The Water Wars by Cameron Stracher

It's the future....the United States is now divided into eight territories.  The population is dependent on the most influential political group in the nation, protecting its most precious commodity - water.  While China is taking clouds from the sky, other corporations or desalinating and polluting the oceans, or damming up the precious liquid, only available to those wealthy enough to afford it.  Things taken for granted in the past - bottled water, swimming pools, blue oceans, polar ice caps - are now stuff of legend and history.  Now, most of the planet is covered with dust and endless hot days and nights. 

Vera and her brother Will live in the Republic of Illinowa, where dust prevails and water doesn't exist.  Their rations go quickly, and what there is of it is filled with chemicals, making people sick.  Nothing happens in their small town...nothing, that is, until Kai shows up.  He's different from everyone else.  He drinks crystal clear water, takes showers regularly, is escorted in a limo while others use their electric cars.  And he knows a secret that he only mentions to his new friends, Vera and Will. 

But suddenly, Kai disappears and Vera and Will find themselves being pulled into the intrigue of who wants Kai and where he is.  From gypsies to mobs to the most powerful people on the planet, the brother and sister set up against all odds to find Kai and in the process, finds out the truth about their world they live in. 

Stracher creates a dystopic world that depends on the one resource no animal, plant or human can live without, and he paints a picture of a parched earth struggling to survive.  The characters will reach readers, but it's the plot and action that will hold their attention as well as the descriptive writing that brings this bleak future world into the minds of those that pick up this book.  Another good addition to those who love dystopian novels.

Book trailer: Cryer's Cross by Lisa McMann

Recovery Road by Blake Nelson

Mad Dog Maddie....that's what people called her when she got wasted.  Her alter-ego comes out and there's no stopping her.  That's why she's at Spring Meadows for eight weeks.  Her parents sent her there to dry up but how can she even try when it's like living in her worst nightmare?  She shares her space Jenna and Angela, but it's Trish that she's drawn to, and a friendship begins to develop. 

The girls share their stories, as well as their lives inside rehab.  They go to the movies together, confide in each other, and work to make it out.  Trish's rehab stint is nearly over, but the two promise they'll continue their friendship outside the walls of Spring Meadows.  After Trish leaves, Maddie is on her own....until she meets Stewart. 

There is no mingling between patients in Spring Meadows, but Maddie can't help it.  During the rest of her time there, she and Stewart become close, unlike any other person she's ever been with.  Maddie also knows she's putting her personal demons aside and vows to hold onto sobriety.  Life right now looks so much different and feels so much better than she could have imagined.  But now it's her time to leave...and also leave Stewart behind.  Again, another promise is made outside of rehab...

But it's those promises Trish, Stewart and Maddie make to each other that become problematic in the real world.  Maddie's friendship with Trish starts out well, but slowly takes a downward spiral when Trish tries to push past the damage she's done.  Maddie's family life is still hard for her to handle, but going back to school and trying to make it past the whispers and rumors is the most difficult.  And when Stewart gets out of rehab, it's into his arms that Maddie runs.

Sometimes though, the things you run from are the things you should run away from.  Maddie's life is a completely different one than when she left it to go into recovery.  Things are beginning to become clearer, including her wanting to graduate, making new friends instead of the ones she got into trouble with, and her love for Stewart.  Real life gets in the way, and are the lessons and treatment at Spring Meadows enough to keep Maddie's life in synch or will she turn again to the demons in order to cope with the stress she faces?

Blake Nelson is an author who crosses bounderies in genres.  This novel is realistically portrayed not only through the characters and their interactions, but also the situations each character finds themselves in.  A powerful story begins to unfold in parallel worlds pre and post rehab.  Blake doesn't sugarcoat Maddie's experience, but writes with gritty realism that resonates throughout the book.  Nelson gets the reader down to the level of the characters, and this is what makes this a remarkable YA book that flows and will quickly take the reader along for the journey. 

Leverage by Joshua C. Cohen

Football is king.  At least, at Oregrove High School it is.  Coach has his best players on the field.  Scott, Tom, and Mike are the reigning trinity for the Knights.  Along with their coach, they are going to make sure they win the state title this year.  But coach has been recruiting, and it’s where he finds a diamond in the rough….Kurt.

Kurt, a product of foster homes is big, strong, and fast.  And he made a vow – he will never again be a victim.  He remembers what Crud Bucket did to him and Lamar, but it’s what happened to Lamar that has made Kurt who he is today.  

Walking onto the team, Kurt Brodsky tries to hide himself, but the scars on his face and his stuttering don’t help.  But with Coach on his side, the three kings welcome him with open arms.  Another warrior on the battlefield to help defend against the enemies, and target the weak….

Danny wants so badly to show his father that his sport isn’t just a hobby.  He works hard beside Bruce, Ronnie and the other gymnasts to become the best he can on the mats, and the high bar.  His suicide jump isn’t perfected yet, but when it is, he knows it’ll garner him some attention.  

He also knows that the gym, especially the weight room, should be avoided when the football players take over.  He’s not only seen how they bully the other, smaller students, but himself as well and will do anything to avoid a run-in.  And now there’s another one. 

But a confrontation does occur.  And what starts out as a small incident quickly becomes violent over time.  Danny witnesses what Scott, Mike and Tom do and so does Kurt, and it’s that incident that lays the foundation of right against wrong, right over might, and victimization vs. freedom.  

Cohen writes his first YA novel that’s powerful.  Gritty, realistic, intense… the reader will step into the halls of Oregrove and walk unseen with both Kurt and Danny as they struggle with themselves and those that surround them.  Cohen doesn’t sugarcoat in this book.  In your face…all of this describes how seniors, especially those that are privileged living in a small town, will act, think and speak like.  Written in alternate voices between Danny and Kurt, readers will experience the triumph and the tragedy Cohen’s written so well within this novel while dealing with issues like bullying, suicide, drug use, friendship, and redemption, what others expect from you and what you expect from yourself.  Excellent debut novel!

YA Books to Movies list

I neede a list of these, and fabulous librarians, you responded!  So, here it is - use it for displays, booktalking, whatever you can do with an amazing list! 

21
About a Boy
Angus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging (they changed the title for the movie)
Beastly
Boy in the Striped Pajamas
Blood and Chocolate
Breaking Dawn

Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant (2009)
City of Ember (2008)

Confessions of a Shopaholic
Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen

Eagle of the Ninth (released as The Eagle)

Ella Enchanted, by Gail Carson Levine

Eragon
Flipped

Girl, Interrupted, by Susanna Kaysen

Golden Compass
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
Hellboy
Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

Holes, by Louis Sachar

Hoot

How to Deal (based upon 2 of Sarah Dessen's titles, That Summer and Someone Like You)

I am number Four
I Love You Beth Cooper
Inkheart
It’s Kind of a Funny Story
Jane Eyre

Legend of the Guardians : The Owls of Ga'Hoole (2010)

Last Song

The Losers

Lovely Bones, by Alice Sebold

Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac

My Sister’s Keeper

Narnia

Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist, by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan

Princess Diaries 1 was based upon a book, but 2 was not.

Scott Pilgrim vs. the world
Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants
Soul Surfer: a true story of faith, family, and fighting to get back on the board
Speak
Stormbreaker

Upcoming (either the film rights have been bought, are in pre-production or post-production):

Hugo Cabret
Hunger Games
Incarceron
Maze Runner
Mortal Instruments
If I Stay
Divergent
Matched
Wicked Lovely
Shiver
Perks of Being a Wallflower
Thirteen Reasons Why

tv series:
Pretty Little Liars
Vampire Diaries

You may want to check out Mid-Continent Library's website Based on the Book:
http://www.mymcpl.org/books-movies-music/based-book

Check out http://www.teenreads.com/features/books2movies.asp as well.

Before they were movies bibliography: http://www.pmlib.org/node/446

I genre-fied!!!

Took the plunge!!  The funeral wreath is from our floral class and it just fits perfectly : )  This is the supernatural section.   Working on fantasy next....

I know it's a little thing and lots of people are doing it, but it was WORK and I'm just so proud that I finally jumped tracks a little : )

Exposed by Kimberly Marcus

Liz and Kate has been forever bests since they were six years old and are still best friends at sixteen.  Liz is Photo Girl – taking amazing photographs and hoping to purse photography in college.  Kate is Mistress of Modern Dance, but unsure exactly what she wants to do.

It’s their monthly sleepover – the only time dedicated to the two girls without outside interference, without threat of anyone taking time away from them, cocooned in the comfort of their friendship and lives.  But a minor spark, a disagreement, gets in the way this one time, and for tonight, Kate sleeps on the couch, while Liz stays in her room.

But something happened….Kate avoids Liz, even after she apologizes for hurting Kate’s feelings.  But nothing Liz can say could possibly prepare her for what Kate finally reveals to her.  Mike, Liz’s brother, home from college, raped her….

Is it true or is Kate lying?  Liz can’t possibly believe that her brother, the one who introduced Liz to Brian, the one whom she told Kate was off limits, could do this.  Why would Kate make something like that up?  Or is Mike the one who is lying?  Consentual or forced?  It not only ruins a friendship, but ruins Liz’s focus, not only with Kate but with those closest to her as well as her passion for photography.  She feels out of focus….and still unsure about who is telling the truth….

A powerful novel in verse, the author sets the scene of the book without the reader possibly knowing what could have happened until they read it.  It’s a look at relationships, not only between friends, but those that are familial as well.  Marcus delves into the gray area that teens start to run into the older they get.  No longer is life a clear division of opposites, but sometimes the lines blur.  And that is what that author so clearly writes about.  Who is truly innocent or guilty is left up to the reader, but the nuances allow a certain modicum of bias the reader will pick up on.  An excellent first book for a new YA author.  Recommended.

Glimpse by Carol Lynch Williams

Liz and Hope are sisters, and they know what a regular family is like.  But that’s in the past….now it’s just them and their mother.  Things at home aren’t the same as they were, and it gets worse when Hope finds her older sister in the bathroom with gun.

Now, in order to make ends meet, Liz and Hope’s mother takes on clients at home to make money.  At their age, they don’t exactly understand what that means, but their lives are uninterrupted with friends, secret crushes and a private spot in the house that becomes their clubhouse. 

But  for Liz, her normal life quickly turns into a nightmare, and one she wants to protect Hope from.  But Liz can only stand so much before she breaks…

Although sisters, both girls have lived very different lives under the same roof.  Hope doesn’t understand why Liz would want to kill herself, but she tries to every time she and her mother visit Liz in the mental hospital.  Liz won’t talk to her mother at all – it’s only Hope that she’ll speak to, although it’s not a lot.  All her mother wants to make sure of is that Liz hasn’t told the secret, whatever that means…

The more visits Hope and her mother make to Liz, who is still unresponsive, the more Hope begins to understand what happened to Liz, especially when she and her mother must see a family counselor who talks to Hope about Liz’s predicament.  But it’s when the counselor asks for Liz’s diary that Hope’s mother becomes aggressive, mean…demanding Hope give her the book.  Hope doesn’t have it, but she knows where it is.  And when she finds it in their secret place, the floodgates open and Hope then realizes exactly how bad Liz’s life has become because of her mother’s demands on her. 

Lynch Williams unfolds a tragic story gradually to a situation both girls live in and through, but with different voices that create very strong characters in Hope and Liz.  The author writes a tale about abuse and neglect and its ugly aftermath without having to resort to first-hand experiences or sufferings of the older sister, but the reader knows all too well what has happened.  Lynch Williams also leaves the ending open, not tied up in a perfect bow that makes this novel all that more realistic and powerful.  Those who love novels-in-verse will find this an excellent choice, and one that will make them read every part of the beautiful prose Lynch uses so well to convey the truth about the lives of two innocent people.  Highly recommended.

If you haven't seen this one...oh, you're gonna love it!!!

I'm using this as the intro video tomorrow and Tuesday for my booktalks! 

Book trailer: Blood on My Hands by Todd Strasser

I love his YA mystery!!!!

Two for the girls! The Complete History of Why I Hate Her and Amy & Roger's Epic Detour

I've been reading and have four to blog, but I'm cutting it up into two parts. Here's part one, which features some great reads for girls - one a romance, the other about friendships....

The Complete History of Why I Hate her by Jennifer Richard Jacobson

Nola just wants a summer to be herself.  She loves her little sister, Song, but has always wanted the  feeling of being a normal teenger, not a sister of a sibling who has cancer.  So this summer, she’s off to Rocky Cove Inn to work at the resort as a waitress, surrounded by other teens from all over the place. 

On her bus ride there, she meets the quirky, funny, and always lively Carly, who’s on her way to Boston to be with her family.  All it takes is one bus trip to seal the deal of a friendship.  Even though they've never met, when Nola gets off the bus at Rocky Cove, she already misses her new bubbly friend….

It isn’t long until Nola is immersed in life at Rocky Cove, including meeting the guy counselors from across the way, going to parties in a cabin by the lake, and spending the afternoons she has off swimming, running, and writing haikus to Song and sending them home.  And the best thing that could ever happen – Carly shows up to work too! 

But is it the best thing in the world?  At first Nola thinks so, but slowly she’s seeing a side of Carly that she isn’t sure is real or imagined.  Is Carly in competition with her, or is she just being a friend?  Why doesn’t Carly cheer Nola on when good things happen to her?  At first dubbed the Cannoli’s, Nola isn’t sure she wants a friend that she feels strangles her more than allows her freedom to be herself.  Or is Nola just presuming that Carly is being this way?  Isn't imitation the best form of flattery?

Jacobson has written a quick and dramatic unfolding of events between two girls and a friendship that quickly becomes toxic.  She recognizes the invisible signs that people wear but don’t always show others they have.  Both Nola and Carly are realistic in two very separate ways, and the reader at first is excited for the friendship, but is also omnisciently aware of what really is happening before Nola does.  This is not a happy romance book, but one with a darker side.  Jacobson’s use of haikus within the book, as well as a budding romance for Nola, rounds out this novel into one that readers will start and finish quickly.  Recommended. 

Amy & Roger’s Epic Detour by Morgan Matson

Amy Curry killed her father.  Now, she won’t even think about driving a car.  Home isn’t home anymore since the accident either.  Her brother is in North Carolina, and her mother found another job in faraway Connecticut – as far as possible from California as she could get, and now Amy has to leave too.  But this time, it’s a cross-country trip, which Amy’s mother has meticulously mapped out.  The conundrum?  How is Amy to get to the East Coast in a car?  She can’t do it after what happened….

Enter Roger, an old childhood friend Amy vaguely remembers.  He has the summer off and is going to Philly to stay with his dad and volunteers to take Amy to Connecticut as well as drop of the car Amy’s mother needs.  Great….just what Amy DOESN”T want – a long car trip with a college who happens to be HOT….

For about a year, Amy has had to deal with the pain and suffering of losing a parent.  She doesn’t want to talk about it, feel anything, and becomes a recluse, only allowing herself out when starring in musicals, which is her passion.  She doesn’t want to be stuck in a car answering questions, but when the road trip starts, she realizes Roger doesn’t know what happened, and a small weight is lifted. 

And so the long cross-country trip begins, but Roger and Amy decide to take this time to come to terms with some of the people and incidents in their lives.  Instead of taking the “safe route” Amy’s mom has emailed, Amy and Roger decide to start out at Yosemite,  and from there they run into an endless highway with a shoe tree, a fabulous party in Colorado, and some amazing topiaries in Kentucky. 

But more than that, Amy’s layers begin to peel off as she slowly realizes that life can go on.  Roger also learns that sometimes the people you meet in life are there for now, but there are so many more interesting people to bump into.

What a wonderful read for girls!  Not only does the novel contain romance and road trips, twinkies and tents, but so much added stuff, such as Roger’s playlists of music for the trip, and scraps of a travel log that Amy shares with the reader, including receipts, pictures, menus, notes, and doodles among other things.  The readers feels like the back seat passenger in this novel, and gets to know Roger and Amy on so many different levels the closer they get to their destination, not only physically, but emotionally as well.

This is exactly what you get when you read the title – an epic adventure!   Recommended. 

This has been a day of posts!!

Done all sorts of things over the weekend, and found this video...had to share it : )

Human.4 by Michael A. Lancaster

We don’t know what happened to Kyle Straker.  All there is left is a cassette tape.  Old technology – worthless in today’s society of the 21^st century and the upgrades we’ve done…

For Kyle, it all started on a summer day in the small village of Millgrove.  The local talent show, a tradition for this town of 1,000, was about to start, and Kyle, his best friend Simon, and Simon’s girlfriend Lilly wanted to see if Danny Birnie could actually hypnotize people.  But no one volunteered, so Kyle did. 

It was this decision that propelled him into the unbelievable, enough to drive a person insane…

When Kyle comes out of his hypnotic state, he realizes something isn’t right.  Every one on the green isn’t moving.  Televisions, telephones, and computers aren’t working.  Weird green symbols flash onto the screens of  the computer he checks – it looks more like an alphabet, but he isn’t sure. 

And then the village awakens.  And it’s what they’ve become.  Human or inhuman?  And what about Kyle, Lilly and the other two that were hypnotized?  What did they miss? But more importantly, what have they themselves become? 

Kyle soon pieces together the only parts he knows how to and what he and the others discover is something they can’t even comprehend.  But Danny, their off-kilter friend knows the truth, and he gives them a choice.  Follow or be erased….

Lancaster takes dystopia to a new level in this science fiction thriller that’s sure to catch the attention of the reader.  The plot line is quick and will definitely grab the reader’s attention from the very first page.  Lancaster pulls together an assortment of writing devices, which only lends to the “authenticity” of this book, which is actually the oldest form of communication for those who haven’t been upgraded.  From a dictionary, to expert analyses, from flashbacks taken from the cassette tape, to the editor’s note, all of these are combined within the novel to slowly build tension for the reader, making it one of those books that can’t be put down.  Excellent for junior high and high school collections – it won’t disappoint sci-fi readers!

Book trailer: Trapped by Michael Northrop

Here's a link to the library webpage.  Click on "book trailers" to view as well as download in .wmv format:
http://www.nisdtx.org/120820731141528687/site/default.asp

You can also view in schooltube and youtube.  I do believe I have more to learn when it comes to QR codes!
Schooltube: http://www.schooltube.com/video/8cf9d2a53701c1f553b1/Trapped-by-Michael-Northrop
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-KgwuQJNuVQ


Thanks for you patience guys.  I still have a copy I'll be sending out too : )

Blood on My Hands by Todd Strasser

A cell phone picture…it’s all that’s needed to put Callie on the run. She was holding the bloody knife, and standing over Katherine’s dead body. With her family’s past, everyone is going to believe she did it. But did she?


One year ago, Katherine Remington-Day asked Callie to sit with her and Dakota at lunch and it changed Callie’s life. Her best friend had moved away, and her boyfriend, Slade, joined the national guard. Callie’s only connection to safety were the few phone calls and instant messages she and Slade shared, a long cry from the two years they’d been dating. But now, in the small town of Soundview, Callie had a chance at a social life, and she took it.

What she didn’t expect were the nuances and dance friends played when they became Katherine’s friend. It came with a price – sometimes something trivial, sometimes something serious, but Callie knew if she bent to Katherine’s rules, there would be a next time. She didn’t know if she wanted to give more that she already had, and Katherine made her choose between Slade and her friends. Callie thought she chose wisely, but now, on the run for murder, the only person she can rely on is Slade.

With his help, Callie is able to elude the police, but she knows time is running short. And with flashback memories, she is able to piece together enough personal information to figure out who the killer is. But will she be believed? And is it enough?

Strasser comes back with another YA thriller, following on his Wish You Were Dead book. Fast paced, the reader is allowed into the present and past lives of Callie and her friends and is able to see just who her friends really are and the various motives they’d all have for murder. Not only that, but the situations Callie goes through are believable instead of far-fetched, the plot is tightly written, and the ending will surprise. The reader feels for Callie, and believes her story, but continues to look for clues as to whom it would be. It’s one of those books where you want to flip to the end to find out who the killer is, but decide to wait to see the story unfold. For those readers who enjoy mystery fiction, this is one to put in their hands.

And this is what a weeded book looks like afterwards...

These are just two of the many art displays compliments of the amazing art staff we have on campus!

The Tension of Opposites by Kristina McBride

Tessa and Noelle have been best friends for years. They’ve shared everything together in the small town of Centerville, Ohio. But with all relationships, events can stagger and tear them apart. And that’s what happened two years ago.


Now, Cooper, Noelle's older brother, is telling Tessa she's alive and coming home.  After two years of abduction by a stranger, Tessa’s best friend is back, but not completely. Tessa thought it was hard to live knowing her best friend was gone, possibly killed. She’d gone through therapy to understand that loss, but now…it’s harder to live knowing Noelle is back and what happened to her. Two years at the hand of a monster can change a person to someone you never even knew. How do you deal with something like that?  Can a friendship you thought was gone forever be re-kindled, and more importantly, can it be the same?

In high school, Tessa’s passion in photography has put her in the advanced classes, which she loves. A new student, Max, is in her class too, and Max sees Tessa for more than what she shows to everyone else, and slowly Tessa lets him into her world. The theme for the next photography project is the opposite of tensions – up down, hot cold, lost found….and all Tessa can think about is Noelle,

“kidnapped, abducted, snatched
Enslaved, imprisoned, restrained.”

When Noelle finally tries to start a normal life by entering into high school, both girls know it will be a long, hard journey, with students knowing what happened to Noelle, with Noelle facing her past and present, and with Tessa trying her hardest to create the perfect balance for not only her best friend, but herself and Max as well.

Kristina McBride creates a dramatic and bold debut novel that deals with real-life issues that have been on the front pages of newspapers as well as televisions today. Many people see the “inside story” of an abductor and can only imagine the horror. McBride writes about the opposite of the abductor and focuses on the life of the abductee after her rescue and the implications of her new life on her as well her family and friends after the tragic events have been aired in public. Paired with the photographic theme of Tessa’s work that creates not only the title of this book, but permeates with symbolism throughout, McBride has created a novel that will keep the reader engaged with the characters as well as the plotline and relationships, and what ultimately will happen to Tessa and Noelle…is there such a thing as resiliency after something that devastating? This debut novel focuses on the now and how the victim and those closest to her must cope with the tragic loss of two years without reliving the past and its brutality. Perfect pairing with Mazer’s The Missing Girl and Scott’s Living Dead Girl.

Trapped by Michael Northrop

Excerpt from the book:
“Some of the others might’ve seen things differently, and some of them might’ve told it better, but you don’t get to pick. You don’t because, for one thing, not all of us made it.”

School is in session at Tattawa High School when the snow starts. Kids are milling around wondering if school is shut down and they get another holiday out of it. But Scotty doesn’t want that to happen. He’s all over shooting out at the basketball game scheduled that evening. Jason wants to work on his amazing go-cart in the shop, and their buddy Pete just wants to hang out. But then the announcement comes all. School and all activities are shutting down and students need to go home now.

The snow is still falling, but the guys have it all figured out. Jason convinces the shop teacher to keep it open and his dad’ll pick them up all. He has a four-wheeler. And then they get to work. And the snow continues to fall, harder and harder….

But now they know they’ve made a mistake. Scotty left his phone at home, and Pete’s and Jason’s won’t pick up signal. Their last hope are the buses, so they head that direction. But they’re all gone, and only Coach Gossell is left with a handful of students. Les, the meanest guy on campus, Elijah, who has a creepy vibe, Krista, the most popular and beautiful, along with her friend Julie are left behind. Now the snow is piling up and the road outside can’t be seen.

A nor’easter, the biggest and baddest in East Coast history has hit, and Scotty and the rest aren’t leaving campus anytime soon. And slowly they’re feeling the effects…first the power goes out, then the water freezes, and outside, it’s a freezing wasteland, where second story homes look like one story. They’re trapped and can’t reach the outside world. But it’s their world inside that is slowly starting to come apart, and it’s only day one…

What a great second novel from this author! A punch right to the stomach within the first two chapters of this book will keep readers turning the pages to find out just what happened to those left at school. Northrop actualizes the dire situation with what typical teenagers without adults around would do and how the environment of the school still resonates loudly with each clique left in the halls. The enemy is nature, and she is violent and dangerous, but Northrop leaves the reader guessing to find out is the enemy wins or not. Although some may disparage the ending, I found it surprising at first, but with a definite mental image in my mind. Excellent for reluctant readers as well as those who enjoy trying to outwit the characters and figure out just what will happen around the next twist and turn in this story.

Friend is Not A Verb by Daniel Ehrenhaft

Henry (Hen for short) has just been dumped by his girlfriend, who also kicked him out of her band.  His sister is on the lam as a criminal, and his parents continue to try hard to make him eat meat.....the only solid thing in his life is his best friend and next door neighbor, Emma. 

And so begins the life of Hen Birnbaum, official bum.  He lives the life of a teenager in NYC, trying to get gigs in places like the Bimbo Lounge and wondering where the popular tag, "Steal Your Parents' Money," found on buttons all over the city, originated.  But right now, he has better things to think about - like why his sister decided to come home after a year of absence without warning and what the heck happened to her, why he and his friend Emma keep having some strange karmic connection through dreams and cell phone calls, and how come his parents are the most uncool people on the planet?

When Sarah, finally gets home, she tells him to see Gabriel, her partner in crime about bass guitar lessons.  It can only help him become that famous rock star he's always wanted to be (according to the VH1 Behind the Music video he plays through his head that happens to star him as uber rock star of the future).  But for now, his rock-star self  gets to walk dogs while trying to figure out what happened to his sister and Gabriel and why they're being sought out by the authorties.  It doesn't hurt that Hen commits his first crime ever by stealing Gabriel's manuscript (aka his love letter to Sarah) but it only adds fuel to the burning question of why (Jean Paul Satre's head, an ex- Nazi and leyaks don't help anything either!)

But along the way, Hen realizes that the Unseen Hand can either give him a fist bump, a high five or slap him in the face, and his life, which he may find pathetic, has some very interesting qualities to it.  And sometimes a crisi-tunity (crisis and opportunity) is the most important thing you can try to overcome. 

Ehrenhaft writes another extremely humorous novel about the life of a typical teen-age guy living out a life of angst with weirdo parents, a failed relationship with a rock goddess, all while trying to live out his dream of rocking out.  Filled with lots of rock and roll references from David Bowie to Green Day to Journey, this novel will make you smile, if not make you laugh out loud.  Along with a great story, Ehrenhaft parallels the plot with the sub-text of true friendship, where the word "friend" was a noun only but is now a verb as well (think Facebook) and how the the circles of friendship created in his story use both type of grammar to make their connections.  What a refreshing, funny and humorous book in the midst of everything dark and deep in YA lit!

Yummy: the last days of a Southside shorty by G. Neri

It was 1994, and a hot summer but things in Southside were getting hotter.  There was a dangerous mankiller on the loose and police had no leads.  Everyone in the neighborhood knew him...knew what he did...

A gang shooting took the life of a 14 year old innocent girl, who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.  And she knew her killer - he went to school, even church with her. 

Yummy was 11 years old when he died.  At one point in his life, he was committing a felony every month, but because of his age, he came back to the Southside projects in Chicago, Illinois.  Yummy is the cold-blooded killer everyone was looking for....

This powerful graphic novel takes the short life of a child and pulls in the reader through narrative, images, and a biography.  But it's the essence and the not so black-and-white issue at hand that will draw the reader in.  Although not an in-depth look into Robert Sandifer's (aka Yummy's) life, the reader gets to know him through the words and illustrations Neri and Du Burker have created.  The forward by the author lets the reader know that this is a blend of narrative fiction and non-fiction taken from the stories, news reports and other sources about Robert Sandifer.  The afterward gives a brief synopsis of  Chicago's Southside and the Black Disciple Nation as well as an annotation of additional information.  A very quick read, but one that will leave the reader with lingering thoughts, and for this reader, a desire to know more about the story of this tragic tale and life of this kid....