

What great characters – I want Iris’s power, errr curse, errr power, lol. Acid is cool. Petra is fabulous. I want Astrophil. And the marbles… now wouldn’t those come in handy?

Fantastic story – just the right length and pace. Perfect. Good Cybils finalist! Great, even.

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Audrey, Wait!

2 Comments / 2009, Books in Bed, Cybil Challenge, Favorites, Young Adult /

I didn’t expect to really love Audrey, Wait! but that’s what happened. I think I loved it simply because I’ve survived two teenage girls (with two more to go.) Audrey’s life is like the normal teen girl x10.

I laughed out loud, over and over again, because it was all so totally believable to me. With all of the musicians Michelle-Belle was with, one of them could totally have written a song about her and BAM – instant fame – and instant chaos because teen girls don’t handle stuff well, heck nobody handles fame well without help. And you know what teens are like when it comes to asking parents for help… hahaha.

Will the YA target audience love Audrey, Wait! as much as I did? I have no idea. They’ll probably roll their eyes a lot, debate the merits of the songs included in the heading of each chapter, and head to their favorite band’s fan site and talk trash about the lead singer’s ex-girlfriend or something.

Hah.

Should this be a Cybils finalist? Hmmm, maybe. I’ve certainly read better YA fiction but I’ve also read worse. It’s always good to have solid female characters in YA books. OK yes, I’m good with it being a finalist.

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Marsbound

1 Comment / 2009, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction, Sci Fi and Fantasy /

I’m not really a SciFi fan so I would never have picked Marsbound from the library shelf. I would never have even looked at it close enough to see the author’s name and realize, “Hey, that’s Unca Joe!” that way TW did. I just don’t do much SciFi.

But man I’m glad that a) Lorena talks about her Unca Joe b) TW likes SciFi and pays attention to what Lorena says because Marsbound was excellent.

While TW was reading it, I asked her how it was – and she said good, sort of YA-like (though errr YA books don’t generally have their 18 or 19 year old teen girls having space sex with 30 year old men) and sort of “Acorna-like”.

TW was right, it was YA-like and it was Acorna-like because it’s such an easy and interesting read. You don’t have to work TOO hard to follow the story. The characters are likeable (except the “dragon lady”) and the story moves along at a fairly steady pace. No significant dragging, no jumping ahead and causing you to say “Hey, what happened there?!”

Loved the book. I want a sequel. Maybe an entire series.

Oh yea, also good – books about Gainesville that do not contain characters who are falling all over themselves to worship Gator football or basketball or any other GATOR sport. Nice touch, Unca Joe. Very nice.

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4 Cybils I did love – or at least like a whole lot

1 Comment / 2009, Books in Bed, Children's Literature, Cybil Challenge, Favorites, Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry, Young Adult /

I didn’t plan to read quite so many of these last night but it happened and it was fun. There were four that I loved or liked a whole heck of a lot.

First, a non-fiction MG/YA – 11 Planets A New View of the Solar System – the only concern I have about this book is its listing as a YA. It’s a little young and a little light for a YA. Though, honestly at 45, I found the refresher pretty interesting and even helpful when I started reading Unca Joe’s latest book Marsbound (but that’s another post entirely.) So maybe it is YA – for the really non-science geek crowd? It was well written, well organized, great photos, interesting charts in the back. It almost made me wish I was in 4th grade and needed to write a report about the planets.

Next, A River of Words (non-fiction picture book) – what a fantastic book about William Carlos Williams. Great illustrations, they were perfect and really helped make the book so interesting. I’d like to own this one.

After that, Houndsley and Catina and the Quiet Time hahaha – great book and not just because Catina feels the way I do about the snow (or she did at the beginning of the book.) Nice illustrations. This is a book I think all of my big kids would have asked me to read to them over and over again – and then enjoyed reading on their own.

Last but not least, a last minute read when I needed an easy quick book to read so that I could start Unca Joe’s book as soon as TW had finished it – and she wasn’t quite finished – Alvin Ho (middle grade fiction.) I laughed out loud. A lot. It reminded me a little bit of the graphic novel, American Born Chinese – without the illustrations (though there were some and the ones that were there were fabulous.) When Alvin has his “Astroman” incident I seriously laughed out loud which is good since I’m like Alvin’s dad – do not touch my toys, darn it! I loved, loved, loved this book and I’m hoping to convince Liz to read it.

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The Miraculous Life of Edgar Mint

2008, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction /

It took me an awful long time to read The Miraculous Life of Edgar Mint and I don’t know why. It’s a pretty short book. It’s a very good book. I read a good while every night. It just seemed like it never ended – and then when it did, wah! That was NOT the ending I wanted. It wasn’t a horrible ending but still, sigh. I wanted the miraculous life to really end miraculously – but, life is miraculous even if it ends a wee bit differently than you might like it to.

Really. Very good book.

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Change of Heart

2008, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction /

I was a little shocked to see a Picoult novel I hadn’t read just sitting on the library shelf. It made me nervous. I’m that disconnected from the library and reading that I haven’t read the latest Picoult? ugh. I need to get some library lists built and get serious about catching up! (And my 2009 challenges need to be less… challenging…)

So, I picked up Change of Heart and TW starts making Picoult jokes (like she always does) and about 3 pages into the book, I start making groaning noises. Picoult just gets more and more like a teen “problem book” with every new novel she puts out. When will it end? By 10 pages, I was making Picoult jokes. And I said to TW…

“I’d like to write Picoult a letter. I need her advice. Advice that only she can give that will drastically improve my quality of life. I’d like to know what products she uses on her hair.”

I went back to the book and about 50 pages later the woman ANSWERED MY QUESTION. I do believe she is The Messiah. I believe.

(And for those who have read this book, you’ll “get it”. Seriously. It was kind of weird to read that book and have her answer the question I really had just asked… all out of the blue and stuff. Very weird. )

Another winner from Picoult, jokes or no jokes – ridiculous problems or no ridiculous problems. Great characters. Interesting material. Fun to read even though it was hard to read.

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