A Review of The Accidental Genius of Weasel High by Rick Detorie

Larkin Pace wants to be a filmmaker. He also kind of assumes he's the boyfriend of his buddy Brooke, at least until she says those fatal words, "And how about you, Larkin? Have you found a girlfriend yet?"

These words reverberate through Larkin's brain, especially as he observes Brooke getting cozy with the school bully, Dalton Cooke, who spends a certain amount of his free time picking on Larkin.

And that's only one of Larkin's problems. There's the fact that he's on the short side. There's his evil older sister, whom he's dubbed The Beast. There's his friend, Freddie, who barely talks (except to say "Mahz well," which translates as "Might as well"). And there's crotchety Mrs. Grobnik, his new after-school boss—thanks to his mother, who has assigned him to work as the old lady's assistant.

I should point out that this book is illustrated, with a very Diary of a Wimpy Kid feel to it. Only it's not an imitator. Instead, the book's marketing campaign hews to truth in advertising with its slogan, "A book for the wimpy kid who has grown into a wimpy teen." I assure you, Larkin is not Greg Heffley. But he is an excellent if slightly nebbishy teen, and the people that surround him are a colorful cast in their own right.

For example, meet The Beast, AKA Kelly:

Then in stomped Kelly, who plopped her backpack on the chair by the door. Mom was right behind her.

"Kelly, have you had breakfast yet?"

"Yes, Mother. I had ibuprofen."

[Illustration with voice bubble: Kelly is making a bracey face and shaking her fists, eyes shut, as Larkin and his mother look on.] "It's the only thing I can manage because these braces are KILLING ME!"

Kelly was sporting her new look this morning. Lately she's been wearing a plastic thing under her hair that makes it look like there's a little speed bump on top of her head. I think she ordered it from an infomercial.

Which also gives you a glimpse of Larkin's slightly wry voice, one of the charms of this book.

Each section has a header, e.g., "Ten Things I Hate about Being 14," which includes items such as "Even girls are taller than me," "My mom has to drive me everywhere," and oh yes, after the fifth item: "I can't think of five more right now. I'll have to finish the list later." Ha. A few more memorable headers are "Miss Sadie, the Love Doctor," "She Who Must Get Her Way," and "Why Weasel's Library Lady Hates Me." And that's not counting the episode in which Larkin and Freddie sleep over at Freddie's cousin Jason's house in hopes of filming the ghost of a dead cat. Or the one where raccoons invade Kelly's bedroom late at night and Larkin scares them off using an "American Girly" doll.

And you know what? Old lady "Miss Sadie" isn't half bad, especially after she and Larkin get to talking about old movies.

Then there's the way Freddie never actually calls Larkin by name...

Rick Detorie's new book is more subtle than Diary of a Wimpy Kid, and Larkin is much more likable than Greg (who is funny partly because he has no idea how selfish he is). Larkin's big break doesn't turn out so great and neither does his love life, but the book still ends on a hopeful note. For 11- to 15-year-old boys—and girls—I happily recommend The Accidental Genius of Weasel High.

P.S. You may know Detorie best thanks to his comic strip, One Big Happy, about a six-year-old girl named Ruthie and her family.

Note for Worried Parents: I'd call this a PG. It's for and about teens, but at the younger end of the spectrum, say middle school and early high school. Larkin is interested in girls and makes reference to a hickey at one point, but he never even gets a girl to go out with him except as friends (the topic of a running joke). Pretty mild stuff.

Wimp Yourself

Thanks to Tricia at The Miss Rumphius Effect and Travis at 100 Scopes Notes for this link, where you can "Go Wimp Yourself!" Here's my Diary of a Wimpy Kid avatar. (Note the astonishing similarity to my Book Aunt portrait...) I'd say it's worth the movie ad--go try it for yourself!

The Popular Kids

So this week I'm thinking about books that are so popular they get made into movies and are otherwise worshipped by vast quantities of young readers, as well as by old people hoping to make money. These would be the books considered commercial, the ones that make the bestseller lists. Some of them are even well written! No, seriously, there's a reason kids like certain series. Jeff Kinney's Diary of a Wimpy Kid books, for example, are among the funniest things I've ever read.

When I cruised the bookstore yesterday, I came across a new book in another popular series, the Alex Rider books by Anthony Horowitz. The flap copy for Crocodile Tears doesn't give away much, except to say that Alex has been recovering from a gunshot wound inflicted by a sniper and that he wants to live a normal life, but human suffering is a business, and he's about to have another spy-type adventure related to that business. This reminds me why I like the Alex Rider books—they're not like those movies where being a young spy is a frolicsome thing. We are shown, rather, that being a teen spy is to be hurt and dirty and even exploited by one's spy superiors. There are a lot of Alex Rider wannabe's out there, most of them inferior because the characterization isn't as strong, which is why I bought the book, no questions asked. And one of these days I'll get organized enough to write a detailed post about the Rider imitators!

Which, amusingly enough, include the Young James Bond books by Charlie Higson. It's obvious that somebody in the Bond franchise saw how well the Alex Rider series was doing and said, "Hey! We should be writing those, about a younger version of Agent 007!" So they did. In my opinion, the Higson books are a bit uneven. I think Robert Muchamore's Cherub series comes closer to the Alex Rider books as far as being gripping. You'll find that Muchamore's young heroes are more earthy, in part—truly—because they aren't upper-class kids like Alex. Along the same lines, I've noticed that my teenage students, who are mostly Latino and African American and quite poor, have no interest in Alex Rider. I figure it's because he's too rich and white and British. I suppose I'm not the first to wonder if we'd have more readers in the inner city if we had more books, not just about pregnant girls and drug dealers a la Precious, but along the lines of the Percy Jackson or Alex Rider series, only with young minority heroes.

Of course, the first book in the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series, The Lightning Thief, is now a movie that will be coming out on Presidents' Day weekend in 2010. In case you haven't seen it yet, here's the trailer. The movie poster is shown to the left.

Just who are the most popular kids in the world of children's books? For boys, always an uncertain audience, Diary of a Wimpy Kid is currently number one—it's about a middle school kid, but readers in grades ranging as low as fourth or even third get a kick out of it. For one thing, it's a friendly read, with a hand-written-style font, relatively few words on the page, and lots of illustrations, making it sort of a graphic novel, or halfway there. Main character Greg Heffley is one of the most selfish kids you'll ever meet, but the joke is that he's a pretty typical middle school kid and has no idea he's that selfish. Very few writers have captured the essential boyness of that age as well as Kinney has. And the stuff he makes into humorous episodes! Greg's little brother turning potty training into a racket, what happens when you tell a 12-year-old boy he has to do his own laundry, and the true terrors of public pools are just a few things that come to mind. If anything, the DWK books resemble a really well-written, character-driven comic strip like Calvin and Hobbes or FoxTrot. Makes sense, since Kinney is first and foremost a cartoonist. There's some Malcolm in the Middle and Everybody Hates Chris here, too. Of course, movie plans are already underway for the wimpy kid.

The Percy Jackson books were burning hot about three years ago and continue to be popular, with the upcoming movie amping up interest. In case you haven't heard, they're about a boy who finds out the Greek gods are alive and well and living above Manhattan. What's more, Percy is the son of Poseidon. He soon finds himself fighting off monsters and going on quests with his new friends, many of whom are also demigods. There's even a training camp!

As for the Alex Rider books, they're a little less popular now than they were five or six years back, but they continue to be recognized reads for tweens and teens, especially boys. (The movie didn't do very well.)

For girls, the Twilight books are still sizzling, with the rising of New Moon, the movie, getting fans ages 13 and 31 all twittery and giggly again. (Team Edward or Team Jacob?) But Twilight has migrated to the adult bestseller list somehow, and the true hot book on this week's New York Times bestseller list for children is Catching Fire, Suzanne Collins' highly anticipated sequel to last fall's hot book, The Hunger Games. The books are about a dystopian post-U.S.A. where teens from the 24 districts are forced to compete in gladiator-like games to the death. When two teens manage to beat the system in Book One, the government tries to use them in Book Two. Katniss and Peeta also find themselves becoming the symbols of a resistance movement.

I'll give you a hint about book popularity: besides checking the bestseller lists, note how many customer reviews have been written on the Amazon book page. Catching Fire has only been out since September 1 and it has already garnered 300 customer reviews, which is more than most books rack up in 5-10 years. Since a single review is unlikely to stand out in a batch that big, what's really happening is a conversation, with people feeling wildly compelled to chime in. I'm sure you're wondering, so here you go: Twilight has 4,536 customer reviews, while Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone has 5,543. The Hunger Games has 674 and The Graveyard Book has garnered 327, both in the past year. And books that aren't so popular, the vast unwashed masses of the publishing world? They usually show somewhere from 10 to 30 customer reviews.

Two other key books on the New York Times Bestseller list for children's chapter books this week are Ellen Hopkins' Tricks and Maggie Stiefvater's Shiver. Ellen Hopkins, as I've said before, is not for the faint of heart, and definitely not for Worried Parents. I heard her talk about this book and read a selection in a workshop at the August 2009 Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) Conference. She said something like, "Well, if people think my previous books were shocking, wait till they see this one!" Her latest novel-in-verse is about how a handful of teen characters become prostitutes. The author read us a poem about a teenage boy reluctantly having sex with two older men, and I have to say I felt all prudish just listening! But there you have it—it's a bestseller. [Note: See Ellen Hopkins' note in the comments. It is her hope that the book will deter young people from pursuing this lifestyle.]

Shiver is a werewolf story (207 customer reviews on Amazon), so its popularity may be linked to the phenomenon that is Twilight. I have read Stiefvater's book Lament: The Faerie Queen's Deception, and what I learned is that the woman is a very good writer, better than most of the people currently writing teen paranormal fiction. It shouldn't surprise you to hear that Shiver was just optioned to be made into a movie.

Neil Gaiman's Newbery winner, The Graveyard Book, continues to enthrall, speaking of well written. There's no question about this one becoming a movie!

Another much-anticipated book in the NYT's top ten is Fire by Kristin Cashore. I read Graceling last year and thought it was good, though I wasn't quite as enamored of it as some of my friends in the Kidlitosphere blogging community. Graceling is about a magically gifted warrior girl on a quest to circumvent the evil first manifested by the kidnapping of the elderly father of a king. Prequel Fire is set in the same world as Graceling, telling the story of an unnaturally beautiful girl, the daughter of a monster, who has powers of mind control and gets caught up in her country's political struggles. (I try not to get Catching Fire and Fire mixed up!) The cover art to the left is from the UK edition.

The other four books in the NYT's top ten are The Magician's Elephant by Kate DiCamillo (which someone just gave me for my birthday), The Million-Dollar Throw by Mike Lupica, Hush, Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick, and Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher. These are, respectively, another magical fable from the Newbery award-winning author of The Tale of Despereaux (which, you'll note, was made into a movie), a sports book in a series that's growing in popularity and really should generate at least one movie, a Twilightish paranormal romance about a hunky fallen angel, and a Young Adult novel about the reasons a teenager has killed herself.

Of the books on the list, The Magician's Elephant and Thirteen Reasons Why are probably the least commercial. I'm a little leery of teen suicide books, but that's just me—I've got more of a middle grade fiction personality than a YA one. Without even reading it, I can recommend The Magician's Elephant to you. Not to mention The Graveyard Book, which I have read. It manages to be both literary and commercial, a fairly remarkable achievement on Gaiman's part.

Overall, I thought this list was more promising than the list of Top Ten Bestsellers in Children's Picture Books, which made me want to cry. Read it and see if you can guess why: Fancy Nancy: Splendiferous Christmas by Jane O'Connor, The Christmas Sweater: A Picture Book by Glenn Beck, LEGO Star Wars by Simon Beecroft, Nubs by Mary Nethery, Waddle by Rufus Butler Seder, Eragon's Guide to Alagaesia by Christopher Paolini, Skippyjon Jones: Lost in Spice by Judy Schachner, Otis by Loren Long, Julie Andrews' Collection of Poems, Songs, and Lullabies by Julie Andrews and her daughter, Emma Walton Hamilton, and Where the Wild Things Are: The Movie Storybook by Barb Bersche.

From the depths of my soul, the question bursts forth: What are these kids reading? And close on its heels: What are their parents thinking?

Most of these "picture books" are movie tie-ins, books with visual effects, books by political pundits, etc. While I know Fancy Nancy is popular, I feel that after the first book, the series quickly sold out and went downhill, becoming a fashionable franchise (no pun intended) rather than true storytelling. For me, the only real books on the list are the poetry collection edited by Julie Andrews and her daughter, Skippyjon, and Otis. I have yet to get my hands on Andrews and Hamilton's anthology, but as a poet and poetry lover, I look forward to reading it. I confess I'm not a big fan of the Skippyjon books, possibly because I don't own a cat, although I suppose in this case the cat is actually a stand-in for a small child. I read Otis standing in a bookstore and thought it was a nice story about an anthropomorphized tractor, though not as compelling as, say, the classic Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel by Virginia Lee Burton.

Sigh.

If you take the time to skim through Amazon's list of the Top 100 Bestselling Books for Children, you'll get a little better picture of the market, finding other commercial books such as the 39 Clues series and my 9-year-old nephew's favorite, Klutz Press's very fun Encyclopedia of Immaturity, along with more literary works. Well, a few, anyway. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak is holding its own, for instance.

I did notice a boxed set of the first four Magic Treehouse books in the top 100. Mary Pope Osborne has really cornered the second grade series market, and yes, her books are a pleasant read. But I'm telling you—I can't wait for someone to come up with a far more wonderful series for that age group. So far, it hasn't happened. This begs the question: how good can a series actually be? Does the very concept of a series somehow dilute the literariness of books? Then, too, why do some books seem more like powerful sequels than a series series? Yes, some of the successful books listed above are series, but do second and following books fall short by definition?

On that conundrumical note, I'll conclude my report on the coolest of the cool. It's kind of like watching the popular kids at school. Sometimes you wonder why they're popular when they seem so ordinary, or even, in some cases, so unappealing. On the other hand, there are times it makes sense. Some of the popular kids are truly extraordinary, and their singular status seems completely deserved.

Grabbers: The Best Books I Read in 2008

Alabama Moon, by Watt Key (2006, ages 9-12)

I’m with the crowd asking why Key’s book didn’t get a Newbery, or at least a Newbery Honor. What an amazing read! Its young hero reminded me of Candide crossed with Maniac Magee. The adventure just sings, buoyed up by an underlayer of emotional resonance.

Moon Blake has been raised in the backwoods by his survivalist father, and he’s learned his lessons well—he can trap, fish, dig for roots, and handle almost anything the wilderness might throw at him. He is less well prepared for the challenges of civilization, however. When his father dies, ten-year-old Moon attempts to comply with his father’s final instructions to go to Alaska and look for other people who hate the government, but he soon finds himself caught up in a system that doesn’t understand him in the least. From the hostility of a rural constable to the walls of a reform school, the traps close in on Moon. But he adapts by applying his survival skills in creative ways, and pretty soon he and two new friends are on the run, back in the woods. Of course, even a capable kid like Moon can’t solve every problem.

One of the greatest strengths of this book is its characters, which are flawed, yet real and likable. Moon is a very compelling young hero, but the secondary characters are of interest, too. For example, Hal is first introduced as a bully, but Moon doesn’t know how to play that social game. He fends off Hal’s attacks, then casually befriends the baffled boy. No one has ever expected anything but trouble from Hal, and Moon’s straightforward respect helps Hal to become a different person.

I should note that this book has rich appeal for boy readers, more than just about anything I’ve ever read.

Since I came a little late to Alabama Moon, which was originally published in September 2006, I’ll note that some reviewers have objected to the book’s happy ending—and to them I say, well, every so often, in actual real life, things turn out right. For example, I know an older couple who recently adopted a six-year-old child out of the foster system. She is now being raised by loving, educated people who deeply care about her needs. So yeah, it can happen.

That said, I think the ending of this book works. It doesn’t seem tacked on so much as well earned by the indomitable Moon. Read Watt Key’s wonderful book and you’ll see what I mean.


The Graveyard Book, by Neil Gaiman (2008, ages 9-12)

I’m not generally crazy about horror, but I was a big Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan because (a) it was essentially fantasy and (b) the writing and storytelling were simply amazing. That’s pretty much how I feel about Neil Gaiman’s work. Coraline wasn’t my favorite book in the world, but it was arguably good. And now, with The Graveyard Book, I leave behind any lingering reluctance about genre to exclaim that Gaiman has written the proverbial tour de force, taking Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book as his starting point and creating something utterly new.

Bod (Nobody) Owens is a toddler when his family is brutally murdered in the middle of the night. He wakes up and leaves the house, meandering over to the edge of the nearby cemetery. There he is rescued from the murderous Jack by Silas and the Owens—a vampire and a ghostly couple. The Owens take the little boy in and raise him in the cemetery, with Silas (AKA Bagheera) providing food and protection. (Note that the word “vampire” is never actually used in the book—readers are left to draw their own conclusions about Silas.)

Bod is educated by other ghosts, and one of the droller aspects of the book is that we understand what Bod does not: that his curriculum is thoroughly antiquated, being taught by tutors who predate him by a century or two. But he learns other useful things in the graveyard, phantasmal skills such as Fading, Haunting, and Dreamwalking. He also befriends a dead witch and a live girl and learns just why ghouls should be avoided.

I first read about Bod in a short story in an anthology last summer. I was utterly riveted and went to Gaiman’s website to beg him to write more about the boy raised in a cemetery. Upon discovering that a whole book was coming out, I marked the publication date on my calendar. When the day finally arrived, I rushed over to the bookstore and waited for a clerk to open up a box in the storeroom so I could get my copy.

As they say (far too often!), I was not disappointed. I think what I like best about The Graveyard Book is the tenderness intertwined with the horror. This book isn’t just a macabre adventure story: it is creative and funny and poignant and scary all at the same time.


The Arrival, by Shaun Tan (2007, Young Adult; I’d add ages 9-12)

Shaun Tan’s lengthy, wordless fable may be the most stunning book ever to emerge from the field of children’s literature. Of course, it is just as easily a book for adults. Having read Tan’s intriguing book, The Red Tree, I had looked forward to seeing what he would create next. It’s an understatement to say that The Arrival surpassed my expectations. I suggest you find a quiet place and block out some time to experience his book uninterrupted.

The Arrival is the story of an immigrant. With its sepia tones and old-fashioned clothing, it appears to be set in the 1940s, its hero leaving Eastern Europe to find a home in America. But readers will soon realize that the tale is set in another world altogether. The language of that new world—as written on incomprehensible signs—is like nothing we have ever seen before. Neither are the pets or the public statues or the mechanisms of everyday life.

If you know anything about Tan’s earlier work, you might ascribe the fantastical machines and animals in The Arrival to his penchant for including such things in his work. But these components take on a new meaning in the context of immigration: readers become immigrants themselves, just as baffled by the things they see as our quiet hero is.

The implied time setting serves to remind us that our ancestors were all immigrants at one point or another. And so The Arrival succeeds in its quest to universalize the immigrant experience—a feeling reinforced by the tales that the main character and his new friends share about the kinds of oppression they fled in their former homes.

Funny how such a pointed tale doesn’t seem didactic. Instead it is a rich, heartfelt read, with details such as the contents of the man’s suitcase juxtaposed with sweeping vistas such as the clouds overlooking his journey by boat to a new land. In Shaun Tan’s work, everything becomes fraught with symbolic meaning, yet none of it seems heavy-handed. Tan’s book is a gift, and it is like nothing you’ve ever seen before.

Note: I’ve been telling people about this book all last year, so I was very pleased to see it win a 2008 Special Citation for Excellence in Graphic Storytelling from the Boston Globe-Horn Book Awards committee.


Forever Rose, by Hilary McKay (2008, Young Adult; I’d add ages 9-12)

I’m a big fantasy fan, but Hilary McKay’s five books about the eccentric Casson family are my new favorites when it comes to realistic contemporary fiction for children. Like her predecessors—Beverly Cleary, Louise Fitzhugh, and Cynthia Voigt—McKay has created a group of characters that simply can’t be compared to any others.

You really, really need to read all of the books in order: Saffy’s Angel, Indigo’s Star, Permanent Rose, Caddy Ever After, and Forever Rose. You’ll meet the ineffectual Casson parents—a dreamy mother who is usually painting in a shed in the backyard and a vain artist father who spends most of his time in the city trying to impress people. Then there are the children, each of whom is named after a paint color. Each also has a book, though irrepressible Rose eventually takes over the series. First Saffy (Saffron) tries to find out about her adoption and befriends a non-stereotypical girl in a wheelchair. Then musician Indigo faces bullies with some help from his sister and her friend. Artist Rose, who is the youngest, paints on the walls and deals with her father’s defects and defection, among other adventures. Eldest Caddy (Cadmium) is crazy for animals, falls for her driving instructor, and leads the troops because of her parents’ absentminded absences. These plots might sound typical, but as you read the books they become something new. You fall in love with these characters and they seem completely real—one of the greatest compliments I can give to any book.

For the record, Saffy’s Angel won all kinds of recognition from reviewers and award committees, starting with the British Whitbread Award for best children’s book of 2002. The other books have also been well reviewed.

I will note that I loved the Casson books so much I went looking for McKay’s earlier work, but I was a little disappointed. Although her older stuff is fun, it isn’t nearly as compelling as the newer books. Suffice it to say that the author came into her own with her stories about the Casson family. I implore you to add them to your shelf of books!


Diary of a Wimpy Kid, by Jeff Kinney (2007, ages 9-12)

In the same way that Mo Willems has shot to the top of the picture book world, Jeff Kinney seemingly came out of the blue to write the quintessential book for and about middle school boys. Which is a real relief because, as Jon Scieska has pointed out, there aren’t that many great books for and about boys out there, partly explaining why boys don’t read more.

A latecomer to Kinney’s books, I don’t feel I need to discuss plot in detail, except to say that the books make you want to tell someone about different scenes in order to make them laugh. Coincidentally enough, this is the same way a boy the age of main character, Greg Heffley, might come home from seeing a funny movie and retell scenes in limpid, clear language along the following lines: “And then [stop to snort with laughter], and then [laugh some more] he did this thing, and then [laugh-laugh-laugh] it was just so funny!” Which reminds me that a very nice pothead in one of my high school English classes used to recounts scenes from Monty Python and the Holy Grail in a similar fashion when we were supposed to be listening to the teacher.

Okay, so my favorite detail is the Cheese Touch, which alludes to the way that any kid who accidentally touches the decrepit piece of cheese lying on the outdoor basketball court at Greg’s school since time immemorial is said to have the equivalent of leprosy, or at least the cooties, until someone else is touched by him and it’s passed along.

I did find myself telling my nephew, when I got him the first book for Christmas, “Now, the main kid in this story is kind of selfish, but he doesn’t know he’s selfish.” Which makes it, not necessarily okay, but all the more funny, for some reason. My nephew and I were both happy to learn that the third book, after Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Roderick Rules (2008), is coming out at the end of this month: Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Last Straw. You should read it. Because it’s really [snort, snort, chortle] funny!


Savvy, by Ingrid Law (2008, ages 9-12)

Mibs Beaumont’s relatives on her mother’s side all have unique magical gifts called savvies, and now it's her turn—almost. Mibs is about to turn 13, which is when a savvy manifests itself. One of her brothers channels electricity and another creates storms (not always conveniently!). Her mother’s intimidating savvy is to do things perfectly, while her grandfather can create new land where there wasn’t any before. I like how her great-aunt would go back in time 20 minutes every time she sneezed, but my favorite savvy is the one that belonged to Mibs’s grandmother—she collected snippets of old radio music in jars to play back later simply by taking off the lids.

The whole family is gearing up for Mibs’s 13th birthday and the onset of her savvy when disaster strikes: her father, who is out of town, gets in a car accident and hovers near death. With the wild hope that her soon-to-be savvy will allow her to heal people, Mibs sets out to see her father—only she doesn’t have permission to go. Soon she and a little entourage of fellow runaways have commandeered the bus of a traveling Bible salesman and are making their unexpectedly circuitous way to her father’s bedside.

The savvies, Mibs’s interactions with her sibling and friends, and odd bits and pieces of plot such as the salesman’s trouble selling a shipment of pink Bibles all combine to make Law’s book a fresh contribution to a genre that too often consists of a stultifying blur of swords and magic portals. (An agent once told me he simply refused to read even one more attempted fantasy featuring kids going through a magic portal!) It just won a Boston Globe-Horn Book Honor Award, and there’s been some talk about it getting a Newbery nod. Whether that happens or not, Savvy is helping to reshape a genre that, by its very nature, calls out for continual reshaping.


The Serial Garden: The Complete Armitage Family Stories, by Joan Aiken (2008, ages 9-12)

In my first riff (soon to post!), I’m going to talk about people getting a little tired of British fantasy, but the fact remains that the best of it is simply outstanding—I’m thinking of two of my favorite authors, Diana Wynne Jones and Terry Pratchett, among others. The Serial Garden is a somewhat old-fashioned book, a collection of stories Joan Aiken wrote over the course of many years, and yet it’s utterly compelling and fresh.

Think about it: who wouldn’t want the chance to raise a baby griffin? One reason for Aiken’s success her is that none of the outlandish scenarios are treated by her characters as if they were shocking. Whether Harriet and Mark are kept up late doing assignments by a ghostly governess while supposedly on vacation or their parents are turned into ladybirds (ladybugs), they see the situations as handy adventures or problems to be solved. The parents are especially stoic about all of this random magic.

Aiken is sometimes poignant and often funny. Yes, if the golden apple is in your house, the three Furies are likely to move into the coal cellar and cast an aura of gloom over the whole place. If miniature people live nearby, they are simply another set of neighbors, and fairly troublesome ones, at that. Living in a magical spot can also mean your home will be co-opted by wizards or cursed by witches at some point. And if you’re an Armitage, you really must keep an eye out for elderly druids fighting over a bathmat made of beard hair in your backyard.


Paper Towns, by John Green (2008, Young Adult)

I finally decided to see what all the fuss was about and read one of John Green’s books. So hey—he’s a really good writer! That just might kind of possibly explain all those awards and glowing reviews. At any rate, I would say that John Green has claimed the crown as the new voice of YA fiction for boys, with Rachel Cohn as his counterpart for girls (a sort of anti-Homecoming king and queen, considering the outsider status of their key characters). Put it this way: Green and Cohn’s books are the ones I usually recommend to people who want to know what YA is all about these days.

If you want to be convinced that Green is good at what he does, read the first chapter of the dreadful Daniel X by overly popular writer James Patterson. Then read the first chapter of Paper Towns. Now, and this is tricky: which character do you care about? Please mark Q or—if you’re from the distant planet Who Cares—X.

Yes, folks, it’s all about the characters. Okay, well, plot matters, but plot without characters who matter is simply a waste of your valuable page time, especially when it comes to Young Adult fiction. In Paper Towns, we find that main character Quentin has been watching his bold neighbor, Margo Roth Spiegelman, from afar for a long time, so when she comes to his bedroom window asking him to take her on a vengeful series of midnight adventures, he quickly caves. Then Margo disappears, leaving Q to solve the mystery of her whereabouts and plans.

John Green uses the odd device of a paper town as the key symbol in this book; he also incorporates Walt Whitman’s poetry. A review I read complained that Quentin and Margo are one-dimensional and fail to ring true—like the paper towns. I would say instead that Green makes a point of showing us that Q thinks he knows who Margo is, and she thinks she knows who he is, but both are wrong. They eventually begin to move past their flat views of each another to catch glimpses of dimensionality. Which is what’s supposed to happen in real life, let alone in a book for and about teens.

Note for WPs (Worried Parents): There is enough talk about sex, drinking, and body parts in Paper Towns that you may not want your child to read it, especially if he or she is at the preteen end of the spectrum.


Traction Man Meets Turbodog, by Mini Grey (2008, Picture Book)

I am, quite simply, in love with this book, and with its predecessor, Traction Man Is Here! It represents action figure play better than anything I’ve seen since Pixar’s Toy Story. The child who owns the titular toy hovers just outside the edge of the story telling as Traction Man takes center stage, along with his faithful pal, Scrubbing Brush (cleverly drawn to act like a little dog).

In this second book, Traction Man and Scrubbing Brush get dirty playing, so much so that the kid’s father apparently attempts to throw Scrubbing Brush away and replace him with a snazzy new sidekick, Turbodog. Not only does Turbodog make a lousy Robin to Traction Man’s Batman, but Traction Man is worried about his missing friend. He sets out on a quest to find Scrubbing Brush, accompanied by the obnoxious one-note Turbodog.

Deadpan humor is the name of the game here, but I’m going to stop trying to describe these books and just tell you—step over all the action figures in your kid’s room and read the Traction Man books with him!


The Flim-Flam Fairies, by Alan Katz (2008, Picture Book)

Could it be that there is too much bathroom humor in this picture book? Of course not! Yet I don’t hear much talk about The Flim-Flam Fairies on the Web. I’m telling you, this one should be the new gold standard for potty humor. Forget Walter the Farting Dog; Flim-Flam Fairies is the book for any child who likes to say “poo” and then fall apart laughing!

In this cumulative tale, the sweet Tooth Fairy actually ends up losing her temper. But first the young reader is addressed by a series of fake fairies who interrupt each other to offer outrageous deals. All the child has to do is tuck certain items under his (or her) pillow: we meet the Earwax Fairy, the Dirty Underwear Fairy, and the Clipped Toenail Fairy, to name just a few. Rendered in a nice graphic style by Michael Slack, the fairies are a parade of goofy thugs, each with a slightly different wing style. The Flim-Flam Fairies is such a great, icky book for little boys—and also for small girls who aren’t obsessed with pink! (In fact, if Fancy Nancy ever had an opposite number, this would have to be it.)



AND TWO MORE...

The next two writers are in my small writing group, so I’ll just confess my bias up front. But here’s why you should check out their most recent books:


Death by Latte, by Linda Gerber (2008, Young Adult, though I’d add Tweens)

Aphra Connolly is gearing up to be the tween and teen girl’s answer to Alex Rider, especially in this second book. (At first I thought Aphra was going to be the new Nancy Drew, but there’s too much international travel and suspense for such a small-town, albeit classic, model.) The first book, Death by Bikini, was a lot of fun, but Gerber really hits her stride with Death by Latte.

Aphra fools her father and flies to Seattle in search of her mother, who has her reasons for not having been in touch—she’s CIA, in search of a rogue agent. The bad guys would love to use Aphra against her mother, but it’s still a shock when Aphra realizes her mom is not happy to see her. Aphra also has another encounter with Seth Mulo, whom she met in the first book, and discovers he has his own agenda. Soon an agent is murdered and Aphra and Seth must find the information he hid before he died—while avoiding a swirl of danger and double crosses. I look forward to the next chapter in Aphra’s adventures, Death by Denim, which is due out in May 2009!


Daughter of War, by Marsha Skrypuch (2008, Young Adult)

Historical fiction isn’t usually my first pick, but you should know what this Canadian writer has been up to: she’s telling the kinds of stories most people don’t know about or think about, and yes, she’s gotten death threats. She was also given a medal of honor by the President of Ukraine for her work. Skrypuch primarily writes books about dark chapters in history, such as the Ukrainian and Armenian genocides.

Daughter of War continues a story begun in Skrypuch’s 2003 book, Nobody’s Child. Marta has managed to escape the genocide, but she is virtually a slave and even becomes a concubine while living in Turkey, pretending to be Muslim. Amid shifting politics and threats, she struggles to locate her sister and her friend Kevork. Even if she can find Kevork again, will he accept what has happened to her since they were separated by the war? Teachers who’ve been concentrating on the Holocaust should seriously consider rounding out their curriculum with Skrypuch’s painfully moving books from the hidden corners of history.