Deep Thoughts

I recently read Terry Pratchett's new book, Nation. I am a Pratchett fan and would read anything he wrote, including copy on the back of a cereal box. But this, this was something more than his usual parodies. Something great even.

It seems to have been inspired by the terrible tsunami of a couple of years ago, Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs and Steel, Pratchett's take on Victorian England and trying coming to terms with the meaning of life and death. The Nation is a group of islanders. Mau is off island going through the rite of passage to become an adult when a tsunami tears through the chain of islands they live in. By the time he returns from his time alone, there is no one there to finish the rite of passage ceremony and he is caught--no longer a boy but not yet a man. Then a strange English girl steps out of the jungle and it turns out he is not alone but definitely without his people.

I loved that Mau is not your typical hero--what he's good at is asking questions and acting practically. Not a man of action, charm and wit, he's thoughtful and raging against the dark. Daphne has Tiffany Aching-like qualities and yet she's her own person. She and Mau are both willing to question the way the world is and are unwilling to take the answer, "because this is how it's always been."

Really a fabulous book. But maybe not for children. At least not a book you could entirely grasp as a child, although it would still be likable and would hold up under rereading as the child matured. The themes are big--the meaning of life, the senselessness of death, the importance of philosophical curiosity and the unequal distribution of the world's wealth are all featured. Great for high school and middle school. Definitely great for adults.

Books it made me think of:
Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond
other Terry Pratchett books, especially Wee Free Men

Roar and other dystopian fantasies

City of Ember by Jeanne Duprau, The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, The Tomorrow Code by Brian Falkner. There are a lot of books showing a bleak future for our world out there for kids these days. Roar by Emma Clayton is another such book. Roar is set in a world where all animals have gone berserk, attacking humans without provocation which creates the need for all of humanity to live in big walled cities crowded together in poorly constructed apartments beset with mold and little hope for the future. Mika's twin has gone missing and is presumed dead by everyone but him. As there stories unfold in parallel, we come to see who is controlling their fates and hope they will be reunited. The story is intense, fast-paced and suspenseful. Mika and Ellie are smart and likable--heroes you can really get behind. It would be a great companion book to any of those listed above or perhaps Lois Lowry's The Giver.

Catching Up

I have read a lot of books lately and not posted on any of them. Here's an attempt to get a big more caught up. Hopefully more later.

Peace, Locomotion by Jacqueline Woodson
This is a sequel to the book Locomotion which I haven't read although I will search it out now that I've read this one. Told in letters by Lonnie Collins Motion, or Locomotion, to his little sister this is a story about living in a loving foster care home (how refreshing!). In the few months covered in the book, Locomotion writes about friendship, missing his dead parents, missing his sister, wanting to be a poet and how his teacher's perception of this affects his school work, and quite movingly about the foster family's oldest brother returning from the Iraq war after being injured. A beautiful cry for peace in our world.

Books it made me think of:
Love That Dog and Hate That Cat by Sharon Creech
Make Lemonade by Virginia Euwer Wolff (although Peace Locomotion is for a younger audience)
Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis

Dragons for the rest of us

Eon Dragoneye Reborn, by Alison Goodman is a dragon book but not only a dragon book. Set in a fantasy world based on traditional Chinese society and mythology, it is a story of intrigue, sword fighting, court politics, and mostly pretending to be something you're not. Eon is a dragoneye apprentice hoping to be chosen by the Rat Dragon to protect the empire. Eon is his master's last chance to have an apprentice chosen, a cripple who causes people to make the sign warding off evil wherever he goes, and disrespected in his household, his training classes and by the world at large. But more than that, Eon is really 16 year old Eona masquerading as a boy.

Coming out in December, Eon is a book you won't want to put down. And then you'll wish 2010 would hurry up and get here because that's when the second book in the duology will appear. Here's her website: http://alisongoodman.com.au/

Books that you might also like if you like Eon:

Moribito: Guardian of the Spirit, by Nahoko Uehashi (fantasy inspired by Japanese history and culture about a female warrior)
The Masqueraders, by Georgette Heyer (period romance about a brother and sister who each masquerade as the other)

Why blog? Why now?

I love to read. I love to recommend books to people. But now that I'm not working in a bookstore, I need an outlet. So here it is. At least, I think it will be. An outlet, that is.

What's the plan? Only to blog about books I like. Mostly to blog about children's books. And, hopefully, to start some conversations about them. So feel free to play along. Tell me your thoughts, dreams and ambitions. Or just tell me about what you like to read. And what you like about it.

Ready, set, read!