Emerging from lockdown in New Zealand

In New Zealand we have just emerged from COVID-19 lockdown. We are counting ourselves very lucky to live on this beautiful island at the bottom of the world, where our government decided to enter lockdown by ‘going hard and going early’. Our reported COVID numbers are now very low and we have been able to emerge from our house-bound bubbles and interact with friends and family again.

We had about two days warning before going into a level 4 complete nationwide lockdown. It was a weird, panic-fueled two days. From my library workplace I packed my car full of everything I could think of, so that I could remain productive through this time and get a backlog of book cataloguing and processing done at home. My little Toyota Corolla was packed to the gunnels as I drove off, not to return to my library again until six weeks later.

I was just going to pop in on this blog to talk about some fantastic new books I’ve been reading - but really, in the times we are in, one can’t just make a post without commenting on the climate we have been living through. I had also planned to abandon this blog this year, as I have started a new one specifically for Pinehurst School – but I haven’t quite been able to let go. I will keep dropping by to write short reviews about my favourite books. Putting the right book in the hand of the right reader has always been my great passion. 

14th April 2020. Loving this. We have been passing this one round the bubble. My turn now and I am loving it!

For some, lockdown has been a time when they’ve enjoyed the chance to get a lot of guilt-free reading done. Others found they just couldn’t settle and watching Netflix became the easier option. I need to read a lot to keep up with my job – so I steadily chugged through my to-be-read pile. I discovered some new favourites and discarded some half-read. In my next few blog posts I will cover reviews about the favourites. 

I particularly enjoyed having time to savour the beautiful 'Where the Crawdads Sing' by Delia Owens. All the hype is true on this fiction novel, for adults or older teens. It's just beautiful.

Zinga rating 5 stars

Markus Zusak - Bridge of Clay

Bridge of Clay by Markus Zusak

Senior YA Fiction, Adults.

Markus Zuzak’s latest tome of a book is no easy read. It’s a book you need to take your time over, each line requiring the critical analysis of reading poetry, such is the mystery and imagery of each line.

However, once you have navigated your way through the imagery and innuendo of the text and the outline of a setting begins to emerge, you are in for a treat. Zusak’s Bridge of Clay is the story of the five rough and tumble Dunbar boys, fending for themselves after losing their mother to cancer.

The story begins with the return of the Dunbar’s wayward father, The Murderer. The Murderer delivers an invitation for the sons to join him at his new homestead where he needs help to build a bridge that won’t get washed out during the flood season.

Fourth brother Clay is the only Dunbar prepared to take another chance on their father. His willingness to follow his father out to the bush block is the trigger that begins to unlock the grief and entrapment the boys had found themselves in for so long. 

The oldest Dunbar son, Matthew, narrates the story in rough fragments that criss-cross characters, time and place. Perhaps this style is also part of the symbolism: Matthew pounding the story out on an old typewriter, dug up from the ground.

Yes, it could have done with a bit more editing, and probably would have been a lot more readable with a smoother flow. But I found myself totally caught up in the sad and mournful story of these beautiful, unruly boys with shattered hearts.

And the animals. Loved those misfit animals.

Zinga rating: 4.5 stars                                                                     

Markus Zusak is the author of five books, including the international best seller, The Book Thief, which spent more than a decade on the New York Times bestseller list, and is translated into more than forty languages - establishing Zusak as one of the most successful authors to come out of Australia.

Markus grew up in Sydney, Australia, and still lives there with his wife and two children. In a statement about Bridge of Clay, Zusak said:

 “Clay Dunbar builds a bridge for a multitude of reasons: for his brothers and to honour his parents…but it’s also an attempt at greatness. He builds a bridge to save himself, and to make a single, beautiful moment: a miracle and nothing less.        

                                                                                                                                 www.zusakbooks.com 

Summerlost

Although summer has now passed and our autumn colours are well and truly showing their glory, Summerlost makes for a perfect little holiday read no matter what time of year. This wonderfully bittersweet story is written by Ally Condie, author of the very popular fantasy series 'Matched'.

Lost

‘Last summer we had a Dad and a brother and then they were gone. We did not see it coming.’

After the death of her husband and son in a horrific car accident, Cedar’s mother takes her grieving family back to the small town where their grandparents live. Twelve year old Cedar narrates the story of her family’s adjustment to life without their loved ones, and their first summer of knowing that in the space of one moment your life can be changed forever.

‘We learned from the accident that anything could happen. Anything bad, anyway.’

Found

Cedar worries about what might happen if her mum finds someone new and falls in love. But, reeling in her loss and trying her best to make like life is normal, Cedar’s mum buys a holiday cottage to give them new focus.

‘Mom didn’t end up falling in love with a person, but she did fall in love with a house.’

A character-filled holiday house becomes part of their healing process. Cedar’s mum works obsessively on the house’s renovations while Miles and Cedar entertain themselves and try not to let their mum know they’re watching soap operas for most of the day!

Lost

With time on their hands, memories and regrets flood back. Cedar lives in deep remorse of her last words and actions toward her little brother, who had special needs.

'I couldn't tell anyone. I never, ever wanted Ben to be dead. But sometimes I wanted him gone. And then he was.'

Found

Cedar becomes curious about the boy who rides past her house each day, nicknaming him the Nerd-On-A-Bike. When she learns that his weird attire is his costume for the outdoor Summer Shakespeare theatre festival she stops being so mean to him and a delightful friendship evolves. 

With help from Leo (Nerd-On-A-Bike), Cedar also gets a job at the festival and the two become intrigued by an old unsolved mystery at the theatre. Cedar gets so caught up in solving the mystery of actress Lisette Chamberlain that she makes some decisions that result in her new friends being hurt and betrayed.

Found

I am so glad I found this adorable coming-of-age story. And, I have to admit it was the gorgeous cover image that sold it for me.  

The grief journey Cedar and her family goes through is raw and honest. Cedar makes mistakes and has to live with them.  Most of these actions are born out of her emotional processing and Ally Condie does a magnificent job of writing this voice of grief and loss. I love the way Condie completes the story with a beautiful conversation between Cedar and Leo:

“A minute ago you told me that you thought I was cute.”

“Yeah,” Leo said. “I mean, I do think that. But you’re not my girlfriend. You’re my person.”

I knew right away what he meant.

I thought he was cute and he thought I was cute but it was different than it was when people have crushes.

With Leo I’d fallen into another kind of like. I couldn’t wait to tell him stuff and I loved hearing him laugh at my jokes and I loved laughing at his jokes. He made me feel like I had a spot in the world.

It felt as if Leo and I could like each other all our lives.

So I hugged him.

He was my person too.”

Zinga Rating: Five Stars *****

The Matched series also by Ally Condie

An Ember in the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir

An awesome and engrossing series is unfolding here. 

You will just love the brave young heroes and heroines in Sabaa Tahir’s An Ember in the Ashes, who fight for love, family and freedom in an empire at war. I am still waiting to get my hands on book three - iiin the meantime let me tell you about the first book in the series, An Ember in the Ashes. 

Laia and Elias live within an empire built on corruption, oppression and class domination. Laia is from the underclasses, the peasants, who work for the empire as slaves or servants. Elias is an elite soldier in the Blackcliff Military Academy, privileged but trained to do the biding of the emperor, trained to kill. 

Recently Elias has become disillusioned with the destiny bestowed on him. He has had enough of the violence and tyranny of his calling and has been planning an escape through the many tunnels under the ancient city.

On the very evening that Elias has planned to escape, Laia’s home is raided and her brother Darin is arrested for treason. In the scuffle to stop the soldiers taking Darin away, Laia’s grandparents are brutally murdered before their eyes. Laia runs from the aggressors but vows to find Darin and help him escape.

In the depths of the ancient city’s catacombs Laia seeks out and enlists the help of rebel insurgents. They arrange for her to stand in as a servant to the cruel and malicious ‘Commandant’ - leader of the empire’s armies and the Blackcliff Academy. The Commandant just happens to be Elias’s birth mother.

Laia believes that if she can survive the cruelties dished out by the abusive Commandant she will find information about where Darin is being kept. But the paths of Elias and Laia are about to cross and it seems like their destinies may be inextricably connected.  

   

But before either of them are able to achieve their missions, Elias and his best friend and combat partner Helene are given an even greater set of challenges; they must go to battle in a series of mystical and merciless trials … unto to the death.   

An Ember in the Ashes is part of a (so far!) series of three. The following books in this series are:

A Torch Against the Night & Reaper at the Gates.                               Zinga Rating *****

https://www.sabaatahir.com/books/an-ember-in-the-ashes  

    

                                   

An Uninterrupted View of the Sky by Melanie Crowder

It is wonderful to see more young adult books about diverse cultures and communities making it to publication and receiving the promotion and recognition they deserve. We need well written stories that give us the opportunity to step into new cultures and view life through someone else’s eyes. Diverse books give us understanding and compassion and allow us see ourselves, in all our otherness, reflected in the stories we read.

The current attention to diversity titles may be due in part to the campaign called ‘We need diverse books’ which recognises that children’s books don’t always reflect the diversity that can be found in every community and classroom.

Last year, while reading the School Library Journal I came across a review for a terrific new book called An Uninterrupted View of the Sky, set in Bolivia, South America. This book grabbed my interest because it is not only about stepping into another culture, it is about a culture that I actually have stepped into!

In 2014 I travelled to Cochabamba, Bolivia and walked the very streets this book is set in . I wandered the cancha’s (markets) and took the high-altitude, low-oxygen climb above the streets to view the Cristo del Concordia.  While I was there I met many beautiful young people whose lives had also been interrupted by time spent in prison due to their parents' incarceration. These teenagers impressed us with their resilience in such a broken and corrupt society.

*            *          *   

And so to the story.

Francisco's Papa is a poet from the rural Andes. He loved his rural roots but moved to the city of Cochabamba to give his children education and opportunity. When Papa is shockingly arrested on false drug trafficking charges, Francisco’s mother gives up all hope for a better future and abandons her home and family. With no home to go to, Francisco and his sister Pilar must stay at the jail with their father, as is the custom in many South American cities.

Though Papa is in deep despair he hangs on to his belief that Francisco must be the one to break through the poverty cycle. He encourages Francisco to keep working hard on his grades so that he can attend university and acquire the skills to challenge and the change the corrupt legal systems of the city. As the harrowing weeks pass, where they attend school during the day and go home to the prison at night, Francisco and Pilar realise another of their classmates is also living in the prison. Pilar befriends Soledad, a teenage girl who is in grave danger living in the prison cells, but who has nowhere else to go. 

Soledad’s grim situation motivates Francisco to take Pilar and Soledad back to their father’s Andean home. Francisco is astonished to find how beautiful and peaceful it is and he begins to understand his father’s dream for him.  

In the last few pages of the book Francisco, still living in the village, receives a letter. He has been successful in his application to attend San Simon University.  

Melanie Crowder has done a wonderful job of drawing an accurate picture of the realities of life in this harsh country, but like the poetry of Francisco’s father she manages to weave a message of hope and possibility throughout the heart-wrenching imagery.

A wonderfully well-written and engaging story.

Zinga rating: 5 *****

Lauren Wolk

This month I am introducing the work of Lauren Wolk, author of two recently published children's/ young adult titles.
                                                           

In 2016 Lauren Wolk published the rural American post-war novel Wolf Hollow, to great acclaim - and it went on to win a Newbery Honor medal for 2017. In an interview with Denise Mealy, Lauren talks about her inspiration for the setting of Wolf Hollow:

Lauren Wolk: My mother’s stories of her childhood on a small farm in western Pennsylvania inspired Wolf Hollow. So did many, many wonderful visits there, from the time I was a baby right up until my grandmother died at 96, in 2014. Three generations of that farming family taught me about life during World War II—through stories and hundreds of photographs (yes, a picture of my mother and her brothers really did win a camera and a lifetime of film)—but the farm itself taught me about rural life. Not much changed from my mother’s childhood to my own. The farm was the same beautiful place where everyone worked very hard and valued simple things, like gathering on the porch when a storm moved through, or sitting around the kitchen table at night, peeling apples for pies, or picking anything and everything ripe, from peaches and melons to tomatoes and raspberries. It was a hard, magical, unforgettable way of life, and I miss it very much.

www.thechildrensbookreview.com/weblog/2016/10/lauren-wolk-discusses-wolf-hollow.html 

Not long afterwards, in late 2017, the beautiful Beyond the Bright Sea had emerged and was ready for print. This time a sea-wrecked sailor, his adopted daughter and their ramshackle island home create the setting, making for a riveting mystery adventure.

https://www.thechildrensbookreview.com/weblog/2017/05/get-to-know-crow-from-lauren-wolks-beyond-the-bright-sea.html

These novels are wonderful children's stories that evoke the simpler life of days gone by - subtly interlaced with the prejudice that was rife, accepted and unchallenged through this time.

In both stories Wolk's young heroines quietly question those judgements and challenge the beliefs of those around them. Delightful reading!


My Zinga Rating  - Five Stars ✭✭✭✭✭

Nevermoor by Jessica Townsend

Christmas is just a few days away now. The traffic has increased, the shopping malls are overflowing and here in New Zealand the days are getting longer and warmer. I’m squeezing in my own Christmas shopping in between finishing up my last duties at work and ferrying my grown children to and from airports. The excitement is building!

Strangely, even though I’m surrounded by books all day, on entering the mall I still find myself drawn towards the bookshops. If I’m near Glenfield mall, a wee visit to my friend Sherill at Paper Plus is always called for. Visiting Sherill is like therapy, she always has me in fits of laughter as we discuss the books I’m looking for and I always end up coming away with a stack of wonderful new items on my wish list.   

As those from the country of Iceland have known for many years, books make the best of Christmas gifts. So, even though I’ve bought my gift list items I’m also throwing in a book for each family member this year. To me books are by very nature the essence of long summery (or Wintry!) Christmas holidays. They are your permission to sit and relax for hours on end.

In this post I’m recommending a wonderful middle grade novel that has to be one of the best stocking fillers you could find. 

The book is Nevermoor: the trials of Morrigan Crow by Jessica Townsend. 

Nevermoor is a thoroughly captivating fantasy novel that will be heartily devoured. Children who enjoyed the world of Harry Potter will find Morrigan Crow’s adventures engaging and exciting.

Here’s a link from the publisher talking about Jessica Townsend's recent tour in New Zealand.

https://www.hachette.co.nz/news--events/nevermoor-jessica-townsend/

If you have a tweenie or middle school* aged person in your life, grab one of these gems to throw in the Christmas stocking. You can’t go wrong!

Merry Christmas and happy reading over the holidays!

Michele

*my reference for  Middle School stretches to year ten– up to age 14