Review: Into the Wild

Into the Wild by Sarah Beth Durst

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars

What a GREAT idea! Wish I'd thought of it!

Julie lives in suburban Massachusetts with her mother, Rapunzel, and her adopted brother, Puss In Boots. Her mother, brother, and a host of their friends all escaped from The Wild hundreds of years ago, where they had been imprisoned, forced to relive their fairytale stories over and over and over again. The Wild is now imprisoned under Julie's bed.

Until it isn't.

I loved the way this story took every fairy tale convention and turned it on its head. Goldie(locks) is a self-centered woman only concerned with what SHE wants; Cindy wears ridiculous clothes and drives around in a bright orange suburban; and Snow's seven have very old-fashioned ideas about whether young ladies should be wearing jeans at the dinner table. So fun!

This was a quick, fun, energetic story, and the characters were so compelling, I can't wait to read the sequel.

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Review: Little Brother

Little Brother by Cory Doctorow

My review

rating: 5 of 5 stars
If you don't read the blog boingboing.net, you should. And if you like what you see, then you should definitely read Little Brother.

Written by Cory Doctorow, one of the editors of the delightfully subversive, fascinating and informative blog Boing Boing, Little Brother doesn't disappoint in any measure. It's a quick read, with lots of action, strong characters with good voices, and a quick-moving plot.

Like another of my recent reads, The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau Banks, this book is a pseudo-issues book, tackling the issue of individual freedoms versus national safety.

In the near future, Marcus and some friends ditch school to participate in the scavenger hunt portion of an online game, and are therefore in the wrong place at the worst possible time when a terrorist attack blows up the Bay Bridge in San Francisco. Arrested and held by the Department of Homeland Security, Marcus and his friends quickly learn what personal freedoms really mean, and when the DHS takes over the city, detaining, questioning, and wrongly imprisoning hundreds of innocent civilians in the pursuit of terrorists, the teens decide to fight back.

Part of the fascination of this book is its plausibility. Doctorow takes his plot to logical extremes, and all of the digital subversion the teens participate in is based in real technology and theory.

As with The Disreputable History, I was impressed with the way the author's argument was presented. While it's clear where Doctorow and his main characters stand on the issues, he presents the arguments of the other side and allows his characters to argue smartly, even eloquently for their side. We sometimes see the opposing characters as bumbling or moronic because they are seen through Marcus' eyes, but Doctorow doesn't take any shortcuts explaining his side of the argument.

It's also a great example of another trend I've been seeing in YA lately — authors giving their intended audience a great deal of credit. These books treat their teen audience as near-adults who think and decide for themselves, which is as it should be.

I've no doubt Little Brother will be challenged and banned widely — for a lot of reasons. So pin your "I read banned books" button proudly to your lapel and download it for free from the author's website if you can't get your hands on a copy anywhere else.


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Review: The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks

The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks by E. Lockhart

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars
I am not a very good feminist. I always thought I was sort of fair to middling, but now I realize that I usually only see something through a feminist viewpoint if someone else points it out to me. It's something I'd like to change.

In fact, I wish I had had this book when I was a teenager (or, more specifically, I wish it has existed when I was a teenager) because it really made some great points about being a young woman in a male dominated society.

Frankie Landau-Banks attends a prestigious boarding school whose students go on to Ivy-League colleges, big business and politics. At first, she doesn't think much about the Old Boys network she is a part of until she decides she really wants to be a part of it — and can't. It might have to do with the fact that she's not rich enough, not well-connected enough, maybe even not Christian enough (at all) — or it might just be that she's not male enough.

I loved the way the author wove in the feminist ideas without beating people over the head with them. Frankie's older sister is away in college at Berkley and has a lot of strong feminist ideas, not all of which Frankie is ready to accept. After Frankie's (rich, powerful, old boy) boyfriend gives her his favorite T-shirt, Frankie and Zada have the following conversation:

But when she told Zada about it, Zada said, "Ugh. Frankie, don't be so retro. I mean, Matthew's a good guy and all, but wearing his T-shirt is like wearing a sign that says 'Property of Matthew Livingston' on your breasts."

"Zada!"

"Well, it is."

"It is not."

"It's like he's marking you."

"On the contrary," Frankie snapped. "He gave me something he loves, something he usually wouldn't want to be without."

Throughout the book, Frankie needs to make up her own mind about how she sees the world. Unfortunately, she doesn't always like what she sees. But the author doesn't villify anyone, either. There are other young women in the book who are happy being trophy girlfriends, or enjoy being domestic and fitting traditional female roles, and neither Frankie nor the author judge them for their decisions. They leave that entirely up to the reader.

Even the boys, who are sometimes less than virtuous knights in shining armor, aren't truly the villains of this story. They are as much the heroes of their own stories as Frankie is of hers.

The story was fun and rambunctious even without getting into feminist theory, but I think the underlying message is a really great one for young women to think about — and make up their own minds about. I wish I'd had a big sister Zada, or an E. Lockheart to make me think about these things when I was a teen.


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Suite Scarlett

Suite Scarlett by Maureen Johnson

My review

rating: 2 of 5 stars
I had trouble getting into this book. I liked Scarlett as a character, and I liked her quirky family and odd guest at the hotel, but I felt like nothing ever really happened. It had a very episodic feel to me, as if I were reading the quirky adventures of Scarlett in her hotel. Tune in next week! There also never really seemed to be very much at stake for her or any of the other characters.



I wanted to love it! But ended up thinking it was just OK.


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Percy Jackson to the Rescue!

The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan

My review

rating: 5 of 5 stars
What a great book! Fun, fast-paced, great characters, great premise.



I loved the idea that Percy's ADD and dyslexia were linked to him being half god, and I especially loved the ways in which the mythical creatures insinuated themselves into modern society.



Percy's voice was clever and believable, and I'm sure I'll be picking up more of this series when I can!


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The Hound of Rowan

The Hound of Rowan by Henry H. Neff

My review

rating: 2 of 5 stars
I realize that there have been stories about magical schools since long before Ms. Rowling picked up a pen, and that there will be similar stories long after, but as I was reading this particular addition to the pile, I couldn't help being stunned by the similarities. The details were all significantly different, but many of the tropes were exactly the same. Enter a magical school that likes to play tricks on its inhabitants (moving staircases?), unusual magical pets, a reformed ogre employed by the school with a soft spot for the protagonist, a big bad believed to be vanquished all these years, a magical sport the protagonist excels at… I could go on and on.



Another similarity to the first Harry Potter book is that the story didn't really get going until nearly two-thirds of the way into the book. Even then, however, I found myself having trouble really enjoying it. Every dozen pages or so, I would find myself so astounded by the audacity of the similarities to the Harry Potter books that I'd have to stop reading.



Sorry, Mr. Neff. I bet I would have loved this book a lot — if it had come out 11 years ago.


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