When an accident at a Vermont nuclear power plant causes a meltdown, and forces people who live nearby to abandon their homes, everyone blames Emily's parents. Her father was an engineer, and her mother was a spokeswoman for the plant, and both were known as big drinkers. Whether drinking played a part in the accident or not, 16-year-old Emily can't handle the accusations and scorn of people who've lost their homes - on top of the pain of losing her parents. So she runs away in the hope of putting distance, and memory, far behind her. She buries her feelings and fears in drugs and other seedy behavior, until she meets a 9-year-old boy who fled a rough foster home. The boy gives her new responsibility, new hope, and eventually heartbreak so big that she risks going back to her radioactive home near the plant to await her fate. Close Your Eyes, Hold Hands by Chris Bohjalian has a happy ending, but readers must first endure the pain and fear that Emily goes through. Despite the tragedy, or perhaps because of it, Emily finds a courage and resilience she didn't know she had. I think many of us can relate to the sadness, confusion and fear that Emily goes through, as well as the bravery she shows, even though each of us has our own unique troubles and challenges.
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When 15-year-old Bee's mother goes missing, she's not content with her father's answer that it's "complicated" and not her fault. When she gets her hands on a thick envelope of documents including emails, journal entries, receipts, and an FBI file, Bee is determined to find out what really happened. What she discovers is shocking, heartbreaking, snarky, sweet, silly and relatable all at once. In a novel told through these found documents, with occasional interjections by Bee, we discover the answer to the title question Where'd You Go, Bernadette? We learn about a quirky family that lives in a house that must be weed-whacked on the inside, one that plans a trip to Antarctica because Bee gets straight As, one whose dinner reservations are made by a virtual assistant based in India (thus leading to the FBI file). We also learn about a creative woman who can't recover from crushed dreams, her genius husband who throws himself into work to escape reality, and their uniquely gifted daughter who loves her family despite its eccentricities and flaws. Written by Maria Semple, the book is a quick read. It's hard not to be drawn into the lives of Bee, Bernadette, Elgie and the rest of the quirky cast of characters. The Kite Runner, written by Khaled Hosseini in 2003, is not a new book, but it's one that I'm embarrassed to say I hadn't gotten around to reading until now. Once I started it, though, I couldn't put it down. The book follows Amir, who grew up the privileged son of a successful businessman in the relatively peaceful time before the monarchy was overthrown in 1973. The ethnic and religious discrimination that tears apart the country today was strong even then, but Amir was spared. The servant boy who worked in his home, Hassan, was not. While Hassan and his father were treated like family in Amir's home, they were mistreated in the wider community. This was a challenge for Amir, who grew up with and played daily with Hassan; their friendship was hindered by society's expectations. When the boys are 12, a tragic incident drives a wedge in their relationship and forces Hassan and his father to leave Amir's home. Amir is wracked with guilt for the rest of his life, through his family's escape when the Soviets invade Afghanistan in 1979 and his adulthood in America. Many years later, a family friend still in Afghanistan contacts Amir, now a married man and published author. That phone call forces Amir to return to modern day, war-torn Afghanistan. He must face the devastation of his childhood homeland and, if he has the courage, right the wrong he committed against Hassan. The glimpse into the culture and history of Aghanistan was eye-opening, revealing the history and consequences of deeply rooted differences that still divide the country. The book widened my understanding of and empathy for the generation that grew up after Amir, the children who never knew life without gunfire, bombs and war. It helped me understand that no matter how long are soldiers are in the country trying to rebuild it and keep peace, the fighting and intolerance have been around longer. Those differences are not easily overcome. But even without that historical element, the story of friendship, betrayal, courage and redemption was riveting. Amir is the main character and tells the story, and while he is not always likeable, he is very realistic. He deals with the petty jealousies of a child, the yearning for his father's approval, and the cowardice of not speaking up for himself and his friend Hassan. He struggles with the transition to America and with coming to terms with his past. The story gets its name, The Kite Runner, from the person who outruns all of his competitors to retrieve the last and most valued kite knocked out of the annual kite fighting competition. With strings coated in glass, the contest is painful but the winners granted highest honors. Hassan was Amir's kite runner, willing to do anything for the person he considered more his friend than master. As a child, Amir could not return that loyalty. While the book is often heartbreaking, it ends on a hopeful note. I recommend this to anyone interested in historical fiction and global issues. I also think anyone who likes a good story about friendship, betrayal and redemption will also enjoy it. It's 371 pages and can be a little slow at the beginning, but it's worth sticking with it. Many of us, at one time or another, have wished we could be someone else: someone cooler, smarter, better looking, more popular, whatever. But would we be crazy enough -- or, as some people might say, brave enough -- to just walk away from everything we know and reinvent ourselves? After high school junior Christopher Creed disappears, leaving only a cryptic note, the community is left to wonder if he ran away, killed himself or was murdered. Everyone has their own version of what happened. Classmates who saw Chris as an obnoxious weirdo and a target for bullies had no trouble believing he committed suicide even though no body had been found. His parents, certain Chris had been happy and and would never hurt himself or run away, began looking for someone to blame. His neighbor Ali, who saw things from her bedroom window that others didn't know, wasn't sure if Chris was dead or alive but was convinced his parents had played a part. The Body of Christopher Creed by Carol Plum-Ucci explores not just a teen's mysterious disappearance but also how one event can ricochet throughout a community. It highlights how gossip, rumors and a belief in reputation over fact can have dangerous consequences. The main character, Torey Adams, is one of the students who paid little attention to Chris Creed -- except for the time he punched Chris for touching his guitar (seems most of the boys in Chris' class have their own memory of punching him). But after Chris disappears, Torey starts to feel guilty about the careless rumors and insensitive jokes of his friends and their parents. With the help of Ali and Bo, a kid from the "wrong side" of town whose police record makes him a suspect in Chris' disappearance, Torey begins tracking down clues in hopes of solving the mystery. As the belief that Chris may have run away to create a new identity takes hold in Torey's mind, he comes to the realization that everyone, no matter their reputation or differences, deserves some compassion. The climax in an Indian burial ground is as surprising as it is terrifying, but still leaves more questions than answers. I recommend this book to mystery lovers, who will enjoy putting the pieces together as they are revealed bit by bit in flashbacks. But I also think all readers can relate to the gossip mill that is high school, and the pressures from parents and peers on teens that don't fit in. The book is 276 pages long but not a difficult read. Sixteen-year-old Lydia Lee appears to have it all. She spends hours on the phone each evening, talking to friends. She dives into advanced science classes in the hopes of one day becoming a doctor. She's polite to her parents, agreeing to their every request without so much as a grumble or complaint. But, as her family is soon to find out, picture-perfect Lydia is only an illusion. When she goes missing and is found dead, drowned in a local lake, her family struggles to understand what happened. They eventually realize that everything they thought they knew about Lydia was wrong. In Everything I Never Told You, author Celeste Ng explores what it's like to be a minority. Lydia's father was the only Chinese-American student in all of his schools growing up. Her white mother was the sole woman pursuing a medical degree in a time most people thought women went to college only to catch a husband. Their biracial marriage in the 1950s was rare, and in some states, illegal. In the town where Lydia grew up in the 1970s, there is no one outside of her family who looks like her. In all of their experiences, being the minority meant facing taunts, isolation and limited opportunities. Those limited opportunities haunted Lydia's parents, who transferred all of their hopes and dreams onto her. Lydia struggled under the weight of their expectations, creating a public face that masked her unhappiness and insecurity. While readers are shown what is going through each character's mind -- during the current investigation into Lydia's death and in the decades before -- it is clear that the family members never shared their experiences and feelings with one another. If they had, maybe they could have helped one another. Or maybe they would have been further weighed down with guilt and shame. We'll never know. And while readers learn what Lydia was thinking the night she died, her parents and siblings never do. They are left with countless questions that they will never be able to answer. This is not a happy book, but it is an interesting one. Reading about the experiences of Lydia and her family through their eyes brought home the challenges faced by anyone who feels isolated or unaccepted because of their race, religion or sexual orientation. Some of us will never experience this firsthand. Books like this help us better understand what others may be going through. Another plus is that the book is written like a mystery, with the opening line telling us "Lydia is dead. But they don't know this yet." Pieces of the puzzle are slowly revealed as the author alternates between present time and the past. I'd recommend this book to anyone who likes realistic fiction about families or mysteries that aren't necessarily about detectives and crimes. Fans of Ellen Hopkins' books may also like this. Even though it is not written in verse, it is the same kind of story of dysfunctional families and survivors of tragedy that Hopkins often writes about. 'crash and burn': darkly funny, gripping tale of an unlikely hero and an unfortunate villain11/5/2014 Most of us probably know someone like Steven “Crash” Crashinsky: hates school, loves to party, considers himself a player. And in the spring of his senior year, Crash becomes a celebrity when he manages to stop a disturbed classmate from blowing up the school in a massacre styled on Columbine. His heroism sends his popularity skyrocketing (especially among the ladies) and lands him a lucrative book deal to tell his story. So during the last summer before going off to college, while he is determined to live it up with his friends, he begins to recount his story. Since he first met the school attacker, David Burnett, in elementary school, the story must start there.
Between chapters that detail Crash’s exploits that final summer, we learn how he met “Burn,” his sometimes friend/rival/enemy who earned the nickname after an explosive incident when they were young. We come to understand that Burn has been diagnosed bipolar, among other things. He is a certified genius, but also, at times, certifiably insane. We meet Roxanne, Burn’s older sister, who wields sarcasm like a weapon and delves into some dark places in her struggle to deal with her brother’s issues. And we learn about Crash’s own problems: struggles in school because of ADHD, emotional abuse from a father who thinks he’s lazy and worthless, and a reliance on weed and “redcups” to cope with stress. As Crash tells his story, we get a unique glimpse into the minds of teenagers who are learning disabled, dealing with mental illness, disaffected from their families and society, and distracted by the temptations of sex, drugs and alcohol. Written in the irreverent voice of most modern teenagers, Crash and Burn is at times darkly funny, emotionally gripping and violently tense. The characters’ bluntness about their fondness for, um, blunts -- and girls and parties -- makes them realistic. The plot about the school attack is, unfortunately, not that hard to believe. And while Crash is the story’s hero and Burn its villain, neither fits their label quite so easily. I found myself shaking my head at Crash when he uses yet another girlfriend or lights another joint, but ready to defend him from his heartless father. Burn does terrible things leading up to the school attack, but I also understood the feelings of helplessness that led him to some of those actions. The final showdown at the school is intense. As the narrator, Crash at one point tells readers that he’s getting to the good stuff: “If this was a movie, this would be the time to put on your 3-D glasses. Also, if you want to go to the bathroom or if you want a snack, get it now. I’ll wait.” He’s right that once you start that section of the story, you will want to read to the very end. Throughout the book, Crash teases of a secret that Burn whispered to him that ended the siege on the school. Finally, near the end, you learn the secret and, to me, it was devastating. Crash and Burn is Michael Hassan’s first novel, and I highly recommend it. I know some readers will be turned off by the length of the book, just over 500 pages. Since the characters and story would greatly appeal to people who might normally not like to read, I do wish the author trimmed it down a little so those readers won’t be scared away. But I encourage you to give it a try. It is a riveting book -- you’ll laugh and nod approval at some of Crash’s adventures; you’ll shake your head in sadness at other times. This is one of those books that draws you in and keeps a hold on you from the first page to the last. |
AuthorMrs. McHugh is a librarian and instructional technology specialist. She loves talking books and pop culture with her students at Hanover High School. Archives
February 2024
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