All by Sandra

{Review} Inside Out and Back Again by Thanhha Lai

{Review} Inside Out and Back Again by Thanhha Lai

Sandra
Verse Week, Books

I now understand
when they make fun of my name,
yelling ha-ha-ha down the hall 
when they ask if I eat dog meat,
barking and chewing and falling down laughing
when they wonder if I lived in the jungle with tigers,
growling and stalking on all fours.

I understand
because Brother Khoi
nodded into my head
on the bike ride home
when I asked if kids
said the same things
at his school.

Inside Out and Back Again by Thanhha LaiThanhha Lai writes her verses in her award winning middle grade novel in verse, Inside Out and Back Again, from the heart, and memory of deeply felt experience.

She poignantly and artistically brings emotion, both painful and joyful, straight from the page and into the senses. She recounts her family’s escape before the fall of Saigon through the eyes and the voice of Ha Ma. With other refugees they’re packed into small, often unsanitary quarters on a ship that will take them to safety, freedom and a new culture. 

Ha Ma, her brother Quang remembers,  “was as red and fat as a baby hippopotamus” when he first saw her, thus inspiring her name, Vietnamese for river horse. He could not have imagined that in a few years her name would become the stick that tormented her in a foreign land (Alabama) far from her beloved Saigon.

I taught in a public high school for many years and some of my students were children of those leaving their homelands in search of a better or freer life. Children that were just like Ha Ma. I went through the process to become certified to teach English as a Second Language. Yet with all my training and experience I realize that I could not have known the real pain these children lived with each day, in a new and strange environment.

{Review} Tiger Moon by Antonia Michaelis

Sandra
Books
And the heart of the hero who wasn’t a hero felt both light and heavy.

Tiger Moon, Antonia Michaelis’s beautifully written tale of two intertwining stories of hope, despair, love and friendship glows as well with each turn of the page. The book is filled with mystical images laced with magical realism which guide the reader into a world of sacrifice and heroism.

Safia, the stunningly beautiful daughter of an impoverished high-caste father is sold to a wealthy beast of a man who covets both her virginity and her beauty—her beauty comes to the marriage intact, but not her virginity. Safia, the eighth wife, is no more to him than a lovely possession with an essential requirement of chastity. She knows that when her beastly betrothed consummates the marriage, he will learn the truth, which will result in her certain death.

Fortunately for Safia, her husband becomes ill and must wait to consummate his desire. She passes her days waiting for her death while spinning a tale for a young eunuch, a tale of Farhad who will surely save her. Time passes with fable and truth intertwining to create a dream-like world where truth and understanding transcend all obstacles

{Early Review} Struck by Jennifer Bosworth

Sandra
Books

Struck by Jennifer Bosworth

Struck, Jennifer Bosworth’s beautifully crafted debut depicting a vision of an apocalypse precariously facing the final stroke from the hand of God pulls the reader into a world both uncomfortably familiar and visionary. All unbelievers face the fires of hell. The good and obedient souls wish for the the glory of heaven. 

Struck has something for everyone and held me in its grip from the dramatic start to the electric conclusion.

If you’re a reader who loves a gripping tale to read into the late hours of the night because you can’t leave it alone, this one will be just the ticket! If you delight in allusions, metaphors and sundry literary devices, welcome aboard!

{Review} A Dog's Purpose by W. Bruce Cameron

Sandra
Books

A DOg's Purpose by W. Bruce CameronBefore reviewing W.Bruce Cameron’s A Dog’s Purpose A Novel for Humans, I went to my trusty Thesaurus in search of replacement words for sentimental:  

Dewy-eyed, corny, gushing, idealistic, inane, insipid, maudlin, moonstruck and mushy. 

Okay, I’m all of those and then some when it comes to my love of dogs, especially my own little basset hound, Nico.

I picked up Cameron’s book one afternoon, curled into my most comfortable reading position on the couch, snuggled my dog at my side and began reading. I finished hours later at 12:30 AM with tears flowing down my face, gulping back sobs and my own dog looking at me with grave concern in his brown eyes.

{Mini-Review} Grave Mercy by Robin LaFevers

Sandra
Books

[Editor’s Note: Since Grave Mercy has benefited from a colossal publicity push, we thought it would be worth having a second opinion on this book. Interestingly, Sandra’s take is quite similar to Laura’s. Warning: Some may read this review as slightly spoilerish.]

Set in medieval Brittany, Grave Mercy’s timeless theme of abuse and escape gives the story of Ismae, Death’s Daughter, a contemporary storyline that unfortunately does not work, even when I did my best to employ the concept of Suspension of Disbelief.  

Mortain, the  God of Death, feeds off belief in and worship of him much as humans  nourish themselves  with bread and meat. Without belief and worship, Mortain would starve for lack of sustenance. Ismae Rienne, who Robin LaFevers created in Grave Mercy, bears a deep, red stain from her left shoulder to her right hip,

…a trail left by herbwitche’s poison that [her] mother used to expel [her] from her womb. 

The expulsion failed.

Life for Ismae’s mother was too ugly, dangerous and harsh to bring a child into. Yet, Ismae survived with a mark upon her signifying her role as the daughter of death, Mortain’s progeny. Her earthly father did not perceive the mark of the God Mortain upon her as significant, rather he viewed her as his personal whipping post, something  he could pummel his fists upon thus feeding  his cruel streak.

I felt absolute horror for Ismae.

{Review} Deadly Cool by Gemma Halliday

Sandra
Books

Books, I love them. So, who am I to judge whether a book is good or bad?

We’re all different so our taste in books differs.

I taught high school language arts for twenty-six years, so I suffered from an ailment I’ll call deep-seated-snob syndrome, DSSD. Some books I read in the privacy of my own home where I wouldn’t be caught holding a Stephen King novel in my hands—or God forbid, James Patterson.

I enjoyed these secret reads. I didn’t need to analyze them, rate them or discuss them with students. I simply climbed into their worlds, lost myself in the story and loved every minute of it.  

Reading King’s Pet Semetary late one night while lounging in bed, I came to the page where the main character’s dead cat comes back from the dead, drags its dead carcass up the stairs and leaps upon the bed. At that precise moment my own cat (clearly channeling her inner demon) leapt onto my bed. Fortunately, I avoided heart failure, but I may have screeched instead.

The point to all of this is to say, books have a place in each person’s life at its different stages and times.

After reading Gemma Halliday’s Deadly Cool this week, a bit of DSSD malady raised its ugly head. 

{Review} The Storyteller by Antonia Michaelis

Sandra
Books

Some books etch themselves into my mind, become part of me, my experience, my emotions.

The ones that do that best are those that sneak up on me, ingraining themselves without my even realizing it. Antonia Michaelis’ The Storyteller is one of those—it didn’t seize me, it gently corralled me before I knew I was lost to its power.

Embroiled in the fairy-tale woven into reality with magical words giving beauty to a dark and haunting edged world, Michaelis’ writing lulled me like a melody until the harsh reality clambered to wake me to the sorrow, the pain behind the beauty of The Storyteller’s reality.

I love this book, which combines Shakespearean tragedy laced with the magical realism of Gabriel Garcia Marquez.  

{Review} Raised By Wolves by Jennifer Lynn Barnes

{Review} Raised By Wolves by Jennifer Lynn Barnes

Sandra
Books

You can decide who you want to be, who you want to be tied to. Who you can trust.

I never thought I’d be such a fan of werewolf and shapeshifter novels—but they’ve recently become some of my favorites. 

Patricia Briggs’ Mercy Thompson series (Amazon, Goodreads) is one to which I am hopelessly addicted, I enjoyed Maggie Stiefvater’s Wolves of Mercy Falls trilogy (Amazon, Goodreads) and consumed Rachel Vincent’s Shifters series (Amazon, Goodreads). There’s something captivating about stories of people who are not entirely people, that are connected to the animal world in a different way. And, when these novels are done well, the dynamics of “the pack” are absolutely compelling—typical family drama amplified. 

Jennifer Lynn Barnes’ Raised by Wolves is the first in her young adult werewolf series focusing on a human girl adopted by the Alpha of a werewolf pack after a rogue wolf killed her parents. At 15, Bronwyn Alessia St. Vincent Clare has only experienced the rigid life of the pack.

Bryn has emblazoned in her mind a bloodbath of loss that not even the Alpha can erase: She hid while a rabid werewolf bit and killed her parents before searching desperately for his true query. Bryn herself. Later, Callum finds her hiding like a mouse curled under the sink. He adopts, saves and schools her in the ways of wolves.

Rule one. No rational werewolf would bite a human. The ramifications are horrific.

{I Love} The Novels of Rosemary Clement-Moore

Sandra
I Love

Editor’s Note: This is a special guest post from my mom. Sandra is a retired high school English teacher with a lot of opinions and a newfound love of YA literature and urban fantasy—she’s a longtime fan of horror, campy mysteries and police procedurals. As a kid, her goal was to grow up to be Nancy Drew, so much so that she carried around a notebook to report on her neighbors’ potential criminal activities.

In my little Pacific Northwest town of the fifties, women stayed home, took care of the house and centered their lives on their families and husbands. Nancy Drew, the brilliant and virtuous sleuth, gave preteen girls a glimpse of another world, of what could be.

Independent and clever, she drove her blue roadster into mysteries that never quit evolving, into places where atmosphere cloaked young girls in other worlds and thrilling tales.

I loved Nancy.

And, I’ve found a new love.

{Guest Review} Slice of Cherry by Dia Reeves

Sandra
Books

Editor’s Note: This is a special guest review from my mom. Sandra is a retired high school English teacher with a lot of opinions and a newfound love of YA literature and urban fantasy—she’s a longtime fan of horror, campy mysteries and police procedurals. As a kid, her goal was to grow up to be Nancy Drew, so much so that she carried around a notebook to report on her neighbors’ potenital criminal activities. We’re hoping that she’ll start every review like this one—with an f-bomb.

Evisceration is so fucking cool!

Kit and Fancy, the Cordelle sisters, take you through a portal into another world that’s bizarre and fascinating.

It’s a world where evisceration’s cool, where a crowd of gorgeous people born to carry their heads in their hands have star status, where imps pass from one person to another through kisses and buried bodies grow into trees sprouting the fruit of their inhumanity.

Portero, Kit and Fancy’s hometown, is a place unlike, yet like, those we know.