53. Pleasure in the Stars by Olivia Myers

listened to audio via Audible Escape
narrated by D Rampling (horrid!!!)
Unabridged audio (1:35)
2015 Soft Kiss books
95 pgs.
Adult SciFi Erotica
Finished 3/19/2020
Goodreads rating: 3.24 - 34 ratings
My rating: 1

First line/s:  "Natalie looked at her work friends, Jackie and Moona, and sighed as she gratefully let her suitcase bounce heavily onto the hotel bed."

My comments:  Probably one of the worst narrators I've ever heard in my life, she absolutely ruined the story - the little bit of the story there was.  Blech!  Whenever she spoke as a female she did it in a squeaky high-pitched falsetto voice, and her male voice was unbelievable horrible as well  Whoever hired her needs to find another occupation!

Goodreads synopsis:  An alien race known for pleasure, would she dare.
          Natalie’s work friends have to drag her along to the planet New Saigon’s Pleasure Love Festival, a ten-day party where races from all planets indulge in love, sex, and pleasure. But the lights, the scents, the sounds—everything is too much for Natalie.
          Concerned that she isn’t having as much fun and relaxing as much as she ought to, her well-meaning friends hire a Katarian escort to give Natalie all the fun they think she’s been missing out on. Can Natalie relax enough to enjoy herself with a Katarian who promises nothing but pleasure…and what happens if he’s offering her more than one night?

Boxes for Katje - Candace Fleming

Illustrated  by Stacey Dressen-McQueen

2003, Farrar, Straus & Giroux

HC $17.99

32 cram-packed pgs.

Goodreads rating: 4.43 (320 ratings)

My rating: 5
TPPL

Endpapers: Excellent!
     Front - Mayfield, Indiana; May, 1945
     Back - Mayfield, Indiana; May, 1947 (yards FULL of tulips)

Illustrations:  Full page (no white :) edge-to-edge; bright, colorful, loaded with lots to take in. 

Title page:  Two-page painting of a girl (Rosie) with a package in her arms and her dog walking down a sidewalk towards in a "U.S. Mail" box

1^st line/s:  "After the war, there was little left in the tiny Dutch town of Olst.  The townspeople lived on cabbages and seed potatoes.  They patched and repatched their worn-thin clothing and they went without soap or milk, sugar or new shoes."

My comments:  I adore this story.  It's based on true happenings after World War II.  It's about people hearing of others with misfortune...and then doing something about it.  This is why I knit bears for orhans in South Africa and crochet 6 x 6 squares for afghans go to people who are colder than I am.  This story brought tears to my eyes.  I want a copy of my own!

Goodreads:  After World War II there is little left in Katje's town of Olst in Holland. Her family, like most Dutch families, must patch their old worn clothing and go without everyday things like soap and milk. Then one spring morning when the tulips bloom "thick and bright," Postman Kleinhoonte pedals his bicycle down Katje's street to deliver a mysterious box – a box from America! Full of soap, socks, and chocolate, the box has been sent by Rosie, an American girl from Mayfield, Indiana. Her package is part of a goodwill effort to help the people of Europe. What's inside so delights Katje that she sends off a letter of thanks – beginning an exchange that swells with so many surprises that the girls, as well as their townspeople, will never be the same.  This inspiring story, with strikingly original art, is based on the author's mother's childhood and will show young readers that they, too, can make a difference. 

27. Painted Ladies - Robert B. Parker

Spenser #39 (published posthumously)
Audio read by Joe Mantegna
Random House Audio, 2010
5 unabridged cds (5.5 hours)
$32.00
304 pgs.
Rating:  5 (though I missed Hawk)

I don’t think, when I first heard Joe Mantegna read the Spenser books, I liked his rendition of the Spenser I had in my head. Apparently his voice has grown on me, because I loved the reading of this story. Mantegna’s voice is now Spenser’s voice for me. I noticed in Barnes and Noble yesterday that the very last Spenser that Parker wrote before he died is now on sale. So sad. What a fantastic writer, storyteller, humorist, even!

In this, the 39th Spenser, Pearl falls in love! Nice touch, and a great way to end the story. Pearl, by the way, is Susan and Spenser’s dog. Romping in the Public Gardens with Otto is a riot. Such infused humor throughout the story.

Spenser is hired by Ashton Prince as a body guard during the payment of a ransom for a unique Dutch painting, Lady with a Finch. When Prince is blown up during the exchange, Spenser feels he didn’t do his job well enough and joins the team of Belson, Quinn, and all sorts of others that Parker has introduced throughout the years. Hawk is absent – somewhere out of the country, but Susan is very much a part of this story, including helping in unique ways throughout Spenser’s investigation.

Excellent story. Parker just kept getting better and better.

20. The Moses Expedition - Juan Gomez-Jurado

for: adults
Atria Books, 2007, translated to English (from Spanish) 2010
HC $24.99
386 pgs.
Rating: 2

The story is told in a way to keep even a person with major ADHD interested...short 2-3 page chapters, coming from different points-of-view. Characterization is a weak point, and almost every single character, including one of the two protagonists, is not very likable. Everyone argues with one another, is incredibly rude to each other, or likes each other for either no reason at all or for a ridiculous reason. The plot is predictable, a billionaire with Jewish roots is trying to find the Ark of the Covenant in the middle of the Jordanian desert in total secrecy. Of course, the leader of an Islamic terrorist cell is included in the top-secret, greatly guarded mission. No one is who they are supposed to be, and the selfish, stupid, "heroine" journalist that's asked to accompany the mission is the only survivor. Okay. I've given a lot away. I wish I'd never started the book, 'cause it over took a week's worth of major reading time, Once I was into it and wanted to stop, I felt I'd put too much time into it and should finish. So I did. I can't wait to begin something else.

1. Bloody Mary - J. A. Konrath

#2 Jacqueline "Jack" Daniels series
Audio read by Susie Breck & Dick Hill
Brilliance Audio, 2005
7 unabridged cds
7 hrs, $29.95
(HC 320 pgs.)
Rating: 2

Very grizzly...almost upsettingly so, I literally cringed at some of the descriptions. And also quite funny in some places. They didn't really seem to work together for me. I read the first- Whiskey Sour - and didn't really care for the protagonist. And I didn't like her any more in this installment. So kick me if I decide to read another.

One of Lt. Daniels' coworkers is a cruel serial killer and he has decided that Jack is his ultimate target. In the meantime, he kills randomly, going somewhat crazy, and dismembering his female victims. When he is caught it is discovered that he has a tumor and it is blamed on all his previous vicious behavior. He fakes amnesia and is set free...free to stalk Jack and kill even more. Her mother is one of the next victims, but she's still somewhat alive when the story ends.

80. In Search of Mercy - Michael Ayoob

Minotaur Books, 2010
HC $24.99 TPPL
293 pgs.
for: adults
rating: now that's a good question. The ending just sucked. So.....3?

Modern day Pittsburgh, PA. The story is told in the first person by Dexter Bolzjak,a young man still living a brutal part of his past over and over. An unusual loner with few friends, he spent most of his youth watching gruesome videos and trying to discover when and how they were edited. He was enlisted to become his high school hockey goalie when his quick reflexes were discovered. He'd never had any interest in sports at all, but became quite a hockey star. However, when sadistic fans capture him and brutally torture him, his life becomes more-or-less a non-life.

Now, years later, he makes a weird friendship with an old, sick drunk, who enlists him to find his long-lost love, a movie actress named Mercy Carnahan who had disappeared without a trace perhaps fifty years before. Is it possible to try to unweave the mysterious story after so much time? Dexter becomes determined to figure it out. And as he discovers clues, he flashbacks and mulls over his own devastating trauma.

This story had twists, turns, and plot devices that I would have never considered. However, when I finished the book I wanted to throw it across the room. It was and incredibly unsatisfying ending, left me flat, flat, flat.

I am writing this review 6 weeks after I finished the book, so it's spotty. I just remember that it's an unusual story with an unsatisfying ending and really odd happenings. Whew.

79. Killer Smile - Lisa Scottoline

Audio read by Barbara Rosenblat
Harper Audio, 2004
9 unabridged cds
10.5 hrs.
$39.95
(HC 320 pgs.)
Rating: 3

Mary DiNunzio, a lawyer in an all-woman Philadelphia law firm, investigates the death during World War II of Amadeo Brandolini, an Italian immigrant who supposedly killed himself at an internment camp in Montana.

Interspersed throughout the story is much blind-date matchmaking to try and find the young widow another love. There are some very funny parts, but it's quite predictable and the "surprise" ending is a little unbelievable...or at least the way it was brought into the open was.

This was an entertaining read, but not an enthralling one. Plus what's with the title? I can't relate it to the book at all....

78. Matched - Ally Condie

Dutton Books, 2010
HC $17.99
369 pgs.
for: Young Adults
Rating: 4

This was very The Giver-ish. And since The Giver is one of my all-time favorite books, I totally enjoyed mulling over the way life is in this futuristic science fiction novel.

People in Cassia's society have long, healthy lives. Their "perfect" jobs are chosen for them, as is their mate. Usually matches are people that live in a different city, people that are chosen specifically for each other, and they see each other for the first time at a special ceremony on a monitor. But Cassia is matched to her lifelong best friend, Xander. What could be more wonderful?

In a society where choices are made for everyone, very few balk at them. It's too easy to be taken away, to disappear. There's lots of underlying fear of the white-coated Officials. Meals are delivered, dishes are taken away to a cleaning facility. You own nothing that you covet. One artifact from the past is all you can have...and some have not even that. You wear pants and shirts that are all the same, the dull colors showing your age or occupation. You are assigned your abode. Food is nourishing and blah. On your 80th birthday, you die. You've lived a good life. And heaven forbid you discover you're drawn to someone other than the person you're matched to. It's unthinkable, unheard of.

So we're there when Cassia loses her beloved grandfather on his 80th birthday, and we watch as she discovers there's another young man that she's very drawn to. Dilemmas. Lots to think about. And, of course, a sequel to follow. We're left so far up in the air that we'll really splat if we fall.....

77. Nothing to Lose - Lee Child

#12 Jack Reacher
Audio read by Dick Hill
Random House Audio, 2008
11 unabridged cds ($44.95)
14 hours
432 pages
Rating: 3.5 (a bit tedious in places)

Jack Reacher is certainly an interesting character. He is homeless, cocky, loves the way he lives, and has a certain code that he lives by. He carries no wallet, an ATM card, and knowledge of numbers and the way the body works that he can throw someone an elbow, placed just right, and incapacitate them...maim them...or even kill them, if he desires. He can figure his way out of all sorts of dilemmas. He's quite uncanny. And unbelievable, sure, but is that why you'd read these thrillers, for reality? Don't think so. He also has a way of getting involved in capers that make the reader ponder questions about the U.S. government and what's REALLY going on.....

In this novel, Reacher is traveling from one corner of the country to another...from Calais, Maine to San Diego, CA. He travels by hitchhiking, by bus, by walking. He is dropped off in Hope, Colorado and discovers there's no public transportation to continue west, so he begins the 15+ mile walk toward the next town, Despair, Colorado. No cars travel along this road, and he ends up walking the entire distance. What he gets to is a town that wants him out, gone, bye-bye. And of course, him being Jack Reacher, he wonders why and what's going on. We're soon to find out.

A hotel in Hope becomes his home for the next week or so, and a female cop becomes his "helper" and confidante. Well, confidante to a certain point, he always keeps some things to himself. And what they discover is scary, both unbelievable and believable, and a good tale involving the government, the war in Iraq, and even touches on the lives of guys that are being asked to return to Iraq for duty over and over again.

I enjoyed listening to this story, although the next Reacher novel I have I think I'm going to read to see if my take on the guy and his personality changes.

76. Solomon's Oak - Jo-Ann Mapson

2010, Bloomsbury
TPPL
371 pgs.
For: adults
Rating: 4

I remember my friend, Carol, talking about Jo-Ann Mapson, so when I was this sitting on the "New Books" shelf at the library, I decided to try it. Thanks, Carol!

I enjoyed it. I enjoyed the setting, which is in the farmlands east of Monterey, California. I enjoyed the characters, although I couldn't quite get into the protagonists head, although Mapson tried really hard. I am not an animal lover and this is a book about animal lovers....horses, goats, and dogs, particularly. However, I didn't mind it at all, and enjoyed learning bout the different personalities of each.

Three people with emotional wounds are brought together. The protagonist, a farm woman who lost her dearly beloved husband of 20-or-so years unexpectedly the previous year, a New Mexican crime lab photographer that has been injured in a shootout and must learn to live with intense pain - physically and emotionally - for the rest of his life, and a teenage girl with a huge chip on her shoulder and even more loss. Her sister disappeared four years before, and that led to her mother's death and her father's abandonment. Whoa!

The story is well told, though almost repetitious in places. However, it went fast and was entertaining and made me think....deeply. The widow, Glory Solomon, is coping with money problems and begins a small business holding weddings and the reception at the chapel her husband had built, and in their barn. The cop, Joseph Vigil, is making a photographic studies of trees, and the teenager, Juniper McGuire, complete with multiple piercings and even a tattoo, is quickly put to work helping with catering the weddings and lots of farm chores.

These people, and people like them, are everywhere. Out there. In our world. Trying to live with the heartbreak and anxiety and unfairness of life. Parts of each of them are in many of us. It doesn't hurt to be reminded of this once in awhile.

74. All the Wrong Moves - Merline Lovelace

A Samantha Spade Mystery
Berkley Prime Crime (paper), 2009
230 pages
Rating: 2

The setting of this book is El Paso and just east of there, with a foray to Tucson and Sahuarita. I love it when the protagonist hits I-10! I enjoyed the setting a lot.

Sam Spade joined the Air Force after her quickie Las Vegas marriage disintegrated and ended up getting a pretty cushy job - the head of a unit that tests all sorts of new inventions/contraptions that people all over the country cook up, possible technology for the government. While trying out a robot (by being strapped inside it), she discovers two corpses in the desert.

There are lots and lots of acronyms here, as well as humor, hormones, and all the things that belong in a "cozy" mystery. Unfortunately, cozy mysteries are not really my cup of tea. The book went fast, but I must admit this isn't my genre and I won't read this author again. Oh well. It was the setting I went after, and I enjoyed that part a lot.

73. Big Whopper - Patricia Reilly Giff

Zigzag Kids #2
Illustrateda by Alasdair Bright
Wendy Lamb Books/Random House, 2010
Simultaneously in paper?
68 pages
Rating: 3

Patricia Reilly Giff, award-winning author, has begun another series of early chapter books for young kids. Set in the after-school program at the Afternoon Center at the Zelda A. Zigzag School, readers meet the same group of children in each installment. However, each one features a different child as the protagonist. Alasdair Bright’s line drawings accentuate a small part of almost every two-page spread.

I read this one before the first, but there was no problem understanding what was going on. I'm guessing you can jump in anywhere. This one's about a frizzy blonde-haired girl named Destiny who loves the afterschool program. She runs into trouble, however, when she tells a lie because she's feeling a little like a loser. It's a simple lie, but it troubles her greatly. Then she tells her friend, Mitchell, and he tries to help her fix things. Meanwhile, it's DISCOVER week at the center, and Destiny feels she's never going to DISCOVER anything - and be able to write it on the huge drawing-paper wall. It's another student, one named Gina, that precipitates much of the frustrations that Destiny is feeling this week. We all have a Gina in our lives! Of course everything turns out well. Too well??

It's a very cute story. Teachers and adults are helpers and friends, not the enemy. When I look online for reading level guidelines, I see ages 9 - 12 everywhere. This seems much too high to me. My nine and ten year olds could read this just fine, but it would seem very young for them, I think. But would a first or early-second grader, which I would think would be the target group, be able to read it? Yes, it's written in short sentences and paragraphs. Is the font the right size? I'm really not sure!

72. The Cardturner - Louis Sachar

A Novel About a King, a Queen, and a Joker
Delacorte Press, 2010
$17.99
for: YA and adults who understand (even just a little) the game of bridge
337 pgs. (okay, ok, I only skimmed the last pages, the in-depth bridge descriptions...)
Rating: 5

I giggled my way through this story. I love the way Sachar creates characters...some with no surprises, some with lots of little surprises that keep edging in and making you smile, making you like them more (or less) or understand them better, or wish you knew them yourself...

Our protagonist, Alton. A 17 year old who pretty much lets people walk all over him, but has the ability to keep his mouth shut even when he could come up with a snappy retort. Sometimes it's better to be that guy. He likes and respects his 11 year old sister. Wow. He knows his parents are full of it, but he just silently rolls his eyes. He's smart, but doesn't let many people see that he is.

His uncle, Trapp, the grumpy, blind-from-diabetes, millionaire bridge player. He doesn't say much, but he packs a punch. He is insightful except for when it comes to Alton (but he makes us wonder, all along, if he's pulling the wool over our eyes about that, too.) He's a good man, with lots of love and caring that he doesn't show in "normal" ways. He's a brilliant card player. I love when he talks about the urge to communicate, "Why do you think people gossip so much? Why can't we keep secrets? Why have we invented the printing press, the telephone, the Internet? It's so ideas can grow and reproduce. Our bodies, our brains, are just machines that ideas use for a while, then toss aside when they wear out."

Toni. Toni Castaneda. Close family friend of Trapp. New friend and card partner for Alton. She carries a secret....and becomes the only one with whom Alton can confide about some pretty weird stuff.

Bridge. As in the card game. Duplicate bridge, to be precise. Who would have ever thought that a book about teenagers playing a game that Sachar portrays as mainly played by senior citizens would be so entertaining? So interesting? So ....well.... magical almost. I don't play bridge, though I played lots of whist and hearts in college a zillion years ago. Therefore, I had a bit of an idea about trumps and four players. The bidding, the intricacies, were all new. I got it, though, except what I decided NOT to get...some of the bidding, for example. My big questions: Will Young Adults Like All The Details? Some will, for sure. But most? I can't wait to find out.

The plot moves along quickly. What Sachar introduces in the last quarter of the book is magical, special, and fun, fun, fun. I won't spoil it here, but I've got to say I loved this and couldn't wait for every fifteen minutes I could stick my nose into the book.

Written in the first person, on p. 310 Alton says, "Since you've stuck with me this long, you know I don't do a lot of long descriptive paragraphs. I don't use many similes or metaphors. "A screaming lightning bolt of pain" is the only one that come immediately to mind....." Sachar writes this so that you really get to know this kid - and want to know him more!

I've rambled, I've rambled, not good. I'd better end, And what have I really said?

Louis Sachar's website is here.
GreenBeanTeenQueen writes a review that actually tells about the story and gives more information than I'm able to in my current reflective mood.
Presenting Lenore gives some great quotes from the book and some interesting comparisons to other books.
And Sherry at Semicolon sums it all up quite nicely (and don't you feel you MUST read a blog whose subtitle is Books We Must Have Though We Lack Bread ??)

71. Fragile - Lisa Unger

Audio read by Nancy Linari
Books On Tape, 2010
10 unabridged cds
11 hrs. 35 min.
327 pages
Rating: 2

The last two disks were not needed. The book went on and on....and on. Yes, it was a mystery, but not the gritty type of mystery that I usually like, where clues mount up until they all fit together. This is not a cozy, but one of the more nicey-nice "thrillers." Sorry, it didn't seem too thrilling to me.

Set in small town The Hollow, New York, where everybody knows everybody and what they had for dinner, we meet the Cooper family: Jones and Maggie and their son, Ricky. We meet Maggie's mother, retired HS principal and a parade of interwoven characters that only a small town could dream up. Ricky's girlfriend Charlene disappears, and it brings back uncomfortable memories for most of the players - when a high school girl named Sarah was murdered 20 years previously. (Like what was kept under wraps for 20 years with this crowd would REALLY be kept under wraps....mmhmm) The blurbs made it sound really intriguing. But....it's ultra-predictable. It's told from different points-of-view and gets a little laborious. Perfect Maggie is the perfect wife, mother and psychologist. Son Ricky is the rebellious though super-smart son that will, of course, go to a major college without too much protesting, husband Jones is the super handsome dynamic cop who was the high school super star....and most of the other characters are damaged pretty much beyond repair or really, really good. There's supposedly redemption at the end, but everything becomes way too pat. Come on!

I've spent a couple of weeks listening to this as I drive back and forth to school. It was pretty endless, I've got to admit. Guess I've got to stick to police procedurals or private eye whodunnits when I look for my mysteries from now on. I'm sure there's a great audience for this book out there, but it's not the genre for me. I wonder how I should separate the mystery genre. Cozies (I know these aren't my cuppa tea), police procedurals, private eye whodunnits, and these mysteries that unfold without cops and private eyes. It's the private eye wodunnits that I really enjoy.

70. As Simple as It Seems - Sarah Weeks

Laura Geringer Books, Harper Collins, 2010
HC $15.99
181 pages
for: Middle grades
Rating: 4

The summer between 5th and 6th grades becomes one unlike any other, a summer of missing her best friend, and the first summer full of free time that she must learn to live with something that she feels makes her an entirely different person. Months earlier, Verbena has discovered a secret that she's trying to wrap her head around. She, of course, has a difficult time figuring everything out (she's only eleven after all). Then a boy a few years younger than her moves into the abandoned house next door for the summer. This gives Verbie an opportunity to become someone else for awhile.

"Pooch" and Verbena spend time resurrecting and repairing an old wooden rowboat on the lake that's through the woods behind their houses. This allows them to get to know each other a bit, learning each others strengths, weaknesses, and idiosyncracies. But because of this, unexpected danger comes very close to striking.

Told in the first person, Sarah Weeks does a pretty decent job of allowing us into Verbena's head. The last paragrah tells of the year to follow and how everything came together for her. I don't think that last paragraph was really needed. Weeks had more or less said that Verbie was moving in the right directions, that things would be okay, and the race through her 6th grade year didn't seems to end this otherwise smart book very well.

I like Verbena wearing her nightgown for two days, inside and out. I like that she's naturally curious. I like how much she loves her parents. I like the habit she has of pushing her glassses up and down her nose...and I like that she wears glasses. I like her relationship with her three-legged dog, Jack.

Sarah Weeks' website is here.
Her blog is here. It's only updated once in awhile, but worth a peek.

69. Anything but Typical - Nora Raleigh Baskin

Audio Read by Tom Parks - beautifully
Brilliance Audio, 2009
3 unabridged cds
4 hours
208 pages
Many places I've visited say "YA". I go with the ages 9-12, grades 4+
Rating: 5

I started reading this last year, but I couldn't renew it because there were other holds on it, so I didn't get very far. When I ran across this audio form I jumped at the chance to listen. Tom Parks gave the protagonist so much character - this was an excellent read/listen.

Jason Blake is autistic. He flaps, he can't look anyone in the eye, he feels safest looking down or standing toward a wall. He rarely speaks directly to someone other than repeating the last words they said. He has no friends - of course everyone thinks he's "weird." He tells his story in the first person, we get INSIDE HIS HEAD. Wow. Like Out of My Mind, every teacher in the world should read this book!

Jason is a writer, writing on the computer on a STORYBOARD site where others can read his stories and respond to them. He makes a friend in this way, but when he finds they will both be attending a storyboard convention in Dallas he tries to sabotage his attending, because he knows that once Rebecca sees him they'll not be friends anymore. Reality. A happy ending would be great, right? Reality......

I also really enjoyed the way that Baskin included Jason's parents in the story.....how Jason interacts with them, how he knows what they're feeling by the way they act and the looks on their faces, how he relates to each one of them individually. Outstanding on every level, with my parent hat on, with my teacher hat on, with my reader hat on.

I recommended this book to all my colleagues at Wednesday's staff meeting. To get inside Jason's head was magical to me. Everyone's brain works differently, and some work REALLY differently. We all need to not only remember that, but see it and feel it and live it through the pages of an exceptional book like this.

Dizzy - Jonah Winter

Illustrated by Sean Qualls
Arthur A. Levine Books, Scholastic, 2006
HC $16.99
48 pages
Rating: 4
Endpapers: Chocolate brown
Cover: pinks and brown
Quite eye-appealing

Dizzy Gillespie invented Bepop. And Jonah Winter tells his story creating bepop with his words!

"On certain nights
he'd elbow the piano man
off the bench
and play the keyboard with his left hand
and the trumpet with his right

The older musicians --
they soon got tired
of these shenanigans --
they wanted him fired!

'Not a chance," said the boss,
"this kid's a WIZ -- '"

What a great read-aloud! Follow along on a map - South Carolina to Philadelphia to Ney York, then, listen to a piece of his music! It'll stay with kids a long time.

The illustrations flow across the pages like the music, like the words.

(Winter wrote this book while snapping along to "Night in Tunisia" and "Salt Peanuts") There's additional biographical information in the author's note at the end of the book.)

68. Eggs - Jerry Spinelli

Audio read by Suzanne Toren & Cassandra Morris (excellent)
Recorded Books/Hachette, 2007
Jerry Spinelli, 2007
4 unabridged cds
4.5 hours
253 pages
Rating: 3.5

David’s mother has died in a “freak accident.” That’s putting it mildly – she slipped on a wet floor and fell down a flight of stairs. But David’s only 9, and he and his bereaved dad move from Minnesota to the east coast so that David’s grandmother can care for him while David’s father works. David is a mess. He resents his grandmother. His father is only home on weekends. He knows not a soul.

But then he meets Primrose, a 13-year-old free spirit who lives with (and resents) her psychic mother in a teeny tiny house on the end of a road. There’s an old van out in the yard that Primrose takes over for her bedroom. She paints. She decorates. She drags in mismatched furniture.

David and Primrose have an extremely odd relationship, but it works for them. They spend the nights roaming the town – trash-picking, hanging out in the all-night quick stops, visiting with their friend Refrigerator John. This part was a little unbelievable to me. A nine year old sneaks out of his bedroom each and every night and his grandmother, who loves him and worries about him, never discovers this? And they hang out in the home of Refrigerator John and he never questions it, or worries about what will happen to him if he’s found out? Yes, he’s their friend…that’s wonderful, and special. But in this day and age, this sort of arrangement between adults and kids would NOT look good……

The story was very well read in two voices, a young girl doing David and Primrose, and “older” female voice doing the narrator and grandmother. Easy and enjoyable to listen to. I didn’t think I’d continue on much past the beginning, but it hooked me and I listened happily all the way through. But it was just a bit too unbelievable. I have a student who’s listening to it right now. It’ll be interesting to see what she has to say about it….she’s enjoying it so far.

66. No Talking - Andrew Clements

Audio read by Keith Nobbs
Recorded Books, 2007
3 unabridged cds
3 hrs.
160 pages
Rating: 4

This ended up being a delightful story. As I first listened, I didn’t think I’d proceed, but it kept getting more and more interesting. Great premise – that an extremely talkative group of fifth graders would challenge each other (boys vs. girls) to not talk for 48 hours. They were smart enough to realize that it wouldn’t be able to work unless they could speak, in some way, to their parents and teachers, so they added a caveat – you could respond to someone as long as you used three words or less. Thank you Mahatma Ghandi (and thank you to the teacher who had these fifth graders present an oral report on India).

This experimental challenge changed the kids and even some of the teachers. Clements shows some of the kids’ thought processes, especially the two protagonists, both clever kids but real loudmouths, Dave Packer and Lynsey Burgess. Interesting concept. Cleverly put together. I’ve started reading it to my particularly talkative fourth grade. Yup, they’re extreme yackahoolas. Real loudmouths. They think out loud, they blurt out without raising their hands, they hoot, they holler, they sing, thye dance! ! ! Well, at least they’re happy…….

65. Yarn Bombing - Mandy Moore & Leanne Prain

The Art of Crochet and Knit Graffiti
Arsenal Pulp Press, Vancouver, 2009
paper, $19.95
(TPPL 746.43 M7851y)
230 pages

I stumbled across this book last Sunday as I wandered through the Valdez/Main Library in downtown Tucson. I don't go there much, you have to park underneath in this huge echoing parking garage. But I do love, on an occasional Sunday, to drive up and down the uncrowded-Sunday-downtown-Tucson streets, not worrying if you make a wrong turn, and watching the oneway signs with a little more ease since it's not as busy as other times.

That being said, this book fit perfectly with my mood. And I've taken all week to read through it and check it out. This is all new to me. And newS to me. I want to see this myself! How could I possible have been missing it? I KNOW I would notice knit or crocheted pieces decorating a lamp pole, or car antenna, or chain-link fence. And sure, I've never been to Sweden (where it appears a lot of this takes place), but I have been all over the U.S., where it looks like it's been happening, too. I think it's time for me to begin a Tucson trend.....

What is yarn bombing? What is crochet and knit graffiti? Just what it sounds like! The easiest way to explain is to quote directly from the book:

On city street corners all over the world, yarn graffiti artists snake their work around telephone poles, wrap it through barbed wire, and flip cozies onto car antennas. Originally started in Houston, Texas by a crew named Knitta Please (a.k.a. Knitta), there is now an international guerrilla knitting movement embraced by artists of all ages and nationalities. Knit and crochet graffiti has been seen in countries from Canada to Chile to China. This book has been written to inspire you to take up the needles (or hooks) and join us in world yarn domination!

Merging the disciplines of installation art, needlework, and street art, yarn bombing takes many forms. It generally involves the act of attaching a handmade item to a street fixture or leaving it in the landscape; however, this varies from artist to artist. Yarn graffiti can be aw complex as a sweater that has been created to cover a statue or as simple as a crocheted rectangle wrapped around a lamp post. Some artists tag items as tiny as door handles, others create works large enough to cover a public monument.

Yarn Bombing blog (written by the authors of this book).
An austratlian fiber artists "bombs" a VW bug!
The Knitted Mile - installed in Dallas, Texas this very weekend, 9/25 & 26, I think....