Category Archives: books

A big and crucial push for our school around literacy is more home-school connections around reading and writing. Families have to be involved in the literacy lives of their children. With that in mind, our school decided to give every students a book to read over this summer, with helpful hints to parents on the importance of reading aloud and suggestions for how to use the book at home. The committee chose one book for the entire school. We are reading The Lemonade War by Jacqueline Davies, a book I had heard about before but had never opened. (My son had read it and gave it a shrug when I asked if he liked it. A shrug means he read it but would not read it again, nor recommend it much to friends).

The story of The Lemonade War unfolds around two siblings — Evan and Jessie — as they compete against each other for earning the most money. These two are locked into a sibling rivalry that neither of them really likes. The problem is that Evan, going into fourth grade, is not a strong student while Jessie, a second grader, is highly intelligent, but has some asperger’s qualities about her. And she is jumping over third grade to enter fourth grade, in the same class as her older brother.

I liked the book fine enough, I guess, but the one thing that kept gnawing at me as I reading the book — and it was something that I could not shake loose — was the believability of the ages of Evan and Jessie. There is no way these two kids are that young. The dialogue, the inner thoughts, the actions — it all pointed to kids who are older by at least a year or two. I could not buy it and that annoyed me to no end as I was reading. I know plenty of second and fourth graders (even gifted ones, like Jessie) and I am sorry — Davies did not capture the kids I know here.

But, the theme of siblings fighting and then resolving a difficult problem — coupled with a broken marriage and friendship issues — is a worthy point of talk for a school-wide book. I sort of wish we had gone with something with more adventure and exciting plot, though, so that the summer reading didn’t feel like so much of a … eh … school assignment. I wonder how my boys did with this book? I guess I will find out in a few weeks when the new year begins.

Peace (in the war),
Kevin

Before I give you my thoughts on Gary Paulson’s look at growing up, I want to share a story.

When I was around 12 years old or so, a bunch of friends and I created this very elaborate bicycle jump park in the woods near us. It had ramps, jumps, obstacles and all of the wild things you can do with rocks and logs and a few boards. Pretty cool. One day, a friend of mine finagled a jump that was higher than we had seen before. And he put it right at the bottom of a hill. And he dared me to jump it. Well, what I was supposed to do? I took up on that dare. I remember being at the top of the hill, looking down, and thinking: maybe this isn’t such a good idea. Too late. My friends were waving their hands, shouting. I took off, and quickly that thought of “maybe this isn’t such a good idea” came floating into my head.

I hit the jump perfectly, as it turned out. The air below me was incredible. What I didn’t count on was my front tire of the bike coming off in mid-air. Time really does slow down, did you know that? I could see the tire falling and thought, Shoot (well, take away the o‘s and add an i and you get the idea), and the bike came crashing down, skidding to a sudden stop as the front forks dug into the sand. My head kept moving, though, thanks to Newton’s Laws of Accidental Physics, and my mouth slammed into the handlebars. Blood flowed. And part of my front tooth was now gone. I staggered back home with a broken bike, a broken tooth and … a story to tell for the next few years.

I bring this bit of personal history up because while I was laughing out loud as I was reading How Angel Peterson Got His Name, I was also nodding my head and thinking: yep, I can see that happening. Getting trapped in a pickle barrel that you want to send over a small waterfall? Yep. Putting on skis and tying rope to a fast car to beat a world record? Yep. Making a glider out of an old WWII Army kite and trying to fly? Yep. In my mind, those narratives (which are true stories of Paulson’s childhood) are all plausible. Kids, particularly boys, are pretty dumb when it comes to impulsive “what if” events, and are aleways ready to do anything for a thrill. It helps that Paulson and his crew had no television and very little other entertainment in their lives. They were on their own (we were, too, although I am not as old as Paulson) and made their own fun. Sometimes, that was dangerous.

I have to admit: it’s hard for me to see my own kids doing some of the things that go on in this book, although my middle son loved this collection of stories. I don’t know if that worries me or not, you know? He hasn’t come home with a chipped tooth yet. But he and his friends are so … safe. As a parent, I like that. I want them as safe as possible. As a fellow boy, well, I want to build him a giant ramp and dare him to go down it at top speed … just to see what happens.

How Angel Peterson Got His Name is a wonderful collection and a fairly quick read, and it would be be perfect for the upper elementary or middle school boy who might be a bit reluctant to read non-fictional text.  (I am already thinking how to use a chapter here for some narrative writing). Paulson will surely draw those readers in (maybe drag them in) with his hilarious adventures and character sketches of his childhood friends.

I have no idea if girls would even find it funny.

Peace (in the daring adventures of childhood),
Kevin

This novel gets not only a rave review here, but also the award for the longest dang title that I have come across this year. The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catheryn Valente is a magical story that apparently began as a story-within-a-story of another of Valente’s adult novels. This book unfolds with magical twists that echo other famous stories and it comes packed with more than a few obscure English words that had me wishing for a dictionary (or an app for that). I read this book as read-aloud with my six year old son, and while some of the vocabulary had us both scratching our heads, the story itself kept us coming back for more, and more, and more, and I thank my friend, Donalyn Miller, for the recommendation on Twitter.

I won’t give the tale all away, except to say that the protagonist — a complicated yet engaging girl named September, whose mother is a mechanic and whose father has been sent off to war — makes her way to Fairyland with the help of the Green Wind (on the back of a leopard), and she must deal with all sorts of conflicts in order to steer her way to the end of the tale, where the gears of Fairyland and the real world come together. September’s nemesis, the Marquess, wants to pull the gears asunder, dividing the intersections of magic forever. The ending is really quite wonderful, and Valente wisely leaves open the doorway to future stories of September and Fairyland (although what that title would be is something to think about). Woven like a tapestry of fairy tales and stories of magic, with periodic intrusions by the narrator/writer, The Girl was a wonderful diversion from the summer heat for my son and I.

What more can you ask? Oh, and add in a dragon known as a wyvery, whose grandfather is a public library … yep … you read that right … and a witch whose magical power comes from a spoon … yep … and a herd of migrating bicycles ….. sure … and you should get a little taste of what is in store.

As I put down the book for the last time (and then lent it to my nieces for read-aloud at their house), I imagined all of the young readers I have had in the past who would devour this story and whose imaginations would be enriched by the tale and the words, and the technique of this writer. I’ll be on the lookout for them this coming year.

Peace (in the fairylands of imagination),
Kevin

It seems like a long time ago that I started The Information:  A History, A Theory, A Flood, by James Gleick. It was. I kept picking it up and putting it down, again and again.  Week after week, there it was. It was stubborn, and so was I, and yet, we found some way to finish our dance. Finally.

I loved the beginning of this book, in which Gleick tracks how primitive cultures used talking drums and other means to disperse information over long distances, and how those methods slowly made their way into such advancements as Morse Code. Information leads to knowledge, perhaps (this isn’t always clear because we don’t always make sense of the information we have or even know it is information), and the more disperse the information, the more likely the possibility that knowledge will also spread. I also loved the ending sections, where Gleick brings us into the modern age of technology and social networks, and the conundrum that we have of having so much information that we don’t know what to do with it. Very interesting.

The middle of the book … I got bogged down with the science of genomes carrying information, and other obscure mathematics that I know are important but I just could not sink my teeth into. I mentioned in a post on Google Plus the other day that here is a book I wish I could remix for myself, so that I could create a powerful tome of ideas. But of course, I would need to know what to leave out, right? I would need more … information.

Would I recommend this book? Yes, for the first few chapters and the last few chapters, and for skimming in the middle. I don’t often skim, but here, I had to. I didn’t give up, either, because I know Gleick is on to something important here, giving our concept of “information” a biography of its own as we try to find some ground to stand upon in this age of boundless and seemingly endless information and data. Gleick gives us one way to at least begin to understand it all.

Peace (in the info),
Kevin

Jesus — David Thorn must have a lot of time on his hands. Actually, he admits it. He had tons of time on his hands as he worked at a design company, so he began visiting chat rooms and created a website where he wrote for the sole purpose of enraging people and engaging them. Thorn then unleashes his own wicked sense of humor that comes at the expense of any fool who emails him or mentions him (wait a sec — that could be me) in his uproarious book The Internet is a Playground.

This collection of his actual correspondences (from his website: http://27bslash6.com/)  with nincompoops and fools willing to engage him in an email battle of wits had me laughing out loud, and then hiding the book when my older sons asked what was up.  The chapters that are “profiles” of assorted idiots weren’t as entertaining to me. Yeah, this is not a book for kids. And it may not be a book for most adults either, particularly if your radar for vulgar and non-PC writing is on high alert. You will be offended. That was fine with me, but it may not be with you.

Thorn skewers so many people, and unfolds such incredibly funny fake narratives and cutting jibes, that you just have to dive into his head and go with him. I found myself uncomfortable with what he was writing on more than one occasion, but what the hell … that’s what books are supposed to do, right?

Still, you buy this book at our own peril. And you write about him at your own peril, too. (gulp — I liked the book, David. I did.)

Peace (on the playground),
Kevin

I’ve written before about my wonder at how in the heck Rich Riordan can write and publish so many books. And I have worried that the pace of publishing might diminish his appeal. Well, not quite yet. I just finished up the second of the Kane Chronicles series — The Throne of Fire — as a read-aloud with my son, and we both enjoyed it quite a bit. This series is not on the same scale as The Lightning Thief series, but perhaps that is because I am used to Riordan as  a writer now.

This book follows brother and sister Sadie and Carter Kane as they try to save the world from Chaos. Steeped in rich and odd Egyptian mythology, the book follows the Kanes as they try to re-awaken the Sun God, Ra, from his self-imposed slumber in order to find balance in the world as the evil spirits of Chaos begin to rise. They somewhat succeed, but at some terrible costs that set the stage for more books in the series.

As we were reading the book, I kept imagining that in Riordan’s mind, there will be a slow convergence of the stories unfolding here in the Kane Chronicles and in his new Lightning Thief spin-off — The Lost Hero, which I liked immensely, and which I see will have a sequel on the stands in October (see!) — in which the protagonists of both storylines slowly come together. I kept imagining characters here as having shadow stories in the other book, and in The Lost Hero, there are characters — including Percy Jackson — who have gone missing. Maybe they are stuck inside another cultural mythology? If it comes true, remember that I wrote it here first.

Peace (in the book),
Kevin