Thu Feb 09 2012
Take a peek at what teens and tweens are reading, and you may find some books that are just too good to put down.
The hot-off-the-presses “Mockingjay” is the final entry in the futuristic trilogy by Suzanne Collins that began with “The Hunger Games.” The books are set in a post-apocalyptic America called Panem, which has been divided into a dozen districts, all run with absolute authority (think Big Brother) from a place called the Capitol. Every year, one boy and one girl are chosen from each district (think Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery”) to participate in the games, which are a literal fight-to-the-death broadcast on television from an arena (think Roman gladiators). In the first book, District 12’s representatives are Katniss Everdeen (an outdoorsy girl who loves her best friend, a boy named Gale) and Peeta Mellark, a gentle boy who has a crush on Katniss. Book two, “Catching Fire,” begins immediately after the games and introduces more politics, as the districts begin to rebel against their oppressors (think “Star Wars”). And as punishment, the nasty leader comes up with a nuance to that year’s games that is a shocker to everybody. But “the Capitol has no end of creative ways to kill people,” says the book. Book three continues the story and the action, with a full-blown civil war. Many of the rebels are forced to go underground, and not all of our friends survive.
It’s hard to tell you more of what happens in books two and three without revealing the end of book one. Let’s just say it’s a kind of science fiction “Survivor” for teens with a continuing love story (or two), a sociopolitical backdrop and plenty of intense action — including some pretty grisly violence. The series has treachery, bravery, a wedding, an assassination, and genetically engineered tracker jacker wasp venom “so carefully created to target the place where fear lives in your brain.”
“The Hunger Games” is now on the list of my favorite reads. The clever author has taken elements from many sources and woven them together into this truly original package. She has developed characters the reader can become involved with. And “Mockingjay” may be the best of the three. Parts of it remind me of Terry Brooks’ Shannara fantasies. And moments remind me of Harry Potter, but there’s no magic, other than the magic of technology, imagination and love. The sad/happy ending surprised me a bit. I loved it. And I cried; I hated to leave these characters. The trilogy is more than three books; it’s a great adventure. Whatever your age, don’t miss it.
Life of a Poet
“The Dreamer” by Pam Muñoz Ryan is a fictionalized account of the childhood of poet Pablo Neruda. Born Neftalí Reyes in Chile, the boy is sickly and shy, and his cruel father ridicules him. Neftalí daydreams and gets distracted by the beauty around him, constantly stopping to collect and investigate beautiful things, such as a pinecone or a beetle on a leaf. To express the boy’s budding interesting in writing, Ryan adds original poetry, at first in the form of sounds and simple questions. From his uncle, who owns a newspaper, Neftalí develops a social conscience and finds that words have power. When the teenaged Neftalí writes a political piece for a magazine, he angers his father, who burns all his beloved notebooks, calling him “an embarrassment to the family.” In defense, the young man creates the pen name of Pablo Neruda and keeps writing. In 1971, Neruda was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.
Award-winning illustrator Peter Sís chose dots for his simple drawings, which include pictures within pictures and a lovely triptych to open each chapter. A selection of Neruda’s poems appears at the end. The text and illustrations are all in almost-black green, a tribute to the poet, who, we find out in the author’s note, liked to write in green ink, which he considered the color of hope.
Fun with Magic
In “Abby Carnelia’s One and Only Magical Power” by David Pogue of Shaker Heights, Abby discovers accidentally that when she pulls on her earlobes, an egg starts spinning. Hoping to find out what she can do with her bizarre talent, she winds up at a camp for kids who want to learn magic — Camp Cadabra in New Hampshire — the summer following sixth grade. With the help of a new friend, 14-year-old Ben, Abby performs her egg “trick” on stage, in front of everybody. Because of her gift, she’s picked to go to “Super Camp” along with other junior-high-school-age kids — each with one special talent — chosen from five camps around the country. There, aptitudes toward invisibility, teleportation, telekinesis and more are developed. Abby wonders, “Is there something waiting to be discovered inside every kid on earth?” But at the advanced camp, things don’t seem quite right to Abby, and the e-mails from home are strange.
Mystery and History
“The Danger Box” by Blue Balliett (the best-selling author of “Chasing Vermeer”) contains a mystery within a mystery. As a sort of game, a man had a box delivered to himself, but he died while it was en route. The delivery truck that was carrying the box was stolen. The box, which contains a mysterious notebook, ends up in the garage of the grandparents of a 12-year-old boy named Zoomy in Three Oaks, Mich. The boy, who’s a bit OCD/autistic, carries a purple pen (like Harold’s purple crayon in the classic story): “It helps me imagine I can see more clearly than I really can,” says Zoomy. The boy is legally blind, but he has an “expert nose,” and he loves computers. At the library, he meets a girl named Lorrol, and the two of them become detectives, researching the notebook. They make a great discovery and put together “The Gas Gazette,” giving clues throughout the book to the identity of a famous historical personage.
Copyright © 2010 by Mary Louise Ruehr.
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BOOK NOTES, One for the Books Extra Online
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Check out my blog on books, inspiration, fun and thought-provoking goodies! It’s called “Shine A Light!”
http://blogs.dixcdn.com/shine_a_light/
If you lose that link, go to www.recordpub.com. Click “Blogs” in the blue bar at the top of the page, and find “Shine A Light.”
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For best-seller lists and more book news, go to:
http://www.recordpub.com/news/article/4865900
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Here are links to other recent One for the Books columns. More links are available on my blog at http://blogs.dixcdn.com/shine_a_light/one-for-the-books/
Making the World a Better Place -- http://www.recordpub.com/news/article/4835710
Graphic Novels--Not just comic books for grownups -- http://www.recordpub.com/news/article/4868765
Prize-Winning Fiction -- http://www.recordpub.com/news/article/4803780
Authors’ Lives, Real or Imagined -- http://www.recordpub.com/news/article/4856578
Memorable Characters -- http://www.recordpub.com/news/article/4822150
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Thanks for reading One for the Books. Please let us know what kind of book news you’d like to see on this page. Send e-mail to Books@recordpub.com. Send other mail to Mary Louise Ruehr, Books Editor, Record-Courier, 126 N. Chestnut St. (P.O. Box 1201), Ravenna, OH 44266.
“One for the Books” now appears on Saturdays (approximately the second and fourth of each month) on the Books page in the Arts & Entertainment section of the Record-Courier.
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