"Wonder" Book Review

Summary

Wonder is the story of August, a boy with a facial deformity, who is going to attend school with other kids his own age for the first time after being home-schooled for years. The story is told through short interconnected vignettes incorporating various characters' points of view.

Thoughts

• I liked how the story was told from the point of view of different characters, but was disappointed that I didn't get the point of view of Julian, a boy who bullies August.
• I could never tell if August prefers to be called Auggie or August. He never states a preference and all the characters call him either one at various times throughout the book. It kind of annoyed me a bit, frankly. Most kids have a name/nckname they prefer to be called.
• I was surprised by how smart August is. It's also interesting to see how aware he is of how others perceive him.
• Was shocked when I got to the sister's point of view. Before her section came up, she seemed (to August and the rest of the family) like August's biggest supporter, but it turns out that she has always been resentful of how much attention he gets from their parents and how embarassed she is to be seen with him around the neighborhood and at her school.
• Many of the other characters in the book are jealous of August's family.
• I liked hearing about the same event from different prospectives.
• Quotes are used at the beginning of different sections of the book from a diverse range of sources such as Christina Aguilera, The Little Prince, and Shakespeare.
•  The book also incorporates text messaging and emails to great effect.
• At August's school there appear to be graduations for every year. I don't think I liked this concept much, since by the time high school graduation rolls around it won't be as special then.
• This book reminds me a lot of the movie Mask, starring Eric Stoltz and Cher. If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it!

Bonus Feature: Other Movies/TV Shows About Facially Deformed Characters

I mentioned Mask in my review, but here are some other movies and TV shows that feature facially deformed characters.

• The Elephant Man (movie)-Perhaps one of the most famous in this category, it depicts a Victorian doctor who rescues a disfigured man who is being abused as he wrks as a sideshow freak.
• Beauty and the Beast (TV show) Just want to clarify tht I'm talking about the three-season TV show that ran from 1987-1990 and starred Ron Perlman as Vincent and Linda Hamilton, and not the current remake. 
• Beauty and the Beast (classic animated version) Bookworm Belle stays in the Beast's castle in order to save her father from being a prisoner of the Beast. Belle does not know that the beast is actually a handsome prince in disguise unde a witch's spell. Many of my friends have said that they think the beast is actually bettr-looking than his handome prince persona, but I'm not sure I agree.
• The Hunchback of Notre Dame  There are numerous movie versions of this clasic Victor Hugo tale of the title hunchback Quasimodo's doomed love for the gypsy girl Esmaralda. They include an animated version, one made in 1939 starring Charles Laughton and Maureen O'Hara, and a third film made in 1956 starring Anthony Quinn.

Here's a link to a fun blog that mentions a few other facially deformed characters in various movies: http://www.screenjunkies.com/movies/movie-lists/11-classic-deformed-movie-characters/

"Future of Us" YA Teen Book Review

Summary

The Future of Us poses the question, 'If you knew what your future held would you try to change it?' The year is 1996, Pre-Facebook, Pre-Ipod, Pre-Netflix, and (according to the book) the Internet was used by less than half of all American high school students. Teenager Emma just received her own computer and an AOL start-up disk (remember those? I think at one point they were made into Christmas ornaments and art projects). Through this AOL disk Emma is able to log-in to her future Facebook account, and receive glimpses into her life and the lives of her friends, including Josh, her next-door neighbor, who is in love w/her.

Thoughts

•  Please note that I was/am a teenager and attending high school in 1996 as Emma and Josh were in the book.
• For the record, the first time I used the Internet was in 1996, as part of a project for my chemistry class. It was a pretty big deal then, we had to get permission slips signed by our parents and everything.
• The book poses the question, 'would you try to change your future if you knew what was going to happen?' I think there are def. a few things I would do differently if I had the chance. I think though (and from reading other Sci-fi books) that you can do things that might try to change the future, but in the end some things are fated to happen.
• I didn't think the characters were v. well-developed. Emma runs track and Josh skates, but there really isn't much more to their characters. The book mainly focuses on their relationship with each other and their friends.
• I felt that Emma tended a little toward the melodramatic.
• I think the authors did a good job of re-creating the world of 1996 in particular  by mentioning dial-up Internet, VHS tapes, bands popular during the era such as Green Day and Dave Matthews Band, walkmans, and cassette tapes.
• I was surprised that cassette tapes were mentioned so often. I definitely bought and owned a number of CDs in '95/'96 and cassette tapes were starting to be relegated to the dusty back corners of music stores.
•  I think Emma took rather drastic action when she found info about her future she didn't like,  such as tracking down and calling her supposed future husband, letting future info affect where might go to college, and trying to possibly prevent a friend's teen pregnancy.
• I didn't really care for the ending very much, it wasn't v. definitive, and I tend to like endings that wrap up all the loose ends in a nice, neat package.
• Not exactly sure what message the book is sending. Seems to be to focus on the here and now, and not dwell too much on the past or future, which is a good message at any age, I guess.

Bonus Feature: Stats from 1996

• Oprah's Book Club started
• Travelocity.com, and Ebay both launched.
• Tupac Shakur was murdered
• Independence Day was the number one movie at the box office, but The English Patient won the Best Picture Oscar
• The New York Yankees won the World Series
• People were doing a dance called the Macarena, which was also the longest running number-one single of 1996. Learn the dance here!
• E.R. was the number one TV show.
• The number one non-fiction book was Angela's Ashes, a man's memoir about growing up poor in New York and Ireland. Find out about it and buy it here! 
• After killing 23 people, The Unabomber was turned in by his own brother.
• Prince Charles and Princess Diana divorced.
• DVDs were introduced in Japan
• People were mad for the toy Tickle Me Elmo at Xmas time. A clerk was injured during a Wal-Mart sale, and black market prices soared to as much as $3,000. See what the fuss was about here! Annoying right? 
• Dolly the sheep was the first mammal to be cloned. She died in 2003.

Sources: http://www.thepeoplehistory.com/1996.html, http://pop-culture.us/Annual/1996.html, Wikipedia.com, Publisher's Weekly, Youtube.com, Amazon.com and the CBC website. 

"The London Eye Mystery" Book Review

 


Summary
Ted and Kat have lost their visiting cousin Salim on trip to go up in the London Eye. He went up in the capsule with a group of people, but never came down. He apparently vanished into thin air and his mom, Ted and Kat's aunt, is distraught. During the course of the novel the two siblings grow closer as they journey through London to solve the puzzle of Salim's disappearance. One aspect of the book that makes it stand out is that Ted has Asperger's syndrome, an autism spectrum disorder, and with it, a fascination w/weather patterns, even going so far as to listen to late night weather broadcasts,  both traits that Kat finds annoying. The mystery is solved in the end in a twist that surprised even me (and I've read a lot of mysteries.)

Thoughts:

• Loved the cover above, the version I read had quite a different cover.
• Was intrigued by idea of someone going up in London Eye and not coming down.
• I found the brother/sister team of Kat/Ted realistic. Neither one is perfect and Kat had a natural annoyance w/her autistic brother that I personally thought was true-to-life.
• Reminded me of The Curious Incident of the dog in the Nighttime, which is an adult book narrated by an autistic boy, which I also highly recommend.
• I'll admit that at I did have a vague idea in the beginning of the story about what happened to Salim, (and was partially right), but the book did a good job of keeping me guessing to the end.
• Liked the unique setting of London, and the mentions of the London Eye (of course!), the Tube, the metric system, and the Celsius temperature scale inc. a mention of it "being 18 degrees and hot."
• Thought Ted's obsession with the weather added interesting elements to the story
• Found Ted to be an intelligent narrator despite being rather literal, and not understanding certain slang and jokes, for example when he hears about footballers (soccer players in Europe-well pretty much everywhere besides the U.S.) being sold, he asks why they are being kept as white slaves even though slavery has been abolished.
• Salim is half-Pakistani and his mom and dad are divorced, so for a time his dad is under suspicion for Salim's disappearance.
• Surprised that Salim and his friend Marcus, who is also half-Asian, were teased at school for their ethnic backgrounds. Even though it was addressed in Bend it Like Beckham (a great movie btw), I was still taken aback that it was still going on in the past five years.
• Was sad to learn that the author (Siobhan Dowd) died in 2007. All royalties go to a foundation, but I'm  sorry that there won't be any more novels featuring Kat, Ted, or Salim.   

Bonus Feature: (This is special supporting material related to the book in some way):

Places in London I'd Like to Visit: (Please note I have never been to London before)

• The London Eye (even more so after reading this book!)
• The National Portrait Gallery
• Buckingham Palace
• King's Cross Station (for the Harry Potter fan in me!)
• Tower of London
• Picadilly Circus (Mostly just cuz I love the name)
•  Big Ben
• Houses of Paliament
• Cabinet War Rooms
• Covent Gardens (for the buskers, aka street performers)
• The Globe Theater

Welcome!

Hi there,
Welcome to my blog! My name is Tricia and I'm a 30-something woman who thinks there is some really exciting writing going on in children's/YA literature and plan to share my thoughts on current and classic children's books ranging from middle-grade fiction to YA reads.

Thanks for joining me!

Tricia