Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater

A bit of a new twist on werewolf lore, August 30, 2009

I confess, I read the reviews on this book before I started reading it so I was perhaps expecting it to be a bit "more" of everything because of the high ratings it was given. My analysis after finishing: the story was a predictable and contrived, somewhat interesting but finally merely banal. I thought it was a little better than OK and I would recommend it to any teen girl who likes reading werewolf stories or sweet, paranormal romance. The tale involves a girl named Grace who falls in love with a werewolf named Sam. They can't be together while he is animal, but for a time they share human love during the waning days of summer and throughout some of autumn in Minnesota. Supposedly it is cold weather and climate changes that make the wolves turn from animal to human and vice versa.

That said, my main problem with the plot is that so many questions are left unanswered and left dangling at the end of the book. We are also given a trite explanation for Grace's continued human existence despite the fact that she was bitten by a wolf. The characters -- mostly wolves -- are stereotypical good guys and bad guys. Not much depth of character development there. Except of course for Sam who is the lovesick wolf, the "best" of the pack.

Now I must say that the part that bugged me most about the book, however, was the complete absence of adults in the lives of almost all of the teens in this novel. I realize that there are parents who are self absorbed, but I think the author of this tale got a little carried away and made them completely worthy of a visit by the local child protective services. Not only were they physically not present in their homes much, but they didn't interact with their children nor were they consulted when events transpired that might have necessitated a legal guardian being available. It just didn't ring true but then again, this wasn't probably meant to be realistic fiction -- more like fantasy!

Although not my cup of tea, I think the intended audience -- teen-aged girls -- will probably like this book a lot. The chasteness of the relationship between Grace and Sam, the longing and angst over their too short period of togetherness, will appeal to those who like that tension and who hope for a happy ending with true love conquering all.

Ms C.

Do you have a free hour? Need an elective?

Sign up for LIBRARY SCIENCE!

This course is designed to acquaint students with the organization and operational procedures involved in running a school library. Students gain skills in use and maintenance of the online library catalog, including data entry, check in and out, and materials management. Daily activities include assisting other students with research, book location and copy needs. Experience is given in shelving and processing books, displaying periodicals, fine collection, reference clipping, vertical files maintenance, and book repair. In addition, students learn how to use standard online research data bases and how to acquire materials through outside library systems. Assignments include reading a wide variety of young adult and other literature, writing reviews, and posting on the Celtic Librarian web page blog. Students also attend the OHS Book Club meetings and will facilitate at least one of the book discussions. Students contemplating taking this class should be highly motivated, very organized, love to read and talk about books, and be eager to learn more about research methods and the internet.

Contact Ms Crawford for further information.

To tell the truth...

The challenge: Micah wants to tell you the truth. She really does. Problem is, she's a self confessed liar. She lies about everything -- big things and small things. Deliberate wild lies -- like the time she told her classmates she was an hermaphrodite -- or when she pretended for two days that she was really a boy. She tells little white lies and and then admits to lies of omission. So what's the reader to think?

This is a wild story with an evolving narrative that is half revelation, half concealment. Is Micah to be trusted as she tells us what happened to her 'after hours boyfriend' Zach? Can we believe her when she describes her childhood and the strange events that shape her life and make her into what she is? Are we sure that things happened as she says they did? What of her parents? her friends? her favorite teacher?

I think teens will really enjoy this very fast-paced novel with some surprises and some "gotcha" moments along the way. Can't say much more without revealing a spoiler or two. Let's just say, the questions mount and some of the answers may perplex you.

Mature themes and content.

Ms C.

Sarah's Key by Tatiana De Rosnay

"On July 16 and 17, 1942, 13,152 Jews were arrested in Paris and the suburbs, deported and assassinated at Auschwitz.” Those Jews were drug from their homes in France by FRENCH police following orders given by the Nazis. On the day that she was rounded up by French police, 10 year old Sarah Starzynski had locked her little 4 year old brother Michel in a cabinet telling him that she would be back to let him out when the police let them come back home. The families of men, women and children (most between the ages of 2-12 and most BORN in France) were not allowed to return to their homes; instead they were taken to the Voledrome d’Hiver and sequestered there in abominable conditions. They were separated by sex, husbands taken from wives and even worse -- mothers were torn from their children. These confused, hungry and mistreated citizens were loaded on cattle trains and taken in convoys to the camps.

This fictionalized account of the roundup and of the relationship of two families connected through an apartment on Rue de Saintonge in Paris is haunting and memorable.

The novel shifts from past to present with chapter changes, moving between scenes of Sarah as she is imprisoned in Vel D’hiv to American born, now French citizen and journalist, Julia Jarmond Tezac who is assigned the story when that tragedy is to be memorialized on the 60^th commemoration of the Vel’ d’Hiv’. Julia soon discovers that the French are largely ignorant of this deplorable event and their embarrassment at knowing that this was done keeps them from remembering those lost families – and in fact, many French families simply took over the homes and possessions of the former Jewish occupants. Sarah’s story affects Julia in ways she never imagined and completely alters her views of herself and her life. Julia becomes consumed with knowing what happened to Sarah and her family and begins a mission of discovery. What she learns provides a lesson and an admonishment for us all: Zakhor. Al Tichkah. (Remember. Never forget.)

Highly recommended - read with [[ASIN:0156031663 Those Who Save Us]] by Jenna Blum and [[ASIN:0307394964 Skeletons at the Feast: A Novel]] by Chris Bohjalian -- two other incredible novels that provide additional insight into how the horror of the Holocaust affected all of Europe in those very dark days of World War II.

Ms C

Johanna Kelly's Book Review

My Sister's Keeper

By Jodi Picoult

3 - 1/5 stars

Anna was born, not as a mistake, or a surprise, but made to save her sister's life. Anna's sister, Kate, has a very deadly form of leukemia; if Anna weren't an exact match for blood and bone marrow transplants, then Kate would die. Now, Kate needs a kidney. Anna does not want to help her sister anymore.

I was glued to this book, every chapter is from a different character's viewpoint. I went between wanting Anna to just give up the kidney to wanting to hug her and say its all over. My Sister's Keeper deserves 3 1/5 stars because the author seemed to throw in things that weren't needed and that didn't make sense. On June 26 the movie will be released, read the book first, then see the movie!

King of the Screwups by KL Going

Teens will like this YA novel about a boy who just can't seem to do anything right, even when he's deliberately trying to do things wrong! Liam is cursed with good looks and a great fashion sense. No matter what he does, he is still Mr. Popularity. In disgrace after his father catches him in flagrante delicto in his office, Liam finds himself kicked out of the house and sent to live at the trailer home of his gay 'Aunt Pete.'

Once there, Liam decides that he will remake himself and finally gain the respect and love of his father -- a demanding perfectionist who controls his son and wife with a very firm hand and who has specific ideas of what each should and should not be or do.

In the process of trying to become something he's not, Liam discovers himself. Along with some memorable characters, the friends of his rocker DJ uncle, and the girl next door, Liam finally realizes that he has to learn to respect who he really is.

Readers will enjoy the fashion references and the humor in this abosorbing and touching book about one high school boy's search for the truth about himself and his family.

Recommend.

Ms C.

Chance Norton's Book Review

Old School

By Tobias Wolff

4 of 5 Stars

This is a very different book than I am used to reading in that everything that happens could very well happen at any school. It could happen at O’Hara if the students applied themselves. But at the same time some moments were unbelievable when the author talks of the students behavior and attitude toward books and their authors. That comment will make much more sense if you read the book.

First of all this book is about a boy in a boarding school in New York who doesn’t come from the background that everyone else around him does and this colors everything he does at the school. What doesn’t change about him is his love of literature. From beginning to end he loves books and tries his best to emulate authors and in the process learns a lot about how to live his life and a lot more about human characteristics. This book also has a crazy plot change that no one I know who read it expected it to do. Nice change.

Overall it’s a good book but one I would expect to read for a school assignment, not nessessarily for pleasure.

Meaghan Kimbrell's Book Review

My Sister’s Keeper

By Jodi Picoult

**** Stars

I loved this novel. It is now one of my favorite books that I have read. The author wrote this novel very well it kept the reader, me, interested the entire time. I would have finished this book in one night if I hadn’t been distracted by other people and other school work.

In this novel the Fitzgerald family has three children two that came naturally then a third, Anna, which was specifically made to be an exact donor match for her older sister, Kate, who was diagnosed with a rare form of leukemia at the age of three. Mr. and Mrs. Fitzgerald ‘created’ Anna at first thinking that they were only going to use something that Anna would need or miss right after giving birth to her. But thirteen years later and after numerous operations Anna hires an attorney so that she can become medically emancipated from her parents so that she can make her own health decisions. Sara, the mother, is an attorney and she decides to represent herself in the case While all this is going on the oldest child, Jesse, who has been neglected since Kate was diagnosed, is out setting fires to run down old buildings just to get some attention and his father, Brian, has to put them out since he is the captain at a fire house.

The novel's ending has a surprising twist that I was not expecting but I still really liked the novel.

Johanna Kelly's Book Review

Deadline

By Chris Crutcher

*****stars

What would you do if you had only one more year to live? In Deadline, Ben Wolf finds out he has less than a year to live due to a rare blood disease; if he undergoes treatment, he most likely wouldn’t live too much longer, and treatment would make him tired and weak. So Ben decides to make his last year, his senior year in high school, his best. In this process, he finds a deeper meaning to life, and a deeper meaning to what secrets can reveal.

Deadline is in my opinion, the perfect book. In 316 pages, we see love, hate, abuse, mental illness, and so much more. Deadline will comfort you, make you laugh and cry, and make you see the world from a different perspective.

Everyone should read Deadline.

Chance Norton's Book Review

The Silmarillion

By J.R.R. Tolkien

**** stars

This is a book which was purposefully written as a “myth” type of story, everything in it reads just like the bible or stories of Norse or Egyptian Gods. So yes, it is sort of slow at points and it does get tedious even for Tolkien’s work, and for anyone who has ever read The Hobbit or the Lord of the Rings, he does get wordy every now and then. But for all that slowness and similar writing style to the Bible, it is a very interesting and thought provoking book.

Well, four books actually. The title Silmarillion comes from the main book in this collection of books, the others are Ainulindale (the creation story, much like Genesis in the Bible), Valaquenta (a full accounting of all major Gods and their underlings, similar to the angels), and finally the entire story of the Rings of Power and the Third Age. The first part, the creation story is probably the most difficult part in the novel to read because it is very abstract and hard to follow unless you are locked away in your room with no distractions. Ainulindale tells the tale of the Valar, which are the Gods of Middle Earth, and how they came into being by the one True God, Iluvatar. Like I said earlier it is very abstract and Bible like. Hard to read but still interesting if you are into the whole Lord of the Rings world.

The next part Valaquenta reminded me of if you picked up a book of Norse myths and read stories about the top fifteen most powerful figures in it. It tells of the Valar’s characteristics and the First War and sundering of the earth because of Melkor’s treachery (a member of the Valar gone bad, similar to Lucifer).

And the reason I found this book most tedious is that it repeats itself in the introductions. Like the beginning of the next section, Silmarillion, does a quick overview of the last half of Valaquenta. Weird because it is literally on the next page of the book… But, Silmarillion does take the story much further, giving details of the specific battles, the why of how these things happened and the main part of the story which involves the title. Silmarillion comes from the Silmarils, jewels that housed the power of the Valar. These jewels were stolen by Melkor to hurt the chances of the Valar winning the war (of which the story of the Lord of the Rings is merely a continuation). Basically this act throws the Valar further out of contact with the Elves and Dwarves and eventually brings about the downfall of Numor (the greatest of the kingdoms of men, the Black Riders from the movies were Numorian Kings). It is all very interesting for the backstory of the Lord of the Rings and helps you to understand so much more than the average movie watcher or book reader would know. For instance, Sauron, the Dark Lord of the Rings who is the main villain of the books, was merely a lieutenant to the true evil, Melkor, and though he was considered almost as cruel as Melkor, Sauron was no where near as powerful as his master was.

The last story in this book was a retelling of the entire history of the Third Age (the setting of the original books) but in an impersonal way. Not really about Frodo’s path but about the overview of the story. Rather than say how Frodo feels throughout the course of events it would say that Frodo was almost catured at this point or that he captured the creature Gollum to serve as a guide on his travels.

I liked this book a lot. But then again I am really into the whole history of the books I like. The story was interesting enough to me that I could forge through the tedious or boring parts, much like the Lord of the Rings books. Sometimes they get tedious and boring but I still enjoy the plot. So my recommendation is that if you like the Lord of the Rings then check this out from the library. And be prepared to renew your time.