Sorta Like a Rock Star
Author: Matthew Quick
Publication Date: 5/1/10
Publisher: Little Brown and Company

Blurb (GR): Amber Appleton lives in a bus. Ever since her mom's boyfriend kicked them out, Amber, her mom, and her totally loyal dog, Bobby Big Boy (aka Thrice B) have been camped out in the back of Hello Yellow (the school bus her mom drives). Still, Amber, the self-proclaimed princess of hope and girl of unyielding optimism, refuses to sweat the bad stuff. But when a fatal tragedy threatens Amber's optimism--and her way of life, can Amber continue to be the rock star of hope? With an oddball cast of characters, and a heartwarming, inspiring story, this novel unveils a beautifully beaten-up world of laughs, loyalty, and hard-earned hope.

Review:

Why isn't this book more popular? The only reason I know about it is because one day I was browsing my GR friends' shelves looking for a book written by an author whose name starts with "Q" for a reading challenge. How sad is that? Sorta Like a Rock Star deserves better.

Amber Appleton is a peculiar sort of girl. If you have seen Happy-Go-Lucky, Amber is pretty much a younger version of Poppy, an incorrigible optimist. She is the life of the party, she stands up for the weak, cheers up elderly, saves stray dogs, all with never-ending enthusiasm and positivity. Only, as you can expect, such approach to life is not necessarily healthy. It is too much of a burden to hold up so many people. One day, after a particularly devastating event, Amber can't take it any longer and succumbs to depression. Will she be able to pull through?

In an ocean of conventional YA books with recycled plots and characters, Sorta Like a Rock Star stands out. Amber's story is heartbreaking and inspiring. As for the characters, I do not know which one of them I liked the most - Amber, upbeat, hopeful, improper and pushy; or her best doggy friend Thrice B who never fails to hump his canine lady friend even with fresh stitches in his belly; or maybe Private Jackson, a Vietnam vet who copes with his war memories by writing haikus and drinking green tea. I just can't decide...

Speaking of haikus. Can't say I knew much about this poetry form before reading this book, but haikus here had quite an effect on me, meaning, they made me bawl like a baby.

4/5 stars

The Piper's Son
Author: Melina Marchetta
Publication Date: 3/8/11
Publisher: Candlewick Press

Blurb (GR): Award-winning author Melina Marchetta reopens the story of the group of friends from her acclaimed novel Saving Francesca - but five years have passed, and now it's Thomas Mackee who needs saving. After his favorite uncle was blown to bits on his way to work in a foreign city, Tom watched his family implode. He quit school and turned his back on his music and everyone that mattered, including the girl he can't forget. Shooting for oblivion, he's hit rock bottom, forced to live with his single, pregnant aunt, work at the Union pub with his former friends, and reckon with his grieving, alcoholic father. Tom's in no shape to mend what's broken. But what if no one else is either? An unflinching look at family, forgiveness, and the fierce inner workings of love and friendship, The Piper's Son redefines what it means to go home again.

Review:

I don't know how Melina Marchetta does it - takes a story that seems so soap-operish and turns it into something so honest and real.

Let me tell you what The Piper's Son is all about. Tom Mackee is a complete mess. His beloved uncle died 2 years ago, his father is lost somewhere, undoubtedly drunk, his mother and sister left his dad and moved to another state. Tom has been for years and still is lost and lonely. He takes drugs, he abandoned his friends, he betrayed the girl he loved, he dropped out of uni. All is bad until he hits the rock bottom and is forced to move in with his aunt Georgie who has a whole set of problems of her own - she is pregnant by the man who hurt her in the worst possible way, she is full of grief and despair. How will these people pull themselves together?

In someone else's hands such a plot can turn into cheap melodrama. But somehow Marchetta makes it a truly great story of pain, grief, betrayal, forgiveness and love. She just has this great way with words. You know how people often like to advise authors - "show not tell," well, Marchetta is a master of showing. It's not what her characters say, but what they do and how they do it that gives me goosebumps, or makes my heart ache or my eyes well up with tears.

I want to take a moment here to say how much I adore the cover of the Australian edition of the novel

It represents the mood of the story so well - Tom's loneliness and isolation are so palpable!

On the other hand, I despise American colorful cover which has nothing to do whatsoever with what is inside this book.

The Piper's Son is not my favorite Melina Marchetta book, Saving Francesca is. And Tom is not my favorite Marchetta boy, that title belongs to Jonah Griggs. But I loved this novel. I loved revisiting Francesca, Will and their relationship. I loved Justine and her violinist (will she ever call him BTW, or they need to get their own book to finally get together?). I loved watching Tom change and make up for his crappy behavior. But my favorite part was undoubtedly Georgie and Sam's story, it was heart-breakingly beautiful.

The Piper's Son was all I expected from the author. I can't wait to read it again and again...

5/5 stars

Saving Francesca
Author: Melina Marchetta
Publication Date: 9/28/04
Publisher: Knopf Books for Young Readers

Blurb (GR): Francesca used to think her biggest problem was transferring to St. Sebastian's--a school only recently turned coed: "What a dream come true, right? Seven hundred and fifty boys and thirty girls? But the reality is that it's either like living in a fish bowl or like you don't exist."

But now there's this matter of her usually vibrant and annoyingly optimistic mother Mia refusing to get up in the morning. Her taciturn father doesn't have much to say on the subject, her beloved little brother Luca is anxiously looking to her for answers, and her so-called friends from her old neighborhood seem to have abandoned her. So, Francesca keeps it all inside--her frustration with school (there aren't enough girl's bathrooms and no girl's sports teams); her fear making new friends (with the few girls who do go to St. Sebastian's); and her overwhelming hatred of the smug Will Trombal, who despite being completely infuriating, is also incredibly cute. Keeping this to herself when all she wants to do is spill it to her mother is killing Francesca, but with Mia trying to make herself well again, Francesca will have to figure out how to save herself.

Review:

Within just a few days (and books) Melina Marchetta has become one of my favorite YA writers. Just like my other favorite author E. Lockhart, she writes about teens and she knows what she is talking about, unlike some YA authors who should not be named.

Let's take Saving Francesca. The story is set in St. Sebastian - a not so long ago all-male school that just recently turned co-ed. You might expect this book to be quite a romp - this school at first appears to be a paradise for girls with male to female ratio of 25 to 1. But Marchetta knows better. St. Sebastian is a deeply sexist place where girls are either completely ignored or viewed as sexual objects. Neither are the boys portrayed as suave sex gods (as seems to be the trend these days). They are quite obnoxious, sometimes infuriating, and stinky creatures with (maybe) some redeeming qualities.

Francesca Spinelli is one of the "lucky" 30 girls. She is having a tough time. She doesn't have any friends in her new school and acquiring new girl friends out of so few is not easy. Plus, her mother, the rock of her family, suddenly succumbs to an acute depression.

Saving Francesca is about Francesca's journey to find her strength and save herself from despair, to find friendships in the most unexpected places and maybe love.

The book covers all familiar topics from Marchetta's other novels. It is about mothers and daughters, friendships, finding strength in yourself. It is full of humor and honest emotion. It is funny and it is heartbreaking.

I enjoyed every sentence of it.

5/5 stars

Jellicoe Road
Author: Melina Marchetta
Publication Date: 8/26/08
Publisher: Harper Teen

Blurb (GR): "What do you want from me?" he asks. What I want from every person in my life, I want to tell him. More.

Abandoned by her mother on Jellicoe Road when she was eleven, Taylor Markham, now seventeen, is finally being confronted with her past. But as the reluctant leader of her boarding school dorm, there isn't a lot of time for introspection. And while Hannah, the closest adult Taylor has to family, has disappeared, Jonah Griggs is back in town, moody stares and all.

In this absorbing story by Melina Marchetta, nothing is as it seems and every clue leads to more questions as Taylor tries to work out the connection between her mother dumping her, Hannah finding her then and her sudden departure now, a mysterious stranger who once whispered something in her ear, a boy in her dreams, five kids who lived on Jellicoe Road eighteen years ago, and the maddening and magnetic Jonah Griggs, who knows her better than she thinks he does. If Taylor can put together the pieces of her past, she might just be able to change her future.

Review:

I don't often give books 5-star ratings. Normally these are the books that either horrify me (Unwind, The Handmaid's Tale) or delight me with superb writing (The Queen of Attolia, The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks) or awe me with imaginative world building (The Left Hand of Darkness) or make me cry (Before I Die). Jellicoe Road definitely falls into this last "made-me-weep" category.

Jellicoe Road is the location of a boarding school for kids that are often neglected or with criminal tendencies. Taylor Markham is residing in the school because her mother had abandoned her at the age of 11 at a nearby 7-Eleven. Now Taylor is 17 and unexpectedly selected to be the school's leader in the game of territory wars with the Townies (locals from a tiny neighboring town) and Cadets (who spend several weeks a year in the Australian wilderness). Taylor is not sure she can handle the responsibility. She is uneasy more than ever - her mentor and friend Hannah disappears and Taylor is sure it has something to do with her mother; Jonah Griggs, a Cadet who she has a shared past with, is back and seems to know her all too well; she is plagued by dreams of a young boy who attempts to tell her something. What follows is Taylor's journey through the past and present to uncover the reasons why and how she was abandoned by her mother.

As always, it is hard for me to explain what I like about a 5-star book, but I'll try. Melina Marchetta draws characters that are deep, complex, and real. The relationships among them are touching - more than anything I think, this book is about the power of friendship and, boy, there are some magnificent examples of friendship in this book! The book is also about grief, guilt, forgiveness and, of course, love.

If I am forced to point out any flaws in this book, I'd say the writing some might find confusing in the beginning. It takes a few pages to figure out what is a dream and what is a page from a story Taylor is reading; what is from present and what is from the past. But soon enough all pieces of the puzzle fall together and you are faced with a deep, meaningful and heartbreaking story.

Another thing that might bother readers is that some characters go through a lot of tragic events, sometimes too many. However, the story never becomes overly melodramatic or emotionally manipulative IMO.

Jellicoe Road is a remarkable work of YA fiction and rightfully deserves the Printz award it was given in 2009. I have no doubt I will read Marchetta's books in future.

5/5 stars

Scrawl
Author: Mark Shulman
Publication Date: 9/14/10
Publisher: Roaring Book Press

Blurb(GR): Tod Munn is a bully. He's tough, but times are even tougher. The wimps have stopped coughing up their lunch money. The administration is cracking down. Then to make things worse, Tod and his friends get busted doing something bad. Something really bad. Lucky Tod must spend his daily detention in a hot, empty room with Mrs. Woodrow, a no-nonsense guidance counselor. He doesn't know why he's there, but she does. Tod's punishment: to scrawl his story in a beat-up notebook. He can be painfully funny and he can be brutally honest. But can Mrs. Woodrow help Tod stop playing the bad guy before he actually turns into one . . . for real? Read Tod's notebook for yourself.


Review:

Well, if you’re looking to get deep into the mind of a bully, this ain’t it.  (Go check out Courtney Summers instead.)  That’s because Tod Munn isn’t really a bully.  Or if he is, he’s a rather benevolent one.  He’s also on the honor roll, has perfect attendance, and is a pretty talented seamstress (seamster?).  He’s well-read, a fantastic speller, and doesn’t use drugs or drink or even swear.

And okay, yes, this book is written as a series of journal entries from Tod to his guidance counselor so maybe he's heavily editing/putting a good spin on his own behavior.  But I just never got that impression.  Even when Tod begins writing in his own private notebook, the journal entries don’t become any more explicit.  I never felt like he was lying to me…and I love narrators that lie to me.

However, for what this is – essentially the story of a good kid, forced to deal with poverty, absent parents, and teachers who’ve labeled him the bad kid – it’s an enjoyable read.  It’s very rewarding to see Tod discover writing as both a release and a way to examine his own life and try to make it better.

I grew up in similar circumstances as this main character.  I can still remember clearly all the mortification that I felt at being poor, using free lunch tickets, having no clothes to wear, no food at home, no parents.  I remember shame, selfish desperation, and learned resourcefulness.  Unfortunately, this book did not make me recall any of those feelings.  In one way I am thankful for that, because I don’t enjoy reliving those memories.  But this book would have earned more of my respect if it had challenged me. 

Everything here feels toned down and oversimplified.  Tod’s home life seems hard, but then much of it is explained
away. His bullying, rather tame to begin with, is brushed aside with “mitigating” factors.  In fact, Tod isn’t even the real bully…he’s the victim!  Of course.  The ending is just ridiculous.  Tod takes almost no responsibility for anything that he’s done, but when the real bully is finally revealed, no consideration is given to his/her mitigating circumstances.  He/she is just plain mean.  So yes…let’s all take a walk in Tod’s shoes and understand just where he’s coming from…but everyone else?  Nah.

Perfect Musical Pairing

Queen – Under Pressure

This song makes me feel all the emotion about poverty, hunger, and compassion that I think this book is lacking.  Put it on after finishing this book if you feel the same way!  Or, you could just play it right now…because Queen is one of the greatest bands of all time.  You’re welcome.

3/5 Stars

How to Save a Life
Author: Sara Zarr
Publication Date: 10/18/11
Publisher: Little Brown

Blurb (GR): Jill MacSweeny just wishes everything could go back to normal. But ever since her dad died, she's been isolating herself from her boyfriend, her best friends--everyone who wants to support her. And when her mom decides to adopt a baby, it feels like she's somehow trying to replace a lost family member with a new one.

Mandy Kalinowski understands what it's like to grow up unwanted--to be raised by a mother who never intended to have a child. So when Mandy becomes pregnant, one thing she's sure of is that she wants a better life for her baby. It's harder to be sure of herself. Will she ever find someone to care for her, too?

As their worlds change around them, Jill and Mandy must learn to both let go and hold on, and that nothing is as easy--or as difficult--as it seems.

Critically acclaimed author and National Book Award finalist Sara Zarr delivers a heart-wrenching story, told from dual perspectives, about the many roads that can lead us home.

Review:

Reading Sara Zarr reminds me of that old Hemingway quote, “There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.” Boy does she know how to do that.  Only, she translates every emotion with such stark, raw purity that it feels like I am the one bleeding.  Maybe not everyone has been a pregnant teenager with a dreadful home life or a hostile, sarcastic girl who’s just lost her closest support, but I think that it would be hard for anyone not to find something to relate to in these girls.

Mandy and Jill are two girls who want more.  Mandy is eight months pregnant and takes a desperate chance on Robin, a middle aged widow who agrees to adopt her child with no contracts, lawyers, or social workers.  Jill is Robin’s daughter, still reeling from the loss of her father only a year ago, and highly suspicious of Mandy and her motivations.  These girls couldn’t possibly have less in common, but they are thrown together, and they may end up
impacting each other’s lives in unexpected ways.

Each Sara Zarr novel that I have read features a young woman dealing with conflict in her life and learning to cope, and yet none of these girls feel at all like the same person.  Each novel feels original.  And that’s true here as well:  Mandy and Jill have very distinct personalities and voices.  I could relate to Mandy’s insecurity as a potential mother, to her confusion about who she is, to her firm conviction about who she’s not.  I could also relate to Jill; to her desperate fear of love and intimacy, after experiencing real loss for the first time.

I like the love interests, but I love that they don’t play a major role in this story.  This is a story about Mandy and Jill finding peace and certainty within themselves, and learning to trust.  The only part of this story that doesn’t feel quite real to me is the end.  But, I think that most of you know by now that I have a hard time with happy endings.  What seems incongruous to me, will probably only increase the popularity of this book.  Who doesn’t love a happy 
ending?

SPOILERS AHEAD
Me. 

Maybe it’s because I could relate so much to Mandy’s doubts that she would be a good mother.  That’s not something that goes away as soon as your baby is born and placed into your arms.  There’s no magical balm for that.  I have had to earn what little confidence I have piece by piece, one bedtime, one meal, one scraped knee at a time.  I guess I wanted to see some of that in Mandy – that everything wasn’t magically fixed.  And I know that Christopher should be told about the baby, but it felt too much like Mandy seeking for some kind of outside completion, outside validation.  She doesn’t need that. 

END SPOILERS

Perfect Musical Pairing

Mumford & Sons – Timshel

I love this album for these books.  This song is such a healing balm, which is something that I think both Mandy and Jill need.  It has two distinct phrases, which remind me so much of Mandy and Jill.

Jill:
"Cold is the water
It freezes your already cold mind
Already cold, cold mind
And death is at your doorstep
And it will steal your innocence
But it will not steal your substance"

and Mandy:
"And you are the mother
The mother of your baby child
The one to whom you gave life
 And you have your choices
And these are what make man great
His ladder to the stars"

4.5/5 Stars

I think that this song is about a lost love, but when I was reading through the lyrics (in English…because I’m an ignorant American I only speak one language), I was so struck with all the feelings of loss that Guadalupe Garcia McCall so perfectly describes in this book.

While I'm sleeping
I feel that we walk
The two of us, 
very close to each other,
Towards a blue sky
But when I wake up - the red sky
You are missing.

4/5 Stars