![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
May Book Reviews
May. 18th, 2005 04:53 pmFAR FROM XANADU by Julie Anne Peters
An easy way to sum up this book is to call it a lesbian “What’s Eating Gilbert Grape.” It’s a coming-of-age story set in a small Midwestern town, complete with a missing father and an overweight mother. However, Julie Anne Peters (a Colorado author), has some really nice touches. I was deeply grateful for her thoughtful portrayal of small Midwestern towns where people are actually supportive and respectful. I was also interested that the book dealt more with the character coming to terms with her sexuality than it did the trauma of coming-out to her community. This seems to be a new trend in YA lit, and one for which I am deeply appreciative. Accepting ones’ sexuality, whatever it maybe, is hard enough without fictional examples of overt violence as a result of ones identity. Society is becoming more accepting, and so is literature.
http://www.teenreads.com/reviews/031615881X.asp
WHERE I WANT TO BE by Adele Griffin
I have to admit I was somewhat disappointed by Adele Griffin’s latest offering about sibling rivalry from beyond the grave. It lacked the intensity of her previous books including my favorites: THE OTHER SHEPERDS, SONS OF LIBERTY, and AMANDINE. I have also come to be disturbed by the trend of nameless psychological illnesses in YA literature. While the teen years is a time when many mental illnesses begin to emerge, generic, undiagnosed, illnesses in fiction seem to add to the fear, rather than help people understand different mental illnesses, how they are treated, and how people cope with them.
http://www.teenreads.com/reviews/0399237836.asp
Other notable books this month:
GODLESS by Pete Hautman
GODLESS by Pete Hautman was the National Book Award winner in the Young People’s Literature category this year. It is an interesting book about faith and religion, centering on a boy who decides to start his own religion worshipping the town water tower. It’s an interesting book and will probably be forced on young people long after more relevant books have been written. This is the kind of book I think it would be really interesting to discuss at a church youth group or interfaith gathering; but as far as I know inter-faith book groups for young people don’t really exist.
DADDY LONG LEGS by Jean Webster
I decided to reread this turn-of-the-century classic and found I enjoyed it more as an adult than I did as a child. There are a number of extremely valid criticisms about this book, including the somewhat creepy relationship between the main character and her guardian figure, but I was won over by the surprisingly modern first person voice, and the charming descriptions of the life of a college girl 100 years ago. This book is truly a classic.
THE WHITE ALBUM by Joan Didion
Wow! I have never read any Didion before, but I was absolutely blown away by her essays recapping the madness of the 1960s from the view of the somewhat more sober 1970s. This book really helped me “grok” what the 60s were all about, plus there is some really fascinating and interesting trivia about things like the CA governor’s mansion fiasco during Ronald Reagan tenure, and about the CA water delivery system, plus two beautiful essays about Doris Lessing and Georgia O’Keefe.
Next time: A review of Barry Yourgrau’s latest book for children, the truly nasty, NASTYBOOK.
S
An easy way to sum up this book is to call it a lesbian “What’s Eating Gilbert Grape.” It’s a coming-of-age story set in a small Midwestern town, complete with a missing father and an overweight mother. However, Julie Anne Peters (a Colorado author), has some really nice touches. I was deeply grateful for her thoughtful portrayal of small Midwestern towns where people are actually supportive and respectful. I was also interested that the book dealt more with the character coming to terms with her sexuality than it did the trauma of coming-out to her community. This seems to be a new trend in YA lit, and one for which I am deeply appreciative. Accepting ones’ sexuality, whatever it maybe, is hard enough without fictional examples of overt violence as a result of ones identity. Society is becoming more accepting, and so is literature.
http://www.teenreads.com/reviews/031615881X.asp
WHERE I WANT TO BE by Adele Griffin
I have to admit I was somewhat disappointed by Adele Griffin’s latest offering about sibling rivalry from beyond the grave. It lacked the intensity of her previous books including my favorites: THE OTHER SHEPERDS, SONS OF LIBERTY, and AMANDINE. I have also come to be disturbed by the trend of nameless psychological illnesses in YA literature. While the teen years is a time when many mental illnesses begin to emerge, generic, undiagnosed, illnesses in fiction seem to add to the fear, rather than help people understand different mental illnesses, how they are treated, and how people cope with them.
http://www.teenreads.com/reviews/0399237836.asp
Other notable books this month:
GODLESS by Pete Hautman
GODLESS by Pete Hautman was the National Book Award winner in the Young People’s Literature category this year. It is an interesting book about faith and religion, centering on a boy who decides to start his own religion worshipping the town water tower. It’s an interesting book and will probably be forced on young people long after more relevant books have been written. This is the kind of book I think it would be really interesting to discuss at a church youth group or interfaith gathering; but as far as I know inter-faith book groups for young people don’t really exist.
DADDY LONG LEGS by Jean Webster
I decided to reread this turn-of-the-century classic and found I enjoyed it more as an adult than I did as a child. There are a number of extremely valid criticisms about this book, including the somewhat creepy relationship between the main character and her guardian figure, but I was won over by the surprisingly modern first person voice, and the charming descriptions of the life of a college girl 100 years ago. This book is truly a classic.
THE WHITE ALBUM by Joan Didion
Wow! I have never read any Didion before, but I was absolutely blown away by her essays recapping the madness of the 1960s from the view of the somewhat more sober 1970s. This book really helped me “grok” what the 60s were all about, plus there is some really fascinating and interesting trivia about things like the CA governor’s mansion fiasco during Ronald Reagan tenure, and about the CA water delivery system, plus two beautiful essays about Doris Lessing and Georgia O’Keefe.
Next time: A review of Barry Yourgrau’s latest book for children, the truly nasty, NASTYBOOK.
S
